We here recall the incident of Columbus and the egg. A dinner was given in his honor and many great men were there. The attention Columbus received made some people jealous. One of them with a sneer asked Columbus if he did not think any one else could have discovered the Indies. In answer Columbus took an egg from a dish on the table and handing it to the questioner asked him to make it stand on end.
After trying several times the man gave it up. Columbus, taking the egg in his hand, tapping it gently on one end against the top of the table so as to break the shell slightly, made it balance.
"Any one could do that," said the man. "So any one can discover the Indies after I have shown him the way," said Columbus.
It was his day of pride and triumph. Poor Columbus was soon to find out how Spain treated those who had given to it the highest honor and the greatest riches. Three times again he sailed to the New World, and once a base Spanish governor sent him back to Spain with chains upon his limbs. Those chains he kept hanging in his room till he died, and asked that they should be buried with him.
They who had once given him every honor, now treated him with shameful neglect. He who had ridden beside the king and dined with the highest nobles of Spain, became poor, sad and lonely.
He died in 1506, fourteen years after his great discovery.
Then Spain, which had treated him so badly, began to honor his memory. But it came too late for poor Columbus, who had been allowed to die almost like a pauper, after he had made Spain the richest country in Europe.