The True Story of Christopher Columbus Called The Great Admiral | Page 9

could not get any encouragement there, he
was determined to stay in Spain no longer but to go away and try the
king of France.
Once more he talked over the finding of Cathay with the priests and the
sailors of Palos. They saw how patient he was; how persistent he was;
how he would never give up his ideas until he had tried them. They
were moved by his determination. They began to believe in him more
and more. They resolved to help him. One of the principal sea captains
of Palos was named Martin Alonso Pinzon. He became so interested
that he offered to lend Columbus money enough to make one last
appeal to the king and queen of Spain, and if Columbus should succeed
with them, this Captain Pinzon said that he would go into partnership
with Columbus and help him out when it came to getting ready to sail
to Cathay.
This was a move in the right direction. At once a messenger was sent to
the splendid Spanish camp before the city of Granada, the last
unconquered city of the Moors of Spain. The king and queen of Spain
had been so long trying to capture Granada that this camp was really a
city, with gates and walls and houses. It was called Santa Fe. Queen
Isabella, who was in Santa Fe, after some delay, agreed to hear more
about the crazy scheme of this persistent Genoese sailor, and the Friar
Juan Perez was sent for. He talked so well in behalf of his friend
Columbus that the queen became still more interested. She ordered
Columbus to come and see her, and sent him sixty-five dollars to pay
for a mule, a new suit of clothes and the journey to court.
About Christmas time, in the year 1491, Columbus, mounted upon his
mule, rode into the Spanish camp before the city of Granada. But even
now, when he had been told to come, he had to wait. Granada was
almost captured; the Moors were almost conquered. At last the end
came. On the second of January, 1492, the Moorish king gave up the
keys of his beloved city, and the great Spanish banner was hoisted on
the highest tower of the Alhambra--the handsomest building in

Granada and one of the most beautiful in the world. The Moors were
driven out of Spain and Columbus's chance had come.
So he appeared before Queen Isabella and her chief men and told them
again of all his plans and desires. The queen and her advisers sat in a
great room in that splendid Alhambra I have told you of. King
Ferdinand was not there. He did not believe in Columbus and did not
wish to let him have either money, ships or sailors to lose in such a
foolish way. But as Columbus stood before her and talked so earnestly
about how he expected to find the Indies and Cathay and what he hoped
to bring away from there, Queen Isabella listened and thought the plan
worth trying.
Then a singular thing happened. You would think if you wished for
something very much that you would be ve up a good deal for the sake
of getting it. Columbus had worked and waited for seventeen years. He
had never got what he wanted. He was always being disappointed. And
yet, as he talked to the queen and told her what he wished to do, he said
he must have so much as a reward for doing it that the queen and her
chief men were simply amazed at his--well, what the boys to-day call
"cheek"--that they would have nothing to do with him. This man really
is crazy, they said. This poor Genoese sailor comes here without a thing
except his very odd ideas. and almost "wants the earth" as a reward.
This is not exactly what they said, but it is what they meant.
His few friends begged him to be more modest. Do not ask so much,
they said, or you will get nothing. But Columbus was determined. I
have worked and waited all these years, he replied. I know just what I
can do and just how much I can do for the king and queen of Spain.
They must pay me what I ask and promise what I say, or I will go
somewhere else. Go, then! said the queen and her advisers. And
Columbus turned his back on what seemed almost his last hope,
mounted his mule and rode away.
Then something else happened. As Columbus rode off to find the
French king, sick and tired of all his long and useless labor at the
Spanish court, his few firm friends there saw that, unless they did
something right away, all the glory and