At last the ships arrived which were to take them from the island, where the unfeeling Ovando had suffered them to languish above a year, exposed to misery in all its various forms.  When he arrived at St. Domingo, Ovando treated him with every kind of insult and injustice.  Columbus submitted in silence, but became extremely impatient to quit a country where he had been treated with such barbarity.

The preparations were soon finished, and he set sail for Spain with two ships, but disaster still pursued him to the end of his course.  He suffered acutely from a painful and dangerous disease, and his mind was kept uneasy and anxious by a continued succession of storms.  One of the vessels being disabled, was forced back to St. Domingo, and in the other he sailed 700 leagues with jury-masts, and reached with difficulty the port of St. Lucar in Spain, 1504.

On his arrival he received the fatal news of the death of his patroness queen Isabella, from whom he had hoped for the redress of his wrongs.

He applied to the king, who, instead of confirming the titles and honours which he had formerly conferred upon him, insulted him with the proposal of renouncing them all for a pension.

Disgusted with the ingratitude of a monarch whom he had served with fidelity and success, exhausted with the calamities which he had endured, and broken with infirmities, this great and good man breathed his last at Valladolid, a.d. 1506, in the 69th year of his age.

He was buried in the cathedral at Seville, and on his tomb was engraved an epitaph commemorating his discovery of a New World.

  Christobal Colon, obiit 1506,

  AEtat 69.

  A Castilla y a Leon
  Neubo Mundo dio Colon.[A]

Thus much for Columbus; those who are the greatest benefactors of mankind seldom meet with much gratitude from men in their lives; they must look to God for their reward, and leave future generations to do justice to their memory.

It was very unfortunate for the natives of America, that the country fell into the hands of such a cruel, covetous, and bigoted nation as the Spaniards were.  Their thirst for gold was insatiable, and the cruelties they exercised upon the natives are too horrible to recite.  After the death of Columbus, the Indians were no longer treated with gentleness, for it was his defence of the property and lives of these harmless natives that brought down upon his head such bitter hatred.  You will now look into your map and follow Columbus in some of his discoveries.  You will see a great number of islands extending in a curve from Florida, which is the southernmost part of the United States, to the mouth of the river Oronoko in South America; and, as Columbus firmly believed these islands, when he discovered them, to be a part of India, the name of Indies was given to them by Ferdinand and Isabella; and, even after the error was detected, and the true position of the new world ascertained, the name has remained, and the appellation of Indies is given to the country, and that of Indians to the inhabitants.