DEATH OF THE QUEEN.
Poor, old, infirm, he had now to receive intelligence which was to deepen all his evils. He remained at Seville, too unwell to make a journey himself, but sent his son Diego to court, to manage his affairs for him. The complaints of the admiral, that he had no news from court, are quite touching. He says, he desires to hear news each hour. Couriers are arriving every day, but none for him: his very hair stands on end to hear things so contrary to what his soul desires. He alludes, I imagine, to the state of the Queen's health; for, in a memorandum of instructions to his son, written at this period, the first thing, he says, to be done is, "to commend affectionately, with much devotion," the soul of the Queen to God. Could the poor Indians but have known what a friend to them was dying, one continued wail would have gone up to heaven from Hispaniola and all the western islands. The dread decree, however, had gone forth, and on the 26th of November, 1504, it was only a prayer for the departed that could have been addressed; for the great Queen was no more. If it be permitted to departing spirits to see those places on earth they yearn much after, we might imagine that the soul of Isabella would give "one longing, lingering look" to the far West.