NOMBRE DE DIOS, PORTO BELLO AND SAN LORENZO
Within twenty miles, at the very most, east and west of Colon lie the
chief existing memorials of the bygone days of Spanish discovery and
colonization, and English adventurous raids and destruction, on the
Isthmus. All that is picturesque and enthralling--that is to say, all
that is stirring, bloody, and lawless--in the history of the Caribbean
shore of the Isthmus lies thus adjacent to the Atlantic entrance of the
Canal. To the east are Nombre de Dios and Porto Bello--the oldest
European settlements on the North American continent, the one being
founded about 1510, almost a century and a half before the landing at
Plymouth, and the other in 1607, the very year of the planting of
Jamestown, Virginia. To the west is the castle of San Lorenzo at the
mouth of the Chagres, the gateway to the Pacific trade, built in the
latter years of the sixteenth century and repeatedly destroyed. About
these Spanish outposts, once thriving market towns and massive
fortresses, but now vine-covered ruins where “the lion and the lizard
keep their court” clusters a wealth of historical lore.
Let us for the time turn from the Panama of today, and from speculation
as to its future, and look back upon the Panama of the past. It is a
past too full of incident, too replete with stories of battle, murder
and sudden death for full justice to be done to it in a chapter.
Volumes, libraries almost, have been written about it, for Panama is not
one of the happy countries without a history. Of that history the survey
here is necessarily the most cursory.
[Illustration: MODERN PORTO BELLO PROM ACROSS THE BAY]
Twenty miles from Colon to the east is the spacious deep water harbor of
Porto Bello, visited and named by Columbus in 1502. Earlier still it had
harbored the ships of Roderigo de Bastides who landed there in
1500--probably the first European to touch Panama soil. He sought the
strait to the Indies, and gold as well. A few miles east and north of
Porto Bello is Nombre de Dios, one of the earliest Spanish settlements
but now a mere cluster of huts amidst which the Canal workers were only
recently dredging sand for use in construction. Few visit Nombre de Dios
for purposes of curiosity and indeed it is little worth visiting, for
fires, floods and the shifting sands of the rivers have obliterated all
trace of the old town. The native village consisted of about 200 huts
when the American invasion occurred, but a spark from one of the engines
set off the dry thatch of one of the huts and a general conflagration
ensued. The Americans have since repaired the damages, to the sanitary
advantage of the place, but at heavy cost to its picturesqueness.
[Illustration: TYPICAL NATIVE HUT IN PORTO BELLO DISTRICT]
For that quality you must look to its past, for it figured largely in
the bloody life of the Isthmus in the 16th century. It was founded by
one Don Diego de Nicuesa, who had held the high office of Royal Carver
at Madrid. Tired of supervising the carving of meats for his sovereign
he sailed for the Isthmus to carve out a fortune for himself.
Hurricanes, treachery, jealousy, hostile Indians, mutinous sailors and
all the ills that jolly mariners have to face had somewhat abated his
jollity and his spirit as well when he rounded Manzanillo Point and
finding himself in a placid bay exclaimed: “_Detengamonos aqui, en
nombre de Dios_” (Let us stop here in the name of God). His crew,
superstitious and pious as Spanish sailors were in those days, though
piety seldom interfered with their profanity or piracy, seized on the
devout invocation and Nombre de Dios became the name of the port.
The town thus named became for a time the principal Spanish port on the
Caribbean coast and one of the two terminals of the royal road to Old
Panama. But the harbor was poor, the climate sickly, for the town was
shut in on the landward side by mountains which excluded the breeze. It
came to be called the Spanish Graveyard. Children died in infancy, and
Spanish mothers sent theirs to Cruces to be reared. Difficult of defense
by either land or sea it was menaced alternately by the Cimmaroons and
the English, and in 1572 Sir Francis Drake took it by assault but
gained little profit by the adventure, in which he nearly lost his life.
Warned by this, and by other attacks, a distinguished Spanish engineer
was sent to examine Nombre de Dios with other Caribbean ports.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO PORTO BELLO HARBOR, FROM SPANISH FORT]
He was impressed by Porto Bello and reported “if it might please your
Majesty it were well that the city of Nombre de Dios be brought and
builded in this harbor.” It was so graciously ordered and the “city”
having been “brought and builded” at Porto Bello its old site gradually
relapsed into wilderness save for the few huts found when the American
engineers descended upon it seeking not gold but sand. In the course of
this quest they uncovered an old Spanish galleon but did not report any
pieces of eight, ingots or doubloons. Indeed looking all over the Canal
work we may well say, never was there so much digging for so little
treasure, for even in the great Culebra cut no trace of precious metal
was found.
Nombre de Dios then affords little encouragement for the visits of
tourists, but Porto Bello, nearer Colon, is well worth a visit. The
visit however is not easily made. The trip by sea is twenty miles
steaming in the open Caribbean which is always rough, and which on this
passage seems to any save the most hardened navigators tempestuous
beyond all other oceans. There are, or rather were, no regular lines of
boats running from Colon and one desiring to visit the historic spot
must needs plead with the Canal Commission for a pass on the government
tug which makes the voyage daily. The visit is well worth the trouble
however for the ruins are among the finest on the American continent,
while the bay itself is a noble inlet. So at least Columbus thought it
when he first visited it in 1502. His son, Fernando, who afterwards
wrote of this fourth voyage of the Genoese navigator, tells of this
visit thus:
[Illustration: BULLOCK CART ON THE SAVANNA ROAD]
[Illustration: MODERN INDIAN, DARIEN REGION
Note characteristic weapons--machete, javelin and shot-gun]
“The Admiral without making any stay went on till he put into Puerto
Bello, giving it that name because it is large, well peopled and
encompassed by a well cultivated country. He entered the place on the
2nd of November (1502), passing between two small islands within which
ships may lie close to the shore and turn it out (sic) if they have
occasion. The country about the harbor, higher up, is not very rough but
tilled and full of houses, a stone’s throw or a bow shot one from the
other; and it looks like the finest landscape a man can imagine. During
seven days we continued there, on account of the rain and ill weather,
there came continually canoes from all the country about to trade, for
provisions, and bottoms of fine spun cotton which they gave for some
trifles such as points and pins.”
Time changes, and things and places change with it. What are “bottoms of
fine spun cotton” and “trifles such as points”? As for the people whose
houses then so plentifully besprinkled the landscape round about, they
have largely vanished. Slain in battle, murdered in cold blood, or
enslaved and worked to death by the barbarous Spaniards, they have given
place to a mongrel race mainly negro, and of them even there are not
enough to give to Porto Bello today the cheery, well populated air which
the younger Columbus noticed more than 400 years ago.
The real foundation date of Porto Bello is fixed at 1607, though
probably the moving thither of Nombre de Dios began earlier. Its full
name in Spanish was San Felipe de Puertovello, for the pious Spaniards
were hard put to it to name a city, a mountain, a cape or a carouse
without bringing in a saint. Typically enough San Felipe was soon
forgotten and the name became Puerto Bello or beautiful harbor. It grew
rapidly, for, as already noted, the city of Nombre de Dios was reërected
there. By 1618 there were 130 houses in the main town not counting the
suburbs, a cathedral, governor’s house, kings’ houses, a monastery,
convent of mercy and hospital, a plaza and a quay. The main city was
well-built, partly of stone or brick, but the suburbs, one of which was
set aside for free negroes, were chiefly of wattled canes with palm
thatch. A few plantations and gardens bordered on the city, but mainly
the green jungle came down to the very edge as it does with Chagres,
Cruces or other native towns today.
It was the Atlantic port of entry for not Panama alone, but for the
entire west coast of South America and for merchandise intended for the
Philippines. Its great days were of course the times of the annual fairs
which lasted from 40 to 60 days, but even at other times there were 40
vessels and numbers of flat boats occupied in the trade of the port. Yet
it was but an outpost in the jungle after all. No man alone dared tread
the royal road from the city’s gate after nightfall. In the streets
snakes, toads and the ugly iguana, which the natives devour eagerly,
were frequently to be seen. The native wild cat--called grandiloquently
a lion or a tiger--prowled in the suburbs and, besides carrying off
fowls and pigs, sometimes attacked human beings. The climate was better
than that of Nombre de Dios yet sufficiently unhealthful. Child-birth
was so often fatal and the rearing of children attended with so much
mortality that all mothers who were able resorted to Panama or Cruces at
such a time.
It was for a time a considerable market place and for the privilege of
trading there the brokers paid into the public coffer 2,000 ducats a
year. Another source of revenue was a tax of two reales on each head of
cattle slaughtered in the shambles--a tax still retained in form in the
Republic of Panama. He who brought in a negro slave had to pay two pesos
for the privilege and from this impost a revenue of some $1,000 a year
was obtained, most of which was used in cutting down the jungle and in
maintaining roads.
[Illustration: NATIVE FAMILY IN CHORRERA]
Before Porto Bello had even the beginnings of a town, before even the
settlement at Nombre de Dios had been begun, there landed at the former
port a Spaniard to whom the Isthmus gave immortality and a violent
death--two gifts of fortune which not uncommonly go hand in hand. Vasco
Nunez de Balboa was with Bastides in the visit which preceded that of
Columbus. Thereby he gained a knowledge of the coast and a taste for
seafaring adventure. Having tried to be a planter at Santo Domingo and
failed therein, he gave his creditors the slip by being carried in a
barrel aboard a ship about to explore the Panama coast under the
Bachelor Encisco. Though they laughed at him for a time as “_el hombre
de casco_”, “the man in a cask”, his new companions in time came to
accept his leadership and ultimately discarded that of Encisco, for
besides gallantry Balboa possessed a genius for intrigue. Except for his
great achievement of the discovery of the Pacific, and his genius in
making friends of the tribes he had subdued, Balboa’s career does not
differ greatly from that of the leaders of other remorseless Spanish
hordes who harried the hapless people of Central America, robbing,
enslaving and murdering them with brutal indifference to their rights
and totally callous to their sufferings. One can hardly read of the
Spaniards in Central America and Peru without sympathizing somewhat with
the Indian cacique who, having captured two of the marauders, fastened
them to the ground, propped open their jaws and poured molten gold down
their throats saying the while: “Here’s gold, Spaniards! Here’s gold.
Take a plenty; drink it down! Here’s more gold.”
[Illustration: SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RUIN AT PORTO BELLO
This edifice, still well preserved, is believed to be the Casa Real, or
Custom House]
Balboa was a pacifier as well as a fighter and it is recorded of him
that even on the warpath he was not unnecessarily brutal. Indeed one
cacique whom he overthrew was so impressed with his forbearance that he
entered into alliance with the Spaniard and gave him his favorite
daughter. Though he never married the girl Balboa “always lov’d and
cherish’d her very much”, according to Herrera, which is perhaps more
than some wives get with a wedding ceremony.
To anyone who has seen the Isthmian country as it is today, when the
stateliest native house is but a hut, and when it would appear that the
barest necessities of life are all that are sought by its people, the
story told by Herrera, the official historian of the Spanish court,
suggests a pitiful deterioration in the standard of native life. Of the
home and village of Comagre, the greatest cacique of the Darien region,
he writes:
“His palace was more remarkable and better built than any that had yet
been seen either on the Islands, or the little that was known of the
Continent, being 150 paces in length and eighty in breadth ... so
beautifully wrought that the Spaniards were amaz’d at the sight of it
and could not express the Manner and Curiosity of it. There were in it
several Chambers and Apartments and one that was like a Buttery was full
of such Provisions as the Country afforded, as Bread, Venison, Swine’s
Flesh, etc. There was another large Room like a Cellar full of earthen
Vessels, containing Several sorts of white and red Liquors made of
Indian Wheat, Roots, a kind of Palm-Tree and other Ingredients, the
which the Spaniards commended when they drank them!”
[Illustration: _Canal Commission Photo._
STREET IN MODERN PORTO BELLO]
How ingenuous the historian’s closing line! Doubtless the Spaniards
commended as lavishly as they drank. The blood they shed, the gold they
stole, the houses they burned, the women they violated and the Indians
they foully tortured and murdered form a long count in the indictment of
civilization against Spain in Central America and the West Indies. That
today the Spanish flag waves over not one foot of the territory ravaged
by Pizarro, Nicuesa, Cortez, Balboa, and Pedrarias is but the slenderest
of justice--the visitation upon the children of the sins of their
fathers. It is fair to say that of all the ruffianly spoliators Vasco
Nuñez de Balboa was the least criminal. If he fought savagely to
overthrow local caciques, he neither tortured, enslaved nor slew them
after his victory, but rather strove to make them his friends. He left
the provinces somewhat depleted of gold and pearls after his visits, but
one of the evidences of the complete lack of the cultivating grace of
civilization among the Indians was that they did not care so much for
these gewgaws as they did for their lives, the honor of their women and
their liberty. This would of course stamp them as sheer barbarians on
Fifth Avenue or the Rue de la Paix.
[Illustration: ANCIENT TRAIL FROM PORTO BELLO
Over this trail Balboa may have led his men on the march that led to the
still unknown Pacific]
As a matter of fact the Indian scorn of the Spanish greed for gold was
the cause of Balboa’s first hearing of the Pacific Ocean. He had made an
alliance with Careta, a cacique of some power, who gave his daughter to
Balboa, together with 70 slaves and about 4000 ounces of gold. As usual
the Spaniards were quarreling over the plunder, when a son of the
cacique, one Panciano, strode amongst them and, kicking the gold out of
his way, addressed them in language thus reported by the historian
Quintana:
“Christians! why quarrel and make so much turmoil about a little gold,
which nevertheless you melt down from beautifully wrought work into rude
bars? Is it for such a trifle that you banish yourselves from your
country, cross the seas, endure hardships and disturb the peaceful
nations of these lands? Cease your unseemly brawl and I will show you a
country where you may obtain your fill of gold. Six days’ march across
yonder country will bring you to an ocean sea like this near which we
dwell, where there are ships a little less in size than yours, with
sails and oars, and where the people eat out of vessels of gold and have
large cities and wealth unbounded.”
In the light of our later knowledge we know that he referred to the
Pacific and to Peru. At the conclusion of his address he volunteered to
lead the Spaniards to the unknown sea, provided they first would aid him
and his father in the overthrow of a hostile tribe, and further that
they increase their own numbers to 1000 men, for he foresaw hard
fighting.
To recuperate his force and add to it Balboa returned to his base at
Santa Maria. Here he found trouble of divers kinds. Part of his men were
mutinous. Letters from friends at Madrid told that his enemies there
were conspiring for his undoing--had even caused a new governor to be
sent out to replace him, with orders to send him home for trial. But the
most immediate danger was an Indian plot to raid and wholly obliterate
the Spanish town--an enterprise which we can hardly blame the oppressed
aborigines for cherishing.
An Indian girl, whom a cavalier had first converted to Catholicism, then
baptized and then taken for his mistress, revealed the plot to her
lover. It had been told her by her brother who, knowing of the wrath to
come, in the quaint language of Peter Martyr, “admonyshed her at the
days appoynted by sume occasion to convey herselfe oute of the way leste
shee shuld bee slayne in the confusion of bataile.” Instead of doing
this the faithless one, “forgettinge her parentes, her countrie and all
her friendes, yea and all the kinges into whose throates Vaschus had
thrust his sworde, she opened uppe the matter unto hym, and conceled
none of those things which her undiscrete broother had declared unto
her.”
[Illustration: _Canal Commission Photo_
SPANISH FORT AT ENTRANCE TO PORTO BELLO HARBOR]
Balboa was never accused of hesitation. The girl was forced to reveal
her brother’s hiding place. He was put to the torture and the
information thus extorted enabled the Spaniards to strike at once and
strike hard. With 150 men he went into the Indian territory of Darien,
surprised the natives and put them to total rout. The almost invariable
victories of the Spaniards, except when they were taken by surprise, do
not indicate superior valor on their part. To begin with they carried
fire arms which affrighted the Indians as well as slaughtered them.
Further, they wore partial armor--leather jerkins, helmets and cuirasses
of steel--so that the unhappy aborigines were not only exposed to
missiles, the nature of which they could not comprehend, but saw their
own arrows and javelins fall useless from a fairly struck target. In
one battle the Indians were even reduced to meeting their foes with
wooden swords, and, after the inevitable victory, one of the victors to
further impress the vanquished with the futility of their defensive
weapons ordered the fallen chief to stretch forth his right arm, and
with one blow struck it off.
The Indians were superstitious. Anything out of the ordinary filled them
with dread. Many refused to stand and fight because Balboa rode into
battle on a white horse. Some trained blood hounds that the Spaniards
took into battle with them also terrified them. Doing battle with them
in the open was almost like slaughtering sheep. Only in ambush were they
formidable. It may be noted in passing that not all the barbarities were
on the Spanish side. One of Balboa’s most trusted lieutenants, Valdivia,
was caught in a tempest and his ship wrecked. Those who escaped were
captured by the natives, penned up and fattened for a cannibal feast.
The day of festivity arriving Valdivia and four of his companions were
conducted to the temple and there offered up a sacrifice. Their hearts
were cut out with knives of obsidian and offered to the gods while their
bodies were roasted and devoured by the savages.
News from Madrid convinced Balboa that he was in disfavor at court. Some
great exploit was needed to reëstablish his prestige. He determined to
seek without delay that new sea of which he had been told, and to this
end gathered an army of 190 Spaniards and about 1,000 Indians. A pack of
the trained European war dogs were taken along. The old chroniclers tell
singular tales about these dogs. Because of the terror they inspired
among the Indians they were held more formidable than an equal number of
soldiers. One great red dog with a black muzzle and extraordinary
strength was endowed with the rank of a captain and drew the pay of his
rank. In battle the brutes pursued the fleeing Indians and tore their
naked bodies with their fangs. It is gravely reported that the Captain
could distinguish between a hostile and a friendly native.
[Illustration: _Photo, Prof. Otto Lutz_
A GROUP OF CHOLO INDIANS]
It is practically impossible to trace now the exact line followed by
Balboa across the Isthmus. Visitors to the Canal Zone are shown Balboa
Hill, named in honor of his achievement, from which under proper
climatic conditions one can see both oceans. But it is wholly improbable
that Balboa ever saw this hill. His route was farther to the eastward
than the Zone. We do know however that he emerged from the jungle at
some point on the Gulf of San Miguel. What or where the hill was from
which with “eagle eyes he star’d at the Pacific” we can only guess. It
was one of the elevations in the province of Quareque, and before
attaining it Balboa fought a battle with the Indians of that tribe who
vastly outnumbered his force, but were not armed to fight Spaniards.
“Even as animals are cut up in the shambles,” according to the account
of Peter Martyr, “so our men, following them, hewed them in pieces; from
one an arm, from another a leg, here a buttock, there a shoulder.” The
chief Porque and 600 of his followers were slain and as usual dead and
living were robbed of their golden jewelry.
[Illustration: NATIVES GRINDING RICE IN A MORTAR OWNED BY ALL
It never occurred to the Indians to let one man own the mortar and
charge all others for its use]
Balboa’s force of Spaniards was now reduced to 67 men; the rest were
laid up by illness, but notwithstanding the ghastly total of Indian
lives taken, no Spaniard had been slain. With these he proceeded a day’s
journey, coming to a hill whence his native guides told him the
sought-for sea might be seen. Ordering his men to stay at the base he
ascended the hill alone, forcing his way through the dense underbrush
under the glaring tropical sun of a September day. Pious chroniclers set
down that he fell on his knees and gave thanks to his Creator--an act of
devotion which coming so soon after his slaughter of the Quarequa
Indians irresistibly recalls the witticism at the expense of the Pilgrim
Fathers, that on landing they first fell upon their knees and then upon
the aborigines. Whatever his spirit, Balboa never failed in the letter
of piety. His band of cut-throats being summoned to the hilltop joined
the official priest in chanting the “Te Deum Laudamus” and “Te Dominum
confitur.” Crosses were erected buttressed with stones which captive
Indians, still dazed by the slaughter of their people, helped to heap.
The names of all the Spaniards present were recorded. In fact few
historic exploits of so early a day are so well authenticated as the
details of Balboa’s triumph.
[Illustration: _Photo T. J. Marine._
FAMILY TRAVEL ON THE PANAMA TRAIL]
Descending the hill they proceeded with their march for they were then
but half way to their goal. Once again they had to fight the jungle and
its savage denizens. Later exploring parties, even in our own day, have
found the jungle alone invincible. Steel, gunpowder and the bloodhounds
opened the way, and the march continued while the burden of gold
increased daily. It is curious to read of the complete effrontery with
which these land pirates commandeered all the gold there was in sight.
From Comagre were received 4000 ounces--“a gift”; from Panca, ten
pounds; Chiapes disgorged 500 pounds to purchase favor; from Cocura 650
pesos worth of the yellow metal and from Tumaco 640 pesos besides two
basins full of pearls of which 240 were of extraordinary size. The names
of these dead and gone Indian chiefs signify nothing today, but this
partial list of contributions shows that as a collector Balboa was as
efficient as the Wiskinkie of Tammany Hall. Not counting pearls and
girls--of both of which commodities large store was gathered up--the
spoil of the expedition exceeded 40,000 pesos in value.
It was September 29, 1513, that at last Balboa and his men reached the
Pacific. Being St. Michael’s day they named the inlet of the sea they
had attained the Gulf of St. Michael. On their first arrival they found
they had reached the sea, but not the water, for the tide which at that
point rises and falls twenty feet, was out and a mile or more of muddy
beach interspersed with boulders intervened between them and the water’s
edge. So they sat down until the tide had returned when Balboa waded in
thigh deep and claimed land and sea, all its islands and its boundaries
for the King of Spain. After having thus performed the needful
theatrical ceremonies, he returned to the practical by leading his men
to the slaughter of some neighboring Indians whose gold went to swell
the growing hoard.
The Spaniards made their way along the Pacific coast to a point that
must have been near the present site of Panama City, for it is recorded
that on a clear day they could see the Pearl Islands in the offing.
Balboa wanted mightily to raid these islands, but felt it more prudent
to hasten back to the Atlantic coast and send reports of his discovery
and tribute of his gold to the King before his enemies should wholly
undo him. So he made his way back, fighting and plundering new tribes
all the way and leaving the natives seemingly cowed, but actually full
of hatred. They had learned the folly of standing against the white
man’s arms. “Who that had any brains,” asked one chieftain touching
Balboa’s sword, “would contend against this macana which at one blow can
cleave a man in two?”
[Illustration: DESERTED NATIVE HUT
Note the profusion of pineapples growing wild, without further attention
they will thrive and multiply]
The return was made to Antigua where Balboa was received with loud
acclaim. Indeed he had accomplished the incredible. Not only had he
discovered a new ocean, not only had he brought home booty worth a
dukedom, but in the height of the rainy season he had marched 190 men
through the unknown jungle, fighting pitched battles almost every day,
taking food and drink where he could find it or going without, and
finally brought all back without losing a man. No expedition since, even
the peaceful scientific or surveying ones of our own days, has equaled
this record. He had left the Indians pacified, if resentful, and the
letter which he sent off to King Ferdinand was a modest report of a most
notable achievement. “In all his long letter,” says Peter Martyr, “there
is not a single leaf written which does not contain thanks to Almighty
God for deliverance from perils and preservation from many imminent
dangers.”
But Vasco Nunez de Balboa now approached the unhappy and undeserved
close of a glorious career. As his letter went slowly across the seas
in a clumsy galleon to Spain, one Pedrarias with a commission to govern
Balboa’s province and to deal out summary justice to Balboa, who had
been represented to the King as a treacherous villain, was on the
Atlantic making for the New World. When Ferdinand received Balboa’s
letter he would have given much to recall his hasty commission to
Pedrarias, but there was no wireless in those days, and the new
governor, with power of life and death over Balboa, was now well out at
sea.
The blow did not fall at once. On arrival at Santa Maria de la Antigua
in June, 1514, Pedrarias sent a courier to Balboa to announce his coming
and his authority. The devoted followers of Vasco Nunez were for
resisting the latter, assuring him that the King could not have received
the report of his notable discovery, else he would not thus have been
supplanted. Balboa however submitted gracefully, promising the newcomer
implicit obedience. Pedrarias, though charged to try Balboa for treason,
concealed his orders until he had gathered all the useful information
that the old chieftain could impart and won many of his followers to his
own personal support. Then he arrested Balboa and put him on trial, only
to have him triumphantly acquitted. Pedrarias was disgusted. He hated
Balboa and feared his influence in the colony. For his own part he was
tearing down the little kingdom his predecessor had erected.
[Illustration: WHAT THEY STILL CALL A ROAD IN PANAMA]
Balboa had fought the Indian tribes to their knees, then placated them,
freed them without torture and made them his allies. Pedrarias applied
the methods of the slave trader to the native population. Never was such
misery heaped upon an almost helpless foe, save when later his apt pupil
Pizarro invaded Peru. The natives were murdered, enslaved, robbed,
starved. As Bancroft says, “in addition to gold there were always women
for baptism, lust and slavery.” The whole Isthmus blazed with war, and
where Balboa had conquered without losing a man Pedrarias lost 70 in one
campaign. One of these raids was into the territory now known as the
Canal Zone. On one raid Balboa complained to the King there “was
perpetrated the greatest cruelty ever heard of in Arabian or Christian
country in any generation. And it is this. The captain and the surviving
Christians, while on this journey, took nearly 100 Indians of both
sexes, mostly women and children, fastened them with chains and
afterwards ordered them to be decapitated and scalped.”
[Illustration: OUTDOOR LIFE OF THE NATIVES
The tree is a mango so loaded with fruit that the boughs droop. The
fruit is seldom liked by others than natives]
Ill feeling rapidly increased between Pedrarias and Balboa. The former
with the jealousy and timidity of an old man continually suspected
Balboa of plotting against him. His suspicion was not allayed when royal
orders arrived from Spain creating Balboa adelantado and governor of the
newly discovered Pacific coast. The title sounded well but he would have
to fight to establish his government over the Indians and even then
Pedrarias would be his superior. But he determined to make the effort,
though with the whole Isthmus in war-paint because of the cruelties of
Pedrarias he would have to fight every inch of his way. Moreover he
tried to carry across the isthmus the hulls of four brigantines,
constructed on the Atlantic coast and designed to be put together on the
Pacific. Just why he attempted this exploit is perplexing, for there
were as good timber and better harbors for shipyards on the Pacific
side. Nearly 2000 Indian lives were sacrificed in the heart-rending task
of carrying these heavy burdens through the jungle, and when the task
was ended it was found that the timbers of two of the ships were
useless, having been honeycombed by worms. Two however were seaworthy
and with them he put forth into the Pacific, but a great school of
whales encountered near the Pearl Islands, where even today they are
frequently seen, affrighted his men who made him turn back.
In his party was a man who had fallen in love with Balboa’s beautiful
mistress, the daughter of the Indian cacique Careta. She had been
annoyed by his advances and complained to Vasco Nunez, who warned the
man to desist, accompanying the warning with remarks natural to the
situation. This man overheard a conversation, really concerning some
pitch and iron for the ships but which might be distorted to convey the
impression that Balboa was plotting the overthrow of Pedrarias. By an
unlucky chance the eavesdropper was chosen as one of a party to carry
dispatches to Pedrarias, and had no sooner reached the presence of that
bloodthirsty old conquistadore than he denounced Balboa as a traitor.
Moreover he roused the old man’s vanity by telling him that Balboa was
so infatuated with his mistress that he would never marry the governor’s
daughter--a marriage which had been arranged and announced as an affair
of state.
In a rage Pedrarias determined to put an end to Balboa. Accordingly he
wrote a pleasant letter, beseeching him to come to Santa Maria for a
conference. That Balboa came willingly is evidence enough that he had no
guilty knowledge of any plot. Before he reached his destination however
he was met by Pizarro with an armed guard who arrested him. No word of
his could change the prearranged program. He was tried but even the
servile court which convicted him recommended mercy, which the malignant
Pedrarias refused. Straightway, upon the verdict the great explorer,
with four of his men condemned with him, was marched to the scaffold in
the Plaza, where stood the block. In a neighboring hut, pulling apart
the wattled canes of which it was built that he might peer out while
himself unseen Pedrarias gloated at the sight of the blood of the man
whom he hated with the insane hatred of a base and malignant soul. There
the heads of the four were stricken off, and with the stroke died Vasco
Nunez de Balboa, the man whose name more than any other man’s deserves
to be linked with that of Columbus in the history of the Isthmus of
Panama. It was in 1517, and Balboa was but forty-two years old.
[Illustration: NATIVE HUT AND OPEN-AIR KITCHEN]
Had the bungling and cruel Pedrarias never been sent to the Isthmus that
part of the country known as the Darien might by now be as civilized as
the Chiriqui province. As it was, the thriving settlements of Acla and
Antigua languished and disappeared, and the legacy of hatred left by the
Indians of that day is so persistent that the white man has never been
able to establish himself on the eastern end of the Isthmus.
[Illustration: COCOANUT GROVE ON THE CARIBBEAN COAST]
Fate has dealt harshly with the memory of Balboa. Keats, in his best
known and most quoted sonnet, gives credit for his discovery to Cortez.
Local tradition has bestowed his name on a hill he never saw, and
Panamanian financial legislation has given his name to a coin which is
never coined--existing as a fictitious unit like our mill. He did not
himself realize the vastness of his discovery, and gave the misleading
name of the South Sea to what was the Pacific Ocean. But time is making
its amends. History will accord with the verdict of John Fiske who said
of him:
“Thus perished in the forty-second year of his age the man who, but for
that trifle of iron and pitch, would probably have been the conqueror of
Peru. It was a pity that such work should not have fallen into his
hands, for when at length it was done, it was by men far inferior to him
in character and caliber. One cannot but wish that he might have gone on
his way like Cortez, and worked out the rest of his contemplated career
in accordance with the genius that was in him. That bright attractive
figure and its sad fate can never fail to arrest the attention and
detain the steps of the historian as he passes by. Quite possibly the
romantic character of the story may have thrown something of a glamour
about the person of the victim, so that unconsciously we tend to
emphasize his merits while we touch lightly upon his faults. But after
all, this effect is no more than that which his personality wrought upon
the minds of contemporary witnesses, who were unanimous in their
expressions of esteem for Balboa, and of condemnation for the manner of
his taking off.”
[Illustration: _Ramsay, Photo_
CANAL COMMISSION STONE CRUSHER, PORTO BELLO]
And finally the United States government has acted wisely and justly
when in decreeing a great port, lined with massive docks, the stopping
place for all the argosies of trade entering or leaving the Canal at its
Pacific end, they conferred upon it the name Balboa. It will stand a
fitting monument to the great soldier and explorer whose murder affected
for the worse all Central America and Peru.
But to return to Porto Bello. Balboa’s own association with that
settlement was of the very briefest, but the influence of his discovery
was to it all important. For the discovery of the Pacific led to the
conquest of Peru under Pizarro, the founding of Old Panama and the
development at Porto Bello of the port through which all the wealth
wrung from that hapless land of the Incas found its Atlantic outlet.
[Illustration: NATIVE HUTS NEAR PORTO BELLO
The Indians of this region are fishermen and famous navigators. They
ship on vessels leaving Colon for far distant ports]
[Illustration: AN INDIAN FAMILY OF THE DARIEN]
The story of Old Panama may be reserved for a later chapter, even though
the rise and fall of both Nombre de Dios and Porto Bello were chiefly
dependent upon the chief Spanish city of the Pacific coast. For great as
was the store of gold, silver and jewels torn from the Isthmian Indians
and sent from these Spanish ports back to Spain, it was a mere rivulet
compared to the flood of gold that poured through the narrow trails
across the Isthmus after Pizarro began his ravishment of Peru. With the
conquest of the Land of the Incas, and the plunder thereof that made of
the Isthmus a mighty treasure house attracting all the vampires and
vultures of a predatory day, we have little to do here. Enough to point
out that all that was extorted from the Peruvians was sent by ship to
Panama and thence by mule carriage either across the trail to Nombre de
Dios or Porto Bello, or else by land carriage to some point on the
Chagres River, usually Venta Cruces, and thence by the river to San
Lorenzo and down the coast to Porto Bello. Nor did the mules return with
empty packs. The Peruvians bought from the bandits who robbed them, and
goods were brought from Spain to be shipped from Panama to South America
and even to the Philippines.
It seems odd to us today with “the Philippine problem” engaging
political attention, and with American merchants hoping that the canal
may stimulate a profitable Philippine trade, that three hundred years
ago Spanish merchants found profit in sending goods by galleons to Porto
Bello, by mule-pack across the Isthmus and by sailing vessel again to
Manila. Perhaps to the “efficiency experts” of whom we are hearing so
much these days, it might be worth while to add some experts in
enterprise.
[Illustration: _Photo by Underwood and Underwood_
RUINED SPANISH FORT AT PORTO BELLO
Now used as an American cemetery. The site is one of infinite beauty,
but the cemetery is neglected]
As this Spanish trade increased the corsairs or buccaneers sprung into
being--plain pirates, who preyed on Spanish commerce alone, finding
excuse in the fact that the Spanish were Catholics, or in the plea that
Spain had no right to monopolize American trade. The excuses were mere
subterfuges, but served in a day when piracy was winked at. The men
offering them were not animated by religious convictions, nor would they
have engaged in the American trade if permitted. For them the more
exciting and profitable pursuit of piracy, and this they pushed with
such vigor that by 1526 the merchant vessels in the trade would sail
together in one fleet guarded by men-of-war. At times these fleets
numbered as many as forty sail, all carrying guns. The system of
trade--all regulated by royal decree--was for the ships to sail for
Cartagena on the coast of Colombia, a voyage occupying usually about two
months. Arrived there, a courier was sent to Porto Bello and on to
Panama with tidings of the approach of the fleet. Other couriers spread
the tidings throughout the northern provinces of South America.
[Illustration: _Photo by Underwood and Underwood_
SAN BLAS LUGGERS AT ANCHOR]
The fleet would commonly stay at Cartagena a month, though local
merchants often bribed the general in command to delay it longer. For
with the arrival of the ships the town awoke to a brief and delirious
period of trading. Merchants flocked to Cartagena with indigo, tobacco
and cocoa from Venezuela, gold and emeralds from New Granada, pearls
from Margarita and products of divers sorts from the neighboring lands.
While this business was in progress, and the newly laden galleons were
creeping along the coast to Nombre de Dios and Porto Bello, word had
been sent to Lima for the plate fleet to come to Panama bearing the
tribute to the King--gold stripped from the walls of temples, pearls
pried from the eyes of sacred images, ornaments wrested from the arms
and necks of native women by a rude and ribald soldiery. With the plate
fleet came also numerous vessels taking advantage of the convoy, though
indeed there was little danger from pirates on the Pacific. The
Atlantic, being nearer European civilization, swarmed with these gentry.
[Illustration: THE TEETH OE THE TROPICS
Skeletonized jaws of a Bayano river crocodile]
At Panama all was transferred to mules and started for the Atlantic
coast. So great was the volume of treasure and of goods to be
transported that the narrow trail along which the mules proceeded in
single file, usually 100 in a caravan or train, was occupied almost from
one end to the other, and the tinkling of the mule-bells, and the cries
of the muleteers were seldom stilled. Indians sometimes raided the trail
and cut out a loaded mule or two, and the buccaneers at one time,
finding robbery by sea monotonous, landed and won rich booty by raiding
a treasure caravan. The bulkier articles of commerce were packed in
carts at Panama and sent to Venta Cruz where they were transferred to
flat boats, and taken down the river to San Lorenzo and thence to Porto
Bello by sea. When the galleons had cast anchor at that port, and the
merchants and caravans were all arrived the little town took on an air
of bustle and excitement astonishing to the visitor who had seen it in
the hours of its normal life.
[Illustration: NATIVE BRIDGE IN THE DARIEN]
[Illustration: _Copyright, 1912, National Geographic Magazine,
Washington, D. C.
Photo by Henry Pittier_
CHOCO INDIAN GIRLS
Note the toes. With them they pick up the smallest objects]
“The spectator,” says Alcedo, “who had just before been considering
Porto Bello in a poor, unpeopled state, without a ship in the port and
breathing nothing but misery and wretchedness, would remain
thunderstruck at beholding the strange alteration which takes place at
the time of this fair. Now he would see the houses crowded with people,
the square and the streets crammed with chests of gold and silver, and
the port covered with vessels; some of these having brought by the river
Chagres from Panama the effects of Peru, such as cacao, bark (quina),
vicuna wool, bezoar stone, and other productions of these provinces. He
would see others bringing provisions from Cartagena; and he would
reflect that, however detestable might be its climate, this city was the
emporium of the riches of the two worlds, and the most considerable
commercial depot that was ever known.”
The visitor to Porto Bello today may see still standing the long stone
façade of the aduana, or custom house, facing the ancient plaza. In
that square the merchants erected cane booths and tents made of sails,
while all available space was filled with bales of goods drawn thither
on sledges. With the fleet came 5000 or 6000 soldiers, who besides the
sailors needful to man the vessels, the merchants and their clerks, the
porters, the buyers of all nationalities and the native sightseers
crowded the little town of a few hundred houses so that it appeared to
be in possession of a mob.
An itinerant preacher, Thomas Gage, who has left some entertaining
reminiscences of his experiences on the Isthmus, tells quaintly of
seeking lodgings during the fair:
“When I came into the Haven I was sorry to see that as yet the Galeons
were not come from Spaine, knowing that the longer I stayed in that
place, the greater would be my charges. Yet I comforted myselfe that the
time of year was come, and that they could not long delay their coming.
My first thoughts were of taking up a lodging, which at that time were
plentifull and cheape, nay some were offered me for nothing with this
caveat, that when the Galeons did come, I must either leave them, or pay
a dear rate for them. A kind Gentleman, who was the Kings Treasurer,
falling in discourse with me, promised to help me, that I might be
cheaply lodged even when the ships came, and lodgings were at the
highest rate. He, interposing his authority, went with me to seeke one,
which at the time of the fleets being there, might continue to be mine.
It was no bigger than would containe a bed, a table, a stoole or two,
with roome enough beside to open and shut the doore, and they demanded
of me for it during the aforesaid time of the fleet, sixscore Crownes,
which commonly is a fortnight. For the Towne being little, and the
Soldiers, that come with the Galeons for their defence at least four or
five thousand; besides merchants from Peru, from Spain and many other
places to buy and sell, is causes that every roome though never so
small, be dear; and sometimes all the lodgings in the Towne are few
enough for so many people, which at that time doe meet at Portobel. I
knew a Merchant who gave a thousand Crownes for a shop of reasonable
bignesse, to sell his wares and commodities that yeer I was there, for
fifteen daies only, which the Fleet continued to be in that Haven. I
thought it much for me to give the sixscore Crownes which were demanded
of me for a room, which was but as a mouse hole, and began to be
troubled, and told the Kings Treasurer that I had been lately robbed at
sea, and was not able to give so much, and bee besides at charges for my
diet, which I feared would prove as much more. But not a farthing would
be abated of what was asked; where upon the good Treasurer, pitying me,
offered to the man of the house to pay him threescore Crownes of it, if
so be that I was able to pay the rest, which I must doe, or else lie
without in the street. Yet till the Fleet did come I would not enter
into this deare hole, but accepted of another faire lodging which was
offered me for nothing. Whilst I thus expected the Fleets coming, some
money and offerings I got for Masses, and for two Sermons which I
preached at fifteen Crownes a peece. I visited the Castles, which indeed
seemed unto me to be very strong; but what most I wondered at was to see
the requa’s of Mules which came thiether from Panama, laden with wedges
of silver; in one day I told two hundred mules laden with nothing else,
which were unladen in the publicke Market-place, so that there the
heapes of silver wedges lay like heapes of stones in the street, without
any feare or suspition of being lost. Within ten daies the fleet came,
consisting of eight Galeons and ten Merchant ships, which forced me to
run to my hole. It was a wonder then to see the multitude of people in
those streets which the weeke before had been empty.
“Then began the price of all things to rise, a fowl to be worth twelve
Rialls, which in the mainland within I had often bought for one; a pound
of beefe then was worth two Rialls, whereas I had in other places
thirteen pounds for half a Riall, and so of all other food and
provisions, which was so excessively dear, that I knew not how to live
but by fish and Tortoises, which were very many, and though somewhat
deare, yet were the cheapest meat I could eate.”
[Illustration: INDIAN HUTS NEAR PORTO BELLO]
On this annual fair, and on trade with the back country, both Nombre de
Dios and Porto Bello waxed prosperous and luxurious. Prosperity was a
dangerous quality for a town or a man to exhibit in those days when
monarchs set the example of theft and extortion, and private plunderers
were quick to follow it. So Nombre de Dios was early made the point of
an audacious raid by Sir Francis Drake. Though Drake was a bold
adventurer, he is given a measure of immortality by a statue in Baden,
the inscription on which celebrates him as the introducer of potatoes
into Europe. But personal profit, not potatoes, had his chief attention,
though as a side issue he engaged in the slave trade. July 29, 1572, he
made a descent upon Nombre de Dios with 73 men armed, according to a
writer of the time, with “6 Targets; 6 Fire Pikes; 12 Pikes; 24 Muskets
and Callivers; 16 Bowes and 6 Partizans; 2 Drums and 2 Trumpets.” His
men landed from pinnaces and after encountering “a jolly hot volley of
shot” in the plaza put the Spaniards to flight. At the point of a sword
a captive was forced to lead the raiders to the Governor’s house where
to his joy Drake discovered a stack of silver ingots worth a million
pounds sterling. But ’twas an embarrassment of riches, for the bars
were of 40 pounds weight each and therefore hard to move, so Drake
sought the King’s Treasure House where he hoped to find more movable
wealth. As the door was being broken down he fainted from loss of blood,
and as he lay speechless on the sill the Spaniards rallied and attacked
the invaders. Though Drake reviving sought to hold his men up to the
fight, they had lost their dash, and despite his protestations carried
him bodily to the boats. The men were wiser than their leader because it
was the chance arrival of some soldiers from Panama that had rallied the
populace of the town, and the English, deprived of Drake’s leadership,
would certainly have been overwhelmed. That leader however grieved
sincerely when a Spanish spy told him later that there were 360 tons of
silver in the town and many chests of gold in the treasure house.
[Illustration: COUNTRY BACK OF PORTO BELLO]
[Illustration: NATIVE WOMEN OF THE SAVANNAS BEARING BURDENS]
With his appetite whetted for treasure Drake retired to plan a more
profitable raid. This was to be nothing less than a land expedition to
cut off one of the treasure caravans just outside of old Panama on its
way down the Nombre de Dios trail. Had the Indian population been as
hostile to the English then as they became in later days this would have
been a more perilous task. But at this time the men who lurked in the
jungles, or hunted on the broad savannas had one beast of prey they
feared and hated more than the lion or the boa--the Spaniard. Whether
Indian or Cimmaroon--as the escaped slaves were called--every man out in
that tropic wilderness had some good ground for hating the Spaniards,
and so when Drake and his men came, professing themselves enemies of the
Spaniards likewise, the country folk made no war upon them but aided
them to creep down almost within sight of Panama. Halting here, at a
point which must have been well within the Canal Zone and which it
seems probable was near the spot where the Pedro Miguel locks now rise,
they sent a spy into the town who soon brought back information as to
the time when the first mule-train would come out.
All seemed easy then. Most of the travel across the isthmus was by night
to avoid the heat of the day. Drake disposed his men by the side of the
trail--two Indians or Cimmaroons to each armored Englishman. The latter
had put their shirts on outside of their breastplates so that they might
be told in the dark by the white cloth--for the ancient chroniclers
would have us believe them punctilious about their laundry work. All
were to lie silent in the jungle until the train had passed, then
closing in behind cut off all retreat to Panama--when ho! for the fat
panniers crammed with gold and precious stones!
[Illustration: CAMINA REALE, OR ROYAL ROAD NEAR PORTO BELLO]
The plan was simplicity itself and was defeated by an equally simple
mischance. The drinks of the Isthmus which, as we have seen, the
Spaniards commended mightily when they drank, were treacherous in their
workings upon the human mind--a quality which has not passed away with
the buccaneers and cimmaroons, but still persists. One of Drake’s jolly
cutthroats, being over fortified with native rum for his nocturnal
vigil, heard the tinkle of mule bells and rose to his feet. The leading
muleteer turned his animal and fled, crying to the saints to protect him
from the sheeted specter in the path. The captain in charge of the
caravan was dubious about ghosts, but, there being a number of mules
loaded with grain at hand, concluded to send them on to see if there
were anything about the ghosts which a proper prayer to the saint of the
day would exorcise. So the Englishmen again heard the tinkling mule
bells, waited this time in low breathing silence to let the rich prize
pass, then with shouts of triumph dashed from the jungle, cut down or
shot the luckless muleteers, and swarmed about the caravan eager to cut
the bags and get at the booty--and were rewarded with sundry bushels of
grain intended to feed the crowds at Nombre de Dios.
[Illustration: A LADY OF THE SAVANNA]
The disaster was irreparable. The true treasure train at the first
uproar had fled back to the walls of Panama. Nothing was left to Drake
and his men but to plod back empty handed to Cruces, where they had
left their boats. Of course they raided the town before leaving but the
season was off and the warehouses barren. Back they went to the coast
and relieved their feelings by ransacking a few coastwise towns and
hurling taunts at the governor of Cartagena. Shortly thereafter they
renewed their enterprise and did this time capture the treasure train,
getting perhaps $100,000 worth of plunder, with but little loss. Some
French pirates under Captain Tetu, who had joined in the adventure,
suffered more severely and their captain, wounded and abandoned in the
forest, was put to death by the Spaniards with certain of their favorite
methods of torture.
[Illustration: NATIVE CHILDREN, PANAMA PROVINCE]
After a time in England Drake returned to the Caribbean with a
considerable naval force, harried the coast, burned and sacked some
towns, including Nombre de Dios, and obtained heavy ransom from others.
He put into the harbor of Porto Bello, with the intent of taking it
also, but while hesitating before the formidable fortresses of the place
was struck down by death. His body, encased in lead, was sunk in the bay
near perhaps to the ancient ships which our dredges have brought to
light. The English long revered him as a great sailor and commander,
which he was, though a reckless adventurer. His most permanent influence
on the history of the Isthmus was his demonstration that Nombre de Dios
was incapable of defense, and its consequent disappearance from the map.
Such greatness as had pertained to Nombre de Dios was soon assumed by
Porto Bello, which soon grew far beyond the size attained by its
predecessor. It became indeed a substantially built town, and its
fortresses on the towering heights on either side of the beautiful bay
seemed fit to repel any invader--notwithstanding which the town was
repeatedly taken by the English. Even today the ruins of town and forts
are impressive, more so than any ruins readily accessible on the
continent, though to see them at their best you must be there when the
jungle has been newly cut away, else all is lost in a canopy of green.
Across the bay from the town, about a mile and a half, stand still the
remnants of the “Iron Castle” on a towering bluff, Castle Gloria and
Fort Geronimo. These defensive works were built of stone, cut from reefs
under the water found all along the coast. Almost as light as pumice
stone and soft and easily worked when first cut, this stone hardens on
exposure so that it will stop a ball without splitting or chipping. When
Admiral Vernon, of the British navy, had captured the town in 1739, he
tried to demolish the fort and found trouble enough. “The walls of the
lower battery,” he recorded, “consisting of 22 guns, were nine foot
thick and of a hard stone cemented with such fine mortar that it was a
long work to make any impression in it, to come to mine at all, so that
the blowing up took sixteen or eighteen days.” Even today the relics of
the Iron Fort present an air of bygone power and the rusty cannon still
lying by the embrasures bring back vividly the days of the buccaneers.
Inheriting the greatness and prosperity of Nombre de Dios, Porto Bello
inherited also its unpleasant prominence as a target for the sea rover.
French filibusters and various buccaneers raided it at their fancy,
while the black Cimmaroons of the mainland lay in wait for caravans
entering or leaving its gates. To describe, or even to enumerate, all
the raids upon the town would be wearisome to the reader. Most savage,
however, of the pests that attacked the place was Sir Henry Morgan, the
Welsh buccaneer, whose exploits are so fully and admiringly related by
Esquemeling that we may follow his narrative, both of the sack of Porto
Bello, and the later destruction of the Castle of San Lorenzo.
[Illustration: BULL-RIDER AND NATIVE CAR AT BOUQUETTE, CHIRIQUI]
It was in 1668 that Morgan made his first attack upon Porto Bello.
“Here,” wrote Esquemeling, “are the castles, almost inexpugnable, that
defend the city, being situated at the entry of the port; so that no
ship or boat can pass without permission. The garrison consists of three
hundred soldiers, and the town is constantly inhabited by four hundred
families, more or less. The merchants dwell not here, but only reside
for awhile, when the galleons come or go from Spain; by reason of the
unhealthiness of the air, occasioned by certain vapors that exhale from
the mountains. Notwithstanding their chief warehouses are at Porto
Bello, howbeit their habitations be all the year long at Panama; whence
they bring the plate upon mules at such times as the fair begins, and
when the ships, belonging to the Company of Negroes, arrive here to sell
slaves.”
Morgan’s expedition consisted of nine ships and about 460 men, nearly
all British--too small a force to venture against such a stronghold. But
the intrepid commander would listen to no opposition. His ships he
anchored near Manzanillo Island where now stands Colon. Thence by small
boats he conveyed all save a few of his men to a point near the landward
side of the town, for he feared to attack by sea because of the great
strength of the forts. Having taken the Castle of Triana he resolved to
shock and horrify the inhabitants of the town by a deed of cold-blooded
and wholesale murder, and accordingly drove all the defenders into a
single part of the castle and with a great charge of gunpowder
demolished it and them together. If horrified, the Spaniards were not
terrified, but continued bravely the defense of the works they still
held. For a time the issue of the battle looked dark for Morgan, when to
his callous and brutal mind there occurred an idea worthy of him alone.
Let us follow Esquemeling’s narrative again:
[Illustration: THE INDIANS CALL HER A WITCH]
“To this effect, therefore, he ordered ten or twelve ladders to be made,
in all possible haste, so broad that three or four men at once might
ascend them. These being finished, he commanded all the religious men
and women whom he had taken prisoners to fix them against the walls of
the castle. Thus much he had beforehand threatened the governor to
perform, in case he delivered not the castle. But his answer was: ‘I
will never surrender myself alive.’ Captain Morgan was much persuaded
that the governor would not employ his utmost forces, seeing religious
women and ecclesiastical persons exposed in the front of the soldiers to
the greatest dangers. Thus the ladders, as I have said, were put into
the hands of religious persons of both sexes; and these were forced at
the head of the companies, to raise and apply them to the walls. But
Captain Morgan was deceived in his judgment of this design. For the
governor, who acted like a brave and courageous soldier, refused not, in
performance of his duty, to use his utmost endeavors to destroy
whosoever came near the walls. The religious men and women ceased not to
cry unto him and beg of him by all the Saints of Heaven he would deliver
the castle, and hereby spare both his and their own lives. But nothing
could prevail with the obstinacy and fierceness that had possessed the
governor’s mind. Thus many of the religious men and nuns were killed
before they could fix the ladders. Which at last being done, though with
great loss of the said religious people, the pirates mounted them in
great numbers, and with no less valour; having fireballs in their hands
and earthen pots full of powder. All which things, being now at the top
of the walls, they kindled and cast in among the Spaniards.
[Illustration: A CUNA-CUNA FAMILY NEAR PORTO BELLO]
[Illustration: COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY F. E. WRIGHT
A NATIVE VILLAGE
These villages are now scattered throughout the Canal Zone but will
disappear as the order expelling natives from the Zone is more
thoroughly enforced.]
“This effort of the pirates was very great, insomuch as the Spaniards
could no longer resist nor defend the castle, which was now entered.
Hereupon they all threw down their arms, and craved quarter for their
lives. Only the governor of the city would admit or crave no mercy; but
rather killed many of the pirates with his own hands, and not a few of
his own soldiers because they did not stand to their arms. And although
the pirates asked him if he would have quarter, yet he constantly
answered: ‘By no means; I had rather die as a valiant soldier, than be
hanged as a coward’. They endeavored as much as they could to take him
prisoner. But he defended himself so obstinately that they were forced
to kill him; notwithstanding all the cries and tears of his own wife and
daughter, who begged him upon their knees he would demand quarter and
save his life. When the pirates had possessed themselves of the castle,
which was about night, they enclosed therein all the prisoners they had
taken, placing the women and men by themselves, with some guards upon
them. All the wounded were put into a certain apartment by itself, to
the intent their own complaints might be the cure of their disease; for
no other was afforded them.”
[Illustration: A TRAIL NEAR PORTO BELLO]
For fifteen days the buccaneers held high carnival in Porto Bello. Drunk
most of the time, weakened with debauchery and riot, with discipline
thrown to the winds, and captains and fighting men scattered all over
the town in pursuit of women and wine, the outlaws were at the mercy of
any determined assailant. Esquemeling said, “If there could have been
found 50 determined men they could have retaken the city and killed all
the pirates. Less than fifty miles away was Panama with a heavy garrison
and a thousand or more citizens capable of bearing arms. Its governor
must have known that the success of the raid on Porto Bello would but
arouse the pirates’ lust for a sack of his richer town. But instead of
seizing the opportunity to crush them when they were sodden and
stupefied by debauchery he sent puerile messages asking to be informed
with what manner of weapons they could have overcome such strong
defenses. Morgan naturally replied with an insult and a threat to do
likewise to Panama within a twelvemonth.
[Illustration: A CHOLO MOTHER AND DAUGHTER]
“For fifteen days the revel was maintained, every citizen who looked as
if he had money being put to the torture to compel him to confess where
he had hidden it. When all had been extorted that seemed possible the
buccaneers made ready to depart. But first Morgan demanded 100,000
pieces of eight, in default of which he would burn the city and blow up
the castles. The wretched citizens sought aid of the President of Panama
who was as unwilling to help them with gold as with powder and lead. In
some miraculous way they raised it, and Morgan and his men departed,
making their way to that town of revelry, Port Royal, of which I have
already spoken, at the entrance to Kingston harbor. Perhaps it is fair
to contrast with Esquemeling’s story of the exploit Morgan’s official
report--for this worthy had a royal commission for his deeds. The
Captain reported that he had left Porto Bello in as good condition as he
found it, that its people had been well treated, so much so that
“several ladies of great quality and other prisoners who were offered
their liberty to go to the President’s camp refused, saying they were
now prisoners to a person of quality who was more tender of their honors
than they doubted to find in the President’s camp; and so voluntarily
continued with him.”
[Illustration: A GROUP OF CUEPA TREES]
Captain Morgan’s own testimony to his kindness to prisoners and his
regard for female honor impresses one as quite as novel and audacious as
his brilliant idea of forcing priests and nuns to carry the scaling
ladders with which to assault a fortress defended by devout Catholics.
Yet except for little incidents of this sort the whole crew--Spanish
conquistadores, French filibusters and British buccaneers--were very
tenacious of the forms of religion and ostentatious piety. The Spaniards
were always singing Te Deums, and naming their engines of war after the
saints; Captain Daniels, a French filibuster, shot dead a sailor for
irreverent behavior during mass; the English ships had divine service
every Sunday and profanity and gambling were sometimes prohibited in the
enlistment articles. All of which goes to show that people may be very
religious and still a pest to humanity--nor is it necessary to turn to
the buccaneers for instances of this fact.