Sovereigns to honour them with special favours and rewards. To this very
manly, wise and humane address the people listened with some emotion,
assuring Columbus that they placed their hopes in him, "begging him
earnestly to remember them always, and that as quickly as he could he
should give them the great joy which they anticipated from his coming
again."

All of which things being done, the ships [ship--there was only the Nina]
loaded and provisioned, and the Admiral's final directions given, he
makes his farewells and weighs anchor at sunrise on Friday, January 4.,
1493. Among the little crowd on the shore who watch the Nina growing
smaller in the distance are our old friends Allard and William, tired of
the crazy confinement of a ship and anxious for shore adventures. They
are to have their fill of them, as it happens; adventures that are to
bring to the settlers a sudden cloud of blood and darkness, and for the
islanders a brief return to their ancient peace. But death waits for
Allard and William in the sunshine and silence of Espanola.




CHAPTER III

THE VOYAGE HOME

Columbus did not stand out to sea on his homeward course immediately, but
still coasted along the shores of the island as though he were loth to
leave it, and as though he might still at some bend of a bay or beyond
some verdant headland come upon the mines and jewels that he longed for.
The mountain that he passed soon after starting he called Monte Christi,