All this shows his good heart toward his own people; for toward one not
his own was he guilty of an ignoble act. It was to that sailor Rodrigo,
of the _Pinta_, who had been the first to sight land early on the
morning of October 12. When Columbus was asked to whom the queen's
promised reward of ten thousand maravedis should go, he replied, "To
myself." Surely it could not have been because he wanted the money for
its own sake; it did not equal twenty-five dollars, and he had already
received a goodly sum on arriving in Barcelona; it must have been that
he could not bear to share the glory with another, and so told himself
that the light he saw bobbing up and down early that night was carried
by a human being, and the human being must have been in a canoe, near
the island. On the strength of this argument he claimed the money
Rodrigo had expected to receive.




CHAPTER XIII

PREPARING FOR A SECOND VOYAGE


Once the story of the first voyage had been digested, all thoughts were
turned toward preparations for the next. Indeed, while Columbus was
still in Sevilla on his way to Barcelona he had received a letter from
the monarchs asking him what they could do to help him accomplish a
second voyage, and he had sent them a list of his needs in the way of
men, ships, and supplies. This the royal officers now brought out and
the sovereigns went over it carefully with their new Admiral.