shameful
neglect. He who had ridden beside the king and dined with the highest
nobles of Spain, became poor, sad and lonely.

He died in 1506, fourteen years after his great discovery.

Then Spain, which had treated him so badly, began to honor his memory.
But it came too late for poor Columbus, who had been allowed to die
almost like a pauper, after he had made Spain the richest country in
Europe.

CHAPTER II

THREE GREAT DISCOVERERS

VERY likely some of the readers of this book have asked their fathers or
mothers how Spain came to own the islands of Cuba and Porto Rico, whose
people they treated so badly that the United States had to go to war a
few years ago and take these islands from Spain. Of course, you all know
how the battleship _Maine_ was blown up in the harbor of the city of
Havana, and nearly all its brave sailors went to the bottom and were
drowned. That was one reason why we went to war. If you should ask me
that question, I would say that these were some of the islands which
Columbus found, when he sailed into those sunny seas four centuries ago.
They were settled by Spaniards, who killed off all their people and have
lived on them ever since. There they have raised sugar cane, and
tobacco, and coffee, and also oranges and bananas and all kinds of fine
fruits.

They might have kept on owning these islands and raising these fruits
for many years to come, if they had not been so cruel to the people that
they rose against them, and with the help of the United States
Government the islands were taken from Spain.

When Columbus told the nobles and people of Spain of his wonderful
discovery, and showed them the plants and animals, the gold and other
things, he had found on these far-off islands, it made a great
excitement in that country.

You know how the finding of gold in Alaska has sent thousands of our own
people to that cold country after the shining yellow metal. In the same
way the gold which Columbus brought back sent thousands of Spaniards
across the wide seas to the warm and beautiful islands of which the
great sailor told them, where they hoped to find gold like stones in our
streets.

Dozens of ships soon set sail from Spain, carrying thousands of people
to the fair lands of the west, from which they expected to come back
laden with riches. At the same time two daring sailors from England,
John Cabot and his son Sebastian, crossed the ocean farther north, and
found land where