leaving the growing city of Isabella in charge of his brother Diego, who
had accompanied him on the voyage, set out himself for the mountains of
Cibao with four hundred men, well armed, and a great multitude of Indians.
When they arrived at the foot of the mountain land, it was found that so
large a force could not ascend the wild and difficult path which was used
by the Indians, and some brave young Spanish gentlemen who had been used to
all kinds of manoeuvres in the wars with the Moors, and were very eager
to win fresh renown, undertook to make a road by which the whole company
could pass. Thus in a few hours, by dint of hard labour, the first road in
the New World was constructed, and it was called in honour of those who had
made it, "El Puerto de los hidalgos," "The Gentleman's Pass."
When they came to the gorge of the mountain an immense plain spread out
before them covered with lovely flowers, and with trees rising out of it,
such as the graceful palm with its slender stem and feathery plume at the
top, and the wide-spreading mahogany-tree with its dense foliage. The air
was so balmy, and the whole scene was so beautiful, that Columbus gave it
the name of "Vega Real," which means Royal Plain.
As they went higher up the mountains the way became rougher, and they lost
the sweet flowers and fruits which had afforded them so much delight. Some
of them saw what it must be confessed gave them still greater pleasure, and
that was the gold which sparkled in the sands of the streams. At the top of
a steep hill they built a fort, which they called Fort St. Thomas, that
there might be a place of refuge for those who should work the mines.
Caonabo did not at all like his "golden house" to be thus invaded, and took
his revenge, as will be seen hereafter. The Indians as yet were very
willing to exchange gold for the glass beads and toys the Spaniards gave
them, and would search for it on purpose to bring it to them. One old man
parted with two pieces of gold which weighed an ounce, and thought he was
magnificently paid for it with a hawk's bell.
When Columbus returned to Isabella, he found that the building of the city
had been neglected: the workmen were either ill or weary of the task, and
he gave orders that all who had come out to the island should assist in the
labour. The proud Spanish _hidalgos_ worked with very unwilling hearts, and
never forgave Columbus for submitting them to what they considered a great
degradation. Some of them were so disappointed with the New World and the
difficulty of making themselves rich without any trouble that they fell ill
and died, bitterly reproaching Columbus until their last hour as being the
cause of all their misfortunes. These troubles made the Admiral very
unhappy; still, amidst them all he had some joys, and one very great one,
when after he had gone to coast along a part of Cuba unknown to him, he
came upon the large island of Jamaica, with its high blue mountains and its
groves of majestic trees. Jamaica thus ranks third of the great islands
made known to the Europeans. Here the natives made each of their boats out
of the single trunk of a tree, and when they used for this purpose the
enormous stem of a mahogany tree they had a very large boat indeed.
Columbus did not stay long at Jamaica, but cruised about another part of
Cuba, and found some smaller islands near its coast, which were so lovely
that he called them "The Queen's Gardens." On his way back to Hispaniola he
became very ill, and was senseless when his vessel reached the port of
Isabella. Great was his joy, when he opened his eyes once more to find his
brother Bartholomew by his bedside; he had been sent to the island by the
Spanish sovereigns, and as he was very brave and clever he was well fitted
to take the command of affairs whilst his brother was ill.
The troubles in the island rapidly increased. The chiefs, with the
exception of the faithful one, were ready to make war on the Spaniards and
drive them away. Caonabo was the fiercest of all; he lay siege to the Fort
of St. Thomas, but Alonso de Ojeda was inside with a few brave men, and
harassed his army so much by his firearms that the Indians at last withdrew
in despair. Ojeda afterwards captured Caonabo in a very daring manner, and
brought him bound to himself on his horse to the city of Isabella, where he
was imprisoned in the Admiral's house. After this the Indians were ordered
to pay tribute in gold dust, which at first only made them resist the more;
it seemed so hard to them to have to work from morning to night in search
of gold, after the free and happy life, happy for them because it was idle,
they had lived in their island before the strangers came. It was not until
a battle had been fought on the lovely plain of the Vega, and some of them
had been killed by the firearms of the Spaniards, which were far more
destructive than their own weapons, that they consented with heavy hearts
to bring their tribute.
For everything that went wrong, Columbus alone was unjustly blamed, and at
last some unkind persons went to Spain and told the King and Queen that he
had brought all the misery on the colony by his bad government. And a day
came when he set out for Spain himself to plead his cause with Ferdinand
and Isabella; because, whatever his enemies had said, his conduct had
always been loyal and upright, and the cause of all the unhappiness lay in
the violent temper and the avarice of many of the men who had embarked with
him for the sake of making themselves rich, instead of serving the king and
queen, and promoting the glory of Spain.
The vessel he sailed in was crowded with criminals, discontented persons
and Indian captives; amongst the latter was the proud chief Caonabo, but he
died during the voyage.
When Columbus arrived this time in Spain, there were neither triumphs nor
rejoicings, and he wore as he landed the dress of a Franciscan friar, a
long robe, with a cord for a girdle, in sign of humility. He was soon
cheered, however, by a kind invitation to court. Ferdinand and Isabella did
not yet forget how much they owed to him, and they gave no heed to the
complaints that had been made against him, while the massive gold ornaments
he had brought with him, and the rich products of the islands induced them
to hope that his discoveries would bring them great wealth in the time to
come.
He therefore lived in Spain in some degree of comfort until the May of the
year 1498, when after many tiresome delays he started on a third voyage
with only six ships and took a different route to that he had gone before.
From the Cape Verde Isles he went south-west towards the region spreading
out eight or ten degrees north and south of the Equator, where the sea is
smooth as glass, and the sun shines straight down, and there is not a
breath of air to fill a sail. The heat on this occasion was intense, and
the mariners very nearly died of thirst when their supply of water was
exhausted and they could get no more. Columbus therefore sailed westward,
instead of going farther south as he had at first proposed, and one day,
just three months after he had left Spain, three mountains seemed to rise
up out of the ocean afar, and as he came nearer he found to his joy that
all the mountains rose from one island, to which in his thankfulness he
gave the name of Trinidad.[16]
On this voyage he also discovered the mouths of the river Orinoco, which it
will be seen, by the map of South America, are not very far from the island
of Trinidad. Still, Columbus did not think when he landed, that he was
treading the shores of a vast new continent, but imagined that it was a
part of Asia. After this he found the land the Indians called Paria. The
natives here welcomed him kindly, and brought him bread and maize: they
were tall and graceful, and their manners were gentle; they wore garments
of cotton wrought so beautifully with colours that they looked like rich
silks, and they carried targets besides bows and arrows. They had several
kinds of liquors which they offered to the Spaniards to drink. One was
"white as milk," made from maize; others were nearly black, and tasted as
if they were made from unripe fruit.
The country was covered with flowers and fruit-trees; vines were twined
from tree to tree and bright plumaged birds, chiefly parrots, flitted
about. Some of the natives wore collars of gold around their necks, and
some had bracelets of pearls, the sight of which gave great satisfaction to
the Spaniards, for they thought they had discovered a new source of riches.
Columbus would have liked to have spent much time in exploring the coasts
of Paria, but his stores were nearly all consumed, and he was ill and
almost blind from having strained his eye-sight during the dark nights of
his voyages, and was therefore obliged to think of returning to Hispaniola
or San Domingo, as it was called besides. Along the north coast of Paria he
saw many islands, some of which afterwards became famous for their pearl
fisheries, and in one little barren isle he got many beautiful pearls in
exchange for hawks' bells, and pieces of broken china, which the Indians
thought very precious.
At last, wearied out in mind and body he arrived at Hispaniola, hoping to
rest for a while in peace, but he found the colony in a state of
rebellion; a wicked man named Roldan, who had been raised to high estate by
Columbus, persuaded the people to rise up against the Admiral of the Indies
and his brothers: the mines were no longer worked, the building of the city
was left unfinished, and there was scarcely any food. And now we come to
the saddest part in the whole story of Columbus. Some wretched convicts who
had been sent out of Spain to the island, and who were in league with
Roldan, contrived to make their escape and return to Europe, where the
false reports they spread reached the ears of Ferdinand and Isabella, and
induced them to believe at last that he was not really worthy of the trust
they had reposed in him. Francesco Bovadilla, a man who cared very little
what he did, was therefore sent to Hispaniola with orders to govern the
island in his stead, whilst Columbus himself was to be sent back to Spain.
It had happened that at the very moment the Admiral was going to embark on
his third voyage he was deeply affronted by a follower of one of his worst
enemies in Spain; and although he had endured many wrongs and injuries in a
patient and forgiving spirit, he gave way this time to a violent fit of
passion, and struck the time-serving creature repeatedly in his wrath. The
news of this was of course conveyed to the King and Queen, and this one act
of passion on the part of Columbus made them more inclined to believe in
the reports of his ill conduct than all the complaints that had been spoken
against him: they thought that if he were capable of such an action, there
were more cruel and angry deeds to come; just as one little storm cloud
hastening across the clear blue sky makes us dread that others, heavier
and darker, are near.
As soon as Bovadilla arrived he settled himself in the Admiral's house,
Columbus being absent at one of the forts, and laid hands on all the money,
plate, jewels, and valuable things he could find. Columbus disdained to
question the acts of an unruly man like Bovadilla, and journeying in haste
and alone to St. Domingo, he calmly resigned his command. He was then put
in fetters, although for a long time no one could be found who would fasten
them. At last this shameful office was performed by one of his cooks, a
Spaniard. His brother Diego was already in chains on board a caravel:
Bartholomew would have resisted, but was advised by the Admiral to submit
calmly, and the three brothers, who were so loving and could have comforted
one another in their misfortunes, were all kept apart.
One day Columbus saw an officer named Villejo coming towards him in his
prison followed by his guards.
"Where are you going to take me, oh, Villejo?" he asked.
"To the vessel, your Excellency, to embark," he replied.
"To embark!" exclaimed Columbus, radiant with joy. "Do you speak truth?"
"By the life of your Excellency I speak truth;" said he; and they went
indeed on board the caravel which was to convey them to Spain.
During the voyage Villejo and the captain of the vessel were very kind to
him, and were grieved to see him in chains; they would have removed them,
but Columbus would not let them do so, saying that they had been placed
upon him by order of the King, and his younger son Fernando tells us that
his father, stung at last by a sense of his wrongs, kept them ever after
hung up in his room as a sign of the manner in which he had been rewarded
for his services. Yet let us hope that when he looked at them he forgave
his enemies, since there are no injuries too deep to be forgiven, if we
ourselves would receive pardon of our heavenly Father for our many
misdeeds.
When Columbus landed at Cadiz thus shackled, a murmur of shame and
indignation was breathed throughout Spain. Ferdinand and Isabella ordered
his fetters to be removed at once, and sent him a large sum of money to pay
the expenses of a visit to court. And when he appeared in their presence,
bowed down by illness and age, and worn out with the dangers and
misfortunes he had gone through, and he saw tears in the eyes of Isabella,
who had once been his kindest friend, he knelt down and burst into a flood
of tears himself. The Queen consoled him with gentle words, and tried to
atone by her kindness for the many affronts he had suffered. Ferdinand
always maintained that he had never given orders for Columbus to be
fettered, and that Bovadilla had acted rashly on his own authority. Be that
as it may, the King was a stern and narrow-minded man; he did not like to
see a foreigner filling the important office of Viceroy of the Indies, and
he took care never to reinstate Columbus in his former dignity, whilst he
sent out a man named Ovando to govern Hispaniola instead of Bovadilla.
Columbus now formed the project of finding a strait somewhere about the
Isthmus of Darien, which should prove a shorter route to India than the
voyage by the Cape of Good Hope. Although he was getting feeble and aged he
had the same steadfast spirit which had enabled him to wait patiently all
the best years of his life, and had helped him bravely through all his
troubles, and he wanted yet to be of farther service to his fellow-men
before he died. The Portuguese under Vasco de Gama had already anchored
opposite Calcutta, and the trade with India was thus all their own, while
the discovery of the West Indian islands seemed to be less important. If
anything more were to be done by Columbus it must be begun at once, and the
King and Queen granted him four caravels with which to set out on his
fourth and last voyage. The crews of all amounted to four hundred and fifty
men. His brother Bartholomew was with him and his younger son Fernando; the
elder one, Diego, being left to manage his affairs in Spain.
The little fleet was to have gone straight to Jamaica, but the principal
vessel sailed so badly that it hindered the others, and Columbus steered
instead for Hispaniola, hoping to exchange it for one of the fleet that had
carried out Ovando. He also asked to be allowed shelter in the harbour of
San Domingo, as he believed from certain signs in the atmosphere which he
knew only too well, that a very great storm was near; but Ovando would
neither let him have a vessel nor take shelter. Just at that time, the
fleet which had brought out Ovando was ready to sail, and was to convey to
Spain, the rebel and conspirator Roldan, Bovadilla, who had treated
Columbus so ill, and many persons who had led idle and wicked lives in the
island. They had with them a great quantity of gold, some of which had been
gained by the labour and miseries of the Indians. Amongst the gold that
Roldan was going to take to the King and Queen was one enormous solid lump,
which was said to have been found by an Indian woman in a brook.
Although Columbus was denied shelter himself he sent a message to the port,
warning the men who were about to sail of the approaching storm, and
entreating them to remain in the harbour until it was over. Well had it
been for them if they had listened to his advice, but they only laughed at
it and boldly put out to sea. Before two days had passed a terrible
hurricane arose, the tempest burst over the ships, and all those men who
had been the greatest enemies of Columbus were swallowed up with their gold
by the foaming waves. The few vessels which were not entirely destroyed
returned to Hispaniola in a shattered condition; only one was able to reach
Spain, and that strangely enough had on board a large sum of money which
belonged by right to Columbus, and had been despatched to Spain by his
agent.
Columbus kept close to the shore that night, but the tempest was terrible
for him too; the caravels were dispersed and every one on board expected
death, or thought that the others were lost. At last all the vessels, more
or less damaged, arrived safely at Port Hermoso on the west of the island,
and Columbus stayed there some days to repair them. During an interval of
calm he reached the Gardens of Cuba, but soon after this his troubles
began afresh. For forty days he coasted along Honduras, while the most
fearful storms prevailed, and the whole time he could enter no port. The
sea was tremendously high, heavy rains fell continually, and the thunder
and lightning were so terrific that the mariners thought that the end of
the world was coming; added to this the sails and rigging of the caravels
were torn, and the provisions were spoiled by the damp. Columbus grieved
that his son Fernando should be exposed to all these misfortunes. He says
of him in a letter, "God gave him so great courage that he sustained the
others, and if he put his hand to work, he did it as if he had been at sea
for eighty years. It was he who consoled me; I had fallen ill and many a
time was near the gate of the tomb. From a little cabin which I had caused
to be constructed on the stern I directed the voyage. My brother was on the
most wretched and dangerous of the vessels; great was my sorrow because I
had brought him against his will." Then he goes on to tell all his
troubles; and laments that although he had served Castille for so many
years, he had not really a roof in the land he could call his own. He
thought tenderly, too, of his son Diego, in Spain, and pictured the sorrow
he would feel if he heard that all the vessels had perished. In the forty
days the fleet only made seventy leagues; but at least they reached a cape
where the coast made an angle and turned southwards, and the admiral in his
joy and gratitude gave it the name of "Gracias a Dios."[17]
Now he sailed along the Mosquito shore, the rivers of which abounded with
tortoises and alligators, and in one of these rivers they lost some of
their men who had gone in a boat to seek for provisions. This cast a great
gloom over the rest, which had not passed away when they came to a
beautiful island full of groves of cocoa nuts, bananas, and palms, and
rested awhile between it and the main land. The Indians on shore were very
proud, for when the admiral refused the gifts they brought to the ship,
they tied all the toys and bells the Spaniards had given them together, and
laid them on the sands. When Columbus quitted the spot, he took seven of
these Indians with him as interpreters, and coasted along Costa Rica for
several leagues, until he entered a great bay full of lovely islands. The
natives here wore large plates of gold hanging from chains of cotton cord
around their necks, and strange crowns made of the claws of beasts, and the
quills of birds. They told the strangers that about seventy leagues off
they would find Veragua, a country which abounded in gold. And it seemed,
indeed, as if they spoke the truth, for the nearer they came to that
country the more gold they saw. The natives wore crowns of it on their
heads, and rings of it round their wrists and ancles; their garments were
embroidered with it; their tables and seats were ornamented with it. But
Columbus had not come out this time in search of gold, but to find the
strait which should enable Spain to trade with India at ease, and he left
the land of promised riches and went on the way he thought would lead to
his discovery. Alas! it was soon found that the caravels were too leaky to
sail with safety; they had been pierced through by a worm which infests
the tropical seas, and can bore through the hardest wood;[18] and Columbus
was obliged to give up sailing, for the present, in search of the strait,
and returned to seek for the gold mines of Veragua.[19] It was now
December, and again the caravels were overtaken by one of the terrible
storms of the tropics. The poor mariners gave themselves up for lost; day
and night they confessed their sins one to another, and made vows of what
they would do if their lives were spared. The lightnings were so incessant
that the sky glowed like "one vast furnace;" and they saw, too, for the
first time a water-spout, which, advancing towards the caravels, threatened
them with destruction; but the Lord heard the prayers the terrified seamen
sent up at the strange sight, and the column of water passed by without
doing them any injury.
In the midst of the storm there was an interval of calm, during which they
saw many sharks; these fishes are supposed to scent dead bodies at a
distance, and often draw near ships when danger is at hand. The sailors
caught some of them, and took out of one a live tortoise, which lived some
time on board one of the vessels; from another they took the head of a
shark, which shows that these monsters sometimes eat one another. In the
history which Fernando wrote of his father, he says that the sufferings of
all on board were very great for want of food; the provisions being spoiled
by the damp, and they had to eat their biscuit in the dark, because it was
so full of worms that it was too dreadful to behold by clear daylight.
At last they entered a port which the Indians called Hueva, and went from
thence along a canal for three days. When they landed they found the
natives living in the trees like birds, their cabins being fastened to
poles which were suspended from one tree to another. Perhaps they did this
on account of the wild beasts, the forest being full of lions, bears,
racoons, tiger-cats, and sajinos, a species of wild boar which attack men.
After a while the caravels anchored in the mouth of a river which was
really in the country of the gold mines. The admiral sent his brother on
shore to explore the land; and as he soon satisfied himself that there was
gold to be found there in plenty, Columbus at once began to form a
settlement on the river, which he called Belen, or Bethlehem, after the
star the wise men had seen in the east, because the caravels had arrived
there on the Feast of the Epiphany. It was agreed that Bartholomew should
remain here while the admiral returned to Spain to procure fresh vessels
and supplies. So they built houses of wood, thatched with the leaves of
palm trees, on a little hill not far from the mouth of the river, and eked
out their scanty store of provisions with the pine-apples, bananas, and
cocoanuts, which grew around them in plenty; and drank the wine the Indians
made from the pine-apple, and a sort of beer prepared from maize, or Indian
corn. When the rains ceased, however, Columbus found that the river was so
shallow, his crazy and worm-eaten ships could not get out and cross the
bar, so that he was obliged to wait patiently until the rains should swell
the river again and set him free.