pread out his
hands and say, "This is what I have done: it is the best I can do; how
are you going to treat me?" He said in effect, "This is what I have
done; you will see that it will all come right in time; do not worry
about it; but meanwhile I have something else to propose which I think
your Majesties will consider a good plan."

His new demand was for a fleet of six ships, two of which were to convey
supplies to Espanola, and the other four to be entrusted to him for the
purpose of a voyage of discovery towards the mainland to the south of
Espanola, of which he had heard consistent rumours; which was said to be
rich in gold, and (a clever touch) to which the King of Portugal was
thinking of sending a fleet, as he thought that it might lie within the
limits of his domain of heathendom. And so well did he manage, and so
deeply did he impress the Sovereigns with his assurance that this time
the thing amounted to what is vulgarly called "a dead certainty," that
they promised him he should have his ships.

But promise and performance, as no one knew better than Columbus, are
different things; and it was a long while before he got his ships. There
was the usual scarcity of money, and the extensive military and
diplomatic operations in which the Crown was then engaged absorbed every
maravedi that Ferdinand could lay his hands on. There was an army to be
maintained under the Pyrenees to keep watch over France; fleets had to be
kept patrolling both the Mediterranean and Atlantic seaboards; and there
was a whole armada required to convey the princesses of Spain and Austria
to their respective husbands in connection with the double matrimonial
alliance arranged between the two countries. And when at last, in
October 1496, six million maravedis were provided wherewith Columbus
might equip his fleet, they were withdrawn again under very mortifying
circumstances. The appropriation had just been made when a letter
arrived from Pedro Nino, who had been to Espanola and come back again,
and now wrote from Cadiz to the Sovereigns, saying that his ships were
full of gold. He did not present himself at Court, but went to visit his
family at Huelva; but the good news of his letter was accepted as an
excuse for this oversight.

No one was better pleased than the Admiral. "What did I tell you?" he
says; "you see the mines of Hayna are paying already." King Ferdinand,
equally pleased, and having an urgent need of money in conn