Columbus, after many delays, fits out another squadron, and sails on his
third voyage, 30th May, 1498--Touches at Gomara--Retakes a prize to a
French privateer--Off the Cape de Verdes--Sends three of his ships to
Hispaniola, and steers south-west with the remainder--Long becalmed--
Steers west and sights Trinidad--Sees mainland of South America--Natives
come off--Alarmed by music--A bore threatens to destroy the ships--
Enters the Serpent's Mouth--Sails up the Gulf of Paria--Mistakes the
promontory for an island--Anchors at the mouth of the river--Natives
come off--Pearls seen among them--Large quantities procured--Passes
through the Dragon's Mouth--Natives seen fishing for pearls--Three
pounds weight obtained--His eyesight failing, steers for Hispaniola--
Makes the land fifty leagues more to the west than he had expected--
Reaches Isabella--Disastrous state of the settlement--Bobadilla sent out
to supersede Columbus--Summoned to Isabella--Columbus and his brothers
sent in chains to Spain--Arrival--Reaction in his favour--Honourably
received at Court--Ovando sent out to supersede Bobadilla--The belief of
Columbus that a passage into the Indian Ocean was to be found--Obtains
authority to fit out another fleet.
It was not without numerous wearying delays that Columbus at length
succeeded in getting another squadron fitted out to prosecute his
discoveries. He at length obtained six vessels, with which he set sail
on the 30th of May, 1498. Having heard that a French squadron was
cruising off Cape Saint Vincent, he first stood to the south-west,
touching at the islands of Porto Santo and Madeira, and then continued
his course to the Canary Islands. As he approached Gomara on the 19th
of June, he saw at anchor a French privateer with two Spanish prizes.
The former put to sea in all haste, followed by her prizes, one of which
had only four men on board, besides six Spanish prisoners. Though he
sent three of his vessels in pursuit, the privateer and one of the
prizes escaped, but the six Spaniards on board the other, rising on
their captors, she was retaken and brought back to the port.
Leaving Gomara, Columbus dispatched three of his ships to carry supplies
to Hispaniola, and with the three remaining vessels prosecuted his
voyage towards the Cape de Verde Islands. Though suffering from
sickness, he continued to keep his reckoning and make his observations
with his usual minuteness.
Touching at the Cape de Verdes, he was disappointed at not obtaining the
goats, sheep, and cattle he had expected. The weather was sultry and
depressing, and he and his crew suffered greatly. Steering south-west
for about one hundred and twenty leagues, he reached the fifth degree of
north latitude, the region known among seamen by the name of the "calm
latitudes." Suddenly the wind fell, a dead calm commenced, which lasted
for eight days. The air was like a furnace, the tar melted, the seams
of the ships yawned, the salt meat became putrid, the wheat was parched,
the hoops round some of the casks of wine and water shrank, while others
burst, letting out their contents.
To get out of this latitude he steered to the south-west, hoping to find
a milder temperature farther on. In this he was not disappointed. At
length a cool breeze filled the sails of the vessels, and they again
made good progress.
Columbus intended to have stood first to the south and then westward,
but the heat had made the vessels leak so excessively that it was
necessary to find a harbour as soon as possible. The provisions were
also spoiled, and the water nearly exhausted. On the 31st of July but
one cask of water remained in each ship, when about midday a seaman at
the masthead hailed that he saw the summits of three mountains rising
above the horizon.
Columbus had before determined to give the name of the Trinity to the
first land he should behold, and was struck by the appearance of these
three mountains united in one. He therefore called the island La
Trinidad. Steering to its eastern extremity, he saw a rock resembling a
galley under sail off a headland, which, in consequence, he called Punta
de la Galera. No safe anchorage appearing, he coasted westward in
search of a harbour and water. Instead of a sterile land, he saw the
country covered with groves of palm-trees, cultivated in many places,
and enlivened by hamlets and scattered habitations, while streams came
rushing down the hill-sides.
At length anchoring, abundance of water was obtained from a limpid
brook, and traces of animals were seen, which must have been those of
deer, though supposed to be those of goats.
When coasting the island, he now for the first time saw, stretching away
to the south, that mighty continent of which he had so long been in
search, it being the land near the many mouths of the Oronoco; supposing
it, however, to be an island, he called it La Isla Santa. On the 2nd of
August he cast anchor near the south-west portion of Trinidad. As the
ships approached this place, a large canoe, with five and twenty Indians
on board, put off from the shore.
He in vain tried to induce the savages to come on board, by offering
them looking-glasses, glass, beads of polished metal, and glittering
trinkets. They remained gazing in mute wonder at the ships, but kept
their paddles ready to make off at the least attempt to approach them.
They were young, well formed, and naked, excepting fillets of cotton
bound round their heads, and coloured cloths about their loins. Besides
their bows and arrows, they carried bucklers,--an article of armour now
first seen among the inhabitants of the New World.
Believing that they might be affected by music, Columbus ordered the
band to strike up; but the Indians, mistaking the sounds as a sign of
hostility, seized their bows and let fly a shower of arrows. The
discharge of a couple of crossbows, however, put them to flight. They
afterwards approached the other ships, but had conceived an especial
fear of that of the Admiral.
Columbus, supposing himself to be in the seventh degree of latitude,
though actually in the tenth, expected to find the inhabitants similar
to the natives of Africa, under the same parallel,--black, with crisp
hair,--and was astonished at finding these natives even fairer than
those met with farther north.
The ships brought up at Point Arenal, the nearest to the mainland,
between which and the island Columbus observed, night and day, a current
flowing at a tremendous speed, boiling and raging to such a degree that
he thought it was crossed by a reef of rocks. From its dangerous
appearance he gave to it the name of Boca del Sierpe--the Serpent's
Mouth. He feared that the current from the east would prevent his
return, while his ships might be lost on the supposed rocks, should he
attempt a passage.
That night, while kept awake by his illness, he heard a terrible roaring
from the south, and beheld the sea heaped up and covered with foam, like
a huge watery ridge the height of the ships, rolling towards them. As
this furious surge approached, rendered more terrible in appearance by
the obscurity of night, he trembled for the safety of his vessels. His
own ship was lifted up to such a height that he feared she would be
overturned, while another was torn from her anchorage. The crews
expected to be swallowed up, but the surge passed on and gradually
subsided.
Early in the morning he sent the boats to sound the water at the
Serpent's Mouth, and to his great joy several fathoms were found; the
currents and tides setting both ways, either to enter or return. A
favourable breeze springing up, he entered the tranquil expanse between
Trinidad and the mainland of Paria, and, to his great surprise, he here
found the water fresh.
He continued northward towards a mountain at the north-west point of the
island, and here beheld two lofty capes, one projecting from the island
of Trinidad, the other at the end of the long promontory of Paria,
which, supposing it to be an island, he named Isla de Gracia. Between
these capes was another channel beset with rocks, among which the
current forced its way with roaring turbulence, to which he gave the
name of Boca del Dragon.
Not wishing to encounter it, he steered along the inner side of the
promontory, round which, fancying that it was an island, he expected to
get, and then to be able to strike northward for Hispaniola.
The country appeared to be cultivated in some places, and in others
covered with fruit-trees and plants, and abounding with monkeys. He
was, however, greatly astonished at finding the water still fresh, and
that it became more and more so the farther he proceeded. It was that
season, however, when the rivers which empty themselves into the Gulf of
Paria are swollen by rains. He was surprised also at the calmness of
the sea, not being aware that the only two entrances were by the
Serpent's and Dragon's Mouths into this large expanse of water.
For some time no inhabitants were met with. At length the ships brought
up at the mouth of the river, and immediately a canoe with three Indians
came off to the caravel anchored nearest the shore, when the captain,
springing in, upset her, and the people, as they were swimming, were
secured. Being brought to the Admiral, they were presented with beads,
hawks' bells, and sugar. The report they gave in consequence, on
returning on shore, induced many other natives to come off. They were
tall, finely formed, and graceful in their movements, being armed with
bows and arrows and targets. The men wore cotton cloths of various
colours about their heads and loins, but the women were destitute of
clothing. They brought maize and other eatables, with beverages, some
white, made from maize, others green, expressed from various fruits.
They judged of everything by the sense of smell. As they came near they
smelt the boat, then smelt the people, as they did all the articles
offered them. Although setting little value on the beads, they were
delighted with the hawks' bells, and still more so with anything of
brass. Taking some of the people as guides, he proceeded west for eight
leagues, to a point which he called the Needle. So beautiful was the
country, that he gave it the name of The Garden.
Here many natives came off, and invited the Admiral on shore in the name
of their King. Many wore collars and burnished plates of that inferior
kind of gold, called by the Indians _guanin_, and they pointed to a land
in the west, from whence they said it came; but the cupidity of the
Spaniards was excited by strings of pearls round the arms of some of
them. These, they said, were procured at the sea-coast on the northern
side of Paria, and they showed the mother-of-pearl shells from which
they were taken.
To secure specimens to be sent to Spain, Columbus dispatched some boats
to that part of the shore. Numbers of the natives came down, and
treating the Spaniards as beings of a superior order, regaled them with
bread and various fruits of excellent flavour. They had among them tame
parrots, one of light green with a yellow neck, and the tips of the
wings of a bright red, others of a vivid scarlet, except some azure
feathers in the wing. These they gave to the Spaniards, who, however,
cared for nothing but pearls, many necklaces and bracelets of which were
given by the Indian women in exchange for hawks' bells or articles of
brass.
The Spaniards returned on board highly delighted at the way they had
been treated, while the quantity of pearls seen among the natives raised
the sanguine anticipations of Columbus, who was anxious to send the
finest specimens to the sovereigns.
Still believing the peninsula of Paria to be an island, he sailed on
westward until compelled, by finding the water more shallow as he
advanced, to anchor, when he sent a caravel to explore. She returned
the following day with a report that at the end of the gulf there was an
opening of two leagues, which led into an inner gulf, into which flowed
a quantity of fresh water by four openings. It was in reality the mouth
of the large river now called the Paria. To the inner gulf Columbus
gave the name of the Gulf of Pearls.
Finding no passage to the westward, the ships proceeded in an opposite
direction for the Boca del Dragon. On the 13th of August they anchored
in a fine harbour, to which Columbus gave the name of Puerto de Gatos.
Here also were seen mangroves growing in the water with oysters clinging
to the branches, their mouths open, as the Spaniards supposed, to
receive the dew which was afterwards thought to be transformed into
pearls. That they were thus formed was believed until comparatively
late years.
The passage through which he was about to pass is extremely dangerous
after the rainy season, and the water which rushes through it foams and
roars as if breaking on rocks. Scarcely had the ships entered than the
wind died away, and shipwreck appeared imminent, but they were at length
carried through by the current of fresh water into the open sea.
Columbus now stood to the westward, running along the northern coast of
Paria, still supposing it to be an island, intending to visit the Gulf
of Pearls. To the north-east he saw the two islands of Tobago and
Granada, and on the 15th those of Margarita and Cubagua, afterwards
famed for their pearl fishing.
On approaching the latter, a number of Indians were seen fishing for
pearls. A boat being sent to communicate with them, a seaman offered a
broken piece of gaily-painted porcelain to a woman who had round her
neck a string of pearls, which she readily gave in exchange.
On this the Admiral sent people on shore, who with beads and hawks'
bells soon procured three pounds weight of pearls, some of very large
size.
The coast still trending to the westward, and rising into lofty ranges
of mountains, Columbus began to suspect that he was off the mainland of
India; but his eyesight failing, he was reluctantly compelled to steer
for Hispaniola to seek for needed rest. On making land, after a sail of
five days, he found that he was fifty leagues to the westward of his
destination, having been driven across by the strong steady current
which sets in from the east, and assists to give an impetus to the Gulf
Stream.
Sending on shore for an Indian messenger to take a letter to his brother
the Adelantado, a canoe came off with several Indians, one of whom
carried a Spanish crossbow. As this was not an article of traffic, the
Admiral feared that fresh troubles had arisen, and that the weapon had
fallen into the Indian's hands by the death of a Spaniard.
Sailing, he arrived near the mouth of the river on the 30th of August,
when a caravel, appeared, on board of which came the Adelantado. The
brothers met with mutual joy, but the latter grieved to see the great
navigator so broken down in health, a mere wreck of himself, though with
his spirit still rising superior to all bodily affliction.
Though considerable progress had been made in the building of Isabella,
now called San Domingo, at the mouth of the Ozema, the Adelantado had
sad accounts to give of the state of the island. Rebellion had been
rife among the colonists in all directions. The Indians had been
barbarously treated, and all authority had been set at defiance.
Attempts had been made to murder the Adelantado, and the leaders had
sent home the most serious accusations against him and Columbus and
their brother Diego. They had succeeded too well in raising suspicions
in the mind of Ferdinand as to the loyalty of Columbus, and an officer
of the royal household, Don Francisco de Bobadilla, was sent out
nominally to investigate the causes of the rebellion, but with power to
arrest the persons and sequestrate the effects of those he might
consider guilty; while he was to take upon himself the government of the
island, and to demand the surrender of all fortresses, ships, and other
royal property.
Columbus had gone into the interior to arrange matters, while the
Adelantado and his brother had almost succeeded in overcoming the
rebellion, when Bobadilla, accompanied by a guard of twenty-five men and
six friars, who had charge of a number of Indians sent back to their
country, appeared off Saint Domingo on the 23rd of August, 1500.
Landing, without stopping to investigate the conduct of Columbus and his
brothers, he instantly commenced the most arbitrary proceedings. He
took up his residence in the house of Columbus, of whose whole property,
gold, plate, jewels, horses, together with his public and even private
letters and manuscripts, he at once possessed himself.
Don Diego was seized, thrown into irons, and confined on board a
caravel. Columbus was summoned to San Domingo; he came, almost
unattended, when, being at once seized, Bobadilla gave orders that he
should be put in irons, and confined him in the fortress.
When the irons were brought, every one present shrank at the task of
putting them on the limbs of the venerable and illustrious prisoners,
either from a sentiment of compassion at so great a reverse of fortune,
or out of habitual reverence for his person. A wretched cook named
Espinosa was the only person found to rivet the fetters. The great
navigator conducted himself with the magnanimity which might have been
expected. The injustice and ingratitude of the sovereigns alone wounded
his spirit, and he bore all his present misfortunes in silence.
Though the Adelantado was at the head of a strong force when summoned to
San Domingo, he returned unattended, and was treated as his brother had
been. Columbus had expected to have suffered on the scaffold, and was
greatly relieved when he found himself conducted on board a caravel
commanded by a worthy captain--Alonzo de Villejo--who told him that he
had orders to carry him to Spain.
He and his brother embarked, amidst the scoffs and shouts of a miscreant
rabble, who took a brutal joy in heaping insult on his venerable head.
Villejo, touched by the sufferings of Columbus, treated him with much
respect, and would have relieved him of his shackles, but he answered,
"No: their Majesties commanded me to submit to whatever Bobadilla might
devise; by their authority he has put upon me these shackles. I will
wear them until they direct them to be taken off, and I will preserve
them as relics and memorials, as the reward of my services."
The page of history presents no sadder picture than Columbus in chains
crossing the ocean from those lands discovered by his genius, boldness,
and perseverance.
The voyage was favourable and of moderate duration. In a short time the
ship, with her illustrious prisoner on board, arrived at Cadiz.
Columbus a prisoner and in chains produced almost as great a sensation
as his triumphant return from his first voyage. A reaction took place,
and a strong sympathy was expressed, against which it would have been
odious for the Government to contend. The ignominious manner in which
Columbus had been treated created murmurs of astonishment at the Court
at Grenada, and a letter written by him on board reached the
noble-minded Isabella before the document sent home by Bobadilla. She
saw how grossly Columbus had been wronged and the royal authority
abused, and her heart was filled with mingled sympathy and indignation.
The Queen and Ferdinand instantly sent off to Cadiz, directing that the
prisoners should be set at liberty and treated with all distinction; and
they wrote a letter to Columbus, expressing their grief at what he had
suffered, and inviting him to Court. Conscious of his integrity, his
heart was cheered, and he anticipated an immediate restitution of all
his rights and dignities.
He appeared in Grenada, not as a disgraced man, but richly dressed, and
attended by a noble retinue. He was received with unqualified favour
and distinction, and as he beheld tears in the benign eyes of Isabella,
he threw himself on his knees, and for some time could not utter a word
for the violence of his tears and sobbing. Enabled to speak, he
defended himself fully; indeed, the imputations of his enemies had been
his best advocate.
Meantime the Pinzons and several other explorers had sailed forth,
chiefly in search of pearls and gold.
While we feel indignant at the treatment received by Columbus, we must
not forget the miseries of the helpless natives his discoveries had
brought within the power of so-called civilised Europeans.
The excellent Las Casas gives a vivid and faithful picture of the
tyranny exercised over the Indians by worthless Spaniards; wretches who
in their own country had been the vilest of the vile, but had in the New
World assumed the tone of grand cavaliers. Over much of their conduct
it is necessary to draw the veil. Their very pleasures were attended
with cruelty. At the least freak of ill humour they inflicted blows,
and lashes, and even death itself, on their helpless slaves.
Such were some of the evils which had sprung up under the rule of
Bobadilla. The wrongs of the natives reaching the benevolent heart of
Isabella, she urged that a new governor, Don Nicolas de Ovando, should
be sent out to supersede him, to inquire into the conduct of Columbus.
Ovando shortly afterwards sailed in command of one of the largest fleets
that had yet proceeded to the New World.
We should always bear in mind the lofty enthusiastic aspirations which
influenced the mind of the great navigator. He had hoped by the wealth
he should obtain to win the Holy Sepulchre from the infidels, but more
practical schemes soon occupied him. The wealth brought from the East,
owing to the discoveries of the Portuguese, aroused him to emulation.
He had found a strong current setting westward, through the Caribbean
Sea, between the coasts of Paria on the south and Cuba on the north, the
latter, as he believed, being a part of the Asiatic continent stretching
onwards in the same direction. He believed therefore that there must be
a straight opening into the Indian Sea, and, could he discover it, he
believed that he should be able to reach India by a far more easy route
than any yet followed.
His plan was listened to with attention by the sovereigns, and he was
authorised to fit out another armament.
He asked permission to touch at Hispaniola for supplies on the outward
voyage, but the sovereigns, knowing that he had many enemies in the
island, forbade him doing so. They, however, to soothe his feelings,
wrote him a letter dated the 14th of March, 1502, solemnly assuring him
that all his dignities should be enjoyed by him and his sons after him,
and that they would bestow further honours and rewards upon him and them
as well as upon his excellent brothers.