Ferdinand cared little for the sufferings of Indians, but their sale would not bring him the profits he had been led to expect from his new dominions, and he was therefore more than willing to listen to the many complaints of tyranny, favouritism, and deceit, brought against the Governor by those returning from the West. Here the crowning offence had been in reality the employment of all able-bodied Europeans, priests as well as laymen, in the construction of a city in Española to which Columbus gave the name of “Isabella,” “in remembrance,” says Las Casas, “of the Queen Doña Isabel whom he above all held in great reverence; and he was more desirous of serving and pleasing her than any other person in the world.” “Columbus,” wrote Peter Martyr, “has begun the building of a city and the planting of our seeds and the raising of cattle.” His words call up a picture of peaceful and slow-rewarded toil, little to the taste of the majority pressed to take their share, their natural dislike of manual labour stimulated by the ennervating climate and habits of self-indulgence. The crops grew apace, but so also did fever and disease; and for all that went wrong the people held their foreign Admiral responsible. Indeed there was often sufficient foundation to make the reports brought home plausible. Columbus was a born leader of men in action, where a strong personality will always dominate; but he had few gifts as a governor, and least of all that invaluable instinct for selecting trustworthy subordinates. His choice of officials was often betrayed; his government, as a rule too kindly towards the cut-throat ruffians he commanded, on occasions varied by excessive severity. Whatever its quality he reaped odium, not only amongst the colonists, but with their relations and friends in Castile. Enough was obviously at fault to require inspection; and in 1500, when Columbus who had sailed from Spain on a third voyage in 1498 was occupied in exploring fresh islands, Francisco de Bobadilla, an official of the royal household, arrived in Española, charged with the duty of inquiring into the Admiral’s conduct. His high-handed action, in immediately arresting Columbus and his brothers Bartholomew and Diego on their return to headquarters, is one of the most dramatic episodes in history; and its appeal was felt throughout the length and breadth of Spain. Villejo, the officer in command of the prisoners on the voyage home, offered to remove the fetters in which they had been sent on board, but Columbus sternly refused. He would wear them, he declared, until he knelt before his sovereigns, keep them by him till his dying day. Crippled by gout, his hair whitened by care, he disembarked at Cadiz, the irons clanking on his wrists and ankles; and at the sight horror and shame spread from cottage and shop to castle and palace. Was this the discoverer’s reward for a New World?