expenditures, for it is necessary.

"Done January 18.
"Your father who loves you more than himself.


There is playful reference here to Fonseca, with whom Columbus was
evidently now reconciled; and he was to be buttonholed and made to read
the Admiral's letter to the Pope. Diego Mendez is about to start, and is
to make a "long statement"; and in the meantime the Admiral will write as
many long letters as he has time for. Was there no friend at hand, I
wonder, with wit enough to tell the Admiral that every word he wrote
about his grievances was sealing his doom, so far as the King was
concerned? No human being could have endured with patience this
continuous heavy firing at long range to which the Admiral subjected his
friends at Court; every post that arrived was loaded with a shrapnel of
grievances, the dull echo of which must have made the ears of those who
heard it echo with weariness. Things were evidently humming in Espanola;
large cargoes of negroes had been sent out to take the place of the dead
natives, and under the harsh driving of Ovando the mines were producing
heavily. The vessels that arrived from the Indies brought a great deal
of gold; "but none for me."


Letter written by CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS to his Son, DON DIEGO,
February 5, 1505.

"VERY DEAR SON,--Diego Mendez left here Monday, the 3rd of this
month. After his departure I talked with Amerigo Vespucci, the
bearer of this letter, who is going yonder, where he is called in