Letter written by CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS to DON DIEGO, November 28, 1504.

“Very dear son,—­I received your letters of the 15th of this month.  It is eight days since I wrote you and sent the letter by a courier.  I enclosed unsealed letters to many other persons, in order that you might see them, and having read them, seal and deliver them.  Although this illness of mine troubles me greatly, I am preparing for my departure in every way.  I would very much like to receive the reply from their Highnesses and wish you might procure it:  and also I wish that their Highnesses would provide for the payment of these poor people, who have passed through incredible hardships and have brought them such great news that infinite thanks should be given to God, our Lord, and they should rejoice greatly over it.  If I [lie ?] the ’Paralipomenon’—­[ The Book of Chronicles]—­and the Book of Kings and the Antiquities of Josephus, with very many others, will tell what they know of this.  I hope in our Lord to depart this coming week, but you must not write less often on that account.  I have not heard from Carbajal and Jeronimo.  If they are there, commend me to them.  The time is such that both Carbajals ought to be at Court, if illness does not prevent them.  My regards to Diego Mendez.

“I believe that his truth and efforts will be worth as much as the lies of the Porras brothers.  The bearer of this letter is Martin de Gamboa.  I am sending by him a letter to Juan Lopez and a letter of credit.  Read the letter to Lopez and then give it to him.  If you write me, send the letters to Luis de Soria that he may send them wherever I am, because if I go in a litter, I believe it will be by La Plata.—­[The old Roman road from Merida to Salamanca.]—­May our Lord have you in His holy keeping.  Your uncle has been very sick and is now, from trouble with his jaws and his teeth.

“Done in Seville, November 28.

“Your father who loves you more than himself.

.S.
.S.A.S. 
XMY
Xpo FERENS.”

Bartholomew Columbus and Ferdinand were remaining with Christopher at Seville; Bartholomew probably very nearly as ill as the Admiral, although we do not hear so many complaints about it.  At any rate Diego, being ay Court, was the great mainstay of his father; and you can see the sick man sitting there alone with his grievances, and looking to the next generation for help in getting them redressed.  Diego, it is to be feared, did not receive these letters with so much patience and attention as he might have shown, nor did he write back to his invalid father with the fulness and regularity which the old man craved.  It is a fault common to sons.  Those who are sons will know that it does not necessarily imply lack of affection on Diego’s part; those who are fathers will realise how much Christopher longed for verbal assurance of interest and affection, even though he did not doubt their reality.  News of the serious illness of Queen Isabella had evidently reached Columbus, and was the chief topic of public interest.