After the sixty days assigned by the king of Portugal were elapsed[8], their Catholic majesties sent Garcia de Herrera, one of the gentlemen of their household, to require the court of Portugal to refrain from encroaching on the limits granted by the Pope to the crown of Castile and Leon.  Their majesties afterwards sent Don Pedro de Ayala and Garcia Lopez de Carvajal, to say that they were willing to admit all honourable means of continuing in friendship with the king of Portugal, but they were satisfied nothing belonged to his crown in the ocean, except Madeira, the Azores, and the Cape Verde islands, as far as Guinea and the gold mines.  They even offered to submit the difference between the crowns on this subject to the decision of persons nominated on both sides, with power to the arbitrators to name an umpire, if they could not agree, or to have the matter at issue debated at the court of Rome or any other neutral place, as their majesties had no wish to invade the rights of others, or to permit the infringement of their own.  The Portuguese court proposed to divide the ocean by a straight line, or parallel drawn west from the Canaries, leaving all to the north of that line to the crown of Castile and Leon, and all to the south to belong to Portugal.  At length, after tedious negotiations, a congress took place at Tordesillas, in which, after long debates, it was agreed on the 7th June 1473[9], that the meridianal line of division should be established 370 leagues farther west than that mentioned in the Popes bull from the islands of Cabo Verde; all to the west of which was to belong to Spain, and all eastwards to Portugal; yet leaving it lawful to the subjects of Spain to sail through the seas thus allotted to Portugal, following their direct course; but neither party to trade or barter beyond their own limits.

Before leaving Barcelona, the admiral placed his sons Don James and Don Ferdinand as pages in the service of prince John; and having received his commission of admiral and viceroy, extending as large as the papal grant, he repaired to Seville to expedite his second voyage to the new world.  He here applied himself to procure able pilots, and to review the men who were to embark in the expedition, in the presence of the controller Soria.  All persons were prohibited from carrying out any goods for barter, and it was ordered that every thing belonging to their majesties or to private persons should be entered at the custom-house, both in Spain and the Indies, under the penalty of confiscation.  The admiral had instructions to muster his men as soon as he arrived at Hispaniola, and to do the same as often as he thought proper, with power to regulate their pay.  He was likewise authorized to nominate alcaldes and alguazils, or magistrates, in the islands and other parts, with power to try causes both civil and criminal, from whom appeals might be made to himself.  In the first instance he was allowed the direct nomination