er entertained by the junta of cosmographers, or at least
to have been willing to dismiss Columbus gently, for they merely said
that, with the wars at present on their hands, and especially that of
Granada, they could not undertake any new expenses, but when that war was
ended, they would examine his plan more carefully.

TEDIOUNESS OF COLUMBUS'S SUIT

Thus terminated a solicitation at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella
which, according to some authorities, lasted five years; for the facts
above mentioned, though short in narration, occupied no little time in
transaction. During the whole of this period, Columbus appears to have
followed the sovereigns in the movements which the war necessitated, and
to have been treated by them with much consideration. Sums were from time
to time granted from the royal treasury for his private expenses, and he
was billeted as a public functionary in the various towns of Andalusia,
where the court rested. But his must have been a very up-hill task. Las
Casas, who, from an experience larger even than that which fell to the lot
of Columbus, knew what it was to endure the cold and indolent neglect of
superficial men in small authority, and all the vast delay, which cannot
be comprehended except by those who have suffered under it, that belongs
to the transaction of any affair in which many persons have to cooperate,
compares the suit of Columbus to a battle, "a terrible, continuous,
painful, prolix battle." The tide of this long war (for war it was, rather
than a battle) having turned against him, Columbus left the court, and
went to Seville "with much sadness and discomfiture." During this dreary
period of a suitor's life--which, however, has been endured by some of the
greatest men the world has seen, which was well known by close
observation, or bitter experience, to Spenser, Camoens, Cervantes,
Shakespeare, Bacon--one joy at least was not untasted by Columbus,
namely, that of love. His beloved Beatrice, whom he first met at Cordova,
must have believed in him, even if no one else had done so; but love was
not sufficient to retain at her side a man goaded by a great idea, or
perhaps that love did but impel him to still greater efforts for her sake,
as is the way with lovers of the nobler sort.

ENCOURAGEMENT OF FRIENDS; GARCIA HERNANDEZ.

Other friends, too, shared his enthusiasm, and urged him onward. Juan
Perez de la Marchena, guardian of the monastery of La Rabida, in
Anda