It does not appear that he was a bad man; he was a man wholly unused to command; he was an imprudent man, and was weak.  He had compromised the crown by the easy terms on which he had rented and sold estates; he had been obliged, in order to maintain the revenue, to work the natives with more severity than ever.  He knew very well that the system, under which he was working could not last long.  One of his maxims was, “Do the best with your time,” and he was constantly sacrificing future advantages for such present results as he could achieve.

The Indians, who had been treated badly enough before, were worse treated now.  And during his short administration, if it may be called an administration,—­during the time when he was nominally at the head of affairs—­he was reducing the island to lower and lower depths.  He did succeed in obtaining a large product of gold, but the abuses of his government were not atoned for by such remittances.  Worst of all, the wrongs of the natives touched the sensitiveness of Isabella, and she was eager that his successor should be appointed, and should sail, to put an end to these calamities.

The preparations which were made for Ovando’s expedition, for the recall of Bobadilla, and for a reform, if it were possible, in the administration of the colony, all set back any preparations for a new expedition of discovery on the part of Columbus.  He was not forgotten; his accounts were to be examined and any deficiencies made up to him; he was to receive the arrears of his revenue; he was permitted to have an agent who should see that he received his share in future.  To this agency he appointed Alonzo Sanchez de Carvajal, and the sovereigns gave orders that this agent should be treated with respect.

Other preparations were made, so that Ovando might arrive with a strong reinforcement for the colony.  He sailed with thirty ships, the size of these vessels ranging from one hundred and fifty Spanish toneles to one bark of twenty-five.  It will be remembered that the Spanish tonele is larger by about ten per cent than our English ton.  Twenty-five hundred persons embarked as colonists in the vessels, and, for the first time, men took their families with them.

Everything was done to give dignity to the appointment of Ovando, and it was hoped that by sending out families of respectable character, who were to be distributed in four towns, there might be a better basis given to the settlement.  This measure had been insisted upon by Columbus.

This fleet put to sea on the thirteenth of February, 1502.  It met, at the very outset, a terrible storm, and one hundred and twenty of the passengers were lost by the foundering of a ship.  The impression was at first given in Spain that the whole fleet had been lost; but this proved to be a mistake.  The others assembled at the Canaries, and arrived in San Domingo on the fifteenth of April.