The matter was referred to the Sovereigns, who ordered Fonseca to carry out the Admiral's wishes; and the two were immediately at loggerheads.

When the Council for the Indies was afterwards formed Fonseca became head, of it, and had much power to make things pleasant or otherwise for Columbus.
It became necessary now to raise a considerable sum of money for the new expedition.

Two-thirds of the ecclesiastical tithes were appropriated, and a large proportion of the confiscated property of the Jews who had been banished from Spain the year before; but this was not enough; and five million maravedis were borrowed from the Duke of Medina Sidonia in order to complete the financial supplies necessary for this very costly expedition.

There was a treasurer, Francisco Pinelo, and an accountant, Juan de Soria, who had charge of all the financial arrangements; but the whole of the preparations were conducted on a ruinously expensive scale, owing to the haste which the diplomatic relations with Portugal made necessary.

The provisioning was done by a Florentine merchant named Juonato Beradi, who had an assistant named Amerigo Vespucci--who, by a strange accident, was afterwards to give his name to the continent of the New World.
While these preparations were going on the game of diplomacy was being played between the Courts of Spain and Portugal.