occasioned by the
various complaints made against the admiral by Father Buil, Margarite, and
the Spaniards who had returned from Hispaniola. The name of this
commissioner was Juan Aguado, and his powers were vouched for by the
following letter from the sovereigns:--

"The King and the Queen.

"Cavaliers, Esquires and other persons, who by our command are in the
Indies: we send you thither Juan Aguado, our Gentleman of the Chamber,
who will speak to you on our part: we command that you give him faith
and credence.
"I the King: I the Queen.
"By command of the King and Queen, our Lords.
"HENAND ALVAREZ.
"Madrid, the ninth of April, one thousand
four hundred and ninety-five."

PLOTS TO UNDERMINE AND RUIN THE ADMIRAL

The royal commissioner arrived at Isabella in October, 1495, and his
proceedings in the colony, together with the fear of what he might report
on his return, quickened the admiral's desire to return to Court, that he
might fight his own battles there himself. For the tide of his fortune was
turning, and this appeared by several notable signs. Strong as was the
confidence which the Sovereigns reposed in him, the representations of
Margarite and Buil--the rough soldier and the wily Benedictine--had
produced their effect. They complained of the despotic rule of Columbus;
of the disregard of distinctions of rank which he had manifested by
placing the hidalgoes on the same footing as the common men, as regards
work and rations, during the construction of the settlement; and of his
mania for discovery, which made him abandon the colony already formed, in
the unremunerative search for new countries. The commissioner who was sent
to investigate these charges, as well as to report on the condition of the
colony, found no difficulty in collecting evidence to substantiate them.
An unsuccessful man is generally persuaded that somebody else has caused
his failure. And the "somebody else," in the case of the colonists, was,
by universal consent, the foreign sea captain who had deluded Spanish
hidalgoes by his wild projects, and had become a grandee under false
pretences. The Indians, too, who were glad to lay their miseries at the
door of somebody, and who were told that Aguado was the new admiral, and
had come to supplant the old one, were not slow to add their quota to the
charges against Columbus. To rebut these accusations, as well as to
protest against the issue of licences, t