THE ENCHANTED ISLANDS
Columbus did not intend to remain long at San Salvador. His landfall
there, although it signified the realisation of one part of his dream,
was only the starting-point of his explorations in the New World. Now
that he had made good his undertaking to "discover new lands," he had to
make good his assurance that they were full of wealth and would swell the
revenues of the King and Queen of Spain. A brief survey of this first
island was all he could afford time for; and after the first exquisite
impression of the white beach, and the blue curve of the bay sparkling in
the sunshine, and the soft prismatic colours of the acanthus beneath the
green wall of the woods had been savoured and enjoyed, he was anxious to
push on to the rich lands of the Orient of which he believed this island
to be only an outpost.
On the morning after his arrival the natives came crowding down to the
beach and got down their canoes, which were dug out of the trunk of a
single tree, and some of which were large enough to contain forty or
forty-five men: They came paddling out to the ship, sometimes, in the
case of the smaller canoes which only held one man, being upset by the
surf, and swimming gaily round and righting their canoes again and
bailing them out with gourds. They brought balls of spun cotton, and
parrots and spears. All their possessions, indeed, were represented in
the offerings they made to the strangers. Columbus, whose eye was now
very steadily fixed on the main chance, tried to find out if they had any
gold, for he noticed that some of them wore in their noses a ring that
looked as though it were made of that metal; and by making signs he asked
them if there was any more of it to be had. He understood them to say
that to the south of the island there dwelt a king who had large vessels
of gold, and a great many of them; he tried to suggest that some of the
natives should come and show him the way, but he "saw that they were not
interested in going."
The story of the Rheingold was to be enacted over again, and the whole of
the evils that followed in its glittering train to be exemplified in this
voyage of discovery. To the natives of these islands, who guarded the
yellow metal and loved it merely for its shining beauty, it was harmless
and powerless; they could not buy anything with it, nor did they seek by
its aid to secure any other enjoyments but the happiness of looking at it
and admiring it. As soon as the gold was ravished from their keeping,
however, began the reign of lust and cruelty that always has attended and
always will attend the knowledge that things can be bought with it. In
all its history, since first it was brought up from the dark bowels of
the earth to glitter in the light of day, there is no more significant
scene than this that took place on the bright sands of San Salvador so
long ago--Columbus attentively examining the ring in the nose of a happy
savage, and trying to persuade him to show him the place that it was
brought from; and the savage "not interested in going."
From his sign-conversation with the natives Columbus understood that
there was land to the south or the south-west, and also to the
north-west, and that the people from the north-west went to the
south-west in search of gold and precious stones. In the meantime he
determined to spend the Sunday in making a survey of the island, while
the rest of Saturday was passed in barterings with the natives, who were
very happy and curious to see all the strange things belonging to the
voyagers; and so innocent were their ideas of value that "they give all
they have for whatever thing may be given them." Columbus, however, who
was busy making calculations, would not allow the members of the crew to
take anything more on their own account, ordering that where any article
of commerce existed in quantity it was to be acquired for the sovereigns
and taken home to Spain.
Early on Sunday morning a boat was prepared from each ship, and a little
expedition began to row north about the island. As they coasted the
white rocky shores people came running to the beach and calling to them;
"giving thanks to God," says Columbus, although this is probably a flight
of fancy. When they saw that the boats were not coming to land they
threw themselves into the water and came swimming out to them, bringing
food and drink. Columbus noticed a tongue of land lying between the
north-west arm of the internal lagoon and the sea, and saw that by
cutting a canal through it entrance could be secured to a harbour that
would float "as many ships as there are in Christendom." He did not,
apparently, make a complete circuit of the island, but returned in the
afternoon to the ships, having first collected seven natives to take with
him, and got under way again; and before night had fallen San Salvador
had disappeared below the north-west horizon.
About midday he reached another island to the southeast. He sailed along
the coast until evening, when he saw yet another island in the distance
to the south-west; and he therefore lay-to for the night. At dawn the
next morning he landed on the island and took formal possession of it,
naming it Santa Maria de la Concepcion, which is the Rum Cay of the
modern charts. As the wind chopped round and he found himself on a
lee-shore he did not stay there, but sailed again before night. Two
of the unhappy prisoners from Guanahani at this point made good their
escape by swimming to a large canoe which one of the natives of the new
island had rowed out--a circumstance which worried Columbus not a
little; since he feared it would give him a bad name with the natives.
He tried to counteract it by loading with presents another native who
came to barter balls of cotton, and sending him away again.
The effect of all that he was seeing, of the bridge of islands that
seemed to be stretching towards the south-west and leading him to the
region of untold wealth, was evidently very stimulating and exciting to
Columbus. His Journal is almost incoherent where he attempts to set down
all he has got to say. Let us listen to him for a moment:
"These islands are very green and fertile, and the breezes are very
soft, and there may be many things which I do not know, because I
did not wish to stop, in order to discover and search many islands
to find gold. And since these people make signs thus, that they
wear gold on their arms and legs,--and it is gold, because I showed
them some pieces which I have,--I cannot fail, with the aid of our
Lord, in finding it where it is native. And being in the middle of
the gulf between these two islands, that is to say, the island of
Santa Maria and this large one, which I named Fernandina, I found a
man alone in a canoe who was going from the island of Santa Maria to
Fernandina, and was carrying a little of his bread which might have
been about as large as the fist, and a gourd of water, and a piece
of reddish earth reduced to dust and afterwards kneaded, and some
dry leaves--[Tobacco]--which must be a thing very much appreciated
among them, because they had already brought me some of them as a
present at San Salvador: and he was carrying a small basket of their
kind, in which he had a string of small glass beads and two blancas,
by which I knew that he came from the island of San Salvador, and
had gone from there to Santa Maria and was going to Fernandina. He
came to the ship: I caused him to enter it, as he asked to do so,
and I had his canoe placed on the ship and had everything which he
was carrying guarded and I ordered that bread and honey be given him
to eat and something to drink. And I will go to Fernandina thus and
will give him everything, which belongs to him, that he may give
good reports of us. So that, when your Highnesses send here, our
Lord pleasing, those who come may receive honour and the Indians
will give them of everything which they have."
This hurried gabbling about gold and the aid of our Lord, interlarded
with fragments of natural and geographical observation, sounds strangely
across the gulf of time and impresses one with a disagreeable sense of
bewildered greed--like that of a dog gulping at the delicacies in his
platter and unwilling to do justice to one for fear the others should
escape him; and yet it is a natural bewilderment, and one with which we
must do our best to sympathise.
Fernandina was the name which Columbus had already given to Long Island
when he sighted it from Santa Maria; and he reached it in the evening of
Tuesday, October 16th. The man in the canoe had arrived before him; and
the astute Admiral had the satisfaction of finding that once more his
cleverness had been rewarded, and that the man in the canoe had given
such glowing accounts of his generosity that there was no difficulty
about his getting water and supplies. While the barrels of water were
being filled he landed and strolled about in the pleasant groves,
observing the islanders and their customs, and finding them on the whole
a little more sophisticated than those of San Salvador. The women wore
mantillas on their heads and "little pieces of cotton" round their
loins-a sufficiently odd costume; and they appeared to Columbus to be a
little more astute than the other islanders, for though they brought
cotton in quantities to the ships they exacted payment of beads for it.
In the charm and wonder of his walk in this enchanted land he was able
for a moment to forget his hunger for gold and to admire the great
branching palm-trees, and the fish that
"are here so different from ours that it is wonderful. There are
some formed like cocks of the finest colours in the world, blue,
yellow, red and of all colours, and others tinted in a thousand
manners: and the colours are so fine, that there is not a man who
does not wonder at them, and who does not take great pleasure in
seeing them. Also, there are whales. I saw no beasts on land of
any kind except parrots and lizards. A boy told me that he saw a
large snake. I did not see sheep nor goats, nor any other beast;
although I have been here a very short time, as it is midday, still
if there had been any, I could not have missed seeing some."
Columbus was not a very good descriptive writer, and he has but two
methods of comparison; either a thing is like Spain, or it is not like
Spain. The verdure was "in such condition as it is in the month of May
in Andalusia; and the trees were all as different from ours as day from
night, and also the fruits and grasses and the stones and all the
things." The essay written by a cockney child after a day at the seaside
or in the country, is not greatly different from some of the verbatim
passages of this journal; and there is a charm in that fact too, for it
gives us a picture of Columbus, in spite of his hunt for gold and
precious stones, wandering, still a child at heart, in the wonders of the
enchanted world to which he had come.
There was trouble on this day, because some of the crew had found an
Indian with a piece of gold in his nose, and they got a scolding from
Columbus for not detaining him and bartering with him for it. There was
bad weather also, with heavy rain and a threatening of tempest; there was
a difference of opinion with Martin Alonso Pinzon about which way they
should go round the island: but the next day the weather cleared, and the
wind settled the direction of their course for them. Columbus, whose eye
never missed anything of interest to the sailor and navigator, notes thus
early a fact which appears in every book of sailing directions for the
Bahama Islands--that the water is so clear and limpid that the bottom can
be seen at a great depth; and that navigation is thus possible and even
safe among the rockstrewn coasts of the islands, when thus performed by
sight and with the sun behind the ship. He was also keenly alive to
natural charm and beauty in the new lands that he was visiting, and there
are unmistakable fragments of himself in the journal that speak
eloquently of his first impressions. "The singing of the little birds is
such that it appears a man would wish never to leave here, and the flocks
of parrots obscure the sun."
But life, even to the discoverer of a New World, does not consist of
wandering in the groves, and listening to the singing birds, and smelling
the flowers, and remembering the May nights of Andalusia. There was gold
to be found and the mainland of Cathay to be discovered, and a letter,
written by the sovereigns at his earnest request, to be delivered to the
Great Khan. The natives had told him of an island called Samoete to the
southward, which was said to contain a quantity of gold. He sailed
thither on the 19th, and called it Isabella; its modern name is Crooked
Island. He anchored here and found it to be but another step in the
ascending scale of his delight; it was greener and more beautiful than
any of the islands he had yet seen. He spent some time looking for the
gold, but could not find any; although he heard of the island of Cuba,
which he took to be the veritable Cipango. He weighed anchor on October
24th and sailed south-west, encountering some bad weather on the way; but
on Sunday the 28th he came up with the north coast of Cuba and entered
the mouth of a river which is the modern Nuevitas. To the island of Cuba
he gave the name of Juana in honour of the young prince to whom his son
Diego had been appointed a page.
If the other islands had seemed beautiful to him, Cuba seemed like heaven
itself. The mountains grandly rising in the interior, the noble rivers
and long sweeping plains, the headlands melting into the clear water, and
the gorgeous colours and flowers and birds and insects on land acted like
a charm on Columbus and his sailors. As they entered the river they
lowered a boat in order to go ahead and sound for an anchorage; and two
native canoes put off from the shore, but, when they saw the boat
approaching, fled again. The Admiral landed and found two empty houses
containing nets and hooks and fishing-lines, and one of the strange
silent dogs, such as they had encountered on the other island--dogs that
pricked their ears and wagged their tails, but that never barked. The
Admiral, in spite of his greed for gold and his anxiety to "free" the
people of the island, was now acting much more discreetly, and with the
genuine good sense which he always possessed and which was only sometimes
obscured. He would not allow anything in the empty houses to be
disturbed or taken away, and whenever he saw the natives he tried to show
them that he intended to do them no harm, and to win their good will by
making them presents of beads and toys for which he would take no return.
As he went on up the river the scenery became more and more enchanting,
so that he felt quite unhappy at not being able to express all the
wonders and beauties that he saw. In the pure air and under the serene
blue of the sky those matchless hues of blossom and foliage threw a
rainbow-coloured garment on either bank of the river; the flamingoes, the
parrots and woodpeckers and humming-birds calling to one another and
flying among the tree-tops, made the upper air also seem alive and shot
with all the colours of the rainbow. Humble Christopher, walking amid
these gorgeous scenes, awed and solemnised by the strangeness and
magnificence of nature around him, tries to identify something that he
knows; and thinks, that amid all these strange chorusings of unknown
birds, he hears the familiar note of a nightingale. Amid all his
raptures, however, the main chance is not forgotten; everything that he
sees he translates into some terms of practical utility. Just as on the
voyage out every seaweed or fish or flying bird that he saw was hailed by
him as a sign that land was near, so amid the beauty of this virgin world
everything that he sees is taken to indicate either that he is close upon
the track of the gold, or that he must be in Cipango, or that the natives
will be easy to convert to Christianity. In the fragrance of the woods
of Cuba, Columbus thought that he smelled Oriental spices, which Marco
Polo had described as abounding in Cipango; when he walked by the shore
and saw the shells of pearl oysters, he believed the island to be loaded
with pearls and precious stones; when he saw a scrap of tinsel or bright
metal adorning a native, he argued that there was a gold mine close at
hand. And so he went on in an increasing whirl of bewildering
enchantment from anchorage to anchorage and from island to island, always
being led on by that yellow will o'-the-wisp, gold, and always believing
that the wealth of the Orient would be his on the morrow. As he coasted
along towards the west he entered the river which he called Rio de Mares.
He found a large village here full of palm-branch houses furnished with
chairs and hammocks and adorned with wooden masks and statues; but in
spite of his gentleness and offer of gifts the inhabitants all fled to
the mountains, while he and his men walked curiously through the deserted
houses.
On Tuesday, October 30th, Martin Alonso Pinzon, whose communications the
Admiral was by this time beginning to dread, came with some exciting
news. It seemed that the Indians from San Salvador who were on board the
Pinta had told him that beyond the promontory, named by Columbus the Cape
of Palms, there was a river, four days' journey upon which would bring
one to the city of Cuba, which was very rich and large and abounded with
gold; and that the king of that country was at war with a monarch whom
they called Cami, and whom Pinzon identified with the Great Khan. More
than this, these natives assured him that the land they were on at
present was the mainland itself, and that they could not be very far from
Cathay. Columbus for once found himself in agreement with Martin Alonso.
The well-thumbed copy of Marco Polo was doubtless brought out, and
abundant evidence found in it; and it was decided to despatch a little
embassy to this city in order to gain information about its position and
wealth. When they continued their course, however, and rounded the cape,
no river appeared; they sailed on, and yet promontory after promontory
was opened ahead of them; and as the wind turned against them and the
weather was very threatening they decided to turn back and anchor again
in the Rio de Mares.
Columbus was now, as he thought, hot upon the track of the Great Khan
himself; and on the first of November he sent boats ashore and told the
sailors to get information from the houses; but the inhabitants fled
shyly into the woods. Having once postulated the existence of the Great
Khan in this immediate territory Columbus, as his habit was, found that
everything fitted with the theory; and he actually took the flight of the
natives, although it had occurred on a dozen other occasions, as a proof
that they mistook his bands of men for marauding expeditions despatched
by the great monarch himself. He therefore recalled them, and sent a
boat ashore with an Indian interpreter who, standing in the boat at the
edge of the water, called upon the natives to draw near, and harangued
them. He assured them of the peaceable intentions of the great Admiral,
and that he had nothing whatever to do with the Great Khan; which cannot
very greatly have thrilled the Cubans, who knew no more about the Great
Khan than they did about Columbus. The interpreter then swam ashore and
was well received; so well, that in the evening some sixteen canoes came
off to the ships bringing cotton yarn and spears for traffic. Columbus,
with great astuteness, forbade any trading in cotton or indeed in
anything at all except gold, hoping by this means to make the natives
produce their treasures; and he would no doubt have been successful if
the natives had possessed any gold, but as the poor wretches had nothing
but the naked skins they stood up in, and the few spears and pots and
rolls of cotton that they were offering, the Admiral's astuteness was for
once thrown away. There was one man, however, with a silver ring in his
nose, who was understood to say that the king lived four days' journey in
the interior, and that messengers had been sent to him to tell him of the
arrival of the strange ships; which messengers would doubtless soon
return bringing merchants with them to trade with the ships. If this
native was lying he showed great ingenuity in inventing the kind of story
that his questioners wanted; but it is more likely that his utterances
were interpreted by Columbus in the light of his own ardent beliefs. At
any rate it was decided to send at once a couple of envoys to this great
city, and not to wait for the arrival of the merchants. Two Spaniards,
Rodrigo de Jerez and Luis de Torres, the interpreter to the expedition
--who had so far found little use for his Hebrew and Chaldean--were chosen;
and with them were sent two Indians, one from San Salvador and the other
a local native who went as guide. Red caps and beads and hawks' bells
were duly provided, and a message for the king was given to them telling
him that Columbus was waiting with letters and presents from Spanish
sovereigns, which he was to deliver personally. After the envoys had
departed, Columbus, whose ships were anchored in a large basin of deep
water with a clean and steep beach, decided to take the opportunity of
having the vessels careened. Their hulls were covered with shell and
weed; the caulking, which had been dishonestly done at Palos, had also
to be attended to; so the ships were beached and hove down one at a time
--an unnecessary precaution, as it turned out, for there was no sign of
treachery on the part of the natives. While the men were making fires to
heat their tar they noticed that the burning wood sent forth a heavy
odour which was like mastic; and the Admiral, now always busy with
optimistic calculations, reckoned that there was enough in that vicinity
to furnish a thousand quintals every year. While the work on the ships
was going forward he employed himself in his usual way, going ashore,
examining the trees and vegetables and fruits, and holding such
communication as he was able with the natives. He was up every morning
at dawn, at one time directing the work of his men, at another going
ashore after some birds that he had seen; and as dawn comes early in
those islands his day was probably a long one, and it is likely that he
was in bed soon after dark. On the day that he went shooting, Martin
Alonso Pinzon was waiting for him on his return; this time not to make
any difficulties or independent proposals, but to show him two pieces of
cinnamon that one of his men had got from an Indian who was carrying a
quantity of it. "Why did the man not get it all from him?" says greedy
Columbus. "Because of the prohibition of the Admiral's that no one
should do any trading," says Martin Alonso, and conceives himself to have
scored; for truly these two men do not love one another. The boatswain
of the Pinta, adds Martin Alonso, has found whole trees of it. "The
Admiral then went there and found that it was not cinnamon." The Admiral
was omnipotent; if he had said that it was manna they would have had to
make it so, and as he chose to say that it was not cinnamon, we must take
his word for it, as Martin Alonso certainly had to do; so that it was the
Admiral who scored this time. Columbus, however, now on the track of
spices, showed some cinnamon and pepper to the natives; and the obliging
creatures "said by signs that there was a great deal of it towards the
south-east." Columbus then showed them some gold and pearls; and
"certain old men" replied that in a place they called Bo-No there was any
amount of gold; the people wore it in their ears and on their arms and
legs, and there were pearls also, and large ships and merchandise--all to
the south-east. Finding this information, which was probably entirely
untrue and merely a polite effort to do what was expected of them, well
received, the natives added that "a long distance from there, there were
men with one eye, and other men with dogs' snouts who ate men, and that
when they caught a man they beheaded him and drank his blood" . . .
Soon after this the Admiral went on board again and began to write up his
Journal, solemnly entering all these facts in it. It is the most
childish nonsense; but after all, how interesting and credible it must
have been! To live thus smelling the most heavenly perfumes, breathing
the most balmy air, viewing the most lovely scenes, and to be always hot
upon the track of gold and pearls and spices and wealth and dog-nosed,
blood-drinking monstrosities--what an adventure, what a vivid piece of
living!
After a few days--on Tuesday, November 6th--the two men who had been sent
inland to the great and rich city came back again with their report.
Alas for visions of the Great Khan! The city turned out to be a village
of fifty houses with twenty people in each house. The envoys had been
received with great solemnity; and all the men "as well as the women"
came to see them, and lodged them in a fine house. The chief people in
the village came and kissed their hands and feet, hailing them as
visitors from the skies, and seating them in two chairs, while they sat
round on the floor. The native interpreter, doubtless according to
instructions, then told them "how the Christians lived and how they were
good people"; and I would give a great deal to have heard that brief
address. Afterwards the men went out and the women came in, also kissing
the hands and feet of the visitors, and "trying them to see if they were
of flesh and of bone like themselves." The results were evidently so
satisfactory that the strangers were implored to remain at least five
days. The real business of the expedition was then broached. Had they
any gold or pearls? Had they any cinnamon or spices? Answer, as usual:
"No, but they thought there was a great deal of it to the south-east."
The interest of the visitors then evaporated, and they set out for the
coast again; but they found that at least five hundred men and women
wanted to come with them, since they believed that they were returning to
heaven. On their journey back the two Spaniards noticed many people
smoking, as the Admiral himself had done a few days before; and this is
the first known discovery of tobacco by Europeans.
They saw a great many geese, and the strange dogs that did not bark, and
they saw potatoes also, although they did not know what they were.
Columbus, having heard this report, and contemplating these gentle
amiable creatures, so willing to give all they had in return for a scrap
of rubbish, feels his heart lifted in a pious aspiration that they might
know the benefits of the Christian religion. "I have to say, Most Serene
Princes," he writes,
"that by means of devout religious persons knowing their language
well, all would soon become Christians: and thus I hope in our Lord
that Your Highnesses will appoint such persons with great diligence
in order to turn to the Church such great peoples, and that they
will convert them, even as they have destroyed those who would not
confess the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit: and after their
days, as we are all mortal, they will leave their realms--in a very
tranquil condition and freed from heresy and wickedness, and will be
well received before the Eternal Creator, Whom may it please to give
them a long life and a great increase of larger realms and
dominions, and the will and disposition to spread the holy Christian
religion, as they have done up to the present time, Amen. To-day I
will launch the ship and make haste to start on Thursday, in the
name of God, to go to the southeast and seek gold and spices, and
discover land."
Thus Christopher Columbus, in the Name of God,
November 11, 1492.