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.
OPPRESSION OF THE INDIANS.
And if so, what did she see there?
How different was the aspect of things from what governors and officers of all kinds had told her: how different from aught that she had thought of, or commanded! She had insisted that the Indians were to be free: she would have seen their condition to be that of slaves.

She had declared that they were to have spiritual instruction: she would have seen them less instructed than the dogs.