DISCOVERY OF JAMAICA, TRINIDAD, AND AMERICA, 1494.

mew, some six years after, was, upon various gradually extended their investigations over pretexts-among which may be named cruelty to the natives, urged by the very men whose outrages he had striven to repress sent across the Atlantic in chains rivetted upon him by the hands of one of his own menial servants; he must have had leisure to think remorsefully on the injuries he had helped to inflict on the caciques and their unhappy people.

CRIMINALS SENT TO HAYTI AS FREE COLONISTS, 1497.

13

demand; and by compelling them to work severe. Thus, in the vicinity of the gold in the gold mines, a species of employment districts, each individual above fourteen for which their former easy mode of life, and years of age was expected to pay every delicate though healthy frames, nourished three months the measure of a Flemish almost exclusively upon vegetable diet, com- hawk's-bell of gold-dust, equal in value to pletely unfitted them. about five dollars of that epoch, or to fifteen Beyond all question, Columbus was de- dollars of the present time. The caciques liberately instrumental in the establishment were compelled to furnish a much larger of slavery in the West Indies; and that, amount; and each individual, on rendering too, in opposition to his royal patroness, his tribute, received a copper medal, which who ever recommended him most earnestly he was obliged to wear as a certificate of to watch over the welfare of the Indians, payment; those who were found without and who, when she heard of his distributing these tokens being liable to arrest and punthem as slaves, exclaimed indignantly-ishment. Guarionex, one of the five leading "what right has the admiral to give away caciques, who severally governed the island my vassals?" and ordered all who had been at the period of its discovery, complained of brought from Hayti, to be restored to their this unreasonable and grievous system of homes, including both prisoners-of-war and others who had been transported to Spain by private individuals. At this juncture, a letter of Columbus was on its way, advising the continuance of the system of slavery instituted by him as a measure of policy, necessary to the welfare of the colony.*

Las Casas, Montesinos, Ximenes, Boyle, and the whole of the Dominican missionaries who were contemporaries with Columbus, remonstrated against the enslaving of the natives in any degree, and especially against the system of repartimientos or distributions, by which the natives were divided among the Spaniards, "and even," says Robertson, "refused to absolve or admit to the sacrament such of their countrymen as continued to hold the natives in servitude."

The taxes imposed by Columbus immediately after the defeat of Caonabo and the other caciques, on the people, were most

The pertinacity of the admiral, in continuing to make slaves of all captives taken in war, and the assertion of some of the malcontent colonists, that he entered into hostilities with that view, was the main reason which induced Isabella to consent to a commission being sent out to investigate his conduct, and if necessary, to supersede him in the command.

The settlements soon lost their prestige. The sufferings of the early adventurers, from the disappointment of their hopes, and from virulent diseases, for the most part caused by their own excesses, had given a very unfavourable character to the islands; so much so, that in 1497 Ferdinand and Isabella issued a proclamation stating, that as all the persons whom they had ordered to embark for the Indies were not sufficient to form a colony "such as it behoves for the service of God and our service," it was expedient that others should go and live there at their own expense; they therefore decreed "that all and every person, men and women, who may have committed any murders and offences whatsoever" (except heresy and certain other crimes) should at pleasure have their punishments commuted to tem

un

taxation. His richly fertile plain yielded no gold; and though the mountains on his borders contained mines, and the torrents washed down the glittering dust into the river beds, yet his subjects were skilled and unfit for the laborious work of collecting it; he therefore proffered, instead of the tribute required, to cultivate with grain a band of country stretching across the island, from sea to sea, "enough," says Las Casas, "to have furnished all Castile with bread for ten years." This offer, which, if accepted, might have tended to the rapid development of the agricultural resources of the country simultaneously with its mineral wealth, was rejected; nothing could be accepted in the stead of gold. To aggravate the misery of the natives, the most depraved criminals were sent among them as free colonists; and these newly-released convicts from the dungeons of Castile,† on arriving in Hayti, assumed the airs of grand porary banishment to Hispaniola (Hayti); thus, it condemned to death they were to maintain themselves there for two years instead, or for one if they had incurred any minor punishment, even though it amounted to the loss of a limb. They were, moreover, promised a free pardon for every crime committed up to the day of the publication of the proclamation. Magistrates were at the same time desired to make banishment to Hispaniola the most frequent penalty for crime. To these miscreants "lands, mountains, and waters" were to be granted in perpetuity.-(Southey, vol. i., p. 47.) This pernicious measure was suggested by Columbus himself, who lived long enough to witness its effects. In a letter written to the king after his return to Spain, he says, "I am informed that since I left this island [Hayti], six parts out of seven of the natives are dead, all through ill-treatment and inhumanity; some by the sword, others by blows and cruel usage, others through hunger. The greater part have perished in the mountains and glens, whither they had fled from not being able to support the labour imposed upon them."--(Irving, vol. ii., p. 245.)

14

EXTERMINATION OF NATIVE WEST INDIANS BY SPANIARDS.

,

cavaliers; men who had come out as miners, | tives among his favourites, giving fifty to labourers, and scullions, would not go a some, and one hundred to others. This furlong from their houses except they were was done by virtue of a writing called a reborne on palanquins; each kept several partimiento, which ran thus-" To you concubines, seizing for this purpose the we entrust so many Indians under such a daughters and sisters of caciques, and had cacique, and you are to have them instructed two or three slaves to serve them. in our holy Catholic faith." At first they Columbus, in his dispatches, complained were to work in the mines for six months. bitterly of the conduct of the colonists, Afterwards the term was increased to eight; declaring that "they robbed the Indians; and as they died off rapidly, Ovando supabused the women in the most shocking plied his favourites with more to keep up manner; and lest their hands should get their complement, instead of giving repartiout of practice, used, for pastime, to try mientos to others. This plan he pursued all who could most dexterously strike off the the time he remained governor of the island, head of an Indian, so that it should fly and it afterwards became general throughclean from the body to the ground;" yet he out the West Indies and South America. follows up his exposition of the cruelties Both natives and colonists suffered severely practised by his countrymen, with a decla- from famine, in consequence of the neglect ration that "one evil only must be borne of cultivation, and from various new disfor some years; that the Spaniards should cases, one in particular arising from the be permitted to use the Indians, made pri- promiscuous intercourse of the Spaniards soners of war, as slaves:" (Southey, vol. i., with the Indian women, became fearfully p. 59,) overlooking the fact, that the soli- contagious, and spread havoc and alarm tary evil he deemed it inexpedient to abolish among the colonists; their joints swelled, was alone sufficient to account for and ori- their blood became as it were poisoned, their ginate every other. noses, hands, fingers, and toes, putrified and dropped off, their bones rotted, many died raving mad; others returned to Europe, hoping their native air would cure them; there they spread this horrible and heretofore unknown malady, which, on its first manifestation amongst the Spanish and French armies, inflicted wide-spread destruction, and spread an almost universal panic, as recorded in the works of early medical writers on this loathsome subject. To return to the Indians :-the death of Queen Isabella, in 1506, removed the only check which had partially restrained the ferocious cruelty of her subjects, who now gave loose to the most demoniacal excesses: bets were made during their drunken revels, who could soonest cleave the skull of an Indian, and divide him at a single blow; their dogs were fed with the flesh of their victims, and it was not unusual to borrow a quarter or a limb of a human being, from a neighbour, for the use of the blood-hounds, promising a similar return on the ensuing day. In the search for gold, towns and villages were laid waste, and burned; the slightest resistance was avenged by indiscriminate slaughter-the caciques were murdered in cold blood-the women who tempted the lust of the invaders were reserved for their sensuality; tortures of the most barbarous nature were

The oppressions of the natives greatly increased during the brief sway of Bovadilla, who, trusting to obtain the favour of the sovereigns, by amassing, no matter at what cost of blood and suffering, a large amount of gold, divided the aboriginal population into classes, and then distributed them among the colonists, suffering these latter to inflict upon their wretched victims blows and lashes, and even death itself, according to their own wicked wills. Isabella, on hearing of these proceedings, indignantly ordered the recal of Bovadilla, and the release of the natives, who immediately left the Spaniards, and deeply disgusted with their previous conduct, could not be induced to labour for hire, or to receive from them religious instruction. This latter fact weighed deeply with Isabella, who unhappily gave her consent to the renewal of the compulsory system, to the end that they might be brought within the pale of the Romish church, but specially urged that they should all be well paid and gently treated, particularly those who should become Christians. Ovando, the new governor, availed himself of this permission, and distributed the naOn the 1st of July, 1502, he set sail with a fleet of thirty-two sail, for Europe, richly laden with illgotten gold, twenty sail of which, with all on board, including Bovadilla, the unfortunate cacique Guarionex, and others, perished in a storm within twenty-resorted to for the purpose of forcing a disfour hours of their departure from Hayti. covery of that gold for which the Spaniards

HISTORY OF THE WEST INDIES FROM 1517 TO 1655,

15

thirsted with such insatiate desire-those whose lives were spared were kept as slaves, and sent to work in the mines, where they perished rapidly: while such as escaped to the mountain fastnesses and forests in the several islands, perished of hunger; and many destroyed themselves to avoid the cruel torments to which they would have been subjected by their persecutors. The cloquent Las Casas, and other eye-witnesses, have related deeds of horror enacted by these fiends in human form, which almost exceed belief, and are frequently of a character too fearful and disgusting to be dwelt upon. It was with a view of saving the remnant of the miserable Indians, that the importation of Africans was proposed by Las Casas, his overwhelming sympathy for the suffering he witnessed leading him to overlook the cruel injustice of serving one people at the expense of another. Eventually negroes were introduced, but it was not to save, but to supply the place of the unfortunate race who had been swept from off the face of the earth. Thus crime begets crime; and man, left a prey to the guilty passions of his unregenerate nature, goes on in his awful career until the cup of iniquity is full. For many years the other nations of Europe did not interfere with the Spanish monopoly of the West Indies. The first English vessels seen there were two ships of war under Sebastian Cabot and Sir Thomas Pert in 1516. The earliest trader visited the islands two years later; she was fired on by the colonists at St. Domingo, and the Governor was blamed for not sinking her, and thus preventing any additional information being conveyed to England. In 1536, the French began to molest the Spaniards in their new acquisitions; as did the English soon after under Hawkins, Drake, Duddeley, Raleigh, Baskervil, Saville, the earl of Cumberland, Sherley, and others. At the commencement of the 17th century, the English, French, and Dutch, began to form settlements on the islands and parts of the main-land not pre-occupied by Europeans. Disputes soon arose as to the rights of first location; but in some instances the subjects of two nations (as, for instance, English and French at Montserrat) partitioned an island between them. The Spaniards, however, long endeavoured to maintain exclusive possession of the West Indian seas, and even of those islands which they were unable to colonize. Hos- With these views, and probably also with tilities were carried on against the ships a desire to get rid of General Venabies, who

of all nations, attempting to navigate any part of the newly discovered hemisphere, and the most barbarous cruelties were practised on all persons found there; even shipwrecked mariners, when their lives were spared, were doomed to the terrible slavery of the mines. This led to depredations on their colonies, and attacks on their annual "plate-fleet," by Buccaneers, Flibustiers, Corsairs, and other adventurers, and to a desultory warfare on the part of the English, French, and Dutch, against the Spaniards, even when their governments at London, Paris, the Hague, and Madrid, were at peace. Despite these proceedings, and notwithstanding the absence of any protection from the crown, many Englishmen located themselves on different islands, colonized Barbadoes, and commenced a traffic with the Spanish Main, as the coast of southern America was then called.

The Spaniards did not quietly submit to these encroachments on their assumed exclusive jurisdiction. In 1629 they seized 600 English settlers at St. Christopher's, and condemned them to subterranean bondage in their mines. In the following year (15th of November, 1630) a treaty was signed at Madrid, between Charles I. of England, and Philippe IV. of Spain, which was a renewal of that entered into in 1604, between Queen Elizabeth and Philip II., but no notice was taken of the possessions which the English had, in the interval, acquired in the West Indies; the Spaniards consequently deemed themselves at liberty to pursue their determination of exterminating all interlopers; they attacked the English settlers at Tortuga in 1638, at New Providence in 1611, and at Santa Cruz in 1650, massacred indiscriminately men, women, and children, plundered the settlements, burned the habitations, and then left the islands. These and other atrocious proceedings, which Charles I. was unable to prevent or punish, checked the early attempts made by British to settle peaceably in the west. When, however, Oliver Cromwell had decided on keeping peace with France, he resolved ou punishing the flagrant perfidy of Spain, diminishing its exorbitant pretensions, and increasing the resources and influence of his own country, by gaining possession of the West Indian colonies, which then poured such wealth into the coffers of the Spanish monarch.

16 RISE AND PROGRESS OF BRITISH POWER IN THE WEST INDIES.

was plotting the restoration of monarchy, a moot point of political economy among the Protector determined to seize Hispan- the planters, whether it was most profitable iola. He therefore despatched an arma- to work a gang of slaves to death rapidly, ment thither, composed chiefly of the in- and replace them by fresh importations, mates of the various goals, then crowded or by less severe labour, to extend the with petty delinquents and partisans of duration of existence over a longer period. royalty. The fleet and troops, under the Many, in the very recklessness of brutality, joint command of Admiral William Penn adopted the latter opinion; they separated and General Robert Venables, sailed from husband and wife, permitting no intercourse Portsmouth early in 1655; rendezvoused at between them, and this, together with the Barbadoes, where they were joined by inequality of numbers between the sexes, numerous volunteers, and on the 13th of and the licentiousness, as well as cruelty of April, 7,000 infantry and a troop of horse the colonists, occasioned such an enormous were landed, with three days' provision, waste of life, as to require in the middle of ten leagues to the westward of the city of the eighteenth century, an annual supply St. Domingo. On the 15th, three regiments of about ninety to one hundred thousand disembarked two leagues to the westward of Africans. the city. Both detachments met with unforeseen difficulties; were attacked vigorously by the Spaniards and negroes, and completely routed, owing to their cowardice and want of discipline.

Of 9,700 men landed, only 8,000 re-embarked on the 3rd of May;-when Venables directed the 7th of May to be kept as a day of humiliation, and issued an order, that in any future contests, whoever should be found to turn his back to the enemy, and attempt to flee, should immediately be run through the body by the officer in the next rearward division; who, if he failed to perform this duty, was himself to suffer death without mercy. The flect proceeded to Jamaica, and captured that island, as will be stated in the ensuing chapter.

The

The amount of sin and suffering, national and individual, perpetrated and inflicted in the West Indies, is appalling. England rushed madly onwards in a career of crime and oppression; she put forth all her strength to become the mistress of these blood-stained islands. When war arose in Europe, it was carried on in the New World with a bitterness and fury outvying that manifested in the Old; and hostile fleets for years incarnadined the tranquil western seas with the blood of thousands, in the attempt to retain or acquire possession of these sugar fields for their respective countries. In a mere pecuniary view, the expenditure of men and treasure must have been enormous. wealth which England squandered in this contest* largely contributed to swell the National The demand in Europe for sugar, coffee, Debt. A so-called "West India Interand other tropical products, and the suit- est" was gradually formed, which became a ableness of the soil and climate of the West source of great evil, not only by blinding Indies for their growth, together with the the nation to the wrongs which were being proximity of these islands, rendered them committed, morally and socially, but also important as affording means for the rapid by establishing a monopoly in the supply of acquisition of wealth. The slave trade on tropical produce, and usurping to itself exthe African coast, supplied, as has been pre-clusively the title of Colonial Interest, and viously stated, the wretched victims, by whose thus throwing into the shade all our other blood and sweat, sugar and coffee were transmarine dominions, preventing the ocraised; and to the millions of Indians who cupation of valuable islands like Java, and had perished in the search for gold-was causing the immense territories of the Brinow added millions of Africans, torn from tish crown in the East Indies to be undertheir homes, and condemned under the rated and neglected. The purchase of partorture of the whip and the goad, to culti-liamentary nomination boroughs by the vate the land for their European task- wealthy owners of sugar plantations; the acmasters, and to enrich the coffers of Eng-quisition of similar estates by members of land, France, Spain, Holland, and other the peerage; the common cause made by, and states, who all vied with each other in their complete organization of, the whole body of haste to grow rich, at the expense of suffering humanity.

Life- so far as the negro was concerned --was a mere question of money; it was long

* It terminated in 1810, by her conquest of nearly every European possession in the West Indies, though some of the most valuable were afterwards restored to their previous owners.