He showed in that voyage all the attributes of a great discoverer; he deserved the honors which were paid to him on his return.
As has been said, however, this does not mean that he was a great organizer of cities, or that he was the right person to put in charge of a newly founded colony.

It has happened more than once in the history of nations that a great general, who can conquer armies and can obtain peace, has not succeeded in establishing a colony or in governing a city.
On the other hand, it is fair to say that Columbus never had a chance to show what he would have been in the direction of his colonies had they been really left in his charge.

This is true, that his heart was always on discovery; all the time that he spent in the wretched detail of the arrangement of a new-built town was time which really seemed to him wasted.
The great problem was always before him, how he should connect his discoveries with the knowledge which Europe had before of the coast of Asia.

Always it seemed to him that the dominions of the Great Khan were within his reach.

Always he was eager for that happy moment when he should find himself in personal communication with that great monarch, who had been so long the monarch of the East--who, as he thought, would prove to be the monarch of the West.
Columbus died with the idea that he had come close to Asia.