Chapter 8 No.8

During the two years that elapsed from the Admiral's leaving Hispaniola in 1496 to his return there in 1498, many things happened on both sides the Atlantic, which need recording. In 1496 we find, that Don Bartholomew Columbus sent to Spain three hundred slaves from Hispaniola. He had previously informed the Sovereigns that certain caciques were killing the Castilians, and their Highnesses had given orders in reply, that all those who should be found guilty should be sent to Spain.

If this meant the common Indians as well as the caciques, then it seems probable that the question about selling them with a safe conscience was already decided.

CRIMINALS SENT TO THE INDIES.

In 1497, two very injudicious edicts were published by the Catholic Sovereigns, upon the advice, as we are told, of Columbus; one, authorizing the judges to transport criminals to the Indies; the other, giving an indulgence to all those who had committed any crime (with certain exceptions, among which heresy, lese majeste, and treason, find a place) to go out at their own expense to Hispaniola, and to serve for a certain time under the orders of the admiral. The remembrance of this advice on his part, might well have shamed Columbus from saying, as he did three years afterwards, in his most emphatic manner, "I swear that numbers of men have gone to the Indies who did not deserve water from God or man." It is but fair, however, to mention, that Las Casas, speaking of the colonists who went out under these conditions, says, "I have known some of them in these islands, even of those who had lost their ears, whom I always found sufficiently honest men."

"REPARTIMIENTOS."

In 1497, letters patent were issued from the Sovereigns to the admiral, authorizing him to grant repartimientos of the lands in the Indies to the Spaniards. It is noticeable that in this document there is no mention of Indians, so that they had not come to form portion of a repartimiento at this period. The document in question is of a formal character, expressed in the style of legal documents of the present day, by virtue of which the fortunate Spaniard who gets the land is "to have, and to hold, and to possess," and so forth; and is enabled "to sell and to give, and to present, and to traffic with, and to exchange, and to pledge, and to alienate, and to do with it and in it all that he likes or may think good."

While the acts of legislation above narrated, which cannot be said to have been favourable to good government in the Indies, were being framed at the Court of Spain, Don Bartholomew Columbus was doing much in his administration of Hispaniola that led to very mischievous results.

Before the admiral left the island, he had discovered some mines to the southward, and had thought of choosing a port in their vicinity, where he might establish a colony. He had spoken about this in his letters to the Government at home. As he entered the Bay of Cadiz on his return, he met some vessels there, which were bound for Hispaniola, and which contained letters from their Highnesses approving of his suggestion. By these ships, therefore, he sent orders to his brother to make this southern settlement; and the "Adelantado" accordingly proceeded southwards, and fixed upon a port at the entrance or the river Ozama. He sent for artizans from Isabella, and commenced building a fortress, which he called St. Domingo, and which afterwards became the chief port of the island.

XARAGUA PENETRATED; TRIBUTE IMPOSED UPON THE INDIANS.

There was one part of Hispaniola into which the Spaniards had not yet penetrated: it was called Xaragua, and was reigned over by a Cacique named Bohechio, whose sister, Anacaona, the wife of Caonabo, and a noted beauty, seems also to have had much authority in those parts. The Adelantado, after seeing the works at St. Domingo commenced, resolved to enter the kingdom of Xaragua, whither he proceeded at the head of one hundred men. Arriving at the river Neyba, he found an immense army of Indians drawn up there to oppose his progress. Don Bartholomew made signs to them that his errand was peaceful; and the good-natured Indians accepting his proffers of amity, he was conducted some thirty leagues further to the city of Xaragua, where he was received with processions of dancing and singing women, and feasted magnificently. After having been well entertained by these Indians, the "Adelantado" proceeded to business, and, in plain terms, demanded tribute of them. Bohechio pleaded that there was no gold in his dominions, to which the Adelantado replied that he did not wish to impose tribute upon any people, except of the natural production to be found in their country. It was finally settled that Bohechio should pay tribute in cotton and cazabi-bread. He acceded to this agreement very willingly; and the Adelantado and this cacique parted on the most friendly terms.

Don Bartholomew then returned to Isabella, where he found that about three hundred men had died from disease, and that there was great dearth of provisions. He distributed the sick men in his fortresses, and in the adjacent Indian villages, and afterwards set out on a journey to his new fort of St. Domingo, collecting tribute by the way. In all these rapid and energetic proceedings of the Adelantado, and still more from causes over which he had no control, the Spaniards must have suffered much; and, doubtless, those complaints on their part, which were soon to break out very menacingly, were not unheard at the present time.

If the Spaniards, however, complained of the labours which Don Bartholomew imposed upon them, the Indians complained still more, and far more justly, of the tribute imposed upon them. Several of the minor chiefs, upon this occasion of collecting tribute, complained to the great Cacique Guarionex, and suggested a rising of the Indians. This cacique seems to have been a peaceful, prudent man, and well aware of the power of the Spaniards. But he now consented to place himself at the head of an insurrection, which, however, the lieutenant-governor, soon made aware of it, quelled at once by a battle in which he was victorious over Guarionex, taking him and other principal persons captive. The chief movers of the revolt were put to death; but Guarionex was delivered up to his people, who flocked by thousands to his place of imprisonment, clamouring for his restitution.

DISCONTENT OF THE SPANISIH COLONISTS.

About this time messengers came from Bohechio and Anacaona, informing the Adelantado that the tribute of that country was ready for him, and he accordingly went to fetch it. During his absence from the seat of government, and under the less vigorous administration of Don Diego Columbus, who had been left at the head of affairs at Isabella, those discontents among the Spaniards, which had no doubt been rife for a long time, broke out in a distinct manner. I allude to the well-known insurrection of Roldan, whom the admiral, on his departure, had left as chief justice in the island. The disputes between the chief justice and the governor were to form the first of a series of similar proceedings to take place afterwards in many colonies even down to our own times. It may be imagined that the family of Columbus were a hard race to deal with; and any one observing that the admiral was very often engaged in disputes, and almost always in the right, might conjecture that he was one of those persons who pass through life proving that all people about them are wrong, and going a great way to make them so. This would have been an easy mode of explaining many things, and therefore very welcome to a narrator, but it would not be at all just towards Columbus to saddle upon him any such character. Here were men who had come out with very grand. expectations, and who found themselves pinched with hunger, having dire storms to encounter, and vast labours to undergo; who were restrained within due bounds by no pressure of society; who were commanded by a foreigner, or by members of his family, whom they knew to have many enemies at court; who thought that the Sovereigns themselves could scarcely reach them at this distance; and who imagined that they had worked themselves out of an law and order, and that they deserved an Alsatian immunity. With such men (many of them, perhaps, "not worthy of water,") the admiral and his brothers had to get useful works of all kinds done; and did contrive to get vessels navigated, forts built, and some ideas of civilization maintained. But it was an arduous task at all times: and this Roldan did not furnish the least of the troubles which the admiral and his brothers had to endure.

INSURRECTION OF ROLDAN.

Roldan, too, if we could hear him, would probably have something to say. He wished, it appears, to return to Spain, as Father Buil and Margarite had done; and urged that a certain caravel which the Governor Don Bartholomew Columbus had built, might be launched for that purpose. Such is the account of Ferdinand Columbus, who maintains that the said caravel could not be lunched for want of tackle. He also mentions that Roldan complained of the restless life the Adelantado led his men, building forts and towns; and said that there was no hope of the admiral coming back to the colony with supplies. Without going into these squabbles-and indeed it is very difficult when a quarrel of this kind arises, taking it up at the point where it breaks out, to judge it upon that only, since the stream of ill-will may have run underground for a long time-suffice it to say, that Roldan and his men grew more and more insubordinate; were not at all quelled by the presence of the Adelantado on his return from Xaragua; and finally quitted Isabella in a body. The Adelantado contrived to keep some men faithful to him, promising them, amongst other things, two slaves each. Negotiations then took place between the Adelantado and Roldan, which must be omitted for the present, to enter upon the further dealing of Don Bartholomew with the Indians.

FLIGHT OF GUARIONEX.

These poor, islanders were now harassed both by the rebels and by the loyal Spaniards, whom the Adelantado could not venture to curb much, for fear of their going over to the other party. The Indians were also tempted by Roldan to join him, as he contended that tribute had been unjustly imposed upon them. From all these difficulties, Guarionex made his escape by flying to the territories of Maiobanex, the cacique of a hardy race, who inhabited the hilly country towards Cabron. This flight of Guarionex was a very serious affair, as it threatened the extinction of tribute in that cacique's territory; and Don Bartholomew accordingly pursued the fugitive. After some skirmishes with the troops of Maiobanex, in which, as usual, the Spaniards were victorious, the Adelantado sent a messenger to Maiobanex, telling him that the Spaniards did not seek war with him, but that he must give up Guarionex, otherwise his own territory would be destroyed by fire and sword. Maiobanex replied, that everyone knew that Guarionex was a good man, endowed with all virtue, wherefore he judged him to be worthy of assistance and defence, but that they, the Spaniards, were violent and bad men, and that he would have neither friendship nor commerce with them.

MAIOBANEX AND HIS GUEST.

Upon receiving this answer, the Adelantado burnt several villages, and approached nearer to the camp of Maiobanex. Fresh negotiations were entered into: Maiobanex convoked an assembly of his people; and they contended that Guarionex ought to be given up, and cursed the day when first he came amongst them. Their noble chief, however, said, "that Guarionex was a good man, and deserved well at his hands, for he had given him many royal gifts when he came to him, and had taught him and his wife to join in choral songs and to dance, of which he made no little account, and for which he was grateful: wherefore, he would be party to no treaty to desert Guarionex, since he had fled to him, and he had pledged himself to take care of the fugitive; and would rather suffer all extremities than give detractors a cause for speaking ill, to say that he had delivered up his guest." The assemblage of the people being dismissed, Maiobanex informed his guest that he would stand by him to the last.

THEIR CAPTURE.

The fugitive cacique, however, finding that Maiobanex's people were ill-disposed towards him, quitted, of his own accord, their territory; but by so doing, he was not enabled to save his generous host, who, with his family, was surprized and taken; and Guarionex himself being shortly afterwards captured and put in chains at Fort Concepcion, the two caciques probably shared the same prison. Thus concludes a story, which, if it had been written by some Indian Plutarch, and the names had been more easy to pronounce, might have taken its just place amongst the familiar and household stories which we tell our children, to make them see the beauty of great actions.