As soon as the messages of Columbus reached their Majesties, then at Almazan, they sent, July 12, 1496, a letter inviting him to Court, and reassuring him in his despondency by expressions of kindness. So he started to join the Court in a somewhat better frame of mind. He led some of his bedecked Indians in his train, not forgetting "in the towns" to make a cacique among them wear conspicuously a golden necklace.
Bernaldez tells us that it was in this wily fashion that Columbus made his journey into the country of Castile,--"the which collar," that writer adds, "I have seen and held in these hands;" and he goes on to describe the other precious ornaments of the natives, which Columbus took care that the gaping crowds should see on this wandering mission.
It is one of the anachronisms of the _Historie_ of 1571 that it places the Court at this time at Burgos, and makes it there to celebrate the marriage of the crown prince with Margaret of Austria. The author of that book speaks of seeing the festivities himself, then in attendance as a page upon Don Juan. It was a singular lapse of memory in Ferdinand Columbus--if this statement is his--to make two events like the arrival of his father at Court, with all the incidental parade as described in the book, and the ceremonies of that wedding festival identical in time. The wedding was in fact nine months later, in April, 1497.
Columbus's reception, wherever it was, seems to have been gracious, and he made the most of the amenities of the occasion to picture, in his old exaggerating way, the wealth of the Ophir mines. He was encouraged by the effect which his enthusiasm had produced to ask to be supplied with another fleet, partly to send additional supplies to Española, but mainly to enable him to discover that continental land farther south, of which he had so constantly heard reports.
It was easy for the monarchs to give fair promises, and quite as easy to forget them, for a while at least, in the busy scenes which their political ambitions were producing. Belligerent relations with France necessitated a vigilant watch about the Pyrenees. There were fleets to be maintained to resist, both in the Mediterranean and on the Atlantic coast, attacks which might unexpectedly fall. An imposing armada was preparing to go to Flanders to carry thither the Princess Juana to her espousal with Philip of Austria. The same fleet was to bring back Philip's sister Margaret to become the bride of Prince Juan, in those ceremonials to which reference has already been made.