1493-1506.
The Spanish sovereigns, in order to obtain the privilege of extending
their sway over the islands discovered by Columbus, immediately sent
embassadors to Rome to request Pope Alexander VI. to confirm the title of
Spain to the recently found lands, for it was then believed that the pope
had sole and absolute authority to dispose of all countries inhabited by
heathen peoples. Pope Martin V. and his successors had already granted to
the crown of Portugal the possession of all the lands it might acquire by
right of discovery beyond Cape Bojador toward the East. Pope Alexander
VI., to reward the Spaniards for wresting Spain from the Moors, issued
a bull, on the fourth of May, 1493, establishing a line of limitation,
running from the north to the south pole, distant one hundred leagues
west of the Azores and the Cape Verd Islands, giving to Spain all the
lands she had discovered or might discover west of it, which had not been
acquired by any Christian power before the preceding Christmas, and to
Portugal all the territory, on the same conditions, which lay east of
it. These territorial concessions of the pope caused the possessions of
Spain, in the western hemisphere, to be called the West Indies, and those
of Portugal, in the eastern hemisphere, the East Indies. The position of
the line of demarkation displeased the Portuguese. To settle the dispute
which it caused, the two countries sent commissioners to Tordesillas,
Spain, who agreed, on the seventh of June, 1494, that the position of the
line should be changed so that it should pass, north and south, three
hundred and seventy leagues west of the Cape Verd Islands.
Meanwhile in Spain a fleet of seventeen ships had been fitted out to sail
to the Indies in the West. About fifteen hundred Spanish adventurers
took passage on the different vessels, which were freighted with
agricultural and mining implements, horses, cattle, and stores of various
kinds, necessary for planting colonies on the newly-discovered islands.
Commanded by Columbus, the fleet weighed anchor in the roadstead of
Cadiz, on Wednesday, the twenty-fifth of September, 1493, and thence
sailed toward the West India archipelago.
After a voyage of thirty-eight days the fleet reached the island
of Dominica. The approach of Columbus to the field of his former
explorations is thus described: “On Saturday night, the second of
November, the admiral perceiving a great change in the sky and winds, and
having observed the heavy rains, and believing that he was near land,
ordered most of the sails to be furled, and commanded all to be upon the
watch, and not without cause for that same night, at daybreak, land was
descried seven leagues to the westward, a high mountainous island, which
he called Dominica (Sunday), because it was discovered on Sunday morning.
Shortly afterward he saw another island, northeast of Dominica, and then
another, and another after that, more northward. For this blessing which
God had been pleased to bestow on them, all the men assembled on deck
and sang the _Salve Regina_ and other prayers and hymns very devoutly,
giving thanks to God, because in twenty days after departing from Gomera,
[one of the Canary Islands,] they had made that land, estimating the
distance between them to be between seven hundred and fifty and eight
hundred leagues. Finding no convenient harbor in which to anchor on the
east side of Dominica, they stood for another island, which the admiral
called Marigalante, which was the name of his ship.”[175] Thence he
proceeded northward “to a large island which he called Santa Maria de
Guadalupe, to honor her and the request of the friars of the house of
that name, to whom he had made promise to call some island by the name of
their monastery.... Going ashore in the boat to view a village which they
had observed, they found none of the inhabitants in it, the people having
fled to the woods, except some children to whose arms they tied some
baubles to allure their fathers when they returned. In the houses they
found geese like ours, a great number of parrots, with red, green, blue,
and white feathers, as large as common cocks. They also found pumpkins,
and a kind of fruit which looked like our green pine-apples, but much
larger, and inside full of solid substance like a melon, and much sweeter
both in taste and smell, that grew on long stalks like lilies or aloes,
wild about the fields.... They also saw other kinds of fruit and herbs
different from ours; beds of cotton nets (_hamacas_), bows and arrows,
and other things....
“The next day, which was Tuesday, the fifth of November, the admiral sent
two boats ashore to capture some natives who might give him a description
of the country, and tell him how far off and in what direction Española
lay. Each boat brought back a youth. The youths agreed in saying that
they were not of that island, but of another called Borriquen, and that
the inhabitants of that island of Guadalupe were Caribbees or cannibals,
and had taken them prisoners from their own island. Soon after the boats
returning to shore, to take up some Christians they had left there, six
women were found with them, who had fled from the Caribbees, and came
of their own accord aboard the ships.... One of the women told them
that toward the south there were many islands, some inhabited, others
not, which both she and the other women, severally called Giamachi,
Cairvaco, Huino, Buriari, Arubeira, Sixibei. But the continent, which
they said was very great, both they and the people of Española called
Zuanta [Yucatan?], because in former times canoes had come from that land
to barter.... The same women gave them information where the island of
Española lay; for though the admiral had inserted it in his sea-chart,
yet for his further information he desired to hear what the people of
that country said of it.... Then the admiral landed and went to some
houses, where he saw ... a great deal of cotton, spun and unspun, looms
to weave, a great number of men’s skulls hung up, and baskets filled with
men’s bones.”[176]
On his way to the island of Española, Columbus discovered an island which
he called San Juan Baptista, but the Indians, Borriquen. On the twelfth
of November he arrived off the north coast of Española. On Thursday, the
twenty-eighth of the same month, the discoverer with his fleet entered
the harbor of the Villa de la Navidad, and found the place burnt and
deserted. The next morning “the admiral landed, much concerned to see the
houses and fort in ashes and nothing left belonging to the Christians
except some ragged clothing and similar things as are found in a place
plundered and destroyed. Seeing no one to question, the admiral went up
a river that was near with some boats.... Having found nothing but some
of the clothing of the Christians, he returned to Navidad, where he saw
the bodies of eight Christians, and of three other persons in the fields,
whom they recognized by their clothing, and they seemed to have been
dead about a month. While the Christians were searching for some other
tokens or writings of the dead, a brother of the cacique, Guacanagari,
came with some Indians to talk with the admiral. These could speak some
words of Spanish, and knew the names of all the Christians that had been
left there. They related that the latter soon began to quarrel among
themselves, and each to take as much gold and as many women as they
could obtain. Pedro Gutierrez and Escovedo thereupon killed a person
named Diego, and then they and nine others went away with their women to
a cacique, whose name was Caunaboa, who was lord of the mines, and he
killed them all. Then many days afterward he came with a great number of
men to Navidad, where there was only Diego de Arana with ten men, who had
remained with him to guard the fort, all the others being dispersed about
the island. The cacique, Caunaboa, coming there at night, set fire to the
houses where the Christians lived with their women, and the Christians,
being frightened, fled to the sea, where eight were drowned, and three
died ashore, whose bodies they showed to them. Guacanagari undertook
to defend the Christians, but he and his men were wounded and were
compelled to flee for their lives.”[177]
About the ninth of December Columbus sailed eastwardly from the site of
the Villa de la Navidad, and anchored before an Indian town, where he
determined to plant a colony. “He landed with all his men, provisions and
implements, which he had brought in the ships of the fleet, at a plain,
near a rock, on which a fort could easily be built. Here he erected a
town, and called it Isabela, in honor of Queen Isabella. This place was
deemed very suitable, inasmuch as the harbor was very large, though
exposed to the northwest, and had an attractive river a bow-shot from
it, from which canals of water might be cut to run through the middle of
the town, and beyond was an extensive plain, from which the Indians said
the mines of Cibao were not very distant. For these reasons the admiral
was eager to settle the colony. On account of the fatigue of the voyage
and that caused by his labor here, he did not have time to write in his
journal, from day to day, what happened, as had been his habit. He also
fell sick, which interrupted his writing from the eleventh of December to
the twelfth of March, 1494. Meanwhile he administered the affairs of the
town according to his ability. He intrusted Alonso de Hojeda with fifteen
men to discover the mines of Cibao. Afterward, on the second of February,
twelve ships of the fleet set sail for Castile, under the command of
Antonio de Torres.”[178]
In March Columbus with a body of armed men explored the country of Cibao.
“It is rough and stony,” writes Ferdinand Columbus, “full of gravel,
grassy, and watered by several rivers in which gold is found. The
farther they went into the country the more rugged and mountainous they
found it. On the tops of the mountains were grains of gold-sand, for, as
the admiral said, the great rains carry it down from the summits of the
mountains to the rivers in small sand.... The admiral, perceiving that
he was now eighteen leagues from Isabela, and the country he had left
behind him very craggy, ordered a fort to be built in a very pleasant and
defensible place, which he called the castle of San Tomas, to command the
country about the mines, and to be a place of safety for the Christians
who went there. The command of this new fort he gave to Don Pedro
Margarita, a person of some importance, with fifty-six men, among whom
were men of all trades to erect the fort, which was built with clay and
timber, which made it strong enough to resist the attack of any number
of Indians that might come against it.... On Sunday, the twenty-ninth of
March, Columbus arrived at Isabela, where melons were already grown fit
to eat, although it was not more than two months after the seed had been
put into the ground. Cucumbers came up in twenty days, and a wild vine of
that country, having been pruned, had produced grapes which were good and
large. The next day, being the thirtieth of March, a farmer gathered ears
of wheat, the seed of which he had sown at the latter end of January.
There were also pease, but much larger than those they sowed. All they
sowed came up above the ground in three days, and on the twenty-fifth day
they were eating them. The stones of fruit set in the ground sprouted
in seven days, and vine branches shot out in the same time, and in
twenty-five days thereafter they gathered green grapes....
“The admiral, having determined to go to discover the continent,
appointed a council to govern the island in his absence. The persons
composing it were Don Diego Colon, the admiral’s brother, with the title
of president; F. Boyl [Friar Buil] and Pedro Fernandez Coronel, regents;
Alonzo Sanchez de Carvajal, rector of Bacca, and Juan de Luxan, gentlemen
of their catholic majesties.... On Tuesday, the twenty-ninth of April,
the wind being favorable, Columbus arrived at Cabo de San Nicolas, and
thence crossed over to the island of Cuba, running along the south coast
of it, and having sailed a league beyond Cabo Fuerte, he put into a large
bay which he called Puerto Grande....
“On Saturday, the third of May, the admiral resolved to sail from Cuba
over to Jamaica, that he might not leave it behind without knowing
whether the report of the abundance of gold there were true. The wind
being favorable, he discovered it on Sunday, when he was less than half
the distance to it. On Monday he came to anchor, and thought it was the
most attractive of all the islands which he had seen in the Indies. So
many people, in large and small canoes, came aboard his vessels that it
was quite astonishing. The next day he ran along the coast to search
for harbors. When the boats went to examine the havens, there came out
so many canoes and armed men to defend the country, that the men in the
boats were forced to return to the ships, not through fear, but to avoid
making enemies of them.... On Tuesday, the thirteenth of May, Columbus
determined to stand over again for Cuba to coast along it, intending
not to return until he had sailed five or six hundred leagues, and was
satisfied whether it were a continent or an island.... On Friday, the
thirteenth of June, the admiral perceiving that the coast of Cuba ran
far to the west, and that it was a matter of the greatest difficulty to
sail that way on account of the infinite number of islands and sand-bars
that were on all sides of them, and he also beginning to be in want of
provisions, for which reason he could not continue his voyage as he had
intended, he determined to return to the town he had begun to build in
Española. To supply himself with wood and water, he anchored at the
island Evangelista, which is thirty leagues in circuit, and seven hundred
from Dominica.”[179]
While Columbus was exploring the coast of Cuba, near the island of
Evangelista, on the twelfth of June, it is said that he, for the purpose
of furnishing indisputable evidence that he had reached the dominions
of the Grand Khan, sent Fernando Perez de Luna, his notary, with four
attesting witnesses, to the vessels, and had each person on board to make
a declaration under oath that he was convinced that the land he saw was a
part of the continent of Asia, and that he believed any one could go from
it by land to Spain.[180] The notary, when taking the depositions, it is
said, informed each person giving this testimony, that should he for any
malicious purpose afterward assert a different opinion, he would, if an
officer, be made to pay a penalty of ten thousand maravedis for such an
offence, and if a person of lower rank, he would receive a hundred lashes
and have his tongue cut out.[181] Strange as it seems, it was Columbus’s
belief that this watery expanse was really the gulf of the Ganges.[182]
Departing from the island of Evangelista, Columbus returned along the
coast of Cuba to Cabo de Santa Cruz, from which he steered to the island
of Jamaica. After leaving it, he discovered the two islands lying off the
east coast of Española, called respectively by the Indians Adamanai and
Mona. On the twenty-ninth of September, 1494, he returned to Isabela.
The people of the island of Española having acquired some knowledge
of the Spanish language, were able at this time to give Columbus
considerable information respecting their religion. From his
conversations with them he was enabled to write the following account of
their peculiar image-worship: “I could discover neither idolatry nor any
sect among them, though each one of their kings, who are very many, as
well in Española as on all the other islands and continent, has a house
apart from the town, in which there is nothing but some carved, wooden
images that are called _cemies_. There is nothing done in these houses
but what is for the service of the _cemies_, to which they repair to
perform certain ceremonies, and pray there, as we do in our churches.
In these houses they have a handsome, round table, made like a dish, on
which is some powder, which they lay on the heads of the _cemies_ with
a certain ceremony. Then through a cane, that has two branches, held to
their own nostrils they snuff up this powder. The words they use none
of our people understand. The powder intoxicates them, and they act as
if they were drunk. They also give the image a name, and I believe it is
that of their father or grandfather, or both; for they have more than
one, and some more than ten, all in memory of their forefathers, as I
have already said. I have heard them praise one more than another, and
have observed them to have more devotion, and show more respect to one
than another, as we do in processions in time of want; and the people
and the caciques boast among themselves of having the best _cemies_.
When they go to these _cemies_ they shun the Christians, and will not
permit them to enter these houses. If they suspect that they will come,
they take their _cemies_ and hide them in the woods for fear that they
should be deprived of them. What is most ridiculous, they have the
habit of stealing one another’s _cemies_. It happened once that the
Christians suddenly rushed into a house with them, and the _cemi_ cried
out, speaking in their language, which showed that it was artificially
made. The _cemi_ being hollow, they had attached a tube to it, which tube
extended to a dark corner of the house, where a man was concealed with
boughs and leaves who had spoken through the tube the words which the
cacique had commanded him. The Spaniards, suspecting something of the
kind, kicked down the _cemi_, and discovered that which has been related.
The cacique seeing that his deception was known to the Spaniards,
earnestly begged them not to speak of it to his subjects or to the other
Indians, because he made them obedient by this artifice.... Three large
stones are also in the possession of almost all the caciques, which are
highly venerated by them and their people. The one they say makes the
corn and the grain to grow, the second helps women in travail, and the
third procures rain or fair weather, whenever they desire to be benefited
in any one of these ways. I sent your highnesses three of these stones by
Antonio de Torres, and have three more to bring with me.
“When these Indians die, they have several ways of performing their
obsequies. The manner in which they bury their caciques is as follows:
They open his body and dry it at a fire in order to preserve it. Of
other persons they only take the head. They bury some in caves or
caverns, and place gourds of water and bread at their heads. Others they
burn in the house where they die, and they do not permit them to die
naturally, but strangle them at their last gasp. This is done to the
caciques. Others are turned out of the house, and are put in a _hamac_,
which is their bed, with bread and water at their heads, and they are
never visited again. Some who become dangerously ill are carried to the
cacique, who tells whether they are to be strangled or not, and what
he commands is done. I have taken pains to learn what they believe,
and whether they know what becomes of them after they are dead. This I
inquired of Caunaboa, who was the principal king of Española, an aged
man, intelligent and of much discernment. He and the rest answered that
they go to a certain valley, which every great cacique supposes to be
his country, where, they affirm, they find their parents and all their
ancestors; that they eat, have women, and enjoy themselves in pleasures
and pastimes.
“The admiral, having brought the island into a peaceable condition, and
built the town of Isabela, besides three forts in different parts of the
country, determined to return to Spain.... He went on board, on Thursday,
the tenth of March, 1496, with two hundred and twenty-five Spaniards and
thirty Indians, and sailed from Isabela, at daybreak, and steered along
the coast with two caravels, one called Santa Cruz, the other La Nina,
the same in which he went to discover the island of Cuba.... Having
supplied himself with bread, wood, and water, he set sail on Wednesday,
the twentieth of April, from the island of Guadalupe, with the wind very
scant, keeping near the latitude of twenty-two degrees, for at that
time they had not found out the way of running away north to catch the
southwest winds.”[183]
After sailing a month in the direction of Spain, “although there were
eight or nine pilots on board the two vessels, yet none of them knew
where they were; but the admiral was confident that they were only a
little west of the Azores.”
Columbus, speaking of the movements of his compasses at this time,
observes: “This morning the Dutch compasses varied, as they formerly
did, a point; and those of Geneva, which previously agreed with them,
varied only a little, but after sailing east varied more, which is a sign
that we are one hundred leagues or more west of the Azores, for when we
were just one hundred there were only a few weeds scattered in the sea,
and the Dutch needles varied a point, those of Geneva cutting the north
point, and when we are a little farther east-northeast they will alter
again.”[184] These noticeable differences in the variations of the
needles, Ferdinand Columbus says, the admiral assigned to “the different
kinds of loadstones used in making them.” ... “In this way,” he remarks,
“they continued their voyage, though all the pilots went like blind men.”
Columbus, when near Spain, confidently asserted that they would be in
sight of the coast on the following morning, which proved to be true,
“for which reason he was looked upon by the seamen as very expert and
almost prophetic in sea affairs.”[185] On Saturday, the eleventh of
June, 1496, the caravels arrived in the port of Cadiz.
“The admiral,” as soon as he had landed, “began to prepare for his
journey to Burgos, where he was favorably received by their catholic
majesties, who were there celebrating the nuptials of Prince Juan, their
son, who married Margarita of Austria.”
[Illustration: FIELD OF VOYAGES TO AMERICA.
ON MERCATOR’S PROJECTION.]
While Columbus was in Española, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella
abrogated in part the concessions granted him, and issued letters-patent
on the tenth of April, 1495, permitting any of their subjects to
make voyages of discovery to the Indies.[186] Commissioned by their
highnesses, Amerigo Vespucci[187] went with a fleet of four vessels,
in 1497, to make discoveries. The account of the voyage is contained
in a letter written by him, in Lisbon, on the fourth of September,
1504. The publication of it made him famous as the discoverer of the
continent of America. Singular as it is true, the palpable discrepancies
found in the subsequent versions of Vespucci’s letter have led many
scholars to discredit the statements of the intelligent and enterprising
Italian.[188] Vespucci thus writes respecting his first voyage:
“The king, Don Ferdinand of Castile, having ordered four ships to
discover new lands toward the west, I was selected by his highness to go
in the fleet to aid in the discoveries.[189] We departed from the port of
Cadiz on the tenth day of May, 1497, and took our course across the great
gulf of the ocean-sea.[190] We spent eighteen months on the voyage, and
discovered much main-land and an endless number of islands, which were in
great part inhabited. As these are not spoken of by ancient writers, I
think that they had no knowledge of them....
“We reached a land which we judged to be firm land, distant from the
Canary Islands about a thousand leagues more to the west, within the
torrid zone, because we found the north pole at an elevation of sixteen
degrees above the horizon,[191] and that we were more than seventy-five
degrees west of the Canary Islands as our instruments showed.[192] We
anchored our ships a league and a half from the coast. We got out our
boats, and, having manned and armed them, we went on land.
“Before we went ashore we were greatly delighted in seeing many people
wandering along the beach. We saw that they were naked and that they
seemed to be frightened when they beheld us, likely, as I supposed,
by seeing us clothed, and of a different stature from their own.
They retired to a mountain, and we could not entice them to hold any
intercourse with us, notwithstanding we endeavored to induce them by
signs of peace and friendship....
“We sailed to the northwest[193] in which direction the coast extended,
always in sight of land, seeing continually, during the voyage, people on
the shore. After sailing two days, we found a secure place for the ships,
and anchored half a league from the land.... The natives were somewhat
timid, and it was a long time before we were able to dispel their fear
and induce them to come and talk to us.... Giving them such things as
looking-glasses, bells, beads, and other trifles, we enticed a number of
them to approach and enter into friendly relations with us....
“These people go entirely naked and wear not a particle of clothing. They
are of a medium size and very well proportioned. Their skin is reddish
like the color of a lion’s skin.... They do not allow any hair to grow
on their eyelids and eyebrows, nor on any part of their bodies; only
on their heads, for they think it very unbecoming. The men and women
are exceedingly quick in their movements, and are unconstrained in
their deportment. They walk and run rapidly. The women do not think it
a difficult thing to run a league or two.... These people are excellent
swimmers. The women surpass the men, for we have observed them many times
swimming unaided, fully two leagues out from land.
“The weapons of these people are bows and arrows. These are curiously
made. They have no iron or any other hard metal on them. They use instead
the teeth of animals or fish.... They are expert bowmen, and hit with
their arrows whatever they shoot at. The women in some parts of the
country handle the bow with considerable skill. Their other weapons are
lances and clubs with elaborately carved heads. When they go to make
war their wives accompany them, not to fight, but to carry provision on
their backs. Sometimes a woman will convey a burden in this manner thirty
or forty leagues, which the strongest men there cannot do as we have
frequently observed....
“These people, although they appear ignorant as talkers, are very
sagacious and crafty in any matter in which they are interested. They do
not talk much, and when they do, it is in a low tone.... Their languages
differ so much that we found people living within the space of a hundred
leagues who could not understand one another’s speech.... They do not
partake of food at appointed times nor in such quantities to satisfy them
during equal intervals. Whenever their appetites demand food, whether in
the middle of the night or day, it does not matter to them, they appease
their hunger.... They take their food from earthen basins made by them,
or from gourds cut in half.
“They sleep in certain nets made of cotton, very large, suspended in the
air.... These people are clean and neat in their persons, for they are
continually bathing.... They live together in common, and make their
houses like cottages, which are very strongly built with the largest
trees and covered with palm leaves.... We found one which contained
six hundred persons, and we saw the occupants of thirteen houses, who
must have numbered four thousand souls. New sites for these houses are
selected every seven or eight years. When we asked why they changed
the location of their dwellings, they said it was because the intense
heat of the sun caused painful diseases to spread among them when the
ground about their houses became permeated and foul with filth; which
explanation seemed quite reasonable to us.
“The riches of these people are the feathers of birds of different
colors, ornaments made of fish bones, and white and green stones, with
which they adorn their cheeks, lips, and ears.... Some of these people,
when they inter their dead, place water and food at the head of the
corpse.... In some parts of the country there is a very inhuman custom of
disposing of a person about to die. His relatives carry him into a great
wood, and, fastening one of their sleeping nets to two trees, put him
in it. Having swung him in it during the day, they, at the approach of
night, depart to their homes, leaving with him water and food sufficient
for his wants during the succeeding five or six days. Should the ill man
partake of the provisions and recover sufficient strength to enable him
to make his way back to the village, his relatives honor his return with
ceremony....
“For their infirmities they have various kinds of medicine very different
from those we use.... I often observed that when a person was stricken
with fever and grew worse, that they bathed him with much cold water
from head to foot, and then built a great fire around him, and made
him walk about the inclosed space for an hour or two until he became
quite fatigued, when they allowed him to sleep. Many were cured by this
treatment.... Blood-letting is an art known to them. They do not take
blood from the arm except in the arm pit. They generally take it from the
loins or the calf of the leg.... They have no grain seed nor corn, but
use instead the root of a tree, from which they make flour, which is very
good, and which they call _Iuca_, and another which they call _Cāzabi_,
and another which they call _Ignami_. Very little meat is eaten by them
except human flesh.... They devour with fierce avidity their enemies,
whom they kill or capture, whether men or women. They thought it very
strange when they learned that we did not eat the flesh of our enemies....
“We landed in a port[194] where we found a village built above the water
like Venice. About forty-five bell-shaped houses were erected here upon
very large piles, and connected one with the other by draw-bridges....
When we were descried by the people they were seemingly terrified, and
to protect themselves they immediately drew their bridges and shut
themselves up in their houses. While we were observing them and wondering
at their actions, we beheld about twenty-two canoes (_canoe_) approaching
us from the direction of the sea. These canoes are boats which they
use, and are made from a single tree. The people in them rowed toward
our boats, no little astonished at our forms and clothing. As they kept
at some distance from us, we made signs to induce them to come nearer.
Failing to assure them of our peaceful intentions, and seeing that they
would not approach any nearer, we rowed toward them. But they did not
remain where they were, but rowed to the land, where, by signs, they
intimated that we should wait for a short time until they returned.
“They hastened away to a mountain, but did not stay there any length of
time. Returning they brought with them sixteen young girls, and, entering
their canoes, rowed to us, and placed four girls in each of our boats.
We were much surprised at this.... They then kept their canoes alongside
of our boats, and we were led to believe that these people were thus
manifesting their friendship. Not suspecting any thing different, we
observed a great number of people swimming toward us from the houses.
Then some old women appeared at the doors of the houses shrieking and
pulling their hair as if in great distress. Suspecting some treachery,
we took up our arms. All at once the girls in our boats plunged into the
sea, and the people in the canoes rowed away, shooting their arrows at
us. Those who swam to us carried lances with them concealed under the
water. Discovering their treachery, we not only defended ourselves, but
vigorously attacked them. We upset in our boats many of their canoes and
killed many people. In a short time those who were not hurt left their
canoes and swam to the shore. They had about fifteen or twenty killed and
wounded, and we five slightly wounded.... We took two girls and two men
prisoners. When we entered their houses we found only two old women and
a sick man. We took from the houses many things of little value, but did
not burn the houses from humane motives....
“This country is thickly inhabited and contains a great many rivers. The
animals in it are quite different from those in our country, except the
lions, panthers, stags, hogs, goats, and deer, and some of these are
somewhat different from ours in form.... But how can I describe the birds
here, which are so many and of so many kinds, and the color of their
feathers so different, that the sight of them amazes one.
“The country is very attractive and fruitful, and covered with very great
woods and forests, in which the trees are always green, for they never
lose their foliage. There are unnumbered fruits very different from
those in our country. This land lies within the limits of the torrid
zone, below the line describing the tropic of Cancer, where the pole is
elevated twenty-three degrees above the horizon, at the end of the second
climate.[195] ... In this country we made a baptismal font, and baptized
many of the people, who called us _caribi_, meaning men of great wisdom.
“The country is called Lariab by the natives. We sailed along its coast
always in sight of land and ran on the whole course toward the northwest
eight hundred and seventy leagues.[196] ... We found gold in some places
but not much. The discovery of the country and the knowledge that gold
was in it satisfied us....
“On our return we sailed toward the sea going between the north and east,
and after seven days we reached some islands.... We landed on one of
them, where we found many people, who called the island Iti [Hayti?]....
We set sail for Spain with two hundred and twenty-two slave-prisoners,
and arrived at the port of Cadiz on the fifteenth of October, 1498,[197]
where we were well received, and sold our slaves. This is what happened
to me in this my first voyage that may be considered noteworthy.”[198]
“Shortly after the departure of the fleet with which Vespucci went to
the New World, Columbus complained to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella
that the permission given by them in 1495 to those who desired to go on
voyages of discovery toward the west was prejudicial to the privileges
previously granted him by their Spanish majesties. The latter therefore
revoked their letters-patent of the tenth of April, 1495, on the second
of June, 1497, declaring that it should “have no force nor effect at any
time, or in any manner whatever, so as to be prejudicial to the said
admiral, and to whatever we have thus granted and confirmed to him.”[199]
“The fitting out of the fleet [for Columbus’s third voyage to the Indies]
was delayed much longer than was necessary through the negligence and
bad management of the king’s officers, and particularly that of Don
Juan Rodriguez de Fonseca, archdeacon of Seville. Hence it happened
that Don Juan, who was afterward bishop of Burgos, was, from that time
onward, a bitter enemy to the admiral and his affairs, and was the chief
person among those who brought him into disgrace with their catholic
majesties.[200] ... The admiral made his preparations for the voyage
with all possible diligence, and on the thirtieth of May, 1498, set
sail from the bay of San Lucar de Berrameda, with six ships, freighted
with provisions and other necessaries for the relief of the planters in
Española and the peopling of that island.”[201]
On Thursday, the fifth of July, Columbus steered westward from the
islands of Cape Verd, and on the last day of the month altered his course
and stood to the north. “One day about noon as he was thus sailing
[off the coast of Venezuela, South America, north of the mouths of the
Orinoco river], Alonso Perez Nirando, a sailor of the town of Huelva,
while going up to the round-top, saw the peaks of three mountains to the
westward, distant about fifteen leagues. Not long afterward they beheld
land extending northeastwardly as far as they could see. When they had
given thanks to God and said the _Salve Regina_ and other prayers used
by seamen in times of distress or joy, the admiral called the discovered
island, la Isla de Trinidad (the island of the Trinity), for he had
thought of giving this name to the first land they should find on the
voyage, and now God had graciously granted him the sight of three
mountains near together as has been mentioned. The fleet stood directly
west to reach a point of land on the south side of the island, and then
coasted along that side of it until the anchors were cast, five leagues
beyond the cape, which Columbus called Punta de la Galera (Point of the
Galley), which name was suggested by a rock on the headland, resembling,
at a distance, a galley under sail. On the following morning, Wednesday,
Columbus continued his course westward, for there was only one cask of
water on board his ship, and one on each of the other vessels, and at the
last anchorage no convenient place had been found to obtain more. At the
next headland, which he called Punta de la Playa (Point of the Strand),
the ships anchored and the crews went to a small brook and obtained a
supply of fresh water. No town or people were seen here, although they
had observed many houses and towns along the coast.... This day, which
was the first of August, when the vessels were sailing between Punta de
la Galera and Punta de la Playa, they discovered the continent, distant
about twenty-five leagues as they guessed. Inasmuch as they thought it
was another island, they called it Isla Santa (Holy Island).”
When the ships anchored at the southwestern extremity of the island
of Trinidad, which point of land Columbus called Punta del Arenal, “a
large canoe,” the admiral writes, “came from the eastward, containing
twenty-four men, all in the prime of life, fully armed with bows, arrows,
and shields. As I have said, they were all young, well proportioned, and
not dark black, but whiter than any other Indians that I had seen....
They wore their hair long and straight, cut in the Spanish fashion. Their
heads were encircled with cotton scarfs elaborately colored, like the
head-dresses of the Moors. Some wore these scarfs round their bodies as
a covering in the place of breeches. When I reached Punta del Arenal I
found that the island of Trinidad was separated from the land of Gracia
(_la tierra de Gracia_)[202] by a strait two leagues wide....
“I discovered beyond the point which I called Punta de la Aguda,
one of the most attractive countries in the world, and very densely
populated.... Some of the natives immediately came in canoes to the
ship to request me in the name of their king to come on land. When they
saw that I paid no attention to them, they came in great numbers in
their canoes to the ship, many of them wearing pieces of gold on their
breasts, and some of them bracelets of pearls on their arms. When I saw
these I was exceedingly pleased, and I made many inquiries to learn
where the people found them. They informed me that they were obtained in
the neighborhood and also at a place north of the country.... Desiring
to get some pearls like those I had seen, I sent some men ashore for
that purpose.... They related that when the boats reached the shore,
two chiefs, whom they took for father and son, came to them from the
throng of the people and conducted them to a very large house, at two
springs, not round and tent-shaped as the other houses. In this house
were many seats, on which they seated our men and themselves. They then
caused bread to be brought with many kinds of fruit and various wines,
both white and red, not made from grapes but apparently from different
fruits.... The men were congregated at one end of the building and the
women at the other. Great vexation was felt by both parties because they
could not understand each other’s language, for they each desired to ask
questions concerning their respective countries.”
Columbus, describing that part of South America which he called Gracia,
now known as Venezuela, and also referring to the Orinoco River pouring
its flood of fresh water into the Gulf of Paria, which he called Golfo
de las Perlas (Gulf of Pearls), remarks: “I think that if the mentioned
river does not flow from the earthly paradise that it comes from a vast
extent of land in the south, of which nothing hitherto has been known.”
In the letter containing this information respecting South America the
admiral speaks of sending to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, to
whom the letter was addressed, a map of the country (_la pintura de la
tierra_).[203]
The channel between the island of Trinidad and the land of Gracia (which
the natives called Paria), Columbus called la Boca de la Sierpe (the
mouth of the Serpent). The fleet then sailed from the Gulf of Paria
through its northern outlet, which Columbus called la Boca del Drago (the
mouth of the Dragon), and passed by the cape which he called Cabo de las
Conchas and the island which he named Margarita. “Although,” as Ferdinand
Columbus remarks, “the admiral saw that the country of Paria extended
much farther westward, nevertheless he says that from that time forward
he could not give as good a description of it as he wished on account of
his eyes being too much inflamed by constant watching. Therefore he was
compelled to obtain the most of his information concerning it from the
sailors and pilots.”[204]
When Columbus arrived, at the end of August, at the island of Española,
where he intended to recruit his failing health, he found the colonists
rebelling against the authority of his brother Bartolomé, whom he had
left there as adelantado, or lieutenant-governor, when he sailed for
Spain in 1496. Columbus at once took steps to put an end to the sedition.
Meanwhile complaints were sent to their Spanish majesties, King Ferdinand
and Queen Isabella, who, to adjust the differences existing between
the two contending factions, sent Francisco de Bobadilla to Española
to discover the cause of the insurrection and to punish by fine and
imprisonment those whom he should find culpable. Summoning the admiral
to appear before him at San Domingo, he, as soon as Columbus arrived,
ordered him to be put in irons and to be confined in the fortress. Having
drawn up certain charges against Columbus, he sent him in chains to
Spain. About the middle of November, 1500, the vessel arrived at Cadiz.
When the news of Columbus’s humiliation at the hands of Bobadilla became
known, the people everywhere censured the latter for the unwarranted
abasement of the distinguished discoverer. The king and queen immediately
sent orders for Columbus to be set at liberty, and afterward received
him with many gracious acknowledgments of his important services, and
publicly declared that Bobadilla should account to them for his ill
treatment.[205]
When the information contained in Columbus’s letter respecting the large
and valuable pearls possessed by the people of Paria became known in
Spain a number of capitalists immediately fitted out a fleet to go to the
Land of Pearls. The command of the vessels was given to Alonso de Hojeda,
who had accompanied Columbus on his second voyage. The cosmographer,
Juan de la Cosa, and Amerigo Vespucci went with Hojeda. Vespucci, in his
account of the voyage, says: “We departed from the port of Cadiz, three
ships in company, on the sixteenth day of May, 1499.... In forty-four
days we arrived at a new land, which we judged to be main-land, and the
continuation of that previously mentioned. It lay in the torrid zone
south of the equator, where the south pole is elevated five degrees.”
They sailed from their first place of anchorage and ran southeastwardly
along the coast forty leagues. The strong currents running from the
southeast to the northwest hindered the progress of the vessels so much
that the explorers determined to change their course and to sail to the
northwest. Following the trend of the coast in this direction, they,
after sailing some time, reached a beautiful bay, at the entrance of
which was a large island. About eighty leagues beyond this harbor they
entered another, where they went on land and obtained one hundred and
fifty pearls and some gold from the friendly natives. At another place
the inhabitants of the country “had their cheeks stuffed with a green
herb which they were continually chewing as animals chew their cud, so
that they were scarcely able to speak. Hanging from the neck of each
native were two dried gourd-shells, one filled with the herb which the
people had in their mouths, the other containing a white meal like chalk
dust. The natives carried small sticks which they wetted at intervals in
their mouths and then put them into the meal and then into the gourds
containing the herb.” Then they again filled their cheeks with the herb.
At another place the explorers remained forty-seven days, where they
obtained “one hundred and nineteen marks of pearls” in exchange for some
small trifles. From a native, Vespucci obtained an oyster containing one
hundred and thirty pearls. The fleet sailed along the coast to where it
was “fifteen degrees north of the equator.” Thence the explorers steered
for Española to obtain provisions. Departing from the island on the
twenty-second of July, 1500, they sailed for Spain, and arrived at the
port of Cadiz on the eighth of September.[206]
When King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella heard that the Portuguese had
reached India by sailing around Africa, they commissioned Columbus to
explore the western coast of Paria, where he conceived a navigable strait
could be found through which the vessels of Spain might sail to Cathay.
Four caravels composed the fleet with which he sailed from Cadiz on the
ninth of May, 1502. On the fifteenth of June, the vessels came in sight
of one of the Caribbean islands called by the natives Mantinino. Thence
they sailed to the island of Dominica, and thence to Española. Departing,
on the fourteenth of July, from the port of Brazil, on the south side
of the island of Española, Columbus sailed toward the Bay of Honduras,
eastward of which he imagined was a strait through which he might sail
to the Indian Ocean and reach Cathay. “We came to certain islands,” says
Ferdinand Columbus, who had accompanied his father to the New World,
“where we went ashore on the largest, called Guanaia, whence those that
make sea-charts took occasion to call all those islands Guanaia, which
are almost twelve leagues from the continent, near the province now
called Honduras, though the admiral then called it Cabo Casinas.” While
the fleet was anchored in one of the roadsteads of the group of islands
called Guanaia, a large log-boat crowded with Indians and filled with
certain commodities arrived there. Describing the capture of this highly
valued prize, Ferdinand Columbus remarks: “Fortune so ordered it that
a canoe, as long as a galley and eight feet wide, all of one tree, and
like the other boats in shape, put in there, loaded with commodities
brought from the country toward the west and bound for Nueva España.[207]
In the middle of it was a covering like an awning, made of palm leaves,
resembling those of the Venetian gondolas, which protected all beneath
it, that neither rain nor sea-water could wet the goods. Under the awning
were the women and children. Although there were twenty-five men in the
canoe, they had not the courage to defend themselves against those in our
boats who pursued them. The canoe being taken without any opposition it
was brought to the admiral’s caravel.... He commanded that such articles
should be taken as were thought to be the most desirable and valuable, as
quilts, shirts of cotton without sleeves, curiously made and dyed with
different colors, apron-cloths, and large sheets in which the Indian
women in the canoe wrapped themselves as the Moorish women, formerly in
Granada, were in the habit of doing. There were also long wooden swords,
with grooved edges on each side, in which sharp pieces of flint were
compactly fastened with thread and a bituminous substance, and these cut
naked men as if they were made of steel; also copper hatchets to cut
wood, like those of stone which the other Indians use; also bells of the
same metal, and dishes and crucibles to melt it in. For food they had
such roots and grain as the people of Española eat, and a kind of liquor
made of maize, like the English beer, and an abundance of cacao-nuts,
which in New Spain pass for money, which they seemed to value very much,
for when they were brought aboard among the other goods, I observed that
when any of these nuts fell, the Indians all stooped to pick them up, as
if they were things of value.... Notwithstanding the admiral had heard
so much from those in the canoe concerning the great wealth, politeness,
and ingenuity of the people westward toward New Spain, yet thinking that
he could sail to those countries lying to the leeward, when he thought
fit from Cuba, he would not go that way at this time, but adhered to
his intention of discovering a strait in the continent to pass into the
South Sea,[208] by which he could sail to the countries that produce
spice. Therefore he resolved to sail eastward toward Veragua and Nombre
de Dios, where he imagined the strait to be.... He was deceived in the
undertaking, for he did not conceive it to be an isthmus, or a narrow
neck of land, as it really was, but a small bay extending from sea to
sea.”[209]
On the coast of Veragua, now the isthmus of Panama or Darien, Columbus
found the ruins of an immense building covered with tables of strange
hieroglyphics and unique reliefs. These vestiges of an ancient
civilization made so profound an impression on the mind of the admiral
that he selected a curiously elaborated piece of the wall, and brought it
away in one of his caravels. “This was the first place, in the Indies,”
says Ferdinand Columbus, “where they saw any sign of an edifice. It was a
great mass of wall of imagery seemingly composed of lime and stone. The
admiral ordered a piece of it to be brought away to show the evidence of
its antiquity.”[210]
On the fifth of January, 1503, they cast anchor near a river which the
Indians called Yebra, and the admiral Belem or Bethlem. Westward of it
was a river which the natives called Veragua. Columbus, having determined
to build a town at this point, began, about the end of February, to erect
“houses upon the river of Belem, about a cannon-shot from its mouth,
within a trench, on the right bank of the river, at the mouth of which
there is a little hill. Besides these houses, which were all of timber
and covered with the leaves of palm trees growing along the shore,
another large house was built to serve as a store-house and magazine,
in which were stored several cannon, some powder, provisions, and other
necessaries for the use of the planters....
“The customs of the Indians here are somewhat similar to those of the
natives of Española and the neighboring islands; but the people of
Veragua and its neighborhood, when they talk to one another and eat turn
their backs, and are always chewing an herb, which, as we think,” says
Ferdinand Columbus, “makes their teeth to decay and rot. Their food is
fish; these they take with nets and hooks.... They have an abundance
of maize, which is a kind of grain growing in an ear, or hard head
like millet, of which they make white and red wine, as beer is made in
England, and mix their spice with it as pleases their palates. It has a
pleasant taste like a sharp, lively wine.”[211]
“In Cariay and the adjacent country,” says Columbus, “there are great
enchanters of a very dreadful kind.... I saw there, built on a mountain,
a sepulcher as large as a house and elaborately sculptured. The body
lay uncovered with the face downward. The people told me of other very
excellent works of art.... They said that there were great mines of
copper in the country, of which metal they make hatchets and other
manufactured articles, both cast and soldered. They also make forges
from it, and all the apparatus of goldsmiths, and also crucibles. The
inhabitants wear clothes. I saw in that province large sheets of cotton
elaborately and skillfully made, and others very delicately colored with
pencils. They informed me that in the interior, towards Cathay, that the
people there have them interwoven with gold.... One thing I dare declare,
for there are many to attest it, that in the land of Veragua I saw more
indications of gold in the two first days [of my stay there] than I had
found during four years in Española.”[212]
The Spaniards, however, were soon attacked by the natives, and were in
such distressing circumstances that Columbus was compelled to abandon
his purpose of leaving a colony on this part of the continent and to
take his men on board the ships and to return to Española. Speaking of
the return-voyage, Ferdinand Columbus writes: “Thus rejoicing that we
were all together again, we sailed along the coast eastward. Although
all the pilots were of the opinion that we might return to San Domingo
by standing away to the north, nevertheless the admiral and his brother
knew that it was requisite to run a considerable distance along this
coast before they steered across the gulf that is between the continent
and Española, at which our men were displeased, thinking that the admiral
designed to sail directly for Spain, whereas he neither had provisions
nor were his ships fit for the voyage.[213] But as he knew best what was
to be done, we held on our course until we came to Porto Bello, where
we were obliged to leave the ship Biscaina, on account of its leaky
condition, being all worm-eaten through and through. Steering along the
coast, we passed by the port we called Retrete, and a country near which
there were many small islands, which the admiral called Las Barbas, but
the Indians and pilots call that the territory of the cacique Pocorosa.
We held on this course ten more leagues to the last land we saw of the
continent, called Marmora, and on Monday, the first of May, 1503, we
stood to the north.... Although all the pilots said we should be east of
the Caribbee islands, yet the admiral feared we should not make Española,
which proved to be true.... We reached an Indian town on the coast of
Cuba, called Mataia, where, having obtained some refreshment, we sailed
for Jamaica.”[214]
On his return to the island of Jamaica, in June, 1503, Columbus,
describing his voyage along the isthmus of Darien, wrote to King
Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, saying: “On the thirteenth of May I reached
the province of Mango, which is contiguous to that of Cathay, and
thence I steered for the island of Española.”[215] Peter Martyr[216]
also seems to have held the opinion that Columbus’s explorations were
along the continent of Asia. Writing in 1510, the first decade of the
New World, he remarks: “The opinion of Christopher Columbus respecting
the magnitude of the sphere and the opinions of the ancients concerning
the under-navigation of the world seem to be adverse. Nevertheless the
parrots and many other things brought from there indicate that the
islands savor only of India, either being near it or else of the same
nature.”[217]
With this fourth voyage, the zealous and enthusiastic navigator ended
his life-work. On the twelfth of September, 1504, Columbus for the last
time set sail from the attractive field of his numerous explorations
and arrived at San Lucar, on the seventh of November, broken down in
health, aged, and the victim of many unjust accusations and bitter
disappointments. Two years afterward, on the twentieth of May, 1506, he
died at Valladolid, being about seventy years old, leaving to another the
discovery, by the way of the west, of a navigable route to the remote
coast of Cathay.
As intended by him, when he set sail on his first voyage, Columbus
afterward made a map on which he delineated “all the sea and the lands
of the ocean-sea” (_del mar Océanus_) discovered by him.[218] Although
the admiral’s chart is lost, there are several maps extant, which, in
part, represent the islands of Juana, Jamaica, Española, and the smaller
ones, as he evidently had outlined them on his new sailing chart (_carta
nueva de navegar_). A map of the world, in the Estense library, at
Modena, made between the years 1501 and 1504,[219] and the map of the
New World (_tabula terre nove_), in the edition of Ptolemy’s geography,
printed in 1513, at Strasburg,[220] exhibit the islands, discovered by
Columbus on his first voyage, and of which he speaks in his journal of
1492 and 1493. The high latitudes in which he placed the Rio de Mares and
other rivers of Juana, when he made his discoveries “toward the north,”
are designated on these maps. On the Ptolemy map the name _c doffun de
abril_ at the southeast point of Cuba appears to designate the same
cape as that of _c de fvndabril_ on the map of the world made by Johann
Ruysch, the German cartographer, contained in the edition of Ptolemy’s
geography, printed at Rome in 1508.[221] Both of these misspelled
names are evidently anomalous forms of the Spanish designation, _C. de
Fuenterabia_. The names on Ruysch’s representation of the island of Cuba
correspond more closely to the Spanish orthography of the designations
given by Columbus to the places he visited than those which are inscribed
on the two maps previously mentioned.[222]
The earliest map extant representing the territory discovered in
the western hemisphere is a map of the world drafted by the Spanish
cartographer, Juan de la Cosa.[223] It was found by Baron de Walckenaër
in the possession of a dealer in old books and wares, from whom he
bought it for a small sum of money. Baron von Humboldt shortly afterward
made its discovery known in his notable work on the geography of the
new continent.[224] When the library of Baron de Walckenaër was sold,
in Paris, in 1853, La Cosa’s map was purchased for the queen of Spain
for four thousand and twenty francs. It is now in the Naval museum, in
Madrid.[225] The famous map-maker drafted the whole world, as then known,
on an ox-hide, five feet nine inches long by three feet wide, on a scale
of fifteen Spanish leagues to a degree. The map is attractively colored
and brightened with gold. It may rightly be called the geographical
frontispiece of the history of the discovery of America.[226]
The map bears the inscription “_Juan de la cosa la fizo enel puerto de S:
mjᵃ en año de. 1500._”—Juan de la Cosa made it in the port of Santa Maria
in the year 1500. A picture of St. Christopher bearing the Christ-child
across the water ornaments the space above the inscription.[227] Most
prominent of the islands of the “Mar Oceanus” delineated on the map are
Cuba, Habacoa,[228] and La Española. The coast of South America, as
far as it had been explored, is well represented by the painstaking
map-maker.[229]
La Cosa, having seen a copy of the map made by Giovanni Caboto (John
Cabot), to display the fields of the English discoveries of 1497 and
1498, attempted to show in what part of the New World they were. As
outlined by him, the land explored by Cabot trends eastwardly from the
sea discovered for the English (_mar descubierta por inglese_), to the
Cape of England (Cavo de Inglaterra). As La Cosa had nothing else than
his imagination to guide him in delineating the coast of North America
between the field of the English discoveries and South America, his
extension of the main-land from the one to the other has no geographical
significance. Unable to determine definitely the position and extent of
the territory of the New World, La Cosa projected it as accurately as his
information respecting the explored parts of its sinuous coast gave him
knowledge. Ignorant of the limits of the New Land he honorably darkens
that part which might be deemed its cartographic development with several
shades of meaningless colors.[230]