THE
HISTORY
OF THE
DISCOVERY AND SETTLEMENT
OF
BY WILLIAM ROBERTSON, D.D.,
PRINCIPAL OF THE UNIVERSITY AT EDINBURIGI, ETC.
WITH AN ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE AND WRITINGS.
TO WHICH ARE ADDED
QUESTIONS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF STUDENTS,
BY JOHN FROST, LL.D.
Conmplete [n One 7oIurmt.
NEW YORK:
DERBY & JACKSON, 119 TNASSAU STREET.
CINCINNATI:-H. W. DEIBMY.
18B6.








THE
LIFE OF DRe W. RO bERTSOn.
WILLIAM ROBERTSON, the eldest son of the Reverend William Robertson, was born on the 8th of September, 1721, at Borthwick, in the shire of
Mid Lothian, of which parish his father was the minister. By the paternal
line he descended from a respectable family in the county of Fife, a branch
of that which, for many generations, possessed the estate of Struan, In
Perthshire. His mother was the daughter of David Pitcairn, esq. of
Dreghorn. He had one brother and six sisters; all of whom were well
settled in life, and most of whom lived to an advanced age.
It was at the parochial school of Borthwick that Robertson received the
initiatory part of his education; but as soon as he was sufficiently forward
to enter on the study of the learned languages, he was removed to the
school of Dalkeith. The latter seminary was then under the superintendence of Mr. Leslie, whose eminence as a teacher was such as to attract
pupils from all parts of Scotland; and the father of Robertson was consequently induced to send him to Dalkeith'rather than to the Scottish
metropolis.
When the future historian was twelve years old, his father was transferred from Borthwick to one of the churches of Edinburgh. In the
autumn of 1733 he joined his parents; and, in October, he was admitted
into the college and university of the northern capital.
Whatever were his first attempts at composition, and it is probable they
were many, nothing has been preserved to show how early he began to
exercise his talents, or with what degree of rapidity those talents were
expanded. It is certain, however, that in the pursuit of knowledge he
displayed that ardour and perseverance without which nothing great will
ever be accomplished. A strong proof of this is afforded by some of his
early commonplace books, which bear the dates of 1735, 1736, and 1737.
The motto, vita sine literis mzors est, which he prefixed to these books,
sufficiently indicates by what an honourable ambition and love of literature
he was inspired at a very tender and generally thoughtless age. The boy
of fourteen, who can cherish the feeling which is implied by this motto,
gives promise that his manhood will reflect lustre on himself and on the
country of his birth.
Among the men of eminence, by whose instructions he profited at the
university, were sir John Pringle, afterwards president of the Royal
Society, but then professor of moral philosophy; MaclaurIn, justly cele
brated for the extent of his mathematical skill and the purity of his style
and Dr. Stevenson, the learned and indefatigable professor of logic. To
the masterly prelections of the latter, especially to his illustrations of the
poetics of Aristotle, and of Longinus on the Sublime, Robertson often
declared that he considered himself to be more deeply indebted than to
any circumstance in the course of his academical career. It was indeed
not towards the abstract sciences that the bent of his genius was directed.
To mnathematical and mechanical speculations he seems to have been at
least cold, perhaps averse. Neither was he remarkable for metaphysical
acuteness. His delight was to trace and elucidate moral and religious
truths, to apply the process of reasoning to subjects more immediately con



Iv                      THE LIFE OF
nected with the every-day business of existence, to search into the causes
and effects of historical events, to expatiate amidst the perennial beauties of
classic lore, and, by meditating on the great models of oratorical art, to
render himself master of all the powerful resources of a ready and persuasive eloquence.
With respect to eloquence, the possession of it was in fact indispensable
to one who, as in all probability was the case with Robertson, had determined t. assure a prominent station among the pastors and leaders of the
Scottish church. The mere kriowledge of rules, however, or even a thorough acquaintance with the rich stores of ancient and modern oratory,
will not suffice to tbrm an orator. It is by use alone that facility of speech
and promptitude of reply can be acquired. It is the collision of minds
which strikes out the " thoughts that breathe, and words that burn."
During the last years, theretore, of his residing at college, he joined with
some of his contemporaries in establishing a society, the avowed purpose
of which, as we are told by Mr. Stewart, was " to cultivate the study of
elocution, and to prepare themselves, by the habits of extemporary discussion and debate, for conducting the business of popular assemblies."
Of the colleagues of Robertson in this society many ultimately rose, like
himself, to high reputation. Among them were Cleghorn, subsequently
professor of moral philosophy at Edinburgh, Dr. John Blair, who became
a member of the Royal Society, and a prebendary of Westminster, and
who gave to the public "The Chronology and History of the World,"
Wilkie, the'author of the Epigoniad, a faulty poem, but above cotlAenpt,
Home, the author of Douglas, and Dr. Erskine, who, in aftei life, was at
once the coadjutor, rival, opponent, and friend of Robertson.
This society continued in existence, and, no doubt, was beneficial to its
members, till it was broken up by a quarrel, which had its rise from a religious source, and which, consequently, was of more than common bitterness. In 1741 that extraordinary man Whitefield, who was then in the
zenith of his fame, paid a visit to Scotland, and his preaching excited in
that country a feeling equally as strong as it had excited in England. On
the subject of his merit violent parties immediately sprang up, especially
among the clergy. By the one side he was considered as a clerical wonder, a kind of apostle, from whose evangelical labours the happiest result
might be expected; by the other side he was calumniated as an impostor,
and a worthless private character, while some, in the excess of their holy
zeal, did not scruple to stigmatize him, even from the pulpit, as " an agent
of the devil."  It was natural that this question should be debated by
Robertson and his associates; and it was, perhaps, not less natural that it
should be argued with so much heat and asperity as not only to cause the
dissolution of the society, but even, it is said, to interrupt, for some time,
the intercourse of the members as private individuals. Of those who
entertained doubts with regard to the personal conduct of Whitefield, and
the utility of his efforts, Robertson was one. From his acknowledged
moderation and evenness of temper we may, however, infer that his hostility to the preacher was carried on in a liberal spirit, and that he did not
think it either necessary or decorous to brand him as an agent of the prince
of darkness.
To excel in his written style as much as in his oral was-one object of his
ambition.  The practice of clothing in an English dress the standard works
of the ancients has been often recommended, as conducive to the improvement of style; and he seems to have believed it to be so, for it was
adopted by him. He carried it so far as to entertain serious thoughts of
preparing for the press a version of Marcus Antoninus. His scheme was,
however, frustrated by the appearance of an anonymous translation at
Glasgow. " In making choice of this author," says Mr. Stewart,' he was
probably not a little influenced by that partiality with which (among the




DR. ROBERTSON.                                v
writers of heathen moralists) he always regarded the remains of the stoical
)hilosophy."
Having completed his academic course, and richly stored his mind, he
quitted the university, and, in 1741, before he had quite attained tile age
of twenty, a license to preach the gospel was given to him by the presbytery of Dalkeith.  This kind of license, which does not authorize to
administer the sacraments or to undertake the cure of souls, is granted to
laymen; and the person who receives it may be considered as being placed
by it in a state of probation.
After the lapse of two years, from the period of his leaving the univer
sity, when he was yet little more than twenty-two, he was, in 1743, pre
sented, by the Earl of Hopetoun, to the living of Gladsmuir.  Of this preferment the yeally value was not more than one hundred pounds. Scanty,
however, as were its emoluments,- it was most opportunely bestowed. He
had not long resided at Gladsmuir when an unexpected and melancholy
event occurred, which put to the trial at once his firmness and his benevolence.  His father and mother expired within a few hours of each other,
leaving behind them a family of six daughters and one son, without the
means of providing for their education and maintenance. On this occasion Robertson acted in a manner which bore irrefragable testimony to the
goodness of his heart, and which was also, as Mr. Stewart justly observes,' strongly marked with that manly decision in his plans, and that persevering steadiness in their execution, which were the characteristic features
of his mind." Regardless of the privations to which he must necessarily
submit, and the interruption which his literary and other projects must
experience, he received his father's family into his house at Gladsmuir,
educated his sisters under his own roof, and retained them there till opportunities arose of settling them  respectably in the world. His merit is
enhanced by the circumstance of his fraternal affection- having imposed on
him a sacrifice far more painful than that of riches or fame. He was tenderly attached to his cousin Miss Mary Nesbit, daughter of the Reverend
Mr. Nesbit, one of the ministers of Edinburgh, and his attachment was
returned; but it was not till 1751, when his family had ceased to stand in
need of his protecting care, that he thought himself at liberty to complete
a union which had, fobr several years, been the object of his ardent wishes.
It is pleasant to know that the wife whom he so tardily obtained was every
way worthy of such a husband, and that he suffered no interruption of his
domestic happiness.
While he was laudably occupied in promoting the welfare of his orphan
relatives, the rebellion broke out in Scotland. "It afforded him," says
lr. Stewart, " an opportunity' of evincing the sincerity of that zeal for the
civil and religious liberties of his country, which he had imbibed with the
first principles of his education; and which afterwards, at the distance of
more than forty years, when he was called on to employ his eloquence in
the national commemoration of the revolution, seemed to rekindle the fires
of his youth. His situation as a country clergyman confined indeed his
patriotic exertions within a narrow sphere; but even here his conduct was
guided by a mind superior to the scene in which he acted. On one occa
sion (when the capital was in danger of falling into the hands of the rebels)
the present state of public affairs appeared so critical that he thought him
self j. Istified in laying aside for a time the pacific habits of his profession,
and in quitting his parochial residence at Gladsmuir to join the volunteers
of Edinburgh. And when, at last, it was determined that the city should
be surrendered, he was one of the small band who repaired to Haddington, and offered their services to the commander of His Majesty's fbrces."
With the exception of this one troubled interval he continued, for many
years, in the tranquil performance of his pastoral duties. The hours of
his leisure were devoted to literary researches and to laying the solid foun



vsI         ~.THE  LIFE  OF
dation of future eminence.  It was his practice to rise early, and to read
and write much before breakfast. The remainder of the day he devoted
to the claims of his profession. As a minister of the gospel he was consci
entious and active; not confining himself to the mere routine of his sacred
office, but endeavouring by every means to extend the comforts and influence of religion. In. the summer months it was customary for him, previous
to the commencement of the church service, to assemble the youthful part
of his flock for the purpose of explaining to them the doctrines of the
catechism. By his zeal, his punctuality, and the suavity of his behaviour,
he won the love of his parishioners; so that, in all their difficulties, it was
to him that they resorted for consolation and for counsel. His pulpit eloquence was such as afforded delight to all classes of people; because,
while it was adorned with those graces' of style which are required to
satisfy men of judgment and taste, it was rendered level to the comprehension of his humblest hearers, by the clearness of its argument and the
perspicuity of its language.
The time at length arrived when the talents of Robertson were to be
displayed on a more extensive and public scene of action, and he was to
assume a leading share in the government of the Scottish church. He did
not, however, come forward among his colleagues till he had attained the
mature age of thirty, and had thoroughly prepared himself to sustain his
new and important part with untiring vigour and a decisive effect. It was
on the question of patronage that he first exerted his powers of eloquence
in a deliberative assembly.
To enable the mere English reader to comprehend this subject, it may,
perhaps, be proper to give some account of the constitution of the church
of Scotland, and also of the right of patronage, out of which arose the
contentions and heartburnings by which the church was disturbed for a
considerable period.
The church of Scotland is ruled by a series of judicatories, rising by
iegular gradation from the kirk session, or parochial consistory, which is
the lowest in order, to the general assembly, which is the highest. The
kirk session is composed of the ministers and lay elders of parishes; a
presbytery is formed of the ministers of contiguous parishes, with certain
representatives from the kirk sessions; and a provincial synod is constituted by the union of a plurality of presbyteries. Crowning the whole is
the general assembly. This body consists of three hundred and sixty-four
members, of whom two hundred and two are ministers, and the remainder
are laymen. Of this number two hundred and one ministers and eightynine lay elders are sent by the presbyteries; the royal boroughs elect
sixty-seven laymen; the universities depute five persons, who may be
either ecclesiastics or laymen; and the Scottish church of Campvere in
Holland supplies two deputies, the one lay and the other clerical. The
annual sittings of the assembly are limited to ten days; but whatever business it has left unsettled is transacted by a committee of the whole house
(called the commission), which, in the course of the year, has four stated
meetings. Among the lay members of the assembly are men of the highest consequence in the kingdom; lawyers, judges, and sometimes nobles
Though all the ministers in Scotland are on a perfect equality with each
other, yet each individual and each judicatory is bound to yield a prompt
obedience to the superintending authority, and each court must punctually.:ay the record of its proceedings before the tribunal which is next in rank
above it; but the general assembly has the power of deciding without
appeal, of enforcing, uncontrolled,'its decrees, and, with the concurrence
of a majority of the presbyteries, of enacting laws for the government of
the Scottish church.
The history of clerical patronage in Scotland since the overthrow of
catholicism, and of the struggles to which it has given rise, has been traced




DR. ROBERTSON.                              VsI
with so much clearness by Dr. Gleig that, though the passage is of some
length, 1 shall give it in his own words. " The Reformation in Scotland,"
says he, " was irregular and tumultuous; and the great object of the pow
erful aristocracy of that kingdom seems to have been rather to get posses
sion of the tithes, and the lands of the dignified clergy, than to purify the
doctrine and reform  the worship of the church. Of this Knox and the
other reformed clergymen complained bitterly; and their complaints were
extorted from them  by their own sufferings. Never, I believe, were the
established clergy of any Christian country reduced to such indigence as
were those zealous and well meaning men, during the disastrous reign of
queen Mary, and the minority of her son and successor; while the pittance that was promised to them, instead of being regularly paid, was
often seized by the rapacity of the regents and the powerful barons who
adhered to their cause, and the ministers left to depend for their subsistence on the generosity of the people.
" As nearly the whole of the ecclesiastical patronage of the kingdom
had come into the possession of those barons, partly by inheritance from
their ancestors, and partly with the church lands which, on the destruction
of the monasteries, they had appropriated to themselves, it is not wonderful that, in an age when men were very apt to confound fcte illegal and
mischievous conduct of him who exercised an undoubted right with the
natural conseque..ces of that right itself, strong prejudices were excited in
the minds of the clergy and more serious part of the people against the
law which Vested in such sacrilegious robbers the right of presentation to
parish churches. It is not indeed very accurately known by whom ministers were nominated to vacant churches for thirty years after the commencement of the Reformation, when there was hardly any settled
government in the church or in the state. In some parishes they were
probably called by the general voice of the people; in others, obtruded
on them by the violence of the prevailing faction, to serve some political
purpose of the day; and in others again appointed by the superintendent
and his council: while in a few the legal patron may have exercised his
right, without making any simoniacal contract with the presentee; which,
however, there is reason to suspect was no uncommon practice.*
"Hitherto the government of the Protestant church of Scohtand had fluctuated from one form to another, sometimes assuming the appearance of episcopacy under superintendents, and at other times being presbyterian in the
strictest sense of the word. In the month of June, 1592, an act was passed,
giving a legal sanction to the presbyterian form of government, and restoring the ancient law of patronage. By that act the patron of a vacant
parish was authorized to present, to the presbytery comprehending that
parish, a person properly qualified to be intrusted with the cure of souls;
and the presbytery was enjoined, after subjecting the presentee to certain
trials and examinations, of which its members were constituted the judges,'to ordain and settle him as minister of the parish, provided no relevant
objection should be stated to his life, doctrine, or qualifications.'
" Though we are assured by the highest authorityt that this right of
patronage, thus conferred by the fundamental charter of presbyterian
government in Scotland, was early complained of as a grievance, it ap
pears to have been regularly exercised until the era of the rebellion against
Charles I. during the establishment as well of the presbyterian as of the
episcopal church. It was indeed abolished by the usurping powers, which
in 1649 established in its stead what was then called' the gospel right of
popular election;' but at the restoration it was re-established together with
episcopacy, and was regularly exercised until the revolution, when epis
* The reader will derive much valuable information on this subject from Dr. Cook's " History
of the Reformation in Scotland."    f Dr. Ilill, Principal of St. Mary's College, in the Urniversity of St. Andrew's.




vill                    THE LIFE OF
copacy was finally overthrown, and, by an act passed onthe 26th of May,'the presbyterian church, government, and discipline, by kirk sessions,
presbyteries, provincial synods, and general assemblies, eg ablished in its
stead. The act of James VI. in 1592 was' revived and conhrmed in every
head thereof, except in that part of it: relating to patronages,' which were
utterly abolished, though nothing was substituted in their stead until the
19th of July immediately succeeding.
" It was then statuted and declared, to use the language of the act,' that,
in the vacancy of any particular church, and for supplying the same with
a minister, the protestant heritors and elders are to name and propose the
person to the whole congregation, to be either approven or disapproven by
themr; and if they disapprove, they are to give in their reasons, to the
effect the affairs may be cognosced by the presbytery of the: bounds; at
whose judgment, and by whose determination, the calling and entry of
every particular minister is to be ordered and concluded. In recompense
of which rights of presentation the heritors of every parish were to pay
to the patron six hundred merks (~33 6s. 8d. sterling), against a certain
time, and under certain proportions.
" Whether this sum, which at that period was very considerable, was
actually paid to the patrons of the several parishes, I know not; but if it
was, or indeed whether it was or not, had it been the intention of the legislature to produce dissension in the country, it could not have devised any
thing better calculated to effect its purpose than this mode of appointing
ministers to vacant churches. The heritors or landholders, if the price was
paid, would naturally contend for the uncontrolled exercise of the right
which they, and they only, had purchased; but it is not by any means
probable that at such a period they could often agree in their choice of a
minister for a vacant parish. The elders, who were men of inferior rank
and inferior education, would, by the envy of the low, when comparing
themselves with the high, be prompted to thwart the wishes of their landlords, which the act of parliament enabled them to do effectully; and the
consequence must have been that two or three candidates for every vacant
church were at once proposed to the people of the parish for their approbation or disapprobation. The people might either give the preference to
one of the candidates proposed, or reject them all, for reasons of which the
members of the presbytery were constituted the judges; and as it appears
that the presbytery generally took part with the people, a source of everlasting contention was thus established between the country gentlemen and
the parochial clergy; an evil than which a greater cannot easily be conceived. For these, and other reasons, this ill digested law was repealed
in the tenth year of the reign of queen Anne, and the right of patronage
restored as in all other established churches.
"By many of the clergy, however, patronage seems to have been considered as an appendage of prelacy; though it has obviously no greater
connexion with that form of ecclesiastical polity than with any other that
is capable of being allied with the state; and, till after the year 1730,
ministers continued to be settled in vacant parishes in the manner pre
scribed by the act of king William and queen Mary.' Even then,' says
Dr. Hill, 6 the church courts, although they could not entirely disregard the
law, continued, in many instances, to render it ineffectual, and by their
authority sanctioned the prevailing prejudices of the people against it.
They admitted, as an incontrovertible principle in presbyterian church
government, that a presentee, although perfectly well qualified, and unexceptionable in his life and doctrine, was nevertheless inadmissible to his
clerical office. till the concurrence of the people who were to be under his
ministry had been regularly ascertained.' The form of expressing this
concurrence was by the subscription of a paper termed' a call;' to which




DR. ROBERTSON.
many of the old ministers paid greater respect than'to the deed of presentation by the patron of the church.
"To render the call good, however, the unanimous consent of the land
holders, elders, and people, was not considered as necessary, nor indeed
ever looked for. Nay, it appears that even a majority was not in all cases
deemned indispensable; for the presbytery often admitted to his charge,
and proceeded to ordain the presentee whose call, by whatever number of
parishioners, appeared to them to afford a reasonable prospect of his becoming, by prudent conduct, a useful parish minister. On the other hand,
presbyteries sometimes set aside the presentation altogether, when they
were not satisfied with the call; and when the patron insisted on his right,
and the presbytery contiried inflexible, the general assembly was, in such
cases, under the necessity either of compelling the members of the presbyterv, by ecclesiastical censures, to do their duty, or of appointing a cornmittee of its own body to relieve them  from that duty, by ordaining the
presentee, and inducting him into the vacant chiurch.  To compulsionl recourse had seldomn been had; and the consequence was that individuals
openly claimed a right to disobey the injunctions of the assembly, whenever they conceived their disobedience justified by a principle of conscience.
" Such woas the state of ecclesiastical discipline in Scotland when Mlr.
Robertson first took an active part in the debates of the general assembly;
and he very justly thought that its tendency was to overturn the presbyte
rian establishment, and introduce in its stead a number of independent
congregational churches. He therefore supported the law of patronage,
not merely because it was part of the law  of the land, but because he
thought it the most expedient method of filling the vacant churches.  It
did not appear to him that the people at large are competent judges of
those qualities which a minister should possess in order to be a useful
teacher of the truth as it is in Jesus, or of the precepts of a sound morality.
He more than suspected that if the candidates for churches were taught
to consider their success in obtaining a settlement as depending on a popular election, many of them would be tempted to adopt a manner of preaching calculated rather to please the people than to promote their edification
He thought that there is little danger to be apprehended firom the abuse
of the law of' patronage; because the presentee must: be chosen from
among those whom the church had approved, and licensed as qualified for
the office of a parish minister; because a presentee cannot be admitted to
the benefice if any relevant objection to his life or doctrine be proved
against him; and because, after ordination and admission, he is liable to
be deposed for improper conduct, and the church declared vacant."
Whatever may be thought of the merits of the cause which Robertson
espoused, it is impossible to doubt that he was a conscientious supporter of
it. To undertake its defence some strength of nerve was, indeed, required.
Success seemed, at the outset, to be scarcely within the verge of probability, and there was much danger of becoming unpopular,  The result,
nevertheless, gave ample proof of what may be accomplished by perseverance and talents.  The first time that he came forward in the assembly was in May, 1751, when a debate arose on the conduct of a minister,
who had disobeyed the sentence of a former assembly. Seizing this
opportunity to enforce his principies of church discipline, Robertson, in a
vigorous and eloquent speech, contended that if subordination were not
rigidly maintained the presbyterian establishment would ultimately be
overthrown, and, therefore, an exemplary punishment ought to be inflicted
on the offending party.  But, though he was heard with attention, his arguments produced so little present effect that, on the house being divided, he
was left in a minority of no more than eleven against two hundred.
Though this decision was not calculated to encourage him, he deter



x                       THE LIFE OF
mined to persist, and an occurrence very soon took place which enabled
nln to renew the contest. The presbytery of Durnferline having been
guilty of disobedience, in refusing to admit a minister to the church of
Inverkeithing, the commission of the assembly, which met in November,
ordered them to cease from their opposition, and threatened, that, if they
continued to be refractory, they should be subjected to a high censure.
Notwithstanding this, the presbytery again disobeyed the mandate of the
superior court. Yet, instead of carrying its threat into effect, the commission came to a resolution that no censure should be inflicted.
Such a resolution as this, after the commission had gone so far as to
resort to threats, was at least absurd. So fair an opening as this circumstance afforded was not neglected by Robertson. He accordingly drew up
a protest, intituled, " Reasons of Dissent from the Judgment and Resolution
of the Commission."  This protest, which was signed by himself; Dr.
Blair, Home, and a few other friends, is an able and closely reasoned production. It boldly declares the sentence of the commission to be inconsistent with the nature and first principles of society; charges the commission itself with having, by that sentence, gone beyond its powers, and
betrayed the privileges and deserted the doctrines of the constitution; considers the impunity thus granted as encouraging and inviting contumacy,
insists on the lawfulness and wisdom of ecclesiastical censures, and on the
absolute necessity of preserving subordination and obedience in the church;
and, finally, maintains that the exercise of no man's private judgment can
justify him in disturbing all public order, that he who becomes a member
of a church ought to conform to its decrees, or, 6 if he hath rashly joined
himself, that he is bound, as an honest man and a good Christian, to withdraw, and to keep his conscience pure and undefiled."
When the assembly met, in 1752, the question was brought before it;
and Robertson supported the principles of his protest with such cogency
of argument, that he won over a majority to his side, and achieved a comPlete triumph. The judgment of the commission was reversed, MIr. Gillespie, one of the ministers of the presbytery of Dumferline, was deposed
from his pastoral office, and ejected from his living, and three other individuals were suspended from their judicative capacity in the superior
ecclesiastical courts. Gillespie, whose only crime was that of being
absent on the day appointed for the induction of-the presentee, was a pious
and amiable'man, and his deposition occasioned so much dissatisfaction,
that it gave rise to a new sect of dissenters, afterwards known by the
appellation of " the Presbytery of Relief;" a sect which still exists, and is
of considerable magnitude.
From this time, though it was not till the year 1763 that he became its
avowed leader, Robertson was, in fact, at the head of the assembly; which'body, for the whole period of his ascendancy, he contrived to keep steady
to his principles. In this task he was ably seconded by Dr. Drysdale, one
of the ministers of Edinburgh. It was not, however, without many struggles that he retained his pre-eminence. Those which took place in 1765
and 1768 were peculiarly violent; motions having then been made, and
vehemently contended for, to inquire into the causes of the rapid progress
of secession from the established church; and, in order to counteract them
to introduce a more popular mode of inducting the parochial ministers
From what is mentioned by sir Henry Wellwood, in his "6 Memoirs o.
Dr. Erskine," it appears that the exertions of Robertson were kept con
tinually on the stretch; and that for his victory he was partly indebted to
cautious management, and to patience which nothing could tire. " During
Dr. Robertson's time," says he, "the struggle with the people was perpetual; and the opposition to presentees so extremely pertinacious, as in a
great measure to engross the business of the assemblies. The parties in
the church were then more equally balanced than they have ever been




DR. ROBERTSON.                              xl
since that period. The measures which were adopted, in the face of such
perpetual opposition, it required no common talents to manage or defend 
especially considering that the leaders in opposition were such men as Dr.
Dick, Dr. Macqueen, Dr. Erskine, Mr. Stevenson of St. Madois, Mr. Freebairn of Dumbarton, Mr. Andrew Crosbie, &c. &c.; men of the first ability
in the country, and some of thema possessed of an eloquence for a popular
assembly to which there was nothing superior in the church or in the
state.
"Dr. Robertson's firmness was not easily shaken, but his caution and
prudence never deserted him. He held it for a maxim, never wantonly
to offend the prejudices of the people, and rather to endeavour to manage
than directly to combat them. Some of the settlements in dispute were
protracted for eight or ten years together; and though the general assemblies steadily pursued their system, and uniformly appointed the presentees
to be inducted, their strongest sentences were not vindictive, and seldomr,
went beyond the leading points to which they were directed."
In 1757 an event happened, which afforded to him an opportunity of
manifesting the liberality of his spirit, and of exercising his influence over
his colleagues, to moderate the vengeance which was threatened to be
hurled on some of his brethren, for having been guilty of an act which was
considered to be of the most profane nature   The chief offender was his
friend Home, who was then minister of Athelstaneford. The crime consisted in Home having not only produced the tragedy of Douglas, but
having also had the temerity to be present at the acting of it in the Edinburgh theatre. With him were involved several of'his clerical intimates,
who, as much from a desire to share with him any odium or peril which
might be incurred, as from a natural curiosity, had been induced to accompany him to the theatre on the first night of the performance.  The storm
which this circumstance raised among the Scottish clergy can, in the present age, hardly be imagined. It seemed as if they had witnessed nothing
less than the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place. The
presbytery of Edinburgh hastened to summon before its tribunal such of
its members as had committed this heinous offence, and it likewise
despatched circulars to the presbyteries in the vicinity, recommending
rigorous measures against all clergymen who had desecrated themselves
by appearing in the polluted region of the theatre. The alarm thus
sounded awakened all the bigotry of the circumjacent presbyteries. That
of Haddington, to which Home belonged, cited him and his friend Carlyle, of Inveresk, to answer for their misconduct. That of Glasgow had no
criminals to chastise, but it was resolved not to remain silent, and, therefore, with a zeal which assuredly was not according to knowledge, it fulminated forth a series of resolutions on this appalling subject. It lamented'" the melancholy but notorious fact, that one, who is' a minister of the
church of Scotland, did himself write and compose a play entitled the
Tragedy of Douglas, and got it to be acted in the theatre at Edinburgh,
and that he, with several other ministers of the church, were present, and
some of them oftener than once, at the acting of the said play before a
numerous audience;" it affirmed, in direct hostility to historical evidence,'that stage plays had "been looked upon by the Christian church, in all
ages, and of all different communions, as extremely prejudicial to religion
snd morality; and, as a natural consequence from this, it called on the
general assembly to reprobate publicly "a practice unbecoming the cha
racter of clergymen, and of such pernicious tendency to the great interests
of religion, industry, and virtue."  The cry of the church was echoed from
the press, angry disputants were arrayed on both sides, and a multitude of
ephemeral pamphlets and pasquinades was rapidly produced.
Throughout the whole of the ecclesiastical proceedings, which on this
occasion were instituted in the presbyteries and in the general assembly




Xli                     THE  LIFE  OF
Robertson exerted himself with more than common ardour and eloquence
on behalf of his friends. Though, being restrained by a promise which he
had given to his father, he had himself never been within the walls of a
theatre, he did not hesitate to avow his belief that no culpability attached
to the persons who were under prosecution. " The promise." said he,
s" which was exacted by the most indulgent of parents, I have hitherto
religiously kept, and it is my intention to keep it till the day of my death.
I am at the same time free to declare, that I perceive nothing sinful or
inconsistent with the spirit of Christianity in writing a tragedy, which
gives no encouragement to baseness or vice, and that I cannot concur in
censuring my brethren for being present at the representation of such a
tragedy,'from which I was kept back by a promise, which, though sacred
to me, is not obligatory on them."
Wholly to overcome the prevalent spirit of bigotry was more than
Robertson could accomplish, but it is believed to have been at least greatly
mitigated by his laudable efforts. To his persuasive eloquence is attributed, and no doubt justly, the comparative mildness of the sentence which
was ultimately pronounced. A declaratory act was passed by the assembly, forbidding the clergy to visit the theatres, but not extending the prohibition to the writing of plays. The silence of the assembly on the latter
head was at least one point gained in favour of liberal principles. As to
the offending ministers, some of them were rebuked by the presbyteries
to which they belonged, and one or two of them were suspended from
their office for a few weeks. Home, however, being disgusted with the
treatment which he had experienced, and having, perhaps, already been
offered patronage in the British metropolis, resigned his living of Athelstaneford in June, 1757, and fixed his residence in London.
By the departure of Homrne, the Select Society, as it was called, lost one
of its ablest members. This society was instituted at Edinburgh, in 1754,
by Allan Ramsay, the painter, who was son to the poet of the same name.
The object of it was philosophical and literary inquiry, and the improvement of the members in the art of speaking. It held its meetings in the
Advocates' Library, and met regularly every Friday evening, during the
sittings of the court of session. At the outset it consisted of only fifteen
ersons, of whom Robertson was one. It, however, soon acquired such
high reputation, that its list of associates was swelled to more than a hundred and thirty names; among which were included those of the most
eminent literary and political characters in the northern division of the
kingdom. Of this number were Hume, Adam Smith, Wedderburn, afterwards Lord Chancellor, sir Gilbert Elliot, lord Elibank, lord  Ionboddo,
lord Kames, lord Woodhouselee, Adam Furguson, Wilkie, Dr. Cullen,
and many others less gifted perhaps, but still rising far above mediocrity
of talent. This society flourished in full vigour for some years; and is
said by professor Stewart, to have produced such debates as have not often
been heard in modern assemblies; debates, where the dignity of the
speakers was not lowered by the intrigues of policy, or the intemperance
of faction; and-where the most splendid talents that have ever adorned
this country were roused to their best exertions, by the liberal and ennobling discussions of literature and philosophy."  That such an assemblage
of learning and genius must have done much towards diffusing through
Scotland a taste fcr letters, there cannot be the shadow of a doubt. Robertscn took an active part, and was one of its presidents. As a speaker, it
was remarked of him, that " whereas most of the others in their previous
discourses exhausted the subject so much that there was no room for
debate, he gave only such brief but artful sketches, as served to suggest
ideas, without leading to a decision."
By a few members of the society, a Review was attempted in 1755, the
principal contributors to which were Blair, Smith, and Robertson.  This




DR. ROBERTSON.                            xl'
undertaking was designed to form a record of the progress of Scottish literature, and. occasionally, to criticise such English and foreign works as
might appear to be worthy of notice. After having published two numbers, which appeared in July and December, the reviewers were under
the necessity of relinquishing their plan. the failure is said to have arisen
from their having lashed, with just but caustic severity, "some miserable
effusions of fanaticism, which it was their wish to banish from the church "
Their attack upon this mischievous trash excited such a vehement party
outcry, that they thought it prudent to discontinue labours which, while
they must fail of being useful, could not fail to expose them to vulgar
odium, and involve them in endless disputes. Time, the great worker or
changes, has since produced a marvellous alteration. At a period less than
half a century later, the most prejudice-.scorning and pungent of all
Reviews was established in the Scottish capital, and was received with
enthusiasm!
The first separate literary production of Robertson, or at least the first
known production, was also laid before the public in 1755. It is a sermon
which he preached in that year before the Scotch society for propagating
Christian knowledge. He chose for his subject, "The situation of the
world at the time of Christ's appearance, and its connexion with the success of his religion."  Though this discourse never rises into a strain of
glowing eloquence, it is a dignified and argumentative composition, in a
chaste and animated style. If it does not flash and dazzle, it at least
shines with a steady lustre. Its merit, indeed, affords us ample cause to
regret that, before his removal from Gladsmuir, he lost a volume of sermons, on which much care is said to have been bestowed. The sole specimen which remains of his talents as a preacher has passed through five
editions, and has been translated into the German language by Mr. Edeling.
The time now came when the high character for learning and talent,
which Robertson had acquired among his friends, was to be ratified by
the public voice. He had long been sedulously engaged on the History
of Scotland, the plan of' which he is said to have formed soon after his
settling at Gladsmuir. By his letters to Lord Hailes we are, in some
measure, enabled to trace his progress. It appears that as early as 1753
he had commenced his labours, and that by the summer of 1757 he had
advanced as far as the narrative of Gowrie's conspiracy. In the spring of
1758 he visited London, to concert measures for publishing; and the History, in two volumes, quarto, was given to the world on the first of February, 1759, about three months subsequent to the completion of it. While
the last sheets were in the press, the author received, by diploma, the degree of Doctor of Divinity from the University of Edinburgh.
At the period when Dr. Robertson commenced his career, this country
could boast of few historians, possessed of philosophic views and an elegant style. Rapin, who, besides, wrote in his native language, Carte, and
others, could not aspire to a loftier title than that of annalists; and the recent production from the pen of Smollet, though displaying talent, was by
far too imperfect to give him a place among eminent historical writers
flume alone had come near to the standard of excellence; and, after enduring a doubtful struggle, in the course of which his spirits were well
nigh overpowered, had at length begun to enjoy the literary honours which
he had so painfully acquired. For a considerable time past he had been
occupied on the reigns of the Tudor race; and, as this subject is inseparably connected with Scottish history, Dr. Robertson was alarmed lest he
himself should sustain injury from the volumes of his friend being published simultaneously with his own. The new candidate for fame endeayoured to induce Hume to proceed with some other portion of his narrative; and, having failed in this, he appears to have been desirous that he
should at least be allowed to be the first to claim the notice of the public,




Xlv                     THE LIFE OF
"I am (says Hume in a letter to him) nearly printed out, and shall be sure
to send you a copy by the stage coach, or some other conveyance. I ba:
of you to make remarks as you go along. It would have been much better had we communicated before printing, whicn was always my desire
and was most suitable to the friendship which always did, and I hope
always will subsist between us. I speak this chiefly on my own account.
For though I had the perusal of your sheets before I printed, I was not
able to derive sufficient benefits from them, or indeed to make any alteration by their assistance. There still remain, I fear, many errors, of which
you could have convinced me if we had canvassed the matter in conversa
tion. Perhaps I might also have been sometimes no less fortunate with
you."  He adds, "Millar was proposing to publish me about March;
but I shall communicate to him your desire, even though I think it entirely
groundless, as you will likewise think after you have read my volume.
Ile has very needlessly delayed your publication till the first week ot
February, at the desire of the Edinburgh booksellers, who could no way
be affected by a publication in London. I was exceedingly sorry not to
be able to comply Kwith your desire, when you expressed your wish that 1
should not write this period. I could not write downward. For when
you find occasion, by new discoveries, to correct your opinion with regard
to facts which passed in queen Elizabeth's days; who, that has not the best
opportunities of informing himself, could venture to relate any recent
transactions? I must therefore have abandoned altogether this scheme oi
the English History, in which I had proceeded so far, if I had not acted as
I did. You will see what light and force this history of the Tudors bestows on that of the Stewarts. Had I been prudent I should have begun
with it."
The alarm which Dr. Rtobertson conceived from the rivalship of his
friend was, however, groundless. His success was not, like that of Hume,
the slow growth of years. It was complete and immediate. So rapid
was the sale of the book, that, before a month had elapsed, his publisher
informed him that it was necessary to set about preparing for a second edition. It was read and admired by a part of the royal family;  and plausive and gratulatory letters were showered on him  from all quarters.
Warburton, Horace Walpole, Lord Mansfield, Lord Lyttelton, Dr. Douglas, Hurd, and many other men of eminence, all concurred in swelling the
chorus of praise. Among the foremost to blazon his merits was his amicable rival, Hurne, whose letters bear repeated testimony to the warmth of
his friendship, and his noble freedom from the base dominion of envy.
"I am diverting myself," says he, "with the notion of how much you
will profit by the applause of my enemies in Scotland. Had you and I
been such fools as to have given way to jealousy, to have entertained animosity and malignity against each other, and to have rent all our acquaint
ance into parties, what a noble amusement we should have exhibited to
the blockheads, which now they are likely to be disappointed of! All the
people whose friendship orjudgment either of us value are friends to both,
and will be pleased with the success of both, as we will be with that of
each other. I declare to you I have not of a long time had a more sensible pleasure than the good reception of your History has given me within
this fortnight."  In another place, with a sportiveness not unusual in his
correspondence, he exclaims, 1" But though I have given this character of
your work to Monsieur Helvetius, I warn you that this is the last time
that, either to Frenchman or Englishman, I shall ever speak the least good
of it. A plague take you! Here I sat near the historical summit of Parnassus, immediately under Dr. Smollet; and you have the impudence to
squeeze yourself by me, and place yourself directly under his feet. Do
yourimagine that this can be agreeable to me! And must not I be guilty oI
great simlplicity to contribute my endeavours to your thrusting me out of




DR. ROBERTSON.                             xv
my place in Paris as well as at London? But I give you warning that you
will find the matter somewhat difficult, at least in the former city. A
friend of mine, who is there, writes home to his father the strangest accounts on that head; which my modesty will not permit me to repeat, but
which it allowed me very deliciously to swallow."
The hold which the History of Scotland thus suddenly acquired on the
public mind it yet retains. Fourteen editions were published during the
lifd-tirr,e of the author, and the editions since his decease have been still
more numerous. It has undoubtedly established itself as a classical Eng..
isn production. For a while, indeed, the voice of criticism was mute;
and the historian had only to enjoy the luxury of his triumph. But, at
length, some of his opinions, particularly his belief of the guilt of Mary
found opponents in the candid and well informed Tytler, the learned,
acute, and eloquent Stuart, and the dogmatical Whitaker; the latter of
whom, though master of talents, erudition, and forcible reasoning, almost
rendered truth itself repulsive by the petulance and overbearingness of
his manner, and the ruggedness of his style. Of his antagonists, however,
the historian took not the slightest putblic notice, contenting himself with
the silent correction of such passages in his work as his matured judgment
had decided to be erroneous. In a letter to Gibbon he laconically notices
Whitaker. " You swill see," says he, "66 that I have got in Mr. Whitaker an
adversary so bigoted and zealous, that though I have denied no article of
faith, and am at least as orthodox as himself, yet he rails against me with all
the asperity of theological hatred. I shall adhere to my fixed maxim of
making no reply."
It was not merely a harvest of unproductive fame that was reaped by
Dr. Robertson. he was no sooner known to the world than preferment
was rapidly bestowed on him. In the autumn of 1758, while his work
was in the hands of the printer, he was translated from Gladsmuir to one
of the churches of the Scottish metropolis. I believe the church to which
he was removed to have neen that of the Old Gray Friars, in which, some
years afterwards, his friend Dr. Erskine became his coadjutor. On the
History issuing from the press, he was appointed chaplain of Stirling Castle, and, in 1761, one of his Majesty's chaplains in ordinary for Scotland.
The dignity of Principal of the College of Edinburgh was conferred on
him in 1762; and, two years subsequently to this, the office of Historiographer for Scotland, which, since the death of Crawfurd, in 1726, had
been disused, was revived in his favour, with an annual stipend of two
hundred pounds.
By the remuneration which he had received for his history, and the
salaries which arose from his various appointments, Dr. Robertson was
now in possession of an income far greater than had ever before been possessed by any Scotch presbyterian minister, and certainly not falling short
of that which had been enjoyed by some bishops at the period when the
church of Scotland was under episcopal government. A few of his indiscreet friends seem, however, to have thought that his talents were not adequately rewarded, and even that the clerical profession in the northern
part of our island did not afford for them a sphere of action sufficiently extensive. The church of England held forth richer prospects to ambition
and to mental endowments; and they were of opinion that, by transferring
his services to that church, he might obtain a share in its highest dignities
and emoluments. To this scheme allusions may be found in the letters
which, about this time, were addressed to him by Dr. John Blalr, Sir Gilbert Elliot, and Mr. Hume. But Dr. Robertson had a larger share of
foresight and prudence than his advisers, and he rejected their dangerous
though well intended counsel. It is, perhaps, more than doubtful whether,
nad it been executed, their plan would have produced the desired effect.
This kind of transplanting has often been tried, but seldom, if ever, with




XVI                     THE LIFE OF
any degree of success. The plant, vigorous on its native bed, languishes
and is dwarfed on an alien soil. Dr. Robertson had now reached the mature age of forty-one; his opinions, his habits, his connexions, had all been
formned with a reference to the circle in which he moved, and it was not
probable that they could be suddenly bent with advantage in an opposite
direction. In Scotland he had no competitors who could rise to a level
with him; in England he would, perhaps, have had many; and he may
be supposed to have thought with Cmsar, that it is better to be the first
man in a village than the second at Rome. Nor was there any room in
England for the exercise of that kind of eloquence in which he particularly
excelled; the eloquence which is manifested in debate. By the force of
his oratory he left far behind all his rivals and opponents, and wielded at
will the general assembly of the Scottish church; but, since the convocation was shorn of its controversial and declamatory glories, since it was
smitten with an incapacity of embarrassing the government, fostering theological rancour, and displaying the unseemly spectacle of Christian divines
arrayed in worse than barbarian hostility to each other, there has not in
this country existed any deliberative clerical body in which Dr. Robertson could have exerted those argumentative and rhetorical powers that,
among his fellow ministers, obtained for him so entire an ascendancy. His
preferment inight also have stopped short of the point which his sanguine
friends expected it to attain; and, whatever its degree, it would in all probability have been looked on with a jealous eye by many of his brethren
on the south of the Tweed.  There was, besides, another and still more
powerful reason that must have influenced his decision. He had for nearly
twenty years been a leading minister of the presbyterian establishment;
and his now quitting it to enter into a prelatical church, which, as being
deemed a scion from the hated stock of Rome, was still held in abomination by mn;ny of his countrymen, could scarcely have failed to be considered
as an interested and base sacrifice of his principles and his character at the
shrine of lucre and ambition. To be branded as a deserter by the zealots
of the one institution, and by the envious of the other, was not a favourable
auspice under which to commence his new career; and he therefore acted
wisely, as well as honourably, in remaining a member of the Scottish
church.
Having resolved to remain in Scotland, and to rely chiefly on his pen for
the advancement of his fortune, Dr. Robertson had now to choose another
theme on which his talents could be profitably employed.  To the composition of history, in which he-had met with such stimulating success, he
wlseiy- -tearmined to adhere. It was, indeed, in that department that he
was peculiarly qualified to excel, by his power of vivid description, and
his happy delineation of character. His friends were consulted on this
occasion; each had some favourite plan to suggest to him; and he seems
to have been absolutely embarrassed by the affluence of subjects, many
of which were worthy of his best exertions to illustrate and adorn them.
if a ludicrous simile may be allowed, we may say that he found it no less
difficult to fix his choice, than it was for Mr. Shandy to decide to what purpose he should apply the legacy which was left to him by his sister Dinah
Dr. John Blair strenuously recommended to him to write a complete His-,
torv of England, and assured him that Lord Chesterfield had declared his
readiness to move, in the house of peers, for public encouragement to him, in
case of his undertaking a work which might with justice be considered as
being a national one. But from adopting this project, though it was one which
he had early cherished, Dr. Robertson was deterred by his honourable unwillingness to interfere with his friend Hume, who was now putting the
finishing hand to his great labour. Hume himself advised him to undertake a series of modern lives, in the manner of Plutarch.  "You see,'
said he, " that in Plutarch the life of Caesar may be read in half an hour




DR. ROBERTSON.                          xvIl
Were you to write the life of Henry the Fourth of France after that model,
you might pillage all the pretty stories in Sully, and speak more of his
mistresses than of his battles. In short, you might gather the flower of al
modern history in this manner. The remarkable popes, the kings of Sweden, the great discoverers and conquerors of the New World, even the
eminent men of letters might furnish you with matter, and the quick desgatch of every different work would encourage you to begin a new one
If one volume were successful, you might compose another at your leisure,
and the field is inexhaustible. There are persons whom you might meet
with in the corners of history, so to speak, who would be a subject of en-,
tertainment quite unexpected; and as long as you live, you might give and
receive amusement by such a work."  That so excellent an idea should
not have been acted upon must be regretted by every one who is a lovei
of literature. By Horace Walpole two subjects, of no trivial interest,
were pointed out. These were the History ot Learning, and the History
of the reigns of Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the two Antonines; the latter
of which Walpole declared that he should be tempted to denominate the
History of Humanity. Dr. Robertson himself seems, at one time, to have
thought, though but transiently, of tracing the events which occurred in
the age of Leo the Tenth. There is no reason to lament that he did not
undertake this task, which was once meditated on by Warton, and has
since been performed by a writer whom nature has largely gifted, and who
possesses a profound knowledge of the records, arts, and language of Italy
But the two plans which had the ascendancy in his mind, and between
which he longw hesitated, were the History of Greece, and the History of
Charles the Iifth. At length, notwithstanding the objections which were
urged by Hurne and Horace Walpole, he made choice of the reign of
Charles as the subject of his second attempt.
When he had for about a year been engaged, partly in those preliminary
researches which are necessary to give value to a work like that on which
he was occupied, and partly in composition, his progress was suddenly
suspended, by the intervention of a personage of such elevated rank as to
render it almost impossible for him to decline a compliance with that
which was required fromn him. It has been seen, that he was earlv desirous
to be the historian of his native island, and that friendship alone prevented
himn froml being so. He was now informed that the wishes of the British
sovereign were in unison with his own. In the latter part of  July, 1761,
he was written to on this head by lord Cathcart. " Lord Bute told me the
king's thoughts as well as his own," said lord Cathcart, " with respect to
your History of Scotland, and a wish his majesty had expressed to see a
History of England by your pen. His lordship assured me, every source
of information which government can command would be open to you,
and that great, laborious, and extensive as the work must be, hie would
take care your encouragement should be proportioned to it. He seemed
to be aware of some objections you once had, founded on the apprehension of'clashing or interfering with Mr. David Hume, who is your friend-.
but as your performance and his will be upon plans so different from each
other, and as his will, in point of time, have so much the start of yours,
these objections did not seem to him such as, upon reflection, were likely
to continue to have much weight with you. T must add, that though 1
did not think it right to inquire into lord l3ute's intentions before I knew a
little of your mind, it appeared to me plain, that they were higher than
any views which can open to you in Scotland, and which, I believe, he
would think inconsistent with the attention the other subject would necessarily require."
A proposition thus powerfully enforced it would, under any circumstances, have been difficult for Dr. Robertson to reject. But, in fact, the
reasons which formerly influenced his conduct had ceased to exist. Hume
VOL. I. —C




xvlil                   THE LIFE OF
had now completed his history, it was before the publ;c, and its fate must
be irrevocably decided before a line of the rival narrative could be com
mitted to paper. Dr. Robertson was convinced of this, and therefore he
did not hesitate to embrace the opportunity which was offered to him.' After the first publication of the History of Scotland, and the favourable
reception it met with," said he in his answer to lord Cathcart, " I had both
very tempting offers from booksellers, and very confident assurances of
public encouragement, if I would undertake the History of England
But as Mr. Hume, with whom, notwvilhstanding the contrariety of our sentiments both in religion and politics, I live in great friendship, was at that
time in the middle of the subject, no consideration of interest or reputation
would induce me to break in upon a field of which he had taken prior possession; and I determined that my interference with him should never be
any obstruction to the sale or success of his work. Nor do I yet repent of
my having resisted so many solicitations to alter this resolution. But the
case I now think is entirely changed. His History will have been published several years before any work of mine on the same subject can
appear; its first run will not be marred by any justling with me, and it
will have taken that station in the literary system which belongs to it.
This objection, therefore, which I thought, and still think, so weighty at
that time. makes no impression on me at present, and 1 can now justify my
undertaking the English History, to myself, to the world, and to him.
Besides, oul manner of viewing the same subject is so different or peculiar,
that (as was the case in our last books) both may maintain their own rank,
have their own partisans, and possess their own merit, without hurting
each other."
To enable him to accomplish so arduous a labour, he considered it necessary, not only that he should be established in such a manner as would
divest him of all anxiety as to pecuniary concerns, but that he should likewise have the power of devoting to study a larger portion of his time than
it was now possible for him to allot to that purpose. "' Were I to carve
out my own fortune," said he, "11  should wish to continue one of his majesty's chaplains for Scotland, but to resign my charge as a minister of
Edinburgh, which engrosses more of my time than one who is a stranger to
the many minute duties of that office can well imagine. I would wish to
apply my whole time to literary-pursuits, which is at present parcelled out
among innumerable occupations. In order to enable me to make this resignation some appointment must be assigned me for life. What that shoutl
be, it neither becomes me, nor do 1 pretend to say. One thing, however
I wish with some earnestness, that the thing might be executed soon, both
as it will give me great vigour in my studies to have my future fortune
ascertained in so honourable a manner, and because, by allowing me to
apply myself wholly to my present work, it will enable nme to finish it in
a less time, and to begin so much sooner to my new task."  But though he
was desirous to obtain some appointment, in order that he might not be
" reduced entirely to the profession of an author," he at the same moment,
with becoming spirit, declared that he did not wish to derive any emolument from it before he could commence the particular task for which the
appointment was to be given. The proposal that he should remove to
London, he was averse from complying with, though he did not put a
direct negative on it; and he could not consent to begin tie History of
Britain till he had completed that of Charles the Fifth.
This scheme, which seems to have been almost brought to maturity,
was, nevertheless, dropped; but for what reason is unknown. Mr. Stewart
is disposed to believe that the failure of it may in part be attributed to the
resignation of lord Bute.  It was certainly:.o much a favourite with Dr.
Robertson that he long cherished it, and abandoned it with reluctance
We may, perhaps, be allowed to smile, or to wonder, that a sovereign




DR. ROBERTSON.                             txi
should have selected a writer confessedly of Whig principles to compose
a History of England, in opposition to one produced by a friend of arbitrary power; and we may also be allowed to doubt, whether, as far as
regarded its sentiments, such a work, written by a Whig under the auspices
of a court, would have proved quite satisfactory either to the monarch or
to the people. There might, at least, have been some danger that it would
have justified the sarcasm which was uttered by Horace Walroole, on another occasion  "You must know, sir," said Dr. Robertsoni to nim, "that
I look upon myself as a moderate Whig." —" Yes, doctor," replied Walpole,'" I look on you as a very moderate Whig."
As soon as this negotiation was broken off, he bent all his exertions to
the task which he had commenced. The public curiosity was highly
excited, and it was long kept on the stretch before it was gratified  In
the summer of 1761, he stated that one third of the work was finished, and
that two years more would be required to bring the whole to perfection.
But there never yet was an author who did not deceive himself, and consequently deceive others, as to the period at which his labour would be
completed. The stupid, the thoughtless, and the malignant (and there are
many persons, not literary, though connected with literature, who belong
to these classes) consider as intended for the purpose of deception the
erroneous estimate which authors are thus apt to form. They either can
not or will not be taught that, in, spite of Dr. Johnson's bold assertion to
the contrary, no man is at all hours capable of thinking deeply, or-of
clothing his thoughts in an attractive dress; that he who is dependent on his
reputation for existence ought not to be compelled to hazard it by crude
and slovenly efforts, the product of haste; that he who draws up a narrative from widely scattered, numerous, and conflicting documents must
often, in painful research, and in balancing evidence, spend more months
than he had calculated on spending weeks; that the discovery of a single
paper, the existence of which was previously unknown, may not only
throw a new light upon a subject, but give to it an entirely new colour,
and may compel a writer to modify, to arrange, and even to cancel, much
that he had supposed to have received his last touches; and, therefore,
that the delay which, as being a proof of literary indolence, is so frequently and so unfeelingly an object of censure, ought rather in many cases
to be rewarded with praise, because it is a duty which an author conscientiously, and at his own cost, performs to society and to truth. Impediments of this kind no doubt retarded the progress of Dr. Robertson; to
which must be added his multifarious avocations, as principal of the university, a minister of one of the churches of the Scottish metropolis, and
an active member of the general assembly, in which body, as Mr. Stewart
informs us, faction was running high at that epoch. The transactions
relative to America he likewise found to be of too vast a magnitude, to
allow of their being compressed into an episode. He was under the necessity of reserving them for a separate history; and this circumstance obliged
him in some degree to make a change in his original plan. It is, there
fore, not wonderful that the publication of his work was protracted six
years beyond the time which he had himself assigned for it.
At length, early in 1769, appeared, in three volumes quarto, the History
of Charles the Fifth. It had been perused, while in the press, by Humre,
and probably by other friends, and had gained the warmest praise. "1
got yesterday from  Strahan," says Hume, in one of his letters, "about
thirty sheets of your History, to be sent over to Suard, and last night and
this morning have run them over with great avidity. I could not deny
myself the satisfaction (which I hope also will not displease you) (o
expressing presently my extreme approbation of them. To say only they
are very well written, is by far too faint an expression, and much inferiol
to the sentiments I feel: they are composed with noblenes5, with dignity




xi                      THE LIFE OF
with elegance, and with judgment, to which there are few equals. They
even excel, and I think in a sensible degree, your History of Scotland. I
propose tobnyself great pleasure in being the only man in England, during
some months, who will be in the situation of doing you justice, after which
you may certainly expect that my voice will be drowned in that of the
public."
Hume's anticipation was prophetic. Soon after the work had come out,
he wrote to his friend, in the following unequivocal terms. "1 The success
has answered my expectations, and 1, who converse with the great, the
fair, and the learned, have scarcely heard an opposite voice, or even whisper, to the general sentiments. Only I have heard that the Sanhedi m at
Mlrs. Mlacaulay's condemns you as little less a friend to government and
monarchy than myself."  Horace Walpole was almost equally laudatory;
lord Lyttelton testified his admiration; and, as Hume had long before
done, recommended to the historian to write, in the manner of Plutarch,
the lives of eminent persons. Voltaire, also, paid a flattering tribute. " It
is to you and to Mr. Hume," said he, " that it belongs to write history
You are eloquent, learned, and impartial. I unite with Europe in esteem
ing you."  Nor was the fame of the author confined to his native island.
Through the intervention of the baron D'Holbach, M. Suard was induced
to translate the work into French, while it was being printed in England,
and his masterly translation is said to have established his own literary
character, and to have been the means of his obtaining a seat in the French
academy. The remuneration which the author himself received was mag
nificent; especially in an age when it was not customary to give a large
sum of money for the purchase of copyright. It is affirmed to have been no
less than four thousand five hundred pounds.
It is not to be imagined, however, that the History of Charles the Fifth
could entirely escape the severity of criticism, which appears to be the
common lot of all literary productions. By the Abbe Mably it was attacked
in rude and contemptuous language; which, without having the power to
injure the work, was disgraceful to the person who descended to use it.
Gilbert Stuart likewise assailed it; but with more. skill than the French
critic, and with a vigour which was animated by personal resentment.
That his acuteness detected many inaccuracies, it would be absurd to dispute; but no one can doubt that he pustled his censure farther than was
consonant with justice, when he characterized Dr. Robertson as an author
"' whose total abstinence from all ideas and inventions of his own permitted
trim to carry an undivided attention to other mnen's thoughts and speculations." WValpole, too, in later life, asserted that the reading of Dr. Robertson was not extensive, that the Introduction to the History of Charles
abounds with gross errors, and that in many instances he has mistaken
exceptions for rules. The work, however, still maintains its station; and,
even admitting all that truth or ingenious prejudice can urge against it,
who is there who will now have the boldness to deny that it forms a splendid addition to our historical treasures?
After having completed this arduous undertaking, Dr. Robertson allowed
himself some respite from literary toil; a respite which, in fact, was necessary for the preservation of his health. His mind was, however, too active
to remain long unoccupied, and he hastened to resume the pen. As a sequel to the history of Charles, he had promised to give to the public a narrative of the Spanish discoveries, conquests, and proceedings in America.
This plan he soon resolved to enlarge, so as to include in it the transactions
of all the European colonizers of the American continent. To the origin
and progress of the British empire in that quarter, it was originally his in
tention to devote an entire volume. Than the History of the New World
It was impossible for him to have chosen a subject more fertile, more
attractive, or better calculated for the display of his peculiar tal




DR. ROBERTSON.                            xt
There was "ample room and verge enough" for eloquence to expatiate
In.  The rapidly succeeding events which he was to describe were
scarcely less marvellous than those of an oriental fiction; one of his heroes,
the dauntless explorer of unknown oceans, will always excite the wonder,
admiration, and pity of mankind; others, though villains, were' at least
villains of no common powers; and the characters, the customs, the manners, the scenery, every thing in short that was connected with the work,
possessed throughout the charm of novelty, and, in many instances, that of
the nmost picturesque and forcible contrast.
To the first part of his subject, that which relates to the discovery of the
New W6rld, and the conquests and policy of the Spaniards, eight years
of studious toil were devoted by Dr. Robertson. At length, in the spring
of 1777, he put forth, in two quartos, the result of his labours. The public again- received him with enthusiasm, and his literary friends again
pressed forward to congratulate and to praise him. Hurne was no longer
in existence; but his place was supplied by Gibbon, who testified his entire
approbation of the volumes even before he had wholly perused them.
" I have seen enough," said he, " to convince me that the present publication will support, and, if possible, extend the fame of the author; that the
materials are collected with care, and arranged with skill; that the pro
gress of discovery is displayed with learning and perspicuity; that the
dangers, the achievements, and the views of the Spanish adventurers, are
related with a temperate spirit; and that the most original, perhaps the
most curious portion of human manners, is at length rescued from the
hands of sophists and declaimers."
But, perhaps, of all the applause which was bestowed on Dr. Robertson, none was more gratifying than that which was given by Burke; a
man eminent at once as a writer, an orator, and a statesman. " I am perfectly sensible," says he, " of the very flattering distinction I have received
in your thinking me worthy of so noble a present as that of your History
of America. I have, however, suffered my gratitude to lie under some
suspicion, by delaying my acknowledgment of so great a favour. But my
delay was only to render my obligation to you more complete, and my
thanks, if possible, more merited. The close of the session brought a
great deal of very troublesome though not important business on me at
once. I could not go through your work at one breath at that time, though
I have done it since. I am now enabled to thank you, not only for the
honour you have done me, but for the great satisfaction, and the infinite
variety and compass of instruction, I have received from your incomparable
work. Every thing has been done which was so naturally to be expected
from the author of the History of Scotland, and of the Age of Charles the
Fifth. I believe few books have done more than this, towards clearing up
lark points, correcting errors, and removing prejudices. You have too
he rare secret of rekindling an interest on subjects that had so often been
treated, and in which every thing which could feed a vital flame appeared
t.) have been consumed. I am sure I read many parts of your History
w ith that fresh concern and anxiety which attend those who are not previously apprized of the event. You have, besides, thrown quite a new
light on the present state of the Spanish provinces, and furnished both materials and hints for a rational theory of what may be expected from them
in tuture
"The part which l read with the greatest pleasure is the discussion on
the manners and character of the inhabitants of the New World. 1 have
always thought witti you, that we possess at this time very great advantages towards the knowledge of human nature. We need no longer go to
history to trace it in all its ages and periods. History, from its comparative youth, is but a poor instructer. When the Egyptians called the Greeks
children in antiquities, we may well call them children; and so we may




xxii                    THE LIFE OF
call all those nations which were able to trace the progress of society only
within their own limits. But now the great map of mankind is unrolled
at once, and there is no state or gradation of barbarism, and no mode o!
refinement, which we have not at the same moment under our view; the
veiy different civility of Europe and of China; the barbarism of Persia
and ol Abyssinia; the erratic manners of Tartary and of Arabia; the
savage state of North America and New Zealand. Indeed you have made
a noble use of the advantages you have had. You have employed philosophy tojudge on manners, and from manners you have drawn new resources for philosophy. I only think that in one or two points you have
hardly done justice to the savage character."
The honours which were paid to him by foreigners were equally grati
fylng. The Royal Academy of History at Madrid unanimously elected
him a member on the eighth of August, in 1777, " in testimony of their
approbation of the industry and care with which he had applied to the
study of Spanish History, and as a recompense for his merit in having contributed so much to illustrate and spread the knowledge of it in foreign
countries."  It likewise appointed one of its members to translate the History of America into the Spanish language, and considerable progress is
believed to have been made in the translation. But the latter measure
excited alarm  in an absurd and decrepit government, which sought for
safety in concealment rather than in a bold and liberal policy, and, like
the silly bird, imagined that by hiding its own head it could escape from
the view of its pursuers. The translation was, therefore, officially ordered
to be suppressed, with the vain hope of keeping the world still in the
dark, with respect to the nature of the Spanish American commerce, and
of the system of colonial administration.
It was not from Spain alone that he received testimonies of respect. In
1781, the Academy of Sciences at Padua elected him one of its foreigr
members; and, in 1783, the same compliment was paid to him by the Imperial Academy of Sciences at St. Petersburgh. The empress Catharine
also, who, numerous as were her faults, was a woman of a strong and enlightened intellect, also conferred on him  a flattering distinction.  She
ordered his friend, Dr. Rogerson, to transmit to him, as a mark of her
esteem, a gold snuff box, richly set with diamonds; observing at the same
time, that a person whose labours had afforded her so much satisfaction
merited some attention from her. So much, indeed, was she delighted
with the works of the Scottish author, that she did not hesitate to assign to
him the place of first model in historical composition, to express mucl
admiration of the sagacity and discernment which he displayed in painting
the human mind and character,. and to declare that the History of Charles
the Fifth was the constant companion of' her journeys, and that she was
never tired of perusing it, particularly the introductory volume.
As soon as enthusiasm had subsided, criticism began its labours in search
of defects. It was objected to the author, that he had shown a disposition
to palliate or to veil the enormities of the Spaniards, in their American
conquests, and that he had shed an illusive lustre round the daring and
intelligent but sanguinary and unprincipled Cortes. Even Professor Stew
art, notwithstanding his honourable affection for the memory of his friena,
shrinks from vindicating him on this score, and contents himself with opposing to the charge " those warm and enlightened sentiments of humanity
which in general animate his writings."  Uiiwilling to censure severely,
and unable to exculpate, Bryan Edwards supggests, as an apology for Dr
Robertson, that this is one of the cases in which the mind, shrinking from
the contemplation of alleged horrors, wishes to resist conviction, and to re
lieve itself by incredulity.  Dr. Gleig, however, the latest biographer of
the historian, indignantly rejects this apology as absurd; and, more enter
prising than his predecessors. partly labours to invalidate the accusation,




DR. ROBERTSON.                           xxiii
ny.essening the sum of Spanish cruelties, and partly to render it of no
weight, by pleading that the writer probably considered the conquests of
Mexico and Peru as means employed by Providence to accomplish the noblest and most beneficent purposes. That Dr. Robertson did really regard
those conquests in such a light we may easily believe; since, in his sermon on the state of the world at the appearance of Christ, he manifests
similar sentiments with respect to the measureless and unslumbering ambirion of those universal robbers the Romans., whom he is pleased to style
"the noblest people that ever entered on the stage of the world."  But
this defence is merely sophistical. Though we are not ignorant that a wise
and benignant Providence educes good from evil, it is not the business of
an historian to diminish the loathing which evil deeds ought to excite; nor
does it appear that morality is likely to be much benefited, by teaching
tyrants and murderers to imagine that, while they are giving the rein to
their own fuarious and malignant passions, they are only performing their
destined tasks as instruments of the Deity.
This was by no means all that was urged against the History of America. It is, in fact, not now attempted to be denied that, in many instances,
Dr. Robertson was led astray by his partiality to the brilliant but fallacious
theories of De Pauw and Buffon. Clavigero, in his History of Mexico,
detected and somewhat harshly animadverted on several errors, a part of
which were subsequently rectified. Bryan Edwards, too, pointed out some
contradictions, and some erroneous statements. But the most severe censor is Mr. Southey, a man eminently well informed on ancient Spanish and
American events.  In his History of Brazil, after having described the
mode of reckoning in use among the transatlantic tribes, he adds, " when
Pauw reasoned upon the ignorance of the Americans in numbers, did he
suppress this remarkable fact, or was he ignorant of it? The same question is applicable to Dr. Robertson, who, on this, and on many other subjects, in what he calls his History of America, is guilty of such omissions,
and consequent misrepresentations, as to make it certain either that he had
not read some of the most important documents to which he refers, or that
he did not choose to notice the facts which he found there, because they
were not in conformity to his own preconceived opinions. A remarkable
example occurs respecting a circulating medium; when he mentions cocoanuts, which were used as money in Mexico, and says,' this seems to be the
utmost length which the Americans had advanced towards the discovery
of any expedient for supplying the use of money.' Now, it is said by
Cortes himself; that when he was about to make cannon, he had copper
enough, but wanted tin; and having bought up all the plates and pots,
which he could find among the soldiers, he began to inquire among the
natives. He then found, that in the province of Tachco, little pieces of
tin, like thin coin, were used for money, there and in other places. And
this led him to a discovery of the mines from whence it was taken. The
reputation of this author must rest upon his History of Scotland, if that can
supportit. His other works are grievously deficient."
Such are the defects which are attributed to Dr. Robertson's History
On the other hand, it ought to be remembered, that many sources of know
ledge, which were then hidden, have since become accessible, that no
man is at all times exempted from the dominion of prejudice, that the most
cautious vigilance may sink into a momentary slumber, and that to him
who has achieved much, a tribute of gratitude is due, even though it may
be discovered that he has left something undone. Were the History of
the Spanish Conquests proved to be merely a fiction, it would nevertheless
continue to be read, such attraction is there in the general elegance of the
language, the skilful delineation of the characters, and the sustained interest and spirit of the narrative.
In the preface to this portion of his labours, he made known his mtention




xxIv                     THE LIFE OF
to resume the subject at a future period; and he assigned the ferment
which then agitated our North American colonies as a reason for suspend.
ing, at present, the execution of that part of his plan which related to
British America. At the very beginning, in truth, of the contest with the
colonies, he congratulated himself on his not having completed his narrative. " It is lucky," said he, in a letter to Mr. Strahan, " that my American
History was not finished before this event. How many plausible theories
that I should have been entitled to form, are contradicted by what has
now happened." A fragment of this History, which, however, was care
fully corrected by him, and which he preserved when he committed his
manuscripts to the flames, was all that he subsequently wrote of the work;
and this was published by his son to prevent it from falling into the hands
of an editor who might make alterations and additions, and obtrude the
whole on the public as the genuine composition of the author.
With respect to a separation between the mother country and the colonlsts, Dr. Robertson seems to have somewhat varied in his sentiments, and
to have contemplated the probability of such an event with much more
dislike in 1775 than he did in 1766. In the latter year, speaking of the
repeal of the stamp act, he said, " I rejoice, from my love of the human
species, that a million of men in America have some chance of running the
same great career which other free people have held before them. I do
not apprehend revolution or independence sooner than these must or should
come. A very little skill and attention in the art of governing may preserve the supremacy of Britain as long as it ought to be preserved." But,
in 1775, though he still acknowledged that the colonies must ultimately
become independent, he was anxious that their liberation should be
delayed till as distant a period as possible, and was clearlyof opinion that
they had as yet no right to throw off their allegiance. Nor was he sparing
of his censure on the ministers for the want of policy and firmness, which
he considered them to have displayed at the commencement of the quar
rel. " I agree with you about the affairs of America," said he, in a letter,
which was written in the autumn of 1775,." incapacity, or want of informa
tion, has led the people employed there to deceive the ministry. Trusting to them, they have been trifling for two years, when they should have
been serious, until they have rendered a very simple piece of business
extremely perplexed. They have permitted colonies, disjoined by nature
and situation, to consolidate into a regular systematical confederacy; and
when a few regiments stationed in each capital would have rendered it
impossible for them to take arms, they have suffered them quietly to levy
and train forces, as if they had not seen against whom they were prepared.
But now we are fairly committed, and I do think it fortunate that the violence of the Americans has brought matters to a crisis too soon for themselves. From the beginning of the contest I have always asserted that
independence was their object. The distinction between taxation and
regulation is mere folly. There is not an argument against our right of
taxation that does not conclude with tenfold force against our power of
regulating their trade. They may profess or disclaim what they pleases
and hold the language that best suits their purpose; but, if they have any
meaning, it must be that they should be free states, connected with us by
blood, by habit, and by religion, but at liberty to buy and sell and trade
where and with whom they please. This they will one day attain, but
not just now, if there be any degree of political wisdom or rigour remaining. At the same time one cannot but regret that prosperous growing
states should be checked in their career. As a lover of mankind, I bewail
it; but as a subject of Great Britain, I must wish that their dependence
on it should continue. If the wisdom of government can terminate the
contest with honour instantly, that would be the most desirable issue
This, however, I take to be now impossible; and I will venture to foim




DR. ROBERTSON                             xxv
tell, that if our leaders do not at once exert the power of the British em
pire in its full force, the struggle will be long, dubious, and disgraceful
We are past the hour of lenitives and half exertions. If the contest be
protracted, the smallest interruption of the tranquillity that reigns in
Europe, or even the appearance of it, may be fatal."
It must be owned, that language like this goes very far towards justifying the sarcasm of Horace Walpole, that the reverend historian was " a
very moderate Whig."  Perhaps, also, his belief that, at the outset, a few
regiments in eacn capital would have sufficed to trample down the resistance  of the Americans, may now appear difficult to be reconciled with a
knowledge of military affairs, or of human nature. Yet we must, at the
same time, remember that this erroneous idea was held by him in common with many other men of intellect, and that it was even brought forward in the British senate as an undeniable truth.
Though the American war precluded Dr. Robertson from bringing to a
close his history of the British settlements, it is not easy to discover why
he could not continue it to a certain point; or why, at least, he could not
proceed with that part of his narrative which related to the colonization of
Brazil, and the violent struggles between the Dutch and the Portuguese in
that country-an extensive subject, and worthy of his pen, as it would have
afforded him abundant opportunities for the display of his delineative
talents. Our curiosity on this head is not satisfied by the reason which,
as we have recently seen, he himself gave, in his preface and in his letter
to Mr. Strahan. That reason, however, he repeated in a correspondence
with his firiend Mr. Waddilove, and it is now in vain to seek for a better.
It is certain that a wish to retire from literary toil was not his motive; for,
at the same moment that he postponed his History of America, he declared
that it was "neither his inclination nor his interest to remain altogether
idle."  As a proof of his sincerity, he projected a History of Great Britain, from the revolution to the accession of the House of Hanover, and
even began to collect the necessary documents. Notwithstanding this
seems to have been, for a while, a favourite scheme, it was speedily relinquished; a circumstance which may justly be regretted. Hume then suggested the History of the Protestants in France. " The events," said he,'are important in themselves, and intimately connected with the great
revolutions of Europe: some of the boldest or most amiable characters of
modern times, the admiral Coligny, Henry IV., &c. would be your peculiar
heroes; the materials are copious, and authentic, and accessible; and the
objects appear to stand at that just distance which excites curiosity without inspiring passion."
The hint given by Hume was, however, not adopted. About the year
1779 or 1780, Dr. Robertson seems, indeed, to have seriously resolved to
write no more for the public, but to pursue his studies at leisure, and for
his own amusement  "His circumstances," says professor Stewart, " were
independent: he was approaching to the age of' sixty, with a constitution
considerably impaired by a sedentary life; and a long- application to the
compositions he had prepared for the press had interfered with much of
the gratification he might have enjoyed, if he had been at liberly to follow
the impulse of his own taste and curiosity. Such a sacrifice Inmust be more
or less made by all who devote themselves to letters, whether with a view
to emolument or to fame; nor would it perhaps be easy to make it, were
it not for the prospect (seldom, alas! realized) of earning lby their exertions, that learned and honourable leisure which he was so fortunate as to
attain."
We must now contemplate Dr. Robertson in another point of view-that
of his ecclesiastical and academical character; in which, no less than in
his literary capacity, he occupied a prominent station. The eminence,
however, which he had not attained without difficulty, he did not hold
VOL. L.-D                       2




XXV1                    THE LIFE OF
entirely without danger. In one instance he was near falling a victim to his
spirit of liberality. In 1778, the British legislature relieved the English
Roman catholics from some of the severest of the barbarous penalties to
which they had been subjected nearly a century before. Encouraged by
this event, the Scottish catholics determined to petition parliament to extend
the benefit to themselves. To this measure Dr. Robertson was friendly,
and he successfully exerted his influence, and that of his partisans, to procure the rejection of a remonstrance against it, which was brought forward
in the general assembly. But on this occasion, as, unhappily, on too many
others, bigotry and ignorance triumphed over sound policy and Christian
charity. The trumpet of fanaticism was immediately sounded, and men
of the most opposite principles and interests hurried to obey the call.
Presbyterians, seceders, and even episcopalians, the latter of whom were
themselves under the lash of penal statutes, all combined in the crusade
against papistry. Pamphlets and speeches were lavished, to prove that
the constitution in church and state must inevitably perish, if an iota of
relief were granted to the faithless members of an idolatrous and sanguinary
church. The Roman catholics were so terrified at the fury that was thus
aroused, that the principal gentlemen among them informed the ministry
that they would desist from appealing to parliament; and they endeavoured
to calm the popular tempest, by publishing in the daily papers an account
of their proceedings. But the enlightened mob of Edinburgh had sagely
resolved that the catholics should not even dare to wish for the slightest
participation in the privileges of British subjects, without being punished?or their temerity. Accordingly, on the 2d of February, 1779, nmultitudes
of the lowest classes, headed by disguised leaders, assembled in the Scottish
capital, burnt the house of the popish bishop and two chapels: and, in
their even-handed justice, were on the point of committing to the flames
an episcopal chapel, when they were propitiated, by being told that an
episcopal clergyman was the author of one of the ablest tracts which had
been published against popery. As, however, they could not consent to
remit their vengeance, but only to change its object, they turned their
wrath upon those who had expressed opinions favourable to the claims of
the catholics.  Dr. Robertson was marked out as one of the most guilty,
and nothing less than the destruction of his property and life was considered
as suffici'ent to atone for his crime. Fortunately his friends had provided
for his safety, and, when the self-appointed champions of religion reached
his house, it was found to be defended by a'military force, which they had
not enough of courage to look in the face. As they had come only to
destroy and to murder, they, of course, retreated, when they discovered
that, to accomplish their purpose, it would also be necessary to fight. Dr.
Robertson is said to have manifested great firmness and tranquillity during
this trying scene.
In selecting Dr. Robertson as the person most worthy of suffering by
their summary process of punishment without trial, the mob of Edinburgh
acted with a more than mobbish share of injustice. Though desirous that
the catholics should be released from their thraldom, he was not disposed
to put any thing to the hazard for the furtherance of that object, and had
already withdrawn his patronage from such obnoxious clients. He was
not one of those who, as Goldsmnith says of Burke, are " too fond of the
right to pursue the expedient."  With him prudence was a governing
principle. When, therefore, he saw that his countrymen were adverse
to the measure, he advised the ministry to forbear from lending their countenance to it. In an eloquent speech, delivered in the general assembly,
I e afterwards explained and vindicated the view which he originally took
of the subject, and the manner in which he finally acted. The perusal of
that which he urged, on the latter point, will not merely show what were
s motives in this instance, but also afford some insight into his general




DR. ROBERTSON.                              xxvln
chnaracter. How far his system of policy is consonant with dignity or
wisdom, which, indeed, are inseparable, I shall not stop to inquire. It
might, perhaps, not improperly, be objected to him, that he mistakes the
voice of a blind infuriated multitude for the voice of the people; though
it is impossible for any two things to be more different in their nature. It
might be asked, too, why the fanatical prejudices of a Scottish mob were
to be treated with more respect than the complaints of the American
colonists why the one were to be indulged or complied with, while the
other wsrn  D be silenced by " a few regiments stationed in each capital?"
"As soon," says he, "as I perceived the extent and violence of the flame
which the discussion of this subject had kindled in Scotland, my ideas
concerning the expedience at this juncture of the measure in question, began
to alter. For although I did think, and I do still believe, that if the protestants in this country had acquiesced in the repeal as quietly as our
brethrern in England and Ireland, a fatal blow would have been given to
popery in the British dominions; I know, that in legislation, the sentiments
and dispositions of the people, for whom laws are made, should be attended
to with care. I remembered that one of the wisest men of antiquity declared, that he had framed for his fellow-citizens not the best laws, but
the best laws which they could bear. I recollected with reverence, that
the divine Legislator himself, accommodating his dispensations to the frailty
of his subjects, had given the Israelites for a season statutes which were
not good. Even the prejudices of the people are, in my opinion, respectable;
and an indulgent legislator ought not unnecessarily to run counter to them.
It appeared manifestly to be sound policy, in the present temper of the
people, to sooth rather than to irritate them; and, however ill founded
their apprehensions might be, some concession was now requisite in order
to remove them."
This was, I believe, the last speech which he made in the General Assembly. While he was yet in the vigour of his faculties, and in the exercise of undiminished influence in that assembly, he came to a resolution to
withdraw himself entirely from public business. It was in the year 1780,
about the time when he ceased to be an historian, and when he was only
fifty-nine, that he adopted this resolution. Several causes seem to have
concurred in producing his retirement. It has been supposed by some,
that he did not wish to remain on the scene till he was eclipsed by younger
rivals; and it is known that he felt disgusted by the conduct of the violent
men of his own party, who, though he had yielded many points to them
against his better judgment, were nevertheless dissatisfied that he refused
to resort to stronger measures than he deemed to be either right or prudent, and who, in consequence, tormented hiin with letters of remonstrance
and reproach, which, as from their nature may easily be imagined, were
written in a petulant and acrimonious style. In addition, there was one
subject, which had long been a particular annoyance to him, and on which
he had been more pertinaciously urged and fretted than on every other.
This was a scheme for abolishing subscription to the Confession of Faith
and Formula. Into this scheme, which he had avowed his determination
to resist, whatever shape it might assume, many of his friends had zealously
entered, and his patience was severely tried by their C" beseeching or besieging" him with respect to so important an object. By his cautious and
persuasive policy, he had for a considerable period prevented the controversy from being agitated in the assemblies; but he was of opinion that it
would ultimately compel attention, and would give rise to vehement disputes; and it was this circumstance, as he himself confessed, that "at
Ieast confirmed his resolution to retire."
Having rendered triumphant a cause which, to say the least, had numnerous enemies, it was hardly to be supposed that his character would not
be aspersed by many of those who were mortified to witness his success.




xxvIII                 THE  LIFE  OF
Accordingly, the charge of having deserted the genuine principles of the
Scottish church was often urged against him by some of his antagonists.
Others, who had more of the zealot in their composition, did not stop here.
These went so far as to accuse him of being indifferent to Christianity
itself; and, in proof of this, they alleged his habits of intimacy with Hume,
and his correspondence with Gibbon. It is difficult to say whether this
stupid calumny ought to excite anger or contempt.
This, however, was the language of only malignant hearts, or little
minds. By the great majority, even of those who were in opposition to
him, full justice was done to his virtues, his talents, and the purity of his
motives. Among those who, believing patronage to be a nuisance, were
the most strenuous in contending with, him, was Dr. Erskine, his college
mate, and colleague in the ministry. That venerable and learned person
always preserved for him a warm esteem, and, after the historian was no
more, paid to his memory an animated and affectionate tribute from the
pulpit. " His speeches in church courts," says Dr. Erskine, "were admired by those whom they did not convince, and acquired and preserved
him an influence over a majority in them, which none before him enjoyed;
though his measures were sometimes new, and warmly, and with great
strength of argument, opposed, both from the press, and in the General
Assembly. To this influence many causes contributed: his fifr- adherence to the principles of'church policy, which he- early adopted; his
sagacity in forming plans; his steadiness in executing them; his quick discernment of' whatever might hinder or promote his designs; his boldness
in encountering difficulties; his presence of mind in improving every occasional advantage; the address with which, when he saw it necessary, he
could make an honourable retreat; and his skill in stating a vote, and
seizing the favourable moment for ending a debate and urging a decision.
He guided and governed others, without seeming to assume any superiority
over them; and fixed and strengthened his power, by often, in matters of
form and expediency, preferring the opinions of those with whom he acted,
to his own. In former times, hardly any rose up to speak in the General
Assembly, till called upon by the Moderator, unless men advanced in years,
of high rank, or of established characters. His example and\influence encouraged young men of abilities to take their share of public business,
and thus deprived Moderators of an, engine for preventing causes being
fairly and impartially discussed. The power of others, who formerly had
in some measure guided ecclesiastical affairs, was derived from ministers
of state, and expired with their fall. He remained unhurt amidst frequent
changes of administration. Great men in office were always ready to
countenance him, to co-operate with him, and to avail themselves of hiaid. But he judged for himself, and scorned to be their slave, or to subm i
to receive their instructions. Hence, his influence, not confined to men of
mercenary views, extended to many of a free and independent spirit, who
supported, because they approved, his rneasures; which others, from the
same independent spirit, thought it their duty steadily to oppose.
"Deliberate in forming his judgmnent, but, when formed, nqt easily
moved to renounce it, he sometimes viewed the altered plans of others
with too suspicious an eye. Hence, there were able and worthy men, of
whom he expressed himself less favourably, and whose later appearances
in church judicatories he censured as inconsistent with principles they had
formerly professed: while they maintained, that the system of managing
church affairs was changed, not their opinions or conduct. Still, however,
keen and determined opposition to his schemes of ecclesiastical policy
neither extinguished his esteem nor forfeited his friendly offices, when he
saw opposition carried on without rancour, and when he believed that it
originated fi'om conscience and principle, not from personal animosity, or
envy, or ambition."




DR. ROBERTSON.                            xxix
Of his private character, Dr. Ersline adds, that "he enjoyed the bounties of Providence, without running into riot; was temperate without austerity; condescending and affable without meanness; and in expense neithner sordid nor prodigal. He could feel Ain injury, and yet bridle his passion; was grave, not sullen; steady, not obstinate; friendly, not officious;
prudent and cautious, not timid."
Than the triumph which the principles of Dr. Robertson obtained in
the General Assembly nothing could be more complete; and it was the
more flattering, inasmuch as it was consummated after he had ceased to
take a part in the debates. It had, from the year 1736, been the custom,
annually, for the Assembly to instruct the Commission, " to make due application to the king and parliament for redress of the grievance of patronage, in case a favourable opportunity for doing so should occur."  So cau
tious was the policy of Dr. Robertson, that, although he had entirely sub
verted the very groundwork on which this instruction was raised, he never
chose to move that it should be expunged. He knew that it was popular
with the great body of the people, and, therefore, he did not think it expedient to risk the chance of dissension in the Assembly, by an unnecessary
and idle attack upon this shadow of a shade. In the year 1784, however,
it was omitted, without ally struggle being made in its favour, and it has
never since been renewed.
Whether the system established by him has contributed to the harmony
and welfare of the Scottish church is a question which yet remains unde
cided. It is urged, by the friends of the system, that it has given peace
to the church; that the General Assembly is no longer occupied with angry
appeals and tumultuous disputes; that instead of there being, as formerly,
a necessity to call in a military force, to protect the presbytery in the act
of induction, ministers are now peaceably settled; and that the worst that
ever happens is the secession of the discontented part of the parishioners,
and the consequent erection of a separate place of worship, which they
frequent only till their zeal cools, and then desert to rejoin the kirk. But,
on the other hand, it is contended, that the peace is rather in appearance
than in reality; that, though the people have ceased to appeal to the Assembly, their silence arises from disgust and weariness, and not from satisfaction; that, grown too wise to enter into a protracted and fruitless contest, they immediately set themselves to rear a seceding meeting house,
which often carries off a large proportion of the parishioners; and that, by
this quiet but continual increase of seceding meetings, the influence of the
established church has been gradually weakened and contracted, a spirit of
disunion has been spread, and a heavy additional burden has been imposed
on property of every kind.
But, whatever doubt may exist on this point, there seems to be none
with respect to another. It is generally acknowledged that Dr. Robertson
conduced greatly to give a more dignified character to the proceedings ot
the General Assembly, to introduce an impartial exercise of the judicial
authority of the church, and to diffuse the principles of tolerance among
men who had hitherto prided themselves on their utter contempt of them.
In such respect are his decisions held, that they still form a sort of com
mon law in the church; and the time which elapsed between his being
chosen Principal of the University and his withdrawing from public life,
is distinguished by the name of Dr. Robertson's administration
It is in his capacity of Principal that he is next to be considered. In this
tImportant office he displayed his wonted activity and talent. He began
the performance of his duties, as his predecessors had done, by delivering
annually a, Latin discourse before the University. Of these orations, the
first, the object of which was to recommend the study of classical learning, was delivered on the third of February, 1763. It is said, among numerous other splendid passages, to have contained a beautiful panegyric




xx5'7THE LIFE OF
on the stoical philosophy.  In the following year, his discourse "consisted
chiefly of moral and literary observations, adapted to the particular cir
curmetances of youth," and the style is affirmed to be " uncommonly elegant
a.d impressive, and possessed of all the distinguishing characteristics of
his English compositions."  In 1765 and 1766, he chose for his theme the
comparative advantages of public and private education; a subject which
he treated in a masterly manner. After 1766 these annual lectures ceased
his time being too fully occupied to allow of the continuance of them.
But, though his lectures were of necessity discontinued, he never remitted in his attention even to the minutest duties of his office. He appears,
indeed, to have felt a filial anxiety to omit nothing which could assist in
giving lustre to the University at which his own talents had been cultivated.
rWvith very slender funds, he made large additions to the public library;
he planned or reformed most of the literary and medical societies, which
have raised Edinburgh to such eminence as a seminary of learning, and a
foculs of literature; and he contrived to preserve anl uninterrupted harmony
among the numerous members of the body which he superintended.
"The good sense, temper, and address," says professor Stewart, "with
which he presided for thirty years at our university meetings, were
attended with effects no less essential to our prosperity; and are attested
by a fact which is perhaps without a parallel in the annals of any other
literary, community, that during the whole of that period there did not
occur a single question which was not terminated by a unanimous
decision."
To his exertions Scotland is also chiefly indebted for its Royal Society,
which received its charter of incorporation in March, 1763.  The basis of
this establishment was the Philosophical Society, the founder of which was
the celebrated Maclaurin.  In his zeal to give all possible lustre to the new
institution, by drawing together men of every species of merit, Dr. Robertson seems, for once, to have acted with less than his usual liberality.
An antiquarian society, at the head of which wvas the earl of Buchan, had,
two years before, been formed in the Scottish metropolis; and this body
also was desirous to obtain the royal charter. The application which it
made to the crown was, howvever, easerly opposed, in a " Memorial from
the principal and professors of the Lnivelrsity of Edinburgh."' This memorial is signed by Dr. Robertson; but it is so feeble in composition as
well as in reasoning, that it is difficult to believe it to have flowed firom his
pen.  The argument on which it wholly relies is, that " narrow countries"
cannot supply materials for more than one society; that Scotland is such a
country; and, therefore, that it "ought not to form its literary plans upon
the model of the more extensive kingdoms in Europe, but in imitation of
those which are more circumscribed." To this hostile proceeding the
antiquaries responded, in a long memorial, which was penned with much
acuteness, and was naturally expressive of some degree of resentment,
They were successful in the'contest, and their charter was granted.
The labours of Dr. Robertson, as a. writer, were closed by a work which
entered largely into antiquarian investigation, as connected with history
In 1791 he published a quarto volume, containing his "Historical Disquisition concerning the Knowledge whic h the Ancients had of India; and the
Progress of Trade with that Country prior to the Discovery of the Passage
to it by the Cape of Good Hope."  An Appendix was dedicated to observations on -the civil policy, the laws and judicial proceedings, the arts,
tho sciences, and the religious institutions of the Indians. This subject, which
occiupied him twelve months, was suggested to him by the perusal of major
Rennell's Memoirs for illustrating his'History of Hinclostan, and was originally taken up with no other object than his own amusement and inbtruction.
That it would become as popular as his other productions was, from its
nature, not to be expected, but it obtained an honourable share of public




1)R. ROBERTSON.                           xxxxi
approbation, and, though it has since been partly superseded by more
elaborate inquiries, which, however, were grounded on more ample mate-ials, it will always retain a certain degree of value, and will be considered as a proof of his industry, of his habits of research, and of the
solidity of his judgment.
The latter years of Dr. Robertson's existence were passed in the well
earned enjoyment of honourable leisure. But, though he ceased to write,
he did not cease to be studious. Till the end of his life he is said to have
rIsen early, and to have given up no part of his time to company before
the hour bf dinner. What lie was in the moments of social ease has been
o excellently described by professor Stewart, that his own words ought
to be used.  "A rich stock of miscellaneous information, acquired from
books and from an extensive intercourse with the world, together with a
perfect acquaintance at all times with the topics of the day, and the
soundest sagacity and good sense applied to the occurrences of common
life, rendered him the most instructive and agreeable of companions. He
seldom  aimed at art; but, with his intimate friends, he often indulged a
sportive and fanciful species of humour. He delighted in good natured
characteristical anecdotes of his acquaintance, and added powerfully to
their effect by his own enjoyment in relating them. He was, in a remarkable degree, susceptible of the ludicrous; but on no occasion did he forget
the dignity of his character, or the decorum of his profession; nor did he
ever lose sight of that classical taste which adorned his compositions. His
turn of expression was correct and pure; sometimes, perhaps, incliining
more than is expected, in the carelessness of a social hour, to formal and
artificial periods; but it was stamped with his own manner no less than his
Yrremeditated style: it was always the language of a superior and a cultivated mind, and it embellished every subject on which he spoke. In the
company of strangers, he increased his exertions to amuse and to inform;
and the splendid variety of his conversation was commonly the chief circumstance on which they dwelt in enumerating his talents; and yet, I
must acknowledge, for my own part, that much as I always admired his
powers when they were thus called forth, I enjoyed his society less than
when I saw him in the circle of his intimates, or in the bosom of his
family."
It is not one of the least amiable features of his character, that, though
he was not forward to volunteer his advice, yet, when he was consulted by
his young acquaintance, as was very often the case, "C he entered into their
concerns with the most lively interest, and seemed to have a pleasure and
a pride in imparting to them all the lights of his experience and wisdom."
It was about the end of the year 1791 that the health of Dr. Robertson
began to manifest indications of decline. Strong symptoms of jaundice
next appeared, his constitution was sapped, and a lingering and fatal illness
ensued. His spirits, however, remained unbroken. Till withitn a few
months of his death, he persisted in officiating as a minister. When his
decaying strength no longer allowed him to perform his clerical duties, he
retired to Grange House, in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, that he might
have the advantage of more quiet, a pure air, and the sight of those rural
and picturesque objects in which he had ever delighted. " While he was
able to walk abroad," says Mr. Stewart, "he commonly passed a part ol
the day in a small garden, enjoying the simple gratifications it afforded
with all his wonted relish. Some who now hear me will long remember,
among the trivial yet interesting incidents which marked these last weeks
of his memorable life, his daily visits to the fruit trees (which were then
in blossom), and the smile with which he, more than once, contrasted the
interest he took in their progress, with the event which was to happen
before their maturity."  It was while he was thus lingering on the verge
of the grave, that he was visited by two gentlemen from New-York-who




Xxxii         LIFE OF DR. ROBERTSON.
were extremely anxious for an interview with him. He rallied all hs
powers to entertain his guests, and to inspire in their minds a feeling of
kindness towards the parent land of the late colonists; and, on their rising
to take leave, he said to them, in accents at once dignified and pathetic,
"When you go home, tell your countrymen that you saw the wreck of Dr.
Robertson."  In less than two months that wreck disappeared in the ocean
of eternity. He expired, with the fortitude which became him, on the
11th of July, 1793, in the seventy-first year of his age, and the fiftieth of his
ministry.
So much has been written by others, respecting the literaiy  merit of
Dr. Robertson, that on this point it is unnecessary, even would my con
fined limits pertnit me, to enter into a lengthened discussion. His style
has less of careless easy grace, but has more of equable dignity, than that
of Hume; it does not display the masterly modulation, but it has none of
the occasional obscurity and meretricious ornament, of that of Gibbon; it
is well balanced, unstained by vulgarisms, more idiomatically English
than might be expected from a native of Scotland, and is defective, perhaps, only in being too uniformly of an elevated tone. In arranging and
linking together into one harmonious whole the scattered parts of' his subject, he is eminently happy; and in delineating characters, manners, and
scenery, in making vividly present to the mind that which he describes,
he has few rivals, and no superiors. If all that has been urged against his
works be admitted, and some of it cannot be denied, it may nevertheless
safely be affirmed, that the balance heavily preponderates in his favour
and that he will always continue to rank in the first class of modem
historians.




PREFACE.
IN fulfilling the engagement which I had come under to the Public with
respect to the History of America, it was my intention not to have published any part of the Work until the whole was completed. The present
state of the British colonies has induced me to alter that resolution. While
they are engaged in civil war with Great Britain, inquiries and speculations concerning their ancient forms of policy and laws, which exist no
longer, cannot be interesting. The attention and expectation of mankind
are now turned towards their future condition. In whatever manner this
unhappy contest may terminate, a new order of things must arise in North
America, and its affairs will assume another aspect. I wait with the solicitude of a good citizen, until the ferment subside, and regular government
be re-established, and then I shall return to this part of my work, in which
I had made some progress. That, together with the history of Portuguese
America, and of the settlements made by the several nations of Europe in
the West India Islands, will complete my plan.
The three volumes which I now publish contain an account of the discovery of the New World, and of the progress of the Spanish arms and
colonies there. This is not only the most splendid portion of the American
story, but so much detached, as by itself to form a perfect whole, remarkable for the unity of the subject. As the principles and maxims of the
Spaniards in planting colonies, which have been adopted in some measure
by every nation, are unfolded in this part of my work; it will serve as a
proper introduction to the history of all the European establishments in
lAmerica, and convey such information concerning this important article of
policy, as may be deemed no less interesting than curious.:
In describing the achievements and institutions of the Spaniards in the
New World, I have departed in many instances, from the accounts of preceding historians, and have often related facts which seem to have been unknown to them. It is a duty I owe the Public to mention the sources from
which I have derived such intelligence which justifies me either in placing
transactions in a new light, or in forming any new opinion with respect to
their causes and effects. This duty I perform with greater satisfaction, as
it will afford an opportunity of expressing my gratitude to those benefactors
who have honoured me with their countenance and aid in my researches.
As it was from Spain that I had to expect the most important information,
with regard to this part of my work, I considered it as a very fortunate
circumstance for me, when Lord Grantham, to whom I had the honour of
being personally known, and with whose liberality of sentiment, and disposition to oblige, I was well acquainted, was appointed ambassador to
the court of Madrid. Upon applying to him, I met with such a reception
as satisfied me that his endeavours would be employed in the most proper
manner, in order to obtain the gratification of my wishes; and I am perfectly sensible, that what progress I have made in my inquiries among the
Spaniards, ought to be ascribed chiefly to their knowing how much his
lordship interested himself in my success.
But did I owe nothing more to Lord Grantham than the advantages
which I have derived from his attention in engaging Mr. Waddilove, the
chaplain of his embassy, to take the conduct of my literary inquiries in
Spain, the obligations I lie under to him would be very great. During five
years that gentleman has carried on researches for my behoof, with such
activity, perseverance, and knowledge of the subject, to which his attention
was turned, as have filled me with no less astonishment than satisfaction.
He procured for me the greater part of the Spanish books which I have
consulted; and as many of them were printed early in the sixteenth century, and are become extremely rare, the collecting of these was such an




4                         PREFACE.
occupation as alone required much time and assiduity. To his friendly
attention I am indebted for copies of several valuable manuscripts, containing facts and details which I might have searched for in vain in works
that have been made public. Encouraged by the inviting good will with
which Mr. Waddilove conferred his favours, I transmitted to him a set of
queries, with respect both to the customs and policy of the native Americans, and the nature of several institutions in the Spanish settlements,
framed in such a manner that a Spaniard might answer them without disclosing any thing that was improper to be communicated to a foreigner.
He translated these into Spanish, and obtained from various persons who
had resided in most of the Spanish colonies, such replies as have afforded
me much instruction.
Notwithstanding those peculiar advantages with which my inquiries
were carried on in Spain, it is with regret I am obliged to add, that their
success must be ascribed to the beneficence of individuals, not to any
communication by public authority. By a singular arrangement of Philip
II. the records of the Spanish monarchy are deposited in the Archivo of
Simancas, near Valladolid, at the distance of a hundred and twenty miles
from the seat of government and the supreme courts of justice. The
papers relative to America, and chiefly to that early period of its history
towards which my attention was directed, are so numerous, that they alone,
according to one account, fill the largest apartment in the Archivo; and,
according to another, they compose eight hundred and seventy-three large
bundles. Conscious of possessing, in some degree, the industry which
belongs to an historian, the prospect of such a treasure excited my most
ardent curiosity. But the prospect of it is all that I have enjoyed. Spain,
with an excess of caution, has uniformly thrown a veil over her transactions
in America. From strangers they are concealed with peculiar solicitude.
Even to her own subjects the Archivo of Simancas is not opened without
a particular order from the crown; and, after obtaining that, papers cannot
be copied without paying fees of office so exorbitant that the expense
exceeds what it would be proper to bestow, when the gratification of literary curiosity is the only object. It is to be hoped, that the Spaniards will
at last discover this system of concealment to be no less impolitic than
illiberal. From what I have experienced in the course of my inquiries, I
am satisfied, that upon a more minute scrutiny into their early operation
in the New World, however reprehensible the actions of individuals may
appear, the conduct of the nation will be placed in a more favourable light.
In other parts of Europe very different sentiments prevail. Having
searched, without success, in Spain, for a letter of Cortes to Charles V.,
written soon after he landed in the Mexican Empire, which has not hitherto
been published; it occurred to me, that as the Emperor was setting out
for Germany at the time when the messengers from Cortes arrived in
Europe, the letter with which they were intrusted might possibly be preserved in the Imperial library at Vienna. I communicated this idea to
Sir Robert Murray Keith, with whom I have long had the honour to live
in fi'iendship, and I had soon the pleasure to learn, that upon his application
her Imperial Majesty had been graciously pleased to issue an order, that
not only a copy of that letter (if it were found), but of any other papers in
the library which could throw light upon the History of America, should
be transmitted to me. The letter from Cortes is not in the Imperial
library; but an authentic copy, attested by a notary, of the letter written
by the magistrates of the colony planted by him at Vera Cruz, which I
have mentioned, p. 210, having been found, it was transcribed, and sent to
me. As this letter is no less curious, and as little known as that which
was the object of my inquiries, 1 have given some account, in its proper
place, of what is most worthy of notice in it. Together with it, I received
a copy of a letter from Cortes, containing a long account of his expedition
to Honduras, with respect to which I did not think it necessary to enter




PREFACE.                              5
into any particular detail; and likewise those curious Mexican paintings,
which I-have described, p. 321.
My inquiries at St. Petersburg were carried on with equal facility and
success. In examining into the nearest communication between our continent and that of America, it became of consequence to obtain authentic
information concerning the discoveries of the Russians in their navigation
from Kamchatka towards the coast of America. Accurate relations of
their first voyage, in 1741,'have been published by Muller and Gmelin.
Several foreign authors have entertained an opinion that the court of Russia
studiously conceals the progress which has been made by more recent
navigators, and suffers the Public to be amused with false accounts of their
route. Such conduct appeared to me unsuitable to those liberal sentiments, and that patronage of science, for which the present sovereign of
Russia is eminent; nor could I discern any political reason, that might
render it improper to apply for information concerning the late attempts of
the Russians to open a communication between Asia and America. My
ingenious countryman, Dr. Rogerson, first physician to the Empress, presented my request to Her Imperial Majesty, who not only disclaimed any
idea of concealment, but instantly ordered the journal of Captain Krenitzin,
who conducted the only voyage of discovery made by public authority
since the year 1741, to be translated, and his original chart to be copied
for my use. By consulting them, I have been enabled to give a more
accurate view of the progress and extent of the Russian discoveries than
has hitherto been communicated to the Public.
From other quarters I have received information of great utility and
importance. M. le Chevalier de Pinto, the minister from Portugal to the
court of Great Britain, who commanded for several years at Matagrosso, a
settlement of the Portuguese in the interior part of Brazil, where the
Indians are numerous, and their original manners little altered by intercourse with Europeans, was pleased to send me very full answers to some
queries concerning the character and institutions of the natives of America,
which his polite reception of an application made to him in my name
encouraged me to propose. These satisfied me, that he had contemplated
with a discerning attention the curious objects which his situation presented
to his view, and I have oftenfollowed him as one of my best instructed guides.
M. Suard, to whose elegant translation of the History of the Reign of
Charles V., I owe the favourable reception of that work on the continent,
procured me answers to the same queries from MA. de Bougainville, who
had opportunities of observing the Indians both of North and South America, and from M. Godin le Jeune, who resided fifteen years among Indians
in Quito, and twenty years in Cayenne. The latter are more valuable from
having been examined by M. de la Condamine, who, a few weeks before
his death, made some short additions to them, which may be considered
as the last effort of that attention to science which occupied a long life.
My inquiries were niot confined to one region in America. Governor Hutchinson took the trouble of recommending the consideration of my queries
to Mr. Hawley and Mr. Brainerd, two protestant missionaries employed
among the Indians of the Five Nations, who favoured me with answers
which discover a considerable knowledge of the people whose customs
they describe. From William Smith, Esq. the ingenious historian of New
York, I received some useful information. When I enter upon the History
of our Colonies in North America, I shall have occasion to acknowledge
how much I have been.indebted to many othergentlemen of that country.
From the valuable Collection of Voyages made by Alexander Dalrymple,
Esq., with whose attention to the History of Navigation and Discovery the
Public is well acquainted, I have received some very rare books, particularly two large volumes of Memorials, partly manuscript and partly in
print, which were presented to the court of Spain during the reigns of
Philip III. and Philip IV. From these I have learned many curious par



6                          PREFACE.
ticulars with respect to the interior state of the Spanish colonies, and the
various schemes formed for their improvement. As this collection of
Memorials formerly belonged to the Colbert Library, I have quoted them
by that title.
All those books and manuscripts I have consulted with that attention
which the respect due from an Author to the Public required; and by
minute references to them, I have endeavoured to authenticate whatever I
relate. The longer I reflect on the nature of historical composition, the
more I am convinced that this scrupulous accuracy is necessary. The his.
torian who records the events of his own time, is credited in proportion to
the opinion which the Public entertains with respect to his means of information and his veracity. He who delineates the transactions of a remote
period, has no title to claim assent, unless he produces evidence in proof of
his assertions. Without this he may write an amusing tale, but cannot be
said to have composed an authentic history. In those sentiments I have
been confirmed by the opinion of an Author,? whom his industry, erudition,
and discernment, have deservedly placed in a high rank among the most
eminent historians of the age. imboldened by a hint from him, I have
published a catalogue of the Spanish books which I have consulted. This
practice was frequent in the last century, and was considered as an evidence of laudable industry in an author; in the present, it may, perhaps,
be deemed the effect of ostentation; but, as many of these books are
unknown in Great Britain, I could not otherwise have referred to them as
authorities, without encumbering the page with an insertion of their full
titles. To any person who may choose to follow me in this path of
inquiry, the catalogue must be very useful.
My readers will observe, that in mentioning sums of money, I have
uniformly followed the Spanish method of computing by pesos. In America, the.pesofuerte, or duro, is the only one known; and that is always
meant when any sum imported from America is mentioned. The peso
fuerte, as well as other coins, has varied in its numerary value; but I have
been advised, without attending to such minute variations, to consider it as
equal to four shillings and six-pence of our money. It is to be remembered,
however, that, in the sixteenth century, the effective value of a peso, i. e.
the quantity of labour which it represented, or of goods which it would
purchase, was five or six times as much as at present.
N. B. Since this edition was put into the press, a History of Mexico, in two
volumes in quarto, translated from the Italian of the Abb4 D. Francesco Saverio Clavigero, has been published. From a person who is a native of New
Spain, who has resided forty years in that country, and who is acquainted with
the Mexican language, it was natural to expect much new information. Upon
perusing his work, however, I find that it contains hardly any addition to the
ancient History of the Mexican empire, as related by Acosta and Herrera, but
what is derived from the improbable narratives and fanciful conjectures of Torquemada and Boturini. Having copied their splendid descriptions of the high
state of civilization in the Mexican empire, M. Clavigero, in the abundance of
his zeal for the honour of his native country, charges me with having mistaken
some points, and with having misrepresented others, in the history of it. When
an author is conscious of having exerted industry in research, and impartiality
in decision, he may, without presumption, claim what praise is due to these
qualities, and he cannot be insensible to any accusation that tends to weaken
the force of his claim. A feeling of- this kind has induced me to examine such
strictures of M. Clavigero on my history of America as merited any attention,
especially as these are made by one who seemed to possess the means of ob.
taining accurate information; and to show that the greater part of them is des
titute of any just foundation. This I have done in notes upon the passages in
my History which gave rise to his criticisms.
College of Edinburgh, MJarch 1 1788,
Mr Gibbon




Page                                Page
BOOK I.                   the Spanish colony-Errors in
the first system of colonizingPROGRESS of Navigation among          Voyage of the Portuguese to the
the ancients —View of their dis-    East Indies by the Cape of Good
coveries as preparatory to those    Hope-Effects of this-discoveof the moderns-Imperfection of      ries made by private adventurersancient navigation and geogra-      in the New World-Name of
phy —Doctrine of the zones-         America given to it —MachiniaFurther discoveries checked by      tions against Columbus —disthe irruption of barbarous na-      graced and sent in chains to
tions- Geographical knowledge       Europe-Fourth voyage of Costill preserved in the East, and    lumbus-His discoveries-disamong the Arabians-Revival          asters-death.....           42
of commerce and navigation in                 BOOK III.
Europe-favoured by the Croisades-extended by travellers      State of the colony in Hispaniola
into the East —promoted by the      -New war with the Indians —
invention of the mariner's com-     Cruelty of the Spaniards-Fatal
pass-First regular plan of dis-     regulations concerning the concovery formed by Portugal-          dition of the Indians-DiminuState of that kingdom-Schemes       tion of that people-Discoveries
of Prince Henry-Early attempts      and settlements-First colony
feeble-Progress along the west-     planted on the Continent —Conern coast of Africa-Hopes of        quest of Cuba-Discovery of
discovering a new route to the      Florida-of the South Sea-        -
East Indies-Attempts to ac-         Great expectations raised by
complish this-prospects of suc-     this-Causes of disappointment
cess.........   17   with respect to these for some
- BOOK II.               time-Controversy concerning
the treatment of the IndiansBirth and education of Columbus       Contrary decisions-Zeal of the
-acquires naval skill in the ser-   ecclesiastics, particularly of Las
vice of  Portugal-conceives         Casas-Singular proceedingsof
hopes of reaching the East In-      Ximenes-Negroes imported indies byholding a westerly course    to America-Las Casas' idea of
— his system  founded on the        a new colony-permitted to atideas of the ancients, and know-    tempt it-unsuccessful-Discoledge of their navigation-and       veries towards the West-Yuon the discoveries of the Portu-    catan-Campeachy-New Spaira
guese-his negotiations with dif-    -preparations for invading it. 92
ferent courts-Obstacles which
BOOK IY.
he had to surmount in Spain-                     OK I
Voyage of discovery-diflicul-     View of America wher; first disties-success-return to Spain        covered, and of th,. manners
— Astonishment of mankind on        and policy of its most uncivilthis discovery of a new world       ized inhabitants-Vast extent
-Papal grant of it-Second           of America-grandeur of the
voyage-Colony settled-Fur-          objects it presents to view-its
ther discoveries-War with the       mountains-rivers-lakes-its
Indians-First tax imposed on        form favourable to commercethem-Third voyage-'He dis-          temperature-predominance of
covers the Continent —State of      cold-causes of this-unculti



8                          CONTENTS.
Page                                Page
vated-unwholesome-its ani-          warlike spirit-View  of other
mals-soil-Inquiry how Ameri-        dominions of Spain in America
ca was peopled-various theo-        -Cinaloa and Sonora —Califorries-what appears most proba-       nia-Yucatan and Hondurasble-Condition and character of      Chili-Tucuman-Kingdom  of
the Americans-All, the Mexi-        Tierra Firmd-New Kingdom of
cans and Peruvians excepted, in     Granada........ 313
the state of savages-Inquiry                BOOK VIII
confined to the uncivilized tribes
-Difficulty of obtaining infor-   View of the interior government,
mation-various causes of this       commerce, &c. of the Spanish
-Method observed in the in-         colonies —Depopulation of Amequiry-I. The bodily constitu-       rica-first effects of their settle-,
tion of the Americans considered    ments-not the consequence of
— I. The qualities of theirminds    any system of policy-nor to be
-III. Their domestic state-IV.      imputed to religion-Number of
Their political state and institu-  Indians still remaining-Fundations-V. Their system of war        mental maxims on which the
and public security-VI.. The        Spanish system of colonization
arts with which thev were ac-       is founded-Condition of differquainted-VII. Their religious       ent orders of men in their colo
ideas and institutions —VI1I.       nies —Chapetones —Creoles —NeSuch singular and detached cus-     groes- Indians-Ecclesiastical
toms as are not reducible to any    state and policy-Character of
of the former heads-IX. Gene-        secular and regular clergy-Small
ral review and estimate of their    progress of Christianity among
virtues and defects.... 122   the natives-Mines, chief object
of their attention —-Mode of
BOOK V.          working these-their produceHistory of the conquest of New        Effects of encouraging this speSpain by Cortes.. 197   cies of industry-Other comBOOK VI.                  modities of Spanish AmericaFirst effects of this new comHistory of the conquest of Peru       merce with America on Spainby Pizarro-and of the dissen-       Why the Spanish colonies have
sions and civil wars of the Spa-    not been as beneficial to the paniards in that country-Origin,      rent state as those of other naprogress, and effects of these. 261   tions-Errors in the Spanish
BOOK VII.                  system of regulating this commerce-confined to one port —
View of the institutions and man-     carried on by annual fleetsners of the Mexicans and Pe-        Contraband trade-Decline of
ruvians —Civilized states in com-   Spain both in population and
parison of other Americans-         wealth- Remedies proposedRecent origin of the Mexicans       View of the wise regulations of
-Facts which prove their pro-       the Bourbon princes-A new and
gress in civilization-View of their  more liberal system introduced
policy in its various branches-     -beneficial effects of this-proof their arts-Facts-which indi-     bable consequences-Trade becate a small progress in civiliza-  tween New Spain and the Phition-What opinion should be         lippines —Revenue of Spain from
formed on comparing those con-      America-whence it arises-to
tradictory facts-Genius of their    what it amounts..... 34"
religion-Peruvian   monarchy
more ancient-its policy founded
on religion-Singular effects of   History of Virginia to the year 1688, 389
this-Peculiar state of property               BOOK X.
among the  Peruvians-Their
public works and arts-roads-      History of New England to the
bridges-buildings-Their un-         year 1652....... 426




A
CATALOGUE
OF
SPANISH BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS.
A CARETTE de Biscay, Relation des   Aldama y Guevara (D. Joa. Augnse
Voyages dans la Riviere de la Plata, et tin de) Arde de la Lengua Mexicana.
de 1i par Terre au Perou. Exst. Recueil 12mo. Mexico, 1754.
doe Thevenot. Part IV.                 Alvarado (Pedro de) Dos Relaciones
A Voyage up the River de a Hern. Cortes referiendole sus Expela Plata, and thence by Land to Peru. diciones y Conquistas en varias Pro8vo. London, 1698.                   vincias de N. Espazgna. Exst. Barcia
Acosta (P. Jos. de) Historia Natu- Historiad. Primit. tom. i.
ral y Moral de las Indias. 4to. Ma-           Lettere due, &c. Exst. Radrid, 1590.                          mus. iii. 296.
(Joseph de) Histoire Natu-   Aparicio y Leon (D. Lorenzo de)
rclle et Morale des Indes tant Orien- Discurso Historico-Politico del Hospital
tales qu' Occidentales. 8vo.  Paris, San Lazaro de Lima. 8vo. Lim. 1761.
1600.                                  Aranzeles Reales de los Ministros de.Novi OxbisHistoria Naturalis la Real Audiencia do N. Espagna.
et Moralis. Exst. in Collect. Theod. fol. Mex. 1727.
de Bry. Pars IX.                       Argensola (Bartolome Leonardo de)
-   De Natura Novi Orbis, Libri Conquista de las Islas Malucas. fol.
duo, et de procuranda Indorum Salute, Mad. 1609.
Libri sex. Salmant. 8vo. 1589.        ----   Anales de Aragon. fol. Sara-    (Christ.) Tratado delas Dro- goqa, 1630.
gas yMedecinas,de las Indias Occiden-   Arguello (Eman.) Sentum Confestales, con sus Plantas Dibuxadas al sionis. 12mo. Mex. 1703.
vivo. 4to. Burgos, 1578.               Arriago (P. Pablo Jos. de) ExtirpaAcugna (P. Christoph.) Relation de cian de la Idolatria de Peru. 4to. Lima,
la Revi6re des Amazones. 12mo. Tom. 1621.
ii. Paris, 1682.                       Avendagno (Didac.) Thesaurus InAcugna's Relationof the great River dicus, ceu Generalis Instructor pro Reof the Amazons in South America. gimine Conscientime, in ijs qua) ad In8vo. London, 1698.                   dias spectant. fol. 2 vols. Antwerp, 1660.
Alarchon  (Fern.) Navigatione  a   Aznar (D  Bern. Fran.) Discurso
Scoprere il Regno di sette Citta. Ra- tocante. la real hazienda y adminismusio iii. 363.                      traciol, tie ella. 4to.
Albuquerque Coello (Duartd de)
Memorial de Artes de la Guerra del   Bandini (Angelo Maria) Vita 6 LetBrasil. 4to. Mad. 1634.             tere di Armerigo Vespucci. 4to. Firenze.
Alcafarado (Fralhc.) An Historical 1745.
Relation of the Discovery of the Isle of   Barcia (D. And. Gonzal.) Historia
Madeira. 4to. Lend. 1675.            dores Primitives de las Indias OccidenAlbedo y Herrera (D. Dionysio de) tales, fol. 3 vols. Mad. 1749.
Aviso  Historico-Politico-Geografico.;  Barco-Centinera (D. Martin de) Arcon las Noticias mas particulares, del gentina y Conquista del Rio de la
Peru, Tierra Firmd, Chili, y Nuevo Plata: Poema. Exst. Barcia HistoReyno de Granada. 4to. Mad. 1740. riad. Primit. iii.
Alrcedo Co.npendi Historico de la   Barros (Joao de) Decadas de Asia.
Provincia y PLerto de Guayaquil. 4to. fol. 4 vols. Lisboa, 1682.
Mad. 1741.                             Bcllesteros (D. Thomas de) Orde.
Memorial sobre diferentes nanzas del Peru. fol. 2 vols. Lima, 1685.
Puntos tocantes al estado de la real   Beltran (P. F. Pedro) Arte de el Idihazienda y del commercio, &c. en las oma Maya reducido a sucintas reglas,
Indias. fol.                         y Semilexicon. 4to. Mex. 1746.
VOL. I.-CZ




10                     A CATALOGUE OF
Benzo (Hieron.) Novi Orbis Histo-   Caracas-Real Cedula de Fundacton
ne-De Bry America, Part IV, V, VI. de la Real Compagnia Guipuscoana
Betancurt y Figueroa (Don Luis) de Caracas. 12mo. Mad. 1765.
Derecho de las Inglesias Metropolita-   Caravantes (Fr. Lopez de) Relacion
nas de las Indias. 4to. Mad. 1637.    de las Provincias que tiene el GovierBlanco (F. Matias Ruiz) Conversion no del Peru, los Officios que ell el so
do Piritu de Indios Cumanagotos y Provien, y la Hacienda que alli tiene
otros. 12mo. Mad. 1690.              su Magestad, lo que se Gasta de ella
Boturini Bonaduci (Lorenzo) Idea de y le queda Libre,,&c. &c. Dedicado al
una nueva Historia general de la Ame- Marques de Santos Claros, Agno de
rica Septentrional, fundada sobre ma- 1611. MS.
terial copiosa de Figuras, Symbolas,   Cardenas y Cano (Gabr.) Ensayo
Caracteres, Cantares, y Manuscritos de Chronologico para la Historia general
Autores Indios. 4to. Mad. 1746.      de la Florida. fol. Mad. 1733.
Botello de Moraes y Vasconcellos   Carranzana (D. Gonzales) A Geo(D. Francisco de) El Nuevo Mundo: graphical Description of the Coasts,
Poema Heroyco. 4to. Barcelona, 1701. &c. of the Spanish West Indies. 8vo.
Botero Benes (Juan) Description de Lond. 1740.
Todas las Provincias, Reynos, y Ciu-   Casas (Bart. de las) Brevissima Redades del Mundo. 4to. Girona, 1748.  lacion de la Destruycion de las Indias.
Brietius (Phil.) Paralela Geographim 4to. 1552.
Veteris et Novre. 4to. Paris, 1648.            (Bart. de las) Narratio Icon
ibus illustrata per Theod. de Bry. 4to.
Cabeza de Baca (Alvar. Nugnez) Oppent. 4614.
Relaclon de los Naufragios. Exst. Bar-    -   (Bart. de las) An Account of
cia Hist. Prim. tom. i.              the first I oyages and Discoveries of the
Examen Apologetico Spaniarou inAmerica. 8vo. Lond.1693.
de la Historica Narration de los Nau-   Cassani (P. Joseph) Historia de la
fragios. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim. tom. i. Provincia de Compagnia de Jesus del
- __ Commentarios de lo Nuevo Reyno de Granada. fol. Mad.
succedido duarante su gubierno del Rio 1741.
de la Plata. Exst. ibid.               Castanheda (Fern. Lop. de) Historia
Cabo de Vacca, Relatione de. Exst. do Descobrimento e Conquista do India
Ramus. iii. 310.                     pelos Portugueses. fol. 2 vol. Lisb. 1552.
Cabota (Sebast.) Navigazione de.   Castellanos (Juan de) Primeray SeExst. Ramus. ii. 211.                cunda de las Elegias de Varones IllusCadamustus (Aloysius) Navigatio tres de Indias. 4to. 2 vol. Mad. 1589.
ad Terras incognitas. Exst. Nov. Orb.   Castillo (Bernal Dias del) Historia
Grynei, p. 1.                        Verdadera de la Conquista de Nueva
Calancha (F. Anton. de la) Cronica Espagna. fol. Mad. 1632.
moralizada del Orden de San Augustin    Castro, Figueroa y Salazar (D. Peon el Peru. fol. Barcelona, 1638.    dro de) Relacion di su ancimiento y
California-Diario Historico de los servicios. 12mo.
Viages de Mar y Tierra hechos en 1768,   Cavallero (D. Jos. Garcia) Brieve
al Norte de California di orden  del Cotejo y Valance de las Pesas y MediMarques de Croix Vi-rey de Nueva Es- das di varias Naciones, reducidas a las
pagna, &c. MS.                       que Corren en Castilla. 4to. Mad. 1731.
Calle (Juanl Diaz de la) Memorial  Cepeda (D. Fern.) Relacion Universal
Informatorio de lo que a su Magestad del Sitio en que esta fundada la CiuProvien de la Nueva Espagna y Peru. dad de Mexico. fol. 1637.
4to. 1645.                              Cieca de Leon (Pedro de) Chronica
Campomanes (D. Pedro Rodrig.) del Peru. fol. Seville. 1533.
Antiguedad Maritima de la Republica   Cisneros (Diego) Sitio, Naturaleza
de Cartago, con en Periplo de su Gene- y Propriedades de la Ciudad de Mexico,
ral Hannon traducido e illustrado. 4to. 4to. Mexico.  1618.
Mad. 1756.                              Clemente (P. Claudio) Tablas Chro
Discurso sobre el fo- nologicas, en que contienen los Suce.
Inento de la Industria popular. 8vo. sos Ecclesiasticosy SecularoesdeIndias.
Mad. 1774.                           4to. Val. 1689.
Discurso  sobre la    Cogullado (P. Fr. Diego Lopez)
Educacion popular de los Artesanos. Historia de Yucatan. fol. Mad. 1688.
8vo. 5 vol. Mad. 1775, &c.             Collecao  dos Brives Pontificos e




SPANISH BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS.  11
Leyes Regias quo Forao Expedidos   Cortese (Fern.) Relacioni, &c. Exet.
v Publicadas desde o Anno 1741, sobre Ramusio ii. 225.
a la Liberdada das Pessoas bene e   Cubero (D. Pedro) Peregrinacion
Commercio dos Indos de Bresil.       del Mayor Parte del Mundo. Zaragoss.
Colleccion General de la Providen- 4to. 1688.
cias hasta aqui tomadas par el Gobier-   Cumana, Govierno y Noticia de. fol.
no sobre el Estragnimento, y Occupa- MS.
cion deTemporalidades de los Regulares
de la Compagnia de Espagna, Indias,   Davila Padilla (F. Aug.) Historia de
&c. Partes IV. 4to. Mad. 1767.       la Fundacion y'Discurso de Provincia de
Colon (D. Fernando) La Historia St. Jago de Mexico. fol. Bruss. 1625.
del Almirante D. Christoval Colon.                (Gil Gonzalez) Teatro
Exst. Bircia Hist. Prim. I. 1.       Ecclesiastico de la Primitiva Iglesia de
Columbus (Christ.) Naiigatio qua losIndias Occidentales. fol. 2 vols. 1649.
multas Regiones hactenus incognitas  Documentos tocantes ala Persecucion,
invenit. Exst. Nov. Orb. Gryntei, p. 90. que losRegulares de laCompagnia sus- (Ferd.) Life and Actions of citaron contra Don B. de Cardenas
his Father Admiral Christoph. Colum- Obispo de Paraguay. 4to. Mad. 1768.
bus. Exst. Churchill's Voyages, ii. 479.
Compagnia Real de Commercio para   Echaveri (D. Bernardo Ibagnez de)
las Islas de Sto. Domingo Puerto-rico, El Reyno  Jesuitico  del Paraguay.
y la Margarita. 12mo.                Exst. tom. iv. Colleccion de DocumenCompendio General de las Contri- tos. 4to. Mad. 1770.
buciones y gattos que occasionan todos   Echave y Assu (D. Francisco de) Ls
los effectos, frutos, caudales, &c. que tra. Estrella de Lima covertida en Sol sobre
fican entre los reynos de Castilla y sur tres Coronas. fol. Amberes, 1688.
America. 4to.                          Eguiara El Egueren (D. J. Jos.) BibConcilios Provinciales Primero y Se  liotheca Mexicana, sive Eruditorum
gundo celebrados en la muy Noble y Historia Virorunp in America Boreali
muy Leal Ciudad de Mexico en los Ag- natorum, &c. toin. prim. fol. Mex. 1775.
nos de 1555 y 1565. fol. Mexico, 1769. N. B. No more than one volume of this
Concilium  Mexicanum  Provinciale work has been published.
tertium celebratum Mexici, anno 1585.   Ercilla y Zuniga (D. Alonzo de) La
fol. Mexici,- 1770.                  Araucana: Poema Eroico. fol. Mad.
Contirnente Americano, Argonauta 1733.
de las costas de Nueva Espagna y                  2 —- - 2 vols. 8vo. Mad. 1777.
Tierra Firmf. 12mo.                    Escalona (D. Gaspar de) GazophyCordeyro (Antonio) Historia Insula. lacium  Regium Peruvicum. fol. Mad.
na das Ilhas a Portugas sugeytas no 1775.
Oceano Occidental. fol. Lisb. 1717.
Corita (Dr. Alonzo) Breve y suma-   Faria y Sousa (Manuel de) Historia
ria Relacion de los Segnores, Manera, del Reyno de Portugal. fol.Amber.1730.
y Differencia de ellos, que havia en la   Faria y Sousa, History of Portugal
Nueva Espagna, y otras Provincias sus from the first Ages to the Revolution
Comarcanas, y de sus Leyes, Usos, y under John IV. 8vo. Lond. 1698.
Costumbres, y de la Forma que tenian    Fernandez (Diego) Prima y secunda
en Tributar sus Vasallos en Tiempo de Parte de la Historia del Peru. fol. Sesu Gentilidad, &c. MS. 4to. pp. 307.   vill. 1571.
Coronada (Fr. Vasq. de) Sommario             - (P. Juan Patr.) Relacion
di due sue Lettere del Viaggio fatto del Historial de las Missiones de los Indias
Fra. Marco da Nizza al sette Citta de  que claman Chiquitos. 4to. Mad. 1726.
Cevola. Exst. Ramusio iii. 354.        Feyjoo (Benit. Geron.) Espagnolos
(Fr. Vasq. de) Relacion Americanos-Discurso VI. del. tom. iv.
Viaggio alle sette Citta. Ramus. iii. 359. del Teatro Critico. Mad. 1769.
Cortes (Hern.) Quattro Cartas diri-           Solucion del gran Progidas al Emperador Carlos V. en que blema Historico sobre la Poblacion do
ha Relacion de sus Conquistas en la la America-Discurso XV. del tom.
Nueva Espagna. Exst. Barcia Hist. v. de Teatro Critico.
Prim. tom. i.                                 (D. Miguel) Relacion DeCortessii (Ferd.) DeInsulis nuperin- scriptiva de la Ciudad y Provincia
ventis Narrationes ad Car. V. fol. 1532. Truxillo del Peru. fol. Mad. 1763.




A CATALOGUE OF
Freyre (Ant.) Piratas de la America. Colleccion general.de Docum, tom,
4to.                                iv.
Frasso (D. Petro) De Regio Patronatu   Hernandes (Fran.) Plantarum AniIndiarum. fol. 2 vols. Matriti, 1775.    malium, et Mineralium Mexicanorum
Historia. fol. Rom. 1651.
Galvao (Antonio) Tratado dos Des-   Herrera (Anton. de) Historia genecobrimentos Antigos y Modernos. fol. ral de los Hechos de los Castellanos en
Lisboa, 1731.                        las Islas y Tierra Firma de Mar OceaGalvano (Ant.) the Discoveries *of no. fol. 4 vols. Mad. 1601.
the World from the first Original unto   -  -   Historia General, &c. 4 rvol
the Year 1555. Osborne's Collect. ii. Mad. 1730.
354.                                   -      General History, &c. TransGamboa (D. Fran. Xavier de) Co- lated byStephens. 8vo. 6 vol.Lond.1740.
mentarios a los ordinanzas de Minas.     -    Descriptio Indiae Occidentafol. Mad. 1761.                      lis. fol. Amst. 1622.
Garcia (Gregorio) Historia Ecclesi-   Huemez  y Horcasitas  (D. Juan
astica y Seglar de la India Oriental y Francisco de) Extracto de los Autos
Occidental, y Predicacion de la Santa de Diligencias y reconocimicntos de los
Evangelia en ella. 12mo. Baeca, 1626. rios, lagunas, vertientes, y desaguas de
(Fr. Gregorio) Origen de los Mexico y su valle, &c. fol. Mex. 1748.
Indios delNuevo Mundo. fol. Mad.1729.
Gastelu (Ant. Velasquez) Arte de   Jesuitas-Colleccion de las applicaLengua Mexicana. 4to. Puibla de los ciones que se van haciendo de los CieAngeles. 1716.                       nes, Casas y Coligios que fueron de la
Gazeta de Mexico por los Annos Compagnia de Jesus, expatriados de
1728, 1729, 1730. 4to.               estos Reales dominios. 4to. 2 vols.
Girava (Hieronymo) Dos Libros de Lima, 1772 y 1773.
Cosmographia. Milan, 1556.                    Colleccion General de ProGodoy (Diego de) Relacion al H. videncias hasta aqui tomadas por el
Cortes, qua trata del Descubrimiento Gobierno sobre el Estrannamiento y
di diversas Ciudades, y Provincias, y Occupacion de temporalidades, de los
Guerras que tuio con los Indios. Exst. Regulares de la Compagnia de EspagBarcia Hist. Prim. tom. i.           na, Indias, e Islas Filipinas. 4to. Mad.. Lettcra a Cortese, &c. Exst. 1767.
Ram usio iii. 300.                            Retrato de los Jesuitas forGomara (Fr. Lopez de) La Historia mado al natural. 4to. 2vols. Mad. 1768.
general de las Indias. 12mo. Anv.1554.: Relacion Abbreviada da ReHistoria general de las Indias. publica que os Religiosos Jesuitas estaExst. Barcia Hist. Prim. tom. ii.    beleceraon. 12mo.
- (Fr. Lopez de) Chronica de   -       Idea del Origen, Gobierno,
laNuevaEspagna o Conquista de Mex- &c. de la Compagnia do Jesus. 8vo.
ico. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim. tom. ii.  Mad. 1768.
Guatemala —Razon puntual de los
Successos mas memorabiles, y de los   Lavinius (Apollonius) Libri V. de
Estragos y dannos quo ha padecido la Peruvime Invention. et rebus in eadem
Ciudad de Guatemala. fol. 1774.      gestis. 12mo. Ant. 1567.
Gumilla (P.Jos.) E1 Orinoco illustra-   Leon (Fr. Ruiz de) Hernandia, Poedo y defendido; Historia Natural, Civil, ma Heroyco de Conquista de Mexico.
y Geographica de este Gran Rio, &c. 4to. Mad. 1755.
4to. 2 tom. Mad. 1745.                 -   (Ant. de) Epitome de la BiblioHistoire Naturelle, Civile, et theca Oriental y Occidental, Nautica
G6ographiquede l'Orenoque. Traduite y Geografica. fol. Mad. 1737.
par M. Eidous. 12mo. tom. iii. Avig.   Lima: A true Account of the Earth1758.                               quake which happened there 28th of
Gusman (Nugno de) Relacion scritta October, 1746. Translated from  the
in Omitlan Provincia de Mechuacan Spanish. 8vo. London, 1748.
della maggior Spagna nell 1530. Exst.   Lima Gozosa, Description de las fes
Ramusio iii. 331.                   tibas Demonstraciones, con que esta
Ciudad celebrb la real Proclamacion
Henis (P. Thadeus) Ephemerides de el Nombre Augusto dcl Catolico
Belli Guiaranici, ab Anno 1754. Exit. MonarchoD. CarlosIII. Lim.4to. 1760.




SPANISH BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS.  13
Llano Zapata (D. Jos. Euseb.) Pre- del Orden de Predicadores. fol. 3 vols.
liminar al Tomo 1. de las Memorias Rom. 1681.
Historico-Physicas, Critico-Apologeti-   Memorial Adjustado  por D. A.
cas de la America Meridional. 8vo. Fern. de Heredia Gobernador de Ni.
Cadiz, 1759.                        caragua y Honduras. fol. 1753.
Lopez (D. Juan Luis) Discurso His-   Memorial Adjustado contra los Offitorico Politico en defenso de la Juris- ciales de Casa de Moneda a Mexico de
dicion Real. fol. 1685.          e-  l anno 1729. fol.
-    (Thom.) Atlas Geographico de   Mendoza (D. Ant. de) Lettera al
laAmerica Septentrional y Meridional. Imperatore del Descoprimento della
12mo. Par. 1758.                    Terra Firma della N. Spagna verso
Lorenzana (D. Fr. Ant.) Arzobispo Tramontano. Exst. Ramusio iii. 355.
de Mexico, ahora de Toledo, Historia          (Juan Gonz. de) Historia del
de Nueva Espagna, escrita por su Es- gran Reyno de China, con un Itineraclarecido Conquistador Hernan. Cor- rio del Nuevo Mundo. 8vo. Rom. 1585.
tes, Aumentada con otros Documentos   Miguel (Vic. Jos.) Tablas de los Suy Notas. fol. Mex. 1770.            cesos Ecclesiasticos en Africa, Indias
Lozano (P. Pedro) Description Cho- Orientales y Occidentales. 4to. Val.
rographica, del Terretorios, Arboles, 1689.
Animales del Gran Chaco, y de los Ri-   Miscellanea Economico-Politico,&c.
tos y Costumbres de las innumeraoiles fol. Pampl. 1749.
Naciones que la habitan. 4to. Cordov.   Molina (P. F. Anton.) Vocabulario
1733.                               Castellano y Mexicano. fol. 1571.
Historia de la Compagnia de   Monardes (El Dottor) Primera y SeJesus en la Provincia del Paraguay. gunda y Tercera Parte de la Historia
fol. 2 vols. Mad. 1753.             Medicinal, de las Cosas que se traen de
nuestras Indias Occidentales, que sirMadriga (Pedro de) Description du ven en Medicina. 4to. Sevilla, 1754.
Gouvernernent du P6rou. Exst. Voy-   Moncada (Sancho de) Restauracion
ages qui ont servi a l'Etablissement de Politica de Espagna, y de scos Publila Comp. des Indes, tom. ix. 105.   cos. 4to. Mad. 1746.
Mariana (P. Juan de) Discurso de   Morales (Ambrosio de) Coronica
les Enfermedades de la Compagnia de General de Espagna. fol. 4 vols. AlcaJesus. 4to. Mad. 1658.              la, 1574.
Martinez de la Puente (D. Jos.)   Moreno y Escaudon (D. Fran. Ant.)
Compendio de las Historiasde los Des- Descripcion y Estado del Virreynato
cubrimientos, Conquistas, y Guerras de Santa F6, Nuevo Reyno de Granade la India Oriental, y sus Islas, desde da, &c. fol. MS.
los Tiempos del Infante Don Enrique   Munoz (D. Antonio) Discurso sobre
de Portugal su Inventor. 4to. Mad. Economia politica. 8vo. Mad. 1769.
1681.
Martyr ab Angleria (Petr.) De Re-   Nizza (F. Marco) Relatione del Viagbus Oceanicis et Novo Orbe Decades gio fatta per Terra al Cevole, Regno di
tres. 12mo. Colon. 1574.            cette Citth. Exst. Ramus. iii. 356.
De Insulis nuper inventis,   Nodal-Relacion del Viage que hicieet de Moribus Incolarum. Ibid. i. 329. ron los Capitanes Barth. y Gonz. de
Opus Epistolarum. fol. Nodal al descubrimiento del Estrecho
Amst. 1670.                         que hoy es nombrado de Maire, y reIl Sommario cavato della conocimiento del de Magellanes. 4to.
sua Historia del Nuevo Mundo. Ra- Mad.
musio iii. i.                         Noticia Individual de los derechos
*Mata (D. Geron. Fern. de) Ideas po- segun lo reglado en ultimo proyecto de
liticas ymorales. 12mo. Toledo, 1640. 1720. 4to. Barcelona, 1732.
Mechuacan-Relacion de las Cere-   Neuva Espagna —-Historia de los In..
monias, Ritos, y Poblacion de los In- dios deNueva Espagna dibidida en tree
dios de Mechuacan hecha al I. S. D. Partes. *En la primera trata de los RiAnt. de Mendoza Vi-rey de Nueva tos, Sacrificios y Idolatrias del Tiempo
Espagna. fol. MS.                   de su Gentilidad. En la segunda de su
Melendez (Fr. Juan) Tesoros Ver- maravillosa Conversion a la Fd, y modaderos de las Indias Historia de la do de celebrar las Fiestas de Neustra
Provincia de S. Juan Baptista del Peru, Santa Iglesia. En la tercera del Go



14                    A CATALOGUEI OF
nio y Caracter de aquella Gente; y   Peralta Barnuevo (D. Pedro de
Figuras con que notaban sus Aconte- Lima fundada, o Conquista del Peru,
cimientos, con otras particularidades; y Poema Eroyco. 4to. Lima, 1732.
Noticias de las principales Ciudades an  -- Calderon (D. Mathias de) El
aquel Reyno. Escrita en el Agno 1541 Apostol de las Indias y nueves gentes
por uno de los doce Religiosos Francis- San Francisco Xavier de la Compagnia
cos que primero passaron a entender en de Jesus Epitome de sus Apostolicos
su Conversion. MS. fol. pp. 618.    Hechos. 4to. Pampl. 1665.
Pereira de Berrido (Bernard.) An.
Ogna (Pedro de) Arauco Domado. nales Historicos do Estado do MaranPoema. 12rno. Mad. 1605.           chao. fol. Lisboa, 1749.
Ordenanzas del Consejo real de las   Peru - Relatione  d'un  Capitano
Indias. fol. Mad. 1681.            Spagnuolo del Descoprimento y ConOrtega (D. Casimiro de) Refumen quista del Peru. Exst. Rarnus. iii. 371.
Historico del primer Viage hecho al         Relatione d'un Secretario do
rededor del Mundo. 4to. Mad. 1769.  Franc. Pizarro della Conquista del
Ossorio (Jerome) History of the Peruz. Exst. Ramusio iii. 371.
Portuguese during the Reign of Em-            Relacion del Peru. MS.
manuel. 8vo. 2 vols. Lond. 1752.      Pesquisa de los Oydores de Panama
Ossorius (Hieron.) De Rebus Ema- contra D. Jayme Mugnos, &c. por hanuelis Lusitanie Regis. 8vo. Col. verlos Commerciado illicitamente en
Agr. 1752.                         tiempo de Guerra. fol. 1755.
Ovalle (Alonso) Historica Relacion   Philipinas-Carta que escribe un
del Reyno de Chili. fol. Rom. 1646. Religioso antiguo de Philipinas, a un
An Historical Relation of the Amigo suyo en Espagna, que le preo
Kingdom of Chili. Exst. Churchill's gunta el Naturel y Genio de los Indios
Collect. iii. 1.                   Naturales de estas Islas. MS. 4to.
Oviedo y Bagnos (D. Jos.) Historia   Piedrahita (Luc. Fern.) Historia
de la Conquista y Publicacion de Vene- general de las Conquistas del Nuevo
zuela. fol. Mad. 1723.             Reyno de Granada. fol. Ambres.
Sommaria, &c. Exst. Ra-   Pinelo (Ant. de Leon) Epitome de
musio iii. 44.                     la Bibliotheca Oriental y Occidental
(Gonz. Fern. de) Relacion en que se conithien los Escritores de
Sommaria de la Historia Natural de los las Indias Orientales y Occidentales.
Indias. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim. tcm. i. fol. 2 vols. Mad. 1737.
H-istoria Generale et Natu-   Pinzonius socius Admirantis Columbi
rale dell Indie Occidentale.  Exst. -Navigatio et Res per eum repertw.
Ramusio iii. 74.                   Exst. Nov. Orb. Grynei, p. 119.
Relatione della Navigatione   Pizarro y Orellana (D.Fern.)Varones
per la grandissima Fiume Maragnon. illustres del N. Mundo. fol. Mad. 1639.
Exst. Ramus. iii. 415.                Planctus Judorum Christianorum in
America Peruntina. 12mo.
Palacio (D. Raim. Mig.) Discurso   Puente (D. Jos. Martinez de la)
Economico Politico. 4to. Mad. 1778. Compendio de las Historias de los Des.
Palafox y Mendoza (D. Juan) Vir- cubrimientos de la India Oriental y suS
tudes del Indios, o Naturaliza y Cos- Islas. 4to. Mad. 1681.
tumbres de los Indios de N.Espagna. 4to.
Vie de Venerable Dom. Jean   Quir (Ferd de) Terra Australis inPalafox Eveque del'Angelopolis. 12mo. cognita; or a new-Southern Discovery,
Cologne, 1772.                     containing a fifth part of the World,
Pegna (Juan Nugnez dela)Conquista lately found out. 4to. Lond. 1617.
v Antiguedades de las Islas de Gran
Caharia. 4to. Mad. 1676.              Ramusio (Giov. Battista) Racolto
Pegna Montenegro (D. Alonso de la) delle Navigationi e Viaggi. fol. 3 vols.
Itinerario para Parochos de Indios, en Venet. 1588.
quo tratan les materias mas particu-   Real Compagnia Guipuzcoana de
lares, tocantes a ellos para se buen ad- Caracas, Noticias historiales Practicas,
ministracion. 4to. Amberes, 1754.   de los Sucesos y Adelantamientos de
Penalosa y Mondragon (Fr. Benito esta Compagnia desde su Fundacion
de) Cinco Excellencias del Espagnol en 1728 hasta 1764. 4to. 1765.
que des peublan a Espagna. 4to.   Recopilacion de Leyes de los Reynos
Pampl. 1629                        de las Indias. fol. 4 vols. Mad. 1756.




SPANISH BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS.  15
Reglamento y Aranceles Reales para   Sanchez (Ant. Ribero) Dissertation
el Commercio de Espagna a Indias.   sur l'Origine de la MIaladie Venerienne,
Relationed'un Gentilhuomodel Sig. dans laquelle on prouve qu'elle n'a
Fern. Cortese della gran Citt~ Temis- point 0t6 portde de l'Amerique. 1765.
tatan, Mexico, et della altre cose delle   Sarmiento de Gamboa (Pedro de)
Nova Spagna. Exst. Ramus. iii. 304. Viage el Estrecho de Magellanes. 1768.
Remesal(Fr.Ant.)Historia general de   Santa Cruz (El Marq.) Commercio
las Indias Occidentales y particular de Suelto y en Companias General. 1732.
la Governacion de Chiapa a Guatimala.   Sta. Domingo, Puerto Rico, y MargaRibadeneyra (De-Diego Portichuelo) rita, Real Compagnia de Commercio.
de Relacion del Viage desde qui salio   Schemidel (Hulderico) Historias y
de-Lima, hasta que Illego a Espagna. Discubrimiento del Rio de la Plata y
Ribadeneyra y Barrientos (D. Ant. Paraguay. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim.
Joach.) Manuel Compendio de el Rcgio tom. iii.
Patronato Indiano. fbl. Mad. 1755.    Sebara da Sylva (Jos. de) Recueil
Ribas (Andr. Perez de) Historia de Chronologique et Analytique de tout
los Triumphos de Nuestra Sta Fe, entre ce qu'a fait en Portugal la Socidtd dite
Gentes la mas Barbaras, en las Mis- de J4sus, depuis son Entree dans ce
siones de Nueva Espagna. Mad. 1645. Royaume en 1540 jusqu'% son ExpulRiol (D. Santiago) Representacion sion 1759. 12mo. 3 vols. Lisb. 1769.
a Philipe V. sobre el Estado actual de   Segni (D. Diego Raymundo) Anti.
los Papeles universales de la Monar- quario Noticiosa General de Espagna
chia. MS.                          y sus Indios. 12mo. 1769.
Ripia (Juan de la) Practica de la   Sepulveda (Genesius) Dialogus de
Administracion y Cobranza de las ren- justis Belli Causis, prmsertim in Indos
tas reales. fol. Mad. 1768.        Novi Orbis. MS.
Rocha Pitta (Sebastiano de) Historia     (Jo. Genesius) Epist. Lib.VII.
de America Portougueza desde o Anno   Sepulveda de Regno, Libri III. 1570.
de 1500 du su Descobrimento ate o de   Seyxas y Lovero, (D. Fr.) Theatro
1724. fol. Lisboa, 1730.           Naval Hydrographico. 4to. 1648.
Rodriguez (Manuel) Explicacion de      D- Descripcion Geographica y
la Bulla de la Santa Cruzada. 1589. Derrotera de la Religion Austral Ma(P. Man.) El Maragnon y gellanica. 4to. Mad. 1690.
Amozonas Historia de los Descubrimi-   Simon (Pedro) Noticias Historiales
entos,Entradas yReducion deNaciones. de las Conquistas de Tierra Firme en
Roman (Hieron.) Republicas del las Indias Occidentales. Cuenta, 1627
Mundo. fol. 3 vols. Mad. 1595.       Solis (D. Ant. de) Historias de las
Roma y Rosell (De Franc.) Las seg- Conquistas de Mexico. Mad. 1684.
nales de la felicidad de Espagna y me-  -- History of the Conquest of Mex
dios de hacerlas efficaces. Mad. 1768. ico.-Translated by Townshend. 1724
Rosende (P. Ant. Gonz. de) Vida del   Solarzono y Pereyrra (Joan) Politica
Juan de Palafox Arzobispo de Mexico. Indiana. fol. 2 vols. Mad. 1776.. Rubaclava (Don Jos. Gutierrez de)    -  De Indiarum Jure, sive de justa
Tratado Historico-Politico y Legal de Indiarum OccidentaliumGubernatione.
el Commercio delasIndiasOccidentales.     Obras Varias posthumas. 1776.
Ruiz (P. Ant.) Conquista Espiritual   Soto y Marne (P. Franc. de) Copiade
hecha por los Religiosos de la Com- la Relacion deViage qui desde la Ciudad
pagnia de Jesus, en las Provincias de la de Cadiz a la Cartagena de Indias hizo.
Paraguay, Uraguay, Parana y Tape.    Spilbergen et Le Maire SpeculumOri.
entalis Occidentalisque Navigationurn.
Salazar de Mendoza (D. Pedro) Mo-   Suarez de Figueroa (Chris.) Hechos
narquia de Espagna, tom. i. ii. iii.    de D. Garcia Hurtado de Mendoza.
_ -- --— y Olarte (D. Ignacio) Historia de la Conquista de Mexico-   Tanco (Luis Bezerra) Felicidad de
Segunda parte. Cordov. 1743.       Mexico en la admirable Aparicion de N.
Salazar de Mendoza y Zovallos (D. Signora di Guadalupe. Mad. 1745.
Alonz. Ed. de) Constituciones y Orde-   Tarragones (Hieron.Gir.) Dos Libros
nanzas antiguas Agnadidas y Modernas de Cosmographia. 4to. Milan, 1556.
de la Real Universidad y estudio gene-   Techo (F. Nichol. de), The History
ral ste San Marcos de la Ciudad de los of the Provinces Paraguay, Tucuman,
Reyes del Peru. fol. En la Ciudad Rio de la Plata, &c. Exst. Churchill's
de los Reyes, 1735.                Coll. vi. 3.




16  A CATALOGUE OF SPANISH BOOKS, &c.
Torquemada (Juan de) Monarquia   Veitia Linage Norte de la Contra.
Indiana. fol. 3 vols. Mad. 1723.     tacion de las Indias Occidentales. fol
Torres (Sim. Per. de) Viage del Sevill. 1672.
Mundo. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim. iii.   Venegas (Miguel), a Natural and
(Franc. Caro de) Historia de Civil History of California. 8vo. 2 vols.
las Ordenes Militares de Santiago, Ca- Lond. 1759.
latrava y Alcantara, desde su Funda-   Verazzano (Giov.) Relatione delle
cion hasta el Rey D. Felipe II. Ad- Terra perlui scoperta nel 1524. Exst.
ministrador perpetuo dellas. 1629.   Ramusio iii. p. 420.
Torribio (P. F. Jos.) Aparato para   Vesputius (Americus) Due Navigala Historia Natural Espagnala. fol. tiones sub Auspiciis Ferdiuandi, &c..
Mad. 1754.                           Exst. de Bry America. Pars X.
-     Dissertacion Historico-Politica  -        Navigatio prima, secunda,
y en mucha parte Geographica de las tertia, quarta. Exst. Nov. Orb. Gry~Islas Philipinas. 12mo. Mad. 1753.  nmi, p. 155.
Totanes (F. Sebastian de) Manual   Viage de Espagna. 12mo. 6 tom.
Tagalog para auxilio de Provincia de Mad. 1776.
las Philipinas. 4to. Samplai en las   Victoria (Franc.) Relationes TheoloPhilipinas.  1745.                   gicm de Indis et de Jure Belli contra eos.
VierayClavijo (D. Jos.) Noticias de la
Ulloa (D. Ant. de) Voyage Historique Historia ge-neral de las Islac de Canaria.
de l'Amerique Meridionale. 4to. 2 tom.   Villalobos (D. Juan de) Manifesto
Paris, 1752.                         sobre la introduccion de esclavos Negros
(D. Ant. de) Noticias Ameri- en las Indias Occidentales. 4to. 1682.
canas, Entretenimientos Physicos-His-   Villagra (Gasp. de) Historia de Nutoricos, sobre la America Meridional y eva Mexico, Poema. Alcala, 1610.
la Septentrional Oriental. Mad. 1772.   Villa Segnor y Sanchez (D. Jos. Ant.)
- (D. Bern. de) Restablecimiento Theatro Americano. Descripcion gede las Fabricas, Trafico, y Commercio neral de los Reynos y Provincias de la
maritimo de Espagna. Mad. 1740.   Nueva Espagna. 2 tom. Mex. 1746.
- (Franc.) Navigatione per scop-  Res puesta sobre el precio
rire l'Isole delle Specierie fino all Mare de Azogue. 4to.
detto Vermojo nel 1539. Exst. Ramus.   Vocabulario Brasiliano y Portugues.
iii. 339.                            4to. MS.
- (D. Bernardo) Retablissement
des Manufactures et du Commerce   Ward (D. Bernardo) Proyecto Ecod'Espagne. 12mo. Amst. 1753.         nomico sobre la poblacion de Espagna,
Uztariz (D. Geron.) Theoria y Prac- la agricultura en todos sus ramos, y de
tica de Commercio y de Marina. fol. mas establecimientos de industria, coMad. 1757.                           mercio con nuestra marina, arreglo de
The Theory and Practice of nuestra intereses en America, libertad
Commerce, and Maritime Affairs. 8vo. del comercio en Indias, &c. MS.
2 vols. Lond. 1751.
Xeres (Franc. de) Verdadera Relacion
Verages (D. Thom. Tamaio de) Re- de la Conquista del Peru y Provincia de
stauracion de la Ciudad del Salvador y Cuzco, Embiada al Emperador CarlosV.
Baia de Todos Sanctos en la Provincia Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim. tom. iii.
del Brasil. 4to. Mad. 1628.                      Relatione, &c. &c. EAst.
Vargas Machuca (D. Bern. de)Milicia Ramusio iii. 372.
y Descripcion de las Indias. -Mad. 1699.
Vega (Garcilasso de la) Histoire de   Zarate (Aug. de) Historia del Desla Conqu~te de la Flcride. Traduite cubrimiento y Conquista de la ProvinparrRichelet. 12mo. 2tom. Leyd. 1731. cia del Peru. Exst. Barcia Hist. Prim.
-     Royal Commentaries of Peru, tom. iii.
by Rycaut. fol. Lend. 1688.                   Histoire de la D!couverte et
Vega (L'Ynca Garcilasso de la) His- de la Conquete du Perou  Paris, 1742.
toires des Guerres Civiles des Espag-   Zavala y Augnon (D. Miguel de)
n.oesdanslesIndes,parBaudoin. 1648. Representacion al Rey N. Segnor D.
Veitia Linage (Jos.) The Spanish Philipe V. dirigida al mas seguro A.u
Rule of Trade to the West Indies.    monto del Rpal Erario.  173-2.
--   Declamacion Oratoria en   Zevallos (D. Pedro Ordognez de)
D)efensa de D. Jos. Fern. Veitia Linage. Historia y Viage del Mundo. 1691.




TIE
HISTORY OF AMERICA~
BY WILLIAM ROBERTSON, D.D.
PRINCIPAL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH, ETC, ETC.








TIHE.HISTORY OF AMERICA.
BO~OK I.
THE progress of men, in discovering and peopling the various parts of the
earth, has been extremely slow. Several ages elapsed before they removed
far from those mild and fertile regions in which they were originally placed
by their Creator. The occasion of their first general dispersion is known;
but we are unacquainted with the course of their migrations, or the time
when they took possession of the different countries which they now inhabit.
Neither history nor tradition furnishes such information concerning these
remote events, as enables us to trace, with any certainty, the operations of
the human race in the infancy of society.
We may conclude, however, that all the early migrations of mankind
were made by land. The ocean which surrounds the habitable earth, as
well as the various arms of the sea which separate one region from another,
though destined to facilitate the communication between distant countries,
seem, at first view, to be formed to check the progress of man, and to mark
the bounds of that portion of the globe to which nature had confined him.
It was long, we may believe, before men attempted to pass these formidable
barriers, and became so skilful and adventurous as to commit themselves
to the mercy of the winds and waves, or to quit their native shores in quest
of remote and unknown regions.
Navigation and shipbuilding are arts so nice and complicated, that they
require the ingenuity, as well as experience, of many successive ages to
bring them to any degree of perfection. From the raft or canoe, which
first served to carry a savage over the river that obstructed him in the chase,
to the construction of a vessel capable of conveying a numerous crew with
safety to a distant coast, the progress in improvement is immense. Many
efforts would be made, many experiments would be tried, and much labour
as well as invention would be'employed, before men could accomplish this
arduous and important undertaking. The rude and imperfect state in which
navigation is still found among all nations which are not considerably civilized, corresponds with this account of its progress, and demonstrates that
in early times the art was not so far improved as to enable men to ulndertake
distant voyages, or to attempt remote discoveries.
As soon, however, as the art of navigation became known, a new species
of correspondence among men took place. It is froIn this era that we
must date the commencement of such an intercourse between nations as
deserves tne appellation of commerce. Men are, indeed, far advanced in
improvement before commerce becomes an object of great importance to
them. They must even have made some considerable progress towards
civilization, before they acquire the idea of property, and ascertain it sa
VOL. 1.-3                    3




18                       HISTORY  OF                      [BOOK!.
perfectly as to be acquainted with the most simple of all contracts, that of
exchanging by barter one rude commodity for another. But as soon as this
important right is established, and every individual feels that he has an
exclusive titfe to possess or to alienate whatever he has acquired by his
own labour and dexterity, the wants and ingenuity of his nt ure suggest
to him a new method of increasing his acquisitions and enjoyments, by
disposing of what s superfluous in his own stores, in order to procure
what is necessary or desirable in those of other men. Thus a commercial
intercourse begins, and is carried on among the members of the same coinmunity. By degrees, they discover that neighbouring tribes possess what
they themselves want, and enjoy comforts of which they wish to partake.
In the same mode, and upon the same principles, that domestic traffic is
carried on within the society, an external commerce is established with
other tribes or nations. Their mutual interest and mutual wants render this
intercourse desirable, and imperceptibly introduce the maxims and laws
which facilitate its progress and render it secure. But no very extensive
commerce can take place between contiguous provinces, whose soil and
climate being nearly the same yield similar productions. Remote countries
cannot convey their commodities, by land, to those places where on
account of their rarity they are desired, and become valuable. It is to navigation that men are indebted for the power of transporting the superfluous
stock of one part of the earth to supply the wants of another. The luxuries and blessings of a particular climate are no longer confined to itself
alone, but the enjoyment of them is communicated to the most distant
regions.
In proportion as the knowledge of the advantages derived from navigation and commerce continued to spread, the intercourse among nations extended. The ambition of conquest, or the necessity of procuring new settlements, were no longer the sole motives of visiting distant lands. The
desire of gain became a new incentive to activity, roused adventurers, and
sent them forth upon long voyages, in search ot countries whose products
or wants might increase that circulation which nourishes and gives vigour
to commerce. Trade proved a great source of discovery: it opened unknown seas, it penetrated into new regions, and contributed more than any
other cause to bring men acquainted with the situation, the nature, and commodities of the different parts of the globe. But even after a regular commerce was established in the world, after nations were considerably civilized, and the sciences and arts were cultivated with ardour and success,
navigation continued to be so imperfect, that it can hardly be said to have
advanced beyond the infancy of its improvement in the ancient world.
Among all the nations of antiquity, the structure of their vessels was ex
tremely rude, and their method of working them very defective.  They
were unacquainted with several principles and operations in navigation,
which are now considered as the first elements on which that science is
founded. Though that property of the magnet by which it attracts iron
was well known to the ancients, its more important and amazing virtue of
pointing to the poles had entirely escaped their observation.  Destitute of
this faithful guide, which now conducts the pilot with so much certainty in
the unbounded ocean, during the darkness of night, or when the heavens are
covered with clouds, the ancients had no other method of regulating their
course than by observing the sun and stars. Their navigation was of consequence uncertain and timid. They durst seldom quit sight of land, but
crept along the coast, exposed to all the dangers, and retarded by all the obstructions, unavoidable in holding such an awkward course. An incredible
length of time was requisite for performing  voyages which  are now
finished in a short space. Even in the mildest climates, and in seas the
least tempestuous, it was only during the summer months that the, ancients
ventured out of their harbours. The remainder of the year was lost in in



AMERICA.                               19
activttv  It would have been deemed most inconsiderate rashness to have
braved the fury of the winds and waves during winter."
While both the science and practice of navigation continued to be so den
fective, it was an undertaking of no small difficulty and danger to visit any
remote region of the earth.  Under ever  disadvantage, however, the
active spirit of commerce exerted itself. The Egyptians, soon after the
establishment of their monarchy, are said to have opened a trade between the
Arabian Gulf, or Red Sea, and the western coast of the great Indian continent. The commodities which they imported from the East, were carried
by land from the Arabian Gulf to the banks of the Nile, and conveyed down
that river to the Mediterranean. But if the Egyptians in early times applied themselves to commerce, their attention to it was of short duration.
The fertile soil and mild climate of Egypt produced the necessaries and
comforts of life with such profusion, as rendered its inhabitants so independent of other countries, that. it became an established maxim among that
people, whose ideas and institutions -differed in almost every point from
those of other nations, to renounce all intercourse with foreigners. In consequence of this, they never went out of their own country; they held all
seafaring persons in detestation, as impious and profane; and fortifying
their own harbours, they denied strangers admittance into them.t It was in
the decline of their power, and when their veneration for ancient maxims
had greatly abated, that they again opened their ports, and resumed any
communication with foreigners.
The character and situation of the Phenicians were as favourable to the
spirit of commerce and discovery as those of the Egyptians wvere adverse
to it. They had no distinguishing peculiarity in their manners and institutions; they were not addicted to any singular and unsocial form of superstition; they could mingle with other nations without scruple or reluctance
The territory which they possessed was neither large nor fertile.  Commerce was the only source from  which they could derive opulence or
power. Accordingly, the trade carried on by the Phenicians of Sidon and
Tyre, was more extensive and enterprising than that of any state in the ancient world. The genius of the-Phenicians, as well as the object of their
policy and the spirit of their laws, were entirely commercial. They were
a people of merchants, who aimed at the empire of the sea, and actually
possessed it. Their ships not only frequented all the ports in the Mediterranean, but they were the first who ventured beyond the ancient boun
daries of navigation, and, passing the Straits of Gades, visited the western
coasts of Spain and Africa. In many of the places to which they resorted,
tkey planted colonies, and communicated to the rude inhabitants some
knowledge of their arts and improvements. While they extended their discoveries towards the north and the west, they did not neglect to penetrate
into the more opulent and fertile regions of the south and east. Having
rendered themselves masters of several commodious harbours towards the
bottom of the Arabian Gulf, they, after the example of the Egyptians, established a regular intercourse with Arabia and the continent of India on the
one hand, and with the eastern coast of Africa on the other. From these
countries they imported many valuable commodities unknown to the rest
of the world, and during a long period engrossed that lucrative branch ot
commerce without a rival. [1]
The vast wealth which the Phenicians acquired by monopolizing the
trade carried on in the Red Sea, incited their neighbours the Jews, under
the prosperous reigns of David and Solomon, to aim at being admitted to
some share of it. This they obtained, partly by their conquest of Idumea.
which stretches along the Red Sea, and partly by their alliance with HiVegitius de Re milt. lib. iv. t Diod. Sicul. lib. i. p. 78. ed. Wesselingii. Amst. 1756. Stra.
bo, lib. xvii. p 1142. ed. Amst. 1707.




20                       HISTOIRY  OF                     [Boox I.
ram, king of Tyre   Solomon fitted out fleets, which, under the direction of
Phenician pilots, sailed from the Red Sea to Tarshish and Ophir. These,
it is probable, were ports in India and Africa, which their conductors were
accustomed to frequent, and from them the Jewish ships returned with such
valuable cargoes as suddenly diffused wealth and splendour through the
ringdom of Israel.?  But the singular institutions of the Jews, the observance of which was enjoined by their divine Legislator, with an intention of preserving them a separate people, uninfected by idolatry, formed
a national character, incapable of that open and liberal intercourse with
strangers which commerce requires. Accordingly, this unsocial genius of
the people, together with the disasters which befell the kingdom of Israel,
prevented the commercial spirit which their monarchs laboured to introduce
and to cherish, from spreading among them. The Jews cannot be numbered among the nations which contributed to improve navigation, or to extend discovery.
But though the instructions and example of the Phenicians were unable
to mould the manners and temper of the Jews, in opposition to the tendency
of their laws, they transmitted the commercial spirit with facility, and
in full vigour, to their own descendants the Carthaginians. The commonwealth of Carthage applied to trade and naval affairs, with no less ardour,
ingenuity, and success, than its parent state. Carthage early rivalled and
soon surpassed Tyre ill opulence and power, but seems not to have aimed
at obtaining any share in the commerce with India. The Phenicians had
engrossed this, and had such a command of the Red Sea as secured to them
the exclusive possession of that lucrative branch of trade.  The commercial
activity of the Carthaginimrs was exerted in another direction. Without
contending for the trade of the East with their mother country, they extended their navigation chiefly towards the west and north. Following the
course which the Phenicians had opened, they passed the Straits of Gades,
and pushing their discoveries far beyond those of the parent state, visited
not only all the coasts of Spain, but those of Gaul, and penetrated at last
into Britain. At the same time that they acquired knowledge of new countries in this part of the globe, they gradually carried their researches towards
the south. They made considerable progress by land into the interior provinces of Africa, traded with some of them, and subjected others to their
empire. They sailed along the western coast of that great continent almost
to the tropic of Cancer, and planted several colonies, in order to civilize the
natives and accustom them to commerce. They discovered the Fortunate
Islands, now known by the name of the Canaries, the utmost boundary of
ancient navigation in the western ocean.t
Nor was the progress of the Phenicians and Carthaginians in their
knowledge of the globe, owing entirely to the desire of extending their
trade from one country to another. Commerce was followed by its usual
effects among both these people. It awakened curiosity, enlarged the ideas
and desires of men, and incited them to bold enterprises. Voyages were
undertaken, the sole ohbject of which was to discover new countries, and to
explore unknown seas. Such, during the prosperous age of the Carthaginlan republic, were the famous navigations of Hanno and Himlico.  Both
their fleets were equipped by authority of the senate, and at public expense. Hanno was directed to steer towards the south, along the coast of
Africa, and he seems- to have advanced much nearer the equinoctial line
than any former navigator.|. Himlico had it in charge to proceed towards
the north, and to examine the western coasts of the European continent.~
Of the same nature was the extraordinary navigation of thq Phenicians
* Mrmoire sur le Pays d'Ophir, par M. d'Anville, Mem. de l'Acadkm. des Inseript. &c. tom.
xxx. 83. t Plinii Nat. Hist. lib. vi. c. 37. edit. in usum Delph. 4to.?685.. Plinii Nat. Hist. lib.v
c 1. Hannonis Periplus ap. Geograph. minores, edit. Hludsoni, vol. i. p. 1. ~ Plinli Nat. Hist. lib.
Ii c 67. Festus Avienus apud Bochart. Geogr. Sacer. lib. i. c. CO. p. 652. Oper. vol. iii. L. Bat. 1707




AM ERi CA.                             21
round Africa. A Phenician fleet, we are told, fitted out by Necho king of
Egypt, took its departure about six hundred and four years before the
Christian era, from a port in the Red Sea, doubled the southern promontory
of Africa, and after a voyage of three years returned by the Straits or
Gades to the mouth of the Nile*t  Eudoxus of Cyzicus is said to have heid 
the same course, and to have accomplished the same arduous undertaking.t
These voyages, if performed in the manner which I have related, may
iustly be reckoned the greatest effort of navigation in the ancient world;
and if we attend to the imperfect state of the art at that time, it is difficult
to determine whether we should most admire the courage and sagacity
with Which the design was formed, or the conduct and good fortune with
which it was executed. But unfortunately all the original and authentic
accounts of the Phenician and Carthaginian voyages, whether undertaken
by public authority or in prosecution of their private trade, have, perished.
Phe information which we receive concerning them from the Greek and
Roman authors is not only obscure and inaccurate, but if we except a short
narrative of Hamno's expedition, is of suspicious authority.[2]  Whatever
acquaintance with the remote regions of the earth the Phenicians or Carthaginians may have acquired, was concealed from the rest of mankind with a
mercantile jealousy. Every thing relative to the course of their navigation
was not only a mystery of trade, but a secret of state. Extraordinary facts
are related concerining their solicitude to prevent other nations from penetrating into what they wished should remain undivulged.4  Many of their
discoveries seem, accordingly, to have been scarcely known beyond the
precincts of their own states. The navigation round Africa, in particular, is
recorded by the Greek and Roman writers rather as a strange amusing tale,
which they did not comprehend or did not believe, than as a real transaction which enlarged their knowledge and influenced their opinions.[3] As
neither the progress of the Phenician or Carthaginian discoveries, nor the
extent of their navigation, were communicated to the rest of mankind, all
memorials of their extraordinary skill in naval affairs seem, in a great measure, to have perished, when the maritime power of the former was annihilated by Alexander's conquest of Tyre, and the empire of the latter was
overturned by the Roman arms.
Leaving, then, the obscure and pompous accounts of the Phenician and
Carthaginian voyages to the curiosity and conjectures of antiquaries, history
must rest satisfied with relating the progress of navigation and discovery
among the Greeks and Romans, which, though less splendid, is better ascertained. It is evident that the Phenicians, who instructed the Greeks in
many other useful sciences and arts, did not communicate to them that extensive knowledge of navigation which they themselves possessed; nor did
the Romans imbibe that commercial spirit and ardour for discovery which
distinguished their rivals the Carthaginians. Though Greece be almost
encompassed by the sea, which formed many spacious bays and commodious harbours: though it be surrounded by a great number of fertile islands,
yet, notwithstanding such a favourable situation, which seemed to invite.
that ingenious people to apply themselves to navigation, it was long before
this art attained any degree of perfection among them. Their early voyages, te object of which was piracy rather than commerce, were so inconsiderable that the expedition of the Argonauts from the coast of Thessaly
to the Euxine Sea, appeared such an amazing effort of skill and courage,
as entitled the conductors of it to be ranked among the demigods, and ex.
alted the vessel in which they sailed to a place among the heavenly con.
stellations. Even at a later period, when the Greeks engaged in the famous
enterprise against Troy, their knowledge in naval affairs seems not to have
been much improved. According to the account of Homer, the only poet
* Herodot lib. iv. c.- 42.  t Plinii Nat. Hist. lib. ii c. 67. X Strab. Geogr. lib.. iii. p. 265. lib. xviil
U154.




~2                      HISTORY OF                        [BooR I
to whom history ventures to appeal, and who, by his scrupulous accuracy
in describing the manners and arts of early ages, merits this distinction, the
science of navigation at that time had hardly advanced beyond its rudest
state. The Greeks in the heroic age seem to have been unacquainted with
the use of iron, the most serviceable of all the metals, without which no
considerable progress was ever made in the mechanical arts. Their vesSels were of inconsiderable burden, and mostly without decks. They had
only one mast, which was erected or taken down at pleasure.  They were
strangers to the use of anchors. All their operations in sailing were clumsy
and unskilful. They turned their observations towards stars, which were
improper for regulating their course, and their mode of observing them was
inaccurate and fallacious. When they had finished a voyage they drew
their paltry barks ashore, as savages do their canoes, and these remained on
dry land until the season of returning to sea approached. It is not then in
the early heroic ages of Greece that we can expect to observe the science
of navigation, and the spirit of discovery, making any considerable progress.
During that period of disorder and ignorance, a thousand causes concurred
in restraining curiosity and enterprise within very narrow bounds.
But the Greeks advanced with rapidity to a state of greater civilization
and refinement. Government, in its most liberal and perfect form, began to
be established in their different communities; equal laws and regular police were gradually introduced; the sciences and arts which are useful or
ornamental in life were carried to a high pitch of improvement; and several of the Grecian commonwealths applied to commerce with such ardour
and success, that they were considered, in the ancient world, as maritime
powers of the first rank. Even then, however, the naval victories of the
Greeks must be ascribed rather to the native spirit of the people, and to
that courage which the enjoyment of liberty inspires, than to any extraordinary progress in the science of navigation. In the Persian war, those exploits, which the genius of the Greek historians has rendered so famous, were
performed bry fleets composed chiefly of small vessels without decks;%
the crews of which rushed forward with impetuous valour, but little art, to
board those of the enemy. In the war of Peloponnesus, their ships seem
still to have been of inconsiderable burden and force. The extent of their
trade, how highly soever it may have been estimated in ancient times, was
in proportion to this low condition of their marine. The maritime states
of Greece hardly carried on any commerce beyond the limits of the Mediterranean sea. Their chief intercourse was with the colonies of their countrymen planted in the Lesser Asia, in Italy, and Sicily. They sometimes vi
sited the ports of Egypt, of the southern provinces of Gaul, and of Thrace;
or, passing through the Hellespont, they traded with the countries situated
around the Euxine sea. Amazingl instances occur of their ignorance, even
of those countries which lay within the narrow precincts to which their
navigation was confined. When the Greeks had assembled their combined
fleet against Xerxes at Egina, they thought it unadvisable to sail to Samos,
because they believed the distance between that island and Egina to be as
great as the distance between Egina and the Pillars of Hercules.t  They
were either utterly unacquainted with all the parts of the-globe beyond the
Mediterranean sea, or what knowledge they had of them was founded on
conjecture, or derived from the information of a few persons whom curiosity
and the love of science had prompted to travel by land into the Upper
Asia, or by sea into Egypt,. the ancient seats of wisdom and arts. After all
that the Greeks learned from them, they appear to have been ignorant of
the most important facts on which an accurate and scientific knowledge of
the clobe is founded.
TiFe expedition of Alexander the Great into the East considerably en* Thucvd. lib. i. c. 14.        t Herodot. lib viii. c. 132.




AMERICA.                                3
~arged the sphere of navigation and of geographical knowledge among the
Greeks. That extraordinary man, notwithstanding the violent passions
which incited him at some times to the wildest actions and the most extravagant enterprises, possessed talents which fitted him, not only to conquer,
but to govern the world. He was capable of framing those told and original schemes of policy, which gave a new form to human affairs. The
revolution in commerce, brought about by the force of his genius, is hardly
inferior to that revolution in empire occasioned by the success of his arms.
It is probable that the opposition and efforts of the republic of Tyre, which
checked him so long ill the career of his.victories, gave Alexander an opportunity of observing the vast resources of a maritime power, and conveyed to him some idea of the immense wealth which the Tyrians derived
from their commerce, especially that with the East Indies. As soon as he
had accomplished the destruction of Tyre, and reduced Egypt to subjection,
he formed the plan of rendering the empire which he proposed to establish,
the centre of commerce as well as the seat of dominion. With this view
he founded a great city, which he honoured with his own name, near one
of the mouths of the river Nile, that by the Mediterranean sea, and the
neighbourhood of the Arabian Gulf, it might command the trade both of the
East and West.?  This situation was chosen with such discernment, that
Alexandria soon became the chief comrmercial city in the world. Not only
during the subsistence of the Grecian empire in Egypt and in the East, but
amidst all the successive revolutions in those countries from the time of the
Ptolemies to the discovery of the navigation by the Cape of Good Hope,,commerce, particularly that of the East Indies, continued to flow in the
channel which the sagacity and foresight of Alexander had marked out
for it.
His ambition was not satisfied with having opened to the Greeks a communication with India by sea; he aspired to the sovereignty of those regions
which furnished the rest of mankind with so many precious commodities,
and conducted his army thither by land. Enterprising, however, as he was,
he may be said rather to have viewed than to have conquered that country.
He did not, in his progress towards the East, advance beyond the banks of
the rivers that fall into the Indus, which is now the western boundary of the
vast continent of India. Amidst the wild exploits which distinguish this
part of his history, he pursued measures that mark the superiority of his genius as well as the extent of his views. He had penetrated as far into India
as to confirm his opinion of its commercial importance, and to perceive that
immense wealth might be derived from intercourse with a country where
the arts oi elegance, having been more early cultivated, were arrived at
greater perfection than in any other part of the earth.t  Full of this idea, he
~rsolved to examine the course of navigation from the mouth of the Indus
to the bottom of the Persian Gulf; and, if it should be found practicable, to
establish a regular communication between them. In order t6 effect this,
he proposed to remove the cataracts, with which the jealousy of the Persians, and their aversion to correspondence with foreigners, had obstructed
the entrance into the Euphrates;: to carry the commodities of the East up
that river, and the Tigris, which unites with it, into the interior parts of his
Asiatic dominions; while, by the way of the Arabian Gulf and the river
Nile, they might be conveyed to Alexandria, and distributed to the rest of
the world. Nearchus, an officer of eminent abilities, was intrusted with the
command of the fleet fitted out for this expedition. He performed this
voyage, which was deemed an enterprise so arduous and important, that
Alexander reckoned it one of the most extraordinary events which distinguished his reign. Inconsiderable as it may now appear, it was at that
* Strab. Geogr. lib. xvii. p 114.. 1149: t Strab. Gecgr. lib. xv. p. 1036. Q. Curtius, lib. xviii
e. 9. t Strab. Geogr. lib. xvi. p. 1075.




24                     HISTORY OF                       [Book I.
time an undertaking of no little merit and difficulty. In the prosecution of
It, striking instances occur of the small progress which the Greeks had made
m naval knowledge.[4] Having never sailed beyond the bounds of the
Mediterranean, where the ebb and flow of the sea are hardly perceptible,
when they first observed this phenomenon at the mouth of the Indus, it appeared to them a prodigy, by which the gods testified the displeasure of
heaven against their enterprise.[5]  During their whole course, they seem
never to have lost sight of land, but followed the bearings of the coast so
servilely, that they could not avail themselves of those periodical winds
which facilitate navigation in the Indian ocean. Accordingly they spent
no less than ten months in performing this voyage,* which, from the mouth
of the Indus to that of the Persian Gulf, does not exceed twenty degrees.
It is probable, that amidst the convulsions and frequent revolutions in the
East, occasioned by the contests among the successors of Alexander, the
navigation to India by the course which Nearchus had opened was discontinued. The Indian trade carried on at Alexandria, not only subsisted, but
was so much extended, under the Grecian monarchs of Egypt, that it proved
a great source of the wealth which distinguished their kingdom.
The progress which the Romans made in navigation and discovery, was
still more inconsiderable than that of the Greeks. The genius of the Roman people, their military education, and the spirit of their laws, concurred
in estranging them from commerce and naval affairs. It was the necessity
of opposing a formidable rival, not the desire of extending trade, which
first prompted them to aim at maritime power. Though they soon perceived, that in order to acquire the universal dominion after which they aspired, it was necessary to render themselves masters of the sea, they still
considered the naval service as a subordinate station, and reserved for it
such citizens as were not of a rank to be admitted into the legions.f In
the history of the Roman republic, hardly one event occurs, that marks
attention to navigation any further than it was instrumental towards conquest.
When the Roman valour and discipline had subdued all the maritime states
known in the ancient world; when Carthage, Greece, and Egypt had submitted to their power, the Romans did not imbibe the commercial spirit of
the conquered nations. Among that people of soldiers, to have applied to
trade would have been deemed a degradation to a Roman citizen. They
abandoned the mechanical arts, commerce, and navigation, to slaves, to
freedmen, to provincials, and to citizens of the lowest class. Even after the
subversion of liberty, when the severity and haughtiness of ancient manners
began to abate, commerce did not rise into high estimation among the
Romans. The trade of Greece, Egypt, and the other conquered countriesi
continued to be carried on in its usual channels, after they:were reduced
into the form of Roman provinces. As Rome was the capital of the world,
and the seat of government, all the wealth and valuable productions of the
provinces flowed naturally thither. The Romans, satisfied with this, seem
to have suffered commerce to remain almost entirely in the hands of the
natives of the respective countries. The extent, however, of the Roman
power, which reached over the greatest part of the known world, the vigilant inspection of the Roman magistrates, and the spirit of the Roman
government, no less intelligent than active, gave such additional security to
commerce as animated it with new vigour. The union among nations was
never so entire, nor the intercourse so perfect, as within the bounds of this
vast empire. Commerce, under the Roman dominion, was not obstructed
by the jealousy of rival states, interrupted by frequent hostilities, or limited
by partial restrictions. One superintending power moved and regulated
the industry of mankind, and enjoyed the fruits of their joint efforts.
Navigation felt its influence, and improved under it. As soon as the
* Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. vi. c. 23.     t Polyb. lib v.




AME RI CA.                             2
Romans acquired a taste for the luxuries of the East, the trade with India
through Egypt was pushed with new vigour, and carried on to greater
extent. By tiequenting the Indian continent, navigators became acquainted
with the periodical course of the winds, which, in the ocean that separates
Africa from India, blow with little variation during one half of the year from
the east, and during the other half blow with equal steadiness fiom the wvest.
Encouraged by observing this, the pilots who sailed from Egypt to India
abandoned their ancient slow and dangerous course along the coast, and, as
soon as the western monsoon set in, took their departure fi'om Ocelis, at the
mouth of the Arabian Gulf, and stretched boldly across the ocean.* The uniform direction of the wind. supplying the place of the compass, and rendering
the guidance of the stars less necessary, conducted them to the port of Musiris, on the western shore of the Indian continent. There they took on board
their cargo, and, returning with the eastern monsoon, finished their voyage
to the Arabian Gulf within the year. This part of India, now known by
the name of the Malabar coast, seems to have been the utllost limit of
ancient tinavigation in that quarter of the globe. What imperfect knowledge
the ancients had of the ilmmnense countries which stretch beyond this towards
the East, they received from  a few adventurers who had visited them  by
land.  Such excursions were neither frequent nor extensive, and it is probable that, while the Roman intercourse with India subsisted, no traveller
ever penetrated further than to the banks of the Ganges.t[6J The fleets from
Egypt which traded at Musiris were loaded it is true, with the spices and
other rich commodities of the continent and islands of the further India; but
tiese were brought to that port, which became the staple of the commerce
betwveen the east and west, by the Indians themselves in canoes hollowed
out of one tree.   The Egyptian and Roman merchants, satisfied with
acquiring those commodities in this manner, did not think it necessary to
explore unknown seas, and venture upon a dangerous navigation, in quest ot
the countries which produced them. But though the discoveries of the Ronans
in india were so limited, their commerce there was such as will appear
considerable, even to the present age, in which the Indian trade has been
extended far beyond the practice or conception of any preceding period.
We are informed by one author of credit,~ that the commerce with India
drained the Roman empire every year of more than four hundred thousand
pounds; and by another, that one hundred and twenty ships sailed annually
from the Arabian Gulf to that country.ll
The discovery of this new method of sailing to India, is the most considerable improvement in navigation made during the continuance of the
Roman power. But in ancient times, the knowledge of remote countries
was acquired more fiequently by land than by sea;[7] and the Romans,from
their peculiar disinclination to naval affairs, may be said to have neglected
totally the latter, though a more easy and expeditious method of discovery.
The progress, however, of their victorious armies throuogh a considerable
portion of Europe, Asia, and Africa, contributed greatly to extend discovery
by land, and gradually opened the navigation of new and unknown seas.
Previous to the Roman conquests, the civilized nations of antiquity had
little communication with those countries in Europe which now form its
most opulent and powerful kingdoms.  The interior parts of Spain and
Gaul were imperfectly known. Britain, separated from the rest of the
world, had never been visited, except by its neighbours the Gauls, and by a
few Carthaginian merchants. The name of Germany had scarcely been
heard of. Into all these countries the arms of the iomnans penetrated.
They entirely subdued Spain. and Gaul; they conquered the greatest and
most fertile part of Britain; they advanced into Germany, as far as the
~ Plit. Nat. Hist. lib. vi. c. 23.  t Strab. Geogr. fib. xv. p. 1006 —-1010,   t Plin. Nat. list
lib. vi. c. oiS.      Ibid.  li Strab. Geogr. lib. ii. p. 179.
VOL. I.-4




.e6                     HISTORY  OF                     [BooK  I
banks of the river Elbe. In Afiica, they acquired a considerable know
ledge of the provinces, which stretched along the iMediternanean Sea, from
Egypt westward to the Straits of Gades. In Asia, they not only subjected
to their power most of the provinces which composed the Persian and
the Macedonian empires, but after their victories over Mlithridates and
Tigranes, they seem to have made a more accurate survey of the countries
contiguous to the Euxine and Caspian seas, and to have carried on a more
extensive trade than that of the Greeks with the opulent and commercial
nations then seated round the Euxine sea.
From  this succinct survey of discovery and navigation, which I have
traced from the earliest dawn of historical knowledge, to the full esta
blishment of the Roman dominion, the progress of both appears to
liave been wonderfully slow. It seems neither adequate to what we
mnight have expected from the activity and enterprise of the human mind,
nor to what might have been performed by the power of the great empires
which successively governed the world. If we reject accounts that are
fabulous and obscure; if we adhere steadily to the light and information
of authentic history, without substituting in its place the conjectures of
fancy or the dreams of etymologists, we must conclude, that the knowledge
which the ancients had acquired of the habitable globe was extremely
confined. In Europe, the extensive provinces in the eastern part of Germany were little known to them. They were almost totally unacquainted
with the vast countries which are now subject to the kings of- Denmark,
Sweden, Prussia, Poland, and the Russian empire. The mere barren
regions that stretch within the arctic circle, were quite unexplored. In
Africa, their researches did not extend far beyond the provinces which
border on the Mediterranean, and those situated on the western shore of
the Arabian Gulf. In Asia, they were unacquainted, as I formerly observed,
with all the fertile and opulent countries beyond the Ganges, which furnish
the most valuable commodities that in modern times have been the great
object of the European commerce with India; nor do they seem to have
ever penetrated into those immense regions occupied by the wandering.ribes, which they called by the general name of Sarmatians or Scythians,
and which are now possessed by Tartars of various denominations, and by
the Asiatic subjects of Russia.
But there is one opinion, that universally prevailed among the ancients,
which conveys a more striking idea of the small progress they had made
in the knowledge of the habitable globe than can be derived from any
detail of their discoveries. They supposed the earth to be divided into
five regions, which they distinguished by the name of Zones. Two of
these, which were nearest the poles, they termed Frigid zones, and believed
that the extreme cold which reigned perpetually there rendered them uninhabitable. Another, seated under the line, and extending on either side
towards the tropics, they called the Torrid zone, and imagined it to be so
burned up with unremitting heat, as to be equally destitute of inhabitants.
On the two other zones, which occupied the remainder of the earth. they
bestowed the appellation of Temperate, and taught that these, being the
only regions in which life could subsist, were allotted to man for his habitation. This wild opinion was not a conceit of the uninformed vulgar, or a
fanciful fiction of the poets, but a system adopted by the most enlightened
philosophers, the most accurate historians and geographers in Greece and
Rome. According to this theory, a vast portion of the habitable earth was
pronounced to be unfit for sustaining the human species. Those fertile and
populous regions within the torrid zone, which are now known not only to
yield their own inhabitants the necessaries and comforts of life with most
luxuriant profusion, but to communicate their superfluous stores to the rest of
the world, were supposed to be the mansion of perpetual sterility and
desolation. As all the parts of the globe with which the ancients were




AMERICA.                               2
acquainted lay within the northern temperate zone, their opinion that the
other temperate zone was filled with inhabitants, was founded on reasoning
and conjecture, not on discovery. They even believed that, by the intolerable heat of the torrid zone such an insuperable barrier was placed
between the two temperate regions of the earth as would prevent for ever
any intercourse between their respective inhabitants. Thus, this extravagant theory not only proves that the ancients were unacquainted with the
true state of the globe, but it tended to render their ignorance perpetual, by
representing all attempts towards opening a communication with the remote
regions of the earth, as utterly impracticable.L8]
But, however imperfect or inaccurate the geographical knowledge which
he Greeks and Romans had acquired may appear, in respect of the
present improved state of that science, their progress in discovery will seem
considerable, and the extent to which they carried navigation and commerce
must be reckoned great, wvhen compared with the ignorance of early times.
As long as the Roman Empire retained suchvigour as to preserve its authority
over the conquered nations, and to keep them united, it was an object oi
public policy, as well as of private curiosity, to examine and describe the
countries which composed this great body. Even when the other sciences
began to decline, geography, enriched with new observations, and receiving
some accession from the experience of every age, and the reports of every
traveller, continued to improve. It attained to the highest point of perfection and accuracy to which it ever arrived in the ancient world, by the
industry and genius of Ptolemy the philosopher. He flourished in the
second century of the Christian mera, and published a description of the terrestrial globe, more ample and exact than that of any of his predecessors.
But, soon after, violent convulsions began to shake the Roman state; the
fatal ambition or caprice of Constantine, by changing the seat of government, divided and weakened its force; the barbarous nations, which Providence prepared as instruments to overturn the mighty fabric of the
Roman power, began to assemble and to muster their armies on its frontier:
the empire tottered to its fall. During this decline and old age of the
Roman state, it was impossible that the sciences should go on improving.
The efforts of genius wer6, at that period, as languid and feeble as those of
government. P'rom the time of Ptolemy, no considerable addition seems to
have been made to geographical knowledge, nor did any important revolution happen in trade, excepting that Constantinople, by its advantageous
situation, and the encouragement of the eastern emperors, became a corn
mercial city of the first note.
At length, the clouds which had been so long gathering round the Roman
empire burst into a storm. Barbarous nations rushed in from several quarters with irresistible impetuosity, and in the general wreck, occasioned by
the inundation which overwhelmed Europe the arts, sciences, inventions,
and discoveries of the Romans perished in a great measure, and disappeared.? All the various tribes which settled in the different provinces of
the Roman empire were uncivilized, strangers to letters, destitute of arts,
unacquainted with regular government, subordination, or laws. The manners and institutions of some of them -were so rude as to be hardly compatible with a state of social union. Europe, when occupied by such inhabit
ants, may be said to have returned to a second infancy, and had to begin
anew its career in improvement, science, and civility. The first effect of
the settlement of those barbarous invaders was to dissolve the union by which
the Roman power had cemented mankind together. They parcelled out
Europe into many small and independent states, liffering irom each otheI
in language and customs. No intercourse subsisted  between the members
of those divided and hostile communities. Accu tomed to a sinlyple mode
H* is. of Chrles Vol. vol. i.




~t.   -             HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK 1..f life, and averse to industry, they had few wants to supply, and few superfluities to dispose of. The nanles of stranger and enemy became once
more words of the same import. Customs every where prevailed, and
even laws were established, which rendered it disagreeable and dangerous
to visit any foreign country.~  Cities, in which alone an extensive commerce
can be carried on, were few, inconsiderable, and destitute of' those immunities which produce security or excite enterprise. The sciences, on which
geography and navigation are founded, wer elittle cultivated. The accounts
of ancient improvements and discoveries, contained in the Greek and
Roman authors, were neglected or misunderstood. The knowledge of
remote regions was lost, their situation, their commodities, and almost their
names, were unknown.
One circumstance prevented commercial intercourse with distant nations
from ceasing altogether.  Constantinople, though often threatened by the
fierce invaders who spread desolation over the rest of Europe, was so fortunate as to escape their destructive rage. In that city the knowledge of
ancient arts and discoveries was preserved; a taste for splendour and elegance subsisted; the productions and luxuries of foreign countries were in
request; and commerce continued to flourish there when it was almost
extinct in every other part of Europe. The citizens of Constantinople did
not confine their trade to the islands of the Archipelago, or to the adjacent
coasts of Asia; they took a wider range, and, following the course which
the ancients had marked out, imported the commodities of the East Indies
from Alexandria. When Egypt was torn from the Roman empire by the
Arabians, the industry of the Greeks discovered a new channel by which
the productions of India might be conveyed to Constantinople. They were
carried up the Indus as far as that great river is navigable; thence they
were transported by land to the banks of the river Oxus, and proceeded
down its stream to the Caspian sea. There they entered the Volga, and,
sailing up it, were carried by land to the Tanais, which conducted them
into the EuKine sea, where vessels from Constantinople waited their arrival.t
This extraordinary and tedious mode of conveyance merits attention, not
only as a proof of the violent passion which the inhabitants of Constantinople
had conceived for the luxuries of the East, and as a specimen of the ardour
and ingenuity with which they carried on commerce; but because it
demonstrates that, during the ignorance which reigned in the rest of Europe,
an extensive knowledge of remote countries was still preserved in the capital of the Greek empire.
At the same time a gleam of light and knowledge broke in upon the
East. The Arabians having contracted some relish for the sciences of the
people whose empire they had contributed to overturn, translated the
books of several of the Greek philosophers into their own language. One
of the first was that valuable work of Ptolemy which I have already mentioned. The study of geography became, of consequence, an early object of
attention to the Arabians. But that acute and ingenious people cultivated
chiefly the speculative and scientific parts of geography. In order to ascertain the figure and dimensions of the terrestrial globe, they applied the
principles of geometry, they had recourse to astronomical observations, they
employed experiments and operations, which Europe in more enlightened
U'mes has been proud to adopt and to imitate. At that period, however,
he fame of- the improvements made by the Arabians did not reach Europe.
P'he knowledge of their discoveries was reserved for ages capable of comprehending and. of perfecting them.
By degrees the calamities ap.d desolation brought upon the western pro
vinces of the Roman empire by its barbarous conquerors were forgotten,
and in some measure repaired. The rude tribes which settled there
* Hist of Charles V.          t Ramusio, vol. i. p. 372. F.




AMERICA.                              29
acquiring insensibly some idea of regular government, and some relish for
the functions and comforts of civil life, Europe began to awake from its
torpid and inactive state. The first symptoms of revival were discerned
in Italy. The northern tribes which took possession of this country, made
progress in improvement with greater rapidity than the people settled in
other parts of Europe. Various causes, which it is not the object of this
work to enumerate or explain, concurred in restoring liberty and independence to the cities of Italy.*  The acquisition of these roused industry, ana
gave motion and vigour to all the attive powers of the human mind.
Foreign commerce revived, navigation was attended to and improved.
Constantinople became the chief mart to which the Italians resorted. There
they not only met with a favourable reception, but obtained such mercan
tile privileges as enabled them to carry on trade with great advantage.
They were supplied both with the precious commodities of the East, and
with many curious manufactures, the product of ancient arts and ingenuity
which still subsisted among the Greeks. As the labour and expense of con
veying the productions of India to Constantinople by that long and indirect
course which I have described, rendered them extremely rare, and of an
exorbitant price, the industry of the Italians discovered other methods of
procuring them in greater abundance and at an easier rate. They some
times purchased them in Aleppo, Tripoli, and other ports on the coast of
Syria, to which they were brought by a route not unknown to the ancients
They were conveyed from India by sea up the Persian Gulf, and, ascending
the Euphrates and Tigris as far as Bagdat, were carried by land across the
desert of Palmyra, and from thence to the towns on the Mediterranean.
But, from the length of the journey, and the dangers to which the caravans
were exposed, this proved always a tedious and often a precarious mode of
conveyance. At length the Soldans of Egypt, having revived the commerce
with India in its ancient channel, by the Arabian Gulf, the Italian merchants,
notwithstanding the violent antipathy to each other with which Christians
and the followers of Mahomet were then possessed, repaired to Alexandria, and
enduring, from the love of gain, the insolence and exactions of the Mahometans,
established a lucrative trade in that port. From that period the commer
cial spirit of Italy became active and enterprising. Venice, Genoa, Pisa,
rose from inconsiderable towns to be populous and wealthy cities. Their
naval power increased; their vessels frequented not only all the ports inthe
Mediterranean, but venturing sometimes beyond the Straits, visited the
maritime towns of Spain, France, the Low Countries, and England; and.
by distributing their commodities over Europe, began to communicate to its
various nations some taste for the valuable productions of the East, as well
as some ideas of manufactures and arts, which were then unknown beyond
the precincts of Italy.
While the cities of Italy were thus advancing in their career of improve
ment, an event happened, the most extraordinary, perhaps, in the history ot
mankind, which, instead of retarding the commercial progress of the Italians,
rendered it more rapid. The martial spirit of the Europeans, heightened
and inflamed by religious zeal, prompted them to attempt the deliverance
of the Holy Land from the dominion of Infidels. Vast armies, composed of
all the nations in Europe, marched towards Asia upon this wild enterprise.
The Genoese, the Pisans, and Venetians, furnished the transports which
carried them thither. They supplied them with provisions and military
stores. Besides the immense sums which they received on this account,
they obtained commercial privileges and establishments of great cnsequence in the settlements which the Crusaders made in Palestine, and in
other provinces of Asia. From those sources prodigious wealth flowed into
the cities which I have mentioned. This was accompanied with a propor* Hist. of Charles V.




30                       HISTORY  OF                    [Boox 1.
tionaI increase of power; and, by the end of the Holy War, Venice in
particular became a great maritime state, possessing an extensive commerce
and ample territories.?  Italy was not the only country in which the Crusades contributed to revive and diffuse such a spirit as prepared Europe for
future discoveries. By their expeditions into Asia, the other European
nations became well acquainted with remote regions, wh:ch formerly they
knew only by name, or by the reports of ignorant and credulous pilgrims.
They had an opportunity of observing the manners, the arts, and the accommodations of people more polished than themselves. This intercourse between
the East and West subsisted almost two centuries. The adventurers who
returned from Asia communicated to their countrymen the ideas which they
had acquired, and the habits of life they had contracted by visiting more
refined nations. The Europeans began to be sensible of wants with which
they were formerly unacquainted: new desires were excited; and such a
taste for the commodities and arts of other countries gradually spread among
them, that they not only encouraged the resort of foreigners to their harbours,
but began to perceive the advantage and necessity of applying to commerce
themselves.t
This comlruncation, which was opened between Europe and the western
provinces of Asia, encouraged several persons to advance far beyond the
countries in which the Crusaders carried on their operations, and to travel by
land into the more remote and opulent regions of the East. The wild fanaticism, which seems at that period to have mingled in all the schemes of
individuals, no less than in all the counsels of nations, first incited men to
enter upon those long and dangerous peregrinations. They were afterwards
undertaken from prospects of commercial advantage, or from motives of
mere curiosity.  Benjamin, a Jew of Tudela, in the kingdom of Navarre,
possessed with a superstitious veneration for the law of Moses, and solicitous
to visit his countrymen in the East, whom he hoped to find in such a state
of power and opulence as might redound to the honour of his sect, set out
from Spain, in the year 1160, and, travelling by land to Constantinople, proceeded through the countries to the north of the Euxine and Caspian seas,
as far as Chinese Tartary. From thence he took his route towards the
south, and after traversing various provinces of the further India, he embarked on the Indian Ocean, visited several of its islands, and returned at
the end of thirteen years, by the way of Egypt, to Europe, with much
information concerning a large district of the globe altogether unknown at
that time to the western woild.t The zeal of the head of the Christian
church co-operated with the superstition of Benjamin the Jew in discovering
the interior and remote provinces of Asia. All Chrlstendom having been
alarmed with the accounts of the rapid progress of the Tartar arms under
Zengis Khan [1246], Innocent IV., who entertained most exalted ideas
concerning the plenitude of his own power, and the submission due to his
injunctions, sent Father John de Plano Carpini, at the head of a mission of
Franciscan monks, and Father Ascolino, at the head of another of Dominicans, to enjoin Kayuk Khan, the grandson of Zengis, who was then at the
head of the Tartar empire, to embrace the Christian faith, and to desist
from desolating the earth by his arms. The haughty descendant of the
greatest conqueror Asia had ever beheld, astonished at this strange mandate
from an Italian priest, whose name and jurisdiction were alike unknown to
him, received it with the contempt which it merited, though he dismissed
the mendicants who delivered it with impunity. But, as they had penetrated into the country by different routes, and followed for some time the
Tartar camps, which were always in motion, they had opportunity of visit.
ing a great part of Asia. Carpini, who proceeded by the way of Poland
~ Essai de l'Histoire du Commerce de Venlse, p. 52, &c.   t Hist of Charles V.: Bergeron, Recueil des Voyages, &c. ton, i. p 1.




AMERICA.                               31
and Russia, travelled through its northern provinces as far as the extremities
of Thibet. Ascolino, who seems to have landed somewhere in Syria,
advanced through its southern provinces Into the interior parts of Persia.?
Not long after [1253], St. Louis of France contributed further towards
extending the knowledge which the Europeans had begun to acquire of those
(listant regions. Some designing impostor, who took advantage of the
slender acquaintance of Christendom with the state and character of the Asiatic
nations, having informed him that a powerful Khan of the Tartais had
embraced the Christian faith, the monarch listened to the tale with pious
credulity, and instantly resolved to send ambassadors to this illustrious
convert, with a view of enticing him to attack their common enemy the
Saracens in one quarter, while he fell upon theim in another. As monks
were the only persons in that age who possessed such a degree of knowledge as qualified them for a service of this kind, he employed in it
Father Andrew, a Jacobine, who was followed by Father William de
Rubruquis, a Franciscan. With respect to the progress of the former,
there is no memorial extant. The journal of the latter has been published
He was admitted into the presence of Mangu, the thlird Khan in succession
from Zengis, and made a circuit through the interior parts of Asia, more
extensive than that of any European who had hitherto explored them.4
To those travellers whom religious zeal sent forth to visit Asia, succeeded
others who ventured into remote countries from the prospect of commercial
advantage, or from motives of mere curiosity.  The first and most eminent
of these was Marco Polo, a Venetian of a noble family. Having engaged
early in trade [1265], according to the custom of his country, his aspiring
mind wished for a sphere of activity more extensive than was afforded to it
by the established traffic carried'on in those ports of Europe and Asia which
the Venetians frequented. This prompted him to travel into unknown
countries, in expectation of opening a commercial intercourse with them
more suited to the sanguine ideas and hopes of a young adventurer.
As his father had already carried some European commodities to the court
of the great Khan of the Tartars, and had disposed of them to advantage,
he resorted thither. Under the protection of Kublay Khan, the most
powerful of all the successors of Zengis, he continued his mercantile peregrinations in Asia upwards of twenty-six years: and during that time advanced towards the east, far beyond the utmost boundaries to which any
European traveller had ever proceeded. Instead of fbllowing the course
of Carpini and Rubruquis, along the vast unpeopled plains of Tartary, he
passed through the chief trading' cities in the more cultivated parts of Asia,
and penetrated to Cambalu, or Peking, the capital of the great kingdom of
Cathay, or China, subject at that time to the successors of Zengis. He
made more than one voyage on the Indian ocean; he traded in many of
the islands from which Europe had long received spiceries and other commodities which it held in high estimation, though unacquainted with the
particular countries to which it was indebted for those precious productions:
and he obtained information concerning several countries which he did not
visit in person, particularly the island Zipangri, probably the same now
known by the name of Japan.j. On his return, he astonished his contemporaries with his descriptions of vast regions whose names had never been
heard of in Europe, and with such pompous accounts of their fertility, their
populousness, their opulence, the variety of their manufactures, and the
extent of their trade, as rose far above the conception of an uninformed age
About half a century after Marco Polo [1322], Sir John Mandeville, an
Englishman, encouraged by his example, visited most of the countries in
the East which he had described, and, like him, published an account of
Ilaklluyt, i. 21. Bergeron, tom. i.  f Hakl. i. 71. Recueil des Voyages par Bergeron, tom 1,
I Viuggi di Marco Polo. Ramus. ii. 2. Bergeron. tom. ii.




HISTORY OF                       [BooK 1.
them.- The narrations of those early travellers abound with many wild
ncoherent tales, concerning giants, enchanters, and monsters. But they
were not from that circumstance less acceptable to an ignorant age, which
delighted in what was marvellous. The wonders which they told, mostly
on hearsay, filled the multitude with admiration. The facts which they
related from their own observation attracted the attention of the more dis
cerning. The former, which may be considered as the popular traditions
and fables of the countries through which they had passed, were gradually
disregarded as Europe advanced in knowledge. The latter, however
incredible some of them may have appeared in their own time, have been
confirmed by the observations of modern travellers. By means of both,
however, the curiosity of mankind was excited with respect to the remote
parts of the earth; their ideas were enlarged; and they were not only
insensibly disposed to attempt new discoveries, but received such information as directed to that particular course in which these were afterwards
carried on.
While this spirit was gradually forming in Europe, a fortunate discovery
was made, which contributed more than all the efforts and ingenuity ot
preceding ages to improve and to extend navigation. That wonderful property of the magnet, by which it communicates such virtue to a needle
or slender rod of iron as to point towards the poles of the earth, was
observed. The use which might be made of this in directing navigation
was immediately perceived. That valuable, but now familiar instrument,
the mariner's compass, was constructed. When by means of it navigators
found that, at all seasons and in every place, they could discover the northb
and south with so much ease and'accuracy, it became no longer necessary
to depend merely on the light of the stars and the observation of the seacoast. They gradually abandoned their ancient timid and lingering course
along the shore, ventured boldly into the ocean, and, relying on this new
guide, could steer in the darkest night, and under the most cloudy sky,
with a security and precision hitherto unknown. The compass may be
said to have opened to man the dominion of the sea, and to have put him
in full possession of the earth by enabling him to visit every part of it.
Flavio Gioia, a citizen of Amalfi, a town of considerable trade in the kingdom of Naples, was the author of this great discovery, about the year one.
thousand three hundred and two. It hath been often the fate of those- illustrious benefactors of mankind who have enriched science and improved
the arts by their inventions, to derive more reputation than benefit from the
happy efforts of their genius. But the lot of Gioia has been still more
cruel; through the inattention or ignorapce of contemporary historians, he
has been defrauded even of the fame to which he had such a just title.
We receive from them  no information with respect to his profession, his
character, the precise time when he made this important discovery, or the
accidents and inquiries which led to it. The knowledge of this event,
though productive of greater efficts than any recorded in the annals of the
human race, is transmitted to us without any of those circumstances which
can gratify the curiosity that it naturally awakens.t  But though the use
of the compass might enable the Italians to perform the short voyages to
which they were accustomed with greater security and expedition, its influence was not so sudden or extensive as immediately to render navigation
adventurous, and to excite a spirit of discovery. Many causes combined
in preventing this beneficial invention friom producing its full effect instantaneously.  rdlen relinquish ancient habits slowly and with reluctance. They
are averse to new experiments, and venture upon them with timidity.  The
commercial jealousy of the Italians, it is probable, laboured to conceal the
* Voyages and Travels, by Sir John Maneville.  t Collinas et Trombellus de Acus Nautice
Inventore, Instit. Atead. Bonon. tomn. ii. part iii. p. 372.




AMERICA.                               3
happy discovery of their countrymen from -other nations. The art of
steering by the compass with such skill and accuracy as to inspire a full
confidence in its direction, was acquired gradually. Sailors unaccustomed
to quit the sight of' land, durst not launch out at once and commit themselves
to unknown seas. Accordingly, near half a century elapsed from the time
of Gioia's discovery, before navigators ventured into any seas which they
had not been accustomed to frequent.
The first appearance of a bolder spirit may be dated from the voyages
of the Spaniards to the Canary or Fortunate Islands. By what accident
they were led to the discovery of those small isles, which lie near five hundred miles from the Spanish coast, and above a hundred and fifty miles
from the coast of Africa, contemporary writers have not explained. But,
about the middle of the fourteenth century, the people of' all the different
kingdoms into which Spain was then divided, were accustomed to make
piratical excursions thither, in order to plunder the inhabitants, or to carry
them off as slaves. Clement VI. in virtue of the right claimed by the Holy
See to dispose of all countries possessed by infidels, erected those isles
into a kingdom in the year one thousand three hundred and forty-four, and
conferred it on Lewis de la Cerda descended from the royal family ot
Castile. But that unfortunate prince, destitute of power to assert his
nominal title, having never visited the Canaries, John de Bethencourt, a
Norman baron, obtained a grant of them from Henry III. of Castile.*
Bethencourt, with the valour and good fortune which distinguished the
adventurers of his country, attempted and effected the conquest; and
the possession of the Canaries remained for some time in his family, as a
fief held of the crown of Castile. Previous to this expedition of Bethen
court, his countrymen settled in Normandy are said to have visited the
coast of Africa, and to have proceeded far to the south of the Canary
Islands [1365]. But their voyages thither seem not to have been undertaken in consequence of any public or regular plan for extending navigation
and attempting new discoveries. They were either excursions suggested
by that roving piratical spirit which descended to the Normans from their
ancestors, or the commercial enterprises of private merchants, which attracted
so little notice that hardly any memorial of them is to be found in contemporary authors. In a general survey of the progress of discovery, it is
sufficient to have mentioned this event; and leaving it among those of
dubious existence, or of small importance. we may conclude, that though
much additional information concerning the remote regions of the East had
been received by travellers who visited them by land, navigation at the be- 
ginning of the fifteenth century had not advanced beyond tlhe state to which
it had attained before the downfal of the Roman empire.
At length the period arrived; when Providence decreed that men were
to pass the limits within which they had been so long confined, and open
to themselves a more ample field wherein to display their talents, their
enterprise, and courage. The first considerable efforts towards this were
not made by any of the more powerful states of Europe, or by those who
had applied to navigation with the greatest assiduity and success. The
glory of leading the way in this new career was reserved for Portugal, one
of the smallest and least powerful of the European kingdoms. As the
attempts of the Portuguese to acquire the knowledge of those parts of the
globe with which mankind were then unacquainted, not only improved and
extended the art of navigation, but roused such a spirit of curiosity and
enterprise as led to the discovery of the New VWorld, of which I propose to
write the history, it is necessary to take a full view of the rise, the progress,
and success of their various naval operations. It was in this school that the
discoverer of America was trained; and unless we trace the steps by whicn'* Viera y Clavijo Notic. de la Histor. de Canaria,i. 268, &c. Glas. Hist. c. 1.
VOL. 1.-5




34                     HISTORY  OP                       LBooK I.
his instrue.tors and guides advanced, it will be impossible to comprehend
the circumstances which suggested the idea, or facilitated the execution, of
his great design.
Various circumstances prompted the Portuguese to exert their activity in
this new direction, and enabled them to accomplish undertakings apparently
superior to the natural force of their monarchy. The kings of Portugal,
having driven the Moors out of their dominions, had acquired power as
well as glory, by the success of their arms against the infidels. By their
victories over them, they had extended the royal authority beyond the nar
row limits within which it was originally circumscribed in Portugal, as well
as in other feudal kingdoms. They had the command of the national force,
could rouse it to act with united vigour, and, after the expulsion of the
Moors, could employ it without dread of interruption from any domes.tic
enemy. By the perpetual hostilities carried on for several centuries against
the Mahometans, the martial and adventurous spirit which distinguished all
the European nations during the middle ages, was improved and heightened
among the Portuguese. A fierce civil war towards the close of the fourteenth century, occasioned by a disputed succession, augmented the military
ardour of the nation, and formed or called forth men of such active and
daring genius as are fit for bold undertakings. The situation of the
kingdom, bounded- on every side by the dominions of a more powerful
neighbour, did not afford free scope to the activity of' the Portuguese by
land, as the strength of their monarchy was no match for that of Castile.
But Portugal was a maritime state, in which there were many commodious
harbours; the people had begun to make some progress in the knowledge
and practice of navigation, and the sea was open to them, presenting the
only field of enterprise in which they could distinguish theinselves.
Such was the state of Portugal, and such the disposition of the people,
when John I. surnamed the Bastard, obtained secure possession of the
crown by the peace concluded with Castile, in the year one thousand four hundred and eleven. He was a prince of great merit, who, by superior courage
anid abilities, had opened his way to a throne which of right did not belong
to him. He instantly perceived that it would be impossible to preserve
public order, or domestic tranquillity, without finding some employment for
the restless spirit of his subjects. With this view he assembled a numerous
fleet at Lisbon, composed of all the ships which he could fit out in his own
kingdom, and of many hired from foreigners. This great armament was
destined to attack the Moors settled on the coast of Barbary [1 412.]  While
it was equipping, a few vessels were appointed to sail along the western
shore of Atrica bounded by the Atlantic ocean, and to discover the unknown
countries situated there. From this inconsiderable attempt, we may date
the commencement of that spirit of' discovery which opened the barriers
[hat had so long shut out mankind from the knowledge of one half of the
terrestrial globe.
At the time when John sent forth these ships on this new voyage, the art
of navigation was still very imperfect. Though Africa lay so near to Portugal, and the fertility of the countries already known on that continent
invited men to explore it more fully, the Portuguese had never ventured to
sail beyond Cape Von.  That promontory, as its name imiports, was
hitherto considered as a boundary which could not be passed. Put the nations
of Europe had now acquired as much knowledge as emboldened theln to
disregard the prejudices and to correct the errors of their ancestors. Tihe
long reign of ignorance, the constant enemy of every curious inquiry and
of every new undertaking, was approaching to its period. The light of
science began to dawn. The workls of the ancient Greeks and Romans
began to be read with admiration and profit. The sciences cultivated by
the Arabians were introduced into Europe by the Mloors settled in Spain
and Portugal, and by the Jews, who were very numerous in both these




AMERICA.                               35
Kingdoms. Geometry, astronomy, and geography, the sciences on which
the art of navigation is founded, became objects of studious attention.
The memory of the discoveries made by the ancients was revived, and the:
progress of their navigation and commerce began to be traced. Some of
the causes which have obstructed the cultivation of science in Portugal,
during this century and the last, did not exist, or did not operate in the sarme
manner, in the fifteenth century; [9] and the Portuguese at that period
seem to have kept pace with other nations on this side of the Alps in literary pursuits.
As the genius of the age favoured the execution of that new undertaking,
to which the peculiar state of the country invited the Portuguese; it proved
successful.  The vessels sent on the discovery doubled that formidable
( ape, which had terminated the progress of former navigators, and proceeded a hundred and sixty miles beyond it, to Cape Bojador. As'ts
rocky cliffs, which stretched a considerable way into the Atlantic, appeared
mrore dreadful than the promontory which they had. passed, the Portugluese
commanders durst not attempt to sail round it, but returned to Lisbon, more
satisfied with having advanced so fa; than ashamed of having ventured no
further.
Inconsiderable as this voyage was, it increased the passion for discovery
which began to arise in Portugal. The fortunate issue of the kirg's expedition against the Moors of Barbary added strength to that spirit in the
nation, and pushed it on to new undertakings.  In order to render these successful, it was necessary that they should be conducted by a person who
possessed abilities capable of discerning what was attainable, who enjoyed
leisure to form a regular system for prosecuting discovery, and who was
animated with ardour that would persevere in spite of obstacles and repulses. Happily for Portugal, she found all those qualities in Henry Duke
of Viseo, the fourth son of King John, by Philippa of Lancaster, sister of
Henry IV. king of England.  That prince, in his early youth, having accompanied his father in his expedition to Barbary, distinguished himself
by many deeds of valour. To the martial spirit, which was the characteristic of every man of noble birth at that time, he added all the accom
plishments of a more enlightened and polished age. He cultivated the
arts and sciences, which were then unknown and despised by persons of
his rank. He applied with peculiar fondness to the study of geography;
and by the instruction of able masters, aswell as by the accounts of travellers, he early acquired such knowledge of the habitable globe, as discovered the great probability of finding new and opulent countries, by sailing along the coast of Africa.  Such an object was formed to awaken the
enthusiasm and ardour of a youthfuI mind, and he espoused with the utmost
zeal the patronage of a design which might prove as beneficial as it appeared to be splendid and honourable.  In order that he might pursue this
great scheme without interruption, he retired fiorom court immediately after
his return from Africa, and fixed his residence at Sagres, near Cape St. Vincent, where the prospect of the Atlantic ocean invited his thoughts coiltinually towards his favourite project, and encouraged him  to execute it.
In this retreat he was attended by some of the most learned men in his
country, who aided him in his researches. He applied for information tc
the Moors of Barbary, who were accustomed to travel by land into the
interior provinces of Afirica in quest of ivory, gold dust, and other rich
commodities. He consulted the Jews settled in Portugal.  By promises,
rewards, and marks of respect, he allured into his service several persons,
foreigners as well as Portuguese, who were eminent fbi' their skill in navigation. In taking those preparatory steps, the great abilities of tile lprince
were seconded by his private virtues.  His integrity, his affabillty, his
respect for religlon, his zeal for the honour of Iis conltity, engaged persons
of all ranks to applaud his design, andm to favour the execution of it. His




36                     HISTORY   OF                     [Boox I.
schemes were allowed, by the greater part of his countrymen, to proceed
neither from ambition nor the desire of wealth, but to flow Itom the warm benevolence of a heart eager to promote the happiness of mankind, and which
justly entitled him to assume a motto for his device, that described the
quality by which he wished to be distinguished, the talent of doing, good.
His first effort, as is usual at the commencement of any new undertaking,
was extremely inconsiderable. He fitted out a single ship [1418], and
giving the command of it to John Gonzales Zarco and Tristan Vaz, two
gentleinen of his household, who voluntarily offered to conduct the enterprise, he instructed them to use their utmost efforts to double Cape Boj ador,
and thence to steer towards the south. They, according to the mode of
navigation which still prevailed, held their course along the shore  and by
following that direction, they must have encountered almost insuperable
difficulties in attempting to pass Cape Bojador. But fortune came in aid
to their want of skill, and prevented the voyage from being altogether
fruitless. A sudden squall of' wind arose, drove them out to sea, and when
they expected every moment to perish, landed them on an unknown island,
which from their happy escape they named Porto Santo. In the infancy
of navigation, the discovery of this small island appeared a matter of' such
moment, that they instantly returned to Portugal with the good tidings, and
were received by Henry with the applause and honour due to fortunate
adventurers. This faint dawn of success filled a mind ardent in the pursuit
of a favourite object, with such sanguine hopes as were sufficient incitements to proceed. Next year [14191 Henry sent out three ships hnder the
same commanders, to whom he joined Bartholomew Perestrellow, in order
to take possession of the island which they had discovered. When they
began to settle in Porto Santo, they observed towards the south a fixed
spot in the horizon like a small black cloud. By degrees, they were led
to conjecture that'it might be land; and steering towards it, they arrived
at a considerable island, uninhabited and covered with wood, which on
that account they called Jladeira.c   As it was Henry's chief object to'
render his discoveries useful to his country, he immediately equipped a fleet
to carry a colony of Portuguese to these islands [1420]. By his provident
care, they were furnished not only with the seeds, plants, and domestic
animals common in Europe; but, as he foresaw that the warmth of the
climate and fertility of the soil would prove favourable to the rearing of
other productions, he procured slips of the vine from the island of Cyprus,
the rich wines of which were then in great request. and plants of the sugarcane from Sicily, into which it had been lately introduced. These throve
so prosperously in this new country, that the benefit of cultivating them was
immediately perceived, and the sugar and wine of Madeira quickly became
articles of some consequence in the commerce of Portugal.t
As soon as the advantages derived from this first settlement to the west
of the European continent began to be felt, the spirit of discovery appeared
less chimerical, and became more adventurous. By their voyages to Madeira, the Portuguese were gradually accustomed to a bolder navigation,
and, instead of creeping servilely along the coast, ventured into the open
sea. In consequence of taking this course, Gilianez, who commanded one
of prince Henry's ships, doubled Cape Bojador [1433], the- boundary of
the Portuguese navigation upwards of twenty years, and which had hitherto
been deemed unpassable.  This successful voyage,s which the ignorance of the age placed on a level with the most famous exploits recorded
in history, opened a new sphere to navigation, as it discovered the vast
continent of Africa, still washed by the Atlantic ocean, and stretching towards the south. Part of this was soon explored; the Portuguese ad* Historical Relation of the first Discovery of Madeira, translated from the Portuguese of Fran.
Alcafarano, p. 15, &c.  t Lad. Ouicciardini Descritt. de Paesi Bassi, p: 180,181.




AMERICA.                              37
vanced within the tropics, and in the space of a few years they discovered
the river Senegal, and all the coast extending fi.om Cape Blanco to Cape
de Verd.
Hitherto the Portuguese had been guided in their discoveries, or en
couraged to attempt them, by the light and information which they received
from the works of the ancient mathematicians and geographers. But when
they began to enter the torrid zone, the notion which prevailed among the
ancients, that the heat which reigned perpetually there was so excessive as
to render it uninhabitable, deterred them, for' some time, from proceeding.
Their own observations, when they first ventured into this unknown and
formidable region, tended to confirm the opinion of antiquity concerning the
violent operation of the direct rays of the sun. As far as the river Senegal,
the Portuguese had found the coast of Africa inhabited by people nearly
resembling the Moors of Barbary. When they advanced to the south of
that river, the human form seemed to put on a new appearance. They
beheld men with skins black as ebony, with short curled hair, flat noses, thick
lips, and all the peculiar features which are now known to distinguish the
race of negroes. This surprising alteration they naturally attributed to the
influence of heat, and if they should advance nearer to the line, they began
to dread that its effects would be still more violent. Those dangers were
exaggerated; and many other objections against attempting furthfer discoveries were proposed by some of the grandees, who, from ignorance from
envy, or from that cold timid prudence which rejects whatever has the air
of novelty or enterprise, had hitherto condemned all prince Henry's schemes.
They represented, that it was altogether chimerical to expect any advantage
from countries situated in that region which the wisdom and experience of
antiquity had pronounced to be unfit for the habitation of men; that their
forefathers, satisfied with cultivating the territory which Providence had
allotted them, did not waste the strength of the kingdom by fruitless projects in quest of new settlements; that Portugal was already exhausted by
the expense of attempts to discover lands which either did not exist, or
which nature destined to remain unknown; and was drained of men, who
might have been employed in undertakings attended with more certain success, and productive of greater benefit. But neither their appeal to the
authority of the ancients, nor their reasonings concerning the interests of
Portugal, made any impression upon the deternmined philosophic mind of
prince Henry. The discoveries which he had already made, convinced him
that the ancients had little more than a conjectural knowledge of the torrid
zone. He was no less satisfied that the political arguments of his opponents,
with respect to the interest of Portugal, were malevolent and ill founded.
In those sentiments he was strenuously supported by his brother Pedro,
who governed the kingdom as guardian of their nephew Alphonso V. who
had succeeded to the throne during his minority [1438]; and, instead of
slackening his efforts, Henry continued to pursue his discoveries with fresh
ardour.
But in order to silence all the murmurs of opposition, he endeavoured to
obtain the sanction of the highest authority in favour of his operations.
With this view he applied to the Pope, and represented, in pompous terms,
the pious and unwearied zeal with which he had exerted himself (luring
twenty years, in discovering unknown countries, the wretched inhabitants
of which were utter strangers to true religion, wandering in heathen darkness, or led astray by the delusions of Ilahomet. He besought the holy
father, to whom, as the vicar of Christ, all the kingdoms of the earth were
subject, to confer on the crown of Portugal a right to all the countries possessed by infidels, which should be discovered by the industry of its subjects, and subdued by the force of its arms. He entreated him to enloin
all Christian powers, under the highest penalties, not to molest Portugal
while engaged in this laudable enterprise, and to prohibit them from settling




38                      f H1STORY  OF                   [Boor I.
in any of the countries which the Portuguese should discover. He promised that, in all their expeditions, it should be the chief object of his
countrymen to spread the knowledge of the Christian religion, to establish
the authority of the Holy See, and to increase the flock of the universal
pastor. As it was by improving with dexterity every favourable conjuncture for acquiring new powers, that the court of Rome had gradually
extended its usurpations, Eugene IV., the Pontiff to whom this application
was made, eagerly seized the opportunity which now presented itself. Hie
instantly perceived that, by complying with prince Henry's request, he
might exercise a prerogative no less flattering in its own nature than likely
to prove beneficial in its consequences. A bull was accordingly issued, in
which, after applauding in the strongest terms the past efforts of the Portuguese, and exhorting them to proceed in that laudable career on which they
had entered, he granted them an exclusive right to all the countries which
they should discover, from Cape Non to the continent of India.
Extravagant as this donation, comprehending such a large portion of the
habitable globe, would now appear, even in Catholic countries, no person in
the fifteenth century doubted that the Pope in the plentitude of his apostolic power, had a right to confer it. Prince Henry was soon sensible of
the advantages which he derived from this transaction. His schemes were
authorized and sanctified by the bull approving of them. The spirit of
discovery was connected with zeal for religion, which in that age was a
principle of such activity and vigour as to influence the conduct of nations.
All Christian princes were deterred from intruding into those countries
which the Portuguese had discovered, or from interrupting the progress of
their navigation and conquests.C10]
The. fame of the Portuguese voyages soon spread over Europe. Men
long accustomed to circumscribe the activity and knowledge of the human
mind within the limits to which they had been hitherto confined, were
astonished to behold the sphere of navigation so suddenly enlarged, and a
prospect opened of visiting regions of the globe the existence of which
was unknown in former times. The learned and speculative reasoned and
formed theories concerning those unexpected discoveries. The vulgar
inquired and wondered; while enterprising adventurers crowded from every
part of Europe, soliciting prince Henry to employ them in this honourable
service. Many Venetians and Genoese, in particular, who were at that
time superior to all other nations in the science of naval affairs, entered
aboard the Portuguese ships, and acquired a more perfect and extensive
knowledge of their profession in that new school of navigation.' In emulation of these foreigners, the Portuguese exerted their own talents. The
nation seconded the designs of the prince. Private merchants formed companies [1446], with a view to search for unknown countries. The Cape
de Verd Islands, which lie off the promontory of that name, were discovered
[1449], and soon after the isles called Azores. As the former of these are
above three hundred miles from the African coast, and the latter nine hundred
miles from any continent, it is evident by their venturing so boldly into the
open seas, that the Portuguese had by this time improved greatly in the art
of navigation.
While the passion for engaging in new undertakings was thus warm and
active, it received an unfortunate check by the death of prince Henry
[1463], whose superior knowledge had hitherto directed all the operations
of the discoverers, and whose patronage had encouraged and protected
them. But notwithstanding all the advantages which they derived from
these, the Portuguese during his life' dd not advance in their utmost progress
towards the south, within five degrees of the equinoctial line; and after
their continued exertions for half a century rfrom 1412 to 1463], hardly
fifteen hundred miles of the coast of.Africa were discovered. To an age
Acquainted with the efforts of navigation in its state of maturity and Min



AMERICA.                               39
provement, those essays of its early years must necessarily appear feeble
and unskilful. But inconsiderable as they may be deemed, they were suffi.
cient to turn the curiosity of the European nations into a new channel, to
excite an enterprising spirit, and to point the way to fiture discoveries.
Alphonso, who possessed the throne of Portugal at the time of prince
Henry's death, was so much engaged in supporting his own pretensionsto the
crown of Castile, or in carrying on his expeditions against the Moors in
Barbary, that, the force of his kingdom being exerted in other operations,
he could not prosecute the discoveries in Africa with ardour. He committed
the conduct of them to Fernando Gomez, a merchant in Lisbon, to whom
he granted an exclusive right of commerce with all the countries of which
prince Henry had taken possession. Under the restraint and op;pression of
a monopoly, the spirit of discovery languished. It ceased to be a national
object, and became the concern of a private man more attentive to his own
gain than to the glory of his country. Some progress, however, was made
The Portuguese ventured at length [1471], to cross the line, and, to their
astonishment, found that region of' the torrid zone, which was supposed to
be scorched with intolerable heat, to be not only habitable, but populous
and fertile.
John II. who succeeded his father Alphonso [1481], possessed talents
capable both of forming and executing great designs. As part of his revet,
nues, while prince, had arisen friom duties on the trade with the newly
discovered countries, this naturally turned his attention towards them, and
satisfied him with respect to their utility and importance. In proportion as
his knowledge of these countries extended, the possession of them appeared
to be of greater consequence. While the Portuguese proceeded along the
coast of Africa, from Cape Non to the river of Senegal, they found all that
extensive tract to be sandy, barren, and thinly inhabited by a wretched
people professing the Mahometan religion, and subject to the vast empire
of Morocco. But to the south of that river, the power and religion of the
Mahometans were unknown. The country was divided into small independent principalities, the population was considerable, the soil fertile,? and
the Portuguese soon discovered that it produced ivory, rich gums, gold, and
other valuable commodities. By the acquisition of these, commerce was
enlarged, and became more adventurous. Men, animated and rendered
active by the certain prospect of gain, pursued discovery with greater
eagerness than when they were excited only by curiosity and hope.
This spirit derived no small reinforcement of vigour from the countenance
of such a monarch as John. Declaring himself the patron of every attempt
towards discovery, he promoted it with all the ardour of his grand-uncle
prince Henry, and with superior power. The effects of this were immediately felt. A powerful fleet was fitted out [1484], which after discovering
the kingdoms of Benin and Congo, advanced above fifteen hundred miles
beyond the line, and the Portuguese, for the first time, beheld a new heaven,
and observed the stars of another hemisphere. John was not only solicitous
to discover, but attentive to secure the possession of those countries. He
built forts on the coast of Guinea; he sent out colonies to settle there; he
established a commercial intercourse with the more powerful kingdoms;
he endeavoured to render such as were feeble or divided tributary to the
crown of Portugal. Some of the petty princes voluntarily acknowledged
themselves his vassals. Others were compelled to do so by force of arms
A regular and well digested system was formed with respect to this new
object of policy, and, by firmly adhering to it, the Portuguese power ana
commerce in Africa were established upon a solid foundation.
By their constant intercourse with the people of Africa, the Portuguese
gradually acoui-ed some knowledge of those parts of that country which
* Navigat:io Aloysii Cadamusti apud Novum Orhem Grynci, p. i2. 18. Navigat. all Isola di Sae
Tome per un Pil tto Portug. Ramusio, i. 115




40                      HIS rORY OF                     [Boox 1.
they had not visited. The information which they received from the natives,
added to what they had observed in theii own voyages, began to open
prospects more extensive, and to suggest the idea of schemes more ir.por
tant than those which had hitherto allured and occupied them. They had
detected the error of the ancients concerning the nature of the torrid zone.
They found as they proceeded southwards, that the continent of Africa,
instead of extending in breadth, according to the doctrine of Ptolemy,? at
that time the oracle and guide of the learned in the science of geography,
appeared sensibly to contract itself, and to bend towards the east. This
reduced them to give credit to the accounts of the ancient Phenician voyages
round Africa, which had long been deemed fabulous, and led them to
conceive hopes that, by following the same route, they might arrive at the
East Indies, and engross that commerce which has been the source of wealth
and power to every nation possessed of it. The comprehensive genius o!
prince Henry, as we may conjecture from the words of the Pope's bull, had
early formed some idea of this navigation. But though his countrymen, at
that period, were incapable of conceiving the extent of his views and
schemes, all the Portuguese mathematicians and pilots now concurred in
representing them.as well founded and practicable. The king entered
with warmth into their sentiments, and began to concert measures for this
arduous and important voyage.
Before his preparations for this expedition were finished, accounts were
transmitted from Africa, that various nations along the coast had mentioned
a mighty kingdom situated on their continent, at a great distance towards
the east, the king of which, according to their description, professed the
Christian reli-ion. The Portuguese monarch immediately concluded, that
this must be the emperor of Abyssinia, to whom the Europeans, seduced by
a mistake of Rubruquis, Marco Polo, and other travellers to the East,
absurdly gave the name of Prester or Presbyter John; and, as he hoped to
receive information and assistance from a Christian prince, in prosecuting a
scheme that tended to propagate their common faith, he resolved to open,
if possible, some intercourse with his court. Withi this view, he made
choice of Pedro de Covillam and Alphonso de Payva, who were perfect
masters of the Arabic language, and sent them into the East to search for
the residence of this unknown potentate, and to make himr proffers of
friendship. They had in charge likewise to procure whatever intelligence
the nations which they visited could supply, with respect to the trade of
India, and the course of navigation to that continent.t
While John made this new attempt by land, to obtain some knowledge
of the country which he wished so ardently to discover, he did not neglect
the prosecution of this great design by sea. The conduct of a voyage for
this purpose, the most arduous and important which the Portuguese had
ever projected, was committed to Bartholomew Diaz [1486], an officer
whose sagacity, experience, and fortitude rendered him equal to the undertaking. He stretched boldly towards the south, and proceeding beyond the
utmost limits to which his countrymen had hitherto advanced, discovered
near a thousand miles of new country. Neither the danger to Which he
was exDosed, by a succession of violent tempests in unknown seas, and by
the fiequent mutinies of his crew, nor the calamities of famine which he
suffered from losing his storeship, could deter him from prosecuting his
enterprise. In recompense of his labours and perseverance, he at last
descried that lofty promontory which bounds Africa to the south. But to
descry it was all that he had in his power to accomplish. The violence ot
the winds, the shattered condition of his ships, and the turbulent spirit ot
the sailors, compelled him to return after a voyage of sixteen months, in
which he discovered a far greater extent of country than any former navigator.
Diaz had called the promontory which terminated his voyage Cabo Tor
* Vide Nov. Orbis Tabul. Geograph. second. Ptolem. Allst. 1730.  t Far ia v Sousa Port
Asia vol. i. p. 26. Lafitau Decouv. de Port. i. 46.




A ME RII C A.                        41
mentoso, or the Stormy Cape; but the king, his master, as he now entertained
no doubt of having found the long-desired route to India, gave it a name
more inviting, and of better omen, The Cape of Good Hope.*
Those sanguine expectations of success were confirmed by the intelligence which John received over land, in consequence of his embassy to
Abyssi _ia. Covillam and Payva, in obedience to their master's instructions,
had repaired to Grand Cairo. From that city they travelled along with a
caravan of Egyptian merchants, and, embarking on the Red Sea, arrived at
Aden, in Arabia. There they separated * Payva sailed directly towards
Abyssinia; Covillam embarked for the jlast Indies, and, having visited
Calfcut, Goa, and other cities on the Malabar coast, returned to Sofala, on
the east side of Africa, and thence to Grand Cairo, which Payva and he
had fixed upon as their place of rendezvous. Unfortunately the former was
cruelly murdered in Abyssinia; but Covillam found at Cairo two Portuguese
Jews, whom John, whose provident sagacity attended.to every circumstance
that could facilitate the execution of -his schemes, had despatched after
them, in order to receive a detail of their proceedings, and to communicate
to them new instructions. By one of these Jews, Covillam transmitted to
Portugal a journal of his travels by sea and land, his remarks upon the
trade of India, together with exact maps of the coasts on which he had
touched; and from what he himself had observed, as well as from the information of skilful seamen in different countries, he concluded, that, by sailing
round Africa, a passage might be found to the East Indies.t
The happy coincidence of Covillam's opinion and report with the discoveries which Diaz had lately made, left hardly any shadow of doubt with
respect to the possibility of sailing from Europe to India. But the vast
length of the voyage, and the furious storms which Diaz had encountered
near the Cape of Good Hope, alarmed and intimidated the Portuguese to
such a degree, although by long experience they were now become adventurous and skilful mariners, that some time was requisite to prepare their
minds for this dangerous and extraordinary voyage. The courage, however, and authority of the monarch gradually dispelled the vain fears of
his subjects, or made it necessary to conceal them. As John thought himself
now upon the eve of accomplishing that great design which had been the
principal object of his reign, his earnestness in prosecuting it became sc
vehement, that it occupied his thoughts by day, and bereaved him of sleep
through the night. While he was taking every precaution that his wisdom
and experience could suggest, in order to ensure the success of the expedition,
which was to decide concerning the fate of his favourite project, the fame
of the vast discoveries which the Portuguese had already made, the reports
concerning the extraordinary intelligence which they had received from the
East, and the prospect of the voyage which they now meditated, drew the
attention of all the European nations, and held them,in suspense and
expectation. By some, the maritime skill and navigations of the Portuguese
were compared with those of the Phenicians and Carthaginians, and exalted
above them. Others formed conjectures concerning the revolutions which
the success of the Portuguese schemes might occasion in the course of trade,
and the political state of Europe. The Venetians began to be disquieted
with the apprehension of losing their Indian commerce, the monopoly of
which was the chief source of their power as well as opulence, and the
Portuguese already enjoyed in fancy the wealth of the East.  But during
this interval, which gave such scope to the various workings of curiosity, ot
hope, and of fear, an account was brought to Europe of an event no less
extraordinary than unexpected, th9 discovery of a New World situated on
the West; and the eyes and admiration of mankind turned immediately
towards that great object.
* Faria y Sousa Port. Asia vol. i. p. 26.'f Ibid. p. 27. Lafitau Decouv. i. p. 4%
VOL. 1. —6                    4




42                      HISTORY  OF                    [BooK II.
B]OOK II0
AMONG the foreigners whom the fame of the discoveries made by the
Portuguese had allured into their service, was Christopher Colon, or
Columbus, a subject of the republic of Genoa. Neither the time nor place
of his birth is known with certainty [11]; but he was descended of an
honourable faimily, though reduced to indigence by various misfortunes.
His ancestors having betaken themselves for subsistence to a seafaringlife,
Columbus discovered in his early youth the peculiar character and talents
which mark out a man for that profession. His parents, instead of thwarting
this original propensity of his mind, seem to have encouraged and confirmed
it by the education which they gave him. After acquiring some knowledge
of the Latin tongue, the only language in which science was taught at that
time, he was instructed in geometry, cosmography, astronomy, and the art
of drawing. To these he applied with such ardour and predilection, on
account of their connexion with navigation, his favourite object, that he
advanced with rapid proficiency in the study of them. Thus qualified, he
went to sea at the age of fourteen [1461], and began his career on that
element which conducted him to so much glory. His early voyages were
to those ports in the Mediterranean which his countrymen the Genoese
frequented. This being a sphere too narrow for his active mind, he made
an excursion to the northern seas [14671, and visited the coast of Iceland,
to which the English and other nations had begun to resort on account of
its fishery. As navigation, in every direction, was now become enterprising,
he proceeded beyond that island, the Thule of the ancients, and advanced
several degrees within the polar circle. Having satisfied his curiosity, by a
voyage which tended more to enlarge his knowledge of naval affairs than
to improve his fortune, he entered into the service of a famous sea-captain
of his own name and family. This man commanded a small squadron
fitted out at his own expense, and by cruising sometimes against the
Mahometans, sometimes against the Venetians, the rivals of his country in
trade, had acquired both wealth and reputation. With him Columbus
continued for several years, no less distinguished for his courage than for
his experience as a sailor. Atlength, in an obstinate engagement off the
coast of Portugal, with some Venetian caravals returning richly laden from
the Low Countries, the vessel on board which he served took fire, together
with one of the enemy's ships to which it was fast grappled. In this
dreadful extremity his intrepidity and presence of mind did not forsake him.
He threw himself into the sea, laid hold of a floating oar; and by the support
of it, and his dexterity in swimming, he reached the shore, though above
two leagues distant, and saved a life reserved for great undertakings.*
As soon as he recovered strepgth for the journey, he repaired to Lisbon,
where many of his countrymen were settled. They soon conceived such a
favourable opinion of his merit, as well as talents, that they warmly solicited
him to remain in that kingdom, where his naval skill and experience could
not fail of rendering him conspicuous. To every adventurer animated either
with curiosity to visit new countries, or with ambition to distinguish himsel.
the-Portuguese service was at that time extremely inviting.  Columbus
listened with a favourable ear to the advice of his friends, and, having gained
the esteem of a Portuguese lady, whom he married, fixed his residence in
Lisbon.  This alliance, instead of detaching him from a seafaring life,
contributed to enlarge the sphere of his naval knowledge, and to excite a
* Lite of Columbus, c. v




AMEl LICA.                             43
desire of extending it still further. His wile was a daughter of Bartholomew
Perestrello, one of the captains employed by prince Henry in his early
ravigations, and who, under his protection, had discovered and planted the
islands of Porto Santo and Madeira. Columbus got possession of the journals
and charts of this experienced navigator; and from them he learned the course
which the Pcrtuguese had held in making their discoveries, as well as the
various circumstances which guided or encouraged them in.their attempts.
The study of these soothed and inflamed his favourite passion; and while he
contemplated the maps, and read the descriptions of the new countries
which Perestrello had seen, his impatience to visit them became irresistible.
In order to indulge it, he made a voyage to Madeira, and continued during
several years to trade with that island, with the Canaries, the Azores, the
settlements in Guinea, and all the other places which the Portuguese had
discovered on the continent of Africa.*
By the experience which Columbus acquired, during such a variety of
voyages to almost every part of the globe with which at that time any
intercourse was carried on by sea, he was now become one of the most
skiiful navigators in Europe. But, not satisfied with that praise, his ambition
aimed at something more. The successful progress of the Portuguese
navigators had awakened a spirit of curiosity and emulation, which set every
man of science upon examining all the circumstances that led to the
discoveries which they had made, or that afforded a prospect of succeeding
in any new and bolder undertaking. The mind of Columbus, naturally
inquisitive, capable of deep reflection, and turned to speculations of this
kind, was so often employed in revolving the principles upon which, the
Portuguese had founded their schemes of discovery, and the mode on which
they had carried them on, that he gradually began to form an idea of
improving upon their plan, and of accomplishing discoveries which hitherto
they had attempted in vain.
To find out a passage by sea to the East Indies, was the  important
object in view at that period. From the time that the Portuguese doubled
Cape de Verd, this was the point at which they aimed in all their navigations,
and in comparison with it all their discoveries in Africa appeared incon
siderable. The fertility and riches of India had been known for many ages:
its spices and other valuable commodities were in high request throughout
Europe, and the vast wealth of the Venetians, arising from their having
engrossed this trade, had raised the envy of all nations. But how intent
soever the Portuguese were upon discovering a new route to those desirable
regions, they searched for it only by steering towards the south, in hopes of
arriving at India by turning to the east after they had sailed round the further
extremity of Africa. This course was still unknown, and even if discovered,
was of such immense length, that a voyage from Europe to India must have
appeared at that period an undertaking extremely arduous, and of very
uncertain issue. More than half a century had been employed in advancing
from Cape Non to the equator; a much longer space of time might elapse
before the more extensive navigation from that to India could be accomplished.
These reflections upon the uncertainty, the danger, and tediousness ef the
course which the Portuguese were pursuing, naturally led Columbus to
consider whether a shorter and more direct passage to the East Indies might
not be found out. After revolving long and seriously every circumstance
suggested by his superior knowledge in the theory as well as the practice
of navigation; after comparing attentively the observations of modern pilots
with the hints and conjectures of ancient authors, he at last concluded, that
by sailing directly towards the west, across the Atlantic-ocean, new countries,
which probably formed a part of the great continent of India, must infallibly
be discovered.
* Life of Colulmbus, c. iv. rv.




44,           H-1S' TORY   OF                I       IBoOiI
Principles and arguments of various kinds, arid derived iiom different
sources, induced him to adopt this opinion, seemingly as chimerical as it
was new and extraordinary. The spherical figure of the earth wvas known,
and its magnitude ascertained with some degree of accuracy. From this
it was evident, that the continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa, as far as
they were known at that time, fobrmed but a small portior of the terraqueous
globe. It was suitable to our ideas concerning the wisdom and beneficence
of the Author of Nature, to believe that the vast space still unexplored was not
covered entirely by a waste unprofitable ocean, but occupied by countries
fit for the habitation of man. It appeared likewise extremely probable that
the continent on this side of the globe was balanced by a proportional quantity
of land in the other hemisphere. These conclusions concerning the existence
of another continent, drawn from the figure and structure of the globe, were
confirmed by the observations and conjectures of modern navigators. A
Portuguese pilot, having stretched further to the west than was usual at that
time, took up a piece of timber artificially carved floating upon the sea;
and;es it was driven towards him by a westerly wind, he concluded that it
came from some unknown land situated in that quarter. C(olumbus's brother-.n-law had found to the west of the Madeira isles, a piece of timber fashioned
m the same manner, and brought by the same wind; and had seen likewise
canes of an enormous size floating upon the waves, which resembled those
described by Ptolemy as productions peculiar to the East Indies.*  After
a course of westerly winds, trees torn up by the roots were often driven upon
the coasts of the Azores; and at one time, the dead bodies of two men
with singular features, resembling neither the inhabitants of Europe nor of
Africa, were cast ashore there.
As the force of this united evidence, arising from theoretical principles
and practical observations, led Columbus to expect the discovery of new
countries in the western ocean, other reasons induced him to believe that
these must be connected with the continent of India. Though the ancients
had hardly ever penetrated into India further than the banks of the Ganges,
yet some Greek authors had ventured to describe the provinces beyond that
river. As men are prone, and at liberty, to inagnify what is remote or
unknown, they represented them as regions of an immense extent. Ctesias
affirmed that India was as large as all the rest of Asia. Onesicritus, whom
Pliny the naturalist follows,t contended that it was equal to a third part
of the habitable earth. Nearchus asserted, that it would take four months
to march in a straight line from one extremity of India to the other.+ The
journal of Mi1arco Polo, who had proceeded towards the East far beyond the
limits to which any European had ever advanced, seemed to confirml these
exaggerated accounts of the ancients. By his magnificent descriptions of
the kingdoms of Cathay and Cipango, and of many other countries the
names of which were unknown in Europe, India appeared to be a region
of vast extent. From these accounts, which, however defective, were-the
most accurate that the people of Europe had received at that period with
respect to the remote parts of the East, Columbus drew a just conclusion.
He contended'that, in proportion as the continent of India stretched out
towards the East, it ilust, in consequence of the spherical figure of the earth,
approach near to the islands which had lately been discovered to the west
of Africa; that the distance fiom the one to the other was probably not
very considerable; and that the most direct as well as shortest course to the
remote regions of the East was to be found by sailing due west. [12]  This
notion concerning the vicinity of India to the western parts of our continent,
was countenanced by some eminent writers among the ancients, the sanction
of whose authority was necessary, in that age, to procure a favourable
reception to any tenet. Aristotle thought it probable that the Columns of
* Lib. i. c. 17.    t Nat. Hist. lib vi. c. 17.    } Strab. Geogr. Iib). xv. p. 1011.




AMERICA                                46
Hercules, or Straits of Gibraltar, were not far removed from the East Indies,
and that there might be a communication by sea between them.?  Seneca,
m terms still more explicit, affirms, that with a fair wind one might sail
from Spain to India in a few days.t The famous Atlantic island described
by Plato, and supposed by many to be a real country, beyond which an
unknown continent was situated, is represented by him as lying: at no great
distance from  Spain. After weighing all these particulars, Columbus, in
whose character the modesty and diffidence of true genius were united with
the ardent enthusiasm of a projector, did not rest with such absolute
assurance either upon his own arguments, or upon the authority of the
ancients, as not to consult such of his contemporaries as were capable of
comprehending the nature of the evidence which he produced in support
of his opinion. As early as the year one thousand four hundred and seventyfour, he communicated his ideas concerning the probability of discovering new
countries, by sailing westward, to Paul, a physician of Florence, eminent
for his knowledge of cosmnography, and who, from the learning as well as
candour which he discovers in his reply, appears to have been well entitled
to the confidence which Columbus placed in him. He warmly approved
of the plan, suggested several facts in confirmation of it, and encouraged
Columbus to persevere in an undertaking so laudable, and which must
redound so much to the honour of his country and the benefit of Europe.+
To a mind less capable of forming and of executing great designs than
that of Columbus, all those reasonings and observations and authorities
would have served only as the foundation of some plausible and fruitless
theory, which might have furnished matter for ingenious discourse or fanciful
conjecture. But with his sanguine and enterprising temper speculation led
directly to action. Fully satisfied himself with respect to the truth of his
system, he was impatient to bring it to the test of experiment, and to set out
upon a voyage ofbdiscovery. The first step towards this was to secure the
patronage of some of the considerable powers in Europe capable of:undertaking such an enterprise. As long absence had not extinguished the affection
which he bore to his native country, he wished that it should reap the fruits
of his labours and invention. With this view, he laid his scheme before the
senate of Genoa, and, making his country the first tender of his service,
offered to sail under the banners of the republic in quest of the new regions
which he expected to discover. But Columbus had resided for so many
years in foreign parts, that his countrymen were unacquainted Wvith his
abilities and character; and, though a maritime people, were so little accustomed to distant voyages, that they could form no just idea of the principles
on which he founded his hopes of success. They inconsiderately rejected
his proposal, as the dream of a chimerical projector, and lost for ever the
opportunity of restoring their commonwealth to its ancient splendour.~
Having performed what was due to his country, Columbus was so little
discouraged by the repulse which he had- received, that instead of relin
quishing his undertaking he pursued it with fresh ardour. He made his
next overture to John II. king of Portugal, in whose dominions he had been
long established, and whom he considered on that account, as having the
second claim to his service. Here every circumstance seemed to promise
him a more favourable reception: he applied to a monarch of an enterprising
genius, no incompetent judge in naval affairs, and proud of patronising every
attempt to discover new countries. His subjects were the most experienced
navigators in Europe, and the least apt to be intimidated either by the
novelty or boldness of any maritime expedition. In Portugal, the professional
skill cf Columbus, as well as his personal good qualities, were thoroughly
inown. and as the former rendered it probable that his scheme was not
* Aristot. de CQelo, lib. ii. c. 14. edit. Du Val. Par. 1629. vol. i. p. 472.    SEcncc. Qumest. Natur.
lib. i. in proem.: Life of Columbus. c. viii.    O Herrera Hist. de las Indias Occid. dec. i,
lib. i. c. vii.




46                     hIs 1  )TORY  OF                tBIooK II.
altogether visionary, the latter exempted him from the suspicion of any
sinister intention in proposing it. Accordingly, the king listened to him in
the most gracious manner, and referred the consideration of his plan to
Diego Ortiz, bishop of Ceuta, and two Jewish physicians, eminent cosmoraphers, whom he was accustomed to consult in matters of this kind.
As in Genoa, ignorance had opposed and disappointed Columbus; in Lisbon,
he had to combat with prejudice, an enemy no less formidable. The persons
according to whose decision his scheme was to be adopted, or rejected, had
been the chief directors of the Portuguese navigations, and had advised to
search for a passage to India by steering a course directly opposite to that
which Columbus recommended as shorter and more certain. They could
not, therefore, approve of his proposal without submitting to the double
mortification of condemning their own theory, and acknowledging his
superior sagacity. After teasing him with captious questions, and starting
innumerable objections, with a view of betraying him into such a particular
explanation of his system as might draw from him a full discovery of its
nature, they deferred passing a final judgment with respect to it. In the
mean time they conspired to rob him of the honour and advantages which
he expected from the success of his scheme, advising the king to despatch
a vessel secretly, in order to attempt the proposed discovery by following
exactly the course which Columbus seemed to point out. John, forgetting
on this occasion the sentiments becoming a monarch, meanly adopted this
perfidious counsel. But the pilot chosen to execute Columbus's plan had
neither the genius nor the fortitude of its author. Contrary winds arose,
no sight of approaching land appeared, his courage failed, and he returned
to Lisbon, execrating the project as equally extravagant and dangeroqs.*
Upon discovering this dishonourable transaction, Columbus felt the
indignation natural to an ingenuous mind, and in the warmth of his resentment determined to break off all intercourse with a nation capable of such
flagrant treachery. He instantly quitted the kingdom, and landed in Spain
towards the close of the year one thousand fourl hundred and eighty-tfour.
As he was now at liberty to court the protection of any patron whom he
could engage to approve of his plan, and to carry it into execution, he
resolved to propose it in person to Ferdinand and Isabella, who at that time
governed the united kingdoms of Castile and Aragon.  But as he had
already experienced the uncertain issue of application to kings and ministers,
he took the precaution of sending into England his brother Bartholomew,
to whom he had fully communicated his ideas, in order that he might
negociate at the same time with Henry VII., who was reputed one of the
most sagacious as well as opulent princes in Europe.
It was not without reason that Columbus entertained doubts and fears
with respect to the reception of his proposals in the Spanish court. Spain
was at that juncture engaged in a dangerous war with Granada, the last of
the Moorish kingdoms in that country.  The wary and suspicious temper
of Ferdinand was not formed to relish bold or uncommon designs. Isabella,
though more generous and enterprising, was under the influence of her
husband in all her actions. The Spaniards had hitherto made no efforts to
extend navigation beyond its ancient limits, and had beheld the amazing
progress of discovery among their neighbours the Portuguese without one
attempt to imitate or to rival them. The war with the Infidels afforded an
ample field to the national activity and love of glory. Under circumstances
so unfavourable, it was impossible for Columbus to make rapid progress with
a nation naturally slow and dilatory in forming all its resolutions. His
character, however, was admirably adapted to that of the people whose
confidence and protection he solicited. He was grave, though courteous in
his deportment; circumspect in his words and actions, irreproachable in his
* Life ofColumbts, c. xi. Herrera, dec. i. lib. i. c. 7.




AMERICA.                              47
morals, and exemplary in his attention to all the duties and functions of
religion. By qualities so respectable, he not only gained many private
friends, but acquired such general esteem, that, notwithstanding the plainness
of his appearance, suitable to the mediocrity of his fortune, he was not
considered as a mere adventurer, to whom indigence had suggested a
visionary project, but was received as a person to whose propositions serious
attention was due.
Ferdinand and Isabella, though fully occupied by their operations against
the Moors. paid so much regard to Columbus, as to remit the consideration
of his plan to the queen's confessor, Ferdinand de Talavera. He consulted
such of his countrymen as were supposed best qualified to decide with respect
to a subject of this kind. But true science had hitherto made so little
progress in Spain, that the pretended philosophers, selected to judge in a
matter of such moment, did not comprehend the first principles upon which
Colurmbus founded his coiinjectures and hopes. Some of them, fromn mistaken
notions concerning the dimensions of the globe, contended that a voyage to
those remote parts of the east which Columbus expected to discover, could
not be performed in less than three years. Others concluded, that either he
would find the ocean to be of infinite extent, according to the opinion of
some ancient philosophers; or, if he should persist in steering towards the
west beyond a certain point, that the convex figure of the globe would
prevent his return, and that he must inevitably perish in the vain attempt to
open a communication between the two opposite hemispheres which nature
had for ever disjoined. Even without deigning to enter into any particular
discussion, many rejected the scheme in general, upon the credit of a maxim,
under which the ignorant and unenterprising shelter themselves in every
age, " That it is presumptuous in any person, to suppose that he alone
possesses knowledge superior to all the rest of mankind united."  They
maintained, that if there were really any such countries as Columbus pretended, they could not have remained so long concealed, nor would the
wisdom and sagacity of former ages have left the glory of this invention to
an obscure Genoese pilot.
It required all Columbus's patience and address to negotiate with men
capable of advancing such strange propositions. He had to contend not
only with the obstinacy of ignorance, but with what is still more intractable,
the pride of false knowledge. After innumerable conferences, and wasting
five years in fruitless endeavours to inform and to satisfy judges so little
capable of deciding with propriety, Talavera at last made such an unfavourable report to Ferdinand and Isabella, as induced them  to acquaint
Columbus, that until the war with the Mloors should be brought to a period
it would be imprudent to engage in any new and extensive enterprise.
Whatever care was taken to soften the harshness of this declaration,
Columbus considered it as a final rejection of his proposals. But, happily
for mankind, that superiority of genius, which is capable of forming great
and uncommon designs, is usually accompanied with an ardent enthusiasm,
which can neither be cooled by delays nor damped by disappointment.
Columbus was of this sanguine temper. Though he felt deeply the cruel
blow given to his hopes, and retired immediately from a court where he
had been amused so long with vain expectations, his confidence in the just
ness of his own system did not diminish, and his impatience to demonstrate
the truth of it by an actual experiment became greater than ever. Having
courted the protection of sovereign states without success, he applied next
to persons of inferior rank, and addressed successively the Dukes of Medina
Sidonia and Medina Celi, who, though subjects, were possessed of power
and opulence more than equal to the enterprise which he projected. His
negotiations with them proved as fruitless as those in which he had been
hitherto engaged; forthese noblemen were either as little convincedby Coltlmbus's arguments as their superiors, or they were afraidof alarming thejealousy




48                       HISTORY  OF                     [BooK II.
and offending the pride of Ferdinand, by countenancing a scheme which he
had rejected.?
Amid the painful sensations occasioned by such a succession of disappointments, Columbus had to sustain the additional distress of having
received no accounts of his brother whom he had sent to the court of England.
In his voyage to that country, Bartholomew had been so unfortunate as to
fall into the hands of pirates, who having stripped him  of every thing
detained him a prisoner for several years. At length he made his, escape,
and arrived in London, but in such extreme indigence, that he was obliged
to employ himself, during a considerable time in drawing and selling maps,
in order to pick up as much money as would purchase a decent dress in
which he might venture to appear at court. He then laid before the King
the proposals with which he had been intrusted by his brother;, and notwithstanding Henry's excessive caution and parsimony, which rendered
him averse to new  or extensive undertakings, he received Columbus's
overtures with more approbation than any monarch to whom they had
hitherto been presented.
Meanwhile, Columbus being unacquainted with his brother's fate, ana
having now no prospect of encouragement in Spain, resolved to visit the
court of England in person, in hopes of meeting with a more favourable
reception there. He had already made preparations for this purpose, and
taken measures for the disposal of his children during his absence, when
Juan Perez, the guardian of the monastery of Rabida, near Palos, in which
they had been educated, earnestly solicited him to defer his journey for a
short time. Perez was a man of considerable learning, and of some credit
with queen Isabella, to whom he was known personally. He was warmly
attached to Columbus, with whose abilities as well as integrity he had
many opportunities of being acquainted.   Prompted by curiosity or
by friendship, he entered upon an accurate examination of his system, in
conjunction with a physician settled in the neighbourhood, who was a considerable proficient in mathematical knowledge. This investigation satisfied
them so thoroughly, with respect to the solidity of the principles on which
Columbus founded his o.pil. on, and the probability of success in executing
the plan which he propose., that Perez, in order to prevent his country
from beintg deprived of the glory and benefit which must accrue to the
-patrons of such a grand enterprise, ventured to write to Isabella, conjuring
eer to consider the matter anew with the attention which it merited.
Moved by the representations of a person whom she respected, Isabella
desired Perez to repair immediately to the village of Santa Fe, in which,
on account of the siege of Granada, the court resided at that time, that she
might confer with him  upon this important subject.  The'first effect of
their interview was a gracious invitation of Columbus back to court, accompanied with the present of a small sum to equip him for the journey. As
there was now a certain prospect that the war with the Moors would
speedily be brought to a happy issue by the reduction of Granada, which
w1ould leave the nation at liberty to engage in new undertakings; this, as
well as the mark of royal favour, with which Columbus had been lately
honoured, encouraged his friends to appear with greater confidence than
tormnerly in support of his scheme. The chief of these, Alonso de Quinta-.milla, comptroller of the finances in Castile, and Luis de Santangel, receiver
of the ecclesiastical revenues in Aragon, whose meritorious zeal in promoting
this great design entitles their names to an honourable place in history,
introduced Columbus to many persons of high rank, and interested thei
warmly in his behalf.
But it was not an easy matter to inspire Ferdinand with favourable sen
timents. He still regarded Columbus's project as extravagant and chime.
* Life of Columb. c. 13 Herrera, dec. ]. lib. i. c. 7.




A MERICA.                             4%
rical; and in order to render the efforts of his partisans ineffectual, he had
the address to employ, in this new negotiation with him, some of the persons
who had formerly pronounced his scheme to be impracticable. To their
astonishment, Columbus appeared before them with the same confident
hopes of success as formerly, and insisted upon the same high recompense.
He proposed that a small fleet should be fitted out, under his command, to
attempt the discovery, and demanded to be appointed hereditary admiral
and viceroy of all the seas and lands which he should discover, and to have
the tenths of the profits arising from them settled irrevocably upon himself
and his descendants. At the same timne he offered to advance the eighth
part of the sum necessary for accomplishing his design, on condition that he
should be entitled to a proportional share of benefit from the adventure
If the enterprise should totally miscarry, he made no stipulation for any reward or'emolument whatever. Instead of viewing this conduct as the
clearest evidence of his full persuasion with respect to the truth of his own
system, or being struck with that magnanimity which, after so many delays.
and repulses, would stoop to nothing inferior to its original claims, the per
sons with whom Columbus treated began meaQly to calculate the expense
of' the expedition, and the value of the reward which he demanded. The
expense, moderate as it was, they represented to be too great for Spain in
the present exhausted state of its finances. They contended that the honours
and emoluments claimed by Columbus were exorbitant, even if -he should
perform the utmost of what he had promised; and if all his sanguine hopes
should prove illusive, such vast concessions to an adventurer would be
deemed not only inconsiderate, but ridiculpus. In this imposing garb of
caution and prudence, their opinion appeared so plausible, and was so
warmly supported by Ferdinand, that Isabella declined giving any countenance to Columbus, and abruptly broke off the negotiation with him which
she had begun.
This was more mortifying to Columbus than all the disappointments
which he had hitherto met with. The invitation to court from Isabella, like
an unexpected ray of light, had opened such prospects of success as encouraged him to hope that his labours were at an end; but now darkness
and uncertainty returned, and his mind, firm as it was, could hardly support
the shock of such an unforeseen reverse. He withdrew in deep anguish
from court, with an intention of prosecuting his voyage to England as his
last resource.
About that time Granada surrendered, and Ferdinand and Isabella, in
triumphal pomp, took possession of a city [Jan. 2, 1492], the reduction of
which extirpated a foreign power from the heart of their dominions, and
rendered them masters of all the provinces extending from the bottom of
the Pyrenees to the frontiers of Portugal. As the flow of spirits which accompanies success elevates the mind, and renders it enterprising, Quintanilla
and Santangel, the vigilant and discerning patrons of Columbus, took advantage of this favourable situation, in order to make one effort more in
behalf of their friend. They addressed themselves to Isabella; and after
expressing some surprise, that she, who had always been the munificent patroness of generous undertakings, should hesitate so long to countenance the
most splendid scheme that had ever been proposed to any monarch; they
represented to her, that Columbus was a man of a sound understanding and
virtuous character, well qualified, by his experience in navigation, as well
as his knowledge of geometry, to form just ideas with respect to the structure of the globe and the situation of its various regions, that, by Offering
to risk his own life and fortune in the execution of his scheme, he gave the
most satisfying evidence both of his integrity and hope of success; that the
sum requisite for equipping such an armament as he demanded was a:;siderable, and the advantages which might accrue from his undertaking were
immense; that he demanded no recompense for his invention and labcrur
VOL. 1.-7




5O-)                      HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK II
but what was to arise from the countries which he should discover; that,
as it was worthy of her magnanimity to make this noble attempt to extend
the sphere of human knowledge, and to open an intercourse with regions
hitherto unknown, so it would afford the highest satisfaction to her piety
and zeal, after re-establishing the Christian faith in those provinces of Spain
from which it had been long banished, to discover a new world, to which
she might communicate the light and blessings of divine truth; that if now
she did not decide instantly, the opportunity would be irretrievably lost,
that Columbus was on his way to foreign countries, where some prince,
more fortunate or adventurous, would close with his proposals, and Spain
would for ever bewail that fatal timidity which had excluded her from the
glory and advantages that she had once in her power to have enjoyed.
1These forcible arguments urged by persons of such authority, and at a
Juncture so well chosen, produced the desired effect. They dispelled all
Isabella's doubts and fears; she ordered Columbus to be instantly recalled,
declared her resolution of employing him on his own terms, and, regretting
the low estate of her finances, generously offered to pledge her own jewels
in order to raise as much money as might be needed in making preparations
for the voyage. Santangel, in a transport of gratitude, kissed the Queen's
hand, and, in order to save her from having recourse to such a mortifying
expedient for procuring money, engaged to advance immediatel-the sum
that was requisite.~
Columbus had proceeded some leagues on hisjourney, when the messenger
from Isabella overtook him. Upon receiving an account of the unexpected
resolution in his favour, he returned directly to Santa Fe, though some
remainder of diffidence still mingled itself with his joy. But the cordial
reception which he met with from Isabella, together with the near prospect
of setting out upon that voyage which had so long been the object of his
thoughts and wishes, soon effaced the remembrance of all that he had sulp
fered in Spain during eight tedious years of solicitation and suspense. The
negotiation now went forward with facility and despatch, and a treaty or
capitulation with Columbus was signed on the seventeenth of April, one
thousand four hundred and ninety-two.: The chief articles of it were:
1. Ferdinand and Isabella, as sovereigns of the ocean, constitute t Columbus
their high admiral in all the seas, islands, and continents, which should be
discovered by his industry; and stipulated that he and his heirs for ever
should enjoy this office, with the same powers and prerogatives which
belonged to the high admiral of Castile within the limits of his jurisdiction
2. They appointed Columbus their viceroy in all the islands and continents
which he should discover; but it; for the better administration of affairs, it
should hereafter be necessary to establish a separate governor in any of
those countries, they authorized Columbus to name three persons of whom
they would choose one for that office; and the dignity of' viceroy, with all
its immunities, was likewise to be hereditary in the family of Columbus.
3.'They granted to Columbus and his heirs for ever, the tenth of the free
profits accruing from the productions and commerce of the countries which
he should discover. 4. They declared, that if any controversy or lawvsuit
shall arise with respect to any mercantile transaction in the countries which
should be discovered, it should be determined by the sole authority of
Columbus, or of judges to be appointed by him. 5. They permitted
Columbus to advance one-eighth part of what should be expended in
preparing for the expedition, and in carrying on commerce with the countries
which he should discover, and entitled him, in return, to an eighth part of
the profit.t
Though the name of Ferdinand appears conjoined with that of Isabella
in this transaction, his distrust of Columbus was still so violent that he
errera. dlec. 1. lib. 1. c. 8.    t Life of Columbus, c. 15. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 9




AMERICA.                -  
refused to take any part in the enterprise as king of Aragon. As the whole
expense of the expedition was to be defrayed by the crown of Castile%
Isabella reserved for her subjects of that kingdom an exclusive right to all
the benefits which might redound from its success.
As soon as the treaty was signed, Isabella, by her attention and activity
in forwarding the preparations for the voyage, endeavoured to make some
reparation to Columbus for the time which he had lost in fruitless solicitation.
By the twelfth of May, all that depended upon her was adjusted; and
Columbus waited on the king and queen in order to receive their final
instructions. Every thing respecting the destination and conduct of the
voyage they committed implicitly to the disposal of his prudence. But
that they might avoid giving anyjust cause of offence to the king of Portugal,
they strictly enjoined him not to approach near to the Portuguese settlements
on the coast of Guinea, or in any of the other countries to which the
Portuguese claimed right as discoverers. Isabella had ordered the ships
of which Columbus was to take the command to be fitted out in the port of
Palos, a small maritime town in the province of Andalusia. As the guardian
Juan Perez, to whom Columbus had already been so much indebted
resided in the neighbourhood of this place, he, by the influence of that
good ecclesiastic, as well as by his own connection with the inhabitants, not
only raised among them what he wanted of the sum that he was bound by
treaty to advance, but engaged several of them to accompany him in the
voyage. The chief of these associates were three brothers of the name
of Pinzon, of considerable wealth, and of great experience in naval'affairs,
who were willing to hazard their lives and fortunes in the expedition.
But after all the efforts of Isabella and Columbus, the armament was not
suitable either to the dignity of the nation by which it was equipped, or
to the importance of the service for which it was destined. It consisted of
three vessels. The largest, a ship of no considerable burden, was cominanded by Columbus, as admiral, who gave it the name of Santa oMqaria,
out of respect for the Blessed Virgin, whom he honoured with singular
devotion. Of the second, called the Pinta, Marton Pinzon was captain, and
his brother Francis pilot. The third, named the Nigna, was under the
command of Vincent Yanez Pinzon. These two were light vessels hardly
superior in burden or force to large boats. The squadron, it it merits that
name, was victualled for twelve months, and had on board ninety men,
mostly sailors, together with a few adventurers who followed the fortune of
Columbus, and some gentlemen of Isabella's court, whom she appointed to
accompany him. Though the expense of' the undertaking was one of the
circumstances which chiefly alarmed the court of Spain, and retarded so
long the negotiation with Columbus, the sum employed in fitting, out this
squadron did not exceed four thousand pounds.
As the art of ship-building in the fifteenth century was extremely rude,
and the bulk of vessels was accommodated to the short and easy voyages
along the coast which they were accustomed to perfbrmn, it is a proof of
the, courage, as well as enterprising genius of Coluinmbus, that lie ventured,
with a fleet so unfit for a distant navigation, to explore unknown seas, wllere
he had no chart to guide him, no knowledge of the tides and currents, and
no experience of the dangers to which he might be exposed. His eagerness
to accomplish the great design which had so long engrossed his thoughlt.s,
made him overlook or disregard every circumstance that would have
intimid'ated a mind less adventurous. He pushed forward the preparations
with such ardour, and was seconded so effectually by the persons to wiomn
Isabella committed the superintendence of this business, that every tiling
was soon in readiness for the voyage. But as Columbus was deeply
impressed with sentiments of religion, he would not set out upon an expe*
diti:n so arduouis, and of' which one great object was to extend the knowledg:,e of theChristian fait,  it without imploring publicly the guidance and




52:                    HISTORY   OF                     [Boox II.
protection of Heaven. With this view, he, together with all the persons
under his command, marched in solemn procession to the monastery of
Rabida. After confessing their sins, and obtaining absolution, they received
the holy sacrament from the hands of the guardian, who joined his
prayers to theirs for the success of an enterprise which he had so zealously
patronized.
Next morning, being Friday the third day of August, in the year one
thousand four hundred and ninety-two, Columbus set sail, a little before
sunrise, in presence of a vast crowd of spectators, who sent up their supplications to Heaven for the prosperous issue of the voyage, which they
wished rather than expected. Columbus steered directly for the Canary
Islands, and arrived there [Aug. 13] without any occurrence that would
have deserved notice on any other occasion. But, in a voyage of such
expectation and importance, every circumstance was the object of attention.
The rudder of the Pinta broke loose the day after she left the harbour; and
that accident alarmed the crew, no less superstitious than unskilful, as a
certain omen of the unfortunate destiny of the expedition. Even in the
short run to the Canaries, the ships were found to be so crazy and ill
appointed, as to be very improper for a navigation which was expected to
be both long and dangerous., Columbus refitted them, however, to the
best of his power; and having supplied himself with fresh provisions, he
took his departure from  Gormera, one of the most westerly of the Canary
Islands, on the sixth day of September.
Here the voyage of discovery may properly be said to begin; for
Columbus, holding his course due west, left immediately the usual track- of
navigation, and stretched into unfrequented and unknown seas. The first
day, as it was very calm, he made but little way; but on the second he
lost sight of the Canaries; and many of the sailors, dejected already,. and
dismayed, when they contemplated the boldness of the undertaking, began
to beat their breasts, and to shed tears, as if they were never mnore to
behold land. Columbus comforted them with assurances of success, and
the prospect of vast wealth in those opulent regions whither he was conducting them. This early discovery of the spirit of his followers taught
Columbus that he must prepare to struggle not only with the unavoidable
difficulties which might be expected from the nature of his undertaking,
but with such as were likely to arise from the ignorance and timidity of
the people under his command; and he perceived that the art of
governing the minds of men would be no less requisite for accomplishing
the discoveries which he had in view, than naval skill and undaunted
courage. Happily for himself, and fcr the country by which he was
employed, he joined to the ardent temper and inventive genius of a projector, virtues of another species, which are rarely united with them. He
possessed a thorough knowledge of mankind, an insinuating address, a
patient perseverance in executing any plan, the -perfect government of his
own passions, and the talent of acquiring an ascendant over those of other
men. All these qualities, which formed him for command, were accompanied with that superior knowledge of his profession, which begets
confidence in times of difficulty and danger.  To unskilful Spanish
sailors, accustomed only to coasting voyages in the Mediterranean, the
maritime science of Columbus, the fruit of thirty years' experience, improved by an acquaintance with all the inventions of the Portuguese,
appeared immense. As soon as they put to sea, he regulated every thing
by his sole authority;, he superintended the execution of every order; and
allowing himself only a few hours for sleep, he was at all other times
upon deck. As his course lay through seas which had not formerly been
visited, the sounding line, or instruments for observation, were continually
in his hands. After the. example of the Portuguese discoverers, he attended
to the motion of tides and currents, watched the flight of birds, the appear




AMERIC A.                             53
ance of fi shes, of sdaweeds, and of every thing that floated on the waves. and
entered every occurrence, with a minute exactness, in the journal which he
kept. As the length of the voyage could not fail of alarming sailors habituated only to short excursions, Columbus endeavoured to conceal from them
the real progress which they made. With this view, though they run
eighteen leagues on the second day after they left Gomera, he gave out that
they had advanced only fifteen, and he uniformly employed the same artifice
of reckoning short during the whole voyage. By the fourteenth of September the fleet was above two hundred leagues to the west of the Canary Isles,
at a greater distance from land than any Spaniard had been before that time.
There they were struck with an appearance no less astonishing than new
They observed that the magnetic needle, in their compasses, did not point
exactly to the polar star, but varied towards the west; and as they proceeded,
this variation increased. This appearance, which is now familiar, though
it still remains one of the mysteries of nature, into the cause of which the
sagacity of man hath not been able to penetrate, filled the companions ot
Columbus with terror. They were now in a boundless and unknown ocean,
far from the usual course of navigation; nature itself seemed to be altered,
and the only guide which they had left was about to fail them. Columbus,
with no less quickness than ingenuity, invented a reason for this appearance,
which, though it did not satisfy himself, seemed so plausible to them, that
it dispelled their fears, or silenced their murmurs.
He still continued to steer due west, nearly in the same latitude with the
Canary Islands. In this course he came within the sphere of the trade
wind, which blows invariably from east to west, between the tropics and a
few degrees beyond them. He advanced before this steady gale with such
uniform rapidity that it was seldom necessary to shift a sail. When about
four hundred leagues to the west of the Canaries, he found the sea so
covered with weeds, that it resembled a meadow of vast extent, and in
some places they were so thick as to retard the motion of the vessels. This
strange appearance occasioned new alarm and disquiet. The sailors ima
gined that they were now arrived at the utmost boundary of the navigable
ocean; that these floating weeds would obstruct their further progress,
and concealed dangerous rocks, or some large track of land, which had
sunk, they knew not how, in that place. Columbus endeavoured to per
suade them, that what had alarmed ought rather to have encouraged them,
and was to be considered as a sign of approaching land. At the same time,
a brisk gale arose, and carried them forward. Several birds were seen.
hovering about the ship [13], and directing their flight towards the west.
The desponding crew resumed some degree of spirit, and began to entertain
fresh hopes.
Upon the first of October they were, according to the admiral's reckoning, seven hundred and seventy leagues to the west of the Canaries; but
lest his men should be intimidated by the prodigious length of the naviga
tion, he gave out that they had proceeded only five hundred and eighty.
four leagues, and fortunately, for Columbus, neither his own pilot, nor those
of the other ships, had skill sufficient to correct this error, and discover the
deceit. They had now been above three weeks at sea; they had pro
ceeded far beyond what former navigators had attempted or deemed possi
ble; all their prognostics of discovery, drawn fiom the flight of birds and
other circumstances, had proved fallacious; the appearances of land, with.
which their own credulityor the artifice of their commander had from time to
time flattered and amused them, had been altogetherillusive, and their prospect
of success seemed now to be as distant as ever. These reflections occurred
often to men who had no other object or occupation than to reason and
discourse concerning the intention and circumstances of their expedition
They made impression at first upon the ignorant and timid, and, extending
by degrees to such as were better informed or more resolute, the contagion




54                      HISTORY OF                     [BooK II.
spread at length from ship to ship. From secret whispers or Murmurmngs,
they proceeded to open cabals and public complaints. They taxed their
sovereign with inconsiderate credulity, in paying such regard to the vain
prornises and rash conjectures of an indigent foreigner, as to hazard the
lives of so many of her own.subjects in prosecuting a chimerical scheme
They affirmed that they had fully performed their duty, by venturing so far
in an unknown and hopeless course, and could incur no blame for refusing
to follow any'longer a desperate adventurer to certain destruction. They
contended, that it was necessary to think of returning to Spain, while
their crazy vessels were still in a condition to keep the sea, but expressed
their fears that the attempt would prove vain, as the wind, which had
hitherto been so favourable to their course, must render it impossible to sail
in an opposite direction. All agreed that Columbus should be compelled by
force to adopt a measure on which their common safety depended. Some
of the more audacious proposed, as the most expeditious and certain method
of getting rid at once of his remonstrances, to throw him into the sea, being
persuaded that, upon their return to Spain, the death of an unsuccessful
projector would excite little concern, and be inquired into with no curiosity.
Columbus was fully sensible of his perilous situation. He had observed,
with great uneasiness, the fatal operation of ignorance and of fear in producing
disaffection among his crew, and saw, that it was now ready to burst out
into open mutiny. He retained, however, perfect presence of mind. He
affected to seem ignorant of their machinations. Notwithstanding the
agitation and solicitude of his own mind, he appeared with a cheerful
countenance, like a man satisfied with the progress he had made, and
confident of success. Sometimes he employed all the arts of insinuation
to soothe his men. Sometimes he endeavoured to work upon their ambition
or avarice, by magnificent descriptions of the fame and wealth which they
were about to acquire. On other occasions he assumed a tone of authority,
and threatened them with vengeance from their sovereign, if, by their
dastardly behaviour, they should defeat this noble effort to promote the
glory of God, and to exalt the Spanish name above that of every other
nation. Even with seditious sailors, the words of a man whom they had
been accustomed to reverence, were weighty and persuasive, and not only
restrained them from those violent excesses which they meditated, but
prevailed with them to accompany their admiral for some time longer.
As they proceeded, the indications of approaching land seemed to be
more certain, and excited hope in proportion. The birds began +o appear
in flocks, making towards the southwest. Columbus, in imitation of the
Portuguese navigators, who had been guided, in several of their discoveries,
by the motion of birds, altered his course from due west towards that quarter
whither they pointed their flight. But, after holding on for several days in
this new direction, without any better success than formerly, having seen
no object, during thirty days, but the sea and the sky, the hopes of his
companions subsided faster than they had risen; their fears revived with
additional force; impatience, rage, and despair, appeared in every countenance. All sense of subordination was lost: the officers, who had hitherto
concurred with Columbus in opinions and supported his authority, now
took part with the private men; they assembled tumultuously on the deck,
expostulated with their commander, mingled threats with their expostulations,
and required him instantly to tack about and to return to Europe. Columbus
perceived that it would be of no avail to have recourse to any of his former
arts, which, having been tried so often, had lost their effect; and that it was
impossible to rekindle any zeal for the success of the expedition armong
men in whose breasts fear had extinguished every generous sentiment. He
saw that it was no less vain to think of employing either gentle or severe
measures to quell a mutiny so general and so violent. It was necessary, on
all these accounts, to soothe passions which he could no longer command,




AME RICA.                              55
and to give way to a torrent too impetuous to be checked. He promised
solemnly to his men that he would comply with their request, provided they
would accompany him, and obey his command for three days longer, and
if, during that time, land were not discovered, he would then abandon the
enterprise, and direct his course towards Spain.?
Enraged as the sailors were, and impatient to turn their faces again towards
their native country, this proposition did not appear to them  unreasonable.
Nor did Columbus hazard much in confining himself to a term so short.
The presages of discovering land were now so numerous and promising,
Jhat he deerneci them infallible.  For some days the sounding line reached
the bottom, and the soil which it brought up indicated land to be at no
great distance.  The flocks of birds increased, and were composed not only
of seafowl, but of such land birds as could not be supposed to fly far from
the shore.  The crew of the Pinta observed a cane floating, which seemed to
have beennewly cut, and likewise a piece of timber artificially carved. The
sailors aboard the Nigna took up the branch of a tree with red berries,
perfectly fresh. The clouds around the setting sun assumed a new appearance; the air was more mild and warm, and during the night the wind
became unequal and variable. From  all these symptoms, Columbus was
so confident of being near land, that on the evening of the eleventh of
October, after public prayers for success, he ordered the sails to be furled,
and the ships to lie to, keeping strict watch, lest they should be driven ashore
in the night.  During this interval of suspense and expectation, no man shut
his eyes, all kept upon deck, gazing intently towards that quarter where
they expected to discover the land, which had been so long the object of
their wishes.
About two hours before midnight, Columbus, standing on the forecastle,
observed a light at a distance, and privately pointed it out to Pedro Guttierez,
a page of the Queen's wardrobe. Guttierez perceived it, and calling to
Salcedo, comptroller of the fleet, all three saw it in motion, as if it were
carried from place to place. A little after midnight the joyful sound of
land! land! was heard from the Pinta, which kept always a head of the
other ships. But, having been so often deceived by fallacious appearances,
every man was now become slow of belief, and waited in all the anguish of
uncertainty and impatience for the return of day. As soon as morning dawned
[Oct. 12], all doubts and fears were dispelled. From every ship an island was
seen about two leagues to the north, whose flat and verdant fields, well stored
with wood, and watered with many rivulets, presented the aspect of a
delightful country.  The crew of the Pinta instantly began the Te Deimn,
as a hymn of thanksgiving to God, and were joined by those of the other
ships, with tears of joy and transports of congratulation. Thi-s office of
gratitude to Heaven was followed by an act of justice to their commander.
They threw themselves at the feet of Columbus, with feelings of selfcondemnation mingled with reverence. They implored him'to pardon
their ignorance, incredulity, and insolence, which had created him so much
unnecessary disquiet, and had so often obstructed the prosecution of his
well-concerted plan; and passing, in the warmth of their admiration, from
one extreme to another, they now pronounced the man, whom they had so
lately reviled and threatened, to be a person inspired by Heaven with
sagacity and fortitude more than human, in order to accomplish a design
so far beyond the ideas and conception of all former ages.
As soon as the sun arose, all their boats were manned and armed. They
rowed towards the island with their colours displayed, with warlike music,
and other martial pomp. As they approached the coast, they saw it covered
with a multitude of people, whom the novelty of the spectacle had drawn
together, whose attitudes and gestures expressed wonder and astonishment
Oviedo, Hist. ap. Ramus, vol. iii. p. 81, E




56                      HISTORY OF                      [BooK 11
at the strange objects which presented themselves to their view. Columbus
was the first European who set foot in the New World which he had discovered. He landed in a rich dress, and with a naked sword in his hand.
His men followed, and kneeling down, they all kissed the ground which
they had so long desired to see. They next erected a crucifix, and
prostrating themselves before it, returned thanks to God for conducting
their voyage to such a happy issue. They then took solemn possession of
~the country, for the crown of Castile and Leon, with all the formalities
which the Portuguese were accustomed to observe in acts of this kind, in
their new discoveries. "
The Spaniards, while thus employed, were surrounded by many of the
natives, who gazed in silent admiration upon actions which they could not
comprehend, and of which they did not foresee the consequences. The
dress of the Spaniards, the whiteness of their skins, their beards, their
arms, appeared strange and surprising. The vast machines in which they
had traversed the ocean, that seemed to move upon the waters with wings,
and uttered a dreadful sound resembling thunder, accompanied with lightning
and smoke, struck them with such terror, that they began to respect theii
new guests as a superior order of beings, and concluded that they were
children of the Sun, who had descended to visit the earth.
The Europeans were hardly less amazed at the scene now before them.
Every herb, and shrub, and tree, was different from those which flourished in
Europe. The soil seemed to be rich, but bore few marks of cultivation.
The climate, even to the Spaniards, felt warm, though extremely delightful.
The inhabitants appeared in the simple innocence of nature, entirely naked.
Their black hair, long and uncurled, floated upon their shoulders, or was
bound in tresses around their heads. They had no beards, and every part
of their bodies was perfectly smooth. Their complexion was of a duskycopper colour, their features singular, rather than disagreeable, their aspect
gentle and timid. Though not tall, they were well shaped and active.
T heir faces, and several parts of their body, were fantastically painted with
glaring colours. They were shy at first through fear, but soon became
familiar with the Spaniards, and with transports of joy received from them
hawksbells, glass beads, or other baubles, in return for which they gave
such provisions as they had, and some cotton yarn, the only commodity of
value that they could produce. Towards evening, Columbus returned to
his ship, accompanied by many of the islanders in their boats, which they
called canoes, and though rudely formed out of the trunk of a single tree,
they rowed them with surprising dexterity. Thus, in the first interview
between the inhabitants of the old, and new worlds, every thing was conducted amicably, and to their mutual satisfaction. The former, enlightened
and ambitious, formed already vast ideas with respect to the advantages
which they might derive from the regions that began to open to their view.
The latter, simple and undiscerning, had no foresight of the calamities and
desolation which were approaching their country.
Columbus, who now assumed the title and authority of admiral and
viceroy, called the island which he had discovered San Salvador. It ik
Detter known by the name of Guanahani, which the natives gave to it, and
is one of that large cluster of islands called the Lucaya or Bahama isles
It is situated above three thousand miles to the west of Gomera; from
which the squadron took its departure, and only four degrees to the south
of it; so little had Columbus deviated from the westerly course, which he
had chosen as the most proper.
Columbus employed the next day in visiting the coasts of the island; and
from the universal poverty of the inhabitants, he perceived that this was
tot the rich country for which he sought. But, conformably to his theory
* Life of Columbus, c. 22, 23. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 23.




AMERICA.                             57
t oncernllng the discovery of those regions of Asia which stretched towards
the east, he concluded that San Salvador was one of the isles which
geographers described as situated in the great ocean adjacent to India.*
Having observed that most of the people whom he had seen wore small
plates of gold, by way of ornament, in their nostrils, he eagerly inquired
where they got that precious metal. They pointed towards the south, and
made him comprehend by signs, that gold abounded in countries situated in
that quarter. Thither he immediately determined to direct his course, in
full confidence of finding there those opulent regions which had been the
object of his voyage, and would be a recompense for all his toils and
dangers. He took along with him seven of the natives of San Salvador,
that, by acquiring the Spanish language, they might serve as guides and
interpreters; and those innocent people considered it as a mark of distinction
when they were selected to accompany him.
He saw several islands, and touched at three of the largest, on which
he bestowed the names of St. Mary of the Conception, Fernandina, and
Isabella. But, as their soil, productions, and inhabitants nearly resembled
those of San Salvador, he made no stay in any of them. He inquired every
where for gold, and the signs that were uniformly made by way of answer,
confirmed him in the opinion that it was brought from the south. He
followed that course, and soon discovered a country which appeared very
extensive, not perfectly level, like those which he had already visited, but
so diversified with risIng grounds, hills, rivers, woods, and plains, that he
was uncertain whether it might prove an island, or part of the continent.
The natives of San Salvador, whom he had on board, called it Cuba;
Columbus gave it the name of Juana. He entered the mouth of a large
river with his squadron, and all the inhabitants fled to the mountains as he
approached the shore. But as he resolved to careen the ships in that place,
he sent some Spaniards, together with one of the people of San Salvador,
to view the interior part of the country. They, having advanced above
sixty miles fi'om the shore, reported, upon their return, that the soil was
richer and more cultivated than any they had hitherto discovered; that,
besides many scattered cottages, they had found one village, containing
above a thousand inhabitants; that the people, though naked, seemed to
be more intelligent than those of San Salvador, but had treated them with
the same respectful attention, kissing their feet, and honouring them as sacred
beings allied to heaven; that they had given them to eat a certain root, the
taste of which resembled roasted chestnuts, and likewise a singular species
of corn called maize, which, either when roasted whole or ground into meal,
was abundantly palatable; that there seemed to be no four-footed animals
in the country, but a species of dogs, which could not bark, and a creature
resembling a rabbit, but of a much smaller size; that they had observed
some ornaments of gold among the people, but of no great value.
These messengers had prevailed with some of the natives to accompany
them, who informed Columbus, that the gold of which they made their
ornaments was found in Cubanacan. By this word they meant the middle
or inland part of Cuba; but Columbus, being -ignorant of their language,
as well as unaccustomed to their pronunciation, and his thoughts running
continually upon his own theory concerning the discovery of the East Indies,
he was led, by the resemblance of sound, to suppose that they spoke of
the great Khan, and imagined that the opulent kingdom of Cathay, described
by Marco Polo, was not very remote. This induced him to employ some
time in viewing the country. He visited almost every harbour, froln Porto
del Principe, on the north coast of Cuba, to the eastern extremity of the
island: but, though delighted with the beauty of the scenes which every
where presented themselves, and amazed at the luxuriant fertility of the
Pet. Mart. epidt. 135.    t Life of Columbtm, c. 24 —-28. Herrera, dec. 1. ii.  i. c. 14.
VOL I —8




5.8                     HISTORY  OF                     [Bozic II.
soil, both which, from their novelty, made a more lively impression upon
his imagination [14], he did not find gold in such quantity as was sufficient
to satisfy either the avarice of his followers, or the expectations of the court
to which he was to return. The people of the country, as much astonished
at his eagerness in quest of gold as the Europeans were at their ignorance
and simplicity, pointed towards the east, where an island which they called
Hcayti was situated, in which that metal was more abundant than among
hem. Columbus ordered his squadron to bend its course thither; but
Marton Alonso Pinzon, impatient to be the first who should take possession
of the treasures which this country was supposed to contain, quitted his
companions, regardless of all the admiral's signals to slacken sail until they
should come up with him.
Columbus, retarded by contrary winds, did not reach HIati till the sixth
of December. He called the port where he first touched St. Nicholas, and
the island itself Espagnola, in honour of the kingdom  by which he was
employed; and it is the only country, of those he had yet discovered, which
has retained the name that he gave it. As he could neither meet with the
Pinta, nor have any intercourse with the inhabitants, who fled in great
consternation towards the woods, he soon quitted St. Nicholas, and, sailing
along the northern coast of the island, he entered another harbour, which he
called Conception. Here he was more fortunate; his people overtook a
woman who was flying from them, and after treating her with great gentleness, dismissed her with a present of such toys as they knew were most
valued in those regions. The description which she gave to her countrymen
of the humanity and wonderful qualities of the strangers; their admiration
of the trinkets, which she showed with exultation; and their eagerness to
participate of the same favours; removed all their fears, and induced many
of them to repair to the harbour. The strange objects which they beheld,
and the baubles which Columbus bestowed upon them, amply gratified their
curiosity and their wishes.   They  nearly resembled the people of
Guanahani and Cuba. They were naked like them, ignorant and simple;
and seemed to be equally unacquainted with all the arts which appear most
necessary in polished societies; but they were gentle, credulous, and timid,
to a degree which rendered it easy to acquire the ascendant over them, especially as their excessive admiration led them into the same error with the
people of the other islands, in believing the Spaniards to be more than mortals,
and descended immediately from heaven. They possessed gold in greater
abundance than their neighbours, which they readily exchanged for bells,
beads, or pins; and in this unequal traffic both parties were highly pleased,
each considering themselves as gainers by the transaction. Here Columbus
was visited by a prince or cazique of the country. He appeared with ail
the pomp known among a simple people, being carried in a sort of palanquin
upon the shoulders of four men, and attended by many of his subjects, who
served him with great respect. His deportment was grave and stately,
very reserved towards his own people, but with Columbus and the Spaniards
extremely courteous. He gave the admiral some thin plates of gold, and a
girdle of curious workmanship, receiving in return presents of small value,
but highly acceptable to him.*
Columbus, still intent on discovering the mines which yielded gold,
continued to interrogate all the natives with whom he had any intercourse,
concerning their situation. They concurred in pointing out a mountainous
country, which they called Cibao, at some distance from the sea, and further
towards the east. Struck with this sound, which appeared tohirn the same
with Cipango, the name by which Marco Polo, and other travellers o the
east, distinguished the island of Japan, he no longer doubted with respect
to the vicinity of the countries which he had discovered to the remote partz
* Life of Columbus, c. 32. Herrera. dec. 1. lib. i. c. 15, &c.




AMER EPICA.                            59
of Asia; and, in full expectation of reachilng soon those regions which had
been the object of his voyage, he directed his course towards the east. I He
put into a commodious harbour, which he called St. Thomas, and found
that district to be under the government of a powerful, cazique, named
Guaclanaharz, who, as he afterwards learned, was one of the five sovereigns
among whom the whole island was divided. He immediately sent messen
gers to Columbus, who in his name delivered to him the present of a mask
curiously fashioned with the ears, nose, and mouth of beaten gold, and
invited him to the place of his residence, near the harbour now called Cape
Fran5ois, some leagues towards the east. Columbus despatched some of
his officers to visit this prince, who, as he behaved himself with greater
dignity, seemed to claim more attention. They returned with such favourable accounts both of the country and of the people, as made Columbus
impatient for that interview with Guacanahari to which he had been invited.
He sailed for this purpose from St. Thomas, on the twenty-fourth of
December, with a fair wind, and the sea perfectly calm'; and as, amidst the
multiplicity of his occupations, he had not shut his eyes for two days, he
retired at midnight in order to take some repose, having committed the
helm to the pilot, with strict injunctions not to quit it for a moment. The
pilot, dreading no danger, carelessly left the helm to an unexperienced
cabin boy, and the ship, carried away by a current, was dashed against a
rock. The violence of the shock awakened Columbus. He ran up to the
deck. There all was confusion and despair. He alone retained presence
of mind. He ordered some of the sailors to take a boat, and carry out an
anchor astern; but, instead of obeying, they made off towards the Nigna,
which was about half a league distant. He then commanded the masts to
be cut down, in order to lighten the ship; but all his endeavours were too
late; the vessel opened near the keel, and filled so fast with water that its
loss was inevitable. The smoothness of the sea, and the timely assistance
of boats from the Nigna, enabled the crew to save their lives. As soon as
the islanders heard of this disaster, they crowded to the shore, with their
prince Guacanahari at their head. Instead of taking advantage of the
distress in which they beheld the Spaniards, to attempt any thing to their
detriment, they lamented their misfortune with tears of sincere condolence.
Not satisfied with this unavailing expression of their sympathy, they put tc
sea a number of canoes, and, under the direction of the Spaniards, assisted
in saving whatever could be got out of the wreck; and, by the united
labour of so many hands, almost every thing of value was carried ashore.
As fast as the goods were-landed, Guacanahari in person took charge of
them. By his orders they were all deposited in one place, and armed
sentinels were posted, who kept the multitude at a distance, in order to
prevent them not only from embezzling, but from inspecting too curiously
what belonged to their guests. [I5]   Next morning this prince visited
Columbus, who was now on board the Nigna, and endeavoured to console
him for his loss, by offering all that he possessed to repair it.*
The condition of Columbus was such that he stood in need of consolation.
Hle had hitherto procured no intelligence of the Pinta, and no longer doubted
but that his treacherous associate had set sail for Europe, in order to have
the merit of carrying the first tidings of the extraordinary discovei ies which
had been made, and to preoccupy so far the ear of their sovereign, as to
rob him of the glory and reward to which he was justly entitled. There
remained but one vessel, and that the smallest and most crazy of the squadron,
to traverse such a vast ocean, and carry so many men back to Europe.
Each of those circumstances was alarming, and filled the mind of Columbus
with the utmost solicitude. The desire of overtaking Pinzon, and of effacing
the unfavourable impressions which his misrepresentations might make in
*Herrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 18.




o60                      HISTORY  OF                     [looK ii.
Spain, made it necessary to return thither without delay. The difficulty
of taking such a number of persons on board the Nigna confirmed him in
an opinion which the fertility of the country, and the gentle temper of the
people, had already induced him to form. He resolved to leave a part of
his crew in the island, that by residing there, they might learn the language
of the natives, study their disposition, examine the nature of the country,
search for mines, prepare for the commodious settlement of the colony with
which he purposed to return, and thus secure and facilitate the acquisition
of those advantages which he expected fiom his discoveries.  When he
mentioned this to his men, all approved of the design; and from impatience
under the fatigue of a long voyage, from the levity natural to sailors, or
firoin the hopes of amassing wealth in a country which afforded such promising
specitnens of its riches, many offered voluntarily to be among the number
of those who should remain.
Nothing was now wanting towards the execution of this scheme, but to
obtain the consent of Guacanahari; and ihis unsuspicious simplicity soon
presented to the admiral a favourable opportunity of proposing it. Columbus
having, in the best manner he could,: by broken words and signs, expressed
some curiosity to know the cause which had moved the islanders to fly
with such precipitation upon the approach of his ships, the cazique informed
him that the country was much infested by the incursions of certain people,
whom he called Carribeans, who inhabited several islands to the south-east.
These he described as a fierce and warlike race of men, who. delighted in
blood, and devoured the flesh of the prisoners who were so unhappy as to
fall into their hands; and as the Spaniards at their first appearance were
supposed to be Carribeans, whom the natives, however numerous, durst not
face in battle, they had recourse to their usual method of securing their
safety, by flying into the thickest and most impenetrable woods. Guacanahari,
while speaking of those dreadful invaders, discovered such symptoms of
terror, as well as such consciousness of the inability of his own people to
resist them, as led Columbus to conclude that he would not be alarmed at
the proposition of any scheme which afforded him the prospect of an additional security against their attacks. He instantly offered him the assistance
of' the Spaniards to repel his enemies: he engaged to take him and hbs
people under the protection of the powerful monarch whom he served, and
offered to leave-in the island such a number of his men as should be sufficient, not only to defend the inhabitants from future incursions, but to
avenge their past wrongs.
The credulous prince closed eagerly with the proposal, and thought
himself already safe under the patronage of beings sprung from heaven,
and superior in power to mortal men. The ground was marked out for a
small fiort, which Columbus called Jcavidad, because he had landed there
on Christmas day. A deep ditch was drawn around it. The ramparts were
fortified with paliisades, and the great guns, saved out of the admiral's ship,
were planted upon them.  In ten days the work was finished; that simple
race of men labouring with inconsiderate assiduity in erecting this first
monument of their own servitude.  During this time, Columbus, by his
caresses and liberality, laboured to increase the high -opinion which the
natives entertained of the Spaniards. But while he endeavoured to inspire
them with confidence in their disposition to do good, he wished likewise
to give them some striking idea of their power to punish and destroy such
as were the objects of their indignation.  With this view, in presence of a
vast assembly, he drew up his men in order of battle, and made an ostentatious but innocent display of the sharpness of the Spanish swords, of the foyce
of their spears, and the operation of their cross-bows. These rude people,
strangers to the use of iron, and unacquainted with any hostile weapons but
arrows of reed pointed ~with the lbones of fishes, wooden swords, andjavelins
hardened in the fire, wondered and trembledo Before this surprise or fear




AMERICA.                              61
had time to abate, he ordered the great guns to be fired. The sudden
explosion struck them with such terror that they fell flat to the ground,
covering their faces with their hands; and when they beheld the astonishing
effect of the bullets among the trees, towards which the cannon had been
pointed, they concluded that it was impossible to resist men, who had the
command of such destructive instruments, and who came armed with
thunder and lightning against their enemies.
After giving such impressions both of the beneficence and power of the
Spaniards, as might have rendered it easy to preserve an ascendant over
the minds of the natives, Columbus appointed thirty-eight of his people to
remain in the island. He intrusted the command of these to Diego de
Arado, a gentleman of Cordova, investing him'with the same powers which
he himself had received from Ferdinand and Isabella; and furnished him
with every thing requisite for the subsistence or defence of this infant
colony. He strictly enjoined them to maintain concord among themselves,
to yield an unreserved obedience to their commander, to avoid giving offence
to the natives by any violence or exaction, to cultivate the friendship of
Guacanahari, but not to put themselves in his power by straggling in small
parties, or marching too far from the fort. He promised to visit them soon
with such a reinforcement of strength as might enable them to take full
possession of the country, and to reap all the fruits of their discoveries. In the
mean time he engaged to mention their names to the king and queen, and
to place their merit and services in the most advantageous light.*
Having thus taken every precaution for the security of the colony, he
left Navidad on the fourth of January, one thousand four hundred and
ninety-three, and steering towards the east, discovered and gave names to
most of the harbours on the northern coast of the island. On the sixth he
descried the Pinta, and soon came up with her, after a separation of more
than six weeks. Pinzon endeavoured to justify his conduct by pretending
that he had been driven from his course by stress of weather, and prevented
from returning by contrary winds. The admiral, though he still suspected
his perfidious intentions, and knew well what he urged in his own defence
to be frivolous as well as false, was so sensible that this was not a proper
time for venturing upon any high strain of authority, and felt such satisfaction
in this junction with his consort, which delivered him from many disquieting
apprehensions, that, lame as Pinzon's apology was, he admitted of it without
difficulty, and restored him  to favour.  During his absence from the
admiral, Pinzon had visited several harbours in the island, had acquired
some gold by trafficking with the natives, but had made no discovery of
any importance.
From the condition of his ships, as well as the temper of his men,
Columbus now found it necessary to hasten his return to Europe. The
former having suffered much during a voyage of such an unusual length,
were extremely leaky. The latter expressed the utmost impatience to
revisit their native country, from which they had been so long absent, and
where they had things so wonderful and unheard-of to relate. Accordingly,
on the sixteenth of January, he directed his course towards the north-east, and
soon lost sight of land. He had on board some of the natives. whom he had
taken from the different islands which he discovered; and besides the gold,
which was the chief object of research, he had collected specimens of all
the productions which were likely to become subjects of commerce in the
several countries, as well as many unknown birds, and other natural
curiosities, which might attract the attention of the learned, or excite ihe
wonder of the pe6ple. The voyage was prosperous to the fourteenth ot
February, and he had advanced near five hundred leagues across the Atlantic
ocean, when the wind began to rise, and continued to blow with increasing
~ Oviedo ap Ramusio, iii. p. 82. E. Herrera, dec. I. lib. i. c. 20. Life of Columbus, c. 34.




62                       HISTORY  OF                     rBOOK  l.
rage, which terminated in a furious hurricane. Every thinL that the naval
skill'and experience of Columbus could devise was employed in order to
save the ships. But it was impossible to withstand the violence of the
storm, and, as they were still far from any land, destruction seemed inevitable
The sailors had recourse to prayers to Almighty God, to the invocation
of saints, to'vows, and charms, to every thing that religion dictates, or
superstition suggests to the affrighted mind of man.  No prospect of
deliverance appearing, they abandoned themselves to despair, and expected
every moment to be swallowed up in the waves. Besides the passions
which naturally agitate and alarm the human mind in such awful situations,
when certain death, in one of his most terrible forms, is before it, Columbus
had to endure feelings of distress peculiar to himself. He dreaded that
all knowledge of the amazing discoveries which he had made was now
to perish; mankind were to be deprived of every benefit that might have
been derived from the happy success of his schemes, and his own name
would descend to posterity as that of a rash deluded adventurer, instead of
being transmitted with the honour due to the author and conductor of the
most noble enterprise that had ever been undertaken. These reflections
extinguished all sense of his own personal danger. Less affected with the
loss of life than solicitous to preserve the memory of what he had attempted
and achieved, he retired to his cabin and wrote upon a parchment a short
account of the voyage which he had made, of the course which he had
taken, of the situation and riches of the countries which he had discovered,
and of the colony that he had left there. Having wrapped up this in an
oiled cloth, which he enclosed in a cake of wax, he put it into a cask
carefully stopped up, and threw  it into the sea, in hopes that some
fortunate accident might preserve a deposit of so much importance to the
world.*[16]
At length Providence interposed to save a life reserved for other services.
The wind abated, the sea became calm, and on the evening of the fifteenth,
Columbus and his companions discovered land; and though uncertain what
It was, they made towards it. They soon knew it to be St. Mary, one of
the Azores or western isles, subject to the crown of Portugal. There,
after a violent contest with the governor, in which Columbus displayed no
less spirit than prudence, he obtained a supply of fresh provisions, and
whatever else he needed. One circumstance, however, greatly disquieted
him. The Pinta, of which he had lost sight on the first day of the hurricane, did not appear; he dreaded for some time that she had foundered at
sea, and that all her crew had perished; afterwards, his fbrmer suspicions
recurred, and he became apprehensive that Pinzon had borne away for
Spain, that he might reach it before him, and by giving the first account of
his discoveries, might obtain some share of his fame.
In order to prevent this, he left the Azores as soon as the weather would
permit [Feb. 24]. Atn lo great distance from the coast of Spain, when near
the end of his voyage, and seemingly beyond the reach of any disaster,
another storm  arose, little inferior to the former in violence; and after
driving before it during two days and two nights, he was forced to take
shelter in the river Tagus [March 4]. Upon application to the King of
Portugal, he was allowed to come up to Lisbon; and, notwithstanding the
envy which it was natural for tmhe Portuguese to feel, when they beheld
another nation entering upon that province of discovery which they had
hitherto deemed peculiarly their own, and in its first essay not only rivalling
but eclipsing their fame, Columbus was received with. all the marks of
distinction due to a man who had performed things so extraordinary and
unexpected. The King admitted him into his presence, treated him with'
the highest respect, and listened to the account which he gave of his voyage.
* Life of Columbus, c. 37. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 1, 2.




AMERICA.                             6
with admiration mingled with regret.  While Columbus, on his part,
enjoyed the satisfaction of describing the importance of his discoveries, and
of being now able to prove the solidity of his schemes to those very
persons, who, with an ignorance disgraceful to themnselves, and fatal to their.ountry, had lately rejected them as the projects of a visionary or designing
adventurer."
Columbus was so impatient to return to Spain, that he remained only
five days in Lisbon. On the fifteenth of March he arrived in the port oi
Palos, seven months and eleven days from the time when he set out thence
upon his voyage. As soon as the ship was discovered approaching the
port, all the inhabitants of Palos ran eagerly to the shore, in order to welcome
their relations and fellow-citizens, and to hear tidings of their voyage.
When the prosperous issue of it was known, when they beheld the strange
people, the unknown animals, and singular productions, brought from the
countries which had been discovered, the effusion of joy was general and
unbounded.  The bells were rung, the cannon fired; Columbus was
received at landing with royal honours, and all the people in solemn procession, accompanied him and his crew to the church, where they returned
thanks to Heaven, which had so wonderfully conducted and crowvned with
success a voyage of greater length and of more importance than had been
attempted in any former age. On the evening of the same day, he had the
satisfaction of seeing the Pinta, which the violence of the tempest had driven
far to the north, enter the harbour.
The first care of Columbus was to inform the King and Queen, who were
then at Barcelona, of his arrival and success. Ferdinand and Isabella, no
less astonished than delighted with this unexpected event, desired Columbus,
in terms the most respectful and flattering, to repair immediately to court,
that from his own mouth they might receive a full detail of his extraordinary
services and discoveries. During his journey to Barcelona, the people
crowded from the. adjacent country, following him every where with admi
ration and applause. His entrance into the city was conducted, by order
of Ferdinand and Isabella, with pomp suitable to the great event, which
added such distinguishing lustre to their reign. The people whom he
brought along with him from the countries which he had discovered,
marched first, and by their singular complexion, the wild peculiarity of their
features, and uncouth finery, appeared like men of another species. Next
to them were carried the ornaments of gold, fashioned by the rude art ot
the natives, the grains of gold found in the mountains, and dust of the same
metal gathered in the rivers. After these appeared the various commodities
of the new discovered countries, together with their curious productions.
Columbus himself closed the procession, and attracted the eyes of all the
spectators, who gazed with admiration on the extraordinary man, whose
superior sagacity and fortitude had conducted their countrymen, by a route
concealed from past ages, to the knowledge of a new world. Ferdinand
and Isabella received him clad in their royal robes, and seated upon a
throne, under a magnificent canopy. When he approached, they stood up,
and raising him as he kneeled to kiss their hands, commanded him to take
his seat upon a chair prepared for him, and to give a circumstantial account
of his voyage. He delivered it with a gravity and composure no less
suitable to the disposition of the Spanish nation than to the dignity of the
audience in which he spoke, and with that modest simplicity which
characterizes men of superior minds, who, satisfied with having performed
great actions, court not vain applause by an ostentatious display of their
exploits. When he had finished his narration, the king and queen, kneeling
down, offered up solemn thanks to Almighty God for the discovery of those
new regions, from which they expected so many advantages to flow In uDo
* Life of Columbus, c 40, 41.  Herrera, dec. 1. lii. ii. c. 3




64                      HISTO R Y  OF                   [BOOK 11
the -kingdoms subject to their government. [17] Every mark of honour
that gratitude or admiration could suggest was conferred upon Columbus.
Letters patent were issued, confirming to him and to his heirs all the privileges
contained in the capitulation concluded at Santa F6; his family was ennobled; the king and queen, and after their example the courtiers, treated him
on every occasion with all the ceremonious respect paid to persons of the
highest rank. But what pleased him most, as it gratified his active mind,
bent continually upon great objects, was an order to equip, without delay,
an armament of such force as might enable him not only to take possession
of the countries which he had already discovered, but to go in search of
those more opulent regions which he still confidently expected to find.*
While preparations were making for this expedition, the fame of Columbus's
successful voyage spread over Europe, and excited general attention. The
multitude, struck with amazement when they heard that a new world had
been found, could hardly believe an event so much above their conception.
Men of science, capable of comprehending the nature, and of discerning
the effects of this great discovery, received the account of it with admiration
and joy. They spoke of his voyage with rapture, and congratulated one
another upon their felicity in having lived in the period when, by this extraordinary event, the boundaries of human knowledge were so Inuch
extended, and such a new field of inquiry and observation opened, as would
/cad mankind to a perfect acquaintance with the structure and productions
of the habitable globe.J [18]  Various opinions and conjectures were
formed concerning the new found countries, andwhat division of the earth
they belonged to. Columbus adhered tenaciously to his original opinion,
that they should be reckoned a part of those vast regions in Asia, comprehended under the general name of India. This sentiment was confirmed
by the observations which he made concerning the productions of the
countries he had discovered. Gold was known to abound in India, and be
had met with such promising samples of it in the islands which he visited,
as led him to believe that rich mines of it might be found. Cotton, another
production of the East Indies, was common there. The pimento of' the
islands he imagined to be a species of the East Indian pepper. He mistook
a root, somewhat resembling rhubarb, for that valuable drug, which was
then supposed to be a plant peculiar to the East Indies.4  The birds brought
home by him were adorned with the same rich plumage which distinguishes those of India. The alligator of the one country appeared to be
the same with the crocodile of the other. After weighing all these circumstances, not only the Spaniards, but the other nations of Europe, seem to
have adopted the opinion of Columbus.  The countries which he had
discovered were considered as a part of India. In consequence of this
notion, the nane of Indies is given to them by Ferdinand and Isabella, in
a ratification of their former agreement, which was granted to Columbus
upon his return.~  Even after the error which gave rise to this opinion was
detected, and the true position of the New World was ascertained, the
name has remained, and the appellation of West Indzes is given by all the
people of Europe to the country, and that of Indians to its inhabitants.
The name by which Columbus distinguished the countries which he had
discovered was so inviting, the specimens of their riches and fertility which
he produced were so considerable, and the reports of his companions,
delivered frequently with the exaggeration natural to travellers, so favourable,
as to excite a wonderful spirit of enterprise among the Spaniards. Though
little accustomed to naval expeditions, they were impatient to set out upon
their voyage. Volunteers of every rank solicited to be employed. Allured
by the inviting prospects which opened to their ambition and avarice,
* Life of Columbus, c. 42, 43. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 3.  t 2 P. Mart. epist. 133, 134,135.
t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 20. Gornera Hist. c. 17.  i Life of Columbus, c. 44




AMERICA.                              65
neitner the length nor danger of the navigation intimidated them. Cautious
as Ferdinand was, and averse to every thing new or adventurous, he seems
to have catched the same spirit with his subjects. Under its influence,
preparations for a second expedition were carried on with rapidity unusual
in Spain, and to an extent that would be deemed not inconsiderable in the
present age. The fleet consisted of seventeen ships, some of which were
of good burden. It had on board fifteen hundred persons, among whom
were many of noble families, who had served in honourable stations. The
greater part of these, being destined to remain in the country, were furnished with every thing requisite for conquest or settlement, with all kinds
of European domestic animals, with such seeds and plants as were most
likely to thrive in the climate of the West Indies, with utensils and instruments
of every sort, and with such artificers as might be most usdful in an infant
colony.*
But, formidable and well provided as this fleet was, Ferdinand and
Isabella did not rest their title to the possession of the newly discovered
countries upon its operations alone. The example of the Portuguese, as
well as the superstition of the age, made it necessary to obtain from the
Roman pontiff a grant of those territories which they wished to occupy.
The Pope, as the vicar and representative of Jesus Christ, was supposed
to have a right of dominion over all the kingdoms of the earth. ~ Alexander
VI., a pontiff infamous for every crime which disgraces humanity, filled the
Papal throne at that time. As he was born Ferdinand's subject, and very
solicitous to secure the protection of Spain, in order to facilitate the execution
of his ambitious schemes in favour of his own family, he was extremely
willing to gratify the Spanish monarchs. By an act of liberality which
cost him nothing, and that served to establish the jurisdiction and pretensions
of the Papal See, he granted in full right to Ferdinand and Isabella all the
countries inhabited by Infidels, which they had discovered, or should discover;
and, in virtue of that power which he derived from Jesus Christ, he conferred on the crown of Castile vast regions, to the possession of which he
himself was so far from having any title, that he was unacquainted with
their situation, and ignorant even of their existence. As it was necessary
to prevent this grant from interfering with that formerly made to the crown
of Portugal, he appointed that a line, s'upposed to be drawn from pole to
pole, a hundred leagues to the westward of the Azores, should serve as a
limit between them; and, in the plenitude of his power, bestowed all to
the east of this imaginary line upon the' Portuguese, and all to the west of
it upon the Spaniards.t  Zeal for propagating the Christian faith was the
consideration employed by Ferdinand in soliciting this bull, and is mentioned
by Alexander as his chief motive for issuing it. In order to manifest some
concern for this laudable object, several friars, urader the direction of Father
Boyl, a Catalonian monk of great reputation, as apostolical vicar, were
appointed to accompany Columbus, and to devote themselves to the
instruction of the natives. The Indians, whom Columbus had brought along
with him, having received some tincture of Christian knowledge, were
baptized with much solemnity, the king himself, the prince his son, and the
chief persons of'his court, standing as their godfathers. Those first fruits
of the New World have not been followed by such an increase as pious men
wished, and had reason to expect.
Ferdinand and Isabella having thus acquired a title, which was then
deemed completely valid, to extend their discoveries and to establish their
dominion over such a considerable portion of the globe, nothing now retarded
the departure of the fleet. Columbus was extremely impatient to revisit
the colony which he had left, and to pursue that career of glory upon which
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 5. Life of Columbus, c. 45.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 4
Torquemeda Mon. Ind. lib. xviii. c. 3.
VOL. I.-9                      5




66                      HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK I1.
he had entered. He set sail from the bay of Cadiz on the twenty-fifth of
September, and touching again at the island of Gomera, he steered further
towards the south than in his fornner voyage. By holding this course, he
enjoyed more steadily the benefit cf the regular winds, which reign within
the tropics, and was carried towards a large cluster of islands, situated
considerably to the east of those which he had already discovered. On the
twenty-sixth day after his departure from Gomera [Nov. 21, he made land.*
It was one of the Carribbee or Leeward Islands, to which he gave the name
of Deseada, on account of the impatience of his crew to discover some part
of the New World. After this he visited successively Dominica, Mliarigalante, Guadaioupe, Antigua, San Juan de Puerto Rico, and several other
islands, scattered in his way as he advanced towards the north-west. All
these he found to be inhabited by that fierce race of people whom Guacanahari had painted in such frightful colours. His descriptions appeared not
to have been exaggerated. l'he Spaniards never attempted to land without
meeting with such a reception as discovered the martial and daring spirit
of the natives; and in their habitations were found relics of those horrid
feasts which they had made upon the bodies of their enemies taken in war.
But as Columbus was eager to know the state of the colony which he
had planted, and to supply it with the necessaries of which lie supposed it
to be in want, he made no stay in any of those islands, and proceeded
directly to Hispaniola [Nov. 22].t  When he arrived off Navidad, the
station in which he had left the thirty-eight men under the command ol
Arada, he was astonished that none of them appeared, and expected every
moment to see them  running with transports of joy to welcome their
countrymen. Full of solicitude about their safety, and foreboding in his
mind what had befallen them, he rowed instantly to land. All the natives
from whom  he might have received information had fled. But the fort
which he had built was entirely demolished, and the tattered garments, the
broken arms and utensils scattered about it, left no room to doubt concerning
the unhappy fate of the garrison.4 While the Spaniards were shedding
tears over those sad memorials of their fellow-citizens, a brother of the
cazique Guacanahari arrived. From him Columbus received a particular
detail of what had happened after his departure from the island. The
familiar intercourse of the Indians with the Spaniards tended gradually to
diminish the superstitious veneration with which their first appearance had
inspired that simple people. By their own indiscretion and ill conduct, the
Spaniards speedily effaced those favourable impressions, and soon convinced
the natives, that they had all the wants, and weaknesses, and passions ot
men. As soon as the powerful restraint which the presence and authority
of Columbus imposed was withdrawn, the garrison threw off all regard for
the officer whom he had invested with command. Regardless of the
prudent instructions which he had given them, every man became independent, and gratified his desires without control. T'he gold, the women,
the provisions of the natives, were all the prey of those licentious oppressors
They roamed in small parties over the island, extending their rapacity and
insolence to every corner of it. Gentle and timid as the people were, those
unprovoked injuries at length exhausted their patience, and roused their
courage. The cazique of Cibao, whose country the Spaniards chiefly
infested on account of the gold which it contained, surprised and cut cEf
several of them, while they straggled in as perfect security as if their
conduct had been altogether inoffensive. He then assembled his subjects,
and surrounding the fort, set it on fire. Some of the Spaniards were killed
in defending it; the rest perished in attempting to make their escape by
crossing an arm of the sea. Guacanahari, whom  all their exactions had
* Oviedo ap. Ramus. iii. 85.   t P. Martyr, dec. p. 15. 18. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 7 Life
of Columbus, c. 46. &c.   + Hist. de Cura de los Palacios. MS.




AMERICA.                               67
not alienated from the Spaniards, took arms in their behalf, and, in endeavouring to protect them, had received a wound, by which he was still
confined.*
Though this account was far from removing the suspicions which the
Spaniards entertained with respect to the fidelity of Guacanahari, Columbus
perceived so clearly that this was not a properjuncture for inquiring into his
conduct with scrupulous accuracy, that he rejected the advice of several of
his officers, who urged him to seize the person of that Prince, and to revenge
the death of their countrymen by attacking his subjects He represented
to them the necessity of securing the friendship of some potentate of the
country, in order to facilitate the settlement which they intended, and the
danger of driving the natives to unite in some desperate attempt against
them, by such an ill-timed and unavailing exercise of rigour. Instead of
wasting his time in punishing past wrongs, he took precautions for preventing
any future injury. With this view, he made choice of a situation more
healthy and commodious than that.of Navidad. He traced out the plan of
a town in a large plain near a spacious bay, and obliging every person to
put his hand to a work on which their common safety depended, the houses
and ramparts were soon so far advanced, by their united labour, as to afford
them  shelter and security.  This- rising city, the first that the Europeans
founded in the New World, he named Isabella, in honour of his patroness
the Queen of Castile.t
In carrying on this necessary work, Columbus had not only to sustain all
the hardships, and to encounter all the difficulties, to which infant colonies
are exposed when they settle in an uncultivated country, but he had to
contend with what was more insuperable, the laziness, the impatience, and
mutinous disposition of his followers. By the enervating influence of a hot
climate, the natural inactivity of the Spaniards seemed to increase. Many
of them were gentlemen, unaccustomed to the fatigue of bodily labour,
and all had engaged in the enterprise with the sanguine hopes excited by
the splendid and exaggerated description of their countrymen who returned
from the first voyage, or by the mistaken opinion of Columbus, that the
country which he had discovered was either the Cipango of Marco Polo,
or the Ophir,4 from which Solomon imported those precious commodities
which suddenly diffused such extraordinary riches through his kingdom.
But when, instead of that golden harvest which they had expected to reap
without toil or pains, the Spaniards saw that their prospect of wealth was
remote as well as uncertain, and that it could not be attained but by the
slow  and persevering efforts of industry, the disappointment of those
chimerical hopes occasioned such dejection of mind as bordered on despair,
and led to general discontent. In vain did Columbus endeavour to revive
their spirits by pointing out the fertility of the soil, and exhibiting the
specimens of gold daily brought in from different parts of the island.
They had not patience to wait for the gradual returns which the former
might yield, and the latter they despised as scanty and inconsiderable.
The spirit of disaffection spread, and a conspiracy was formed, which might
have been fatal to Columbus and the colony. Happily he discovered it;
and, seizing the ringleaders, punished some of them, sent others prisoners
into Spain, whither he despatched twelve of the ships which had served
as transports, with an earnest request for a reinforcement of men and a large
supply of provisions.~
1494.] Meanwhile, in order to banish that idleness which, by allowing
his people leisure to brood over their disappointment, nourished the spirit
of discontent, Columbus planned several expeditions into the interior part of
* P. Martyr, dec. p. 22, &c. Herrera, dec. 1. fib. ii. c. 7. 9. Life of Columbus, c. 49, 50.  t Life
of Columbus, c. 51. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 10.   + P. Martyr, dec. p. 29.   ~ Herrera, doe.
I. ib ii. C. 10, 11.




68                       HISTORY  OF                      [Booc Il.
the country. He'sent a detachment, under the'command of Alonzo de
Ojeda, a vigilant and enterprising officer, to visit the district of Cibao, which
was said to yield the greatest quantity of gold, and followed him in person
with the main body of his troops. In this expedition he displayed all the
pomp of military magnificence that he could exhibit, in order to strike the
imagination of the natives.'He marched with colours flying, with martial
music, and with a small body of cavalry that paraded sometimes in the front
and sonetilnes in the rear. As those were the first horses which appeared
in the New World, they were objects of terror no less than of admiration
to the Indians, who, having no tame animals themselves, were unacquainted
with that vast accession of power which man hath acquired by subjecting
them to his dominion. They supposed them to be rational creatures. They
imagined that the horse and the rider formed one animal, with whose speed
they were astonished, and whose impetuosity and strength they considered
as irresistible. But while Columbus endeavoured to inspire the natives
with a dread of his power, he did not neglect the arts of gaining their love
and confidence. He adhered scrupulously to the principles of integrity and
justice in all his transactions with them, and treated -them, on every occasion,
not only with humanity, but with indulgence.  The district of Cibao
answered the description given of it by the natives. It: was mountainous
and uncultivated, but in every river and brook gold was gathered either in
dust or in grains, some of which were of considerable size. The Indians had
never opened any mines in search of gold. To penetrate into the bowels of
the earth, and to refine the rude ores were operations too complicated and
laborious for their talents and industry, and they had no such high value for
gold as to put their ingenuity and invention upon the stretch in order to
obtain it.* The small quantity of' that precious metal which. they possessed,
was either picked up in the beds of the rivers, or washed from the mountains
by the heavy rains that fall within the tropics. But from those indications,
the Spaniards could no longer doubt that the country contained rich treasures
in its bowels, of which they hoped soon to be masters.t In order to secure
the command of this valuable province, Columbus erected a small fort, to
which he gave the name of St. Thomas, by way of ridicule upon some of
his incredulous followers, who would not believe that the country produced
gold, until they saw it with their own eyes, and touched it with their
hands.+ 
The account of those promising appearances of wealth in the country of
Cibao came very seasonably to comfort the desponding colony, which was
affected with distresses of various kinds. The stock of provisions which
had been brought from Europe was mostly consumed; what remained was
so much corrupted by the heat and moisture of the. climate; as to be almost
unfit for use; the natives cultivated so small a portion of ground, and with
so little skill, that it hardly yielded what was: sufficient: for their own subsistence; the Spaniards at Isabella had hitherto neither time norleisure to clear
the soil, so as to reap any considerable fruits of their own-industry. On all
these accounts, they became afraid of perishing with hunger, and were
reduced already to a scanty allowance. At the same time, the diseases
predominant in the torrid zone, and which, rage chiefly in those uncultivated
countries where the hand of industry has not opened the woods, drained the
marshes, and confined the rivers within a certain channel, began to spread
among them. Alarmed at the violence and unusual symptoms of those
maladies, they exclaimed against' Columbus and. his companions in the
former voyage, who, by their splendid but deceitful descriptions of Hispaniola, had allured them to quit Spain for a barbarous uncultivated land,
where they must either be cut off by famine, or die of unknown distenipers.
* Oviedo, lib. ii. p. 90. A.  t P. Martyr, dec p. 32.  $ IHerrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 12 Li
of Columbus, c. 52.




AMERI CA.                             69
Several of the officers and persons of note, instead of checking, joined in
those seditious complaints. Father Boyi, the apostolical vicar, was one ot
the most turbulent and outrageous. It required all the authority and address
of Columbus to re-establish subordination and tranquillity in the colony.
Threats and promises were alternately employed for this purpose; but
nothing contributed more to soothe the malecontents than the prospect of
finding, in the mines of Cibao, such a rich store of treasure as would be a
recompense for all their sufferings, and efface the memory  of former
disappointments.
When, by his unwearied endeavours, concord and order were so far
restored that he could venture to leave the island, Columbus resolved to
pursue his-discoveries, that he might be able to ascertain whether those new
countries with which he had opened a communication were connected with
any region of the earth already known, or whether they were to be considered as a separate portion of the globe hitherto unvisited. He appointed
his brother Don Diego, with the assistance of a council of officers, to govern
the island in his absence; and gave the command of a body of soldiers to
Don Pedro Margarita, with which he was to visit the different parts of the
island, and endeavour to establish the authority of the Spaniards among the
inhabitants. Having left them very particular instructions with respect to
their conduct, he weighed anchor on the 24th of April, with one ship and
two small barks under his command. During a tedious voyage of full five
months, he had a trial of almost all the numerous hardships to which
persons of his profession are exposed, without making any discovery ot
importance, except the island of Jamaica. As he ranged along the southern
coast of Cuba [191,he was entangled in a labyrinth formed by an incredible
number of small islands, to which he gave the name of the Queen's Garden.
In this unknown course, among rocks and shelves, he was retarded by contrary winds, assaulted with furious storms, and alarmed with the terrible
thunder and lightning which is often almost incessant between the tropics. At
length his provisions fell'short; his crew, exhausted with fatigue as well as
hunger, murmured and threatened, and were ready to proceed to the most
desperate extremities against him. Beset with danger in such various forms,
he was obliged to keep continual watch, to observe every occurrence with
his own eyes, to issue every order, and to superintend the execution of it.
On no occasion was the extent of his skill and experience as a navigator so
much tried. To these the squadron owed its safety. But this unremitted
fatigue of body, and intense application of mind, overpowering his constitution, though naturally vigorous and robust, brought on a feverish disorder,
which terminated in a lethargy, that deprived him of sense and memory,
and had almost proved fatal to his life.?
But, on his return to Hispaniola [Sept. 27], the sudden emotion of joy
which he felt upon meeting with his brother Bartholomew at Isabella,
occasioned such a flow of spirits as contributed greatly to his recovery.
It was now thirteen years since the two brothers, whom similarity of talents
united in close friendship, had separated from each other, and during that
long period there had been no intercourse between them. Bartholomew,
after finishing his negotiation in the court of England, had set out for Spain
by the way of France. At Paris he received an account of the extraordinary
discoveries which his brother had made in his first voyage, and that he was
then preparing to embark on a second expedition. Though this naturally
induced him to pursue his journey with the utmost despatch, the admiral
had sailed for Hispaniola before he reached Spain. Ferdinand and Isabella
received him with the respect due to the nearest kinsman of a person whose
merit and services rendered him so conspicuous; and as they knew what
consolation his presence would afford to his brother, they persuaded him to
~ Life of Columbus, c. 54, &c. Herrera, dee. 1. lib. ii. c. 13i 14 P. Martyr, dec. 1. p. 34, &c.




70                     HISTORY  OF                      [Boox II.
take the command of three ships, which they had appointed to carry
provisions to the colony at Isabella.*
He could not have arrived at any juncture when Columbus stood more
in need of a friend capable of assisting him with his counsels, or of dividing
with him the cares and burdens of government. For although the provisions
now brought from Europe afforded a temporary relief to the Spaniards from
the calamities of famine, the supply was not in such quantity as to support
them long, and the island did not hitherto yield what was sufficient for their
sustenance. They were threatened with another danger, still more formnidable than the return of scarcity, and which demanded more immediate
attention. No sooner did Columbus leave the island on his voyage o1
discovery, than the soldiers under Margarita, as if they had been set free
from discipline and subordination, scorned all restraint. Instead of conforming to the prudent instructions of Columbus, they dispersed in straggling
parties over the island, lived at discretion upon the natives, wasted their
provisions, seized their women, and treated that inoffensive race with all th
insolence of military oppression.t
As long as the Indians had any prospect that their sufferings might come
to a period by the voluntary departure of the invaders, they submitted in
silence, and dissembled their sorrow; but they now perceived that the yoke
would be as permanent as it was intolerable. The Spaniards had built a
town, and surrounded it with ramparts. They had erected forts in different
places. They had enclosed and sown several fields. It was apparent
that they came not to visit the country, but to settle in it. Though the
number of those strangers was inconsiderable, the state of cultivation among
these rude people was so imperfect, and in such exact proportion to their
own consumption, that it was with difficulty they could afford subsistence
to their new guests. Their own mode of life was so indolent and inactive,
the warmth of the climate so enervating, the constitution of their bodies
naturally so feeble, and so unaccustomed to the laborious exertions oI
industry, that they were satisfied with a proportion of food amazingly small.
A handful of maize, or a little of the insipid bread made of the cassadaroot, was sufficient to support men whose strength and spirits were not
exhausted by any vigorous efforts either of body or mind. The Spaniards,
though the most abstemious of all the European nations, appeared to them
excessively voracious. One Spaniard consumed as much as several Indians.
This keenness of appetite surprised them so much, and seemed to be so
insatiable, that they supposed the Spaniards had left their own country'
because it did not produce as much as was requisite to gratify their immoderate desire of food, and had come among them in quest of nourishment.$
Self-preservation prompted them to wish for the departure of guests who
wasted so fast their slender stock of provisions. The injuries which they
suffered added to their impatience for this event. They had long expected
that the Spaniards would retire of their own accord. They now perceived
that, in order to avert the destruction with which they were threatened, either
by the slow consumption of famine, or by the violence of their oppressors, it
was necessary to assume courage, to attack those formidable invaders with
united force, and drive them from the settlements of which they had
violently taken possession.
Such were the sentiments which universally prevailed among the Indians,
when Columbus returned to Isabella. Inflamed, by the unprovoked outrages of the Spaniards, with a degree of rage of which their gentle natures,
formed to suffer and submit, seemed hardly susceptible, they waited only
for a signal from their leaders to fall upon the colony. Some of the
caziques had already surprised and cut off several stragglers. The dread
rf this impending danger united the Spaniards, and re-established the
* ierrera, dec. I. lib. ii. c. 15.  t P. Martyr, dec. p. 47.;  Herrera, dec. 1. ibi. i  c. 17




AMERICA.                             71
authority of Columbus, as they saw no prospect of safety but in committing
themselves to his prudent guidance. It was now necessary to have recourse
to arms, the employing of which against the Indians Columbus had hitherto
avoided with the greatest solicitude. Unequal as the conflict may seem,
between the naked inhabitants of the New World armed with clubs, sticks
hardened in the fire, wooden swords, and arrows pointed with bones or flints,
and troops accustomed to the discipline, and provided with the instruments
of destruction known in the European art of war, the situation of the
Spaniards was far from being exempt from danger. The vast superiority
of the natives in number compensated many defects. A handfu of men
was about to encounter a whole nation. One adverse event, or even any
unforeseen delay in determining the fate of the war, might prove fatal to the
Spaniards  Conscious that success depended on the vigour and rapidity of
his operat;ons, ColuInbus instantly assembled his forces.  They were
reduced to a very smnall number. Diseases, engendered by the warmth
and humidity of the country, or occasioned by their own licentiousness, had
raged among them with much violence; experience had not yet taught them
the art either of curing these, or the precautions requisite for guarding against
themn, two-thirds of the original adventurers were dead, and many of
thse who survived were incapable of service.* The body, which took
the field [March 24, 14951 consisted only of two hundred foot, twenty
horse, and twenty large dogs; and how strange soever it may seem  to
mention the last as compesing part of a military force, they were not perhaps
the least formidable and destructive of the whole, when employed against
naked and timid Indians. All the caziques of the island, Guacanahari
excepted, who retained an inviolable attachment to the Spaniards, were in
arms to oppose Columbus, with forces amounting, if we may believe the
Spanish historians, to a hundred thousand men. Instead of attempting to
draw the Spaniards into the fastnesses of the woods and mountains, they
were so imprudent as to take their station in the Vega Real, the most open
plain in the country. Columbus did not allow them time to perceive their
error, or to alter their position. He attacked them during the night, when
undisciplined troops are least capable of acting with union and concert, and
obtained an easy and bloodless victory. The consternation with which the
Indians were filled by the noise and havoc made by the fire arms, by the
impetuous force of the cavalry, and the fierce onset of the dogs was so
great, that they threw down their weapons, and fled without attempting
resistance. Many were slain; more were taken prisoners, and reduced to
servitude [20]; and so thoroughly were the rest intimidated, that from that
moment they abandoned themselves to despair, relinquishing all thoughts
of contending with aggressors whom they deemed invincible.
Columbus employed several months in marching through the island, and
in subjecting it to the Spanish government, without meeting with any
opposition. He imposed a tribute upon all the inhabitants above the age of
fourteen. Each person who lived in those districts where gold was found,
was obliged to pay quarterly as much gold dust as filled a hawk's bell;
from those in other parts of the country, twenty-five pounds of cotton were
demanded. This was the first regular taxation of the Indians, and served
as a precedent for exactions still more intolerable. Such an imposition was
extremely contrary to those maxims which Columbus had hitherto inculcated
with respect to the mode of treating them. But intrigues were carrying
on in the court of Spain at this juncture, in orderto undermine his power,
and discredit his operations, which constrained him to depart from his own
system of administration. Several unfayourable accounts of his conduct, as
well as of the countries discovered by him, had been transmitted to Spain.
Margarita and Father Boyl were now at court, and in order to justify thea
Life of Columbus, c. 61.




72                      HISTORY  OF                      [BoOs  II.
own conduct, or to gratify their resentment, watched with malevolent
attention for every opportunity of spreading insinuations to his detriment,
Many of the courtiers viewed his growing reputation and power with
envious eyes. Fonseca,: archdeacon of Seville, who was intrusted with the
chief direction of Indian affairs, had conceived such an unfavourable opinion
of Columbus, for some reason which the contemporary writers have not
mentioned, that he listened with partiality to every invective against him.
It was not easy for an unfriended stranger, unpractised in courtly arts, to
counteract the machinations of so many enemies. Columbus saw that there
was but one method of supporting his own credit, and of silencing all his
adversaries. He must produce such a quantity of gold as would not only
justify what he had reported with respect to the richness of the country, but
encourage Ferdinand and Isabella to persevere in prosecuting his plans.
The necessity of obtaining it forced him not only to impose this heavy tax
upon the Indians, but to exact payment of it with extreme rigour; and may
be pleaded in excuse for his deviating on this occasion from the mildness
and humanity with which he uniformly treated that unhappy people.*
The labour, attention, and foresight which the Indians were obliged to
employ in procuring the tribute demanded of them, appeared the most
intolerable of all evils, to men accustomed to pass their days in a careless
improvident indolence.  They were incapable of such a regular and
persevering exertion of industry, and felt it such a grievous restraint upon
their liberty, that they had recourse to an expedient for obtaining deliverance
from this yoke, which demonstrates the excess of their impatience and
despair.  They formed a scheme of starving those oppressors whom they
Dcurst not attempt to expel; and from the opinion which they entertained
with respect to the voracious appetite of the Spaniards, they concluded
the execution'of it to be very practicable. With this view they suspended
all the operations of agriculture; they sowed no maize, they pulled up the
roots of the manioc or cassada which were planted, and, retiring to the most
inaccessible parts of the mountains, left the uncultivated plains to their
enemies. This desperate resolution produced in some degree the effects
which they expected. The Spaniards were reduced to extreme want;
but they received such seasonable supplies of provisions from Europe, and
found so many resources in their own ingenuity and industry, that they
suffered no great loss of men. The wretched Indians were the victims of
their own ill-concerted policy. A great multitude of people, shut up in the
mountainous or wooded part of the country, without any food but the spontaneous productions of the earth, soon felt the utmost distresses of famine.
This brought on contagious diseases; and in the course of a few months
more than a third part of the inhabitants of the island perished, after
experiencing misery in all its various forms.t
But while Columbus was establishing the foundations of the Spanish
grandeur in the New World, his enemies laboured with unwearied assiduity
to deprive him of the glory and rewards which, by his services and
sufferings, he was entitled to enjoy. The hardships unavoidable in a new
settlement, the calamities occasioned by an unhealthy climate, the disasters
attending a voyage in unknown seas, were all represented as the effects ot
his restless and inconsiderate ambition. His prudent attention to preserve
discipline and subordination -was denominated excess of rigour; the
punishments which he inflicted upon the mutinous and disorderly were
Imputed to cruelty. These accusations gained such credit in a jealous
court, that a commissioner was appointed to repair to Hispaniola, and to
inspect into the conduct of Columbus. By the recommendation of his
enemies, Aguado, a groom of the bedchamber, was the person to whom
* IHerrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 17.  ti Herrera, dec. 1. lib. xi. c. 18. Life of Columbus, c. 61
Oviedo, Jib. iii. p. 93. D. Benzon Hist. Novi Orbis, lib. i. c. 9. P. Martyr, dec. p. 48.




AMERICA.                               73
this important trust was committed. But in this choice they seem to have
been more influenced by the obsequious attachment of the man to their
interest, than by his capacity for the station. Puffed up with such sudden
elevation, Aguado displayed, in the exercise of this office, all the frivolous
self-importance, and acted with all the disgusting insolence which are natural
to little minds, when raised to unexpected dignity, or employed in functions
to which they are not equal. By listening with eagerness to every accusal
tion against Columbus, and encouraging not only the malecontent Spaniards,
but even the Indians, to produce their grievances, real or imaginary, he
fomented the spirit of dissension in the island, without establishing any
regulations of public utility, or that tended. to redress the many wrongs,
with fne odium of which he wished to load the admiral's administration.
As Columbus felt sensibly how humiliating his situation must be, if he
should remain in the country while such a partial inspector observed his
motions and controlled his jurisdiction, he took the resolution of returning to
Spain, in order to lay a full account of all his transactions, particularly with
respect to the points in dispute between him and his adversaries, before
Ferdinand and Isabella, from whose justice and discernment he expected an
equal and a favourable decision [1496]. He committed the administration
of affairs, during his absence, to Don Bartholomew, his brother, with the
title of Adelantado, or Lieutenant-Governor.  By a choice less fortunate,
and which proved the source of many calamities to the colony, he appointed
Francis Roldan chief justice, with very extensive powers.*
In returning to Europe, Columbus held a course different from that which
he had taken in his former voyage. He steered almost due east from
Hispaniola, in the parallel of twenty-two degrees of latitude; as experience
had not yet discovered the more certain and expeditious method of stretching
to the north, in order to fall in with the south-west winds. By this ill
advised choice, which, in the infancy of navigation between the New and
Old Worlds, can hardly be imputed to the admiral as a defect in naval skill,
he was exposed to infinite fatigue and danger, in a perpetual struggle with
the trade winds, which blow without variation from the east between the
tropics. Notwithstanding the almost insuperable difficulties of such a
navigation, he persisted in his course with his usual patience and firmness,
but made so little'way that he was three months without seeing land. At
length his provisions began to fail, the crew was reduced to the scanty
allowance of six ounces of bread a day'for each person. The admiral fared
no better than the meanest sailor. But, even in this extreme distress, he
retained the humanity which distinguishes his character, and refused to
comply with the earnest solicitations of his crew, some of whom proposed
to feed upon the Indian prisoners whom they were carrying over, and others
insisted to throw them overboard, in order to lessen the consumption of
their small stock. He represented that they were human beings, reduced
by a common calamity to the same condition with themselves, and entitled
to share an equal fate. His authority and remonstrances dissipated those
wild ideas suggested by despair. Nor had they time to recur; as he came
soon within sight of the coast of Spain, when all their fears and sufferings
ended.t
Columbus appeared at court with the modest but determined confidence
of a man conscious not only of integrity, but of having performed great
services. Ferdinand and Isabella, ashamed of their own facility in lending
too favourable an ear to frivolous or unfounded accusations, received him
with such distinguished marks of respect as covered his enemies with,
shame. Their censures and calumnies were no more heard of at that
juncture The gold, the pearls: the cotton, and other commodities of value
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 18. lib. iii. c. 1.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 1.  Life oz
Co!umus, c. 64.
VOL. I.-10




74                      HISTORY  OF                     fBoOK II.
which Columbus produced, seemed fully to refute what the malecontents
had propagated with respect to the poverty of the country. By reducing
the Indians to obedience, and imposing a regular tax upon them, he had
secured to Spain a large accession of new subjects, and the establishment
of a revenue that promised to be considerable. By the mines which he had
found out and examined, a source of wealth still more copious was opened.
Great and unexpected as those advantages were, Columbus represented
them only as preludes to future acquisitions, and as the earnest of more
important discoveries, which he still meditated, and to which those he had
already made would conduct him with ease and certainty.*
The attentive consideration of all these circumstances made such an
impression, not only upon Isabella, who was flattered with the idea of being
the patroness of all Columbus's enterprises, but even upon Ferdinand, who
having originally expressed his disapprobation of his schemes, was still apt
to doubt of their success, that they resolved to supply the colony of
Hispaniola with every thing which could render it a permanent establishment, and to furnish Columbus with such a fleet, that he might proceed to
search for those new countries of whose existence he seemed to be confident.
The measures most proper for accomplishing both these designs were
concerted with Columbus. Discovery had been the sole object of the first
voyage to the New World; and though, in the second, settlement had been
proposed, the precautions taken for that purpose had either been insufficient, or were rendered ineffectual by the mutinous spirit of the Spaniards,
and the unforeseen calamities arising from various causes. Now a plan was
to be formed of a regular colony, that might serve as a model in all future
establishments. Every particular was considered with attention, and the
whole arranged with a scrupulous accuracy..The precise number of
adventurers who should be permitted to embark was fixed. They were
to be of different ranks and professions, and the proportion of each was
established according to their usefulness and the wants of the colony. A
suitable number of women were to be chosen to accompany these new
settlers. As it was the first object to raise provisions in a country where
scarcity of food had been the occasion of so much distress, a considerable
body of husbandmen was to be carried over. As the Spaniards had then
no conception of deriving any benefit from those productions of the New
World which have since yielded such large returns of wealth to Europe,
but had formed magnificent ideas, and entertained sanguine hopes with
respect to the riches contained in the mines which had been discovered, a
band of workmen, skilled in the various arts employed in digging and
refining the precious metals, was provided. All these emigrants were to
receive pay and subsistence for some years, at the public expense.'
Thus far-the regulations were prudent, and well adapted to the end in
view. But as it was foreseen that few would engage voluntarily to settle
in a country whose noxious climate had been fatal to so many of their
countrymen, Columbus proposed to transport to Hispaniola such malefactors
as bad been convicted of crimes which, though capital, were of a less
atrocious nature; and that for the future a certain proportion of the offenders
usually sent to the galleys, should be condemned to labour in the mines
which were to be opened. This advice, given without due reflection, was
as inconsiderately adopted. The prisons of Spain were drained, in order
to collect members for the intended colony; and the judges empowered to
try criminals were instructed to recruit it by their future sentences. It was
not, however, with such materials that the foundations of a society, destined
to be permanent, should be laid. Industry, sobriety, patience, and mutual
confidence, are indispensably requisite in an infant settlement, where purity
of morals must contribute more towards establishing order than the operation
W 5fe of Columbus, c. 65. Herrera, dec. 1. lb. i. c. 1. l iberrra, de. i. i. iii. c 2,




AMERICA.                               75
or authority of laws. But when such a mixture of what is corrupt is
admitted into the original constitution of the political body, the vices of
those unsound and incurable members will probably infect the whole, and
must certainly-be productive of violent and unhappy effects. This the
Spaniards fatally experienced; and the other European nations having
successively imitated the practice of Spain in this particular, pernicious
consequences have followed in their settlements, which can be imputed to
no other cause.*
Though Columbus obtained, with great facility and despatch, the royal
approbation of every measure and regulation that he proposed, his endeavours
to carry them into execution were so long retarded, as must have tired out
the patience of any man less accustomed to encounter and to surmount
difficulties. Those delays were occasioned partly by that tedious formality
and spirit of procrastination, with which the Spaniards conduct business,
and partly by the exhausted state of the treasury, which was drained by the
expense of celebrating the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella's only son
with Margaret of Austria, and that of ioanna, their second daughter, with
Philip Archduke of Austria;t but must be ci:iefly imputed to the malicious
arts of Columbus's enemies. Astonished at tnhe reception which he met
with upon his return, and overawed by his presence, they gave way, for
some time, to a tide of favour too strong for them to oppose. Their enmity,
however, was too inveterate to remain long inactive. They resumed their
operations; and by the assistance of Fonseca, the minister for Indian affairs,
who was now promoted to the bishopric of Badajos, they threw in so many
obstacles to protract the preparations for Columbus's expedition, that a year
elapsedT before he could procure two ships to carry over a part of the
supplies destined for the colony, and almost two years were spent before
the small squadron was equipped, of which he himself was to take the
command.~
1498.] This squadron consisted of six ships only, of no great burden, and
but indifferently provided for a long or dangerous navigation. The voyage
which he now meditated was in a course different from any he had under
taken. As he was fully persuaded that the fertile regions of India lay to the
south-west of those countries which he had discovered, he proposed, as the
most certain method of finding out these, to stand directly south from the
Canary or Cape de Verd islands, until he came under the equinoctial line,
and then to stretch to the west before the favourable wind for such a course,
which blows invariably between the tropics. With this idea he set sail
[May 30], and touched first at the Canary, and then at the Cape de Verd
islands [July 4]. From the former he despatched three of his ships with a
supply of provisions for the colony in Hispaniola; with the other three, he
continued his voyage towards the south.  No remarkable occurrence
happened until they arrived vithin five degrees of the line [July 19].
There they were becalmed, and at the same time the heat became so
excessive that many of their wine casks burst, the liquors in others soured,
and their provisions corrupted.II The Spaniards, who had never ventured
so far to the south, were afraid that the ships would take fire, and began to
apprehend the reality of what the ancients had taught concerning the
destructive qualities of that torrid region of the globe.  They were
relieved, in some measure, from their Wears by a seasonable fall of rain.
This, however, though so heavy and unintermitting that the men could
hardly keep the deck, did not greatly mitigate the intenseness of the heatl
The admiral, who with his usual vigilance had in person directed every
operation from the beginning of the voyage, was so much exhausted by
* Herrera, dec, 1. lib. iii. c. 2. Touron Hist. Gener. de 1' Amerique, i. p. 51.  t P. Martyr,
epist. 168.    ~ Life of Columbus, c. 65.    Q Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 9    13 P. Martyr,
dec. p. 70.




76                       HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK II.
fatigue and want of sleep, that it brought on a violent fit of the gout,
accompanied with a fever. All these circumstances constrained him to
yield to the importunities of his crew, and to alter his course to the northwest, in order to reach some of the Caribbee islands, where he might refit,
and be supplied with provisions.
On the first of August, the man stationed in the round top surprised them
with the joyful cry of Land! They stood toward it, and discovered a
considerable Island, which the admiral called Trinidad, a name it still
retains. It lies on the coast of Guiana, near the mouth of the Orinoco.
This, though a river only of the third or fourth magnitude in the New
World, far surpasses any of the streams in our hemisphere. It rolls towards
the ocean such a vast body of water, and rushes into it with such impetuous
force, that when it meets the tide, which on that coast rises to an uncommon
height, their collision occasions a swell and agitation of the waves no less
surprising than formidable. In this conflict, the irresistible torrent of the
river so far prevails, that it freshens the ocean many leagues with its flood,.
Columbus, before he could conceive the danger, was entangled among those
adverse currents and tempestuous waves, and it was with the utmost
difficulty that he escaped through a narrow strait, which appeared so
tremendous that he called it La Boca del Drago. As soon as the consternationwhich this occasioned permitted him toreflect upon the nature of an
appearance so extraordinary, he discerned in it a source of comfort and
hope. He justly concluded that such a vast body of water as this river contained, could not be supplied by any island, but must flow through a country
of immense extent, and of consequence that he was now arrived at that
continent which it had long been the object of his wishes to discover.
Full of this idea, he stood to the west along the coast of those provinces
which are now known by the names of Paria and Cumana.  He landed
in several places, and had some intercourse with the people, who resembled
those of Hispaniola in their appearance and manner of life. They wore,
as ornaments, small plates of gold, and pearls of considerable value, which
they willingly exchanged for European toys. They seemed to possess a
better understanding and greater courage than thq inhabitants of the islands.
The country produced four-footed animals of several kinds, as well as a
great variety of fowls and fruits.t The admiral was so much delighted
with its beauty and fertility, that, with the warm enthusiasm of a discoverer,
he imagined it to be the Paradise described in Scripture, which the Almighty
chose for the residence of man while he retained innocence that rendered
him worthy of such a habitation.- [21]  Thus Columbus had the glory
not only of discovering to mankind the existence of a new World, but made
considerable progress towards a perfect knowledge of it; and was the first
man who conducted the Spaniards to that vastj continent which has been the
chief seat of their empire, and the source ofP their treasures in this quarter
of the globe. The shattered condition of his ships, scarcity of provisions,
his own infirmities, together with the impatience of his crew, prevented
him from pursuing his discoveries any further, and made it necessary to
bear away for Hispaniola. In his way thither he discovered the islands ot
Cubagua and Margarita, which afterwards became remarkable for their
pearl-fishery. When he arrived at Hispaniola [Aug. 30], he was wasted
to an extreme degree, with fatigue and sickness; but found the affairs oI
the colony in such a situation as afforded him no prospect of enjoying that
repose of which he stood so much in need.
Many revolutions had happened in that country during his absence. His
brother, the adelantado, in consequence of an advice which the admiral
gave before his departure, had removed the colony from Isabella to a more
x Gumilla Hist. de I'Orenoqae, tom. i. p. 14.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 9-11. Life of
Columbus, c. 66-73.:  Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 12. Gomara, c. 84.




AMERI CA.                             77
commodious station, on the opposite side of the island, and laid the foundation
of St. Domingo,? which was long the most considerable European town in
the New World, and the seat of the supreme courts in the Spanish dominions
there. As soon as the Spaniards were established in this new settlement,
the adelantado, that they might neither languish in inactivity, nor have
leisure to form new cabals, marched into those parts of the island which
his brother had not yet visited or reduced to obedience. As the people were
unable to resist, they submitted every where to the tribute which he iimposed. But they soon found the burden to be so intolerable that, overawed
as they were by the superior power of their oppressors, they took arms
against them.. Those insurrections, however, were not fbrmidable. A
conflict with timid and naked Indians was neither dangerous nor of doubtful
issue.
But while the adelantado was employed against them in the field, a
mutiny of an aspect far more alarming broke out among the Spaniards.
The ringleader of it was Francis Roldan, whom Columbus had placed in
a station which required him to be the guardian of order and tranquillity
in the colony. A turbulent and inconsiderate ambition precipitated him
into this desperate measure, so unbecoming his rank. The argtumnents
which he employed to seduce his- countrymen were frivolous and ill
founded. He accused Columbus and his two brothers of arrogance and
severity; he pretended that they aimed at establishing an independent
dominion in the country; he taxed them with an intention of cutting off
part of the Spaniards by hunger and fatigue, that they might more easily
reduce the remainder to subjection; he represented it as unworthy of
Castilians, to remain the tame and passive slaves of these Genoese
adventurers. As men have always a propensity to impute the hardships
of which they feel the pressure to the misconduct of their rulers; as every
nation views with a jealous eye the power and exaltation of foreigners,
Roldan's insinuations made a deep impression on his countrymen. His
character and rank added weight to them. A considerable number of the
Spaniards made choice of him as their leader; and, taking arms against
the adelantadoand his brother, seized the king's magazine of provisions,
and endeavoured to surprise the fort at St. Domingo. This was preserved
by the vigilance and courage of Don Diego Columbus. The mutineers
were obliged to retire to the province of Xaragua, where they continued
not only to disclaim the adelantado's authority themselves, but excited the
Indians to throw off the yoke.t
Such was the distracted state of the colony when Columbus landed at
St. Domingo. He was astonished to find that the three ships which he had
despatched from the Canaries were not yet arrived. By the unskilfulness ot
the pilots, and the violence of currents, they had been carried a hundred and
sixty miles to the west of St. Domingo, and forced to take shelter in a
harbour of the province of Xaragua, where Roldan and his seditious
followers were cantoned. Roldan carefully concealed from the commanders
of the ships his insurrection against the adelantado, and, employing his
utmost address to gain their confidence, persuaded them to set on shore a
considerable part of the new settlers whom they brought over, that they
might proceed by land to St. Domingo. It required but few arguments to
prevail with those men to espouse his cause. They were the refuse of the
jails of Spain, to whom idleness, licentiousness, and deeds of violence were
familiar; and they returned eagerly to a course of life nearly resembling
that to which they had been accustomed. The commanders of the ships
perceiving, when it was too late, their imprudence in disembarking so many
of their men, stood away for St. Domingo, and got safe into the port a few
* P. Martyr, dec. p. 56.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 5-8. Life of Columbus, c. 74-77
Gonoara, c. 23. P. Martyr, p. 78.




78                       HISTORY OF                       [BooK II.
days after the admiral; but their stock of provisions was so wasted during
a voyage of such long continuance that they brought little relief to the
colony.
By this junction with a band of such bold and desperate associates,
Roldan became extremely formidable, and no less extravagant in his
demands. Columbus, though filled with resentment at his ingratitude, and
highly exasperated by the insolence of his followers, made no haste to take
the field. He trembled at the thoughts of kindling the flames of a civil
war, in which, whatever party prevailed, the power and strength of both
must be so much wasted as might encourage the common enemy to unite
and complete their destruction. At the same time, he observed, that the
prejudices and passions which incited the rebels to take arms, had so far
infected those who still adhered to him, that many of them were adverse,
and all cold to the service. From such sentiments, with respect to the
public interest, as well as from this view of his own situation, he chose to
negotiate rather than to fight. By a seasonable proclamation, offering flee
pardon to such as should merit it by returning to their duty, he made
impression upon some of the malecontents.  By engaging to grant such as
should desire it the liberty of returning to Spain, he allured all those unfortunate adventurers, who, from sickness and disappointment, were disgusted
with the country. By promising to re-establish Roldan in his former office,
ne soothed his pride; and, by complying with most of his demands in
behalf of his followers, he satisfied their avarice. Thus, gradually and
without bloodshed, but after nmany tedious negotiations, he dissolved this
dangerous combination, which threatened the colony with ruin); and restored
the appearance of order, regular government, and tranquillity.t
In consequence of' this agreement with the mutineers, lands were. allotted
them in different parts of the island, and the Indians settled in each district
were appointed to cultivate a certain portion of ground for the use of those new
masters [1499]. The performance of this work was substituted inl place of
the tribute formerly imposed; and how necessary soever such a regulation
might be in a sickly and feeble colony, it introduced among the Spaniards
the Repartimientos, or distributions of' Indians established by them in all
their settlements, which brought numberless calamities upon that unhappy
people, and subjected them  to the most grievous oppession.4  This was
not the only bad effect of the insurrection in Hispaniola; it prevented
Columbus ftom prosecuting his discoveries on the continent, as self-preservation obliged him to keep near his person his brother the adelantado,
and the sailors whom he intended to have employed in that service. As
soon as his affairs would permit, he sent some of his ships to Spain with a
journal of the voyage which he had made, a description of the new countries
which he had discovered, a chart of the coast along which he had sailed,
and specimens of the gold, the pearls, and other curious or valuable productions which he had acquired by trafficking with the natives. At the
same time he transmitted an account of the insurrection in Hispaniola; he
accused the mutineers not only of having thrown the colony into such violent
convulsions as threatened its dissolution, but of having obstructed every
attempt towards discovery and improvement, by their unprovoked rebellion
against their superiors, and proposed several regulations for the better
government of the island, as well as the extinction of that mutinous spirit,
which, though suppressed at present, might soon burst out with additional
rage. Roldan and his associates did not neglect to convey to Spain, by the
same ships, an apology for their own conduct, together with their recriminations upon the admiral and his brothers. Unfortunately for the honour ot
* Heirera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 12. Life of Columbus, c. 7S 779.    Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii 6.
13, 14. Life of Columbus, c. 80. &c.    + Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 14. &c.




AMERICA.                               79
Spain and the happiness of Columbus, the latter gained most credit in the
court of Ferdinand and Isabella, and produced unexpected effects.*
But, previous to the relating of these, it is proper to take a view of some
events, which merit attention, both on account of their own importance, and
their connection with the history of the New World. While Columbus
was engaged in his successive voyages to the west, the spirit of discovery
did not languish in Portugal, the kingdom where it first acquired vigour.
and became enterprising. Self-condemnation and neglect were not the only
sentiments to which the success of Columbus, and reflection upon their own
imprudence in rejecting his proposals. gave rise among the Portuguese.
They excited a general emulation to surpass his performances, and an ardent
desire to make some reparation to their country for their own error. With
this view, Emanuel, who inherited the enterprising genius of his predecessors,
persisted in their grand scheme of- opening a passage to the East Indies by
the Cape of Good Hope, and soon after his accession to the throne equipped
a squadron for that important voyage. He gave the command of it to'Vasco
de Gama, a man of noble birth, possessed of virtue, prudence, and courage,
equal to the station. The squadron, like all those fitted out for discovery
in the infancy of navigation, wvas extremely feeble, consisting only of three
vessels, of neither burden nor force adequate to the service. As the
Europeans were at that time little acquainted with the course of the tradewinds and periodical monsoons, which render navigation in the Atlantic
ocean as well as in the sea that separates Africa from  India, at some
seasons easy, and at others not only dangerous but almost impracticable, the
time chosen for Gama's departure was the imost improper during the whole
year. He set sail from Lisbon on the ninth of July, [1497], and, standing
towards the south, had to struggle for four months ~with contrary winds
before he could reach the Cape of Good Hope.'Here their violence began
to abate [Nov. 20]; and during an interval of calm weather, Gama doubled
that formidable promontory, which had so long been the boundary of
navigation, and directed his course towards the north-east, along the African
coast. He touched at several ports; and after various adventures, which
the Portuguese historians relate with high but just encorniums upon his
conduct and intrepidity, he came to anchor before the city of Melinda.
Throughout all the vast countries which extend along the coast of Africa,
from the river Senegal to the confines of Zanguebar, the Po6ituguese had
found a race of men rude and uncultivated, strangers to letters, to arts, and
commerce, and differing from the inhabitants of Europe no less in their
features and complexion than in their manners and institutions. As they
advanced from this, they observed, to their inexpressible joy, that the
human form gradually altered and improved; the Asiatic features began
to predominate, marks of civilization appeared, letters were known, the
Mahometan religion was established, and a commerce far from being inconsiderable was carried on. At that time several vessels from India were in
the port of Melinda. Ganla now pursued his voyage with almost absolute
certainty of success, and, under the conduct of a llahometan pilot, arrived
at Calecut, upon the coast of Malabar, on the twenty-second of May, one
thousand four hundred and ninety-eight. What he beheld of the wealth,
the populousness, the cultivation, the industry, and arts of this highly
civilized country, far surpassed any idea that he had formed, from the
imperfect accounts which the Europeans had hitherto received of it. But
as he possessed neither sufficient force to attempt a settlement, nor proper
commodities with which he could carry on commerce of any consequence
he hastened back to Portugal, with an account of his success in performing
a voyage, the longest, as well as most difficult, that had ever been made
since the first invention of navigation. He landed at Lisbon on the four
*Herrera, dee. 1. lib. iii. c. 14. Benzon. Hist. Nov. Orb. lib. i. c. 2.




80                     HISTORY  OF                    [BooK II.
teenth of September, one thousand four hundred and ninety-nine, two years
two months and five days from the time he left that port.
Thus, during the course of the fifteenth century, mankind made greater
progress in exploring the state of the habitable globe, than in all the ages
which had elapsed previous to that period. The spirit of discovery, feeble
at first and cautious, moved within a very narrow sphere, and made its
efforts with hesitation and timidity. Encouraged by success, it became
adventurous, and boldly extended its operations. In the course of its progression, it continued to acquire vigour, and advanced at length with a
rapidity and force which burst through all the limits within which ignorance
and fear had hitherto circumscribed the activity of the human race. Almost
fifty years were employed by the Portuguese in creeping along the coast
of Africa from Cape Non to Cape de Verd, the latter of which lies only
twelve degrees to the south of the former. In less than thirty years they
ventured beyond the equinoctial line into another hemisphere, and penetrated
to the southern extremity of Africa, at the distance of forty-nine degrees
from Cape de Verd. During the last seven years of the century, a New
World was discovered in the west, not inferior in extent to all the parts of
the earth with which mankind were at that time acquainted. In the East,
unknown seas and countries were found out, and a communication, long
desired, but hitherto concealed, was opened between Europe and the
opulent regions of India. In comparison with events so wonderful and
unexpected, all that had hitherto been deemed great or splendid faded away
and disappeared. Vast obiects now presented themselves. The human
mind, roused and interested by the prospect, engaged with ardour in pursui!
of them, and exerted its active powers in a new direction.
This spirit of enterprise, though but newly awakened in Spain, began
soon to operate extensively. All the attempts towards discovery made in
that kingdom had hitherto been carried on by Columbus alone, and at the
expense of the Sovereign. But now private adventurers, allured by the
magnificent descriptions he gave of the regions which he had visited, as
well as by the specimens of their wealth which he produced, offered to fit
out squadrons at their own risk, and to go in quest of new countries. The
Spanish court, whose scanty revenues were exhausted by the charge of its
expeditions to the New World, which, though they opened alluring piospects
of future benefit, yielded a very sparing return of present profit, was
extremely willing to devolve the burden of discovery upon its subjects.
It: seized with joy an opportunity of rendering the avarice, the ingenuity,
and efforts of projectors instrumental in promoting designs of certain advantage to the public, though of doubtful success with respect to themselves.
One of the first propositions of this kind was made by Alonzo de Ojeda, a
gallant and active officer, who had accompanied Columbus in his second
voyage. His rank and character procured him such credit with the merchants of Seville, that they undertook to equip four ships, provided he
could obtain the royal license, authorizing the voyage. The powerful
patronage of the Bishop of Badajos easily secured success in a suit
so agreeable to the court. Without consulting Columbus, or regarding
the rights and jurisdiction which he had acquired by the capitulation
in one thousand four hundred and ninety-two, Ojeda was permitted
to set out for -the- New World. In order to direct his course, the bishop
communicated to him the admiral's journal of his last voyage, and his
charts of the countries which he had discovered. Ojeda struck out into no
new path of navigation, but adhering servilelyto the routewhich Columbus
had taken, arrived on the coast of Paria [May]. He traded with the
natives, and, standing to the west, proceeded as far as Cape de Vela, and
ranged along a considerable extent of coast beyond that on which Columbus
*~Ramusio, vol. i. 1139. D.




AMERICA.                               81
had touched.  Having thus ascertained the opinion of Columbus, that this
country was a part of the continent, Ojeda returned by way of Hispaniola
to Spain [October], with some reputation as a discoverer, but with little
benefit to those who had raised the funds for the expedition.*
Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine gentleman, accompanied Ojeda in this
voyage. In what station he served is uncertain; but as he was an experienced
sailor, and eminently skilled in all the sciences subservient to navigation,
he seems to have acquired such authority among his companions, that they
willingly allowed him to have a chief share in directing their operations
during the voyage. Soon after his return, he transmitted an account of his
adventures and discoveries to one of his countrymen; and labouring with
the vanity of a traveller to magnify his own exploits, he had the address
and confidence to frame his narrative so as to make it appear that he had
the glory of having first discovered the continent in the New  World.
Amerigo's account was drawn up not only with art, but with sormie elegance.
It contained an amusing history of his voyage, and judicious observations
upon the natural productions, the inhabitants, and the customs of the
countries which he had visited. As it was the first description of any part
of the New World that was published, a performance so well calculated. to
gratify the passion of mankind for what is new and marvellous, circulated
rapidly, and was read with admiration. The country of which Amerigo:
was supposed to be the discoverer, came gradually to be called by his
name. The caprice of mankind, often as unaccountable as unjust, has
perpetuated this error. By the universal consent of nations, America is the
name bestowed on this new quarter of the globe. The bold pretensions of
a fortunate impostor, have robbed the discoverer of the New World of a
distinction which belonged to him. The name of Amerigo has supplanted
that of Columbus; and mankind may regret an act of injustice, which,
having received the sanction of time, it is now too late to redress. [22]
During the same year, another voyage of discovery was undertaken.
Columbus not only introduced the spirit of naval enterprise into Spain, but
all the first adventurers who distinguished themselves in this new career
were formed by his instructions, and acquired in his voyages the skill and
information which qualified them to imitate his example  Alonso Nigno,
who had served under the admiral in his last expedition, fitted out a single
ship, in conjunction with Christopher Guerra, a merchant of Seville, and
sailed to the coast of Paria. This voyage seems to have been conducted
with greater attention to private emolument than to any general or national
object.  Nigno and Guerra made no discoveries of any importance; but
they brought home such a return of gold and pearls as inflamed their countrymen with the desire of engaging in similar adventures.t
Soon after [Jan. 13, 1500], Vincent Yanez Pinzon, one of the admiral's
companions in his first voyage, sailed from Palos with four ships. He stood
boldly towards the south, and was the first Spaniard who ventured across
the equinoctial line; but he seems to have landed on no part of the coast
beyond the mouth of the Maragnon, or river of the Amazons. All these
navigators adopted the erroneous theory of Columbus, and believed that
the countries which they had discovered were part of the vast continent of
India.n
During the la.-' year of the -fifteenth century, that fertile district of
America, on the confines of which Pinzon had stopped short, was more
fully discovered. The successful voyage of Gama to the East Indies having
encouraged the King of Portugal to fit out a fleet so powerful as not only
Io carry on trade but to attempt conquest, he gave the command of It to
Pedro Alvarez Cabral. In order to avoid the coast of Africa, where he was
* Ierrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 1, 2, 3.  t P. Martyr, dec. p. 87. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 5
H Ilerrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 6. P. Martyr, dec. p. 95.
VOL. I. —11




82                       HISTORY OF                      [BOOK IS
certain of meeting with variable breezes or frequent calms, which might
retard his voyage, Cabral stood out to sea, and kept so far to the west, that,
to his surprise, he found himself upon the shore of an unknown country, in
the tenth degree beyond the line. He imagined at first that it was some
island in the Atlantic ocean, hitherto unobserved; but, proceeding along
its coast for several days, he was led gradually to believe, that: a country
so extensive formed a part of some great continent. This latter opinion
was well founded. The country with which he fell in belongs to that
province in South America now known by the name of Brasil. Wie landed;
and having, formed a very high idea of the fertility of the soil, and agreeableness of the climate, he took possession of it for the crown of Portugal,
and despatched a ship to Lisbon with an account of this event, which
appeared to be no less important than it was unexpected." Columbus's
discovery of the New World was the effort of an active genius enlightened
oy science, guided by experience, and acting upon a regular plan executed
with no- less courage than perseverance. But from this adventure of the
Portuguese, it appears that chance might have accomplished that great
design which it is now the pride of human reason to have formed and
perfected. If the sagacity of Columbus had not conducted mankind to
America, Cabral, by a fortunate accident, might have led them, a few years
later, to the knowledge of that extensive continent.t
While the Spaniards and Portuguese, by those successive voyages, were
daily acquiring more enlarged ideas of the extent and opulence of that
quarter of the globe which Columbus had made known to them, he
himself, far from enjoying the tranquillity and honours with which his
services should have been recompensed, was struggling with every distress
in which the envy and malevolence of the people under his command, or
the ingratitude of the court which he served, could involve him. Though
the pacification with Roldan broke the union and weakened the force of thi
mutineers, it did not extirpate the seeds of discord out of the island
Several of the malecontents continued in arms, refusing to submit to thc
admiral.  He and his brothers were obliged to take the field alternately, in order to check their incursions, or to punish their crimes. The
perpetual occupation and disquiet which this created, prevented him
from giving due attention tQ the dangerous machinations of his enemies in
the court of Spain. A good number of such as were most dissatisfied with
his administration had embraced the opportunity of returning to Europe with
the ships which he despatched from St. Domingo. The final disappointment
of all their hopes inflamed the rage of these unfortunate adventurers against
Columbus to the utmost pitch. Their poverty and distress, by exciting
compassion, rendered their accusations credible, and their complaints interesting. They teased Ferdinand and Isabella incessantly with memorials,
containing the detail of their own grievances, and the articles of their
charge against Columbus. Whenever either the kinD or queen appeared!n public, they surrounded them in a tumultuary manner, insisting with
importunate clamours for the payment of the arrears due to them, and demanding vengeance upon the author of their sufferings. They insulted the
admiral's sons wherever they met them, reproaching them as the offspring
of the projector, whose fatal curiosity had discovered those pernicious
regions which drained Spain of its wealth, and would prove the grave of
its people. These avowed endeavours of the mrnalecontents from America
to ruin Columbus, were seconded by the secret but more dangerous ilsinuations of that party among the courtiers, which had always thwarted his
schemes, and envied his success and credit. 
Ferdinand was disposed to listen, not only with a willing but with a partial
ear, to these accusations.  Notwithstanding the flattering acc-ounts which
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 7.  t Ibid dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 5.  + Life of Columbus, c. 85.




AME RICA.                             83
Columbus had given of the riches of America, the remittances from it had
hitherto been so scanty that they fell far short of defraying the expense of
the armaments fitted out. The glory of the discovery, together with the
prospect of remote commercial advantages, was all that Spain had yet
received in return for the efforts which she had made. But timle had
already diminished the first sensations of joy which the discovery of a
New World occasioned, and fame alone was not an object to satisfy the
cold interested mind of Ferdinand. The nature of commerce was then so
little understood that, where immediate gain was not acquired, the hope of
distant benefit, or of slow and moderate returns, was totally disregarded.
Ferdinand considered Spain, on this account, as having lost by the enterprise
of Columbus, and imputed it to his misconduct and incapacity for government, that a country abounding in gold had yielded nothing of value to its
conquerors. Even Isabella, who from the favourable opinion which she
entertained of Columbus had uniformly protected him, was shaken at length
by the number and boldness of his accusers, and began to suspect that
a disaffection so general must have been occasioned by real grievances which
called for redress. The Bishop of Badajos, with his usual animosity against
Columbus, encouraged these suspicions, and confirmed them.
As soon as the queen began to give way to the torrent of calumny, a
resolution fatal to Columbus was taken. Francis de Bovadilla, a knight of
Calatrava, was appointed to repair to Hispaniola, with full powers to inquire
into the conduct of Columbus, and if he should find the charge of maladministration proved, to supersede him, and assume the government of the
island. It was impossible to escape condemnation, when this preposterous
commission made it the interest of the judge to pronounce the person whom
he was sent to try, guilty. Though Columbus had now composed all the
dissensions in the island; though he had brought both Spaniards and
Indians to submit peaceably to his government; though he had Inade such
effectual provision for working the mines, and cultivating the country, as
would have secured a considerable revenue to the king, as well as large
profits to individuals; Bovadilla, without deigning to attend to the nature
or merit of those services, discovered from the moment that he landed in
Hispaniola, a determined purpose of treating him as a criminal. He took
possession of the admiral's house in St. Domingo, from which its master
happened at that time to be absent, and seized his effects, as if his guilt had
been already fully proved; he rendered himself master of the fort and of the
King's stores by violence; he required all persons to acknowledge him as
supreme governor; he set at liberty the prisoners confined by the admiral,
and summoned him to appear before his tribunal, in order to answer for his
conduct; transmitting to him, together with the summons, a copy of the
royal mandate, by which Columbus was enjoined to yield implicit obedience
tohis commands.
Columbus, though deeply affected with the ingratitude and injustice of
Ferdinand and Isabella, did not hesitate a moment about his own conduct.
He submitted to the will of his sovereigns with a respectful silence, and
repaired directly [October] to the court of that violent and partial judge
whom they had authorized to try him. Bovadilla, without admitting him
into his presence, ordered him instantly to be arrested, to be loaded with
chains, and hurried on board a ship. Even under this humiliating reverse
of fortune, the firmness of mind which distinguishes the character of Columbus
did not forsake him. Conscious of his own integrity, and solacing himsdif
with reflecting upon the great things which he had achieved, he endured
this insult offered to his character, not only with composure but with
dignity. Nor had he the consolation of sympathy to mitigate his sufferings.
Bovadilla had already rendered himself so extremely popular, by granting
various immunities to the colony, by liberal donations of Indians to all who
applied for them, and by relaxing the reins of diiscipline and government,




84                      HISTORY  OF                     [Boox II.
that the Spaniards, who were mostly adventurers, whom their indigence or
crimes had compelled to abandon their native country, expressed the most
indecent satisfaction with the disgrace and imprisonment of Columbus.
They flattered themselves that now they should enjoy an uncontrolled liberty
more suitable to their disposition and former habits of life. Among persons
thus prepared to censure the proceedings, and to asperse the character of
Columbus, Bovadilla collected materials for a charge against him. All
accusations, the most improbable as well as inconsistent, were received.
No informer, however infamous, was rejected. The result of this inquest,
no less indecent than partial, he transmitted to Spain. At the same time he
ordered Columbus, with his two brothers, to be carried thither in fetters;
and, adding cruelty to insult, he confined them in different ships, and
excluded them  from the comfort of that friendly intercourse which might
have soothed their common distress. But while the Spaniards in Hispaniola
viewed the arbitrary and insolent proceedings of Bovadilla with. a general
approbation, which reflects dishonour upon their name and country, one man
still retained a proper sense of the great actions which Columbus had
performed, and was touched with the sentiments of veneration and pity
due to his rank, his age, and his merit. Aionzo de Valejo, the captain of
the vessel on board which the admiral was confined, as soon as he was clear
of the island, approached his prisoner with great respect, and offered to
release him from the fetters with which he was unjustly loaded. " No,"
replied Columbus with a generous indignation, "I wear these irons in
consequence of an order from my sovereigns. They shall find me as
obedient to this as to their other injunctions. By their command I have
been confined, and their command alone shall set me at liberty."
Nov. 23.] Fortunately, the voyage to Spain was extremely short  As
soon as Ferdinand and Isabella were informed that Columbus was brought
home a prisoner and in chamins, they perceived at once what universal
astonishment this event must occasion, and what an impression to their
disadvantage it must make. All Europe, they foresaw, would be filled with
indignation at this ungenerous requital of a man who had performed actions
worthy of the highest recompense, and would exclaim against the injustice
of the nation, to which he had been such an eminent benefactor, as well as
against the ingratitude of the princes whose reign he had rendered illustrious.
Ashamed of their own conduct, and eager not only to make some reparation
for this injury, but to efface the stain which it might fix upon their character,
they instantly issued orders to set Columbus at liberty [Dec. 17], invited
him to court, and remitted money to enable him to appear there in a manner
suitable to his rank. When he entered the royal presence, Columbus threw
himself at the feet of his sovereigns. He remained for some time silent;
the various passions which agitated his mind suppressing his power of
utterance. At length he recovered himself, and vindicated his conduct in a
long discourse, producing the most satisfying proofs of his own integrity as
well as good intention, and evidence, no less clear, of the malevolence of
his enemies, who, not satisfied with having ruined his fortune, laboured to
deprive him of what alone was now left, his honour and his fame. Ferdinand received him with decent civility, and Isabella with tenderness and
respect.  They both expressed their sorrow for what had happened,
disavowed their knowledge of it, and joined in promising him protection
and future favour.  But though they instantly degraded Bovadilla, in order
to remove from themselves any suspicion of having authorized his violent
proceedings, they'did not restore to Columbus his jurisdiction and privileges
as viceroy of those countries which he had discovered. Though willing to
appear the avengers of Columbus's wrongs, that illiberal jealousy winch
* Life of Colunmus, c. 86. Herrera, dec. I. lib. iv. c. 8 —1L Gomara Hist. c. ~3, Oviedo,
Jib, iii. e. 6.




AMERICA                                ~5
prompted them to invest Bovadilla with'such authority, as put it in his
power to treat the admiral with indignity, still subsisted. They were
afraid to trust a man to whom they had been so highly indebted; and
retaining him at court under various pretexts, they appointed Nicholas
de Ovando, a knight of the military, order of Alcantara, governor of
Hispaniola.?
Columbus was deeply affected with this new injury, which came from
hands that seemed to be employed in making reparation for his past
sufferings. The sensibility with which great minds feel every thing that
implies any suspicion of their integrity, or that wears the aspect of an
affront, is exquisite. Columbus had experienced both from the Spaniards,
and their ungenerous conduct exasperated him to such a degree that he
could no longer conceal the sentiments which it excited. Wherever he
went he carried about with him, as a memorial of their ingratitude, those
fetters with which he had been loaded.  They were constantly hung up
in his chamber, and he gave orders, that when he died they should be
buried in his grave.t
1501.] Meanwhile the spirit of discovery, notwithstanding the severe
check which it had received by the ungenerous treatment of the man who
first excited it in Spain, continued active and vigorous. [January,] Roderigo
de Bastidas, a person of distinction, fitted out two ships in copartnery with
John de la Cosa, who having served under the admiral in two of his voyages
was deemed the most skilful pilot in Spain. They steered directly towards
the continent, arrived on the coast of Paria, and, proceeding to the west,
discovered all the coast of the province now known by the name of Tierra
Firme, from Cape de Vela to the Gulf of Darien. Not long after Ojeda,
with his former associate Amerigo Vespucci, set out upon a second voyage,
and, being unacquainted with the destination of Bastidas, held the same
course and touched at the same places. The voyage of Bastidas was
prosperous and lucrative, that of Ojeda unfortunate. But both tended to
increase the ardour of discovery; for in proportion as the Spaniards acquired
a more extensive knowledge of the American continent, their idea of its
opulence and fertility increased.T
Before these adventurers returned from  their voyages, a fleet was
equipped, at the public expense, for carrying over Ovando, the new
governor, to Hispaniola. His presence there was extremely requisite, in
order to stop the inconsiderate career of Bovadilla, whose imprudent
administration threatened the settlementwith ruin. Conscious of the violence
and iniquity of his proceedings against Columbus, he continued to make it
his sole object to gain the favour and support of his countrymen, by
accommodating himself to their passions and prejudices.  With this view,
he established regulations in every point the reverse of those which Columbus
deemed essential to the prosperity of the colony. Instead of the severe
discipline, necessary in order to habituate the dissolute and corrupted members
of which the society was composed, to the restraints of law and subordination,
lie suffered them to enjoy such uncontrolled license as encouraged the wildest
excesses.  Instead of protecting the Indians, he gave a legal sanction to the
oppression of that unhappy people. He took the exact number of such as
survived their past calamities, divided them into distinct classes, distributed
them in property among his adherents, and reduced all the people of the
island to a state of complete servitude. As the avarice of the Spaniards
was too rapacious and impatient to try any method of acquiring wealth
but that of searching for gold, this servitude became as grievous as it was
unjust. The Indians were driven in crowds to the mountains, and compelled
to work in the mines, by masters who imposed their tasks without mercy or
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 10 —1.2. Lifeof Columbus, c. 87  t Life of Columbus, c. 86.
p. 577.  + Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 11.




86                      HISTORY OF                       [BooK II.
discretio;. Labour so disproportioned to their strength and former habits
of life, wasted that feeble race of men with such rapid consumption, as must
have soon terminated in the utter extinction of the ancient inhabitants of
the country.*
The necessity of applying a speedy remedy to those disorders hastened
Ovando's departure. He had the command of the most respectable armament hitherto fitted out for the New World. It consisted of thirty-two ships,
on board of which two thousand five hundred persons embarked with an
intention of settling in the country. [1502.] Upon the arrival of the new
governor with this powerful reinforcement to the colony, Bovadilla resigned
his charge, and was commanded to return instantly to Spain, in order to
answer for his conduct. Roldan and the other ringleaders of the mutineers,
who had been most active in opposing Columbus, were required to leave
the island at the same time. A proclamation was issued, declaring the
natives to be free subjects of Spain, of whom no service was to be expected
contrary to their own inclination, and without paying them an adequate price
for their labour. With respect to the Spaniards themselves, various regulations were made, tending to suppress the licentious spirit which had been
so fatal to the colony, and to establish that reverence for law and order on
which society is founded, and to which it is indebted for its increase and
stability. In order to limit the exorbitant gain which private persons were
supposed to make by working the mines, an ordinance was published,
directing all the gold to be brought to a public smelting-house, and declaring
one half of it to be the property of the crown.t
While these steps were taking for securing the tranquillity and welfare
of the colony which Columbus had planted, he himself was engaged in the
unpleasant employment of soliciting the favour of an ungrateful court, and
notwithstanding all his merit and services, he solicited in vain. He
demanded, in terms of the original capitulation in one thousand four hundred
and ninety-two, to be reinstated in his office of viceroy over the countries
which he had discovered. By a strange fatality, the circumstance which
he urged in support of his claim, determined a jealous monarch to reject
it. The greatness of his discoveries, and the prospect of their increasing
value, made Ferdinand consider the concessions in the capitulation as
extravagant and impolitic. He was afraid of intrusting a subject with the
exercise of a jurisdiction that now appeared to be so extremely extensive,
and might grow to be no less formidable. He inspired Isabella with the
same suspicions; and under various pretexts, equally frivolous and unjust,
they eluded all Columbus's requisitions to perform that which a solemn
compact bound them to accomplish. After attending the Court of Spain
for near two years, as an humble suitor, he found it impossible to remove
Ferdinand's prejudices and apprehensions; and perceived at length that
he laboured in vain, when he urged a claim of justice or merit with an
interested and unfeeling prince.
But even this ungenerous return did. not discourage him froIn pursuing
the great object which first called forth his inventive genius, and excited
him to attempt discovery. To open a new passage to the East Indies was
his original and favourite scheme. This still engrossed his thoughts; and
either from his own observations in his voyage to Paria, or from some
obscure hint of the natives, or from the accounts given by Bastidas and de
la Cosa of their expedition, he conceived an opinion that beyond the continent of America there was a sei which extended to the East Indies, and
hoped to find some strait or narrow neck of land, by which a communication might be opened with it and the part of the ocean already known.
By a very fortunate conjecture, he supposed this strait or isthmus to be
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 11, &c. Oviedo Hist. lib. iii. c. 6. p. 97. Benzon lHist. lib. i. c 12.
p. 51.    t Solorzano Politica Indiana, lib. i. c. 12. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 12.




AMERICA.                              87
situated near the Gulf of Darien. Full of this idea, though he was now o'
an advanced age, worn out with fatigue, and broken with infirmities, he
offered, with the alacrity of a youthful adventurer, to undertake a voyage
which would ascertain this important point, and perfect the grand scheme
which from the beginning he proposed to accomplish. Several circumstances
concurred in disposing Ferdinand and Isabella to lend a favourable ear to
this proposal. They were glad to have the pretext of any honourable
employment for removing from court a man with whose demands they
deemed it impolitic to comply, and whose services it was indecent to
neglect. Though unwilling to reward Columbus, they were not insensible
of his rlerit, and from their experience of his skill and conduct, had reason
to give credit to his conjectures, and to confide in his success. To these
considerations, a third must be added -of still more powerful influence.
About this time the Portuguese fleet, under Cabral, arrived from the Indies;
and, by the richness of its cargo, gave the people of Europe a more perfect
idea than they had hitherto been able to form, of the opulence and fertility
of the East. The Portuguese had been more fortunate in their discoveries
than the Spaniards. They had opened a communication with countries
where industry, arts, and elegance flourished; and where commerce had
been longer established, and carried to greater extent than in any region
of the earth. Their first voyages thither yielded immediate as well as vast
returns of profit, in ccrmmodities extremely precious and in great request.
Lisbon became imme iately the seat of commerce and wealth; while Spain
had only the expectation of remote benefit, and of future gain, from the western
world. Nothing, then, could be more acceptable to the Spaniards tharn
Columbus's offer to conduct them to the East, by a route which he expected
to be shorter, as well as less dangerous than that which the Portuguese had
taken. Even Ferlinand was roused by such a prospect, and warmly
approved of the undertaking.
But interesting as the object of this voyage was to the nation, Columbus
could procure only four small barks, the largest of which did not exceed
seventy tons in burden, for performing it. Accustomed to brave danger,
and to engage In arduous undertakings with inadequate force, he did not
hesitate to accept the command of this pitiful squadron. His brother Bartholomew, anra his second son Ferdinand, the historian of his actions,
accompaniel lAim. He sailed from Cadiz on the ninth of May, and touched,
as usual, at the Canary islands; from thence he proposed to have stood
directly fbr the continent; but his largest vessel was so clumsy and unfit
for service, as constrained him to bear away for Hispaniola, in hopes ot
exchanging her for some ship of the fleet that had carried out Ovando.
When he arrived at St. Domingo [June 29], he found eighteen of these
ships ready loaded, and on the point of departing for Spain. Columbus
immediately acquainted the governor with the destination of his voyage,
and the accident which had obliged him to alter his route. He requested
permission to enter the harbour, not only that he might negotiate the
exchange of his ship, but that he might take shelter during a violent hurric:ne, of.which he discerned the approach from  various prognostics which
h:s experience and sagacity had taught him to observe. On that account.
he advised him likewise to put off for some days the departure of tne
fleet bound for Spain. But Ovando refused his request, and despised his
counsel. Under circumstances in which humanity would have afforded
refuge to a stranger, Columbus was denied admittance into a country of
which he had discovered the existence and acquired the possession. His
salutary warning, which merited the greatest attention, was regarded as
the dream of a visionary prophet, who arrogantly pretended to predict an
event beyond the reach of' human foresight. The fleet set sail for Spain.
Next night the hurricane came on with dreadful impetuosity. Columbus,
aware of the danger, took precautions against it, and saved his little squadron.




88                       HI  T0 HISTORY  OF              [BOOK II.
The fleet destined for Spain met with the fate which the rashness and
obstinacy of its commanders deserved. Of eighteen ships two or three
only escaped. In this general wreck perished Bovadilla, Roldan, and the
greater part of those who had been the most active in persecuting Columbus,
and oppressing the Indians. Together with themselves, all the wealth
which they had acquired by their injustice and cruelty was swallowed up.
It exceeded in value two hundred thousand pesos; an immense sum at that
period, and sufficient not only to have screened them from any severe scrutiny
into their conduct, but to have secured them a gracious reception in the
Spanish court. Among the ships that escaped, one had on board all the
effects of Columbus which had been recovered from the ruins of his
fortune. Historians, struck with the exact discrimination of characters, as
well as the just distribution of rewards and punishments, conspicuous in
those events, universally attribute them to an immediate interposition of Divine
Providence, in order to avenge the wrongs of an injured man, and to punish the
oppressors of an innocent people. Upon the ignorant and superstitious race
of men, who were witnesses of this occurrence, it made a different impression. From  an opinion which vulgar admiration is apt to entertain
with respect to persons who have distinguished themselves by their sagacity
and inventions, they believed Columbus to be possessed of supernatural
powers, and imagined that he had conjured up this dreadful storm by
magical art and incantations in order to be avenged of his enemies.*
Columbus soon left Hispaniola [July 14], where he met with such an
inhospitable reception, and stood towards the continent. After a tedious
and dangerous voyage, he discovered Guanaia, an island not far distant
from  the coast of Honduras.  There he had an interview with some
inhabitants of the continent, who arrived in a large canoe. They appealed
to be a people more civilized, and who had made greater progress in the
knowledge of useful arts than any whom he had hitherto discovered. In
return to the inquiries which the Spaniards made, with their usual eagerness, concerning the places where the Indians got the gold which they
wore by way of ornament, they directed them to countries situated to the
west, in which gold was found in such profusion that it was applied to the
most common uses. Instead of steering in quest of a country so inviting,
which would have conducted him along the coast of Yucatan to the rich
Empire of Mexico, Columbus was so bent upon his favourite scheme of
finding out the strait which he supposed to communicate with the Indian
ocean, that he bore away to the east towards the gulf of Darien. In this
navigation he discovered all the coast of the continent, from Cape Gracias
a Dios to a harbour which, on account of its beauty and security, he called
Porto Bello. He searched in vain for the imaginary strait, through which
he expected to make his way into an unknown sea; and though he went
on shore several times, and advanced into the country, he did not penetrate
so far as to cross the narrow isthmus which separates the Gulf of' Mexico
from the great Southern ocean. He was so much delighted, however,
with the fertility of the country, and conceived such an idea of its wealth
from the specimens of gold produced by the natives, that he resolved to leave
a small colony upon the river Belen, in the province of Veragua, under the'
command of his brother, and to return himself to Spain [150t3], in order to
procure what was requisite for rendering the establishment permanent. But
the ungovernable spirit of the people under his command, deprived Columbus of the glory of planting the first colony on the continent of America
Their insolence and rapaciousness provoked the natives to take arms; and
as these were a more hardy and warlike race of men than the inhabitants
of the islands, they cut off part of the Spaniards, and obliged the rest to
abandon a station which was found to be untenable.4
* Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 7. 9. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. v. c. 1, 9. Lif]C of C9olumbup, c. 8.   t Herrera.'o 1. lib. v. c. 5, &c. Life of Columbus, c. 8, & ~. Oviedo. lib iii c. 9




AMERICA.                              89
This repulse, the first that the Spaniards met with from any of the American nations, was not the only misfortune that befell Columbus: it was
followed by a succession of all the disasters to which navigation is exposed
Furious hurricanes, with violent storms of thunder and lightning, threatened
his leaky vessels with destruction; while his discontented crew, exhausted
with fatigue, and destitute of provisions, was unwilling or unable to execute
his commands. One of his ships perished; he was obliged to abandon
another, as unfit for service; and with the -two which remained, he quitted
that part of the continent, which, in his anguish, he named the Coast of
Vexation,* and bore away for Hispaniola. New distresses awaited him
in this voyage. He was driven back by a violent tempest from the coast of
Cuba,-his ships fell foul of one another, and were so much shattered by the
shock that with the utmost difficulty they reached Jamaica [June 24],
where he was obliged to run them aground, to prevent them from sinking.
The measure 6f his calamities seemed now to be full. He was cast ashore
upon an island at a considerable distance from the only settlement of the
Spaniards in America. His ships were ruined beyond the possibility of
being repaired. To convey an account of his situation to Hispaniola
appeared impracticable; anid without this it was in vain to expect relief.
His genius, fertile in resources, and most vigorous in those perilous extremities when feeble minds abandon themselves to despair, discovered the
only expedient which afforded any prospect of deliverance. He had
recourse to the hospitable kindness of the natives, who, considering the
Spaniards as beings of a superior nature, were eager, on every occasion, to.
minister to their wants. From them he obtained two of their canoes, each
formed out of the trunk of a single tree hollowed with fire, and so misshapen
and awkward as hardly to merit the name of boats. In these, which were
fit only for creeping along the coast, or crossing from one side of a bay to
another, Mendez, a Spaniard, and Fieschi, a Genoese, two gentlemen parti
cularly attached to Columbus, gallantly offered to set out for Hispaniola,
upon a voyage of above thirty leagues.t This they accomplished in ten
days, after surmounting incredible dangers, and enduring such fatigues that
several of the Indians who accompanied them sunk under it, and died.
The attention paid to them by the governor of Hispaniola was neither such
as their courage merited, nor the distress of the persons from whom they
came required. Ovando, from a mean jealousy of Columbus, was afraid
of allowing him to set foot in the island under his government. This ungenerous passion hardened his heart against every tender sentiment which
reflection upon the services and misfortunes of that great man, or compassion for his own fellow-citizens, involved in the same calamities, must have
excited. Mendez and Fieschi spent eight months in soliciting relief for
their commander and associates, without any prospect of obtaining it.
During this period, various passions agitated the mind of Columbus and
his companions in adversity. At first, the expectation of speedy deliverance,
from the success of Mendez and Fieschi's voyage, cheered the spirits of
the most desponding. After some time the most timorous began to suspect
that they had miscarried in their daring attempt [1504]. At length, even
the most sanguine concluded that they had perished. The ray of hope
which had broke in upon them, made their condition appear now more
dismal. Despair, heightened by disappointment, settled in every breast.
Their last resource had failed, and nothing remained but the prospect of
ending their miserable days among naked savages, far from their country
and their friends. The seamen, in a transport of rage, rose in open mutiny,
threatened the life oi Columbus, whom they reproached as the author of
all their calamities, seized ten canoes, which they had purchased from the
Indians, and, despising his remonstrances and entreaties,,made off with
* La Costa de los Constrastea.  t Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 9.
VoL. I.-12                     6




90                     HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK II.
them to a distant part of the island. At the same time the natives mur,
mured at the long residence of the Spaniards in their country. As their
industry was not greater than that of their neighbours in Hispaniola, like
them they found the burden of supporting so many strangers to be altogether intolerable. They began to bring in provisions with reluctance, they
furnished them with a sparing hand, and threatened to withdraw those
supplies altogether. Such a resolution must have been quickly fatal to the
Spaniards. Their safety depended upon the good will of the Indians; and
unless they could revive the admiration and reverence with which that
simple people had at first beheld them, destruction was unavoidable.
Though the licentious proceedings of the mutineers had in a great measure
effaced those impressions which had been so favourable to the Spaniards,
the ingenuity of Columbus suggested a happy artifice, that not only restored
but heightened the high opinion which the Indians had originally entertained
of them. By his skill in astronomy, he knew that there was shortly to be a
total eclipse of the moon. He assembled all the principal persons of the
district around him on the day before it happened, and, after reproaching
them for their fickleness in withdrawing their affection and assistance from
men whom  they had lately revered, he told them, that the Spaniards
were servants of the Great Spirit who dwells in heaven, who made and
governs the world; that he, offended at their refusing to support men who
were the objects of his peculiar favour, was preparing to punish this crime
with exemplary severity, and that very night the moon should withhold her
light, and appear of a bloody hue, as a sign of the divine wrath and an
emblem of the vengeance ready to fall upon them. To this marvellous
prediction some of them listened with the careless indifference peculiar to
the people of America; others, with the credulous astonishment natural
to barbarians. But when the moon began gradually to be darkened, and
at length appeared of a red colour, all were struck with terror. They ran
with consternation to their houses, and returning instantly to Columbus
loaded with provisions, threw them at his feet, conjuring him to intercede
with the Great Spirit to avert the destruction with which they were threat
ened. Columbus, seeming to be moved by their entreaties, promised to
comply with their desire. The eclipse went off, the moon recovered its
splendour, and from that day the Spaniards were not only furnished profusely
with provisions, but the natives, with superstitious attention, avoided every
thing that could give them offence.*
During those transactions, the mutineers had made repeated attempts to
pass over to Hispaniola in the canoes which they had seized. But, from
their own misconduct or the violence of the winds and currents, their efforts
were all unsuccessful. Enraged at this disappointment, they marched towards
that part of the island where Columbus remained, threatening him with
new insults and danger. While they were advancing, an event happened,
more cruel and afflicting than any calamity which he dreaded from them.
The governor of Hispaniola, whose mind was still filled with some dark
suspicions of Columbus, sent a small bark to Jamaica, not to deliver
his distressed countrymen, but to spyout their condition. Lest the sympathy
of those whom he employed should afford them relief, contrary to his intention, he gave the command of this vessel to Escobar, an inveterate enemy
of Columbus, who, adhering to his instructions with malignant accuracy, cast
anchor at some distance from the island, approached the shore in a small
boat, observed the wretched plight of the Spaniards, delivered a letter of
empty compliments to the admiral, received his answer, and departed.
When the Spaniards first descried the vessel standing towards the island,
every heart exulted, as if the long expected hour of their deliverance had
at length arrived; but when it disappeared so suddenly, they sunk into the
*Life of Columbus, c. 103. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 5, 6. Benzon, Hist. lib. i. c 14.




AMERICA.                               91
deepest dejection, and all their hopes died away. Columbus alone, though
he felt most sensibly this wanton insult which Ovando added to his past
neglect, retained such composure of mind as to be able to cheer his followers.
He assured them that Mendez and Fieschi had reached Hispaniola in safety;
that they would speedily procure ships to carry them off; but, as Escobar's
vessel could not take them all on board, that he had refused to go with her,
because he was determined never to abandon the faithful coiripanions of his
distress. Soothed with the expectation of speedy deliverance, and delighted
with his apparent generosity in attending more to their preservation than to
his own safety, their spirits revived, and he regained their confidence.*
Without this confidence he could not have resisted the mutineers, who
were now at hand. All his endeavours to reclaim those desperate men had
no effect but to increase their frenzy.  Their demands became every day
more extravagant, and their intentions more violent and bloody. The
common safety rendered it necessary to oppose them  with open force.
Columbus, who had been long afflicted with the gout, could not take the
field. His brother, the adelantado, marched against them [May 20].
They quickly met. The mutineers rejected with scorn terms of accommodation, which were once more offered them, and rushed on boldly to the
attack. They fell not upon an enemy unprepared to receive them. In the
first shock, several of their most daring leaders were slain. The adelantado, whose strength was equal to his courage, closed with their captain,
wounded, disarmed, and took him  prisoner.   At sight of this, the rest
fled with a dastardly fear suitable to their former insolence. Soon after,
they submitted in a body to Columbus, and bound themselves by the most
solemn oaths to obey all his commands.  Hardly was tranquillity reestablished when the ships appeared, whose arrival Colurnbus had promised
with great address, though he could foresee it with little certainty. With
transports of joy the Spaniards quitted an island in which the unfeeling
jealousy of Ovando had suffered them to languish above a year, exposed to
misery in all its various forms.
When they arrived at St. Domingo [Aug. 13], the governor, with the mean
artifice of a vulgar mind, that labours to atone for insolence by servility,
fawned on the man whom he envied, and had attempted to ruin. He
received Columbus with the most studied respect, lodged him in his own
house, and distinguished him with every mark of honour. But amidst those
overacted demonstrations of regard, he could not conceal the hatred and
malignity latent in his heart. He set at liberty the captain of the mutineers,
whom Columbus had brought over in chains to be tried for his crimes; and
threatened such as had adhered to the admiral with proceeding to a judicial
inquiry into their conduct.  Columbus submitted in silence to what he
could not redress; but discovered an extreme impatience to quit a country
which was under the jurisdiction of a man who had treated him, on every
occasion, with inhumanity and injustice. His preparations were soon finished,
and he set sail for Spain with two ships [Sept. 12]. Disasters similar to
those which had accompanied him through life continued to pursue him
to the end of his career. One of his vessels being disabled, was soon forced
back to St. Domingo; the other, shattered by violent storms, sailed several
hundred leagues withjury-masts, and reached with difficulty the port of St
Lucar [Decemberl.]
There he received the account of an event the most fatal that could have
befallen him, and which completed his misfortunes. This was the death of
his patroness Queen Isabella [Nov. 9], in whose justice, humanity, and
favour he confided as his last resource. None now remained to redress his
wrongs, or to reward him for his services and sufferings, but Ferdinand, who
* Life of Columbus, c. 104. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 17.  t Ibid. c. 107. Herrera, der, 1.
lib. vi. c. 11. + Ibid. c. 108. Henrrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 12.




82                     H HISTORY  OF                   [Boox III.
had so long opposed and so often injured him, To solicit a prince thus
prejudiced against him was an occupation no less irksome than hopeless.
In this, however, was Columbus doomed to employ the close of his days.
As soon as his health was in some degree re-established, he repaired to
court; and though he was received there with civility barely decent, he
plied Ferdinand with petition after petition, demanding the punishment of
his oppressors, and the restitution of all the privileges bestowed upon him
by the capitulation of one thousand four hundred and ninety-two. Ferdinand amused him with fair words and unmeaning promises. Instead of
granting his claims, he proposed expedients in order to elude them, and
spun out the affair with such apparent art, as plainly discovered his intention
that it should never bke terminated. The declining health of Columbus
flattered Ferdinand with the hopes of being soon delivered from an
importunate suitor, and encouraged him to persevere in this illiberal plan.
Nor was he deceived in his expectations. Disgusted with the ingratitude of
a monarch whom he had served with such fidelity and success, exhausted
with the fatigues and hardships which he had endured) and broken with
the infirmities which these had brought upon him, Columbus ended his life
at Valladolid on the twentieth of May, one thousand five hundred and six
in -the fifty-ninth year of his age. He died with a composure of mind
suitable to the magnanimity which distinguished his character, and with
sentiments of piety becoming that supreme respect for religion which he
manifested in eveiy occurrence of his life.+
BOOK IIIo
W rILE Columbus was employed in his last voyage, several events worthy
of notice happened in Hispaniola. The colony there, the parent and nurse
of all the subsequent establishments of Spain in the New World, gradually
acquired the form of.a regular and prosperous society. The humane
solicitude of Isabella to protect the Indians from oppression, and particularly
the proclamation by which the Spaniards were prohibited to compel them
to work, retarded, it is true, for some time the progress of improvement
The natives, who considered exemption from toil as extreme felicity, scorned
every allurement and reward by which they were invited to labour. The
Spaniards had not a sufficient number of hands either to work the mines or
to cultivate the soil. Several of the first colonists who had been accustomed to the service of the Indians, quitted the island, when deprived of
those instruments, without which they knew not how  to carry on any
operation. Many of the new settlers who came over with Ovando, were
seized with the distempers peculiar to the climate, and in a short space above
a thousand of them died. At the same time, the exacting one half of the
product of the mines, as the royal share, was found to be a demand so exorbitant that no adventurers would engage to work them upon such terms. In
order to save the colony from ruin, Ovando ventured to relax the rigoul of
the royal edicts [1505]. He made a new distribution of the Indians among
the Spaniards, and compelled them to labour, for a stated time, in digging
the mines, or in cultivating the ground; but. in order to screen himself from
the imputation of having subjected them again to servitude, he enjoined
their masters to pay them  a certain sum, as the price of their work. He
* Life of Columbus, C. 108. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 13, 14, 15.




A ME Ri CA.                           93
reduced the royal share of the gold found in the mines from the half to the
third part, and soon after lowered it to a fifth, at which it long remained.
Notwithstanding Isabella's tender concern for the oood treatment of the
Indians, and. Ferdinand's eagerness to improve the Royal revenue, Ovando
persuaded the court to approve of both these regulations.*
But the Indians, after enjoying respite from oppression, though during a
short interval, now felt the yoke of bondage to be so galling that they made
several attempts to vindicate their own liberty. This the Spaniards considered as rebellion, and took arms in order to reduce them  to subjection.
When war is carried on between nations whose state of improvement is in
any degree similar, the means of defence bear some proportion to those
employed in the attack; and in this equal contest such efforts must be made,
such talents are displayed, and such passions roused, as exhibit mankind to
view in a situation no less striking than interesting. It is one of the noblest
functions of history to observe and to delineate men at a juncture when their
minds are most violently agitated, and all their powers and passions are
called forth. Hence the operations of war, and the struggles between
contending states, have been deemed by historians, ancient as well as
modern, a capital and important article in the annals of human actions.
But in a contest between naked savages, and one of the most warlike of the
European nations, where science, courage, and discipline on one side, were
opposed by ignorance, timidity, and disorder on the other, a particular
detail of events would be as unpleasant as uninstructive. If the simplicity
and innocence of the Indians had inspired the Spaniaids with humanity,
had softened the pride of superiority into compassion, and had induced them
to improve the inhabitants of the New World, instead of oppressing them,
some sudden acts of violence, like the too rigorous chastisements of
Impatient instructors, might have been related without horror. But, unfortunately, this consciousness of superiority operated in a different manner.
The Spaniards were advanced so far beyond the natives of America in
improvement of every kind, that they viewed them with contempt. They
conceived the Americans to be animals of an inferior nature, who were not
entitled to the rights and privileges of men. In peace they subjected them
to servitude. In war they paid no regard to those laws which, by a tacit
convention between contending nations, regulate hostility, and set some
bounds to its rage. They considered them not as men fighting in defence
of their liberty, but as slaves who had revolted against their masters. Their
caziques, when taken, were condemned, like the leaders of banditti, to the
most cruel and ignominious punishments; and all their subjects, without
regarding the distinction of ranks established among them, were reduced
to the same state of abject slavery. With such a spirit and sentiments were
hostilities carried on against the cazique of Higuey, a province at the
eastern extremity of the island. This war was occasioned by the perfidy
of the Spaniards, in violating a treaty which they had made with the
natives, and it was terminated by hanging up the cazique, who defended
his people with bravery so far superior to that of his countrymen, as
entitled him to a better fatet'
The conduct of Ovando, in another part of the island, was still more
treacherous and crue   The province anciently named Xaragua, which
extends from the fertile plain where Leogane is now situated to the western
extremity of the island, was subject to a female cazique, named Anacoana,
highly respected by the natives.. She, from that partial fondness with which
the women of America were attached to the Europeans (the cause of
which shall be afterwards explained), had always courted the friendship
of the Spaniards, and loaded them with benefits. But some of the adhe
rents of Roldan having settled in her country, were so much exasperated
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. v  c. 3  t Ibid. dec. I. lib. vi. c. 9, 10.




94                       HISTORY  OF                    [Ioo0  III.
at her endeavouring to restrain their excesses, that they accused her oe
having formed a plan to throw  off the yoke, and to exterminate the
Spaniards. Ovando, though he knew well what little credit was due to
such profligate men, marched, without further inquiry, towards Xaragua,
with three hundred foot and seventy horsemen. To prevent the Indians
from taking alarm at this hostile appearance, he gave out that his sole
intention was to visit Anacoana, to whom his countrymen had been so much
indebted, in the most respectful manner, and to regulate with her the mode
of levying the tribute payable to the king of Spain. Anacoana, in order
to receive this illustrious guest with due honour, assembled the principal men
in her dominions, to the number of three hundred; and advancing at the
head of these, accompanied by a great crowd of persons of inferior rank,
she welcomed Ovando with songs and dances, according to the mode of
the country, and conducted him to the place of her residence. There he
was feasted for some days, with all the kindness of simple hospitality, and
amused with the games and spectacles usual among the Americans upon
occasions of mirth and festivity.   But amidst the security which this
inspired, Ovando was meditating the destruction of his unsuspicious entertainer and her subjects; and the mean perfidy with which he executed this
scheme, equalled his barbarity in forming it. Under colour of exhibiting
to the Indians the parade of a European tournament, he advanced with his
troops, in battle array, towards the house in which Anacoana and the chiefs
who attended her were assembled. The infantry took possession of all the
avenues which led to the village. The horsemen encompassed the house.
These movements were the object of admiration, without any mixture of
fear, until, upon a signal which had been concerted, the Spaniards suddenly
drew their swords, and rushed upon the Indians, defenceless, and astonished
at an act of treachery which exceeded the conception of undesigning men.
In a moment Anacoana was secured. All her attendants were seized and
bound. Fire was set to the house; and without examination or conviction,
all these unhappy persons, the most illustrious in their own country, were
consumed in the flames. Anacoana was reserved for a more ignominious
fate. She was carried in chains to St. Dolingo, and, after the formality of
a trial before Spanish judges, she was condemned, upon the evidence of
those very men who had betrayed her, to be publicly hanged.*
Overawed and humbled by this atrocious treatment of their princes and
nobles, who were objects of their highest reverence, the people in all the
provinces of Hispaniola submitted, without further resistance, to the Spanish
yoke. Upon the death of Isabella all the regulations tending to mitigate the
rigour of their servitude were forgotten. The small gratuity paid to them
as the price of their labour was withdrawn, and at the same time the tasks
imposed upon them were increased [1506]. Ovando, without any restraint,
distributed Indians among his friends in the island. Ferdinand, to whom
the Queen had left by will one half of the revenue arising from the settlements in the New WVorld, conferred grants of a similar nature upon his
courtiers, as the least expensive mode of rewarding their services. They
farmed out the Indians, of whom they were rendered proprietors, to their
countrymen settled in Hispaniola; and that wretched people, being compelled to labour in order to satisfy the rapacity of both, the exactions of
their oppressors no longer knew any bounds. But, arbarous as their policy
was, and fatal to the inhabitants of Hispaniola, it produced, for some time,
very considerable effects. By calling forth the force of a whole nation.
and exerting itself in one direction, the working of the mines was carried
on with amazing rapidity and success. During several years the gold brought
into the royal smelting houses in Hispaniola amounted annually to four hundred
~ Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 12. Herrera, dec. 1. ib 1. c. vi.. elaclon de Destruyo. de las Indias pot'Bart. de las Casas, p. 8.




AMERICA.                               95
and sixty thousand pesos, above a hundred thousand pounds sterling; which,
if we attend to the great change in the value of money since the beginning
of the sixteenth century to the present times, must appear a considerable
sum. Vast fortunes were created, of a sudden, by some. Others dissipated,
in ostentatious profusion, what they acquired with facility. Dazzled by
both, new adventurers crowded to America, with the most eager impatience,
o share in those treasures which had enriched their countrymen;  and,
notwithstanding the mortality occasioned by the unhealthiness of the climate
the colony continued to increase.*
Ovando governed the Spaniards with wisdom and justice not inferior to
the rigour with which he treated the Indians. He established equal laws;
and, by executing them with impartiality, accustomed the people of the
colony to reverence them. He founded several new towns in different parts
of the island, and allured inhabitants to them by the concession of'various
immunities. He endeavoured to turn the attention of the Spaniards to
some branch of industry more useful than that of searching for gold in the
mines. Some slips of the sugarcane having been brought from the Canary
islands by way of experiment, they were found to thrive with such increase
in the rich soil and warm  climate to which they were transplanted, that
the cultivation of them  soon became an object of commerce. Extensive
plantations were begun; sugarworks, which the Spaniards called ingenios,
from the various machinery employed in them, were erected, and in a few
years the manufacture of this commodity was the great occupation of
the inhabitants of Hispaniola, and the most considerable source of their
wealth.f
The prudent endeavours of Ovando, to promote the welfare of the
colony, were powerfully seconded by Ferdinand. The large remittances
which he received from the New World opened his eyes, at length, with
respect to the importance of those discoveries, which he had hitherto
affected to undervalue. Fortune, and his own address, having now extricated him out of those difficulties in which he had been involved by
the death of his Queen [1507], and by his disputes with his son-in-law
about the government of her dominions,+ he had full leisure to turn his
attention to the affairs of America. To his provident sagacity Spain is
indebted for many of those regulations which gradually formed that
system of profound but jealous policy, by which she governs her dominions
in the New World.  He erected a court distinguished by the title of
Casa de Contratacion, or Board of Trade, composed of persons eminent
for rank and abilities, to whom he committed the administration of American
affairs. This board assembled regularly in Seville, and was invested with
a distinct and extensive jurisdiction. He gave a regular form to ecclesiastical government in America, by nominating archbishops, bishops, deans,
together with clergymen of subordinate ranks, to take charge of the Spaniards
established there, as well as of the natives who should embrace the Christian
faith, but notwithstanding the obsequious devotion of the Spanish court to
the papal see, such was Perdinand's solicitude to prevent any foreign power
from claiming jurisdiction, or acquiring influence, in his new dominions,
that he reserved to the crown of Spain the sole right of patronage to the
benefices in America, and stipulated that no papal bull or mandate should
be promulgated there until it was previously examined and approved of by
his council. With the same spirit of jealousy, he prohibited anlly goods to
be exported to America, or any person to settle there without a special
license from that council.~
But, notwithstanding this attention to the police and welfare of the colony,
a calamity impended which threatened its dissolution. The original inha* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 18, &c.    t Oviedo, lih. iv. c. 8.    * History of the Reign of
Charles V. p. 6, &c.    5 Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 19 20




96                       HISTORY  OF                    IBooK III.
bitants, on whose labour the Spaniards ]n Hispanlola depended for their
prosperity, and even their existence, wasted so fast that the extinction of the
whole race seemed to be inevitable. When Columbus discovered Hispaniola, the number of its inhabitants was computed to be at least a million.'
They were now reduced to sixty thousand in the space of fifteen years.
This consumption of the human species, no less amazing than rapid, was
the effect of several concurring causes.  The natives of the American
islands were of a more feeble constitution than the inhabitants of the
other hemisphere. They could neither perform the same work nor endure
the same fatigue with men Whose organs were of a more vigorous conformation.'tIhe listless indolence in which they delighted to pass their
days, as it was the effect of their debility, contributed likewise to increase
it, and rendered them from habit, as well as constitution, incapable of hard
abour. The food on which they subsisted afforded little nourishment, and
they were accustomed to take it in small quantities, not sufficient to invigorate
a languid frame, and render it equal to the efforts of active industry. The
Spaniards, without attending to those peculiarities in the constitution of the
Americans, imposed tasks upon them which, though not greater than
Europeans might have performed with ease, were so disproportioned to
their strength, that many sunk under the fatigue, and ended their wretched
days. Others, prompted by impatience and despair, cut short their own
lives with a violent hand. Famine, brought on by compelling such numbers
to abandon the culture of their lands, in order to labour in the mines, proved
fatal to many. Diseases of various kinds, some occasioned by the hardships
to which they were exposed, and others by their intercourse with the
Europeans, who communicated to them some of their peculiar maladies,
completed the desolation of the island. The Spaniards, being thus deprived
of the instruments which they were accustomed to employ, found it impossible to extend their improvements, or even to carry on the works whicP
they had already begun [1508]. In order to provide an immediate remedy
for an evil so alarming, Ovando proposed to transport the inhabitants of the
Lucayo islands to Hispaniola, under pretence that they might be civilizec
with more facility, and instructed to greater- advantage in the Christiar
religion, if they were united to the Spanish colony, and placed under the
immediate inspection of the missionaries settled there. Ferdinand, deceived
by this artifice, or willing to connive at an act of violence which policy
represented as necessary, gave his assent to the proposal. Several vessels
were fitted out for the Lucayos, the commanders of which informed the
natives, with whose language they were now well acquainted, that they
came from a delicious country, in which the departed ancestors of the
Indians resided, by whom they were sent to invite their descendants to resort
thither, to partake of the bliss enjoyed there by happy spirits. That simple
people listened with wonder and credulity; and, fond of visiting their
relations and friends in that happy region, followed the Spaniards with
eagerness. By this artifice above forty thousand were decoyed into Hispaniola, to share in the sufferings which were the lot of the inhabitants ot
that island, and to mingle their groans and tears with those of that wretched
race of lnen.t
The Spaniards had, for some time, carried on their operations in the
mines of Hispaniola with such ardour as well as success, that these seemed
to have engrossed their whole attention. The spirit of discovery languished; and, since the last voyage of Columbus, no enterprise of any
moment had been undertaken. But as the decrease of the Indians rendered
it impossible to acquire wealth in that island with the same rapidity as
formerly, this urged some of the more adventurous Spaniards to search for
new countries, where their avarice might be gratified with more facility.
~ Herrera, dec. 1. iib. x, c. 12. t Ibid. lib. vii. c. 3. Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 6. Gomara Hist. c. 4i.




AM E R I A.                          97
Juan Ponce de Leon, who commanded under Ovando in the eastern district
of Hispaniola, passed over to the island of St. Juan de Puerto Rico, which
Columbus had discovered in his second voyage, and penetrated into the
interior part of the country. As he found the soil to be fertile, and expected, from some symptoms, as well as from the information-of the
inhabitants, to discover mines of gold in the mountains, Ovando permittedhim to attempt making a'settlement in the island. This was easily effected
by an officer eminent for conduct no less than for courage. In a few years
Puerto Rico was subjected to the Spanish government, the natives were
reduced to servitude; and being treated with the same inconsiderate rigour
as their neighbours in Hispaniola, the race of original inhabitants, worn out
with fatigue and sufferings, was soots exterminated.*
About the same time Juan Diaz de Solis, in conjunction with Vincent Yanez
Pinzon, one of Columbus's original companions, made a voyage to the continent. They held the same course which Columbus had taken as far as the
island of Guanaios; but, standing from thence to the west, they discovered
a new and extensive province, afterwards known by the name of Yucatan,
and proceeded a considerable way along the coast of that country.t
Though nothing memorable occurred in this voyage, it deserves notice,
because it led to discoveries of greater importance. For the same reason
the voyage of Sebastian de Ocampo must be mentioned. By the command
of Ovando he sailed round Cuba, and first discovered with certainty, that
this country, which Columbus once supposed to be a part of the continent,
was a large island.:
This voyage round Cuba was one of the last occurrences under the admi
nistration of Ovando. Ever since the death of Columbus, his son, Don
Diego, had been employed in solicitino Ferdinand to grant him the offices
of viceroy and admiral in the New World, together with all the other
immunities and profits which descended to him by inheritance, in consequence
of the original capitulation with his father. But if these dignities and
revenues appeared so considerable to Ferdinand, that, at the expense of
being deemed unjust as well as ungrateful, he had wrested them  from
Columbus, it was not surprising that he should be unwilling to confer them
on his son. Accordingly Don Diego wasted two years in incessant but
fruitless importunity. Weary of this, he endeavoured at length to obtain
by a legal sentence what he could not procure from the favour of an interested monarch. He commenced a suit against Ferdinand before the
council which managed Indian affairs; and that court, with integrity which
reflects honour upon its proceedings, decided against the king, and sustained
Don Diego's claim of the viceroyalty, together with all the other privileges
stipulated in the capitulation. Even after this decree Ferdinand's repugnance
to put a subject in possession of such extensive rights might have thrown
n new obstacles, if Don Diego had not taken a step which interested very
powerful persons in the success of his claims. The sentence of the
council of the Indies gave him a title to a rank so elevated, and a fortune so
opulent, that he found no difficulty in concluding a marriage with Donna
Maria, daughter of Don Ferdinand de Toledo, great commendator of Leon,
and brother. of the duke of Alva, a nobleman of the first rank, and nearly
related to the. king. The duke and his family espoused so warmly the
cause of their new ally, that Ferdinand cduld not resist their solicitations
[1509]. He recalled Ovando, and appointed Don Diego his successor,
though even in conferring this favour he could not conceal his jealousy;
for he allowed him to assume only the title of governor, not that of viceroy,
which had been adjudged to belong to him.~
Don Diego quickly repaired to Hispaniola, attended by his brother, his uncles,
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 1 —4. Gomara Hist. c. 44. Relacion de B. de las Casas, p. 10O
t Ibid. dec. 1. lib. vi. c. 17.  + Ibid. Iib. vii. c. 1.,   Ibid. dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 4, &c.
VOL. I.-13




98                       HISTORY   OF                    [Boox III.
his wife, whom the courtesy of the Span.ards honoured with the title of vicequeen, and a numerous retinue of persons of both sexes born of good families.
He lived with a splendour and magnificence hitherto unknown in the New
World; and the family of Columbus seemed now to enjoy the honours and
rewards due to his inventive genius, of which he himself had been cruelly defrauded. The colony itself acquired new lustre by the accession of so many
inhabitants, of a different rank and character from most of those who had
hitherto migrated to America, and many of the most illulstrious families in the
Spanish settlements are descended from the persons who at that time accompanied Don Diego Columbus.'
No benefits accrued to the unhappy natives from this change of governors.
Don Diego was not only authorized by a royal edict to continue the reparClmientos, or distribution of Indians, but the particular number which he
might grant to every person, according to his rank in the colony, was specilfed. He availed himself of that permission; and soon after he landed at
St. Domningo, he divided such Indians as were still unappropriated, among
his relations and attendants.'
The next care of the new governor was to comply with an instruction
which he received from  the king, about settling a -colony in Cubagua, a
small island which Columbus had discovered in his third voyage.  Though
this barren spot hardly yielded subsistence to its wretched inhabitants,
such quantities of those oysters which produce pearls were found on its
coast, that it did not long escape the inquisitive avarice of the Spaniards,
and became a place of considerable resort. Large fortunes w-ere acquired
by the fishery of pearls, which was carried on with extraordinary ardour.
The Indians, especially those from the Lucayo islands, were compelled to
dive for them; and this dangerous and unhealthy employment was an additional calamity which contributed not a little to the extinction of that,devoted race.$
About this period, Juan Diaz de Solis and Pinzon set out, in conjunction,
upon a second voyage. They stood directly south, towards the equinoctial
line, which Pinzon hiad formerly crossed, and advanced as far as the fortieth
degree of southern latitude. They were astonished to find that the continent of America stretched on their right hand through all this vast extent ot
ocean. They landed in different places, to take possession in name of their
sovereign; but though the country appeared to be extremely fertile and
inviting, their force was so small, having been fitted out rather for discovery
than making settlements, that they left no colony behind them. Their
voyage served, however, to give the Spaniards more exalted and adequate
ideas with respect to the dimensions of this new quarter of the globe.~
Though it was about ten years since Columbus had discovered the main
land of, America, the Spaniards had hitherto made no settlement in any
part of it. What had been so long neglected was now seriously attempted,
and with considerable vigour; though the plan for this purpose was neither
formed by the crown, nor executed at the expense of the nation, but carried
on by the enterprising spirit of private adventurers. The scheme took its
rise from Alonso de Ojeda, who had already made two voyages as a discoverer, by which he acquired considerable reputation, but no wealth.  But
his character for intrepidity and conduct easily procured him associates, who
advanced the money requisite to defray the charges of the expedition.
About the same time, Diego de Nicuessa, who had acquired a large fortune
in Hispaniola, formed a similar design. Ferdinand encouraged both; and
though he refused to advance the snmallest sum, he was extremely liber' l of
titles and patents. He erected two governments on the continent, onf. extending from Cape de Vela to the Gulf of Darien, and the other from that to
Cape Gracias a Dios.  The former was given to Ojeda, the latter to Nicuessa.
x Oviedo. lib. iiic. 1.   t Recopilacion de Leye.s, ib. vi. tit. 8 1. 1, 2. Herrera, dec. 1. lib,
vii.. 10.:    Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 9.  Gomara Hist. c. 78., Ibirl. dec. 1.  ib. vii. o 9.




AMERICA.                               99
Ojeda fitted out a ship and two brigantines, with three hundred men,
Nicuessa, six vessels, with seven hundred and eighty men. They sailed
about the same time from St. Domingo for their respective governments.
In order to give their title to those countries some appearance of validity,
several of the most eminent divines and lawyers in Spain were employed to
prescribe the mode in which they should take possession of them.?  There
is not in the history of mankind any thing more singular or extravagant than
the form which they devised for this purpose. They instructed those
invaders, as soon as they landed on the continent, to declare to the natives
the principal articles of the Christian faith; to acquaint them  in particular, with the supreme jurisdiction of the Pope over all the kingdoms of
the earth; to inform them of the grant which this holy pontiff had made of
their country to the king of Spain; to require them to embrace the doctrines
of that religion which the Spaniards made known to them; and to submit
to the sovereign whose authority they proclaimed. If the natives refused to
comply with this requisition, the terms of which must have been utterly
incomprehensible to uninstructed Indians, then qjeda and Nicuessa were
authorized to attack them with fire and sword; to reduce them, their
wives and children, to a state of servitude; and to compel them by force
to recognise the jurisdiction of the church, and the authority of the monarch,
to which they would not voluntarily subject themselves [231.
As the inhabitants of the continent could not at once yield assent to
doctrines too refined for their uncultivated understandings, and explained to
them by interpreters imperfectly acquainted with their language; as they
did not conceive how a foreign priest, of whom  they had never heard,
could have any right to dispose of their country, or how an unknown prince
should claim jurisdiction over them as his subjects; they fiercely opposed
the new invaders of their territories. Ojeda and Nicuessa endeavoured
to effect by force what they could not accomplish by persuasion. The
contemporary writers enter into a very minute detail in relating their
transactions; but as they made no discovery of importance, nor established
any permanent settlement, their adventures are not entitled to any considerable place in the general history of a period where romantic valour,
struggling with incredible hardships, distinguishes every effort of the
Spanish arms. They found the natives in those countries of which they
went to assume the government, to be of a character very different from that
of their countrymen in the islands. They were free and warlike. Their
arrows were dipped in a poison so noxious, that every wound was followed
with certain death. In one encounter they slew above seventy of Ojeda's
followers, and the Spaniards, for the first time, were taught to dread the
inhabitants of the New World. Nicuessa was opposed by people equally
resolute in defence of their possessions.  Nothing could soften their
ferocity. Though the Spaniards employed every art to soothe theim, and to
gain their confidence, they refused to- hold any intercourse, or to exchange
any friendly office, with men whose residence among them they considerect
as fatal to their liberty and independence [1510].  This implacable enmity
of the natives, though it rendered an attempt to establish a settlement in
their country extremely difficult as well as dangerous, might have been
surmounted at length by the perseverance of the Spaniards, by the superiority of their arms, and their skill in the art of war. But every disaster
which can be accumulated upon the unfortunate combined to complete their
ruin. The loss of their ships by various accidents upon an unknown
coast, the diseases peculiar to a climate the most noxious in all America,
the want of provisions unavoidable in a country imperfectly cultivated,
dissension among themselves, and the incessant hostilities of the natives,
involved them in a succession of calamities, the bare recital of which strikes
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 15.




100                    HISTORY  OF                     [BooK III.
one with horror. Though they received two considerable reinforcements
from Hispaniola, the greater part of those who had engaged in this unhappy
expedition perished, in less than a year, in the most extreme misery.
few who survived settled as a feeble colony at Santa Maria el Antigua, on
the Gulf of Darien, under the command of Vasco Nugnez de Balboa, who,
in the most desperate exigencies, displayed such courage and conduct as
first gained the confidence of his countrymen, and marked him out as their
leader in more splendid and successful undertakings.  Nor was he the
only adventurer in this expedition who will appear with lustre in more
important scenes. Francisco Pizarro was one of Ojeda's companions, and
in this school of adversity acquired or improved the talents which fitted him
for the extraordinary actions which he afterwards performed.  Hernan
Cortes, whose name became still more famous, had likewise engaged early
in this enterprise, which roused all the active youth of Hispaniola to arms;
but the good fortune that accompanied him in his subsequent adventures
interposed to save him from the disasters to which his companions were
exposed. He was taken ill at St. Domingo before the departure of the
fleet, and detained there by a tedious indisposition.*
Notwithstanding the unfortunate issue of this expedition, the Spaniards
were not deterred from engaging in new schemes of a similar nature.
When wealth is acquired gradually by the persevering hand of industry, or
accumulated by the slow operations of regular commerce, the means,
employed are so proportioned to the end attained, that there is nothing to
strike the imagination, and little to urge on the active powers of the mind
to uncommon efforts.  But when large fortunes were created almost
instantaneously; when gold and pearls were procured in exchange for
baubles; when the countries which produced these rich commodities,
defended onlyv by naked savages, might be seized by the first bold invader;
objects so singular and alluring roused a wonderful spirit of enterprise
among the Spaniards, who rushed with ardour into this new path that was
opened to wealth and distinction. While this spirit continued warm and
vigorous, every attempt either towards discovery or conquest was applauded,
and adventurers engaged in it with emulation. The passion for new undertakings, which characterizes the age of discovery in the latter part of the
fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, would alone have been
sufficient to prevent the Spaniards from stopping short in their career. But
circumstances peculiar to Hispaniola, at this juncture, concurred with it in
extending their navigation and conquests. The rigorous treatment of the
inhabitants of that island having almost extirpated the race, many of the
Spanish planters, as I have already observed, finding it impossible to carry
on their works with the same vigour and profit, were obliged to look out for
settlements in some country where people were not yet wasted by oppression. Others, with the inconsiderate levity natural to men upon whom
wealth pours in with a sudden flow, had squandered in thoughtless prodigality
what they acquired with ease, and were driven by necessity to embark in
the most desperate schemes, in order to retrieve their affairs. From all
these causes, when Don Diego Columbus proposed [1511] to conquer the
island of Cuba, and to establish a colony there, many persons of chiet
distinction in Hispaniola engaged with alacrity in the measure. He gave
the command of the troops destined for that service to Diego Velasquez,
one of his father's companions in his second voyage, and who, having been
long settled in Hispaniola, had acquired an ample fortune, with such reputation for probity and prudence, that he seemed to be well qualified for
conducting an expedition of importance. Three hundred men were deemed
sufficient for the conquest of an island of above seven hundred miles in
* Herrera, dec; 1. lib. vii. c. 11, &c; Gomara Hist; c; 57, 58, 59. Benzon. list. lib. i. c. 19-23
P. Martyrs decad. p. 122.




AMERICA.                             101
length, and filled with inhabitants. But they were of the same unwarlike
character with the people of Hispaniola. They were not only intimidated
by the appearance of their new enemies, but unprepared to resist them.
For though, from the time that the Spaniards took possession of the adjacent
island, there was reason to expect a descent on their territories, none of
the small communities into which Cuba was divided, had either made any
provision for its own defence, or had formed any concert for their common
safety. The only obstruction the Spaniards met with was from Hatuey, a
cazique, who had fled from Hispaniola, and had taken possession of the
eastern extremity of Cuba. He stood upon the defensive at their first
landing, and endeavoured to drive them back to their ships. His feeble
troops, however, were soon broken and dispersed; and he himself being
taken prisoner, Velasquez, according to the barbarous maxim  of the
Spaniards, considered him as a slave who had taken arms against his master,
and condemned him  to the flames.  When Hatuey was fastened to the
stake, a Franciscan friar, labouring to convert him, promised him immediate admittance into the joys of heaven, if he would embrace the Christian
faith. "Are there any Spaniards," says he, after some pause, "in that
region of bliss which you describe?"-" Yes," replied the monk, "but
only such as are worthy and good."-" The best of them," returned the
indignant cazique, " have neither worth nor goodness: I will not go to a
place where I may meet with one of that accursed race."'  This dreadful
example of vengeance struck the people of Cuba with such terror that they
scarcely gave any opposition to the progress of their invaders; and Velasquez, without the loss of a man, annexed this extensive and fertile island to
the Spanish monarchy.t
The facility with which this important conquest was completed served
as an incitement to other undertakings. Juan Ponce de Leon, having
acquired both fame and wealth by the reduction of Puerto Rico, was
impatient to engage in some new enterprise. He fitted out three ships at
his own expense, for a voyage of discovery [1512], and his reputation soon
drew together a respectable body of followers. He directed his course
towards the Lucayo islands; and after touching at several of them, as well
as of the Bahama isles, he stood to the south-west, and discovered a country
hitherto unknown to the Spaniards, which he called Florida, either because
he fell in with it on Palm  Sunday, or on account of its gay and beautiful
appearance. He attempted to land in different places, but met with such
vigorous opposition from the natives, who were fierce and warlike, as convinced him that an increase of force was requisite to effect a settlement.
Satisfied with having opened a communication with a new country, of whose
value and importance he conceived very sanguine hopes, he returned to
Puerto Rico through the channel now known by the name of the Gulf of
Florida.
It was not merely the passion of searching for new countries that prompted
Ponce de Leon to undertake this voyage; he was influenced by olne ot
those visionary ideas, which at that time often mingled with the spirit of
discovery, and rendered it more active. A tradition prevailed among the
natives of Puerto Rico, that in the isle of Bimini, one of the Lucayos, there
was a fountain of such wonderful virtue as to renew the youth and recall
the vigour of every person who bathed in its salutary waters. In hopes of
finding this grand restorative, Ponce de Leon and his followers ranged
through the islands, searching with fruitless solicitude and labour for the
fountain which was the chief object of their expedition. That a tale so
fabulous should gain credit among simple and uninstructed Indians is not
surprising. That it should make any impression upon an enlightened people
appears in the present age altogether incredible. The fact, however, is
* B. de las Casas, p. 40.   t Herrera, dec. 1. 1. ix. c. 2, 3, &c. Oviedo, lib. xvii c. 3. p. 170




102                      HISTORY   O1'           ["BooK 1II.
certain; and the most authentic Spanish historians mention this extravagant
sally of their credulous countrymen. The Spaniards at that period were
engaged in a career of activity which gave a-romantic turn to their imagination, and daily presented to them strange and marvellous objects. A New
World was opened to their view. They visited islands and continents, of
whose existence mankind in former ages had no conception.  In those
delightful countries nature seemed to assume another form: every tree and
plant and animal was different from those of the ancient hemisphere. They
seemed to be transported into enchanted ground; and after the wonders
which they had seen, nothing, in the warmth and novelty of their admira
tion, appeared to them so extraordinary as to be beyond belief. If the
rapid succession of new and striking scenes made such impression even
upon the sound understanding of Columbus, that he boasted of having found
the seat of Paradise, it will not appear strange that Ponce de Leon should
dream of discovering the fountain of youth.*
Soon after the expedition to Florida, a discovery of much greater importance was made in another. part of America. Balboa having' been raised
to the government of the small colony at Santa Maria in Darien, by the
voluntary suffrage of his associates, was so extremely desirous to obtain
from the crown a confirmation of their election, that he despatched one of
his officers to Spain, in order to solicit a royal commission, which might
invest him with a legal title to the supreme command. Conscious, however,
that he could not expect success from the patronage of Ferdinand's ministers,
with whom he was unconnected, or from negotiating in a court to the arts
of which he was a stranger, he endeavoured to merit the dignity to which
he aspired, and aimed at performing some signal service that would secure
him the preference to every competitor. Fullof this idea, he made frequent
inroads into the adjacent country, subdued several of the caziques, and
collected a considerable quantity of gold, which abounded more in that
part of the continent than in the islands. In one of those excursions, the
Spaniards contended with such eagerness about the division of some gold,
that they were at the point of proceeding to acts of violence against one
another. A young cazique who was present, astonished at the high value
which they set upon a thing of which he did not discern the use, tumbled
the gold out of the balance with indignation; and turning to the Spaniards,
"C Why do you quarrel (says he) about such a trifle? If you are so passionately fond of gold, as to abandon your own country, and to disturb the
tranquillity of distant nations for its sake, I will conduct you to a region
where the metal which seems to be the chief object of your admiration and
desire is so common that the meanest utensils are formed of it." Transported
with what they heard. Balboa and his companions inquired eagerly
where this happy country lay, and how they might arrive at it. He
informed them that at the distance of six suns, that is, of six days' journey,
towards the south, they should discover another ocean, near to which this
wealthy kingdom was situated; but if they intended to attack that powerful
state, they must assemble forces far superior in number and strength to those
with which they now appeared.4
This was the first information which the Spaniards received concerning
the great southern ocean, or the opulent and extensive country known afterwards by the name of Peru. Balboa had now before him objects suited
to his boundless ambition, and the enterprising ardour of his genius. He
immediately concluded the ocean which the cazique mentioned, to be that
for which Columbus had searched without success in this part of America,
in hopes of opening a more direct communication with the East Indies; and he
* P. Martyr, decad. p. 202. Ensayo Chronol. para la Hist. de la Florida, par de Gab. Cardenas,
p. 1. Oviedo, lib. xvi. c. 11. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ix. c. 5. Hist. de la Conq. de la Florida; paw
Care. de la Vega, lib. 1. c. 3    t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ix. c, 2. Gomara, c. 60. P. Martyr dece
p. 149.




AMERICA.                               103
jectured that the rich territory which had been described to him must be
part of that vast and opulent region of the earth. Elated with the idea
of performing what so great a man had attempted in vain, and eager to
accomplish a discovery which he knew would be no less acceptable to the
king than beneficial to his country, he was impatient until he could set out
upon this enterprise, in comparison of which all his former exploits appeared
inconsiderable. But previous arrangement and preparation were requisite
to ensure success. He began with courting and securing the friendship of
the neighbouring caziques. He sent some of his officers to Hispaniola with
a large quantity of gold, as a proof of his past success, and an earnest of
his future hopes. By a proper distribution of this, they secured the favour
of the governor, and allured volunteers into the service. A considerable
reinforcement from that island joined him, and he thought himself in a condition to attempt the discovery.
The isthmus of Darien is not above sixty miles in breadth; but this neck
of land which binds together the continents of North and South America,
is strengthened by a chain of lofty mountains stretching through its whole
extent, which render it a barrier of solidity sufficient to resist the impulse
of two opposite oceans. The mountains are covered with forests almost
inaccessible. The valleys in that moist climate where it rains during twothirds of the year, are marshy, and so frequently overflowed that the
inhabitants find it necessary, in many places, to build their houses upon
trees, in order to be elevated at some distance from the damp soil, and the
odious reptiles engendered in the putrid waters.*  Large rivers rush down
with an impetuous current from the high grounds. In a region thinly
inhabited by wandering savages, the hand of industry had done nothing to
mitigate or correct those natural disadvantages.  To march across this
unexplored country with no other guides but Indians, whose fidelity could
be little trusted, was, on all those accounts, the boldest enterprise on which
the Spaniards had hitherto ventured in the New World. But the intrepidity
of Balboa was such as distinguished him among his countrymen,at a period
wnen every adventurer was conspicuous for daring courage [1513]. Nor
was bravery his only merit; he was prudent in conduct, generous, affable,
and possessed of those popular talents which, in the most desperate undertakings, inspire confidence.-and secure attachment. Even after the junction
of the volunteers from Hispaniola, he was able to muster only a hundred
and ninety men for his expedition. But they were hardy veterans, inured
to the climate of America, and ready to follow him through every danger.
A thousand Indians attended them to carry their provisions; and, to comrn
plete their warlike array, they took with them several of those fierce dogs,
which were no less formidable than destructive to their naked enemies.
Balboa set out upon this important expedition on the first of September,
about the time that the periodical rains began to abate. He proceeded
by sea, and without any difficulty, to the territories of a cazique whose
friendship he had gained; but no sooner did he begin to advance into the
interior part of the country, than he was retarded by every obstacle, which
he had reason to apprehend, from the nature of the territory, or the disposition of its inhabitants. Some of the caziques, at his approach, fled to the
mountains with all their people, and carried off or destroyed whatever
could afford subsistence to his troops. Others collected their subjects, in
order to oppose his progress; and he quickly perceived what an arduous
undertaking it was to conduct such a body of men through hostile nations,
across swamps, and rivers, and woods, which bad never been passed but
by straggling Indi-ns. But by sharing in every hardship with the meanest
soldier, by appear;ng the foremost to meet every danger, by promising
corfidently to his tro' ps the enjoyment of honour and riches superior to
* P. Martyr, dec. p. 158.




104                     HISTORY  OF                    LBooK III.
what had been attained by the most successful of their countrymen, lihe
inspired them with such enthusiastic resolution, that they followed him
without murmuring. When they had penetrated a good way into the
mountains, a powerful cazique appeared in a narrow pass, with a numerous
body of his subjects, to obstruct their progress. But men who had surmounted so many obstacles, despised the opposition of such feeble enemies
They attacked them with impetuosity, and, having dispersed them with
much ease and great slaughter, continued their march. T'hough their
guides had represented the breadth of the isthmus to be only a journey of
six days, they had already spent twenty-five in forcing their way through
the woods and mountains. Many of them were ready to sink under such
uninterrupted fatigue in that sultry climate, several were taken ill of the
dysentery and other diseases frequent in that country, and all became
impatient to reach the period of their labours and sufferings. At length
the Indians assured them, that from the top of the next mountain they
should discover the ocean which was the object of their wishes. When,
with infinite toil, they had climbed up the greater part of that steep ascent,
Balboa commanded his men to halt, and advanced alone to the summit,
that he might be the first who should enjoy a spectacle which he had so
long desired. As soon as he beheld the South Sea stretching in endless
prospect below him, he fell on his knees, and, lifting up his hands to
heaven, returned thanks to God, who had conducted himrn to a discovery so
beneficial to his country, and so honourable to himself. His followers,
observing his transports of joy, rushed forward to join in his wonder,
exultation, and gratitude. They held on their course to the shore with
great alacrity, when Balboa, advancing up to the middle in the waves with
his buckler and sword, took possession of that ocean in the name of the
king his master, and vowed to defend it with these arms, against all his
enemies.'
That part of the great Pacific or Southern Ocean which Balboa first
discovered, still retains the name of the Gulf of St. Michael, which he
gave to it, and is situated to the east of Panama. From several of the
petty princes, who governed in the districts adjacent to that gulf, he extorted
provisions, and gold by force of arms. Others sent them  to him  voluntarily. To these acceptable presents, some of the caziques added a
considerable quantity of pearls; and he learned from them, with much
satisfaction, that pearl oysters abounded in the sea which he had newly
discovered.
Together with the acquisition of this wealth, which served to soothe
and encourage his followers, he received accounts which confirmed his
sanguine hopes of future and more extensive benefits from the expedition.
All the people on the coast of the South Sea concurred in informing him
that there was a mighty and opulent kingdom  situated at a considerable
distance towards the south-east, the inhabitants of which had tame animals
to carry their burdens. In order to give the Spaniards an idea of these, they
drew upon the sand the figure of the llarnas or sheep, afterwards found in
Peru, which the Peruvians had taught to perform such services as they
described. As the llatna in its form nearly resembles a camel, a beast of
burden deemed peculiar to Asia, this circumstance, in conjunction with the
discovery of the pearls, another noted production of that country, tended to
confirm the Spaniards in their mistaken theory with respect to the vicinity
ef the New World to the East IIdies.'
But though the information which Balboa received from the people on the
coast, as well as his own conjectures and hopes, rendered him extremely
impatient to visit this unknown country, his prudence restrained him from
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. x. c. 1, &c.  Gomnara, c. 62, &r. P. Martyr, dec. p. 205, &c.   t Ibid.
dec. 1. lib. x. c. 2.




AMERICA.                            105
attempting to invade it with a handful of men exhausted by fatigue and
weakened by diseases. [24] He determined to lead back his followers, at
present, to their settlement of Santa Maria in Darien, and to return next
season with a force more adequate to such an arduous enterprise. In order
to acquile a more extensive knowledge of the isthmus, he marched back by
a different route, which he found to be no less dangerous and difficult than
that which he had formerly taken. But to men elated with success, and
animated with hope, nothing is insurmountable. Balboa returned to Santa
Maria [1514], from which he had been absent four months, with greater
glory and more treasure than the Spaniards had acquired in any expedition
in the New World. None of Balboa's officers distinguished themselves
more in this service than Francisco Pizarro, or assisted with greater courage
and ardour in opening a communication with those countries in which he
was destined to act soon a more illustrious part.*
Balboa's first care was to send information to Spain of the important discovery which he had made: and to demand a reinforcement of a thousand
men, in order to attempt the conquest of that opulent country concerning
which he had received such inviting intelligence. The first account of the
discovery of the New World hardly occasioned greater joy than the unexpected tidings that a passage was at last found to the great southern ocean.
The communication with the East Indies, by a course to the westward of
the line of demarcation drawn by the Pope, seemed now to be certain.
The vast wealth which flowed into Portugal, from  its settlements and
conquests in that country, excited the envy and called forth the emulation
of other states. Ferdinand hoped now to come in for a share in this lucrative commerce, and, in his eagerness to obtain it, was willing to make an
effort beyond what Balboa required. But even in this exertion, his jealous
policy, as well as the fatal antipathy of Fonseca, now Bishop of Burgos, to
every man of merit who distinguished himself in the New World, was conspicuous. Notwithstanding Balboa's recent services, which marked him
out as the most proper person to finish that great undertaking which he had
begun, Ferdinand was so ungenerous as to overlook these, and to appoint
Pedrarias Davila governor of Darien. He gave him the command of
fifteen stout vessels and twelve hundred soldiers. These were fitted out
at the public expense, with a liberality which Ferdinand had never displayed in any former armament destined for the New World; and such
was the ardour of the Spanish gentlemen to follow a leader who was about
to conduct them to a country where, as fame reported, they had only to
throw their nets into the sea and draw out gold,t that fifteen hundred
embarked on board the fleet, and, if they had not been restrained, a much
greater number would have engaged in the service.4
Pedrarias reached the Gulf of Darien without any remarkable accident,
and immediately sent some of his principal officers ashore to inform Balboa
of his arrival, with the king's commission to be governor of' the colony.
To their astonishment, they found Balboa, of whose great exploits thgv
had heard so much, and of whose opulence they had formed such high idea,,
clad in a canvass jacket, and wearing coarse hempen sandals used only by
the meanest peasants, employed, together with some Indians, in thatching
his own hut with reeds. Even in this simple garb, which corresponded so
ill with the expectations and wishes of his new guests, Balboa received
them with dignity. The fame of his discoveries had drawn so many adventurers from the islands, that he could now muster four hundred and fifty men.
At the head of those daring veterans, he was more than a match for the
forces which Pedrarias brought with him. But, though his troops murmured loudly at the injustice of the king in superseding their commander,
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. x. c. 3-6. Gomara, c. 64. P. Martyr, dec. p. 229, &c,  t Ibid. c. 14.
+ Ibid. c. 6, 7. P. Martyr, dec. p. 177. 296.
VOL. I. —14




106                     HISTORY O-F                     [Booi III.
and complained that strangers would now reap the fruits of their toil and
success, Balboa submitted with implicit obedience to the will of his sovereign, and received Pedrarias with all the deference due to his character.*
Notwithstanding this moderation, to which Pedrarias owed the peaceable
possession of his government, he appointed a judicial inquiry to be made
into Balboa's conduct, while under the command of Nicuessa, and imposed
a considerable fine upon him, on account of the irregularities of which he had
then been guilty. Balboa felt sensibly the mortification of being subjected
to trial and to punishment in a place where he had so lately occupied the first
station. Pedrarias could not conceal his jealousy of his superior merit; so
that the resentment of the one and the envy of the other gave rise to dissensions extremely detrimental to the colony. It was threatened with a calamity still more fatal. Pedrarias had landed in Darien at a most unlucky time
of the year [July], about the middle of the rainy season, in that part of the
torrid zone where the clouds pour down such torrents as are unknown in
more temperate climates.t The village of Santa Maria was seated in a
rich plain, environed with marshes and woods. The constitution of Europeans was unable -to withstand the pestilential influence of such a situation,
in a climate naturally so noxious, and at a season so peculiarly unhealthy.
A violent and destructive malady carried off many of the soldiers who
accompanied Pedrarias. An extreme scarcity of provision augmented this
distress, as it rendered it impossible to find proper refreshment for the sick,
or the necessary sustenance for the healthy.+  In the space of a month, above
six hundred persons perished in the utmost misery. Dejection and despair
spread through the colony. Many principal persons solicited their dismission, and were glad to relinquish all their hopes of wealth, in order to
escape from that pernicious region. Pedrarias endeavoured to divert those whc
remained from brooding over their misfortunes, by finding them employment.
With this view, he sent several detachments into the interior parts of the
country, to levy gold among the natives, and to search for the mines in
which it was produced.  T hose rapacious adventurers, more attentive to
present gain than to the means of facilitating their future-progress,plundered without distinction wherever they marched. Regardless of the
alliances which Balboa had made with several of the caziques, they stripped
them of every thing valuable, and treated them, as well as their subjects,
with the utmost insolence and cruelty. By their tyranny and exactions,
which Pedrarias, either from want of authority or inclination, did not restrain,
all the country from the Gulf of Darien to the lake of Nicaragua was desolated, and the Spaniards were inconsiderately deprived of the advantages
which they might have derived from the friendship of the natives, in extend
ing their conquests to the South Sea. Balboa, who saw with concern that
such ill-judged proceedings retarded the execution of his favourite scheme,
sent violent remonstrances to Spain against the imprudent government ot
Pedrarias, who had ruined a happy and flourishing colony. Pedrarias,
on the other hand, accused him of having deceived the King, by magnifying
his own exploits, as well as by a false representation of the opulence and
value of the country.~
Ferdinand became sensible at length of his imprudence in superseding
the most active and experienced officer he had in the New World, and, by
way of' compensation to Balboa, appointed him Adelantado, or LieutenantGovernor of the countries upon the South Sea, with very extensive privileges and authority. At the same time he enjoined Pedrarias to support
Balboa in all his operations, and to consult with him concerning every
measure which he himself pursued. [1515] But to effect such a sudden
~ Herrera, dec. 1. lib. x. c. 13, 14.  t Richard, Hist. Naturelle de l'Air, tom. 1, p. 204.: Herrera, dec. 1. iib. x. c. 14. P. Martyr, decad. p. 272.   [ Ibid. dec. 1. lib. x. c. 15. dec. 2.
o., &c. Gomara, c. 66. P. Martyr, dec. 3. c. 10. Relacion de B. de las Casas, p. 12.




AMERI  A.                            107
transition from inveterate enmity to perfect confidence, exceeded Ferdinand's
power. Pedrarias continued to treat his rival with neglect; and Balboa's
fortune being exhausted by the payment of his fine, and other exactions of
Pedrarias, he could not make suitable preparations for taking possession of
his new government. At length, by the interposition and exhortations of the
Bishop of Darien, they were brought to a reconciliation; and, in order to
cement this union more firmly, Pedrarias agreed to give his daughter in
marriage to Balboa. [1516.1 The first effect of their concord was, that
Balboa was permitted to make several small incursions into the country.
These he conducted with such prudence, as added to the reputation which
he had already acquired. Many adventurers resorted to him, and, with
the countenance and aid of Pedrarias, he began to prepare for his expedition to the South Sea. In order to accomplish this, it was necessary to
build vessels capable of conveying his troops to those provinces which he
purposed to invade. [1517.]  After surmounting many obstacles, and
enduring a variety of those hardships which were the portion of the conquerors of America, he at length finished four small brigantines. In these,
with three hundred chosen men, a force superior to that with which Pizarro
afterwards undertook the same expedition, he was ready to sail towards
Peru, when he received an unexpected message from Pedrarias.* As his
reconciliation with Balboa had never been cordial, the progress which his
son-in-law was making revived his ancient enmity, and added to its rancour.
He dreaded the prosperity and elevation of a man whom he had injured
so deeply. He suspected that success would encourage him to aim at independence upon his jurisdiction; and so violently did the passions of hatred,
fear, and jealousy operate upon his mind, that, in order to gratify his
vengeance, he scrupled not to defeat an enterprise of the greatest moment
to his country. Under pretexts which were false, but plausible, he desired
Balboa to postpone his voyage for a short time, and to repair to Acla, in
order that he might have an interview with him. Balboa, with the unsuspicious confidence of a man conscious of no crime, instantly obeyed the
summons;- but as soon as he entered the place, he was arrested by order of
Pedrarias, whose impatience to satiate his revenge did not suffer him to
languish long in confinement. Judges were immediately appointed to proceed to his trial. An accusation of disloyalty to the king, and of an intention
to revolt against the governor was preferred against him. Sentence of death
was pronounced; and though the judges who passed it, seconded by the
whole colony, interceded warmly fobr his pardon, Pedrarias continued inexorable; and the Spaniards beheld, with astonishment and sorrow, the public
execution of a man whom they universally deemed more capable than any
one who had borne command in America, of forming and accomplishing
great designs.4 Upon his death, the expedition which he had planned was
relinquished. Pedrarias, notwithstanding the violence and injustice of his
proceedings, was not only screened from punishment by the powerful patronage of the Bishop of Burgos and other courtiers, but continued in power.
Soon after he obtained permission to remove the colony from its unwholesome station of Santa Maria to Panama, on the opposite side of the isthmus;
and though it did not gain much in point of healthfulness by the change,
the commodious situation of this new settlement contributed greatly to
facilitate the subsequent conquests of the Spaniards in the extensive countries
situated upon the Southern Ucean.4
During these transactions in Darien [1515], the history of which it was
proper to carry on in an uninterrupted tenour, several important events
occurred with respect to the discovery, the conquest, and government of
other provinces in the New World. Ferdinand was so intent upon opening
* Herrera, dec. 2. Iib. i. c. 3. lib. ii. x. 11, 13. 21,  t Ibid. dec. 2. lib. ii. c. 21, 22.   ~   Ibid. lib
Iv. o1. i.




108                     HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK III.
a communication with the Molucca or Spice Islands by the west, that in the
year one thousand five hundred and fifteen he fitted out two ships at his own
expense, in order to attempt such a voyage, and gave the command of them
to Juan Diaz de Solis, who was deemed one of the most skilful navigators
in Spain. He stood along the coast of South America, and on the first of
January, one thousand five hundred and sixteen, entered a river which he
called Janeiro, where an extensive commerce is now carried on. From
thence he proceeded to a spacious bay, which he supposed to be the entrance
into a strait that communicated with the Indian Ocean; but, upon advancing
further, he found it to be the mouth of Rio de Plata, one of the vast rivers
by which the southern continent of America is watered. In endeavouring
to make a descent in this country, De Solis and several of his crew were
slain by the natives, who, in sight of the ships, cut their bodies in pieces,
roasted and devoured them. Discouraged with the loss of their commander,
and terrified at this shocking spectacle, the surviving Spaniards set sail for
Europe, without aiming at any further discovery.*  Though this attempt
proved abortive, it was not without benefit. It turned the attention of
ingenious men to this course of navigation, and prepared the way for a more
fortunate voyage, by which, a few years posterior to this period, the great
design that Ferdinand had in view was accomplished.
Though the Spaniards were thus actively employed in extending their
discoveries and settlements in America, they still considered Hispaniola as
their principal colony, and the seat of government. Don Diego Columbus
wanted neither inclination nor abilities to have rendered the members of this
colony, who were most immediately under his jurisdiction, prosperous and
happy. But he was circumscribed in all his operations by the suspicious.policy of Ferdinand, who on every occasion, and under pretexts the most
frivolous, retrenched his privileges, and encouraged the treasurer, the judges,
and other subordinate officers to counteract his measures, and to dispute his
authority. The most valuable prerogative which the governor possessed
was that of distributing Indians among the Spaniards settled in the island.
The rigorous servitude of those unhappy men having been but little mitigated
by all the regulations in their favour, the power of parcelling out such
necessary instruments of labour at pleasure, secured to the governor great'influence in the colony. In order to strip him of this, Ferdinand created
a new office, with the power of distributing the Indians, and bestowed it
upon Rodrigo Albuquerque, a relation of Zapata, his confidential minister
Mortified with the injustice as well as indignity of this invasion upon his
rights, in a point so essential, Don Diego could no longer remain in a place
where his power and consequence were almost annihilated. He repaired
to Spain with the vain hopes of obtaining redress.t Albuquerque entered
upon his office with all the rapacity of an indigent adventurer impatient to
amass wealth. He began with taking the exact number of Indians in the
island, and found that from sixty thousand, who in the year one thousand
five hundred and eight survived after all their sufferings, they were now
reduced to fourteen thousand. These he threw into separate divisions or
lots, and bestowed them upon such as were willing to purchase them at the
highest price. By this arbitrary distribution several of the natives were
removed from their original habitations, many were taken from their ancient
masters, and all of them subjected to heavier burdens, and to more intolerable
labour, in order to reimburse their new proprietors.-Those additional
calamities completed the misery, and hastened on the extinction of this
wretched and innocent race of men..
The violence of these proceedings, together with the fatal consequences
which attended them, not only excited complaints among such as thought
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. i c. 7.  P. Marty<, dec. p. 317.  t Ibid. dec 1 lib. ix. c. 5. lib  I. cs. 1; Ibid. dec. 1. lib. x c. 12.




AMERICA.                               109
themselves aggrieved, but touched the hearts of all who retained any
sentiments of' humanity. From the time that ecclesiastics were sent as
instructors into America, they perceived that the rigour with which their
countrymen treated the natives, rendered their-ministry altogether fruitless.
The missionaries, in conformity to the mild spirit of that religion which
they were employed to publish, early remonstrated against the maxims of
the planters with respect to the Americans, and condemned the reparti7lientos, or distributions, by which they were given up as slaves to their
conquerors, as no less contrary to natural justice and the precepts of
Christianity than to sound policy. The Dominicans, to whom the instruction
of the Americans was originally committed, were most vehement in testifying against the repartimientos.  In the year one thousand five hundred
and eleven, Montesino, one of their most eminent preachers, inveighed against
this practice, in the great church of St. Domingo, with all the impetuosity
of popular eloquence. Don Diego Columbus, the principal officers of the
colony, and all the laymen who had been his hearers, complained of the
monk to his superiors; but they, instead of condemning, applauded his
doctrine as equally pious and seasonable. The Franciscans, influenced by
the spirit of opposition and rivalship which subsists between the two orders,
discovered some inclination to take part with the laity, and to espouse the
defence of the repartimientos.  But as they could not with decency give
their avowed approbation to a system of oppression so repugnant to the
spirit of religion, they endeavoured to palliate what they could not justify,
and alleged, in excuse for the conduct of their countrymen, that it was
impossible to carry on any improvement in the colony, unless the Spaniards
possessed such dominion over the natives that they could compel them to!abour.*
The Dominicans, regardless of such political and interested considerations,
would not relax in any degree the rigour of their sentiments, and even
refused to absolve, or admit to the sacrament, such of their countrymen as
continued to hold the natives in servitude.t Both parties applied to the
king for his decision in a matter of such importance. Ferdinand empowered
a committee of his privy council, assisted by some of the most eminent
civilians and divines in Spain, to hear the deputies sent from Hispaniola in
support of their respective opinions. After a long discussion, the speculative
point in controversy was determined in favour of the Dominicans, the
Indians were declared to be a free people entitled to all the natural rights
of men; but notwithstanding this decision, the repartimientos were continued
upon their ancient footing.t  As this determination admitted the principle
upon which the Dominicans founded their opinion, they renewed their efforts
to obtain relief for the Indians with additional boldness and zeal. At
length, in order to quiet the colony, which was alarmed by their remonstrances and censures, Ferdinand issued a decree of his privy council [1513],
declaring, that after mature consideration of the Apostolic Bull, and other
titles by which the crown of Castile claimed a right to its possessions in the
New World, the, servitude of the Indians was warranted both by the laws
of God and of man; that unless they were subjected to the dominion of
the Spaniards, and compelled to reside under their inspection, it would be
impossible to reclaim them from idolatry, or to instruct them in the principles
of the Christian faith; that no further scruple ought to be entertained concemrning the lawfulness of the repartimientos, as the king and council were
willing to take the charge of that upon their own consciences; and that
therefore the Dominicans and monks of other religious orders should abstain
for the future from those invectives which, from an excess of charitable but.l-informed zeal, they had uttered against that practice.~
That his intention of adhering to this decree might be fully understood,
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. viii. e. 11.  Oviedo, lib. ii. c. 6. p. 97.  t Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 6. p. 97.
t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. viii. c. 12. lib ix. c. 5' Ibid. dec. 1. lib. ix. c. 14.




110                      HISTORY   OF                   [BooK Ill.
Ferdinand conferred new grants of Indians upon several of his courtiers [25].
But, in order that he might not seem altogether inattentive to the rights of
humanity, he published an edict, in which he endeavoured to provide for
the mild treatment of the Indians under the yoke to which he subjected
them; he regulated the nature of the work which they should be required
to perform; he prescribed the mode in which they should be clothed and
fed, and gave directions with respect to their instructions in the principles of
Christianity.*
But the Dominicans, who from their experience of what was past judged
concerning the future, soon perceived the inefficacy of those provisions, and
foretold, that as long as it was the interest of individuals to treat the Indians
with rigour, no public regulations could render their servitude mild or
tolerable. They considered it as vain, to waste their own time and strength
in attempting to communicate the sublime truths of religion to men whose
spirits were broken and their faculties impaired by oppression. Some ot
them in despair, requested the permission of their superiors to remove to
the continent, and to pursue the object of their mission among such of the
natives as were not hitherto corrupted by the example of the Spaniards, or
alienated by their cruelty from the Christian faith. Such as remained in
Hispaniola continued to remonstrate, with decent firmness, against the servitude of the Indians.t
The violent operations of Albuquerque, the new distributor of Indians,
revived the zeal of the Dominicans against the repartimientos, and called
forth an advocate for that oppressed people, who possessed all the courage,
the talents, and activity requisite in supporting such a desperate cause.
This was Bartholomew de las Casas, a native of Seville, and one of the
clergymen sent out with Columbus in his second voyage to Hispaniola, in
order to settle in that island. He early adopted the opinion prevalent
among ecclesiastics, with respect to the unlawfulness of reducing the
natives to servitude; and that he might demonstrate the sincerity of his
conviction, he relinquished all the Indians who had fallen to his own share
in the division of the inhabitants among their conquerors, declaring that he
should ever bewail his own misfortune and guilt, in having exercised for a
moment this impious dominion over his fellow-creatures.1 From that time
he became the avowed patron of the Indians; and by his bold interpositions
in their behalf, as well as by the respect due to his abilities and character,
he had often the merit of setting some bounds to the excesses of his countrymen. He did not fail to remonstrate warmly against the proceedings
of Albuquerqrue; and though he soon found that attention to his own
interest rendered this rapacious officer deaf to admonition, he did not abandon the wretched people whose cause he had espoused. He instantly
set out for Spain, with the most sanguine hopes of opening the eyes and
softening the heart of Ferdinand, by that striking picture of the oppression
of his new subjects which he would exhibit to his view.6
He easily obtained admittance to the King, whom he ibund in a declining
state of health. With much freedom, and no less eloquence, he represented to him all the fatal effects of the repartinientos in the New World,
boldly charging him  with the guilt of having authorized this impious
measure, which had brought misery and destruction upon a numerous and
innocent race of men, whom Providence had placed under his protection.
Ferdinand, whose mind as well as body was much enfeebled by his distemper, was greatly alarmed at this charge of impiety, which at another
juncture he would have despised. He listened with deep compunction to
the discourse of Las Casas, and promised to take into serious consideration
* Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ix. c. 14.    t Id. ibid. Touron. Histoire G6ndrale de l'Amlrique, tom, i
p. 252.   + Fr. Aug. Davila Padilla Hist. de la Fundacion de la Provincia de St. Jago de Mexico%
p. 303, 304.  Herrera, dec. 1. ib. X. c. 12.  $ Herrera, dec. 1. lib. x. c. 12.  Dec, 2. Jib. i.c. 11.
Davila Padilla Hist. p. 304.




AM ERIC A.                            lI
the means of redressing the evil of which he complained. But death prevented him from executing his resolution. Charles of Austria, to whom all
his crowns devolved, resided at that time In his paternal dominions in the
Low Countries. Las Casas, with his usual ardour, prepared immediately
to set out for Flanders, in order to occupy the ear of the young monarch,
when Cardinal Xiinenes, who, as regent, assumed the reins of government
in Castile, commanded him to desist from the journey, and engaged to hear
his complaints in person.
He accordingly weighed the matter with attention equal to its importance;
and as his impetuous mind delighted in schemes bold and uncommon, he soon
fixed upon a plan which astonished the ministers trained up under the formal
and cautious administration of Ferdinand. Without regarding either therights
of Don Diego Columbus, or the regulations established by the late King, he
resolved to send three persons to America as superintendents of all the colonies
there, with authority, after examining all circumstances on the spot, to decide
finally with respect to the point in question. It was a matter of deliberation and delicacy to choose men qualified for such an important station.
As all the laymen settled in America, or who had been consulted in the
administration of that department, had given their opinion that the Spaniards
could not keep possession of their new settlements, unless they were allowed
to retain their dominion over the Indians, he saw that he could not rely on
their impartiality, and determined to commit the trust to ecclesiastics. As
the Dominicans and Franciscans had already espoused opposite sides in the
controversy, he, from the same principle of impartiality, excluded both these
fraternities from the commission. He confined his choice to the monks of
St. Jerome, a small but respectable order in Spain. With the assistance of
their general, and in concert with Las Casas, he soon pitched upon three
persons whom he deemed equal to the charge. To them he joined Zuazo,
a private lawyer of distinguished probity, with unbounded power to regulate all judicial proceedings in the colonies. Las Casas was appointed to
accompany them, with the title of protector of the Indians.*
To vest such extraordinary powers, as might at once overturn the system
of government established in the New World, in four persons, who, from
their humble condition in life, were little entitled to possess this high authority, appeared to Zapata, and other ministers of the late king, a measure so
wild and dangerous, that they refused to issue the despatches necessary for
carrying it into execution. But Ximenes was not of a temper patiently to
brook opposition to any of his schemes. He sent for the refractory ministers, and addressed them in such a tone that in the utmost consternation they
obeyed his -orders.T  The superintendents, with their associate Zuazo and
Las Casas, sailed for St. Domingo. Upon their arrival, the first act of their
authority was to set at liberty all the Indians who had been granted to the
Spanish courtiers, or to any person not residing in America. This, together
with the infobrmation which had been received from Spain concerning the
object of the commission, spread a general alarm. The colonists concluded
that they were to be deprived at once of the hands with which they
carried on their labour, and that, of consequence, ruin was unavoidable.
But the fathers of St. Jerome proceeded with such caution and prudence as
sooni dissipated all their fears. They discovered, in every step of their
conduct, a knowledge of the world, and of affairs, which is seldom acquired
in, a cloister; and displayed a moderation as well as gentleness still more
rare among persons trained up in the solitude and austerity of a monastic
life. Their ears were open to information from every quarter; they compared the different accounts which they received; and, after a mature
consideration of the whole, they were fully satisfied that the state of the
colony rendered it impossible to adopt the plan proposed by LTas Casas,
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. ii. c. 3.  t Ibid. dec. 2. lib, ii. c. c.




112                      HISTORY OF                     [BOOK I1
andrecommended by the Cardinal. They plainly perceived that the Spaniards
settled in America were so few in number, that they could neither work the
mines which had been opened, nor cultivate the country; that they depended
for effecting both upon the labour of the natives, and, if deprived of it, they
must instantly relinquish their conquests, or give up all the advantages which
they derived from them; that no allurement was so powerful as to surmount
the natural aversion of the Indians to any laborious effort, and that nothing
but the authority of a master could compel them to work; and if they were
not kept constatitly under the eye and discipline of a superior, so great was
their natural listlessness and,ndifference, that they would neither attend to
religious instruction, nor observe those rites of Christianity which they had
been already taught. Upon all those accounts, the superintendents found
it necessary to tolerate the repartimnientos, and to suffer the Indians to remain
under subjection to their Spanish masters. They used their utmost endeayours, however, to prevent the fatal effects of this establishment, and to
secure to the Indians the consolation of the best treatment compatible with
a state of servitude. For this purpose, they revived former regulations,
they prescribed new ones, they neglected no circumstance that tended to
mitigate the rigour of the yoke; and by their authority, their example, and
their exhortations, they laboured to inspire their countrymen with sentiments
of equity and gentleness towards the unhappy people upon whose industry
they depended. Zuazo, in his department, seconded the endeavours of the
superintendents. He reformed the courts of justice in such a manner as to
render their decisions equitable as well as expeditious, and introduced
various regulations which greatly improved the interior policy of the colQny.
The satisfaction which his conduct and that of the superintendents gave
was now universal among the Spaniards settled in the New World; and all
admired the boldness of Ximenes in having departed from the ordinary
path of business in forming his plan, as well as his sagacity in pitching upon
persons whose wisdom, moderation, and disinterestedness rendered themn
worthy of this high trust.?
Las Casas alone was dissatisfied. The prudential consideration which
influenced the superintendents made no impression upon him. He regarded
their idea of accommodating their conduct to the state of the colony, as the
maxim of an unhallowed timid policy, which tolerated what was unjust.
because it was beneficial. He contended that the Indians were by nature
free, and, as their protector, he required the superintendents not to bereave
them of the common privilege of humanity. They received his most virulent
remnanstrances without emotion, but adhered firmly to their own system.
The Spanish planters did not bear with him so patiently, and were ready
to tear him in pieces for insisting in a requisition so odious to them. Las
Casas, in order to screen himself from their rage, found it necessary to take
shelter in a convent; and perceiving that all his efforts in America wVere
fruitless, he soon set out for Europe, with a fixed resolution not to abandon
the protection of a people whom he deemed to be cruelly oppressed.t
Had Xirnenes retained that vigour of mind with which he usually applied
to business, Las Casas must have met with no very gracious reception upon
his return to Spain. But he found the Cardinal languishing under a mortal
distemper, and preparing to resign his authority to the young king, who was
daily expected from the Low Cofintries. Charles arrived, took possession
of the government,' and, by the death of Ximenes, lost a minister whose
abilities and integrity entitled him to direct his affairs. Many of the Flemish
nobility had accompanied their sovereign to Spain. From that warm predilection to his countrynlen, which was natural at his age, he consulted them
with respect to all the transactions in his neiv kingdom; and they, with
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. ii. c, 15. Remesal, Hist; Gener. lib. ii. c. 14, 15, 16   t Ibid. dec. 2 libs
LI. c 16.




AMERICA.                               1l3:an indiscreet eagerness, intruded themselves into every business, and seized
almost every department of administration.*  The direction of American
affairs was an object too alluring to escape their attention. Las Casas
observed their growing influence; and though projectors are usually too
sanguine to conduct their schemes with much dexterity, he possessed a
bustling, indefatigable activity, which sometimes accomplishes its purposes
with greater success than the most exquisite discernment and address. He
courted the Flemish ministers with assiduity. He represented to them the
absurdity of all the maxims hitherto adopted with respect to the govern
ment of America, particularly during the administration of Ferdinand, and
pointed out the defects of those arrangements which Ximenes had introduced.  The memory of Ferdinand was odious to the Flemings. The
superior virtues and abilities of Ximenes had long been the object of their
envy.  They fondly wished to have a plausible pretext for condemning the
measures both of the monarch and of the minister, and of reflecting some
discredit on their political wisdom. The friends of Don Diego Columbus,
as well as the Spanish courtiers who had been dissatisfied with the Cardinal's administration, joined Las Casas in censuring the scheme of sending
superintendents to America. This union of so many interests and passions
was irresistible; and inconsequence of it the fathers of St. Jerome, together
with their associate Zuazo, were recalled.   Roderigo de Figueroa, a
lawyer of some eminence, was appointed chief judge of the island, and
received instructions, in compliance with the request of Las Casas, to
examine once more, with the utmost attention, the point in controversy
between hirn and the people of the colony, with respect to the treatment
of the natives; and in the mean time to do every thing in his power to
alleviate their sufferings, and prevent the extinction of the race.t
This was all that the zeal of Las Casas could procure at that juncture in
favour of the Indians. The impossibility of carrying on any improvements
in America, unless the Spanish planters could command the labour of the
natives, was an insuperable objection to his plan of treating them  as free
subjects. In order to provide some remedy for this, without which he
found it was in vain to mention his scheme, Las Casas proposed to purchase
a sufficient number of negroes from the Portuguese settlements on the coast
of Africa, and to transport them to America, in order that they might be
employed as slaves in working the mines and cultivating the ground. One
of the first advantages which the Portuguese had derived from their discoveries in Africa arose from  the trade in slaves.  Various circumstances
concurred in reviving this odious commerce, which had been long abolished
in Europe, and which is no less repugnant to the feelings of humanity than
to the principles of religion. As early as the year one thousand five hundred
and three, a few negro slaves had been sent into the New World.4  In the
year one thousand five hundred andeleven, Ferdinand permitted the importation of them in greater numbers.6  They -were found to be a more robust
and hardy race than the natives of America.  They were more capable ot
enduring fatigue, more patient under servitude, and the labour of one negro
was computed to be equal to that of four Indians.ll  Cardinal Ximenes,
however, when solicited to encourage this commerce, peremptorily rejected
the proposition, because he perceived the iniquity of reducing one race of
men to slavery, while he was consulting about the means of restoring liberty
to another.~T  But Las Casas, from the inconsistency natural to men who
hurry with headlong impetuosity towards a favourite point, was incapable
of making this distinction. While he contended earnestly for the liberty of
the people born in one quarter of the globe, he laboured to enslave the
* History of Charles V.        t Herrera, dec. 2. lib. ii. c. 16. 19. 21. lib. iii. c. 7, 8.
Iid. dec. 1. lib. v. c. 12.  Q Ibid. lib. viii. c. 9.  I Ibid. lib. ix. c 5.  IF Ibid. dec. 2. lib,. 8.     15                   7
VOL. 1 —15                   7




114                     H IS TO it Y  OF                 [Boox 111.
inhabitants of another region; and in the warmth of his zeal to, save the
A mericans from the yoke, pronounced it to be lawful and expedient to impose
one still heavier upon the Africans. Unfortunately for the latter, Las Casas's
plan was adopted.  Charles granted a patent to one of his Flemish favour-'tfs, containing an exclusive right of importing four thousand neg'roes into
America. The favourite sold his patent to some Genoese merchants for
twenty-five thousand ducats, and they were the first who brought into a
regular form that commerce for slaves between Africa and America, which
has since been carried on to such an amazing extent.*
But the Genoese merchants [1518], conducting their operations, at first,
with the rapacity of monopolists, demanded such a high price for negroes,
that the number imported into Hispaniola made no great change upon the
state of the colony. Las Casas, whose zeal was no less inventive than indefatigable, had recourse to another expedient for the relief of the Indians
He observed, that most 6f the persons who had settled hitherto in Amnerica,
were sailors and soldiers employed in the discovery or conquest of the
country; the younger sons of noble families, allured by the prospect of
acquiring sudden wealth; or desperate adventurers, whom their indigence
or crimes forced to abandon their native land. Instead of such men, who
were dissolute, rapacious, and incapable of that sober persevering industry
which is requisite in forming new colonies, he proposed to supply. the settlements in H-Iispaniola and other parts of the New World with a sufficient
number of labourers and husbandmen, who should be allured by suitable
premiums to remove thither. These, as they were accustomed to fatigue%
would be able to perform the work to which the Indians, from the feebleness
of their constitution, were unequal, and might soon become useful and
opulent citizens. But though Hispaniola stood much in need of a recruit
of inhabitants, having been visited at this time with the small-pox, which
swept off almost all the natives who had survived their long continued oppression; and though Las Casas had the countenance of the Flemish
ministers, this scheme was defeated by the bishop of Burgos, who thwarted
all his projects.f
Las Casas now desparred of procuring any relief for the Indians in those
places where the Spaniards were already settled. The evil was become
so inveterate there as not to admit of a cure. But such discoveries were
daily making in the continent as gave a high idea both of its extent and
populousness. In all those vast regions there was but one feeble colony
planted; and except a small spot on the isthmus of Darien, the natives still
occupied the whole country.  This opened a new and more ample field for
the humanity and zeal of Las Casas, who flattered himself that he might
prevent a pernicious system  from being introduced there, though he had
failed of success in his attempts to overturn it where it was already established. Full of this idea, he applied for a grant of the unoccupied country
stretching along the seacoast from the Gulf of Paria to the western frontier
of that province now known by the name of Santa Martha. He proposed
to settle there with a colony composed of husbandmen, labourers, and'Ecclesiastics. He engaged in the space of two years to civilize ten thousand
bf the natives, and to instruct them so thoroughly in the arts of social life,
that from the fruits of their industry an annual revenue of fifteen thousand
ducats should arise to the king. In ten years he expected that his improvements would be'so far advanced as to yield annually sixty thousand ducats.
He stipulated, that no soldier or sailor should ever be permitted to settle
In this district; and that no Spaniard whatever should enter it without his
permission. He even projected to clothe the people whom he took along
with him in some distinguishing garb, which did not resemble the Spanish
dress, that they might appear to the natives to be a different race of men
* Herrera  dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 20.  t Ibid. dec. 2. lib. ii. c. 21.




AMERICA.                              11l
from those who had brought so many calamities upon heir country.? From
this scheme, of which I have traced only the great lines, it is manifest that
Las Casas had formed ideas concerning the method of treating the Indians,
similar to those by which, the Jesuits afterwards carried on their great
operations in another part of the same continent. He supposed that the
Europeans, by availing themselves of that ascendant which they possessed
in consequence of their superior progress in science and improvement, might
gradually form the minds of the Americans to relish those comforts of which
the7 were destitute, might train them to the artsof civil life, and render them
capable of its functions.
But to the bishop of Burgos, and the council of the Indies, this project
appeared not only chimerical, but dangerous in a high degree. They deemed
the faculties of the Americans to be naturally so limited, and their indolence
so excessive, that every attempt to instruct or to improve them would be
fruitless. They contended, that it would be extremely imprudent to give
the command of a country extending above a thousand miles along the coast
to a fanciful presumptuous enthusiast, a stranger to the affairs of the world,
and unacquainted with the arts of government. Las Casas, far from being
discouraged with a repulse, which he had reason to expect, had recourse
once more to the Flemish favourites, who zealously patronized his scheme
merely because it had been rejected by the Spanish ministers. They prevailed with their master, who had lately been raised to the Imperial
dignity, to refer the consideration of this measure to a select number of his
privy counsellors; and Las Casas having excepted against the members ot
the council of the Indies, as partial and interested, they were all excluded.
The decision of men chosen by recommendation of the Flemings was
perfectly conformable to their sentiments. They warmly approved of Las
Casas's plan, and gave orders for carrying it into execution, but restricted
the territory allotted him to three hundred miles along the coast of Cumana;
allowing him, however, to extend it as far as he pleased towards the interior
part of the country.t
This determination did not pass uncensured. Almost every person who
had been in the West Indies exclaimed against it, and supported their
opinion so confidently, and with such plausible reasons, as made it advisable
to pause and to review the subject more deliberately. Charles himself,
though accustomed, at this early period of his life, to adopt the sentiments
of his ministers with such submissive deference as did not promise that
decisive vigour of mind which distinguished his riper years, could not help
suspecting that the eagerness with which the Flemings took part in every
affair relating to America flowed from some improper motive, and began to
discover an inclination to examine in person into the state of the question
concerning the character of the Americans, and the proper manner of
treating them.' An opportunity of making this inquiry with great advantage
soon occurred [June 20]. Quevedo, the bishop of Darien, who had accompanied Pedrarias to the continent in the year one thousand five hundred
and thirteen, happened to land at Barcelona, where the court then resided.
It was quickly known that his sentiments concerning the talents and disposition of the Indians differed from those of Las Casas: and Charles
naturally concluded that by confronting two respectable persons, who,
during their residence in America, had full leisure to observe the manners
of the people whom they pretended to describe, he might be able to
discover which of them had formed his opinion with the greatest discernment and accuracy.
A day for this solemn audience was appointed.  The emperor appeared
with extraordinary pomp, and took his seat on a throne in the great hall of
* Herrera, dec. 2. Ilb. iv. c. 2.    t Gomara Hist. Gener. c. 77 Herrera, dec. o2. lib. iv c. a
Oviedo, lib. xix. c. 5.




116                      HISTORY  OF                     [BooK III.
the palace.  His principal courtiers attended.  Don Diego Columbus,
admiral of the Indies, was summoned to be present. The bishop of Darien
was called upon first to deliver his opinion. He, in a short discourse,
lamented the fatal desolation of America by the extinction of so many of
ts inhabitants; he acknowledged that this must be imputed, in some
degree, to the extensive rigour and inconsiderate proceedings of the
Spaniards; but declared that all the people of the New World whom  he
had seen, either in the continent or in the islands, appeared to him to be a
race of men marked out, by the inferiority of their talents; for servitude,
and whom it would be impossible to instruct or improve; unless they were
kept under the continual inspection of a master. Las Casas, at greater
length and with more fervour, defended his own system. He rejected with
indignation the idea that any race of men was born to servitude as irreligious
and inhuman. He asserted that the faculties of the Americans were not
naturally despicable, but unimproved; that they were capable of receiving
instruction in the principles of religion, as well as of acquiring the industry
and arts which would qualify them for the various offices of social life;
that the mildness and timidity of their nature rendered theinm so submissive
and docile, that they might be led and formed with a gentle hand. He
professed that his intentions in proposing the scheme now under considera
tion were pure and disinterested; and though from the accomplishment of
his designs inestimable benefits would result to the crown of Castile, he
never had claimed, nor ever would receive, any recompense on that
account.
Charles, after hearing both, and consulting with his ministers, did not
think himself sufficiently informed to establish any general arrangement
with respect to the state of the Indians; but as he had perfect confidence in
the integrity of Las Casas, and as even the bishop of Darien admitted his
scheme to be of such importance that a trial should be made of its effects,
he issued a patent [1522], granting him the district of Cumana formerly
mentioned, with full power to establish a colony there according to his
own plan.?
Las Casas pushed on the preparations for his voyage with his usual
ardour. But, either from his own inexperience in the conduct of affairs,
or from  the secret opposition of the Spanish nobility, who universally
dreaded the success of an institution that might rob them of the industrious
and useful hands which cultivated their estates, his progress in engaging
husbandmen and labourers Was extremely slow, and he could not prevail
on more than two hundred to accompany him to Cumana.
Nothing, however, could damp his zeal. With this slender train, hardly
sufficient to take possession of such a large territory, and altogether unequal
to any effectual attempt towards civilizing its inhabitants, he set sail. The
first place at which he touched was the island of Piieirto Rico. There lie
received an account of a new obstacle to the execution of his scheme,
more insuperable than any he had hitherto encountered. When he left
America, in the year one thousand five hundred and sixteen, the Spaniards
had little intercourse with any part of the continent except the countries
adjacent to the Gulf of Darien. But as every species of inteinal industry
began to stagnate in Hispaniola, when, by the rapid decrease of the natives,
the Spaniards were deprived of those hands with which they had hitherto
carried on their operations, this prompted them  to try various expedients
for supplying that loss. Considerable numbers of negroes were imported;
but, on account of their exorbitant price, many of the planters could not
afford to purchase them. In order to procure slaves at an easier rate, some
of the Spaniards in Hispaniola fitted out vessels to cruise along the coast
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. iV. c. 3, 4, 5. Argensola Annales d'Aragon, 74. 97. Remisal fist. Gcner.
lib. ii. c. 10, 20.




AMERICA.                             117
ot the continent. In places where they found themselves inferior in strength,
they traded with the natives, and gave European toys in exchange for the
plates of gold worn by them as ornaments; but, wherever they could
surprise or overpower the Indians, they carried them off by force, and sold
them as slaves.- In those predatory excursions such atrocious acts of
violence and cruelty had been committed, that the Spanish name was
held in detestation all over the continent. Whenever any ships appeared,
the inhabitants either fled to the woods, or rushed down to the shore in arms
to repel those hated disturbers of their tranquillity. They forced some
parties of the Spaniards to retreat with precipitation; they cut off others;
and in the violence of their resentment against the whole nation, they
murdered two Dominican missionaries, whose zeal had prompted them to
settle in the province of Cumana.t This outrage against persons revered
for their sanctity excited such indignation among the people of Hispaniola,
who, notwithstanding all their licentious and cruel proceedings, were
possessed with a wonderful zeal for religion, and a superstitious respect
for its ministers, that they determined to inflict exemplary punishment,
not only upon the perpetrators of that crime, but upon the whole race.
With this view, they gave the command of five ships and three hundred
men to Diego Ocampo, with orders to lay waste the country of Cumana
with fire and sword, and to transport all the inhabitants as slaves to Hispaniola. This armament Las Casas found at Puerto Rico, in its way to
the continent; and as Ocampo refused to defer his voyage, he immediately
perceived that it would be impossible to attempt the execution of his
pacific plan in a country, destined to be the seat of war and desolation.T
In order to provide against the effects of this unfortunate incident, he
set sail directly for St. Domingo [April 12], leaving his followers cantoned
out among the planters in Puerto Rico. From many concurring causes,
the reception which Las Casas met with in Hispaniola was very unfavourable. In his negotiations for the relief of the Indians, he had censured
the conduct of his countrymen settled there with such honest severity as
rendered him universally odious to them. They considered their own
ruin as the inevitable consequence of his success. They were now elated
with hope of receiving a large recruit of slaves from Cumana, which must
rbe relinquished if Las Casas were assisted in settling his projected colony
there. Figueroa, in consequence of the instructions which he had received
in Spain, had made an experiment concerning the capacity of the Indians,
that was represented as decisive against the system of Las Casas. He
collected in Hispaniola a good number of the natives, and settled them
in two villages, leaving them at perfect liberty, and with the uncontrolled
direction of their own actions. But that people, accustomed to a mode
of life extremely different from that which takes place wherever civilization has made any considerable progress, were incapable of assuming
new habits at once. Dejected with their own misfortunes as well as those
of their country, they exerted so little industry in cultivating the ground,
appeared so devoid of solicitude or foresight in providing i~or their own
wants, and were such strangers to arrangement in conducting their affairs,
that the Spaniards pronounced them incapable of being formed to live
like men in social life, and considered thenm as children, who should be
kept under the perpetual tutelage of persons superior to themselves in
wisdom and sagacity.~
Notwithstanding all those circumstances, which alienated the persons
in Hispaniola to whom Las Casas applied from himself and from his
measures, he, by his activity and perseverance, by some concessions and
many threats, obtained at length a small body of troops to protect him
* Herrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 3.  f Oviedo, Hist. lib. xix. p. 3  + Herrera, dec. 2. 1i1. ix.
t 8, 9.  ~ Ibid. dec. 2. lib. x  c. 5.




118                     HISTORY   OF                    [BOOK III.
and his colony at their first landing. But upon his return to Puerto Rico,
he found that the diseases of the climate had been fatal to several of his
people; and that others having got employment in that island, refused to
follow him. With the handful that remained, he set sail and landed in
Cumana. Ocampo had executed his commission in that province with
such barbarous rage, having massacred many of the inhabitants, sent others
in chains to Hispaniola, and forced the rest to fly for shelter to the woods,
that the people of a small colony, which he had planted at a place which
he named Toledo, were ready to perish for want in a desolated country
There, however, Las Casas was obliged to fix his residence, though
deserted both by the troops appointed to protect him, and by those under
the command of Ocampo, who foresaw and dreaded the calamities to
which he must be exposed in that wretched station. H-Te made the best
provision in his power for the safety and subsistence of his followers, I-ut
as his utmost efforts availed little towards securing either the one or the
other, he returned to Hispaniola, in order to solicit more effectual aid for
the preservation of men who, from confidence in him, had ventured into
a post of so much danger. Soon after his departure, the natives, having
discovered the feeble and defenceless state of the Spaniards, assembled
secretly, attacked them with the fury natural to men exasperated by many
injuries, cut off a good number, and compelled the rest to fly in the utmost
consternation to the island of Cubagua. The small colony settled there
on account of the pearl fishery, catching the panic with which their countrymen had been seized, abandoned the island, and not a Spaniard remained
in any part of the continent, or adjacent islands, from the Gulf of Paria
to the borders of Darien. Astonished at such a succession of disasters,
Las Casas was ashamed to show his face after this fatal termination of all
his splendid schemes. He shut himself up in the convent of the Dominicans at St. Domingo, and soon after assumed the habit of that order."
Though the expulsion of the colony from Cumana happened in the year
one thousand five hundred and twenty-one, I have chosen to trace the progress
of Las Casas's negotiations from their first rise to their final issue without
interruption. His system was the object of long and attentive discussion; and
though his efforts in behalf of the oppressed Americans, partly from his own
rashness and imprudence, and partly from the malevolent opposition of his
adversaries, were not attended with that success which he promised with
too sanguine confidence, great praise is due to his humane activity, which
gave rise to various regulations that were of some benefit to that unhappy
people. I return now to the history of the Spanish discoveries as they
occur in the order of time.'
Diego Velasquez, who conquered Cuba in the year one thousand five
hundred and eleven, still retained the government of that island, as the
deputy of Don Diego Columbus, though he seldom acknowledged his superior, and aimed at rendering his own authority altogether independent t
Under his prudent administration, Cuba became one of the most flourishing~
of the Spanish settlements. The fame of this allured thither many persons
from the other colonies, in hopes of finding either some permanent establishment or some employment for their activity. As Cuba lay to the west of
all the islands occupied by the Spaniards, and as the ocean which stretches
beyond it towards that quarter had not hitherto been explored, these circumstances naturally invited the inhabitants to attempt new discoveries. An
expedition fbr this purpose, in which activity and resolution might conduct
to sudden wealth, was more suited to the genius of the age than the patient
industry requisite in clearing ground and manufacturing sugar. Instigated
* Herrera, dec. 2. lih. x. c, 5. dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 3, 4, 5.  Oviedo, Hist. Iib. xixr. c. 5.  Gomara, c. 77.
D)avila Padilla, lib. i. c. 97. Remisal Hist. Gen. lib xi. c. i2, 23.  t Herrera. dec. 2. lib. x. c 5. p
329  + Ibid. lib. ii. c. 19.




AM E It IC A.                       119
by thisspirit, several officers, who had served under Pedrarias in Darien,
entered Into an association to undertake a voyage of discovery. They
persuaded Franscisco Hernandez Cordova, an opulent planter in Cuba,
and a man of distinguished courage, to join with them in the adventure, and
chose him to be their commander. Velasquez not only approved of the
design, but assisted in carrying it on. As the veterans from Darien were
extremely indigent, he anct Cordova advanced money for purchasing three
small vessels, and fiirnished them with every thing requisite either for
traffic or for war. A hundred and ten men embarked on board of them,
and sailed from St. Jago de Cuba, on the eighth of February, one thousand five hundred and seventeen. By the advice of their chief pilot,
Antonio Alaminos, who had served under the first admiral Columbus, they
stood directly west, relying on the opinion of that great navigator, who
uniformly maintained that a westerly course would lead to the most
Important discoveries.
On the twenty-first day after their departure from St. Jago, they saw land,
which proved to be Cape Catoche, the eastern point of that large peninsula
projecting from the continent of America, which still retains its original name
of Yucatan. As they approached the shore, five canoes came off full of
people decently clad in cotton garments; an astonishing spectacle to the
Spaniards, who had found every other part of America possessed by naked
savages. Cordova endeavoured by small -presents to gain the good will
of these people. They, though amazed at the strange objects now presented for the first time to their view, invited the Spaniards to visit their
habitations, with an appearance of cordiality. They landed accordingly,
and as they advanced into the country, they observed with new wonder
some large houses built with stone. But they soon found that, if the
people of Yucatan had made progress in improvement beyond their cour
trymen, they were likewise more artful and warlike. For though the
cazique had received Cordova with many tokens of friendship, he had
posted a considerable body of his subjects in ambush behind a thicket,
who, upon a signal given by him, rushed out and attacked the Spaniards
with great boldness, and some degree of martial order. At the first flight
of their arrows, fifteen of the Spaniards were wounded; but the Indians
were struck with such terror by the sudden explosion of the fire arms, and
so surprised at the execution done by them, by the cross bows, and by the
other weapons of their new enemies, that they fled precipitately. Cordova
quitted a country where he had met with such a fierce reception, carrying
off two prisoners, together with the ornaments'of a small temple which he
plundered in his retreat.
He continued his course towards the west, without losing sigoht of the coast,
and on the sixteenth day arrived at Campeachy. There the natives received them more hospitably; but the Spaniards were much surprised, that on
all the extensive coast along which they had sailed, and which they imagined
to be a large island, they had not observed any river [26]. As their water had
began to fail, they advanced, in hopes of finding a supply; and at length
they,discovered the mouth of a river at Potonchan, some leagues beyond
Campeachy.
Cordova landed all his troops, in order to protect the sailors while employed in filling the casks; but notwithstanding this precaution, the natives
rushed down upon them with such fury and in such numbers, that forty
seven of the Spaniards were killed upon the spot, and one man only of the
whole body escaped unhurt. Their commander, though wounded in
twelve different places, directed the retreat with presence of mind equal
to the courage with which he had led them on in the engagement, and
with much difficulty they regained their ships. After this fatal repulse,
nothing remained but to hasten back to Cuba with their shattered forces.
In their passage thither they suffered the most exquisite dist ess for want




120                    H I ST O R Y  OF                [Boox III.
of water,that men, wounded and sickly, shut up in small vessels, and ex
posed to the heat of the torrid zone, can be. supposed to endure. Some of
them, sinking under these calamities, died by the way; Cordova, their
commander, expired soon after they landed in Cuba.4
Notwithstanding the disastrous conclusion of this expedition, it contributed rather to animate than to damp a spirit of enterprise among
the Spaniards. They had discovered an extensive country, situated
at no great distance from Cuba, fertile in appearance, and possessed
by a people far superior in improvement to any hitherto known in America.  Though they had carried on little commercial intercourse with
the natives, they had brought off some ornaments of gold, not considerable in value, but of singular fabric.. These circumstances, related
with the exaggeration natural to men desirous of heightening the merit
of their own exploits, were more than sufficient to excite romantic hopes
and expectations. Great numbers offered to engage in a new expedition. Velasquez, solicitous to distinguish himself by some service so
meritorious as might entitle him to claim the government of Cuba independent of the admiral, not only encouraged their ardour, but at his
own expense fitted out four ships for the voyage. Two hundred and
forty volunteers, among whom were several persons of rank and fortune,
embarked in this enterprise. The command of it was given to Juan de
Grijalva, a young man of known merit and courage, with instructions to
observe attentively the nature of the countries which he should discover,
to barter for gold, and, if circumstances were inviting, to settle a colony in
some proper station. He sailed from St. Jago de Cuba on the eighth of
April, one thousand five hundred and eighteen. The pilot, Alaminos,
held the same course as in the former voyage; but the violence of the
currents carrying the ships to the south, the first land which they made
was the island of Cozumel, to the east of Yucatan. As all the inhabitants
fled to the woods and mountains at the approach of the Spaniards, they
made no long stay there, and without any remarkable occurrence they
reazhed Potonchan on the opposite side of the peninsula. The desire of
avenging their countrymen, who had been slain there, concurred with their
ideas of good policy, in prompting them to land, that they might chastise
the Indians of that district with such exemplary rigour as would strike
terror into all the people round them. But though they disembarked all
their troops, and carried ashore some field pieces, the Indians fought with
such courage, that the Spaniards gained the victory with difficulty, and
were confirmed in their opinion that the inhabitants of this country would
prove more formidable enemies than any they had met with in other parts of
America. From Potonchan they continued their voyage towards the west,
keeping as near as possible to the shore, and casting anchor every evening,
from dread of the dangerous accidents to which they might be exposed in
an unknown sea. During the day their eyes were turned continually
towards land, with a mixture of surprise and wonder at the beauty of the
country, as well as the novelty of the objects which they beheld. Many
villages were scattered along the coast, in which they could distinguish
houses of stone that appeared white and lofty at a distance. In the warmth
of their admiration, they fancied these to be cities adorned with towers
and pinnacles; and one of the soldiers happening to remark that this
country resembled Spain in appearance, Grijalva, with universal applause,
called it VNewe Spain, the name which still distinguishes this extensive and
opulent province of the Spanish empire in America [27]. They landed
in a river which the natives called Tabasco [June 9]; and the fame of their
* Herrera, dec. S. lib. ii. c. 17, 18. Hist. Vcrdadera de la Conquista de la Nueva Espana pot
Bernal Diaz del Costillo, cap. 1-7. Oviedo, lib. xvii. c. 3. Gomara, ce 52 P. P. Martyr de Insulis
nuper inventis p ~29.




AMERICA                            121
victory at Potonchan having reached this place, the cazique not only
received them amicably, but bestowed presents upon them of such value,
as confirmed the high ideas which the Spaniards had formed with respect
to the wealth and fertility of the country. These ideas were raised still
higher by Nwhat occurred at the place where they next touched. This was
considerably to the west of Tabasco, in the province since known by the
name of Guaxaca. There they were received with the respect paid to
superior beings. The people perfumed them, as they landed, with incense
of gum copal, and presented to them as offerings the choicest delicacies of,heir country. They were extremely fond of trading with their new
visitants, and in six days the Spaniards obtained ornaments bf gold of
curious workmanship, to the value of fifteen thousanL pesos, in exchange
for European toys of small price. The two prisoners -v hom Cordova had
Drought from Yucatan, had hitherto served as interpreters; but as they did
not understand the language of this country, the Spaniards learned from
the natives by signs, that they were subjects of a great monarch called
Montezuma, whose dominions extended over that and many other provinccs
Leaving this place, with which he had so much reason to be pleased,
Grijalva continued his course towards the west. He landed on a small
island [June 19], which he named the Isle of Sacrifices, because there the
Spaniards beheld, for the first time, the horrid spectacle of human victims,
which the barbarous superstition of the natives offered to their gods. He
touched at another small island, which he called St. Juan de Ulua. From this
place he despatched Pedro de Alvarado, one of his officers, to Velasquez,
with a full account of the important discoveries which he had made, and
with all the treasure that he acquired by trafficking with the natives.
After the departure of Alvarado, he himself, with the remaining vessels,
proceeded along the coast as far as the river Panuco, the country still ap
pearing to be well peopled, fertile, and opulent.
Several of Grijalva's officers contended that it was not enough to have
discovered those delightful regions, or to have performed, at their different
landing-places, the empty ceremony of taking possession of them for the
crownof Castile, and that their glory was incomplete, unless they planted
a colony in some proper station, which might not only secure the Spanish
nation a footing in the country, but, with the reinforcements which they
were certain of receiving, might gradually subject the whole to the
dominion of their sovereign. But the squadron had now been above five
months at sea; the greatest part of their provisions was exhausted, and
what remained of their stores so much corrupted by the heat of the
climate, as to be almost unfit for use; they had lost some men by death;
others were sickly; the country was crowded with people who seemed
to be intelligent as well as brave; and they were under the government
of one powerful monarch, who could bring them to act against their invaders
with united force. To plant a colony under so many circumstances of
disadvantage, appeared a scheme too perilous to be attempted. Grijalva,
though possessed both of ambition and courage, was destitute of the
superior talents capable of forming or executing such a great plan. He
judged it more prudent to return to Cuba, having fulfilled the purpose of
his voyage, and accomplished all that the armament which he commanded
enabled him to perform. He returned to St. Jago de Cuba, on the
twenty-sixth of October, from which he had taken his departure about
six months before.*
This was the longest as well as the most successful voyage which the
Spaniards had hitherto made in the New World. They had discovered
that Yucatan was not an island as they had supposed, but part of the great
* Herrera, dec. 11. lib. iii. c. 1, 2. 9, 10.  Bernal Diaz, c. 8. 17.  Oviedo Hist. lib. xvii. o. 9..2
Gomara, c. 49
VOL. I. —16




12.5                   HISTORY  OF                  [BOOK IV.
continent of America. From Potonchan they had pursued their course
for many hundred miles along a coast formerly unexplored, stretching at
first towards the west, and then turning to the north; all the country which
they had discovered appeared to be no less valuable than extensive. As
soon as Alvarado reached Cuba, Velasquez, transported with success so
far beyond his most sanguine expectations, immediately despatched a
person of confidence to carry this important intelligence to Spain, to
exhibit the rich productions of the countries which had been discovered
by his means, and to solicit such an increase of authority as might enable
and encourage him to attempt the conquest of them. Without waiting
for the return of his messenger, or for the arrival of GrijalVa, of whom
he was become so jealous or distrustful that he was resolved no longer to
employ him, he began to prepare such a powerful armament as might
prove equal to an enterprise of so much danger and importance.
But as the expedition upon which Velasquez was now intent terminated
in conquests of greater moment than what the Spaniards had hitherto
achieved, and led them to the knowledge of a people, who, if compared
with those tribes of America with whom they were hitherto acquainted,
may be considered as highly civilized; it is proper to pause before we
proceed to the history of events extremely different from those which we
have already related, in order to take a view of the state of the. New
World when first discovered, and to contemplate the policy and manners
of the rude uncultivated tribes that occupied all the parts of it with which
the Spaniards were at this time acquainted.
BOOK Iv.
TWENTY-SIX years had elasped since Columbus had conducted the
people of Europe to the New World. During that period the Spaniards
had made great progress in exploring its various regions. They had
visited all the islands scattered in different clusters through that part of
the ocean which flows in between North and South America. They had
sailed along the eastern coast of the continent from -the river De la Plata
to the bottom of the Mexican Gulf, and had found that it stretched without
interruption through this vast portion of the globe. They had discovered
the great Southern Ocean, which opened new prospects in that quarter.
They had acquired some knowledge of the coast of Florida, which led
them to observe the continent as it extended in an opposite direction;
and though they pushed their discoveries no further towards the North,
other nations had visited those parts which they neglected. The English,
in a voyage the motives and success of which shall be related in another
part of this History, had sailed along the coast of America from Labrador
to the confines of Florida.; and the Portuguese, in quest of a shorter
passage to the East Indies, had ventured into the northern seas, and
viekwed the same regions.*  Thus, at the period where I have chosen to
take a view of the state of the New World, its extent was known allnost
from its northern extremityto thirty-five degrees south of the equator. The
countries which stretch from thence to the southern boundary of America,
the great empire of Peru, and the interior state of the extensive dominions
subject to the sovereigns of Mexico, were still undiseovered.
* Horrera, dec. 1. lib. vi c. 16




AMERICA.                             123
When we contemplate the New World, the first circumstance that'
strikes us is its immense extent. It was not a small portion of the earth,
so inconsiderable that it might have escaped the observation or research of
former ages, which Columbus discovered. He made known a new
hemisphere, larger than either Europe, or Asia, or Africa, the three noted
divisions of the ancient continent, and not much inferior in dimensions to a
third part of the habitable globe.
America is remarkable, not only for its magnitude, but for its position.
It stretches from the northern polar circle to a high southern latitude,
above fifteen hundred miles beyond the furthest extremity of the old
continent on that side of the line. A country of such extent passes through
all the climates capable of becoming the habitation of man, and fit for
yielding the various productions peculiar either to the temperate or to the
torrid regions of the earth.
Next to the extent of the New World, the grandeur of the objects which
it presents to view is most apt to strike the eye of an observer. Nature
seems here to have carried on her operations upon a larger scale and with
a bolder hand, and to have distinguished -the features of this country by a
peculiar magnificence. The mountains in America are much superior in
height to those in the other divisions of the globe. Even the plain ot
Quito, which may be considered as the base of the Andes, is elevated
further above the sea than the top of the Pyrenees.  This. stupendous
ridge of the Andes, no less remarkable for extent than elevation, rises in
different places more than one-third above the Peak of Teneriffe, the
highest land in the ancient hemisphere. The Andes may literally be said
to hide their heads in the clouds; the storms often roll, and the thunder
bursts below their summits, which, though exposed to the rays of the sun
in the centre of the torrid zone, are covered with everlasting snows [281].
From these lofty mountains descend rivers, proportionably large, with
which the streams in the ancient continent are not to be compared, either
for length of course, or the vast body of water which they roll towards
the ocean. The Maragnon, the Orinoco, the Plata in South America, the
Mississippi and St. Laurence in North America, flow in such spacious
channels, that long before they feel the influence of the tide, they resemble
arms of the sea rather than rivers of fresh water [29].
The lakes of the New World are no less conspicuous for grandeur than
its mountains and rivers. There is nothing in other parts of the globe
which resembles the prodigious chain of lakes in North America. They
may properly be termed inland seas of fresh water; and even those of the
second or third class in magnitude are of larger circuit (the Caspian Sea
excepted) than the greatest lake of the ancient continent.
The New World is of a form extremely favourable to commercial inter.
course. When a continent is formed, like Africa, of one vast solid mass,
unbroken by arms of the sea penetrating into its interior parts, with few
large rivers, and those at a considerable distance from each other, the
greater part of it seems destined to remain for ever uncivilized, and to be
ebarred from any active or enlarged communication with the rest of
mankind. When, like Europe, a continent is opened by inlets of the ocean
of great extent, such as the Mediterranean and Baltic; or when, like
Asia, its coasts is broken by deep bays advancing far into the country, such
as the Black Sea, the Gulfs of Arabia, of Persia, of Bengal, of Siam, and of
Leotang; when the surrounding seas are filled with large and fertile
islands, and the continent itself watered with a variety of navigable rivers,
those regions may be said to possess whatever can facilitate the progress
of their inhabitants in commerce and improvement. In all these respects
America may bear a comparison with the other quarters of the globe. The
Gulf of Mexico, which flows in between North and South America, may
be considered as a Mediterranean sea, which opens a maritime commerce




124                    HISTORY  OF                   [Boo  I~V.
with all the fertile countries by which it is encircled. The islands
scattered in it are inferior only to those in the Indian Archipelago, in
number, in magnitude, and in value. As we stretch along the northern
division of the American hemisphere, the Bay of Chesapeak presents a
spacious inlet, which conducts the navigator far into the interior parts of
provinces no less fertile than extensive; and if ever the progress of culture
and population shall mitigate the extreme rigour of the climate in the morc
northern districts of America, Hudson's Bay may become as subservient
to commercial intercourse in that quarter of the globe, as the Baltic is in
Europe. The other great portion of the New World is encompassed on
every side by the sea, except one narrow neck which separates the Atlantic
from the Pacific Ocean; and though it be not opened by spacious bays
or arms of the sea, its interior parts are rendered accessible by a -number of
large rivers, fed by so many auxiliary streams, flowing in such various
directions, that almost without any aid from the hand of industry and
art, an inland navigation may be carried on through all the provinces from
the river De la Plata to the GulfofParia. Nor is this bountyof nature confined
to the southern division of America; its northern continent abounds no less in
rivers which are navigable almost to their sources, and by its immense
chain of lakes provision is made for an inland communication, more extensive
and commodious than in any quarter of the globe. The countries stretching
from the Gulf of Darien on one side, to that of California on the other,
which form the chain that binds the two parts of the American continent
together, are not destitute of peculiar advantages.  Their coast on one
side is washed by the Atlantic Ocean, on the other by the Pacific. Some
of their rivers flow into the former, some into the latter, and secure to them
all the commercial benefits that may result from a communication with
both.
But what most distinguishes America from other parts of the earth is the
peculiar temperature of its climate, and the different laws to which it is
subject with respect to the distribution of heat and cold. We cannot
determine with precision the portion of heat felt in any part of the gl6be,
merely by measuring its distance from the equator. The climate of a
country is affected, in some degree, by its elevation above the sea, by the
extent of continent, by the nature of the soil, the height of adjacent mountains, and many other circumstances. The influence of these, however,
is from various causes less considerable in the greater part of the ancient
continent; and from knowing the position of any country there, we can
pronounce with greater certainty what will be the warmth of its climate,
and the nature of its productions.
The maxims which are founded upon observation of our hemisphere
will not apply to the other. In the New World, cold predominates. The
rigour of the frigid zone extends over half of those regions which should
be temperate by their position. Countries where the grape and the fig
should ripen, are buried under snow one half of the year; and lands
situated in the same parallel with the most fertile and best cultivated
provinces in Europe, are chilled with perpetual frosts, which almost.
destroy the power of vegetation [301. As we advance to those parts of
America which lie in the same parallel with provinces of Asia and Africa,
blessed with a uniform enjoyment of such genial warmth as is most friendly
co life and to vegetation, the dominion of cold continues to be felt, and
winter reigns, though during a short period, with extreme severity. If we
proceed along the American continent into the torrid zone, we shall find
the cold prevalent in the New World extending itself also to this region of
the globe, and mitigating the excess of its fervour. While the negro on
the coast of Africa is scorched with unremitting heat, the' inhabitant of
Peru breathes an air equally mild and temperate, and is perpetually shaded
under a canopy of gray clouds, which intercepts the fierce beams of the




AMERICA.                                12s
sun, without obstructing his friendly influence?.  Along the eastern coast
ot America, the climate, though more similar to that of the torrid zone in
other parts of the earth, is nevertheless considerably milder than in those
countries of Asia and Africa which lie in the same latitude.  If from the
southern tropic we continue our progress to the extremity of the American
continent, we meet with frozen seas, and countries horrid, barren, and
scarcely habitable for cold, much sooner than in the north.4
Various causes combine in rendering the climate of America so extremely
different from that of the ancient continent.  Though the utmost extent of
America towards the north be not yet discovered, we know that it advances
much nearer to the pole than either Europe or Asia. Both these have
large seas to the north, which are open during part of the year; and even
when covered with ice, the wind that blows over thebm is less intensely
cold than that which blows over land in the same high latitudes. But in
America the land stretches from the river St. Laurence towards the pole,
and spreads out immensely to the west.  A chain of enormous mountains
covered with snow and ice, runs through all this dreary region.  The
wind, in passing over such an extent of high and frozen land, becomes so
impregnated with cold, that it acquires a piercing keenness, which it
retains in its progress through warmer climates, and it is not entirely
nitigated until it reach the Gulf of Mexico. Over all the continent of
North America, a north-westerly wind and excessive cold are synonymous
terms. Even in the most sultry weather, the moment that the wind veers
to that quarter, its penetrating influence is felt in a transition from heat to
cold no less violent than sudden. To this powerful cause we may ascribe
the extraordinary dominion of cold, and its violent inroads into the southern
provinces, in that part of the globe.+
Other causes, no less remarkable, diminish the active power of heat In
those parts of the American continent which lie between the tropics.  In
all that portion of the globe, the wind blows in an invariable direction
from east to west. As this wind holds its course across the ancient continent, it arrives at the countries which stretch along the western shores of
Africa, inflamed with all the fiery particles which it hath collected from the
sultry plains of Asia, and the burning sands'in the African deserts. The
coast of Africa is, accordingly, the region of the earth Which feels the most
fervent heat, and is exposed to the unmitigated ardour of the torrid zone
But this same wind, which brings such an accession of warmth to the
countries lying between the river of Senegal and Cafraria, traverses the
Atlantic Ocean before it reaches the American shore. It is cooled in its
passage over tnis vast body of water, and is felt as a refreshing gale along
the coast of Brazil [31], and Guiana, rendering these countries, though
among the warmest in America, temperate, when compared with those
which lie opposite to them in Africa [32]. As this wind advances in its
course across America, it meets with immense plains covered With impenetrable forests, or occupied by large rivers, marshes, and stagnating
waters, where it can recover no considerable degree of heat. At length
it arrives at the Andes, which run from north to south through the whole
continent.  In passing over their elevated and frozen summits, it is so
thoroughly cooled, that the greater part of the countries beyond thenl
hardly feel the ardour to which they seem  exposed by their situation.~
In the other provinces of America, from Tierra Ferme westward to the
Mexican empire, the heat of the climate is tempered, in some places, by
the elevation of the land above the sea, in others, by their extraordinary
* Voyage de Ulloa, tom. i. p. 453. Anson's Voyage, p. 184.    t Aneon's Voyage, p. 74; and
Voyage de Quiros, chez. Hist. Gen. des Voyages, tom. xiv. p. 83. Richard Hist. Naturi de I'Air,
ii. 305, &c.  + Charlevoix Hist. de Nouv. Fr. iii. 165. Hist. General) des Voyages, tom. xv
215, &c.  ~' Acosta Hist. Novi Orbis, lib. ii. c. 11. Buffon Hist. Naturelie, &c. tom. ii. 512, &c.
i,. 107, &c. Osborn's Collect. of Voyages, ii. p. 868.




126                     HISTORY  OF                    [Boon IV.
humidity, and in all, by the enormous mountains scattered over this tract
The islands of America in the torrid zone are either small or mountainous,
and are fanned alternately by refreshing sea and land breezes.
The causes of the extraordinary cold towards the southern limits o.
America, and in the seas beyond it, cannot be ascertained in a manner
equally satisfying. It was long supposed that a vast continent, distinguished by the name of Terra  lustralis Incognita, lay between the
southern extremity of America and the Antarctic pole. The same principles which account for the extraordinary degree of cold in the northern
regions of America, were employed in order to explain that which is felt
at Cape Horn and the adjacent countries. The immense extent of the
southern continent, and the large rivers which it poured into the ocean,
were mentioned and admitted by philosophers as causes sufficient to occasion the unusual sensation of cold, and the still more uncommon appearances
of frozen seas in that region of the globe. But the imaginary continent to
which such influence was ascribed, having been searched for in vain, and
the space which it was supposed to occupy having been found to be an open
sea, new conjectures must be formed with respect to the causes of a temperature of climate, so extremely different from that which we experience
in countries removed at the same distance from the opposite pole [33].
After contemplating those permanent and characteristic qualities of the
American continent, which arise from the peculiarity of its situation, and
the disposition of its parts, the next object that merits attention is its condition
when first discovered, as far'as that depended upon the industry and operations
of man. The effects of human ingenuity and labour are more extensive
and considerable than even our own vanity is apt at first to imagine. When
we survey the face of the habitable globe, no small part of that fertility and
beauty which we ascribe to the hand of nature, is the work of man. His
efforts, when continued through a succession of ages, change the appearance
and improve the qualities of the earth.  As a great part of the ancient
continent has long been occupied by nations far advanced in arts and
industry, our eye is accustomed to view the earth in that form which it
assumes when rendered fit to be the residence of a numerous race of men,
and to supply them with nourishment.
But in the New World, the state of mankind was ruder, and the aspect
of nature extremely different. Throughout all its vast regions, there were
only two monarchies remarkable for extent of territory, or distinguished
by any progress in improvement. The rest of this continent was possessed
by small independent tribes, destitute of arts and industry, and neither
capable to correct the defects nor desirous to meliorate the condition of
hat part of the earth allotted to them for their habitation. Countries
occupied by such people were almost in the same state as if they had
been without inhabitants. Immense forests covered a great part of the
uncultivated earth; and as the hand of industry had not taught the rivers
to run in a proper channel, or drained off the stagnating water, many of
the most fertile plains were overflowed with inundations, or converted into
marshes. In the southern provinces, where the warmth of the sun, the
moisture of the climate, and the fertility of the soil,, combine in calling
forth the Imost vigorous powers of vegetation, the woods are so choked
with its rank luxuriance as to be almost impervious, and the surface
of the ground is hid from the eye under a thick covering of shrubs and
herbs and weeds. In this state of wild unassisted nature, a great part of
the large provinces in South America, which extend from the bottom of
the Andes to the sea, still remain. The European colonies have cleared and
cultivated a few spots along the coast; but the original race of inhabitants,
As rude and indolent as ever, have done nothing to open or improve a:ountry possessing almost every advantage of situation and climate. As
ve advance towards the northern provinces of America, nature continues




AMERICA.                             127
to wear the same uncultivated aspect, and, In proportion as the rigour of
the climate increases, appears more desolate and horrid. There the forests,
though not encumbered with the same exuberance of vegetation, are of
immense extent; prodigious marshes overspread the plains, and few marks
appear of human activity in any attempt to cultivate or embellish the
earth. No wonder that the colonies sent from Europe were astonished at
their first entrance into the New World. It appeared to them waste,
solitary, and uninviting. When the English began to settle in America,
they termed the countries of which they took possession, The WVilderness.
Nothing but their eager expectation of finding mines of gold could have
induced the Spaniards to penetrate through the woods and marshes of
America, where at every step they observed the extreme difference
between the uncultivated face of nature, and that which it acquires under
the forming hand of industry and art [34].
The labour and operations of man not only improve and embellish the
earth, but render it more wholesome and friendly to life. When any
region lies neglected and destitute of cultivation, the air stagnates in the
woods; putrid exhalations arise from the waters; the surface of the earth,
loaded with rank vegetation, feels not the purifying influence of the sun
or of the wind; the malignity of the distempers natural to the climate
increases, and new maladies no less noxious are engendered. Accordingly,
all the provinces of America, when first discovered, were found to hbe
remarkably unhealthy. This the Spaniards experienced in every expedition into the New World, whether destined for conquest or settlement.
Though by the natural constitution of their bodies, their habitual temperance, and the persevering vigour of their minds, they were as much
formed as any people in Europe for active service in a sultry climate, they
felt severely the fatal and pernicious qualities of those uncultivated regions
through which they marched, or where they endeavoured te plant colonies.
Great'numbers were cut off by the unknown and violent diseases with
which they were infected. Such as survived the destructive rage of those
maladies, were not exempted from the noxious influence of the climate.
They returned to Europe, according to the description of the early Spanish
historians, feeble, emaciated, with languid looks, and complexions of such
a sickly yellow colour as indicated the unwholesome temperature of the
countries where they had resided.~
The uncultivated' state of the New World affected not only the temperature of the air, but the qualities of its productions. The principle of
life seems to have been less active and vigorous there than in the ancient
continent. Notwithstanding the vast extent of America, and the variety
of its climates, the different species of animals peculiar to it are much
fewer in proportion than those of the other hemisphere. In the islands
there were only four kinds of quadrupeds known, the largest of which
did not exceed the size of a rabbit. On the continent, the variety was
greater; and though the individuals of each kind could not fail of multiplying exceedingly when almost unmolested by men, who were neither so
numerous, nor so united in society, as to be formidable enemies to the
animal creation, the number of distinct species must still be considered
as extremely small. Of two hundred different kinds of animals spread
over the face of the earth, only about one-third existed in America at the
time of its discovery.t-  Nature was not only less prolific in the New
World, but she appears likewise to have been less vigorous in her productions. The animals originally belonging to this quarter of the globe
appear to be of an inferior race, neither so robust nor so fierce as those of
the other continent. America gives birth to no creature of such bulk as
* Gomara Hist. c. 20.22. Oviedo Hist. lib. ii. c. 13. iib.v. c. 10. P. Martyr, Epist. 545. Decad.
p. 176.   t Buffon Hist. Naturelle, tom. ix. p. 86.




128                      HISTORY OF                       rBooK IV.
to be compared with the elephant or rhinoceros, or that equals the lion
and tiger in strength and ferocity [35].  The Tapyr of Brazil, the largest
quadruped of the ravenous tribe in the New World, is not larger than a
calf of six months old.  The Puma and Jaguar, ils fiercest beasts of
prey, which Europeans have inaccurately denominated lions and tigers,
possess neither the undaunted courage of the former, nor the ravenous
cruelty of the latter.*  They are inactive and timid, hardly formidable
to man, and often turn their backs upon the least appearance of resistances.
The same qualities in the climate of America which stinted the growth,
and enfeebled the spirit, of its native animals, have proved pernicious to
such as have migrated into it voluntarily from the other continent,:or have
been transported thither by the Europeans.+  The bears, the wolves, the
deer of America, are not equal in size to those of the Old World.~  Most
of the domestic animals, with which the Europeans have stored the provinces wherein they settled, have degenerated with respect either to bulk
or quality, in a country whose temperature and soil seem to be less favourable to the strength and perfection of the animal creation [36].
The same causes which checked the growth and the vigour of the
more noble animals, were friendly to the propagation and increase of
reptiles and insects. Though this is not peculiar to the New World, and
those odious tribes, nourished by heat, moisture, and corruption, infest
every part of the torrid zone; they multiply faster, perhaps, in America,
and grow to a more monstrous bulk. As this country is on the whole less
cultivated and less peopled than the other quarters of the earth, the active
principle of life wastes its force in productions of this inferior form. The
air is often darkened with clouds of insects, and the ground covered with
shocking and noxious reptiles. The country around Porto Bello swarms
with toads in such multitudes as hide the surface of the earth. At Guayaquil, snakes and vipers are hardly less numerous. Carthagena is infested
with numerous flocks of bats, which annoy not only the cattle but the
inhabitants.11 In the islands, legions of ants have at different times consumed every vegetable production [37], and left the earth entirely bare
as if it had been burned with fire. The damp forests and rank soil of
the countries on the banks of the Orinoco and Maragnon teem  with
almost every offensive and poisonous creature which the power of a sultry
sun can quicken into life.~
The birds of the New World are not distinguished by qualities so conspicuous and characteristical as those which we have observed in its quadrupeds. Birds are more independent of man, and less affected by the
changes which his industry and labour make upon the state of the earth.
They have a greater propensity to migrate from one country to another, and
can gratify this instinct of their nature without difficulty or danger. Hence
the number of birds common to both continents is much greater than that
of quadrupeds; and even such as are peculiar to America nearly resemble
those with which mankind were acquainted in similar regions of the ancient
hemisphere.  The American birds of the torrid zone, like those of the
same climate in Asia and Africa, are decked in plumage which dazzles
the eye with the beauty of its colours; but nature, satisfied with clothing
them in this gay dress, has denied most of them that melody of sound and
variety of notes which catch and delight the ear.  The birds of the temperate climates there, in the same manner as in our continent, are less
* Buffon Hist. Natur. tom. ix. p. 87. Maregravii Hist. Nat. Brazil, p. 2.  t Buffon Hist.
Natur. ix. 13. 203. Acosta Hist. lib. iv. c. 34. Pisonis Hist. p. 6. Herrera, dec. 4. lib. iv. c. 1. lib.
x.; c. 13.  Churchill, v. p. 691. Ovalle Relat. of Cnili, Church. iii. p. I0. Sonario dc Oviedo,
1 14-22. Voyage du Des Marchais, iii. 299.    S Buffon Hist. Natur. ix. 103. Kalh's Travels
i. 102. Biet. voy. de France Equinox. p. 339.   lI Voyage de Ulloa, tom. i. p. 89. Ib. p 147.
Herrera, dec. 11. lib. iii. c. 3. 19.  ~ Voyage de Condamine, p. 167. Gumilla, iii. 120, &c. Hist.
Gener. des Voyages, xiv. 317. Dumont M6moires sur la Louisiane, i. 108. Somario de Oviedo, c.
52-62.




A M E R I C A.                          i29
splendid in their appearance; but, in compensation for that defect, they
have voices of greater compass, and more melodious. In some'districts
of America, the unwholesome temperature of the air seems to be unfavourable even to this part of the creation. The number of birds is less
than in other countries, and the traveller is struck with the amazing solitude
and silence of its forests.* It is remarkable, however, that America,
where the quadrupeds are so dwarfish and dastardly, should produce the
Condor which is entitled to pre-eminence over all the flying tribe, in bulk,
in strength, and in courage.t
The soil in a continent so extensive as America must, of course, be
extremely various.  In each of its provinces we find some distinguishing
peculiarities, the description of which belongs to those who write their
particular history.  In general we may observe, that the moisture and
cold, which predominate so remarkably in all parts of America, must
have great influence upon the nature of its soil; countries lying in the
same parallel with those regions which never feel the extreme rigour of
winter in the ancient continent, are frozen over in America during a great
part of the year. Chilled by this intense cold, the ground never acquires
warmth sufficient to ripen the fruits which are found in the corresponding
parts of the other continent. If we wish to rear in America the productions
which abound in any particular district of the ancient world, we -must
advance several degrees nearer to the line than in the other hemisphere, as
it requires such an increase of heat to counterbalance the natural frigidity
of the soil and climate [38]. At the Cape of Good Hope, several of the
plants and fruits peculiar to the countries within the tropics are cultivated
with success; whereas, at St. Augustine in Florida, and Charles Town in
South Carolina, though considerably nearer the line, they cannot be brought
to thrive with equal certainty [39]. But, if allowance be made for this
diversity in the degree of heat, the soil of America is naturally as rich
and fertile as in any part of the earth. As the country was thinly inhabited,
and by a people of little industry, who had none. of the domestic animals
which civilized nations rear in such vast numbers, the earth was not exhausted by their consumption. The vegetable productions, to which the
fertility of the soil gave birth, often remained untouched, and, being suffered
to corrupt on its surface, returned with increase into its bosom.t As trees
and plants derive a great part of their nourishment from air and water; if
they were not destroyed by man and other animals, they would render to
the earth more, perhaps, than they take from it, and feed rather than impoverish
it. Thus the unoccupied soil of America may have gone on enriching
for many ages. The vast number as well as enormous size of the trees in
America, indicate the extraordinary vigour of the soil in its native state.
When the Europeans first began to cultivate the New World, they were
astonished at the luxuriant power of vegetation in its virgin mould; and in
several places the ingenuity of the planter is still employed in diminishing
and wasting its superfluous fertility, in order to bring it down to a state fit
for profitable culture~ [401.
Having thus surveyed the state of the New World at the time of its
discovery, and considered the peculiar features and qualities which dis*
tinguish and characterize it, the next inquiry that merits attention is, How
was America peopled? By what course did mankind migrate from the one
continent to the other? And in what quarter is it most probable that a
communication was opened between them?
We know, with infallible certainty, that all the human race spring from
* BouguerVoy. au Perou, 17. Chanvalon Voyage i la Martinique, p. 96. Warren's Descript.
Surinam. Osborn's Collect. ii. 924. Lettres Edif. xxiv. p. 339. Charlev. Hist. de la Nouv. France1
ifi. 155.    t Voyage de Ulloa, i. 363. Voyage de Condamine, 175. Buffon Hist. Nat. xvL 184.
Voyage dul Des Marchais, iii. 320.   + Buflin, Hist. Natur. i. 242. Kalm, i. 151., Charlevoix,
Hit de Nouv. Fran. iii. 405. Voyage du Des Marchais, iii. 229. Lery ap. de Bry. part iii. p. 174.
VOL. I.-17




130                     HI STORY   OF                 [BooK IV.
the same source, and that the descendants of one man, under the protection,
as well as in obedience to the command of Heaven, multiplied and
replenished the earth. But neither the annals nor the traditions of nations
reach back to those remote ages, in which they took possession of the
different countries where they are now settled. We cannot trace the
branches of this first family, or point out with certainty the time and
manner in which they divided and spread over the face of the globe
Even among the most enlightened people, the period of authentic history
is extremely short; and every thing prior to that is fabulous or obscure.
It is not surprising, then, that the unlettered inhabitants of Ameiica, who
have no solicitude about futurity, and little curiosity concerning what is
passed, should be altogether unacquainted with their own original. The
people on the two opposite coasts of America, who occupy those
countries in America which approach nearest to the ancient continent are
so remarkably rude, that it is altogether vain to search among them for
such information as might discover the place fiom whence they came, or
the ancestors of whom they are descended.*  Whatever light has been
thrown on this subject is derived not from the natives of America, but
from the inquisitive genius of their conquerors.
When the people of Europe unexpectedly discovered a New World,
removed at a vast distance from every part of the ancient continent which
was then known, and filled with inhabitants whose appearance and manners
differed remarkably from the rest of the human species, the question concefning their original became naturally an object of curiosity and attention. The theories and speculations of ingenious men with respect to
this subject, would fill many volumes; but are often so wild and chimerical,] that I should offer an insult to the understanding of my readers, if
I attempted either minutely to enumerate or to refute them.. Some have
presumptuously imagined, that the people of America were not the offspring
of the same common parent with the rest of mankind, but that they formed
a separate race of men, distinguishable by peculiar features in the constitution of their bodies, as well as in the characteristic qualities of their
minds. Others contend, that they are descended from some remnant of
the antediluvian inhabitants of the earth, who survived the deluge which
swept away the greatest part of the human species in the days of Noah;
and preposterously suppose rude, uncivilized tribes, scattered over an uncultivated continent, to be the most ancient race of people on the earth.
There is hardly any nation from the north to the south pole, to which some
antiquary, in the extravagance of conjecture, has not ascribed the honour
of peopling America. The Jews, the Canaanites, the Phcenicians, the
Carthaginians, the Greeks, the Scythians, in ancient times, are supposed to
have settled in this western world. The Chinese, the Swedes, the Norwegians, the Welsh, the Spaniards, are said to have sent colonies thither
in later ages, at different periods and on various occasions. Zealous advocates stand forth to support the respective claims of those people; and
though they rest upon no better foundation than the casual resemblance of
some customs, or the supposed affinity between a few words in their different languages, much erudition and more zeal have been employed, to
little purpose, in defence of the opposite systems. Those regions of conjecture and controversy belong not to the historian. His is a more limited
province, confined by what is established by certain or highly probable
evidence. Beyond this I shall not venture, in offering a few observations
which may contribute to throw some light upon this curious and much
agitated question
1. There are authors who. have endeavoured by mere conjecture
to account for the peopling of America. Some have supposed that it was
~ Vinegas's Hist. of California, i. 60




AMERICA.                              131
origmally united to the ancient continent, and disjoined from it by tile
shock of an earthquake, or the irruption of a deluge. Others have inragined, that some vessel being forced from its course by the violence of a
westerly wind, might be driven by accident towards the American ccast,
and have given a beginning to population in that desolate continent.*
But with respect to all those systems, it is in vain either to reason or inquire,
because it is impossible to come to any decision. Such events as they
suppose are barely possible, and may have happened. That they ever did
happen, we have no evidence, either from the clear testimony of history,
or from the obscure intimations of tradition.
2. Nothing can be more frivolous or uncertain than the attempts to discover the original of the Americans merely by tracing the resemblance
between their manners and those of any particular people in the ancient
continent. If we suppose two tribes, though placed in the most remote
regions of the globe, to live in a climate nearly of the same temperature,
to be in the same state of society, and to resemble each other in the
degree of their improvement, they must feel the same wants, and exert
the same endeavours to supply them.. The same objects will allure, the
same passions will animate them, and the same ideas and sentiments wvill
arise in their minds. The character and occupations of the hunter in America must be little different from those of an Asiatic who depends for subsistence on the chase. A tribe of savages on the banks of the Danube must
nearly resemble one upon the plains washed by the Mississippi. Instead
then of presuming from this similarity, that there is any affinity between
them, we should only conclude that the disposition and manners of men are
formed by their situation, and arise from the state of society in which they
live. The moment that begins to vary, the character of a people must
change. In proportion as it advances in improvement, their manners refine.
their powers and talents are called forth. In every part of the earth, the
progress of man hath been nearly the same; and we can trace him in his
career from the rude simplicity of savage life, until he attains the industry,
the arts, and the elegance of polished society. There is nothing wonderful, then, in the similitude between the America.ns and the barbarous
nations of our continent. Had Lafitau, Garcia, and many other authors
attended to this, they would not have perplexed a subject, which they
pretend to illustrate, by their fruitless endeavours to establish an affinity
between various races of people, in the old and new continents, upon no
other evidence than such a resemblance in their manners as necessarily
arises from the similarity of their condition. There are, it is true, among
every people, some customs which, as they do not flow from any natural
want or desire peculiar to their situation, may be denominated usages of
arbitrary institution. If between two nations settled in remote parts of the
earth, a perfect agreement with respect to any of these should be discovered,
one might be led to suspect that they were connected by some affinity.
If, for example, a nation were found in America that consecrated the
seventh day to religious worship and rest, we might justly suppose that it
had derived its knowledge of this usage, which is of arbitrary institution,
from the Jews. But, if it were discovered that another nation celebrated
the first appearance of every new moon with extraordinary demonstrations
of joy, we should not be entitled to conclude that the observation of this
monthly festival was borrowed from the Jews, but ought to consider it merely
as the expression of that joy which is natural to man on the return of the
planet which guides and cheers him in the night. The instances of customs.
merely arbitrary, common to the inhabitants of both hemispheres, are,
indeed, so few and so equivocal, that no theory concerning the population of
the New World ought to be founded upon them.
* Parson'g Remains of Japhet, p. 240. Ancient UJnivers. Hist. vol. xx. p. 164i P. Feyjoo Tear
tro Critico, torn. v. p. 304, &c. Acosta Hist. Moral. Novi Orbis, lib. i. 16. c. 19.




132                    HISTORY  OF                     fBoox IV.
3. The theories which have been formed with respect to the original of
the Americans, from observation of their religious rites and practices, are
no less fanciful and destitute of solid foundation. When the religious
opinions of any people are neither the result of rational inquiry, nor derived
from the instructions of revelation, they must needs be wild and extravagant.
Barbarousnations are incapable of the former, and have not been blessed
with the advantages arising from the latter. Still, however, the human
mind, even where its operations appear most wild and capricious, holds a
course so regular, that in every age and country the dominion of particular
passions will be attended with similar effects. The savage of Europe or
America, when filled with superstitious dread of invisible beings. or with
inquisitive solicitude to penetrate into the events of futurity, trembles alike
with fear, or glows with impatience. He has recourse to rites and practices
of the same kind, in order to avert the vengeance which he supposes to be
impending over him, or to divine the secret which is the object of his
curiosity. Accordingly, the ritual of superstition in one continent seems,
in many particulars, to be a transcript of' that established in the other, and
both authorize similar institutions, sometimes so frivolous as to excite pity,
sometimes so bloody and barbarous as to create horror. But without
supposing any consanguinity between such distant nations, or imagining
that their religious ceremonies were conveyed by tradition from the one to the
other, we may ascribe this uniformity, which in many instances seems very
amazing, to the natural operation of superstition and enthusiasm upon the
weakness of the human mind.
4. We may lay it down as a certain principle in this inquiry, that
America was not peopled by any nation of the ancient continent which had
made considerable progress in civilization. The inhabitants of the New
World were in a state of society so extremely rude as to be unacquainted
with those arts which are the first essays of human ingenuity in its advance
towards improvement. Even the most cultivated nations of America were
strangers to many of those simple inventions which were almost coeval with
society in other parts of the world, and were known in the earliest periods
of civil life with which we have any acquaintance. From  this it is
manifest, that the tribes which originally migrated to America, came off
from nations which must have been no less barbarous than their posterity,
at the time when they were first discovered by the Europeans. For,
although the elegant or refined arts may decline or perish, amidst the violent
shocks of those revolutions and disasters to which nations are exposed, the
necessary arts of life, when once they have been introduced among any
people, are never lost. None of.the vicissitudes in human affairs affect
these, and they continue to be practised as long as the race of men exists.
If ever the use of iron had been known to the savages of America, or to
their progenitors; if ever they had employed a plough, a loom, or a forge,
the utility of those inventions would have preserved them, and it is impossible that they should have been abandoned or forgotten. We may conclude,
then, that the Americans sprung from some people, who were themselves
in such an early and unimproved stage of society, as to be unacquainted
with all those necessary arts, which continued to be unknown among their
posterity when first visited by the Spaniards.
5. It appears no less evident that America was not peopled by any
colony from the more southern nations of the ancient continent. None ot
the rude tribes settled in that part of our hemisphere can be supposed to
have visited a country so remote. They possessed neither enterprise, nor
ingenuity, nor power that could prompt them to undertake, or enable them
to perform such a distant voyage. That the more civilized nations in Asia
or Africa are not the progenitors of the Americans, is manifest not only from
the observations which I have already made concerning their ignorance of
the most simple and necessary arts, but from an additional circumstance




AMERICA.                             133
Whenever any people have experienced the advantages which men enljoy
by their dominion over the inferior animals, they can neither subsist without
the nourishment which these afford, nor carry on any considerable operation
independent of their ministry and labour. Accordingly, the first care of
the Spaniards, when they settled in America, was to stock it with all the
domestic animals of Europe; and: if, prior to them, the Tyrians, the
Carthaginians, the Chinese, or any other polished people, had taken
possession of that continent, we should have found there the animals peculiar
to those regions of the globe where they were originally seated. In all
America, however, there is not one animal, tame or wild, which properly
belongs to the warm or even the more temperate countries of the ancient
continent. The camel, the dromedary, the horse, the cow, were as much
unknown in America as the elephant or the lion. ~From which it is obvious,
that the people who first settled in the western world did not issue from
the countries where those animals abound, and where men, from having
been long accustomed to their aid, would naturally consider it not only as
beneficial, but as indispensably necessary to the improvement, and even the
preservation of civil society.
6. From considering the animals with which America is stored, we may
conclude that the nearest point of contact between the old and new continents is towards the northern extremity of both, and that there the
communication was opened, and the intercourse carried on between them.
All the extensive countries in America which lie within the tropics, or
approach near to them, are filled with indigenous animals of various kinds,
entirely different from those in the corresponding regions of the ancient
continent. But the northern provinces of the New  World abound with
many of the wild animals which are common in such parts of our hemisphere
as lie in a similar situation. The bear, the wolf, the fox, the hare, the
deer, the roebuck, the elk, and several other species, frequent the forests of
North America, no less than those in the north of Europe and Asia.*  It
seems to be evident, then, that the two continents approach each other in
this quarter, and are either united, or so nearly adjacent that these animals
might pass from the one to the other.
7. The actual vicinity of the two continents is so clearly established by
modern discoveries, that the chief difficulty with respect to the peopling
of America is removed.  While those immense regions which stretch
eastward from the river Oby to the sea of Kamchatka were unknown or
imperfectly explored, the north-east extremities of our hemisphere were
supposed to be so far distant from any part of the New World, that it was
not easy to conceive how any communication should have been carried on
between them. But the Russians, having subjected the western part of
Siberia to their empire, gradually extended their knowledge of that vast
country, by advancing towards the east into unknown provinces. These
were discovered by hunters in their excursions after game, or by soldiers
employed in levying the taxes; and the court of Moscow estimated the
importance of those countries, only by the small addition which they made to
its revenue. At length Peter the Great ascended the Russian throne. His
enlightened, comprehensive mind, intent upon every circumstance that could
aggrandize his empire, or render his reign illustrious, discerned consequences
of those discoveries which had escaped the observation of his ignorant
predecessors. He perceived that in proportion as the regions of Asia
extended towards the east, they must approach nearer to America; that the
communication between the two continents, which had long been searched
for in vain, would probably be found in this quarter; and that by opening
it, some part of the wealth and commerce of the western world might be
made to flow into his dominions by a new channel. Such an object suited
* Buffon, Hist. Nat. ix. p. 97, &ce




134                     HISTORY OF                     LBooK IV
a genius that delighted in grand schemes. Peter drew up instructions with
his own hand for prosecuting this design, and gave orders for carrying it
into execution.,
His successors adopted his ideas and pursued his plan. The officers
whom the Russian court employed in this service had to struggle with so
many difficulties, that their progress was extremely slow. Encouraged
by some faint traditions among the people of Siberia, concerning a successful
voyage in the year one thousand six hundred and forty-eight, round the
north-east promontory of Asia, they attempted to follow the same course.
Vessels were fitted out, with this view, at different times, from the rivers
Lena and Kolyma; but in a frozen ocean, which nature seems not to have
destined for navigation, they were exposed to many disasters, without being
able to accomplish their purpose. No vessel fitted out by the Russian
court ever doubled this formidable Cape [41]; we are indebted for what
is known of those extreme regions of Asia, to the discoveries made in
excursions by land. In all those provinces an opinion prevails, that there
are countries of great extent and fertility which lie at no considerable
distance from their own coasts. These the Russians imagined to be part
of America; and several circumstances concurred not only in confirming
them in this belief, but in persuading them that some portion of that continent could not be very remote. Trees of various kinds unknown in those
naked regions of Asia, are driven upon the coast by an easterly wind. By
the same wind, floating ice is brought thither in a few days; flights of birds
arrive annually from the same quarter; and a tradition obtains among the
inhabitants, of an intercourse formerly carried on with some countries
situated to the east.
After weighing all these particulars, and comparing the position of the
countries in Asia which had been discovered, with such parts in the northwest of America as were already known, the Russian court formed a
plan, which would have hardly occurred to a nation less accustomed to
engage in arduous undertakings, and to contend with great difficulties.
Orders were issued to build two vessels at the small village of Ochotz,
situated on the sea of Kamchatka, to sail on a voyage of discovery. Though
that dreary uncultivated region furnished nothing that could be of use in
constructing them, but some larch trees: though not only the iron, the
cordage, the sails, and all the numerous articles requisite for their equipment,
but the provisions for victualling them were to be carried through the
immense deserts of Siberia, down rivers of difficult navigation, and along
roads almost impassable, the mandate of the sovereign, and the perseverance
of the people, at last surmounted every obstacle.  Two vessels were
finished, and, under the command of the Captains Behring and Tschirikow,
sailed from Kamchatka, in quest of the New World in a quarter where it
had never been approached. They shaped their course towards the east;
and though a storm soon separated the vessels, which never rejoined, and
many disasters befell them, the expectations from the voyage were not
altogether frustrated. Each of the commanders discovered land, which to
them appeared to be part of the American continent; and, according to
their observation, it seems to be situated within a few degrees of' the
north-west coast of California. Each set some of his people ashore: but
in one place the inhabitants fled as the Russians approached; in another,
they carried off those who landed, and destroyed their boats. The violence
of the weather, and the distress of their crews, obliged both captains to
quit this inhospitable coast. In their return they touched at several islands
which stretch in a chain from east to west between the country which they
had discovered and the coast of Asia. They had some intercourse with
the natives, who seemed to them to resemble the North Americans  They
* Muller, Voyages et Dkcouvertes par les Russes, tom. i. p. 4, 5. 141.




AMERICA.                             135
presented to the Russians the caclumet, or pipe of peace, which is a symbol
of friendship universal among the people of North America, and a usage of
arbitrary institution peculiar to them.
Though the islands of this New Archipelago have been frequented since
that time by the Russian hunters, the court of St. Petersburgh, durng a
period of more than forty years, seems to have relinquished every thought
of prosecuting discoveries in that quarter. But in the year one thousand
seven hundred and sixty-eight it was unexpectedly resumed.  The
sovereign who had been lately seated on the throne of Peter the Great,
possessed the genius and talents of her illustrious predecessor.  During the
operations of the most arduous and extensive war in which the Russian
empire was ever engaged, she formed schemes and executed undertakings,
to which more limited abilities would have been incapable of attending
but amidst the leisure of pacific times. A new voyage of discovery from
the eastern extremity of Asia was planned, and Captain Krenitzin and
Lieutenant Levasheff were appointed to command the two vessels fitted out
for that purpose. In their voyage outward they held nearly the same course
with the former navigators, they touched at the same islands, observed
their situation and productions more carefully, and discovered several new
islands with which Behring,and Tschirikow had not fallen in. Though
they did not proceed so far to the east as to revisit the country which
Behring and Tschirikow supposed to be part of the American continent,
yet, by returning in a course considerably to the north of theirs, they corrected some capital mistakes into which their predecessors had fallen, and
have contributed to facilitate the progress of future navigators in those
seas [42].
Thus the possibility of a communication between the continents in this
quarter rests no longer upon mere conjecture, but is established by undoubted
evidence.*  Some tribe, or some families of wandering Tartars, from the
restless spirit peculiar to their race, might migrate to the nearest islands,
and, rude as their knowledge of navigation was, might, by passing from one
to the other, reach at length the coast of America, and give a beginning to
population in that continent. The distance between the Marian or Ladrone
islands and the nearest land in Asia, is ogreater than that between the part of
America which the Russians discovered, and the coast of Kamchatka; and
yet the inhabitants of those islands are manifestly of Asiatic extract. If,
notwithstanding their remote situation, we admit that the Marian islands
were peopled from our continent, distance alone is no reason why we should
hesitate about admitting that the Americans may derive their original from
the same source. It is probablethat future navigators in those seas, by
steering further to the north, may find that the continent of America approaches still nearer to Asia. According to the information of the barbarous
people who inhabit the country about the north-east promontory of Asia,
there lies, off the coast, a small island, to which they sail in less than a day.
From that they can descry a large continent which, according to their
description, is covered with forests, and possessed by people whose language
they do not understand. By them they are supplied with the skins of
martens, an animal unknown in the northern parts of Siberia, and which is
never found but in countries abounding with trees. If we could rely on
this account, we might conclude that the American continent is separated
from ours only by a narrow strait, and all the difficulties with respect to the
con:munication between them would vanish. What could be offered only
as a conjecture, when this History was first published, is now known to be
certain. The near approach of the two continents to each other has been
discovered and traced in a voyage undertaken upon principles so pure and
so liberal, and conducted with so much professional skill, as reflect lustre
* Muller's Voyages, tom,. i. p. 248, &c. 267. 276.  t Ibid. tom. i. p. 166,




136                    HISTORY   OF                    [BOOK IV.
upon the reign of the sovereign by whom it was planned, and do honour to
the officers intrusted with the execution of it [43].
It is likewise evident from recent discoveries, that an intercourse between
our continent and America.might be carried on with no less facility from
the north-west extremities of turope. As early as the ninth century [A. D.
830], the Norwegians discovered Greenland, and planted colonies there.
The communication with that country, after a long interruption, was renewed
in the last century. Some Lutheran and Moravian missionaries, prompted
by zeal for propagating the Christian faith, have ventured to settle in this
frozen and uncultivated region.* To them we are indebted for much
curious information with respect to its nature and inhabitants. We learn
that the north-west coast of Greenland is separated from America by a very
narrow strait; that, at the bottom of the bay into which this strait conducts,
it is highly probable that they areunited;t that the inhabitants of the two
countries have some intercourse with one another; that the Esquimaux of
America'perfectly resemble the Greenlanders in their aspect, dress, and
mode of living; that some sailors who had acquired the knowledge of a
few words in the Greenlandish language, reported that these were under
stood by the Esquimaux; that, at length [A. D. 1764], a Moravian missionary, well acquainted with the language of Greenland, having visited
the country of the Esquimaux, found, to his astonishment, that the y spoke
the same language with the Greenlanders; that they were in every respect
the same people, and he was accordingly received and entertained by
them as a      ariend and a brother.By these decisive facts, not only the consanguinity of the Esquimaux and
Greenlanders is established, but the possibility of peopling America from
the north of Europe is demonstrated. If the Norwegians, in a barbarous
age, when science had not begun to dawn in the north of Europe, possessed
such naval skill as to open a communication with Greenland, their ancestors,
as much addicted to roving by sea, as the Tartars are to wandering by
land, might, at some more remote period, accomplish the same voyage,
and settle a colony there, whose descendants might, in progress of time,
migrate into America. But if, instead of venturing to sail directly from
their own coast to Greenland, we suppose that the Norwegians held a more
cautious course, and advanced from Shetland to the Feroe islands, and from
them to Iceland, in all which they had planted colonies; their progress
may have been so gradual, that this navigation cannot be considered as
either longer or more hazardous than those voyages which that hardy and
enterprising race of men is known to have perfbrmed in every age.
o. Though it be possible that America may have received its first inhabitants from our continent, either by the north-west of Europe or the northeast of Asia, there seems to be good reason for supposing that the progenitors
of all the American nations from Cape Horn to the southern confines of
Labrador, migrated from the latter rather than the former. The Esquimaux
are the only people in America,. who in their aspect or character bear any
resemblance to the northern Europeans. They are manifestly a race of
men distinct from all the nations of the American continent, in language,
in disposition, and in habits of life. Their original, then, may warrantably
be traced up to that source which I have pointed out. But among all the
other inhabitants of America, there is such a striking similitude in the form
of their bodies and the qualities of their minds, that, notwithstanding the
diversities occasioned by the influences of climate, or unequal progress in
improvement, we must pronounce them to be descended from one source.
There may be a variety in the shades, but we can every where trace the
same original colour. Each tribe has something peculiar which distinguishes
* Crantz' Hist. of Greenl. i. 242. 244. Prevot, Hist. Gkn. des'Voyages, tonm. xv. l52, note (06).
t rggede, p. 2, 3.  1 Crantz' Hit,. of Greenl. p. 261, 262,




AMERICA.                              137
-t but in all of them we discern certain features common to the whole race.
It is remarkable, that in every peculiarity, whether in their persons or
dispositions, which characterize the Americans, they have some resemblance
to the rude tribes scattered over the north-east of Asia, but almost none to
the nations settled in the northern extremities of Europe. We may, therefore, refer them  to the former origin, and conclude that their Asiatic
rogenitors, having settled in those parts of America where the Russians
have discovered the proximity of the two continents, spread gradually over
its various regions. This account of the progress of population in America
coincides with the traditions of the Mexicans concerning their own origin,
which, imperfect as they are, were preserved with more accuracy, and
merit greater credit, than those of any people in the New World. According to them, their ancestors came from a remote country situated to the
north-west of Mexico. The Mexicans point out their various stations as
they advanced from this into the interior provinces, and it is precisely the
same route which they must have held if they had been emigrants from
Asia. The Mexicans, in describing the appearance of their progenitors,
their manners and habits of life at that period, exactly delineate those: of
the rude Tartars from whom I suppose them to have sprung.Thus have I finished a Disquisition which has been deemed of so much
importance that it would have been improper to omit it in writing the history of America. I have ventured to inquire, but without presuming to
decide.  Satisfied with offering conjectures, 1 pretend not to establish any
system. When an investigation is, from its nature, so intricate and obscure,
that it is impossible to arrive at conclusions which are certain, there mag
be some merit in pointing out such as are probable.t
The condition and character of the American nations, at the time when
they became known to the Europeans, deserve more attentive consideration than the inquiry concerning their original. The latter is merely an
object of curiosity; the former is one of the most important as well as
instructive researches which can occupy the philosopher or historian. In
order to complete the history of the human mind, and attain to.a perfect
knowledge of its nature and operations, we must contemplate man in all
those various situations wherein he has been placed. We must follow him
in his progress through the different stages of society, as he gradually advances from the infant state of civil life towards its maturity and decline.
We must observe, at each period, how the faculties of his understanding
unfold; we must attend to the efforts of his active powers, watch the various movements of desire and affection, as they rise in his breast, and
mark whither they tend, and with what ardour they are exerted. The
philosophers and historians of ancient Greece and Rome, our guides in
this as well as every other disquisition, had only a limited view of this
subject, as they had hardly any opportunity of surveying man in his rudest
and most early state. In all those regions of the earth with which they
were well acquainted, civil society had made considerable advances, and
nations had finished a good part of their career before they began to observe them. The Scythians and Germans, the rudest people of whom
any ancient author has transmitted to us an authentic account, possessed
flocks and herds, had acquired property of various kinds, and, when compared with mankind in their primitive state, may be reckoned to have
attained to a great degree of civilization.
But the discovery of the New World enlarged the sphere of contemplation, and presented nations to our view, in stages of their progress,
much less advanced than those wherein they have been observed in our
continent. In America, man appears under the rudest form in which we
* Acosta, Hist. Nat. et Mor. lib. vii. c. 2, &c. Garcia, Origen de los Indios, lib. v. c. 3. Torquemada Monar Ind. lib. i. c. 2. &c. Boturini Benaduci Idea de una Hist. de la Amer. Septentr.
sect. xvii. p. 127..  t1 MWmoires aur la -ouisiane, par DumoInt, tom. 1. p. 119.
VoL. I.-18       8




138                    HISTORY  OF                   [BOOK IV.
can conceive him to subsist. We behold communities just beginning to
unite, and may examine the sentiments and actions of human beings in
the infancy of social life, while they feel but imperfectly the force of its
ties, and have scarcely relinquished their native liberty. That state of
primeval simplicity, which was known in our continent only by the fanciful description of poets, really existed in the other. The greater part of
its inhabitants were strangers to industry and labour, ignorant of arts, imperfectly acquainted with the nature of property, and enjoying almost
without restriction or control the blessings which flowed spontaneously
from the bounty of nature. There were only two nations in this vast
continent which had emerged from this rude state, and had made any
considerable progress in acquiring the ideas, and adopting the institutions,
which belong to polished societies  Their government and manners will
fall naturally under our review in relating the discovery and conquest of
the Mexican and Peruvian empires; and we shall have there an opportunity of contemplating the Americans in the state of highest improvement to which they ever attained.
At present, our attention and researches shall be turned to the small independent tribes which occupied every other part of America. Among
these, though with some diversity in their character, their manners, and
institutions, the state of society was nearly similar, and so extremely -rude,
that the denomination of savage may be applied to them all. In a general history of America, it would be highly improper to describe the condition of each petty community, or to investigate every minute circumstance which contributes to form the character of its members. Such an
inquiry would lead to details of immeasurable and tiresome extent. The
qualities belbnging to the people of all the different tribes have such a
near resemblance, that they may be painted with the same features.
Where any circumstances seem to constitute a diversity in their character and manners worthy of attention, it will be sufficient to point these
out as they occur, and to inquire into the cause of such peculiarities.
It is extremely difficult to procure satisfying and authentic information
concerning nations while they remain uncivilized. To discover their true
character under this rude form, and to select the features by which they
are distinguished, requires an observer possessed of no less impartiality
than discernment. For, in every stage of society, the faculties, the sentiments, and desires of men are so accommodated to their own state, that
they become standards of excellence to themselves, they affix the idea of
perfection and happiness to those attainments which resemble their own,
and, wherever the objects and enjoyments to which they have been ac
customed are wanting, confidently pronounce a people to be barbarous
and miserable. Hence the mutual contempt with which the members of
communities, unequal in their degrees of improvement, regard each other.
Polished nations, conscious of the advantages which they derive from their
knowledge and arts, are apt to view rude nations with peculiar scorn, and,
in the pride of superiority, will hardly allow either their occupations, their
feelings, or their pleasures, to be worthy of men. It has seldom been the
lot of communities, in their early and unpolished state, to fall under the observation of persons endowed with force of mind superior to vulgar prejudices, and capable of contemplating man, under whatever aspect he appears,
with a candid and discerning eye.
The Spaniards, who first visited America, and who had opportunity ol
beholding its various tribes while entire and unsubdued, and before any
change had been made in their ideas or manners by intercourse with a race
of men much advanced beyond them in improvement, were far from possessing the qualities requisite for observing the striking spectacle presented
to their view. Neither the age in which they lived, nor the nation to which
they belonged, had made such progress in true science, as inspires enlarged




AMERICA.                              139
and liberal sentiments. The conquerors of the New World were mostly
illiterate adventurers, destitute of all the ideas which should have directed
them in contemplating objects so extremely different from those with which
they were acquainted. Surrounded continually with danger or struggling
with haidships, they had little leisure, and less capacity, for any speculative
inquiry. Eager to take possession of a country of such extent and opulence, and happy in finding it occupied by inhabitants so incapable to defend it, they hastily pronounced them to be a wretched order of men, formed merely for servitude; and were more employed in computing the profits
of their labour, than in inquiring into the operations of their minds, or the
reasons of their customs and institutions. The persons who penetrated at
subsequent periods into the interior provinces, to which the knowledge and
devastations of the first conquerors did not reach, were generally of a simi
lar character; brave and enterprising in a high degree, but so uninformed
as to be little qualified either for observing or describing what they beheld.
Not only the incapacity but the prejudices of the Spaniards rendered
their accounts of the people of America extremely defective. Soon after
they planted colonies in their new conquests, a difference in opinion arose
with respect to the treatment of the natives. One party, solicitous to ren
der their servitude perpetual, represented them as a brutish, obstinate race,
incapable either of acquiring religious knowledge, or of being trained to
the functions of social life.'he other, full of pious concern for their conversion; contended that, though rude and ignorant, they were gentle, affectionate, docile, and by proper instructions and regulations might be formed
gradually into good Christians and useful citizens. This controversy, as I
have already related, was carried on with all the warmth which is natural,
when attention to interest on the one hand, and religious zeal on the other,
animate the disputants. Most of the laity espoused the former opinion;
all the ecclesiastics were advocates for the latter; and we shall uniformly.
find that, accordingly as an author belonged to either of these parties, he
is apt to magnify the virtues or aggravate the defects of the Americans
far beyond truth.  Those repugnant accounts increase the difficulty of
attaining a perfect knowledge of their character, and render it necessary
to peruse all the descriptions of them by Spanish writers with distrust,
and to receive their information with some grains of allowance.
Almost two centuries elapsed after the discovery of America, before
the manners of its inhabitants attracted, in any considerable degree, the
attention of philosophers. At length they discovered that the contemplation
of the condition and characterof the Americans, in their original state, tended to complete our knowledge of the human species; might enable us to
fill up a considerable chasm in the history of its progress; and lead to speculations no less curious than important. They entered upon this new
field of study with great ard6ur; but, instead of throwing light upon the
subject, they have contributed in some degree to involve it in additional
obscurity.  Too impatient to inquire, they hastened to decide; and began
to erect systems, when they should have been searching for facts on which
to establish their foundations. Struck with the appearance of degeneracy in the human species throughout the New World, and astonished at
beholding a vast continent occupied by a naked, feeble, and ignorant race
of men, some authors, of great name, have maintained that this part of
the globe had 1but lately emerged from the sea, and become fit for the
residence of man; that every thing in it bore marks of a recent original;
and that its inhabitants, lately called into existence, and still at the beginning of their career, were unworthy to be compared Ewith the people of
a more ancient and improved continent?.  Others have imagined, that,
under the influence of an unkindly climate, which checks and enervates
- M. de Buffon HIist. Nat. iii. 484, &c. ix. 103. 114.




1410                    HISTOR Y  OF                   [Boox IV
the principle of life, man never attained in America the perfection which
belongs to his nature, but remained an animal of an inferior order, defective in the vigour of his bodily frame, and destitute of sensibility, as well
as of force, in the operations of his mind.* In opposition to both these,
other philosophers have supposed that man arrives at his highest dignity
and excellence long before he reaches a state of refinement; and, in the
rude simplicity of savage life, displays an elevation of sentiment, an independence of mind, and a warmth of attachment, for which it is vain to
search among the members of polished societies.4 They seem to consider that as the most perfect state of man which is the least civilized.
They describe the manners of the rude Americans with such rapture, as
if they proposed them for models to the rest of the species. These contradictory theories have been proposed with equal confidence, and uncommon powers of genius and eloquence have been exerted, in order to
clothe them with an appearance of truth.
As all those circumstances concur in rendering an inquiry into the state
of the rude nations in America intricate and obscure, it is necessary to carry
it on with caution. When guided in our researches by the intelligent
observations of the few philosophers who have visited this part of the
globe, we may venture to decide. When obliged to have recourse to the
superficial remarks of vulgar travellers, of sailors, traders, buccaneers, and
missionaries, we must often pause, and, comparing detached facts, endeavour
to discover what they wanted sagacity to observe. Without indulging
conjecture, or betraying a propensity to either system, we must study with
equal care to avoid the extremes of extravagant admiration, or of supercilious
contempt for those manners which we describe.
In order to conduct this inquiry with greater accuracy, it should be
rendered as simple as possible. Man existed as an individual before he
became the member of a community; and the qualities which belong to
him under his former capacity should be known, before we proceed to
examine those which arise from the latter relation. This is peculiarly
necessary in investigating the manners of rude nations. Their political
union is so incomplete, their civil institutions and regulations so few, so
simple, and of such slender authority, that men in this state ought to be
viewed rather as independent agents, than as members of a regular society.
The character'of a savage results almost entirely from his sentiments or
feelings as an individual, and is but little influenced by his imperfect
subjection to government and order.  I shall conduct my researches:
concerning the manners of the Americans in this natural order, proceeding
gradually from what is simple to what is more complicated.
I shall consider, I. The bodily constitution of the Americans in those
regions now under review. Ii. The qualities of their minds. III. Their
domestic state. IV. Their political state and institutions. V. Their
system of war, and public security. VI. The arts with which they were
acquainted. VII. Their religious ideas and institutions. VIII. Such
singular detached customs as are not reducible to any of the former heads.
IX. I shall conclude with a general review and estimate of their virtues
and defects.
I. The bodily constitution of the Americans.-The human body is less
affected by climate than that of any other animal. Some animals are
confined to a particular region of the globe, and cannot exist beyond it;
others, though they may be brought to bear the injuries of a climate
foreign to them, cease to multiply when carried out of that district which
nature destined to be their mansion. Even such as seem capable of being
naturalized in various climates feel the effect of every remove from their
proper station, and gradually dwindle and degenerate from the vigour and
lI de P. Recherches Philos. sur les Amdric. passim6  t M. Rousseau.




AME5ERICA.                            141
perfection peculiar to their species. Man is the only living creature
whose frame is at once so hardy and so flexible, that he can spread over
the whole earth, become the inhabitant of every region, and thrive and
multiply under every climate. Subject, however, to the general law of
Nature, the human body is not entirely exempt from the operation of
climate;. and when exposed to the extremes either of heat or cold, its
size or vigour diminishes.
The first appearance of the inhabitants of the New World filled the
discoverers with such astonishment that they were apt to imagine them a
race of men different from those of the other hemisphere.  Their comr
plexion is of a reddish brown, nearly resembling the colour of copper."
The hair of their heads is always black, long, coarse, and uncurled. They
have no beard, and every part of their body is perfectly smooth. Their
persons are of a full size, extremely straight, and well proportioned [44].
Their features are regular, though often distorted by absurd endeavours,o improve the beauty of their natural form, or to render their aspect more
dreadful to their enemies. In the islands, where four-footed animals were
both few and small, and the earth yielded her productions almost spontaneously, the constitution of the natives, neither braced by the active
exercises of the chase, nor invigorated by the labour of cultivation, was
extremely feeble and languid. On the continent, where the forests abound
with game of various kinds, and the chief occupation of many tribes was
to pursue it, the human frame acquired greater firmness. Still, however,
Che Americans were more remarkable for agility than strength. They
resembled beasts of prey, rather than animals formed for labour [45].
They were not only averse to toil, but incapable of it; and when roused
by force from their native indolence, and compelled to work, they sunk
under tasks which the people of the other continent would have performed
with ease.   This feebleness of constitution was universal among the
inhabitants of those regions in America which we are surveying, and may
be considered as characteristic of the species there.t
The beardless countenance and smooth skin of the American seems to
indicate a defect of vigour, occasioned by some vice in his frame. He is
destitute of one sign of manhood and of strength. This peculiarity, by
which the inhabitants of the New World are distinguished from the
people of all other nations, cannot be attributed, as some travellers have
supposed, to their mode of subsistence.~  For though the food of many
Americans be extremely insipid, as they are altogether unacquainted with
the use of salt, rude tribes in other parts of the earth have subsisted on
aliments equally simple, without this mark of degradation, or any apparent
symptom of a diminution in their vigour.' As the external form of the Americans leads us to suspect that there is
some natural debility in their frame, the smallness of their appetite for
food has been mentioned by many authors as a confirmation of this suspicion. The quantity of food which men consume varies according to the
temperature of the climate in which they live, the degree of activity
which they exert, and the natural vigour of their constitutions. Under
the enervating heat of the torrid zone, and when men pass their days in
indolence and ease, they require less nourishment than the active inhabitants
of temperate or cold countries. But neither the warmth of their Climate,
nor their extreme laziness, will account for the uncommon defect of
appetite among the Americans. The Spaniards were astonished with
observing this, not only in the islands, but in several parts of the continent.
The constitutional temperance of the natives far exceeded, in their opinion,
* Oviedo Somario p. 46. D. Life of Columbus, c. 24.  t Oviedo Som. p. 51. C: Voy.
de Correal, ii. 138. Wafer's Description, p. 131.    $ B. Las Casas Brev. Relac. p. 4. Torquem.
Monar. i. 580. Oviedo Somario, p. 41. Histor. lib. iii. c. 6. IEerrera, dec. i. lib. xi. c. 5. Simon,
p. 41.   0 Charlev. Hist. de. Nouv: Fr. iii. 310.




142                       HISTORY OF                       [Boox IV.
the abstinence of the most mortified hermits:* while, on the other hand,
the appetite of the Spaniards appeared to the Americans insatiably
voracious; and they affirmed, that one Spaniard devoured more food in a
day than was sufficient for ten Americans.t
A proof of some feebleness in their frame, still more striking, is the
insensibility of the Americans to the charms of beauty, and the power of
love. That passion which was destined to perpetuate life, to be the bond of
social union, and the source of tenderness and joy, is the most ardent in
the humr.an breast. Though the perils and hardships of the savage state,
though excessive fatigue on some occasions, and the difficulty at all times
of procuring subsistence, may seem to be adverse to this passion, and to
have a tendency to abate its vigour, yet the rudest nations in every other
part of the globe seem to feel its influence more powerfully than the
inhabitants of the New World.  The negro glows with all the warmth of
desire natural to his climate; and the most uncultivated Asiatics discover
that sensibility, which, from their situation on the globe, we should expect
them to have felt. But the Americans are, in an amazing degree, strangers
to the force of this first instinct of nature. In every part of the New
World the natives treat their women with coldness and indifference.
They are neither the objects of that tender attachment which takes place
in civilized society, nor of that ardent desire conspicuous among rude
nations. Even in climates where this passion usually acquires its greatest
vigour, the savage of America views his female with disdain, as an animal
of a less noble species. He is at no pains to win her favour by the
assiduity of courtship, and still less solicitous to preserve it by indulgence
and gentleness.$ Missionaries themselves, notwithstanding the austerity
of monastic ideas, cannot refrain from expressing their astonishment at the
dispassionate coldness of the American young men in their intercourse
with the other sex.~ Nor is this reserve to be ascribed to any opinion
which they entertain with respect to the merit of female chastity.  That
is an idea too refined for a savage, and suggested by a delicacy of sentiment
and affection to which he is a stranger.
But in inquiries concerning either the bodily or mental qualities of
particular races of men, there is not a more common or more seducing
error, than that of ascribing to. a single cause, those characteristic
peculiarities which are the effect of the combined operation of many
causes. The climate and soil of America differ in so many respects from
those of the other hemisphere, and this difference is so obvious and striking,
that philosophers of great eminence have laid hold on this as sufficient to
account for what is peculiar in the constitution of its inhabitants. They
rest on physical causes alone, and consider the feeble frame and languid
desire of the Americans, as consequences of the temperament of that
portion of the globe which they occupy.  But the influences of political
and moral causes ought not to have been overlooked. These operate with
no less effect than that on which many philosophers rest as a full explanation
of the singular appearances which have been mentioned. Wherever the
state of society is such as to create many wants and desires, which cannot
be satisfied without regular exertions of industry, the body accustorned to
labour becomes robust and patient of fatigue. In a more simple state,
where the demands of men are so few and so moderate that they may be
gratified, almost without any effort, by the spontaneous productions of
nature, the powers of the body are not called forth, nor can they attain their
proper strength.  The natives of Chili and of North America, the two
* Ramusio, iii. 304. F. 306. A. Simon Conquista, &c. p. 39. Hakluyt, iii. 468. 508.  it Herrera,
dec. 1. lib. ii. c. 16.  t Hennepin Maours des Sauvages, 32, &c. Rochefort Hist. des Isles
Ai ltilles, p. 461. Voyage de Correal, ii. 141. Ramusio, iii. 309. F. Lozano Descr. del Gran Chaco,
71. Falkner's Descr. of Patagon, p. 125. Lettere di P. Cataneo ap. Muratori 11 Christian. Felice,
i. 305.   < Chanvalon, p. 51. Lettr. Edif. tom. xxiv. 318. Tertre, ii. 377. VYenegas, i. 81,
Ribas Hist. de los Triumf. p. 11.




AME RKC A.                             143
temperate regions in the New World, who live by hunting, may be deemed
an active and vigorous race, when compared with the inhabitants of the
isles, or of those parts of the continent where hardly any labour is requisite
to procure subsistence. The exertions of a hunter are not, however, so
regular, or so continued, as those of persons employed in the culture of
the earth, or in the various arts of civilized life; and though his agility
may be greater than theirs, his strength is on the whole inferior.  if
another direction were given to the active powers of man in the New
World, and his force augmented by exercise, he might acquire a degree
of vigour which he does not in his present state possess. The truth ol
this is confirmed by experience.' Wherever the Americans have been
gradually accustomed to hard labour, their constitutions become robust,
and they have been found capable of performing such tasks, as seemed
not only to exceed the powers of such a feeble frame as has been deemed
peculiar to their country, but to equal any effort of the natives either of
Africa or of Europe [46].
The sanie reasoning will apply to what has been observed concerning
their slender demand for food. As a proof that this should be ascribed
as much to their extreme indolence, and often total want of occupation, as
to any thing peculiar in the physical structure of their bodies, it has been
observed, that in those districts where the people of America are obliged
to exert any unusual effort of activity, in order to procure subsistence, or
wherever they are employed in severe labour, their appetite is not inferior
to that of other men, and in some places, it has struck observers as remark
ably voracious."
The operation of political and moral causes is still more conspicuous in
modifying the degree of attachment between the sexes. In a state of high
civilization, this passion, inflamed by restraint, refined by delicacy, and
cherished by fashion, occupies and engrosses the heart. It is no longer a
simple instinct of nature; sentiment heightens the ardour of desire, and
the most tender emotions of.Twhich our frame is susceptible soothe and
agitate the soul. This description, however, applies only to those, who,
by their situation, are exempted from the cares and labours of life. Among
persons of inferior order, who are doomed by their condition to incessant
toil, the dominion of this passion is less violent; their solicitude to procure
subsistence, and to provide for the first demand of nature, leaves little
leisure for attending to its second call. But if the nature of the intercourse
between the sexes varies so much in persons of different rank in polished
societies, the condition of man while he remains uncivilized must occasion
a variation still more apparent.  We may well suppose, that amidst the
hardships, the dangers, and the simplicity of domestic life, where subsistence is always precarious and often scanty, where men are almost continually engaged in the pursuit of their enemies, or in guarding against their
attacks, and where neither dress nor reserve are employed as arts of
female allurement, that the attention of' the Americans to their women
would be extremely feeble, without imputing this solely to any physical
defect or degradation in their frame.
It is accordingly observed, that in those countries of America where,
from the fertility of the soil, the mildness of the climate, or some further
advances which the natives have made in improvement, the means of
subsistence are more abundant, and the hardships of savage life are less
severely felt, the animal passion of the sexes becomes more ardent.
Striking examples of this occur among some tribes seated on the banks of
great rivers well stored with food, among others who are masters of
hunting grounds abounding so much with game, that they have a regular
and plentiful supply of nourishment with little labour. The superior degree
* Gumilla, ii. 12. 70. 247. Lafitau, i. 515. Ovalie Church. n. 81. Muratori, i. 295.




144                      HISTORY   OF                     [Boo.K IV.
of security and affluence which those tribes enjoy is followed by their
natural effects. The passions implanted in the human frame by the hand
of nature acquire additional force; new tastes and desires are formed; the
women, as they are more valued and admired, become more attentive to
dress and ornament; the men beginning to feel how much of their own
happiness depends upon them, no longer disdain the arts of winning their
favour and affection. The intercourse of the sexes becomes very different
from that which takes place among their ruder countrymen; and as hardly
any restraint is imposed on the gratification of desire, either by religion or
laws or decency, the dissolution of their manners is excessive.*
Notwithstanding the feeble make of the Americans, hardly any of them
are deformed, or mutilated, or defective in any of their senses. All
travellers have been struck with this circumstance, and have celebrated
the uniform symmetry and perfection of their external figure. Some
authors search for the cause of this appearance in their physical condition.
As the parents are not exhausted or over fatigued with hard labour, they
suppose that their children are born vigorous and sound. They imagine
that, in the liberty of savage life, the human body, naked and unconfined
from its earliest age, preserves its natural form; and that all its limbs and
members acquire a juster proportion than when fettered with artificial
restraints, which stint its growth and distort its shape.t Somethingf without
doubt, may be ascribed to the operation of these causes; but the true
reasons of this apparent advantage, which is common to all savage nations,
lie deeper, and are closely interwoven with the nature and genius of that
state. The infancy of man is so long and so helpless, that it is extremely
difficult to rear children among rude nations.  Their means of subsistence
are not only scanty, but precarious. - Such as live by hunting must range
over extensive countries, and shift often from place to place.  The care of
children, as well as every other laborious task, is devolved upon the women.
The distresses and hardships of the savage life, which are often such as
can hardly be supported by persons in full vigour, must be fatal to those
of more tender age. Afraid of undertaking a task so laborious, and of such
long duration, as that of rearing their offspring, the women, in some parts of
America, procure frequent abortions by the use of certain herbs, and extinguish the first sparks of that life which they are unable to cherish4. Sensible that only stout and well formed children have force of constitution to
struggle through such a hard infancy, other nations abandon and destroy
such of their progeny as appear feeble or defective, as unworthy of attention.~
Even when they endeavour to rear all their children without distinction, so
great a proportion of the whole number perishes under the rigorous treatment which must be their lot in the savage state, that few of those who
laboured under any original frailty attain the age of manhood.ll  Thus.
in polished societies, where the means of subsistence are secured with
certainty, and acquired with ease; where the talents of the mind are
often of more importance than the powers of the body; children are preserved notwithstanding their defects or deformity, and grow up to be useful
citizens. In rude nations, such persons. are either cut off as soon as they
are born, or, becoming a burden to themselves and to the community,
cannot long protract their lives.  But in those provinces of the New
World, where, by the establishment of the Europeans, more regular provision has been made bfor the subsistence of its inhabitants, and they are
restrained from laying violent hands on their children, the Americans are
so far from being eminent for any superior perfection in their form, that
one should rather suspect some peculiar imbecility in the race, from the
* Biet. 389. Charlev. iii. 423. Dumont. M6m. sur Louisiane, i. 155.  t Piso, p. 6j
+ Ellis's Voyage to Hudson'sBay, 198. Herrera, dec. 7. lib, ix. c. 4.  $ Gumilla Bis. ii. 2S4,
Techo's Hist. of Paraguay, &c. Churchill's Collect. vi. 108.  {l Creuxii. Hist. Canad, p. 57




AMERICA.                            146
extraordinary number of individuals who are deformed, dwarfish, mutilated,
blind, or deafi.
How feeble soever the constitution of the Americans nay be, it is remarkable that there is less variety in the human form throughout the New
World than in the ancient continent.  When Columbus and the other
discoverers first visited the different countries of America which lie within
the torrid zone, they naturally expected to find people of the same
complexion with those in the corresponding regions of the other hemisphere. To their amazement, however, they discovered that America
contained no negroes;t and the cause of this singular appearance became
as much the object of curiosity as the fact itself was of wonder. In what
part or membrane of the body that humour resides which tinges the
complexion of the negro with a deep black, it is the business of anatomists
to inquire and describe. The powerful operation of heat appears manifestly to be the cause which produces this striking variety in the human
species. All Europe, a great part of Asia, and the temperate countries of
Africa, are inhabited by men of a white complexion. All the torrid zone
in Africa, some of the warmer regions adjacent to it, and several countries
in Asia, are filled with people of a deep black colour. If we survey the
nations of our continent, making our progress from cold and temperate
countries towards those parts which are exposed to the influence of vehement and unremitting heat, we shall find that the extreme whiteness of
their skin soon begins to diminish; that its colour deepens gradually as we
advance; and, after passing through all the successive gradations of shade,
terminates in a uniform unvarying black. But in Anmerica, where the
agency of heat is checked and abated by various causes, which I have
already explained, the climate seems to be destitute of that force which
produces such wonderful effects on the human frame. The colour of the
natives of the torrid zone in America is hardly of a deeper hue than that
of the people in the more temperate parts of their continent. Accurate
observers, who had an opportunity of viewing the Americans in very
different climates, and in provinces far removed from each other, have
been struck with the amazing similarity of their figure and aspect [47].
But though the hand of nature has deviated solittle from one standard
in fashioning the human form in America, the creation of fancy hath been
various and extravagant. The same fables that were-current in the ancient
continent, have been revived with respect to the New World, and America
too has been peopled with human beings of monstrous and fantastic
appearance. The inhabitants of certain provinces were described to be
pigmies of three feet high; those of others to be giants of an enormous
size. Some travellers published accounts of people with only one eye;
others pretended to have discovered men without heads, whose eyes and
mouths were planted in their breasts. The variety of Nature in her productions is indeed so great, that it is presumptuous to set bounds to her
fertility, and to reject indiscriminately every relation that does not perfectly
accord xwith our own limited observation and experience. But the other
extreme,of yielding a hasty assent on the slighest evidence to whatever
has the appearance of being strange and marvellous, is still more unbecoming a philosophical inquirer; as, in every period, men are more apt to
be betrayed into error by their weakness in believing too much, than by
their arrogance in believing too little. In proportion as science extends6
and nature is examined with a discerning eye, the wonders which amused
ages of ignorance disappear. The tales of credulous travellers concerning
America are forgotten; the monsters which they describe have beensearched for in vain; and those provinces where they pretend to have
* Voy. de Ulloa, i. 23   t P. Martyr, dec. p. 71.
Vo. I.-19




146                       HISTORY OF                      [Booer IV.
found inhabitants of singular forms, are now known to be possessed by a
people nowise different from the other Americans.
Though those relations may, without discussion, be rejected as fabulous,
there are other accounts of varieties in the human species in some parts of
the New World, which rest upon better evidence, and merit more attentive
examination. This variety has been particularly observed in three different
districts.  The first of these is situated in the isthmus of Darien, near the
centre of America. Lionel Wafer, a traveller possessed of more curiosity
and intelligence than we should have expected to find in an associate of
Buccaneers, discovered there a race of men few  in number, but of a
singular make. They are of low stature, according to his description, of
a feeble frame, incapable of enduring fatigue.  Their colour is a dead
milk white; not resembling that of fair people among the Europeans, but
without any tincture of a blush or sanguine complexion. Their skin is
covered with a fine hairy down of a chalky white; the hair of their heads,
their eyebrows, and eye-lashes, are of the same hue. Their eyes are of
a singular form, and so weak that they can hardly bear the light of the
sun; but they see clearly by moonlight, and are most active and gay in
the night.   No race similar to this has been discovered in any other part
of America. Cortes, indeed, found some persons exactly resembling the
white people of Darien among the rare and monstrous animals which
Montezuma had collected.t  But as the power of' the Mexican empire
extended to the provinces bordering on the isthmus of Darien, they were
probably brought thence. Singular as the appearance of those people may
be, they cannot be considered as constituting a distinct species. Among
the negroes of Africa, as well as the natives of the Indian islands, nature
sometimes produces a small number of individuals, with all the characteristic
features and qualities of the white people of Darien.  The former are
called Albinos by the Portuguese, the latter Kackerlakes by the Dutch. In
Darien the parents of those Whites are of the same colour with the other
natives of the country; and this observation applies equally to the anomalous
progeny of the Negroes and Indiains.  The same mother who produces
some children of a colour that does not belong to the race, brings forth -the
rest with a complexion peculiar to her country.   One conclusion may then
be formed with respect to the people described by Wafer, the Albinos and
the Ictackerlakes; they are a degenerated breed, not a separate class of
men; and from some disease or defect of their parents. the peculiar colouar
and debility which mark their degradation are transmitted to them.  As a
decisive proof of this, it has been observed, that neither the white people
of Darien, nor the Albinos of Afiica, propagate their race: their children
are of the colour and temperament peculiar to the natives of their respective
countries~ [48]. 
The second district that is occupied by inhabitants differing in appearance from  the other people o'1 America, is situated in a high nqrthern
latitude, extending from the coast of Labrador towards the pole, as far as
the country is habitable. The people scattered over those dreary regions
are known to the Europeans by the name of Esquimaux.  They themselves, with that idea of their own superiority, which consoles the rudest
and' most wretched nations, assume the name of IKeralit or Men.  They
are of a middle size, and robust, with heads of a disproportioned bulk,
and feet as remarkably small. Their complexion though swarthy, by beilg
continually exposed to the rigour of a cold climate, inclines to the European
white rather than to the copper colour of America, and the men have
beards which are sometimes bushy and long.ll  From  these marks of
* Wafer's Descript. of Isth. ap. Dampier, iii. p. 346.  t Cortes ap. Ramus. iii. p. 241. E.: Margrav. Hlist. Rer. Nat. Bras. lib. viii. c. 4.    ~ Wafer, p. 348. Demanet Iit. (le V'Afrique,
ii. 234. Recherch.'Philos. sur les Amer. ii. 1, &c.   II Ellis Voy. to Huds. Bay, p.131. 139.  De
la Potherie, tom. 1. p. 79. Wales Journ. of a Voy. to Churchill River, Phil. Traes. vol Ix 11)9.




A M  IER I C A.                      147
distinction, as well as from one still less equivocal, the affinity of their
language to that of the Greenlanders, which I have already mentioned,
we may conclude, with some degree of confidence, that the Esquimaux
are a race different from the rest of the Ame:ricans.
We cannot decide with equal certainty concerning the inhabitants of the
third district, situated at the southern extremity of America. These are
the famous Patagonians, who, during two centuries and a half, have
afforded a subject of controversy to the learned, and an object of wonder
to the vulgar. They are supposed to be one of the wandering tribes
which occupy the vast but least known region of America, which extends
from the river de la Plata to the Straits of Magellan. Their proper
station is in that part of the interior country which lies on the banks of the
river Negro; but, in the hunting season, they often roam as far as the straits
wnich separate Tierra del Fuego from the main land. The first accounts
of this people were brought to Europe by the companions of Magellan,*
who described them as a gigantic race, above eight feet high, and oi
strength in proportion to their enormous size. Among several tribes of
animals, a disparity in bulk as considerable may be observed.  Some
large breeds of horses and dogs exceed the more diminutive races in
stature and strength, as far as the Patagonian is supposed to rise above the
usual standard of the human body. But animals attain the highest perfection of their species only in mild climates, or where they find the most
nutritive food in greatest abundance. It is not then in the uncultivated
waste of the Magellanic regions, and among a tribe of improvident savages,
that we should expect to find man possessing the highest honours of his
race, and distinguished by a superiority of size and vigour, far beyond
what he has reached in any other part of the earth. The most explicit
and unexceptionable evidence is requisite, in order to establish a fact
repugnant to those general principles and laws, which seem to affect the
human frame in every other instance, and to decide with respect to its
nature and qualities.  Such evidence has not hitherto been produced.
Though several persons, to whose testimony great respect is due, have
visited this part of America since the time of Magellan, and have had
interviews with the natives; though some have affirmed, that such as they
saw were of gigantic stature, and others have formed the same conclusion
from measuring their footsteps, or from viewing the skeletons of their dead;
yet their accounts vary from each other in so many essential points, and are
mingled with so many circumstances manifestly false or fabulous, as detract
much from their credit. On the other hand, some navigators, and those
among the most eminent of their order for discernment and accuracy, have
asserted that the natives of Patagonia, with whom they had intercourse,
though stout and well made, are not of such extraordinary size as to be
distinguished from the rest of the human species [49]. The existence of
this giogantic race of men seems, then, to be one of those points in natural
history, with respect to which a cautious inquirer will hesitate, and will
choose to suspend his assent until more complete evidence shall decide
whether he ought to admit a fact, seemingly inconsistent with what reason
and experience have discovered concerning the structure and condition of
man, in all the various situations in which he has been observed.
In order to form a complete idea with respect to the constitution of the
inhabitants of this and the other hemisphere, we should attend not only to
the make and vigour of their bodies, but consider what degree of health
they enjoy, and to what period of longevity they usually arrive. _n the
simplicity of the savage state, when man is not oppressed with laoour, or
enervated by luxury, or disquieted with care, we are apt to imagine that
this life will flow on almost untroubled by disease or suffering, until his
* Falkncr's Description of Patagonia, p. 102.




14s                     HISTORY  OF                    [Book IV.
days be terminated in extreme old age by the gradual decays of nature
We find, accordingly, among the Americans, as well as among other rude
-people, persons whose decrepit and shrivelled form seems to indicate an
extraordinary length of life. But as most of them are unacquainted with
the art of numbering, and all of them as forgetful of what is past, as they
are improvident of what is to come, it is impossible to ascertain their age
with any degree of precision.?  It is evident that the period of their
longevity must vary considerably, according to the diversity of climates,
and their different modes of subsistence. They seem, however, to be
every where exempt from many of the distempers which afflict polished
nations. None of the maladies, which are the immediate offspring of
luxury, ever visited them; and they have no names in their languages by
which to distinguish this numerous train of adventitious evils.
But whatever be the situation in which man is placed, he is born to
suffer; and his diseases in the savage state, though fewer in number, are,
like those of the animals whom he nearly resembles in his mode of Jite,
more violent and more fatal. If luxury engenders and nourishes distempers
of one species, the rigour and distresses of savage life bring on those of
another. As men in this state are wonderfully improvident, and their
means of subsistence precarious, they often pass from extreme want to
exuberant plenty, according to the vicissitudes of fortune in the chase, or
in consequence of the various degrees of abundance with which the earth
affords to them its productions in different seasons. Their inconsiderate
gluttony in the one situation, and their severe abstinence in the other, are
equally pernicious. For though the human constitution may be accustomed
by habit, like that of animals of prey, to tolerate long famine, and then to
gorge voraciously, it is not a little affected by such sudden and violent
transitions. The strength and vigour of savages are at some seasons
impaired by what they suffer from a scarcity of food; at others they are
afflicted with disorders arising from indigestion and a superfluity of gross
aliment. These are so common, that they may be considered as the
unavoidable consequence of their mode of subsisting, and cut off considerable
numbers in the prime of life. They are likewise extremely subject to
consumptions, to pleuritic, asthmatic, and paralytic disorders,f brought on
by the immoderate hardships and fatigue which they endure in hunting
and in war; or. owring to the inclemency of the seasons to which they are
continually exposed. In the savage state, hardships and fatigue violently
assault the constitution. In polished societies, intemperance undermines
it. It is not easy to determine which of them operates with most fatal: effect, or tends most to abridge human life. The influence of the former is
certainly most extensive. The pernicious consequences of luxury reach
only a few members in any community; the distresses of savage life are felt
by all. As far as I can judge, after very minute inquiry, the general period
of human life is shorter among savages than in well regulated and industrious societies.
One dreadful malady, the severest scourge with which, in this life,
offended Heaven chastens the indulgence of criminal desire, seems to have
been peculiar to the Americans. By communicating it to their conquerors,
they have not only amply avenged their own wrongs, but, by adding this
calamity to those which formerly imbittered human life, they have, perhaps,
more than counterbalanced all the benefits which Europe has derived from
the discovery of the New World. This distemper, from the country In
which it first raged, or from the people by whom it was supposed to have
been spread over Europe, has been sometimes called the Neapolitan, and
sometimes the French disease. At its first appearance, the infection was
* Ulloa Notic. Americ. 323.  Bancroft Nat. Hist. of Guiana, 334.  t Charlev.' S. Fr. iii. 364.
Lafitau, iL 360. De la Potherie, ii. 37.




AMERICA.                                149
so malignant, its symptoms so violent, its operation so rapid and fatal, as to
baffle all the efforts of medical skill. Astonishment and terror accompanied
this unknown affliction in its progress, and men began to dread the extinction
of the human race by such a cruel visitation.   Experience, and the
ingenuity of physicians, gradually discovered remedies of such virtue as to
cure or to mitigate the evil.  During the course of' two centuries and a
half, its virulence seems to have abated considerably. At length, in the
same manner with the leprosy, which raged in Eorope for some centuries,
t may waste its force and disappear; and in some happier age, this,western infection, like that from the east, may be known only by description [501.
[1. After considering what appears to be peculiar in the bodily constitution
of the Americans, our attention is naturally turned towards the powers
and qualities of their minds. As the individual advances from the ignorance and imbecility of the infant state to vigour and maturity of understanding, something similar to this may be observed in the progress of the
species.  With respect to it, too, there is a period of infancy, during which
several powers of the mind are not unfolded, and all are feeble and defective
in their operation. In the early ages of society, while the condition of
man is simple and rude, this reason is but little exercised, and his desires
move within a very narrow sphere. Hence arise two remarkable characteristics of the human mind in this state. Its intellectual powers are
extremely limited; its emotions and efforts are few and languid.  Both
these distinctions are conspicuous among the rudest and most unimproved
of the American tribes, and constitute a striking part of their description.
What, among polished nations, is called speculative reasoning or research,
is altogether unknown in the rude state of society, and never becomes the
occupation or amusement of the human faculties, until man be so far
improved as to have secured, with certainty, the means of subsistence, as
well as the possession of leisure and tranquillity. The thoughts and
attention of a savage are confined within the small circle of objects immediately conducive to his preservation or enjoyment.  Every thing beyond
that escapes his observation, or is perfectly indifferent to him. Like a
mere animal, what is before his eyes interests and affects him; what is out
of sight, or at a distance, makes little impression.". There are several
people in Anierica whose limited understandings seem not to be capable of
forming an arrangement for futurity; neither their solicitude nor their
foresight extends so far. They follow blindly the impulse of the appetite
which they feel, but are entirely regardless of distant consequences, and
even of those removed in the least degree from immediate apprehension.
While they highly prize such things as serve for present use, or minister
to present enjoyment, they set no value upon those which are not the
object of some immediate want.t When, on the approach of the evening,
a Caribbee feels himself disposed to go to rest, no consideration will tempt
him to sell his hammock. But, in the morning, when he is sallying out to
the business or pastime of the day, he will part with it for the slightest toy
that catches his fancy.4 At the close of winter, while the impression of
what he has suffered from the rigour of the climate is fresh in the mind of
the North American, he sets himself with vigour to prepare materials for
erecting a comfortable hut to protect him against the inclemency of the
succeeding season; but, as soon as the weather becomes mild, he forgets
what is past, abandons his work, and never thinks of it more until the return
of cold compels him, when too late, to resume it.~
If in concerns the most interesting, and seemingly the most simple, the
* Ullo Noticias Americ. 222.    1 Venegas Hist. of Calif. i. 66. Supp. Church. Coll. v. 693
Borde Descr. des Caraibes, p. 16. Ellis Voy. 194.   + Labat Voyages, ii. 114, 115.  Tertre, ii,
385.  ~ Adair's Ilist. of Amer. Indians, 417




150                     HISTORY   OF                    [Booc IV.
reason of man, while rude and destitute of culture, differs so little from the
thoughtless levity of children, or the improvident instinct of animals, its
exertions in other directions cannot be very considerable. The objects
towards which reason turns, and the disquisitions in which it engages,
must depend upon the state in which man is placed, and are suggested
by his necessities and desires. Disquisitions, which appear the most ne
cessary and important to men in one state of society, never occur to those ii
another. Among civilized nations, arithmetic, or the art of numbering, i,
deemed an essential and elementary science: and in our continent, the
invention and use of it reaches back to a period so remote as is beyond the
knowledge of history. But among savages, who have no property to
estimate, no hoarded treasures to count, no variety of objects or multiplicity
of ideas to enumerate, arithmetic is a superfluous and useless art. Accordingly, among some tribes in America it seems to be quite unknown.
There are many who cannot reckon further than three; and have no
denomination to distinguish any number above it.* Several can proceed as
far as ten, others to twenty. When they would convey an idea of any
number beyond these, they point to the hair of their head, intimating that
it is equal to them, or with wonder declare it to be so great that it cannot
be reckoned.t Not only the Americans, but all nations while extremely
rude, seem to be unacquainted with the art of computation.t  As soon,
however, as they acquire such acquaintance or connexion with a variety of
objects, that there is frequent occasion to combine or divide them, their
knowledge of numbers increases, so that the state of this art among any
people may be considered as one standard by which to estimate the degree
of their improvement. The Iroquoise, in North America, as they are much
more civilized than the rude inhabitants of Brazil, Paraguay, or Guiana,
have likewise made greater advances in this respect; though even their
arithmetic does not extend beyond a thousand, as in their petty transactions
they have no occasion for any higher number.~ The Cherokee, a less
considerable nation on the same continent, can reckon only as far as a
hundred, and to that extent have names for the several numbers; the
smaller tribes in their neighbourhood can rise no higher than teni] [51].
In other respects, the exercise of the understanding among rude nati6ns
-is still more limited. The first ideas of every human being must be such
as he receives by the senses. But in the mind of man, while in the savage
state, there seem to be hardly any ideas but what enter by this avenue.
The objects around him are presented to his eye. Such as may be subservient to his use, or can gratify any of his appetites, attract his notice;
he views the rest without curiosity or attention. Satisfied with considering
them under that simple mode in which they appear to him, as separate and
detached, he neither combines them so as to form general classes, nor contemplates their qualities apart from the subject in which they inhere, nor
bestows a thought upon the operations of his own mind concerning them
Thus he is unacquainted with all the ideas which have been denominated
universal, or abstract, or of reflection.  The range of his understanding
must, of course, be very confined, and his reasoning powers be employed
merely on what is sensible. This is so remarkably the case with the ruder
nations of America, that their languages (as we shall afterwvards find) have
not a word to express any thing but what is material or corporeal.  Time,
space, substance, and a thousand terms, which represent abstract and
universal ideas, are altogether unknown to them.~  A naked savage,
cowering over the fire in his miserable cabin, or stretched under a few
* Condam. p. 67. Stadius ap. de Bry, ix. 128. Lery, ibid. 251. Biet. 362. Lettr. Edit' 23.
314.  t Dumont Louis. i. 187. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 3. Bit. 306. Borde, 6.    This is
the cage, with the Greenlanders, Crantz, i. 225, and with Kamchatkadales, M. I'Abb Chappe, iii.
17.  0 Charlev. Nouv Franc. iii. 402.  11 Adair's Hist. of Amer. Indians, 77.  I[ Condam.
p. 54.




AMERICA.                             151
branches which afford him a temporary shelter, has as little inclination as
capacity for useless speculation. His thoughts extend not beyond what
relates to animal life; and when they are not directed towards some o0
its concerns, his mind is totally inactive. In situations where no extraordinary effort either of ingenuity or labour is requisite, in order to satisfy
the simple demands of nature, the powers of the mind are so seldom
roused to any exertion, that the rational faculties continue almost dormant
and unexercised. The numerous tribes scattered over the rich plains of
South America, the inhabitants of some of the islands, and of several
fertile regions on the continent, come under this description.  Their vacant
zountenance, their staring unexpressive eye, their listless inattention, and
total ignorance of subjects which seemed to be the first which should
occupy the thoughts of rational beings, made such impression upon the
Spaniards, when they first beheld those rude people, that they considered
them as animals of an inferior order, and could not believe that they
belonged to the human species." It required the authority of a papal
bull to counteract this opinion, and to convince them that the Americans
were capable of the functions and entitled to the privileges of humanity.t
Since that time, persons more enlightened and impartial than the discoverers
or conquerors of America, have had an opportunity of contemplating the
most savage of its inhabitants, and they have been astonished and humbled
with observing how nearly man in this condition approaches to the brute
creation. But in severer climates, where subsistence cannot be procured
with the same ease, where men must unite more closely, and act with
greater concert, necessity calls forth their talents and sharpens their invention, so that the intellectual powers are more exercised and improved.
The North American tribes, and the natives of Chili, who inhabit the temperate regions in the two great districts of America, are people of cultivated
and enlarged understandings, when viewed in comparison with some of.those seated in the islands, or on the banks of the Maragnon and Orinoco.
their occupations are more various, their system of policy, as well as of
war, more complex, their arts more numerous. But even among them
the intellectual powers are extremely limited in their operations, and,
-unless when turned directly to those objects which interest a savage, are
held in no estimation. Both the North Americans and Chilese, when not
engaged in some of the functions belonging to a warrior or hunter, loiter
away their time in thoughtless indolence, unacquainted with any other
subject worthy of their attention, or capable of occupying their minds.t
If even among them reason is so much circumscribed in its exertions, and
never arrives, in its highest attainments, at the knowledge of those general
principles and maxims which serve as the foundation of science, we may
conclude that the intellectual powers of man in the savage state are destitute
of their proper object, and cannot acquire any considerable degree of vigour
and enlargement.
From the same causes, the active efforts of the mind are few, and on
most occasions languid. If we examine into the motives which rouse
men to activity in civilized life, and prompt them  to persevere in fatiguing exertions of their ingenuity or strength,we shall find that they arise
chiefly from acquired wants and appetites. These are numerous and importunate; they keep the mind in perpetual agitation, and, in order to
gratify them. invention must be always on the stretch, and industry must
be incessantly employed. But the desires of simple nature are few, and
where a favourable climate yields almost spontaneously what suffices to
gratify them, they scarcely stir the soul, or excite any violent emotion.
Hence the people of several tribes in America waste their life in a listless
indolence. To be free from occupation, seems to be all the enjoyment
H Ierrera, dPc.. ii. i, c. 15  t Torquem. Mon Inl iii. 198.  t Lafitau, ii. 2




152                      HISTORY OF                      [BOOK IV.
towards which they aspire. They will continue whole days stretched
out in their hammocks, or seated on the earth in perfect idleness, without
changing their posture, or raising their eyes from the ground, or uttering
a single word.*
Such is their aversion to labour that neither the hope of future good
nor the apprehension of future evil can surmount it. They appear equally
indifferent to both, discovering little solicitude, and taking no precautions
to avoid the one or to secure the other.  The cravings of hunger may
rouse them; but as they devour, with little distinction, whatever will appease its instinctive demands, the exertions which these occasion are of
short duration. Destitute of ardour, as well as variety of desire, they
feel not the force of those powerful springs which give vigour to the
movements of the mind, and urge the patient hand of industry to persevere in its efforts. Man, in some parts of America, appears in a form so
rude that we can discover no effects of his activity, and the principle of
understanding, which should direct it, seems hardly to be unfolded
Like the other animals, he has no fixed residence; he has erected no habitation to shelter him from the inclemency of the weather; he has taken
no measures for securing certain subsistence; he neither sows nor reaps;
but roams about as led in search of the plants and fruits which the earth
brings forth in succession; and in quest of the game which he kills in the
forest, or of the fish which he catches in the rivers.
This description, however, applies only to some tribes. Man cannot
continue long in this state of feeble and uninformed infancy. He was
made for industry and action, and the powers of his nature, as well as the
necessity of his condition, urge him to fulfil his destiny. Accordingly,
among most of the American nations, especially those seated in rigorous
climates, some efforts are employed, and some previous precautions are
taken, for securing subsistence. The career of regular industry is begun,
and the laborious arm has made the first essays of its power. Still, however, the improvident and slothful genius of the savage state predominates. Even among those more improved tribes, labour is deemed ignominious and degrading. It is only to work of a certain kind that a man
will deign to put his hand. The greater part is devolved entirely upon
the women. One-half of the community remains inactive, while the
other is oppressed with' the multitude and variety of its occupations.
Thus their industry is partial, and the foresight which regulates it is no
less limited. A remarkable instance of this occurs in the chief arrangement with respect to their manner of living. They depend for their subsistence, during one part of the year, on fishing; during another, on hunting; during a third, on the produce of their agriculture. Though experience has taught them to foresee the return of those various seasons, and
to make some provision for the respective exigencies of each, they either
want sagacity to proportion this provision to their consumption, or are so
incapable of any command over their appetites, that, from their inconsiderate waste, they often feel the calamities of famine as severely as the
rudest of the savage tribes. What they suffer one year does not augment
their industry, or render them more provident to prevent similar distresses.t
This inconsiderate thoughtlessness about futurity, the effect of ignorance
and the cause of sloth, accompanies and characterizes man in every stage
of savage life;t and, by a capricious singularity in his operations, he is
then least solicitous about supplying his wants, when the means of satisfying them are most precarious, and procured with the greatest difficulty [52]. 
Ilt. After viewing the bodily constitution of the Americans, and cown
* Bouguer Voy. au PWrou, 102. Borde, 15   t Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 338. Lettr. Edif. 23. 998.
Descript. of N. France, Osborn's Collect. ii. 880. De la Potherie, ii. 63. ~ Bancroft's Nat. Himt
of Guiana, 326. 333.




AMERICA.                              153
templating the powers of their minds, we are led, in the natural order of
inquiry, to consider them as united together in society. Hitherto our researches have been confined to the operations of understanding respecting
themselves as individuals; now they will extend to the degree of their
sensibility and affection towards their species.
The domestic state is the first and most simple form of human association. The union of the sexes among different animals is of longer or
shorter duration in proportion to the ease or difficulty of rearing their off.
spring. Among those tribes where the season of infancy is short, and the
young soon acquire vigour or agility, no permanent union is formed. Nature commits the care of training up the offspring to the mother alone, and
her tenderness, without any other assistance, is equal to the task. But
where the state of infancy is long and helpless, and the joint assiduity of
roth parents is requisite in tending their feeble progeny, there a more intimate connexion takes place, and continues until the purpose of nature be
accomplished, and the new race grow up to full maturity. As the infancy
of man is more feeble and helpless than that of any other animal, and he
is dependent during a much longer period on the care and foresight of his
parents, the union between husband and wife came early to be considered
not only as a solemn but as a permanent contract. A general state of promiscuous intercourse between the sexes never existed but in the imiagination of poets. In the infancy of society, when men, destitute of arts
and industry, lead a hard precarious life, the rearing of their progeny demands the attention and efforts of both parents; and if their union had
not been formed and continued with this view, the race could not have
been preserved. Accordingly in America, even among the rudest tribes?
a regular union between husband and wife was universal, and the rights
of marriage were understood and recognised. In those districts where
subsistence was scanty, and the difficulty of maintaining a family was
great, the man confined himself to one wife. In warmer and more fertile
provinces, the facility of procuring food concurred with the influence of
climate in inducing the inhabitants to increase the number of their wives.*
In some countries the marriage-union subsisted during life; in others, the
impatience of the Americans under restraint of any species, together with
their natural levity and caprice, prompted them to dissolve it on very
slight pretexts, and often without assigning any cause.t
But in whatever light the Americans considered the obligation of this
contract, either as perpetual or only as temporary, the condition of women
was equally humiliating and miserable. Whether man has been improved
by the progress of arts and civilization in society, is a question which, in
the wantonness of disputation, has been agitated among philosophers.
That women are indebted to the refinements of polished manners, for a
happy change in their state, is a point which can admit of no doubt. Tc
despise and to degrade the female sex is a characteristic of the savage state
in every part of the globe. Man, proud of excelling in strength and iv
courage, the chief marks ofpre-eminence among rude people, treats woman,
as an inferior, with disdain. The Americans, perhaps from that coldness
and insensibility which has been considered as peculiar to their constitution,
add neglect and harshness to contempt. The most intelligent travellers
nave been struck with this inattention of the Americans to their women.
It is not, as I have already observed, by a studied display of tenderness
and attachment that the American endeavours to gain the heart of the
woman whom he wishes to marry. Marriage itself, instead of being a
union of affection and interests between equals, becomes among them the
unnatural conjunction of a master with his slave. It is the observation of
* Lettr. Edif. 23. 318. Lafitau Mceurs, i. 554. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 234. Jqurnal de Grillet et
Bechamel, p. 88.  t Lafitau, i. 580. Joutel Journ. Histor. 345. Lozano Desc. del Gran Charc,
70. Hennepin Mceurs des Sauvages, p. 30. 33.
VOL. I. —20




154                      HISTORY OF                       [BooK IV
an author whose opinions are deservedly of great weight, that wherevei
wives are purchased their condition is extremely depressed.*   They
become the property and the slaves of those who buy them. In whatever
part of the globe this custom prevails, the observation holds. In countries
where refinement has made some progress, women when purchased are
excluded from society, shut up in sequestered apartments, and kept under
the vigilant guard of their masters.  In ruder nations they are degraded
to the meanest functions. Among many people of America the marriage
contract is properly a purchase.  The man buys his wife of her parents.
Though unacquainted with the use of money, or with such commercial
transactions as take place in more improved society, he knows how to give
an equivalent for any object which he desires to possess. In some places,
the suitor devotes his service for a certain time to the parents of the maid
whom he courts; in others he hunts for them occasionally, or assists in
cultivating their fields and forming their canoes; in others, he offers presents
of such things as are deemed most valuable on account of their usefulness
or rarity.t In return for these he receives his wife; and this circumstance,
added to the low estimation of women among savages, leads him to consider her as a female servant whom he has purchased, and whom  he has
a title to treat as an inferior. In all unpolished nations, it is true, the
functions in domestic economy which fall naturally to the share of women
are so many, that they are subjected to hard labour, and must bear more
than their full portion of the common burden. But in America their condition is so peculiarly grievous, and their depression so complete, that
servitude is a name too mild to describe their wretched state. A wife
afnong most tribes is no better than a beast of burden, destined to every
office of labour and fatigue.  While theJnen loiter out the day in sloth, or
spend it in amusement, the women are condemned to incessant toil.
Tasks are imposed upon them without pity, and services are received
without complacence or gratitude.4 Every circumstance reminds women
of this mortifying inferiority. They must approach their lords with reverence; they must regard them as more exalted beings, and are not permitted
to eat in their presence.~  There are districts in America where this dominion is so grievous, and so sensibly felt, that some women, in a wild emotion of maternal tenderness, have destroyed their female children in their
infancy, in order to deliver them from that intolerable bondage to which
they knew they were doomed.ll  Thus the first institution of social life is
perverted. That state of domestic union towards which nature leads the
human species, in order to soften the heart to gentleness and humanity, is
rendered so unequal as to establish a cruel distinction between the sexes,
which forms the one to be harsh and unfeeling, and humbles the other to
servility and subjection.
It is owing, perhaps, in some measure, to this state of depression, that
women in rude nations are far from being prolific. ~  The vigour of their
constitution is exhausted by excessive fatigue, and the wants and distresses
of savage life are so numerous as to force them to take various precautions
in order to prevent too rapid an increase of their progeny. Among wandering
tribes, or such as depend chiefly upon hunting for subsistence, the mother
cannot attempt to rear a second child until the first has attained such a
degree of vigour as to be in some measure independent of her care
From this motive, it is the universal practice of the American women to
suckle their children during several years;*' and, as they seldom marry
early, the period of their fertility is over before they can finish the long
* Sketches of Hist. of Man, i. 184.  t Lafitau Mceurs, &c. i. 560, &c. Charlev. iii. 285, &c.
Herrera, dec. 4. lib. iv. c. 7. Dumont, ii.'156.  + Tertre, ii. 382. Borde Relat. des Mcours des
Caraibes, p. 21. Biet. 357. Condamine, p. 110. Fermin. i. 79.  q Gumilla, i. 153. Barrere,
164. Labat, Voy. ii. 78. Chanvalon, 51. Tertre, ii. 300.  11 Guini!a, ii. 2:33. 238. Herrera,
dec. 7. lib. ix. c. iv.  ff Lafitau, i. 599. Charlevoix, iii. 304.  ** -Ierrera, dec. 6. ib. i. i.c.




AMERIC{A.                                155
but necessary attendance upon two or three children.?  Among some of
the least polished tribes, whose industry and foresight do not extend so far
as to make any regular provision for their own subsistence, it is a maxim
not to burden themselves with rearing more than tw,  hildren;t and no
such numerous families as are frequent in civilized societies are to be
found among men in the savage state.}  When twins are born, one of them
commonly is abandoned, because the mother is not equal to the task ofreannrmg
both~ [53]. When a mother dies while she is nursing a child, all hope of
preserving its life fails, and it is buried together with her in the same grave.ll
As the parents are frequently exposed to want by their own improvident
indolence, the difficulty of sustaining their children becomes so great that
it is not uncommon to abandon or destroy them.~  Thus their experience
of the difficulty of training up an infant to maturity, amidst the hardships of
savage life, o:ften stifles the voice of nature among the Americans, and
suppresses the strong emotions of parental tenderness.
But though necessity compels the inhabitants of America thus to set
bounds to the increase of their families, they are not deficient in affection
and attachment to their offspring. They feel the power of this instinct in
its full force, and as long as their progeny continue feeble and helpless, no
people exceed them in tenderness and care.*" But in rude nations the
dependence of children upon their parents is of shorter continuance than
in polished societies. When men must be trained to the various functions of
civil life by previous discipline andeducation, whenthe knowledge of abstruse
sciences must be taught, and dexterity in intricate arts must be acquired,
before a young manis prepared to begiit his career of action, the attentive feelings of a parent are not confined to the years of infancy, but extend to what is
more remote, the establishment of his child in the world.  Even thein his
solicitude does not terminate. His protection may still be requisite, and
his wisdom and experience still prove useful guides. Thus a permanent
connection is formed; parental tenderness is exercised, and filial respect
returned, throughout the whole course of life. But in the simplicity of the
savage state the affection of parents, like the instinctive fondness of animals,
ceases almost entirely as soon as their offspring attain maturity. Little instruction fits them for that mode of life to which they are destined.  The
parents, as if their duty were accomplished, when they have conducted
their children through the helpless years of infancy, leave them afterwards
at entire liberty.  Even in their tender age, they seldom advise or admonish,
they never chide or chastise them.  They suffer them to be absolute masters
of their own actions.tt  In an American hut, a father, a mother, and their
posterity, live together like persons assembled by accident, without seeming
to feel the obligation of the duties mutually arising from this connection.tS
As filial love is not cherished by the continuance of attention or good offices,
the recollection of benefits received in early infancy is too faint to excite it.
Conscious of their own liberty, and impatient of restraint, the youth of
America are accustomed to act as if they were totally independent. Their
parents are not objects of greater regard than other persons. They treat
them always with neglect, and often with such harshness and insolence as
to fill those who have been witnesses of theirconduct with horror.~6  Thus
the ideas which seem to be natural to man in his savage state, as theyresult
necessarily from his circumstances and condition in that period of his plmagressq
* Charlev. iii. 303. Dumont, M6m. sur Louisiane, ii. 270. Deny's Hist. Natur. de I'Amdrique,
&c. ii. 365. Charlev. Hist. de Parag. ii. 422.   t Techo's' Account of Paraguay, &c. Church.
Collect. vi. 108. Lett. Edif. xxxiv. 200. Lozano Descr. 92.:  Maccleur's Journal, 63.   < Lett.
Edif. x. 200.  11 Charlev. iii. 368.  Lett. Ediff. x. 200. P. Melch. Hlernandez Memor. de Cheriqui. Colbert. Collect. Orig. Pap. i.  If Venega'. Hist. of Californ. i. 82.  ** Gumlilla, i 211.
Diet. 390.   tt Charlev. iii. 272. Biet. 390. Gumilla, i. 212. Lafitasu, i. 602. Creuxii Hist
Canad. p. 71. Fernandez, Relac. Hist. de los Chequit. 33.  t: Clharlev. Hist. N. Fr. il. 273.
p Gumilla, i. 212.  Tertre, ii. 376.  Charlev. Hist. de N. France, iii. 309.  Charlev. Hist. de
Parag. i. 115. Lozano Descript. dcl Gran. Chaco, p. 68. 100, 101. Fernand. Relac. Histor. de io3
Chequit. 426.




156                       HISTORY OF                       [BooK IV.
affect the two capital relations in domestic life. They render the union
between husband and wife unequal. They shorten the duration and weaken
the force of the connection between parents and children.
IV. From the domestic state of the Americans, the transition to the consideration of their civil government and political institutions is natural. In
every inquiry concerning the operations of men when united together in
society, the first object of attention should be their mode of subsistence.
Accordingly as that varies, their laws and policy must be different. The
1nstitution suited to the ideas and exigencies of tribes which subsist chiefly.y fishing or hunting, and which have as yet acquired but an imperfect conception of any species of property, will be much more simple than those
which must take place when the earth is cultivated with regular industry;
and a right of property, not only in its productions, but in the soil itselfi is
completely ascertained.
All the people of America, now  under review, belong to the former
class. But though they may all be comprehended under the general denomination of savage, the advances which they had made in the art of procuring to themselves a certain and plentiful subsistence were very unequal.
On the extensive plains of South America man appears in one of the rudest
states in which he has been ever observed, or perhaps can exist.  Several
tribes depend entirely upon the bounty of nature for subsistence. They
discover no solicitude, they employ little foresight, they scarcely exert
any industry to secure what is necessary for their support.  The Topayers,
of Brazil, the Guaxeros, of Tierra Firme, the Caiguas, the Jlloxos, and
several other people of Paraguay, are unacquainted with every species of
cultivation.  They neither sow nor plant.  Even the culture of the manioc,
of which cassada bread is made, is an art too intricate for their ingenuity,
or too fatiguing to their indolence. The roots which the earth produces
spontaneously; the fruits, the berries, and the seeds which they gather in
the woods; together with lizards and other reptiles, which multiply amazingly with the heat of the climate in a fat soil moistened by frequent
rains, supply them with food during some part of the year.* At other
times they subsist by fishing; and nature seems to have indulged the laziness of the South American tribes by the liberality with which she ministers in this way, to their wants. The vast rivers of that fegion in America
abound with an infinite variety of the most delicate fish. The lakes and
marshes formed by the annual overflowing of the waters are filled with all
the different species, where they remain shut up, as in natural reservoirs,
for the use of the inhabitants. They swarm in such shoals, that in some
places they are catched without art or industry [54]. In others, the natives have discovered a method of infecting the water with the juice of
certain plants, by which the fish are so intoxicated that they float on the
surface and are taken with the hand [55]. Some tribes have ingenuity
enough to preserve them without salt, by drying or smoking them upon
hurdles over a slow fire.t The prolific quality of the rivers in South
America induces many of the natives to resort to their banks, and to depend almost entirely for nourishment on what their waters supply with
such profusion.+  In this part of the globe hunting seems not to have been
the first employment of men, or the first effort of their invention and labour to obtain food. They were fishers before they became hunters;
and as the occupations of the former do not call for equal exertions of activity or talents with those of the latter, people in that state appear to
possess neither the same degree of enterprise nor of ingenuity. The
* Nieuhcff. Hist. of Brazil. Church. Coll. ii. 134. Simon Conquista de Tierra Firma, p. 16O,
1 echo, Account of Paraguay, &c. Church. vi. 78. Lettr. Edif. 23. 384. 10. 190. Lozano, Descrip. del. Gran Chaco, p. 81. Ribas Histor. de los Triunifos, &c. p. 7.  t Condam. 159. Gumilla, ii. 37. Lettr. Edif. 14. 199. 23. 328.. Acugna, lelat. de la Riv. des Amas. 138.   $ Bar.
rere Relat. de Fr. Equin. p. 155




AMERICA.                               157
petty nations adjacent to the Maragnon and Orinoco are manifestly the
most inactive and least intelligent of all the Americans.
None but tribes contiguous to great rivers can sustain themselves in this
manner. The greater part of the American nations, dispersed over the
forests with which their country is covered, do not procure subsistence
with the same facility. For although these forests, especially in the
southern continent of America, are stored plentifully with game,? considerable efforts of activity and ingenuity are requisite in pursuit of it.
Necessity incited the natives to the one, and taught them the other.
Hunting became their principal occupation; and as it called forth strenuous exertions of courage, of force, and of invention, it was deemed no
less honourable than necessary. This occupation was peculiar to the men.
They were trained to it from their earliest youth. A bold and dexterous
nunter ranked next in fame to the distinguished warrior, and an alliance
with the former is often courted in preference to one with the latter.t
Hardly any device, which the ingenuity of man has discovered for ensnaring or destroying wild animals, was unknown to the Americans.
While engaged in this favourite exercise, they shake off the indolence
peculiar to their nature, the latent powers and vigour of their minds are
roused, and they become active, persevering, and indefatigable. Their
sagacity in finding their prey and their address in killing it are equal.
Their reason and their senses being constantly directed towards this one
object, the former displays such fertility of invention and the latter acquire
such a degree of acuteness as appear almost incredible   They discern
the footsteps of a wild beast, which escape every other eye, and can follow
them with certainty through the pathless forest. If they attack their game
openly, their arrow seldom errs from the mark:1 if they endeavour to
circumvent it by art, it is almost impossible to avoid their toils. Among
several tribes, their young men were not permitted to marry until they
had given such proofs of their skill in hunting as put it beyond doubt that
they were capable of providing for a family. Their ingenuity, always on
the stretch, and sharpened by emulation as well as necessity, has struck
out many inventions which greatly facilitate success in the chase. The
most singular of these is the discovery of a poison, in which they dip the
arrows employed in hunting. The slightest wound with those envenomed
shafts is mortal. If they only pierce the skin, the blood fixes and congeals
in a moment, and the strongest animal falls motionless to the ground.
Nor does this poison, notwithstanding its violence and subtlety, infect the
flesh of the animal which it kills.  That may be eaten with perfect safety,
and retain its native relish and qualities. All the nations situated upon the
banks of the Maragnon and Orinoco are acquaintedwith this composition, the
chief ingredient in which is the juice extracted from the root of the curare,.a species of withe.~ In other parts of America they employ the juice of
the manchenille for the same purpose, and it operates with no less fatal
activity. To people possessed of those secrets the bow is a more destructive weapon than the musket, and, in their skilful hands, does great exe
cution among the birds and beasts which abound in the forests of America
But the life of a hunter gradually leads man to a state more advanced.
The chase, even where prey is abundant, and the dexterity of the hunter
much improved, affords but an uncertain maintenance, and at some seasons
it myst be suspended altogether. If a savage trusts to his bow alone. for
food, he and. his family will be often reduced to extreme distress [56J
Hardly any region of the earth furnishes man spontaneously with what his
wants require. In the mildest climates, and most, fertile soils, his own
P. Martyr, Decad. p. 324. Gumilla, ii. 4, &c. Acugna, 1. 156.  t Charlev. Histoire de la
N. France, ii.. 115.   +iet. Voy. de France Equin. 357. Davies's Discov. of the River of
Amaz. Purchas, iv. p. 1287.   ~ Gumilla, ii. 1. &c Condanl. 208. Recherch. Philos. ii 230
ncroft's Nat. Hist. of Guiana, 281, & c.




}58:HIISTORY   OF                   [BooK IV.
industry and foresight must be exerted in some degree to secure a regular
supply of food.  Their experience of this surmounts the abhorrence of
labour natural to savage nations, and compels them  to have recourse to
culture, as subsidiary to hunting. In particular situations, some small
tribes may subsist by fishing, independent of any production of the earth
raised by their own Industry.  But throughbut all America, we scarcely
meet with any nation of hunters which does not practise some species of
cultivation.
The agriculture of the Americans, however, is neither extensive nor
laborious. As game and fish are their principal food, all they aim at by
cultivation is to supply any occasional defect of these. In- the southern
continent of America, the natives confined their industry to rearing a few
plants, which, in a rich soil and warm climate, were easily trained to maturity.  The chief of these is maize, well known in Europe by the name
of Turkey or Indian wheat, a grain extremely prolific, of simple culture,
agreeable to the taste, and affording a strong hearty nourishment. The
second is the manioc, which grows to the size of a large shrub or small
tree, and produces roots somewhat resembling parsnips. After carefully
squeezing out the juice, these roots are grated down to a fine powder, and
formed into thin cakes called cassada bread, which, though insipid to the
taste, proves no contemptible food.*  As the juice of the manioc is a
deadly poison, some authors have celebrated the ingenuity of the Americans in converting a noxious plant into wholesome nourishment.  But it
should rather be considered as one of the desperate expedients for procuring subsistence, to which necessity reduces rude nations'; or, perhaps,
men were led to the use of it by a progress in which there is nothing
marvellous.  One species of manioc is altogether free of any poisonous
quality, and may be eaten without any preparation but that of roasting it.n the embers. This, it is probable, was first used by the Americans as
food; and, necessity having. gradually taught them the art of separating
its pernicious juice from the other species, they have by experience found
it to be more prolific as well as more nourishingt [57]. The third is the
plantain, which, though it rises to.the height of a tree, is of such quick
growth, that in less than a year it rewards the industry of the cultivator
with its fruit.  This, when roasted, supplies the place of bread, and is
both palatable and nourishing [58].  The fourth is the potatoe, whose culture and qualities are too well known to need any description.  The fifth
is pimnento, a small tree yielding a strong aromatic spice.  The Americans,
who, like other inhabitants of warm climates, delight in whatever is hot
and of poignant flavour, deem this seasoning a necessary of life, and
mingle it copiously with every kind of food they take.:
Such are the various productions, which were the chief object of culture among the hunting tribes on the continent of America; and with a
moderate exertion of active and provident industry these might have
yielded a full supply to the wants of a numerous people.  But men,
accustomed to the free and vagrant life of hunters, are incapable of regular application to labour, and consider agriculture as a secondary and
inferior occupation. Accordingly, the provision for subsistence, arising
from cultivation, was so limited and scanty among the Americans, that,
upon any accidental failure of their usual success in hunting, they were
often reduced to extreme distress.
In the islands, the mode of subsisting was considerably different. None
of the large animnals which abound on the continent were known there.
Only four species of quadrupeds, besides a kind of small dumb dog,
* Sloane Hist. of Jam. Introd. 1!. 18. Lahat, i. 394. Acosta, Hist. Ind. Occid. Natur. lib. iv. c.
17. Ulloa, i. 62. Aublet, Mmr. stir le Magnioc. Ifist. des Plantes, tom. ii. p. 65, &c.  t Martyr,
Decad. 301. Labat, i. 411. Gumilia. iii. 192. Machucha Milic. Indiana, 164.  - Gumilla, iii
171. Acosta, lib. iv. c. 20.




AMER C A.                               159
existed in the islands, the biggest of which did not exceed the size of a
rabbit,? To hunt such a diminutive prey was an occupation which
required no effort either of activity or courage.  The chief employment
of a hunter in the isles was to kill birds, which on the continent are deemed
ignoble game, and left chiefly to the pursuit of boys.t This want of
animals, as well as their peculiar situation, led the islanders to depend
principally upon fishing for their subsistence.  Their rivers, and the sea
with which they are-surrounded, supplied them with this species of food.
At some particular seasons, turtle, crabs, and other shellfish abounded in
such numbers that the natives could support themselves with a facility in
which their indolence delighted.~  At other times, they ate lizards and
ivarious reptiles of odious forms.ll  To fishing the inhabitants of the islands
added some degree of agriculture.  Maize [9], manioc, and other plants
were cultivated in the same manner as on the continent.  But all the fruits
of their industry, together with what their soil and climate produced spontaneously, afforded them but a scanty maintenance.  Though their demands
for food were very sparing, they hardly raised what was sufficient for their
own consumption.  If a few Spaniards settled in any district, such a small
addition of supernumerary mouths soon exhausted their scanty stores, and
brought on a famine.
Two circumstances, common to all the savage nations of America, concurred with those which I have already mentioned, not only in rendering
their agriculture imperfect, but in circumscribing their power in all their
operations. They had no tame animals; and they were unacquainted with
the useful metals.
In other parts of the globe, man, in his rudest state, appears as lord of
the creation, giving law to various tribes of animals, which he has tamed
and reduced to subjection.  The Tartar follows his prey on the horse
which he has reared; or tends his numerous herds, which furnish him both
with food and clothing.: the Arab has rendered the camel docibl, and avails
himself of its persevering strength: the Laplander has formed the reindeer
to be subservient to his will; and even the people of Kamchatka have
trained their dogs to labour. This command over the inferior creatures is
one of the noblest prerogatives of man, and among the greatest efforts of
his wisdom and power.  Without this his dominion is incomplete.  He is
a monarch who has no subjects, a master without servants, and must perform every operation by the strength of his own arm. Such was the condition of all the rude nations in America.  Their reason was so little
improved, or their union so incomplete, that they seem not to have been
conscious of the superiority of their nature, and siuffered all the animal
creation to retain its liberty, without establishing their own authority over
any one species. Most of the animals, indeed, which have been rendered
domestic in our continent, do not exist in the New  World; but those
peculiar to it are neither so fierce nor so formidable as to have exempted
them from servitude. There are some animals of the same species on
both continents. But the rein-deer, which has been tamed and broken to
the yoke in the one hemisphere, runs wild in the other.  The bison of
America is manifestly of the same species with the horned cattle of the
other hemisphere.~T  The latter, even among the rudest nations in our continent, have been rendered domestic; and, in consequence of his dominion
over them, man can accomplish works of labour with greater facility,
and has made a great addition to his means of subsistence. The inhabitants of many regions of the New World, where the bison abounds, might
have derived the same advantages from  it.  It is nlot of a nature so
indocile, but that it might have been trained to be as subservient to man
* Oviedo, lib. xii. in proem.  f Ribas tIist. de los Triumph. p. 13. De la Potherie, ii. 33.
iii. 20.  $ Oviedo, lib. xiii. c. 1. Gomara, Hist. Gener. c. 28.    p Gonlara, Hist. Gener,
c 9 Labat, ii. 221, &c.    I Oviedo, lib. xiii c 3  ~W Buffon. artic. Bison.




160                     HISTORY OF                       [BDoK IV.
as our cattle.? But a savage, in that uncultivated state wherein the
Americans were discovered, is the enemy of the other animals, not their
superior. He wastes and destroys, but knows not how to multiply or to
govern them.t
This, perhaps, is the most notable distinction between the inhabitants ot
the Ancient and New Worlds, and a high pre-eminence of civilized men
above such as continue rude. The greatest operations of man in changing
anti improving' the face of nature, as well as his most considerable efforts
In cultivating the earth, are accomplished by means of the aid which he
receives from the animals that he has tamed, and employs in labour. It is
by their strength that he subdues the stubborn soil, and converts the desert
or marsh into a fruitful field.  But man, in his civilized state, is so
accustomed to the service of the domestic animals, that he seldom
reflects upon the vast benefits which he derives from it. If we were
to suppose him, even when most improved, to be deprived of their useful
ministry, his empire over nature must in some measure cease, and he would
remain a feeble animal, at a loss how to subsist, and incapable of attempting such arduous undertakings as their assistance enables him to execute
with ease.
It is a doubtful point, whether the dominion of man over the animal
creation, or his acquiring the useful metals, has contributed most to extend
his power. The era of this important discovery is unknown, and in our
hemisphere very remote.  It is only by tradition, or by digging up some
rude instruments of our forefathers, that we learn that mankind were
originally unacquainted with the use of metals, and endeavoured to supply
the want of them  by employing flints, shells, bones, and other hard substances, for the same purposes which metals serve among polished nations.
Nature completes the formation of some metals. Gold, silver, and copper,
are found in their perfect state in the clefts of rocks, in the sides of
mountains, or the channels of rivers. These were accordingly the metals
first known, and first applied to use. But iron, the most serviceable of all,
and to which man is most indebted, is never discovered in its perfect form;
its gross and stubborn ore must feel twice the force of fire, and go through
two laborious processes, before it becomes fit for use. Man was long
acquainted with the other metals before he acquired the art of fabricating
iron, or attained such ingenuity as to perfect an invention, to which he is
indebted for those instruments wherewith he subdues the earth, and commands all its inhabitants. But in' this, as well as in many other respects,
the inferiority of the Americans was conspicuous. All the savage tribes,
scattered over the continent and islands, were totally unacquainted with
the metals which their soil produces in great abundance, if we except
some trifling quantity of gold, which they picked up in the torrents that
descended from their mountains, and formed into ornaments.  Their devices
to supply this want of the serviceable metals were extremely rude and
awkward.  The most simple operation was to them  an undertaking of
immense difficulty and labour.  To fell a tree with no other instruments
than hatchets of stone, was employment for a monthl. To form a canoe
into shape, and to hollow it, consumed years; and it frequently began to
mt before they were able to finish it.~  Their operations in agriculture
were equally slow and defective. In a country covered with woods of
the hardest timber, the clearing of a small field destined for culture
required the united efforts of a tribe, and was a work of much time and
great toil. This was the business of the men, and their indolence was
satisfied with performing it in a very slovenly mainner. The labour of
cultivation was left to the women, who, after digging, or rather stirring the
* Nouv. D/Ecouverte par Hennepin, p. 192. KIalm, i. 207,  t Buffon Hist. Nat. ix. 85. Hist
Philos. et Polit. des Etablissem. des Europ. dans les deux Indes, vi. 364  ~ Gumills, Uii 196.
Bord6 Relat. des Caraibes, p. 22.




AMERICA.                                161
feld, with wooden mattocks, and stakes hardened in the fire, sowed or
planted it; but they were more indebted for the increase to the fertility of
the soil than to their own rude industry.*
Agriculture, even when the strength of man is seconded by that of the
animals which he has subjected to the yoke, and his power augmented by the
use of the various instruments with which the discovery of metals has fur.
nished him, is still a work of great labour; and it is with the sweat of his brow
that he renders the earth fertile. It is not wonderful, then, that people
destitute of both these advantages should have made so little progress in
cultivation, that they must be considered as depending for subsistence on
fishing and hunting, rather than on the fruits of their own labour.
From this description of the mode of subsisting among the rude American
tribes, the form and genius of their political institutions may be deduced,
and we are enabled to trace various circumstances of distinction between
them and more civilized nations.
1. They were divided into small independent communities. While
hunting is the chief source of subsistence, a vast extent of territory is
requisite for supporting a small number of people.  In proportion as men
multiply and unite, the wild animals on which they depend for food
diminish, or fly at a greater distance from the haunts of their enemy. The
increase of a society in this state is limited by its own nature, and the
members of it must either disperse, like the game which they pursue, or
fall upon some better method of procuring food than by hunting. - Beasts
of prey are by nature solitary and unsocial, they go not forth to the chase
in herds, but delight in those recesses of the forest where they can roam
and destroy undisturbed. A nation of hunters resembles them both in
occupation and in genius.  They cannot form into large communities, because it would be impossible to find subsistence; and they must drive to
a distance'every rival who may encroach on those domains, which they
consider as their own. This was the state of all the American tribes; the
numbers in each were inconsiderable, though scattered over countries of
great extent; they were far removed from one another, and engaged in
perpetual hostilities or rivalship.t In America, the word nation is not of
the same import as in other parts of the globe. It is applied to small
societies, not exceeding, perhaps, two or three hundred persons, but occu
pying provinces, greater than some kingdoms in Europe. The country of
Guiana, though of larger extent than the kingdom of France, and divided
among a greater number of nations, did not contain above twenty-five
thousand inhabitants.4  In the provinces which border on the Orinoco, one
may travel several hundred miles in different directions, without finding a
single hut, or observing the footsteps of a human creature.~  In North
America, where the climate is more rigorous, and the soil less fertile, the
desolation is still greater. There,journeys of some hundred leagues have
been made through uninhabited plains and forestsll [60]. As long as
hunting continues to be the chief employment of man, to which he trusts
for subsistence, he can hardly be said to have occupied the earth [61].
2. Nations which depend upon hunting are in a great measure strangers
to the idea of property.  As the animals on which the hunter feeds are not
bred under his inspection, nor nourished by his care, he can claim no right
to them while they run wild in the forest. Where game is so plentiful
that it may be catched with little trouble, men never dream of appropriating
what is of small value, or of easy acquisition. Where it is so rare, that the
Aabour or danger of the chase requires the united efforts of a tribe, or village,
what is killed is a common stock belonging equally to all, who, by their
* Gumilla, iii. 166, &c. Lettr. Edif.'xii. 10.  t Lozano Descrip. del Gran Chaco, 59. 62.
Femrnandez'Relac. Hist. de los Chequit. 162.    + Voyages de Marchais, iv. 353.    ( Gumilla,
ii. 101o.  I[. Fabry, quoted by Buffon, iii. 448. Lafitau, ii. 179. Boesu, Travels through
Louisiana, i. 111.
VOL. I.-21-                      9




162:                      HISTORRY  OF                       LBoo 1'.
skill or their courage, have contributed to the success of the excursion
The forest or hunting-grounds are deemed the property of the tribe, from
which it has a title to exclude every rival nation. But no individual arrogates a right to any district of these in preference to his fellow-citizens
They belong alike to all; and thither, as to a general and undivided store,
a? repair in quest of sustenance. The same principles by which they
regulate their chief occupation extend to that which is subordinate.  Even
agriculture has not introduced among them a complete idea of property.
As the men hunt, the women laborur together, and after they have shared the
toils of the seed time, they enjoy the harvest in common.* Among some
tribes, the increase of their cultivated lands is deposited in a public granary, and divided among them at stated times, according to their wantst [621
Among others, though they lay up separate stores, they do not acquire
such an exclusive right of property, that they can enjoy superfluity while
those around them suffer want.4  Thus the distinctions arising from  the
inequality of possessions are unknown. The terms rich or poor enter not
into their language; and being strangers to property, they are unacquainted
with what is the great object of laws and policy, as well as the chief motive
which induced mankind to establish the various arrangements of regular
government.~
3. People in this state retain a high sense of equality and independence.
Wherever the idea of property is not established, there can be no distinction among men but what arises from personal qualities. These can be
conspicuous only on such occasions as call them forth into exertion. In times
of danger, or in affairs of intricacy, the wisdom and experience of age are
consulted, and prescribe the measures which ought to be pursued. WAhen
a tribe of savages takes the field against the enemies of their countr-, the
warrior of most approved courage leads the youth to the combat.ll  If they
go forth in a body to the chase, the most expert and adventurous hunter is
foremost, and directs their motions.  But during seasons of tranquillity and
inaction, when there is no occasion to display those talents, all pre-eminence
ceases.  Every circumstance indicates that all the members of the comlnunity are on a level. They are clothed in the same simple garb. They feed
ac the same plain fare. Their houses and furniture are exactly similar.
No distinction can arise from the inequality of possessions. Whatever fornis
dependence on one part, or constitutes superiority on the other, is unknown,.
All are freemen, all feel themselves to be such, and assert with firmness the
rights which belong to that condition.~  This sentiment of independence
is imprinted so deeply in their nature that no change of condition can eradicate it, an" bend their minds to servitude.  Accustomed to be absolute
masters of then. own conduct, they disdain to execute the orders of another;
and having neve: known control, they will not submit to correction. [68]
Many of the Ameir'ans, when they found that they were treated as slaves
by the Spaniards, died of grief; many destroyed themselves in despair."a
4. Among people in this state, government can assume little authority,
and the sense of civil subordination rmust remain very imperfect.  While
the idea of property is unknown, or incompletely conceived; while the
spontaneous productions of the earth, as well as the fruits of indurtry, are
considered as belonging to the public stock, there can hardly be any such
subject of difference or discussion among the members of the same community, as will require the hand of authority to interpose in order to adjust it.
Where the right of separate and exclusive possession is not introduced, the
* Dr. Furglson's Essay, 125.  t Gumilla, i. 265. Brickell, Hist. of N. Carol. 327.  $ Deny's
Hist. Natur. ii. 392, 2.93.   ) P. Martyr, Decad. p. 45. Veneg. Ilist. of Californ. i 66. Lery,
Navig. in Brazil, c. 17.  iI Acosta Hist. lib. vi. c. 19. Stadius Iist. Brazil, lib. ii. c. 13. D)e
Bry, iii. p. 110. Biet, 361.  IT Labat, vi. 124. Brickell. Hlist. 0r' Carol. 310.  ** Oviedo,
lib. iii. c. 6. p. 97. Vega Conquist. de la Florida, i. 30. ii. 416. Labat, ii. 138. Blenzo. ltist. Nov.
Orb. lib. iv. c. 25.




AMER1CA.                               163
great object of law and jurisdiction does not exist. When the members of
a tribe are called into the field, either to invade the territories of their enemies, or to repel their attacks; when they are engaged together in the
toil and dangers of the chase, they then perceive that they are part of.a
political body. They are conscious of their own connexion with the companions in conjunction with whom they act; and they follow and reverence
such as excel in conduct and valour. But during the intervals between such
common efforts they seem scarcely to feel the ties of political union" [64].
No visible form of government is established.  The names of mnagistrate and subject are not in use. Every one seems' to enjoy his natural
independence,almost entire. If a scheme of public utility be proposed,
the members of the community are left at liberty to choose whether they
will or will not assist in carrying it into execution. No statute imposes
any service as a duty, no compulsory laws oblige them to perform it. All
their resolutions are voluntary, and flow from the impulse of their own
minds.t The first step towards establishing a public jurisdiction has not
been taken in those rude societies. The right of revenge is left in private
hands.$  If violence is committed, or blood is shed, the comnnunity does
not assume the power either of inflicting' or of moderating the punishment.
It belongs to the family and friends of the person injured or slain to avenge
the wrong, or to accept of the reparation offered by the aggressor.  If the
elders interpose, it is to advise, not to decide, and it is seldom their counsels
are listened to; for, as it is deemed pusillanimous to suffer an offender to
escape with impunity, resentment is implacable and everlasting.~  The
object of government among savages is rather foreign than domestic.
They do not aim at maintaining interior order and police by public regulations, or the exertions of any permanent authority, but labour to preserve
such union among the members of their tribe, that they may watch the
motions of their enemies, and act against them with concert and vigour.
Such was the form of political order established among the greater part
of the American nations. In this state were almost all the tribes spread
over the provinces extending eastward of the Mississippi, from the mouth
of the St. Lawrence to the confines of Florida.  In a similar condition were
the people of Brazil, the inhabitants of Chili, several tribes in Paragua
and Guiana, and in the countries which stretch from the mouth of the
Orinoco to the peninsula of Yucatan. Among such an infinite number of
petty associations, there may be peculiarities which constitute a distinction,
and mark the various degrees of their civilization and improvement.  But
an attempt to trace and enumerate these would be vain, as they have not
been observed by persons capable of discerning the minute and delicate
circumstances which serve to discriminate nations resembling one another
in their general character and features. The description which I have
given of the political institutions that took place among those rude tribes
in America, concerning which we have received most complete information, will apply, with little variation, to every people, both in its northern
and southern division, who have advanced no further in civilization than to
add some slender degree of agriculture to fishing and hunting.
Imperfect as those institutions may appear, several tribes Nwere not so
far advanced in their political progress. Among all those petty nations
which trusted for subsistence entirely to fishing and hunting without any
species of cultivation, the union was so incomplete, and their sense of
mutual dependence so feeble, that hardly any appearance of government
ox order can be discerned in their proceedings. Their wants are few, their
objects of pursuit sim'nple, they form into separate tribes, and act together, from
* Lozano Descr. del Gran. Chaco, 93. Melendez Teforos Verdaderos, ii. 23.  t Charlev. Hist.
N. France. iii. 266 2,;8.  t fierrera, dec. 8. lib. iv. c. 8.  0 Charley. list. N. France, iii. 2711
272, Lafit. i. 486. C(assini, Hist. de Nuovo Reyno de Granada, 226.




164                      HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK IV.
instinct, habit, or conveniency, rather than from any formal concert and
association. To this class belong the Californians, several of the small
nations in the extensive country of Paragua, some of the people on the
banks of the Orinoco, and on the river St. Magdalene, in the new kingdom,
of Granada.*
But though among these last mentioned tribes there was hardly any
shadow of regular government, and  even amongr those which   first
described its authority is slender and confined within narrow bounds Tu ere
were, however, some places in America where government was carried far
beyond the degree of perfection which seems natural to rude nations.  In
surveying the political operations of man, either in his savage or civilized
state, we discover singular and eccentric institutions, which start as it
were from their station, and fly off so wide, that we labour in vain to
oring them within the general laws.of any system, or to account for thein
by those principles which influence other communities in a similar situation. Some instances of this occur among those people of America whom
I have included under the common denomination of savage. These are
so curious and important that Ish'all describe them, and attempt to explain
their origin.
In the New World, as well as in other parts of the globe, cold or
Temperate countries appear to be the favourite seat of freedom  and
independence. There the mind, like the body, is firm and vigorous.
There men, conscious of their own dignity, and capable of the greatest
efforts in asserting it, aspire to independence, and their stubborn spirits
stoop with reluctance to the yoke of servitude. In warmer climates, by
whose influence the whole frame is so much enervated that present pleasure
is the supreme felicity, and mere repose is enjoyment, men acquiesce,
almost without a struggle, in the dominion of a superior. Accordingly,
if we proceed from north to south along the continent of America, we shall
find the power of those vested with authority gradually increasing, and
the spirit of the people becoming more tame and passive. In Florida, the
authority of the sachems, caziques, or chiefs, was not only permanent, but
hereditary. They were distinguished by peculiar ornaments, they enjoyed
prerogatives of various kinds, and were treated by their subjects with that
reverence which people accustomed to subjection pay to a master.t
Among the Natchez, a powerful tribe now extinct, formerly situated on
the banks of the Mississippi, a difference of rank took place, with which
the northern tribes were altogether unacquainted. Some families were
reputed noble, and enjoyed hereditary dignity.  The body of the people
was considered as vile, and formed only for subjection.  This distinction
was marked by appellations which intimated the high elevation of the
one state, and the ignominious depression of the other. The former were
called Respectable; the latter, the Stinkards. The great Chief, in whom
the supreme authority was vested, is reputed to be a being of superior
nature, the brother of the sun, the sole object of their worship. They
approach this great Chief with religious veneration, and honour him as the
representative of their deity. His will is a law, to which all submit with
implicit obedience. The lives of his subjects are so absolutely at his disposal, that if any one has incurred his displeasure, the offender comes with
profound humility and offers him hishead. Nordoes the dominion of the
Clhiefs end with their lives; their principal officers, their favourite wives,
together with many domestics of inferior rank, are sacrificed at their tombs,
that they may be attended in the next world by the same persons who
served them in this; and such is the reverence in which they are held,
* Venegas, 1. 68. Lettr. Edif. ii. 176. Techo Hist. of Parag. Churchill, vi. 78. list. Gen. des
Voyages, xiv. 74.  t Cardenas y Cano Ensayo Chronol. i la Hist. de Florida, p. 46. Le Moyne
de Morgues leones Florida, ap. de Bry, p. 1 4, &c. Charlev. Hist. N. France, iii 467, 468




AMERICA.                                165
that those victims welcome death with exultation, deeming it a recompense
of their fidelity and a markl of distinction to be selected to accompany
their deceased master.* Thus a perfect despotism, with its full train of
superstition, arrogance, and cruelty, is established among the Natchez, and,
by a singular fatality, that people has tasted of the worst calamities incident
to polished nations, though they themselves are not far advanced beyond
the tribes around them in civility and improvement.  In Hispaniola, Cuba,
and the larger islands, their caziques or chiefs possessed extensive power.
The dignity was transmitted by hereditary right from father' to son. Its
honours and prerogatives were considerable.  Their subjects paid great.
respect to the caziques, and executed their orders without hesitation or
reserve.t  They were distinguished by peculiar ornaments, and in order
to preserve or augment the veneration of the people, they had the address
to call in the aid of superstition to uphold their authority.  They delivered
their mandates as the oracles of heaven, and pretended to possess the
power of regulating the seasons, and of dispensing rain or sunshine, according as their subjects stood in need of them.
In some parts of the southern continent, the power of the caziques seems
to have been as extensive as in the isles. In Bogota, which is now a province of the new kingdom of Granada, there was settled a nation more
considerable in number, and more improved in the various arts of life, than
any in America, except the Mexicans and Peruvians.  The people of
Bogota subsisted chiefly by agriculture.  The idea of property was
introduced among them, and its rights, secured by laws, handed down by
tradition, and observed with great care.+  They lived in towns which may
be termed large when compared with those in other parts of America.
They were clothed in a decent manner, and their houses may be termed
commodious when compared with those of the small tribes around them.
The effects of this uncommon civilization were conspicuous. Government
bad assumed a regular form. A jurisdiction was established, which took
cognizance of different crimes, and punished them with rigour. A distinction
of ranks was known; their chief, to whom the Spaniards gave the title of
monarch, and who merited that name on account of his splendour as well as
power, reigned with absolute authority. He was attended by officers of
various-conditions; he never appeared in public without a numerous
retinue; he was carried in a sort of palanquin with much pomp, and harbingers went before him to sweep the road and strew it with flowers.  This
uncommon pomp was supported by presents or taxes received from  his
subjects, to whomn their prince was such an object of veneration that
none of them presumed to look him directly in the face, or ever approached
him but with an averted countenance.~ There were other tribes on the
same continent, among which, though far less advanced than the people
of Bogota in their progress towards refinement, the freedom and inde
pendence natural to man in his savage state was much abridged, and their
caziques had assumed extensive authority.
It is not easy to point out the circumstances, or to discover the causes
which contributed to introduce and establish among each of those people a
form of government so different from that of the tribes around them, and
so repugnant to the genius of rude nations. If the persons who had an
opportunity of observing them in their original state had been mcre attentive and more discerning, we rnight have received information from the z
conquerors sufficient to guide us in this inquiry.  If the transactions of
people unacquainted with the use of letters were not involved in impene
trable obscurity, we might have derived some information from  this
* Dumont Memoir. Hist. sur Louisiane, i, 175. Charlev. Hist. N. France, iii. 419, &c. Lettr.
E,'fIl. S). 106. 111.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 16. lib. iii. c. 44. p. 88. Life of Columbus, ch. 32.
i Piedrahita Hist. de las Conquist. del Reyno de Granada, 1). 46.        Herrera, dec. 6. lib. i c g
ib v. c. 56. Piedrahita, c. 5. p. 25, &c. Gomara, Ist. c. 72.




166                     HISTORY  OF                    [Boo: IV.
domestic source. But as nothing satisfactory can be gathered either from
the accounts of the Spaniards, or from their own traditions, we must have
recourse to conjectures in order to explain the irregular appearances in the
political state of the people whom I have mentioned. As all those tribes
which had lost their native liberty and independence were seated in the
torrid zone, or in countries approaching to it, the climate may be supposed
to have had some influence in forming their minds to that servitude which
seems to be the destiny of manfin those regions of the globe. But though
the influence of climate, more powerful than that of any other natural
cause, is not to be overlooked, that alone cannot be admitted as a solution
of the point in question. The operations of men are so complex that we
must not attribute the form which they assume to the force of a single
principle or cause. Although despotism be confined in America to the
torrid zone, and to the warm  regions bordering upon it, I have already
observed that these countries contain various tribes, some of which possess
a high degree of freedom, and others are altogether unacquainted with the
restraints of government. The indolence and timidity peculiar to the
inhabitants of the islands, render them so incapable of the sentiments or
efforts necessary for maintaining independence, that there is no occasion to
search for any other cause of their tame submission to the will of a superior. The subjection of the Natchez, and of the people of Bogota, seems
to have been the consequence of a difference in their state from that of the
other Americans. They were settled nations, residing constantly in one
place. Hunting was not the chief occupation of the former, and the latter
seem hardly to have trusted to it for any part of their subsistence. Both
had made such progress in agriculture and arts that the idea of property
was introduced in some degree in the one community, and fully established
in the other. Among people in this state, avarice and ambition have
acquired objects, and have begun to exert their power; views of interest
allure the selfish; the desire of pre-eminence excites the enterprising;
dominion is courted by both; and passions unknown to man in his savage
state prompt the interested and ambitious to encroach on the rights of their
fellow-citizens.  Motives, with which rude nations are equally unacquainted, induce the people to submit tamely to the usurped authority of
their superiors. But even among nations in this state, the spirit of subjects
could not have been rendered so obsequious, or the power of rulers so
unbounded, without the intervention of superstition. By its fatal influence
the human mind, in every stage of its progress, is depressed, and its native
vigour and independence subdued. Whoever can acquire the direction
of this formidable engine, is secure of dominion over his species. Unfortunately for the people whose institutions are the subject of inquiry, this
power was in the hands of their chiefs. The caziques of the isles could
put what responses they pleased into the mouths of their Cemnis or gods;
and it was by their interposition, and in their name, that they imposed any
tribute or burden on their people.*  The same power and prerogative was
exercised by the great chief of the Natchez, as the principal minister as
well as the representative of the Sun, their deity. The respect which
the people of Bogota paid to their monarchs was likewise inspired by
religion, and the heir apparent of the kingdom was educated in the inner
most recess of their principal temple, under such austere discipline, and
with such peculiar rites, as tended to fill his subjects with high sentiments
concerning the sanctity of his character and the dignity of his station.l
Tnus superstition, which in the rudest period of society, is either altogethes
unknown, or wastes its force in childish unmeaning practices, had acquired
such an ascendant over those people of America, who had made some little
progress towards refinement, that it became the chief instrument of bending
~ Herrera, dec. 1. lib.'i. c. 3.  t Piedrahita, p. 27




AMERICA.                                167
their minds to an untimely servitude, and subjected them, in the beginning
of their political career, to a despotism hardly less rigorous than that which
awaits nations in the last stage of their corruption and decline.
V. After examining the political institutions of the rude nations in
America, the next object of attention is their art of war, or their provision
for public security and defence.  The small tribes dispersed over America
are not only independent and unconnected, but engaged in perpetual
hostilities with one another.*  Though mostly strangers to the idea of
separate property, vested in any individual, the rudest of the American
nations are well acquainted with the rights of each community to its own
domains.  This right they hold to be perfect and exclusive, entitling the
possessor to oppose the encroachment of neighbouring tribes. As it is ot
the utmost consequence to prevent them from destroying or disturbing the
game in their hunting grounds, they guard this national property with a
jealous attention.  But as their territories are extensive, and the boundaries
of them not exactly ascertained, innumerable subjects of dispute arise,
which seldom  terminate without bloodshed.  Even in this simple and
primitive state of society, interest is a source of discord, and often prompts
savage tribes to take arms in order to repel or punish such as encroach on.he forests or plains to which they trust for subsistence.
But interest is not either the most frequent or the most powerful motive
of the incessant hostilities among rude nations. These must be imputed to
the passion of revenge, which rages with such violence in the breast of
savages, that eagerness to gratify it may be considered as the distinguishing
characteristic of men in their uncivilized state. Circumstances of powerful
influence, both in the interior government of rude tribes, and in their
external operations against foreign enemies, concur in cherishing and adding
strength to a passion fatal to the general tranquillity.  When the right ot
redressing his own wrongs is left in the hands of every individual, injuries
are felt with exquisite sensibility, and vengeance exercised with unrelenting
rancour. No time can obliterate the memory of an offence, and it is seldom
that it can be expiated but by the blood of the offender. In carrying on
their public wars, savage nations are influenced by the same ideas, and
animated with the same spirit, as in prosecuting private vengeance. In
small communities, every man is touched with the injury or affront offered
to the body of which he is a member, as if it were a personal attack upon
his own honour or safety.  The desire of revenge is communicated from
breast to breast, and soon kindles into rage. As feeble societies can take
the field only in small parties, each warrior is conscious of the importance
of his own arm, and feels that to it is committed a considerable portion of
the public vengeance. War, which between extensive kingdoms is carried
on with little animosity, is prosecuted by small tribes with all the rancour
of a private quarrel. The resentment of nations is as implacable as that
of individuals. It may be dissembled or suppressed, but is never extinguished; and often, when least expected or dreaded, it bursts out with
redoubled fury.t When polished nations have obtained the glory of victory,
or have acquired an addition of territory, they may terminate a war with
honour.  But savages are not satisfied until they extirpate the community
which is the object of their hatred. They fight, not to conquer, but to
destroy.  If they engage in hostilities, it is with a resolution never to see
the face of the enemy in peace, but to prosecute the quarrel with immortal
enmity.1 The desire of vengeance is the first and almost the only principle
which a savage instils into the minds of his children.~ Thhls grows up
* Ribas Iist. de los Triumph. p. 9.  t Boucher Hist. Nat. de N. France, p. 93. Charley.
Hist. de N. France, iii. 215. 251. Levy ap. de Bry, iii. 204. Creux. Hist. Canad. p. 72. Lozano
Descr. del Gran Chaco, 25. Hennep. Mours des Sauv. 40.  + Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 251.
Colden. i. 108. ii. 126. Barrere, p. 170. 173.  O Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 326. Lery ap. de
Bry, iii. 236. Lozano I-list. de Parag. i. 144.




168                     HISTORY OF                      [BoOK IV.
with him  as he advances in life; and as his attention is directed to few
objects, it requires a degree of force unknown among men whose passions
are dissipated and weakened by the variety of their occupations and
pursuits. The desire of vengeance, which takes possession of the heart oI
savages, resembles the instinctive rage of an anit al rather than the passion
of a man. It turns, with undiscerning fury, even against inanimate objects.
If hurt accidentally by a stone, they often seize it in a transport of anger,
and endeavour to wreak their vengeance upon it.*  If struck with an
arrow in a battle, they will tear it from the wound, break and bite it with
their teeth, and dash it on the ground.   VVWith respect to their enemies
the rage of vengeance knows no bounds. When under the dominion of
this passion, man becomes the most cruel of all animals. He neither pities,
nor forgives, nor spares.
The force of this passion is so well understood by the Americans themselves, that they always apply to it in order to excite their people to take
arms. If the elders of any tribe attempt to rouse their youth froln sloth, ii
a chief wishes to allure a band of warriors to follow him in invading an
enemy's country, the most persuasive topics of their martial eloquence are
drawn from revenge.  " The bones of our countrymen," say they, "'lie
uncovered; their bloody bed has not been washed clean. Their spirits cry
against us; they must be appeased. Let us go and devour the people by
whom they were slain. Sit no longer inactive upon your mats; lift the
hatchet, console the spirits of the dead, and tell them that they shall be
avenged."t
Animated with such exhortations, the youth snatch their arms in a transport ot fury, raise the song of war, and burn with impatience to imbrue
their hands in the blood of their enemies. Private chiefs often assemble
small parties and invade a hostile tribe without consulting the rulers of the
community. A single warrior, prompted by caprice or revenge, will take
the field alone, and march several hundred miles to surprise and cut off a
straggling enemy [651. The exploits of a noted warrior, in such solitary
excursions, often form the chief part in the history of an American campaign [66]; and their elders connive at such irregular sallies, as they tend
to cherish a martial spirit, and accustom their people to enterprise and
danger.~  But when a war is national, and undertaken by public authority,
the deliberations are formal and slow. The elders assemble, they deliver
their opinions in solemn speeches, they weigh with maturity the nature of
the enterprise, and balance its beneficial or disadvantageous consequences
with no inconsiderable portion of political discernment or sagacity. Their
priests and soothsayers are consulted, and sometimes they ask the advice
even of their women.1l If the determination be for war, they prepare for
it with much ceremony. A leader offers to conduct the expedition, and is
accepted. But no man is constrained to follow him; the resolution of the
community to commence hostilities imposes no obligation upon any membu:
to take part in the war. Each individual is still master of his own conduct,
and his engagement in the service is perfectly voluntary.~
The maxims by which they regulate their military operations, though
extremely different from those which take place among more civilized and
populous nations, are well suited to their own political state, and the nature
of the country in which they act. They never take the field in numerous
bodies, as it would require a greater effort of foresight and industry than is
usual among savages, to provide for their subsistence during a march ot
some hundred miles through dreary forests, or during a long voyage upon
their lakes and rivers.  Their armies are not encumbered with baggage ox
* Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 190    t Ibid. iii. 208. IIerrera, dec. i. lib. vi. c. 8.    + Charley
Hist. N. Fr. iii. 216, 217. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 204.    Bossl, i. 110. Iery ap. le Bry, 215.
Hennepin MAeurs des Sauv. 41. Lafitau, ii. 169.   11 Chairlev. Hist. N. Fr. 215. 268. Diet. 367
%W0.    11 Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. 217, 218.




AMERICA.                               169
military stores.  Each warrior, besides his arms, carries a mat and a small
bag of pounded maize, and with these is completely equipped for any
service.  While at a distance from  the enemy's frontier, they disperse
through the woods, and support themselves with the game which they kill,
or the fish which they catch. As they approach nearer to the territories of
the nation which they intend to attack, they collect their troops, and
advance with greater caution. Even in their hottest and most active wars
they proceed wholly by stratagem and ambuscade. They place not their
glory in attacking their enemies with open force. To surprise and destroy
is the greatest merit of a commander, and the highest pride of his followers.
War and hunting are their only occupations, and they conduct both with
the same spirit and the same arts. They follow the track of their enemies
through the fobrest. They endeavour to discover their haunts, they lurk in
some thicket near to these, and, with the patience of a sportsman lying in
wait for game, will continue in their station day after day until they can
rush upon their prey when most secure, and least able to resist them. It
they meet no straggling party of the enemy, they advance towards their
villages, but with such solicitude to conceal their own approach, that they
often creep on their hands and feet through the woods, and paint their skins
of the same colour with the withered leaves, in order to avoid detection.s
If so fortunate as to remain unobserved, they set on fire the enemies' huts
in the dead of night, and massacre the inhabitants as they fly naked and
defenceless from the flames. If they hope to effect a retreat without being
pursued, they carry off some prisoners, whom they reserve for a more
dreadful fate. But if, notwithstanding all their address and precautions,
they find that their motions are discovered, that the enemy has taken the
alarm, and is prepared to oppose them, they usually deem it most prudent
to retire. They regard it as extreme folly to meet an enemy who is on
his guard, upon equal terms, or to give battle in an open field.  The most
distinguished success is a disgrace to a leader if it has been purchased
with any considerable loss of his followers [67], and they never boast of a
victory if stained with the blood of their own countrymen.4  To fall in
battle, instead of being reckoned an honourable death, is a misfortune
which subjects the memory of a warrior to the imputation of rashness or
imprudencel [681.
This system of war was universal in America; and the small uncivilized
tribes, dispersed through all its different regions and climates, display
more craft than boldness in carring on their hostilities.  Struck with this
conduct, -so opposite to the ideas and maxims of Europeans, several
authors contend that it flows from a feeble and dastardly spirit peculiar to
the Americans, which is incapable of any generous or manly exertion.~
But when we reflect that many of these tribes, on occasions which call
for extraordinary efforts, not only defend themselves with obstinate resolution, but attack their enemies with the most daring courage, and that they
possess fortitude of mind superior to the sense of danger or the fear of
death, we must ascribe their habitual caution to some other cause than
constitutional timidity.ll The number of men in each tribe is so small,
the difficulty of rearing new members amidst the hardships and dangers
of savage life is so great, that the life of a citizen is extremely precious,
and the preservation of it becomes a capital object in their policy. Had
the point of honour been the same among the feeble American tribes as
among the powerful nations of Europe, had they been taught to court fame
or victory in contempt of danger and death, they must have been ruined
by maxims so ill adapted to their condition. But wherever their com* Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iil. 237, 238. Hennep. Mceurs des Sauv. p. 59  t Charlev. Hist,
N. Fr. iii. 238. 307. Biet, 381. Lafitau Maeurs des Sauv. ii. 248.  -  Charlev. iti. 376.
d Recherches Philos. sur les Am~ric. i. 115. Voyage de March. iv, 410  1 ILafitau Moeurs des
auv. ii. 248, 249. Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 307.
VOL. I. —22




.170                      HI STORY  O F                  [Book IV.
munities are more populous, so that they can act with considerable force,
and can sustain the loss of several of their members without being sensibly
weakened, the militaIy operations of the Americans more nearly resemble
those of other nations. The Brazilians, as well as the tribes situated upon
the banks of the river De la Plata, often take the field in such numerous
bodies as deserve the name of armies.'  They defy their enemies to the
combat, engage in regular battles, and maintain the conflict with that
desperate ferocity which is natural to men who, having no idea of war
but that of exterminating their enemies, never give or take quarter [691
In the powerful empires of Mexico and Peru, great armies were assembled,
frequent battles were fought, and the theory as well as practice of war
were different from what took place in those petty societies which assume
the name of nations.
But though vigilance and attention are the qualities chiefly requisite
where the object of war is to deceive and to surprise; and though the
Americans, when acting singly, display an amazing degree of address in
concealing their own motions, and discovering those of an enemy, yet it
is remarkable that, when they take the field in parties, they can seldom
be brought to observe the precautions most essential to their own security.
Such is the difficulty of accustoming savages to subordination, or to act in
concert; such is their impatience under restraint, and such their. caprice
and presumption, that it is rarely they can be brought to conform themselves
to the counsels and directions of their leaders. They never station sentinels around the place where they rest at night, and after marching some
hundred miles to surprise an enemy, are often surprised themselves, and
cut off, while sunk in as profound sleep as if they were not within reach
of danger.t
If, notwithstanding this negligence and security, which often frustrate
their most artful schemes, they catch the enemy unprepared, they rush
upon them with the utmost ferocity, and tearing off the scalps of all those
who fall victims to their rage [70], they carry home those strange trophies
in triumph. These they preserve as monuments, not only of their own
prowess, but of the vengeance which their arm has inflicted upon the
people who were objects of public resentment.  They are still more
solicitous to seize prisoners. During their retreat, if they hope to effect it
unmolested, the prisoners are commonly exempt from any insult, and
treated with some degree of humanity, though guarded with the most
strict attention.
But after this temporary suspension, the rage of the conquerors rekindles
with new fury. As soon as they approach their own frontier, some of
their number are despatched to inform their countrymen with respect to
the success of the expedition. Then the prisoners begin to feel the
wretchedness of their condition. The women of the village, together
with the youth who have not attained to the age of bearing arms, assemble,
and forming themselves into two lines, through which the prisoners must
pass, beat and bruise them with sticks or stones in a cruel manner.~ After
this first gratification of their rage against their enemies, follow lamentations for the loss of such of their own countrymen as have fallen in the
service, accompanied with words and actions which seem to express the
utmost anguish and grief.  But in a moment, upon a signal given, their
tears cease; they pass, with a sudden and unaccountable transition, from
the depths of sorrow to the transports of joy; and begin to celebrate their
victory with all the wild exultation of a barbarous triumph.al  The fate
of the prisoners remains still undecided.  The old men deliberate concerning it. Some are destined to be tortured to death, in order to satiate
* Fabri Veriss. Descrip. Indim ap. de Bry, vii. p. 42.    t Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 236, 237. Lettr.
Editf xvii. 308. xx. 130. Lafit. Maeurs, 247. Lahontan, ii. 176.  t Lafitau Mceurs, h. 256.
Lahontan, ii. 184.    [i Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 241. Lafitau Mcaurs, ii. 264.




AMERICA.                               171'he revenge of the conquerors; some to replace the members which the
community has lost in that or former wars.  They who are reserved for
this milder fate, are led to the huts of those whose friends have been
killed. The women meet them at the door, and if they receive them,
their sufferings are at an end.  They are adopted into the family, and.
according to their phrase, are seated upon the mat of the deceased. They
assume his name, they hold the same rank, and are treated thenceforward
with all the tenderness due to a father, a brother;, a husband, or a friend.
But, if either from caprice or an unrelenting desire of revenge, the women
of any family refuse to accept of the prisoner who is offered to them, his
doom is fixed.  No power can then save him from torture and death.
While their lot is in suspense, the prisoners themselves appear altogether
unconcerned about what may befall them. They talk, they eat, they
sleep, as if they were perfectly at ease, and no danger impending.  When
the fatal sentence is intimated to them, they receive it with an unaltered
countenance, raise their death song, and prepare to suffer like men. Their
conquerors assemble as to a solemn festival, resolved to put the fortitude
of the captive to the utmost proof. A scene ensues, the bare description
of which is enough to chill the heart with horror, wherever men have been
accustomed, by milder institutions, to respect their species, and to melt
into tenderness at the sight of human sufferings.  The prisoners are tied
naked to a stake, but so as to be at liberty to move round it. All who
are present, men, women, and children, rush upon them like furies. Every
species of torture is applied that the rancour of revenge can invent. Some
burn their limbs with redhot irons, some mangle their bodies with knives,
others tear their flesh from their bones, pluck out their nails by the roots,
and rend and twist their sinews. They vie with one another in refinements
of torture. Nothing sets bounds to their rage but the dread of abridging
the duration of their vengeance by hastening the death of the sufferers;
and such is their cruel ingenuity in tormenting, that, by avoiding industriously to hurt anlly vital part, they often prolong this scene of anguish for
several days.  In spite of all that they suffer, the victims continue to chant
their death song with a firm voice, they boast of their own exploits, they
insult their tormentors for their want of skill in avenging their friends and
relations, they warn them of the vengeance which awaits them on account
*of what they are now doing, and excite their ferocity by the most provoking reproaches and threats. To display undaunted fortitude, in such
dreadful situations, is the noblest triumph of a warrior.  To avoid the
trial by a voluntary death, or to shrink under it, is deemed infamous and
cowardly. If any one betray symptoms of timidity, his tormentors often
despatch him  at once with contempt, as unworthy of being treated like a
man.*  Animated with those ideas, they endure without a groan what it
seems almost impossible that human nature should sustain. They appear
to be not only insensible of pain, but to court it. "6 Forbear," said an
aged chief of the Iroquois, when his insults had provoked one of his tormentors to wound him with a knife, " forbear these stabs of your knife,
and rather let me die by fire, that those dogs, your allies, from beyond the
sea, may learn by my example to suffer like men."t  This magnanimity,
of which there are frequent instances among the American warriors,
instead of exciting admiration, or calling forth sympathy, exasperates the
fierce spirits of their torturers to fresh acts of cruelty..  Weary, at length
of contending with men whose constancy of mind they cannot vaquisbh,
some chief, in a rage, puts a period to their sufferings, by despatching them
with his dagger or club.~
* De la Potherie, ii. 237. iii. 48.   Ct olden, Hist. of Five Nations, i 200.    T Voyages de
Lahont, i. 236.  t Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 243, &c. 385. Lafitau Mmurs, ii. 265. Creuyij
Hist. Canad. p. 73. Hennep. Mewurs des Sauv. p. 64, &c. Lahont, i 233, &c. Tertre, ii. 405.
De la Potherie, ii. 22 &c.




172                        HISTORY OF                         [BooK IV.
This bartarous scene is often succeeded by one no less shocking.  As
it is impossible to appease the fell spirit of revenge which rages in the
heart of a savage, this frequently prompts the Americans to devour those
unhappy persons who have been the victims of their cruelty. In the ancient world, tradition has preserved the memory of barbarous nations of
cannibals, who fed on human flesh.  But in every part of the New World
there were people to whom this custom was familiar., It prevailed in the
southern continent,- in several of the islands,t and in various districts of
North America.1 Even in those parts where circumstances with which
we are unacquainted had in a great measure abolished this practice, it
seems formerly to have been so well known that it is incorporated into the
idiom of their language. Among the Iroquois, the phrase by which they
express their resolution of making war against an enemy is, "Let us go
and eat that nation."  If they solicit the aid of a neighbouring tribe, they
invite it" "to eat broth made of the flesh of their enemies"~ [71]. Nor
was the practice peculiar to rude unpolished tribes; the principle from
which they took rise is so deeply rooted in the minds of the Americans,
that it subsisted in Mexico, one of the civilized empires in the New World,
and relics of it may be discovered among the more mild inhabitants of
Peru. It was not scarcity of food, as some authors imagine, and the
importunate cravings of hunger, which forced the Americans.to those
horrid repasts on their fellow-creatures.  Human flesh was never used as
common food in any country, and the various relations concerning people
who reckoned it among the stated means of subsistence, flow  trom  the
credulity and mistakes of travellers.   The  rancour of revenge first
prompted men to this barbarous action.I1 The fiercest tribes devoured
rone but prisoners taken in war, or such as they regarded as enemies [72].
Women and children who were not the objects of enmity, if not cut off
in the fury of their first inroad into a hostile country, seldom suffered by
the deliberate effects of their revenge.~
The people of South America gratify their revenge in a manner some
what different, but with no less unrelenting rancour. Their prisoners,
after meeting at their first entrance with the same rough reception as
among the North Americans,"  are not only exempt from  injury, but
treated with the greatest kindness. They are feasted and caressed, and
some beautiful young women are appointed to attend and solace them.
It is not easy to account for this part of their conduct, unless we impute
it to a refinement in cruelty. For, while they seem studious to attach the
captives to life, by supplying them  with every enjoyment that can render
it agreeable, their doom  is irrevocably fixed.  On a day appointed the
victorious tribe assembles, the prisoner is brought forth with great solemnity, he views the preparations for the sacrifice with as much indifference
as if he himself were not the victim, and meeting his fate with undaunted firmness, is despatched with a single blow. T he moment he falls, the
women seize the body and dress it for the feast. They besmear their
children with the blood, in order to kindle in their bosoms a hatred of
their enemies, which is never extinguished, and all join in feeding upon
the flesh with amazing greediness and exultation.jt  To devour the body
of a slaughtered enemy they deem the most complete and exquisite grati
fication of revenge. Wherever this practice prevails, captives never
escape death, but they are not tortured with the same cruelty as among
tribes which are less accustomed to such horrid feasts [73].
* Stadius ap. de Bry, iii. 123. Lery, ibid. 210. Biet, 384. Lettr. Edif. xxiii. 341. Piso, 8.
Condam, 84. 97. Ribas, Hist. de los Triumph. 473.  t Life of Columb. 529  Mart. Dec. p. 18.
Tertre, ii. 405.. Dumont. Mem. i. 254. Charlev; Hist. N. France, i. 259. ii. 14. iii. 21. De la
Potherie, iii. 50.   ~ Challev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 208, 209. Lettr. Edif. xxiii. p. 277. De la Potherie, i. 298.  11 Biet; 383. Blanco, Conversion de Piritu, p. 28. Bancroft, Nat. Hist. of Guiana,
p. 259, &c.  IT Biet, 382. Bandini, Vita di Americo, 84. Tertre, 405  Fermin. Descrip. de
Surin. i. 54.   ** Stadius ap. de Bry iii. 40 123.  Jft Stadius ap. de Bry, iii. 128, &c. Lery
ap. de Bry, iii. 210.




AMERICA.                             173
As the constancy of every American warrior may be put to such severe
proof, the great object of military education and discipline in the New
World is to form the mind to sustain it. When nations carry on war with
open force, defy their enemies to the combat, and vanquish them by the
superiority of their skill or courage, soldiers are trained to be active,
vigorous, and enterprising. But in America, where the genius and maxims
of war are extremely different, passive fortitude is the quality in highest
estimation. Accordingly, it is early the study of the Americans to acquire
sentiments and habits which will enable them to behave like men when
their resolution shall be put to the proof. As the youth of other nations
exercise themselves in feats of activity and force, those of America-vie
with one another in exhibitions of their patience under sufferings. They
harden their nerves by those voluntary trials, and gradually accustom themselves to endure the sharpest pain without complaining. A boy and girl
will bind their naked arms together, and place a burning coal between
them, in order to try who first discovers such impatience as to shake it off.*
All the trials customary in America, when a youth is admitted into the
class of warriors, or when a warrior is promoted to the dignity of captain
or chief, are accommodated to this idea of manliness. They are not displays of valour, but of patience; they are not exhibitions of their ability
to offend, but of their capacity to suffer. Among the tribes on the banks
of the Orinoco, if a warrior aspires to the rank of captain, his probation
begins with a long fast, more rigid than any ever observed by the most
abstemious hermit. At the close of this the chiefs assemble, each gives
him three lashes with a large whip, applied so vigorously that his body is
almost flayed, and if he betrays the least symptoms of impatience or even
sensibility, he is disgraced for ever, and rejected as unworthy of the
honour to which he aspires. After some interval, the constancy of the candidate isproved by a more excruciating trial. He is laid in a hammoc
with his hands bound fast, and an innumrerable multitude of venomous ants,
whose bite occasions exquisite pain, and produces a violent inflammation,
are thrown upon him. The judges of his merit stand around the hammoc, and, while these cruel insects fasten upon the most sensible parts
of his body, a sigh, a groan, an involuntary motion, expressive of what he
suffers, would exclude him for ever from the rank of captain. Even after
this evidence of his fortitude, it is not deemed to be completely ascertained, but must stand another test more dreadful than any he has hitherto
undergone. He is again suspended in his hammoc, and covered with
leaves of the palmetto. A fire of stinking herbs is kindled underneath, so
as he may feel its heat and be involved in its smoke. Though scorched
and almost suffocated, he must continue to endure with the same patien
insensibility. Many perish in this rude essay of their firmness and courage,
but such as go through it with applause, receive the ensigns of their new
dignity with much solemnity, and are ever after regarded as leaders of
approved resolution, whose behaviour in the most trying situations will do
honour to their country.  In North America the previous trial of a warrior is neither so formal nor so severe. Though even there, before a youth
is permitted to bear arms, his patience and fortitude are proved by blows,
by fire, and by insults more intolerable to a haughty spirit than both.t
The amazing steadiness with which the Americans endure the most
exquisite torments, has induced some authors to suppose that, from the
peculiar feebleness of their frame, their sensibility is not so acute as that
of other people; as women, and persons of a relaxed habit, are observed
o be less affected with pain than robust men, whose nerves are more
firmly braced. But the constitution of the Americans is not so different
~ Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 307.   t Gumilla, ii. 286, &c. Biet, 376, &c.  t Charlev. Hist.
N. Fr. iii. 219.




174                      HISTORY   OFV                  [Boox IV.
in its texture from that of the rest of the human species, as to account for
this diversity in their behaviour. It flows from a principle of honour,
instilled early and cultivated with such care, as to inspire man in his rudest
state with an heroic magnanimity, to which philosophy hath endeavoured
in vain to form himr, when more highly improved and polished. This
invincible constancy he has been taught to consider as the chief distinction
of a man, and the highest attainment of a warrior. The ideas which
influence his conduct, and the passions which take possession of his heart,
are few.  They operate of course with more decisive effect than when the
mind is crowded with a multiplicity of objects, or distracted by the varie'of its pursuits; and when every motive that acts with any force in form,ig
the sentiments of a savage, prompts him to suffer with dignity, he will bear
what might seem to be impossible for human patience to sustain. But
wherever the fortitude of the Americans is not roused to exertion by their
ideas of honour, their feelings of pain are the salne with those of the rest
of mankind [74]. Nor is that patience under sufferings for which the
Americans have been so justly celebrated, a universal attainment. The
constancy of many of the victims is overcome by the agonies of torture.
Their weakness and lamentations complete the triumph of their enemies,
and reflect disgrace upon their own country.The perpetual hostilities carried on among the American tribes are productive of very fatal effects. Even in seasons of public tranquillity, their
imperfect industry does not supply them with any superfluous store of
provisions; but when the irruption of an enemy desolates their cultivated
lands, or disturbs them in their hunting excursions, such a calamity reduces
a community, naturally unprovident and destitute of resources, to extreme
want. All the people of the district that is invaded are frequently forced
to take refuge in woods and mountains, which can afford them little subsistence, and where many of them perish. Notwithstanding their excessive caution in conducting their military operations, and the solicitude
of every leader to preserve the lives of his followers, as the rude tribes in
America seldom enjoy any interval of peace, the loss of men among them
is considerable in proportion to the degree of population.  Thus famine
and the sword combine in thinning their numbers. All their communities
are feeble, and nothing now remains of several nations which were once:onsiderable, but the name.
Sensible of this continual decay, there are tribes which endeavour to
ecruit their national force when exhausted, by adopting prisoners taken in
var, and by this expedient prevent their total extinction. The practice,
however, is not universally received.  Resentment operates more power(~llly among savages than considerations of policy.  Far the greater part
of their captives was anciently sacrificed to their vengeance, and it is only
since their numbers began to decline fast, that they have generally adopted
milder maxims. But such as they do naturalize renounce for ever their
native tribe, and assume the manners as well as passions of the people by
whom they are adopted+  so entirely, that they often join them in expeditions against their own countrymen.  Such a sudden transition, and so
repugnant to one of the most powerful instincts implanted by nature, would
be deemed strange among many people; but among the members of small
communities, where national enmity is violent and deep rooted, it has the
appearance of being still more unaccountable. It seems, however, to result
naturally from the principles upon which war is carried on in America.
When nations aim at exterminating their enemies, no exchange of prisoners
can ever take place. From the moment one is made a orisoner, nls country
and his friends consider him  as dead [75]. He has incurred indelible
* Chlarlev. Hist. N. Pr. iii. 248. 385. De la Potheile, iii. 48.   f Charlev. 1ist. N. Fr. iii. 2, 
203. 429 Gumilla, ii. 227, &c.  f Charlev. -list. N. Fr. iii. 245, &c. Lafit. ii. 308.




AMERICA:                              175
disgrace by suffering himself to be surprised or to be taken by an enemy;
and were he to return home, after such a stain upon his honour, his rneares!t
relations would not receive or even acknowledge that they knew him.*
Some tribes were still more rigid, and if a prisoner returned, the infamy
which he had brought on his country was expiated, by putting him instantly
to death.t  As the unfortunate captive is thus an outcast from  his own
country, and the ties which bound him to it are irreparably broken, he
feels less reluctance in forming a new connexion with people, who, as an
evidence of their- friendly sentirnents, not only deliver him from a cruel
death, but offer to admit him  to all the rights of a fellow-citizen,  The
perfect similarity of manners among savage nations facilitates and completes the union, and induces a captive to transfer not only his allegiance,
but his affection to the community into the bosom of which he is received.
But though war be the chief occupation of men in their rude state, and
to excel in it their highest distinction and pride, their inferiority is always
manifest when they engage in competition with polished nations. Destitute
of that foresight which discerns and provides for remote events, strangers
to the union and mutual confidence requisite in forming any extensive plan
of operations, and incapable of the subordination no less requisite in carrying such plans into execution, savage nations may astonish a disciplined
enemy by their valour, but.seldom prove formidable to him by their conduct; and whenever the contest is of long continuance, must yield' to
superior art [76].  The empires of Peru and Mexico, though their progress in civilization, when measured by the European or Asiatic standards,
was inconsiderable, acquired such an ascendency over the rude tribes
around them, that they subjected most of them with great facility    their
power.  When the people of Europe overran the various provinces of
America, this superiority was still more conspicuous. Neither the courage
nor number of the natives could repel a handful of invaders. The alienation and enmity, prevalent among barbarians, prevented them from uniting
in any common scheme of defence, and while each tribe fought separately,
all were subdued.
VI. The arts of rude nations unacquainted with the use of metals,
hardly merit any attention on their own account, bult are worthy of some
notice, as far as they serve to display the genius and manners of man in this
stage of his progress. The first distress a savage must feel, will arise from
the manner in which his body is affected by the heat, or cold, or moisture of
the climate under which he lives; and his first care will be to provide some
covering for his own defence. In the warmer, and more mild climates of
America, none of the rude tribes were clothed.  To most of them nature
had not even suggested any idea of impropriety in being altogether uncovered.t As under a mild climate there was little need of any defence from
the inj ulies of the air, and their extreme indolence shunned every species
of labour to which it wasnot uged by absolute necessity, all the inhabitants
of the isles, and a considerable part of the people on the continent,
remained in this state of naked simplicity. Others were satisfied with
some slight covering, such as decency required. But though naked, they
were not unadorned.'They dressed their hair in many different forms.
They fastened bits of gold, or shells, or shining stones, in their ears, their
noses, and cheeks.~  They stained their skins with a great variety of
figures; and they spent much time, and submitted to great pain, in ornameriting their persons in this fantastic manner. Vanity, however, which
finds endless occupation for ingenuity and invention in nations where
dress has become a complex and intricate art, is circumscribed within so
* Lahont, ii. 185, 186.  t Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 16. p. 173.  7 Lery Navigat. ap. de Bry,
ili. p. 164. Life of Columbus, c. 24. Venegas list. of Californ. p. 7.  Q Lery ap. te Bry, iil,
v. 165. Lettr. Edifiantes, xx.. p. 23.




176                       HISTORY  OF                      [BooK IV.
narrow bounds, and confined tb so few articles among naked savages, that
they are not satisfied with those simple decorations, and have a wonderful
propensity to alter the natural form of their bodies, in order to render it
(as they imagine) more perfect and beautiful. This practice was universal
among the rudest of the American tribes. Their operations for that
purpose begin as soon as an infant is born. By compressing the bones of
the skull, while still soft and flexible, some flatten the crown of their heads;
some squeeze them into the shape of a cone; others mould them as much
as possible into a square figure; and they often endanger the lives of
their posterity by their violent and absurd efforts to derange the plan of
nature, or to improve upon her designs. But in all their attempts either
to adorn or to new model their persons, it seems to have been less the
object of the Americans to please, or to appear beautiful, than to give an
air of dignity and terror to their aspect.  Their attention to dress had
more reference to war than to gallantry. The difference in rank and
estimation between the two sexes was so great, as seems to have extinguished, in some measure, their solicitude to appear mutually amiable.
The man deemed it beneath him to adorn his person, for the sake of one
on whom he was accustomed to look down as a slave. It was when the
warrior had in view to enter the council of his nation, or to take the field
against its enemies, that he assumed his choicest ornaments, and decked
his person with the nicest care.'  The decorations of the women were
few and simple; whatever was precious or splendid was reserved for the
men. In several tribes the women were obliged to spend a considerable
part of their time every day in adorning and painting their husbands, and
could bestow little attention upon ornamenting themselves. Among a race
of men so haughty as to despise, or so cold as to neglect them, the women
naturally became careless and slovenly, and the love of finery and show,
which had been deemed their favourite passion, was confined chiefly to the
other sex.t To deck his person was the distinction of a warrior, as well
as one of his most serious occupations [77]. In one part of their dress,
which at first sight appears the most singular and capricious, the Americans
have discovered considerable sagacity in providing against the chief inconv.eniences of their climate, which is often sultry and moist to excess. All
the different tribes, which remain unclothed, are accustomed to anoint and
rub their bodies with the grease of animals, with viscous gums, and with
oils of different kinds. By this they check that profuse perspiration,
which in the torrid zone wastes the vigour of the frame, and abridges the
period of human life. By this, too, they provide a defence against the
extreme moisture during the rainy season [78]. They likewise, at certain
seasons, temper paint of different colours with those unctuous substances,
and bedaub themselves plentifully with that composition. Sheathed with
this impenetrable varnish, their skins are not only protected from the penetrating heat of the sun, but as all the innumerable tribes of insects have an
antipathy to the smnell or taste of that mixture, they are delivered from their
teasing perseculion, which amidst forests and marshes, especially in the
warmer regions, would have been altogether intolerable in a state of perfect
nakedness.~
The next object to dress that will engage the attention of a savage, is to
prepare some habitation which may afford him shelter by day, and a retreat
at nio'ht. Whatever is connected with his ideas of personal dignity, whateverSears any reference to his military character, the savage warrior deems
an object of importance. Whatever relates only to peaceable and inactive
~ Oviedo Hist. lib. iii. c. 5. Ulona, i. 329. Voyage de Labat, ii. 72. Charlevoix, iii. 323.
Guinilla, i. 197, &c. Acugna Relat. de la iv. des Amaz. ii. 83. Lawson's Voyage to Carolina,
p. 33.   t Wafer's Voyage, p. 142. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 167. Charlev. Hist. N. Fran. iii. 216.
222.  4. Charlev. Hist. de la Nouv. France, iii. 278. 327. Lafitau, ii. 53. Kaim's Voyage, iii
273. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 169, 170. Purch. Pilgr. iv. 1287. Ribas Hist. de los Triumph, &c. 472
I Lahat, fi. 73. Gumilla, i. 190. 20'2. Bancroft Nat. Hist. of Guiana, 81. 280.




AMERICA.                                177
life, he views with indifference. Hence, though finically attentive to dress,
he is little solicitous about the elegance or disposition of his habitation
Savage nations, far from that state of improvement, in which the mode of
living is considered as a mark of distinction, and unacquainted with those
wants, which require a variety of accommodation, regulate the construction
of their houses according to their limited ideas of necessity. Some of the
American tribes were so extremely rude, and had advanced so little beyond
the primaeval simplicity of nature, that they had no houses at all. During
the day, they take shelter from the scorching rays of the sun under thick
trees; at night they form a shed with their branches and leaves r79]. In
the rainy season they retire into coves, formed by the hand of Nature, or
hollowed out by their own industry.   Others, who have no fixed abode,
and roam through the forest in quest of game, sojourn in temporary huts,
which they erect with little labour, and abandon without any concern.
The inhabitants of those vast plains, which are deluged by the overflowing
of rivers during the heavy rains that fall periodically between the tropics,
raise houses upon, piles fastened in the ground, or place them among the
boughs of trees, and are thus safe amidst that wide extended inundation
which surrounds theml.t  Such were the first essays of the rudest Americans towards providing themselves with habitations.  But even among
tribes which are more improved, and whose residence is become altogether
fixed, the structure of their houses is extremely mean and simple.  They
are wretched huts, sometimes of an oblong and sometimes of a circular
form, intended merely for shelter, with no view  to elegance, and little
attention to conveniency. The doors are so low that it is necessary to
bend or to creep on the hands and feet in order to enter them.  They are
without windows, and have a large hole in the middle of the root, to convey
out the smoke.  To follow travellers in other minute circumstances of
their descriptions, is not only beneath the dignity of history, but would
be foreign to the object of my researches.  One circumstance merits
attention, as it is singular, and illustrates the character of the people.
Some of their houses are so large as to contain accommodation for fourscore or a hundred persons. These are built for the reception of different
families, which dwell together under the same roof [80], and often around
a common fire, without separate apartments, or any kindof screen or partition between the spaces which they respectively occupy. As soon as men
have acquired distinct ideas of property; or when they are so much
attached to their females, as to watch them with care and jealousy;
families of course divide and settle in separate houses, where they can
secure and guard whatever they wish to preserve.  This singular mode of
habitation, among several people of America, may therefore be considered
not only as the effect of their imperfect notions concerning property, but
as a proof of inattention, and indifference towards their women.  If they
had not been accustomed to perfect equality, such an arrangement could
not have taken place. If their sensibility had been apt to have taken
alarm, they would not have trusted the virtue of their women amidst the
temptations and opportunities of such a promiscuous intercourse. At the
same time, the perpetual concord, which reigns in habitations where so
many families are crowded together, is surprising, and affords a striking
evidence that they must be people of either a very gentle, or of a very
phlegmatic temper, who in such a situation, are unacquainted with animosity, brawling, and discord.t
After making some provision for his dress and habitation, a savage
* Lettres Edif. v. 273. Venegas Hist. of Califor. i. 76. Lozano, Descrip. del Gran. Chaco, p.
55. Lettres Edif. ii. 176, Gumilla, i. 383, Bancroft, Nat. Hist, of Guiana, 277.   t Gumilla, i.
225. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ix. c. 6. Oviedo Somar. p. 53. C.    t Journ. de Grillet et Bechan;mql
dans la Goyane, p. 65. Lafitau Mceurs, ii. 4. Torquem. Monarq. i, 247. Journal Hist. de Jout,.4
217. Lery Hist. Brazil, ap. de Bry, iii. 238. Lozano Descr. del Gran. Chaco, 67.
VOL. I.- -"




178                     HISTORY  OF                      [BOO3K IV.
will perceive the necessity of preparing proper arms with which to
assault or repel an enemy.  This, accordingly, has early exercised the
ingenuity and invention of all rude nations. The first offensive weapons
were doubtless such as chance presented, and the first efforts of art to
improve upon these, were extremely awkward and simple. Clubs made
of some heavy wood, stakes hardened in the fire, lances whose heads were
armed with flint or the bones of some animal, are weapons known to the
rudest nations. All these, however, are of use only in close encounter.
But men wished to annoy their enemies while at a distance, and the bow
and arrow is the most early invention for this purpose. This weapon is in
the hands of people whose advances in improvement are extremely inconsiderable, and is familiar to the inhabitants of every quarter of the globe.
It is remarkable, however, that some tribes in America were so destitute
of art and ingenuity, that they had not attained to the discovery of this
simple invention,? and seem to have been unacquainted with the use of any
missile weapon.  The sling, though in its construction not more complex
than the bow, and among many nations of equal antiquity, was little known
to the people of North Xmerica,t or the islands, but appears to have been
used by a few tribes in the southern continents [81].  The people, in some
provinces of Chili, and those of Patagonia, towards the southern extremity
of America, use a weapon peculiar -to themselves. They fasten stones,
about the size of a fist, to each end of a leather thong of eight feet in
length, and swing these round. their heads, thrbw them with such dexterity,
that they seldom miss the object at which they aim.~
Among people who had hardly any occupation but war or hunting, the
chief exertions of their invention [82, as well as industry, were naturally
directed towards these objects.  With respect to every thing else, their
wants and desires were so limited, that their invention was not upon the
stretch. As their food and habitations are perfectly simple, their domestic
utensils are few and rude. Some of the southern tribes had discovered
the art of forming vessels of earthen ware, and baking them in the sun, so
as they could endure the fire. In North America, they hollowed a piece
of hard wood in the form of a kettle, and filling it with water, brought it
to boil, by putting red-hot stones into it [83]. These vessels they used in
preparing part of their provisions; and this may be considered as a step
towards refinement and luxury; for men in their rudest state were not
acquainted with any method of dressing their victuals but by roasting them
on the fire; and among several tribes in America, this is the only species
of cookery yet known.l} But the masterpiece of art, among the savages
of America, is the construction of the canoes. An Esquirmaux, shut up in
his boat of whalebone, covered with the skins of seals, can brave that
stormy ocean on which the barrenness of his country compels him to depend
for the chief part of his subsistence.~  The people of Canada venture upon
their rivers and lakes in boats made of the bark of trees, and so light that
two men can carry them, wherever shallows or cataracts obstruct the
navigation [84]. In these frail vessels they undertake and accomplish
long voyages.1   The inhabitants of the isles and of the southern continent
form their canoes by hollowing the trunk of a large tree, with infinite labour;,and though in appearance they are extremely awkward and unwieldy,
they paddle and steer them with such dexterity, that Europeans, well acqualuted with all the improvements in the science of navigation, have been
astonished at the rapidity of their motion, and the quickness of their evolutions. Their pirogues, or war boats, are so large as to carry forty or fifty
men; their canoes, employed in fishing and in short voyages are less capa* Piedrahita Conq. del Nuevo Reyno, ix. 12.    t Nauf. de Alv. Nun. Cabeca de Vaca, c. x.
p. 12C.; Piedrah. p. 16.   q Ovalle's Relation of Chili. Chuich. Collect. iii. 82. Falkner's
Descript. of Patagon. p. 130,   Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 332.  If Ellis Voy. 133.  ** Lafitau
Meurs, &c. ii. 213,




AMERICA.                             179
csous.  The form as well as materials of all these various kinds of vessels,
is well adapted to the-service for which they are destined; and the more
minutely they are examined, the mechanism of their structure, as well as
neatness of their fabric, will appear the more surprising.
But, in every attempt towards industry among the Americans, one
striking quality in their character is conspicuous. They apply to work
without ardour, carr it on with little activity, and, like children, are easily
diverted from it. Even in operations which seem the most interesting,
and where the most powerful motives urge them to vigorous exertions,
they labour with a languid listlessness. Their work advances under their
hand with such slowness, that an eyewitness compares it to the imperceptible progress of vegetation.t They will spend so many years in forming
a canoe, that it often begins to rot with age before they finish it. They
will suffer one part of a roof to decay and perish, before they complete
the other.4  The slightest manual operation consumes an amazing length
of time, and what in polished nations would hardly be an effort of industry,
is among savages an arduous undertaking. This slowness of the Americans in executing works of every kind. may be imputed to various causes.
Among savages, who do not depend for subsistence upon the efforts of
regular industry, time is of so little importance that they set no value
upon it; and provided they can finish a design, they never regard how long
they are employed about it. The tools which they employ are so awkward
and defective that every work in which they engage must necessarily be
tedious. The hand of the most industrious and skilful artist, were it furnished with no better instrument than a stone hatchet, a shell, or the bone
of some animal, would find it difficult to perfect the most simple work. It is
by length of labour that he must endeavour to supply his defect of power.
But above all, the cold phlegmatic temper peculiar to the Americans, renders their operations languid. It is almost impossible to rouse them from
that habitual indolence to which they are sunk; and unless when engaged
in war or in hunting, they seem incapable of exerting any vigorous effort.
Their ardour of application is not so great as to call forth that inventive
spirit which suggests expedients for facilitating and abridging labour.
They will return to a task day after day, but all their methods of executing
it are tedious and operose [85]. Even since the Europeans have communicated to them the knowledge of their instruments, and taught them to
imitate their arts, the peculiar genius of the Americans is conspicuous in
every attempt they make. They may be patient and assiduous in labour,
they can copy with a servile and minute accuracy, but discover little
invention and no talents for despatch. In spite of instruction and example,
the spirit of the race predominates; their motions are naturally tardy, and
it is in vain to urge them to quicken their pace. Among the Spaniards in
America, the work of an Indian is a phrase by which they describe any
thing, in the execution of which an immense time has been employed and
much labour wasted.~
VII. No circumstance respecting rude nations has been the object of
greater curiosity than their religious tenets and rites; and none, perhaps,
has been so imperfectly understood, or represented with so little fidelity.
Priests and missionaries are the persons who have had the best opportunities
of carrying on this inquiry among the most uncivilized of the American tribes.
Their minds, engrossed by the doctrines of their own religion, and habituated
to its institutions, are apt to discover something which resembles those
objects of their veneration, in the opinions and rites of every people.
]Whatever they contemplate they view through one medium, and draw
and accommodate it to their own system.'ihey study to reconcile the
~ Labat, Voyages, ii. 91, &c. 131.'  Gunilla, ii. 297.,+ Borde Relat. des Caraibevc
o. 22.   Q Voyages de Ulloa, i. 335. Lettr. Edif. &c. xv. 348.




180                     HISTORY  OF                      [Boox IV.
institutions which fall under their observation to their own creed, not to
explain them according to the rude notions of the people themselves.
They ascribe to them ideas which they are incapable of forming, and suppose them to be acquainted with principles and facts, which it is impossible
that they should know. Hence, some missionaries have been induced to
believe, that even among the most barbarous nations in America, they had
discovered traces, no less distinct than amazing, of their acquaintance with
the sublime mysteries and peculiar institutions of Christianity. From their
own interpretation of certain expressions and ceremonies, they have concluded that these people had some knowledge of the doctrine of the
Trinity, of the incarnation of the Son of God, of his expiatory sacrifice, of
the virtue of the cross, and of the efficacy of the sacraments.' In such
unintelligent and credulous guides we can place little confidence.
But even when we mnake our choice of conductors with the greatest
care, we must not follow them with implicit faith. An: inquiry into the
religious notions of rude nations is involved in peculiar intricacies, and we
must often pause in order to separate the facts which our informers relate
from the reasonings with which they are accompanied, or the theories
which they build upon them. Several pious writers, more attentive to the
importance of the subject than to the condition of the people whose sentiments they were endeavouring to discover, have bestowed much unprofitable labour in researches of this nature [86].
There are two fundamental doctrines, upon which the whole system of
religion, as far as it can be discovered by the light of nature, is established.
The one respects the being of a God, the other the immortality of the soul.
To discover the ideas of the uncultivated nations under our -review, witt
regard to those important points, is not only an object of curiosity, but
may afford instruction. To these two articles 1 shall confine -my researches,
leaving subordinate opinions, and the detail of local superstitions, to more
minute inquirers. Whoever has had any opportunity of examining into -the
religious opinions -of persons in -the inferior ranks -of life, even in the most
enlightened and civilized nations, willfind that their system of belief is de-rived from instruction, not discovered by inquiry. That -numerous part of fhe
human species, whose lot is labour, who-se principal and almost sole occupation is to secure subsistence, views the arrangement and operations of
nature with little reflection, and has neither leisure nor capacity for entering into that path of refined and intricate speculation which conducts to the
knowledge of the principles of natural religion.  In the'.early and most
rude penods of savage life, such -disquisitions are altogether unknown.
When the intellectual powers are just beginning to unfold, and their first
feeble exertions are directed towards a few objects of primary necessity
and use; when the faculties of the mind are so'limited -as not to have
formed abstract or general ideas; whben language is so barren as to be
destitute of names to distinguish any thing: that is not perceived by some
of the senses; it is preposterous to expect'that man should be capable of
tracing with accuracy the relation between cause and effect; or to suppose
that he should rise from the contemplation of the one to the knowledge ot
the other, and form just conceptions of a Deity, as the Creator and Governor
of the universe. The idea of creation is so familiar, wherever the mind is
enlarged by science and illuminated with revelation, that we seldom reflect
how profound and abstruse this idea is, or consider what progress man
must have made in observation and research, before he could arrive at any
knowledge of this elementary principle in religion. Accordingly, several
tribes have been discovered in America, which have no idea whatever of
a Supreme Being, and no rites of religious worship. Inattentive to that
* Venegas, i. 88. 92.  Torquemada, ii. 445. Garcia Origen. 122.  Herrera, dec. 4. lib. ix. c.
7'. dec. 5. li. iv. c. 7.




AMERICA                                 181
magnificent spectacle of beauty and order presented to their view, unaccustomed to reflect either upon what they themselves are, or to inquire
who is the author of their existence, men, in their savage state, pass their
days like the animals around them, without knowledge or veneration of any
superior power.  Some rude tribes have not in their language any natne for
the Deity, nor have the most accurate observers been able to discover any
practice or institution which seemed to imply that they recognised his
authority, or were solicitous to obtain his favour%. [87].   t is however only
among men in the most uncultivated state of nature, and while their intellectual faculties are so feeble and limited as hardly to elevate them above
the irrational creation, that we discover this total insensibility to the impressions of any invisible power.
But the human mind, formed for religion, soon opens to the reception of
ideas, which are destined, when corrected and refined, to be the great
source of consolation amidst the calamities of life. Among some of the
American tribes, still in the infancy of improvement, we discern apprehensions of some invisible and powerfiul beings.  These apprehensions are
originally indistinct and perplexed, and seem to be suggested rather by
the dread of impending evils than to flow  from  gratitude for blessings
received.  While nature holds on her course with uniform  and undisturbed regularity, men enjoy the benefits resulting from it, without inquiring concerning its cause.  But every deviation from this regular course
rouses and astonishes them.  When they behold events to which they are
not accustomed, they search for the reasons of them with eager curiosity.
Their understanding is unable to penetrate into these; but imagination,
a more forward and ardent faculty of the mind, decides without hesitation.
It ascribes the extraordinary occurrences in nature to the influence of invisible beings, and supposes that the thunder, the hurricane, and the earthquake
are effects of their interposition.  Some such confused notinm of spiritual or
invisible power, superintending over those natural calamities 7hich frequently
desolate the earth, and terrify its inhabitants, may be traced among many
rude nations [88]. But besides this, the disasters and dangers of savage
life are so many, and men often find themselves in situations so formidable,
that the mind, sensible of its own weakness, has no resource but in the
guidance and protection of wisdom and power superior to what is human.
Dejected with calamities which oppress him, and exposed to dangers
which he cannot repel, the savage no longer relies upon himself, he feels
his own impotence, and sees no prospect of being extricated, but by the
interposition of some unseen arm.- Hence, in all unenlightened nations,
the first rites or practices which bear any resemblance to acts of religion,
have it for their object to avert evils which men suffer or dread. The
Mllanitous or Okkis of the North Americans were amulets or charms, which
they imagined to be of such virtue as to preserve the persons who reposed
confidence in them from any disastrous event, or they were considered as
tutelary spirits, whose aid they might implore in circumstances of distress.t
The Cemis of the islanders were reputed by them  to be the authors of
every calamity that afflicts the human race; they were represented under
the most frightful forms, and religious homage was paid to them with no
other view than to appease these furious deities.$  Even among those tribes
whose religious systenm was more enlarged, and who had formed some
concelption of benevolent beings, which delighted in conferring benefits, as
well as of malicious powers prone to inflict evil; superstition still appears
* Biet, 539. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 221. Nieuhoff. Church. Coll. ii. 132, Let.tr. Edif. 2. 177.
Td. 12,13. Venegas, i, 87. Lozano Descr. del Gran Chaco, 59. Fernand. Mission. de Chequit. 39.
Gumilla, ii. 156. Rochefort Hist. des Antilles, p. 468. Margrave Hist. inAppend. de Chiliensibus,
286. Ulloa, Notic. Amer. 335, &c. Barrere, 218, 219. Harcourt Voy. to Guiana, Purch. Pilgr. iv
p. l273. Account of Brazil, by a Portuguese. Ibid. p. 1289, Jones's Journal, p. 59.  t Charlev
N. Fr. iii 343., c, Creuxii Hist. Canab, p 82., &c.   ~ Oviedo. lib. iii. c. 1. p. 111. P. Martyr,
decad. P. 102, &.




182   X                  HISTORY   OF                   [Boox IV.
as the offspring of fear, and all its efforts were employed to avert calami.
ties. They were persuaded that their good deities, prompted by the
beneficence of their nature, would bestow every blessing in their power,
without solicitation or acknowledgment; and their only anxiety was to
soothe and deprecate the wrath of the powers whom they regarded as
the enemies of mankind.*
Such were the imperfect conceptions of the greater part of the Americans
with respect to the interposition of invisible agents, and such, almost universally, was the mean and illiberal object of their superstitions. Were
we to trace back the ideas of other nations to that rude state in which
history first presents them to our view, we should discover a surprising
resemblance in their tenets and practices; and should be convinced, that
in similar circumstances, the faculties of the human mind hold nearly the
same course in their progress, and arrive at almost the same conclusions.
The impressions of fear are conspicuous in all the systems of superstition
formed in this situation. The most exalted notions of men rise no higher
than to a perplexed apprehension of certain beings, whose power, though
supernatural, is limited as well as partial.
But, among other tribes, which have been longer united, or have made
greater progress in improvement, we discern some feeble pointing towards
more just and adequate conceptions of the power that presides in nature.
They seem to perceive that there must be some universal cause to whom
all things are indebted for their being. If we may judge by some of their
expressions, they appear to acknowledge a divine power to be the maker of
the world, and the disposer of all events. They denominate him the Great
Spirit.t But these ideas are faint and confused, and when they attempt to
explain them, it is manifest that among them the word spirit has a meaning
very different from that in which we employ it, and that they have no conception of any deity but what is corporeal. They believe their gods to be of
the human form, though of a nature more excellent than man, and retail such
wild incoherent fables concerning their functions and operations, as are
altogether unworthy of a place in history. Even among these tribes, there
is no established form of public worship; there are no temples erected in
honour of their deities; and no ministers peculiarly consecrated to their
service. They have the knowledge, however, of several superstitious
ceremonies and practices handed down to them by tradition, and to these
they have recourse with a childish credulity, when roused by any emergence from  their usual insensibility, and excited to acknowledge the
power, and to implore the protection of superior beings.;
The tribe of the Natchez, and the people of Bogota, had advanced
beyond the other uncultivated nations of America in their ideas of religion,
as well as in their political institutions; and it is no less difficult to explain
the cause of this distinction than of that which we have already considered. The Sun was the chief object of religious worship among the
Natchez.  In their temples, which were constructed with some magnificence, and decorated with various ornaments, according to their mode of
architecture, they preserved a perpetual fire, as the purest emblem of their
divinity. Ministers were appointed to watch and feed this sacred flame.
The first function of the great chief of the nation, every morning, was an
act of obeisance to the Sun; and festivals returned at stated seasons, which
were celebrated by the whole community with solemn but unbloody rites,~
This is the most refined species of superstition known in America, and
perhaps one of the most natural as well as most seducing. The Sun is the
apparent source of the joy, fertility, and life, diffused through nature; and
* Tertre, ii. 365. Borde, p. 14. State of Virginia, by a Native, book iii. p. 32, 33. Dumont, i.
1.65. Bancroft Nat. Hist. of Guiana, 309.   t Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 343. Sagard, Voy. du Paysa
des Hurons, 226.   * Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 345. Colden, i 17.  ~ Daumont,. 158, &c. Charlev
N. Fr.'iii. 417, &c. 429. Lafitau, i. 167,




AMERICA.                              183
while the human mind, in its earlier essays towards inquiry, contemplates
and admires his universal and animating energy, its admiration is apt to
stop short at what is visible, without reaching to the unseen cause; and
pays that adoration to the most glorious and beneficial work of God, w hich
is due only to him who formed it. As fire is the purest and most active of
the elements, and in some of its qualities and effects resembles the Sun, it
was, not improperly, chosen to be the emblem of his powerful operation.
The ancient Persians, a people far superior, in every respect, to that rude
tribe whose rites I am describing, founded their religious system on similar
principles, and established a form of public worship, less gross and exceptionable than that of any people destitute of guidance from revelation.
This surprising coincidence in sentiment between two nations, in such
different states of improvement, is one of the many singular and unaccountable circumstances which occur in the history of human affairs.
Among the people of Bogota, the Sun and Moon were, likewise, the
chief objects of veneration.  Their system of religion was more regular
and complete, though less pure, than that of the Natchez. They had
temples, altars, priests, sacrifices, and that long train of ceremonies, which
superstition introduces wherever she has fully established her dominion
over the minds of men. But the rites of their worship were cruel and
bloody. They offered human victims to their deities, and many of their
practices nearly resembled the barbarous institutions of the Mexicans, the
genius of which we shall have an opportunity of considering more attentively in its proper place."
With respect to the other great doctrine of religion, concerning the
immortality of the soul, the sentiments of the Americans were more
united: the human mind, even when least improved and invigorated by
culture, shrinks from the thoughts of annihilation, and looks forward with
hope and expectation to a state of future existence. This. sentiment,
resulting from a secret consciousness of its own dignity, from an instinctive
longing after immortality, is universal, and may be deemed natural.
Upon this are founded the most exalted hopes of man in his highest state
of improvement; nor has nature withheld from him this soothing consolation, in the most early and rude period of his progress. We can trace this
opinion from one extremity of America to the other, in some regions more
faint and obscure, in others more perfectly developed, but nowhere
unknown. The most uncivilized of its savage tribes do not apprehend
death as the extinction of being. All entertain hopes of a future and more
happy state, where they shall be for ever exempt from the calamities which
imbitter human life in its present condition. This future state they conceive to be a delightful country, blessed with perpetual spring, whose
forests abound with game, whose rivers swarm with fish, where famine is
never felt, and uninterrupted plenty shall be enjoyed without labour or toil.
But as men, in forming their first imperfect ideas concerning the invisible
world, suppose that there they shall continue to feel the same desires, and
to be engaged in the same occupations, as in the present world; they naturally ascribe eminence and distinction, in that state, to the same qualities
and talents which are here the object of their esteem. The Americans,
accordingly, allotted the highest place, in their country of spirits, to the
skilful hunter, to the adventurous and successful warrior, and to such as had
tortured the greatest number of captives, and devoured their flesh.t  These
notions were so prevalent that they gave rise to a universal custom, which
is at once the strongest evidence that the Americans believe in a future
state, and the best illustration of what they expect there. As they imagine,
that departed spirits begin their career anew in the world whither they are
gone, that their friends may not enter upon it defenceless and unprovided,
* Piedrahita, Conq. del N. Reyno, p. 17. Herrera, dec. 6. lib. v. c. 6.   t Lery ap. de Bry, iii,222. Clharlev. N. Fr. iii. 351, &c. Dela Potherie, ii. 45, &c. iii. 5.




184                       HISTORY OF                       LBooK IV.
they bury together with the bodies of the dead their bow, their arro'" s,
and other weapons used in hunting or war; they deposit in their tombs the
skins or stuffs of which they make garments, Indian corn, manioc, venison,
domestic utensils, and whatever is reckoned among the necessaries in their
simple mode of life.* In some provinces, upon the decease of a cazique
or chief, a certain number of his wives, of his favourites, and of his slaves,
were put to death, and interred together with him, that he might appear
with the same dignity in his future station, and be waited upon by the same
attendants.t This persuasion is so deep rooted that many of the deceased
person's retainers offer themselves as voluntary victims, and court the
rivilege of accompanying their departed master, as a high distinction.
It has been found difficult, on some occasions, to set bounds to this enthusiasm of affectionate duty, and to reduce the train of a favourite leader to
such a number as the tribe could afford to spare [89].
Among the Americans, as well as other uncivilized nations, many of the
rites and observances which bear some resemblance to acts of religion,
have no connection with devotion, but proceed from a fond desire of prying
into futurity. The human mind is most apt to feel and to discover this vain
curiosity, when its own powers are most feeble and uninformed.  Astonished with occurrences of which it is unable to comprehend the cause, it
naturally fancies that there is something mysterious and wonderful in their
origin. Alarmed at events of which it cannot discern the issue or the consequences, it has recourse to other means of discovering them  than the
exercise of its own sagacity.  Wherever superstition is so established as to
form a regular system, this desire of penetrating into the secrets of futurity
is connected with it.  Divination becomes a religious act.  Priests, as the
ministers of heaven, pretend to deliver its oracles to men.  They are the
only soothsayers, augurs, and magicians, who profess the sacred andimportant art of disclosing what is hid from other eyes.
But, among rude nations, who pay no veneration to any superintending
power, and who have no established rites or ministers of religion, their
curiosity, to discover what is future and unknown, is cherished by a
different principle, and derives strength from  another alliance.  As the
diseases of men, in the savage state, are (as has been already observed)
like those- of the animal creation, few, but extremely violent, their im-.
patience under what they suffer, and solicitude for the recovery of health,
soon inspired them with extraordinary reverence for such as pretended to
understand the nature of their maladies, and to be possessed of knowledge
sufficient to preserve or deliver them from their sudden and fatal effects.
These ignorant pretenders, however, were such utter strangers to the
structure of the human frame, as to be equally unacquainted with the
causes of its disorders, and the manner in which they will terminate.
Superstition, mingled frequently with some portion of craft, supplied what
they wanted in science.  ihey imputed the origin of diseases to superna
tural influence, and prescribed or performed a variety of mysterious rites,
which they gave out to be of such efficacy as to remove the most dangerous
and inveterate maladies.  The credulity and love of the marvellous,
natural to uninformed men, favoured the deception, and prepared them to
be the dupes of those impostors.  Among savages, their first physicians are
a kind of conjurers or wizards, who boast that they know what is past,
and can foretell what is to come. Incantations, sorcery, and mummeries of
diverse kinds, no less strange than frivolous, are the means which they
employ to expel the imaginary causes of malignity;t and, relying upon
* Chronica de Cieca de Leon, c. 28. Sagard, 288. Creux. Hist. Canad. p. 91. Rochefort,
Hist. des Antiles, 568. Biet, 391. De la Potherie, ii. 44. iii. 8. Blanco Convers. de Piritu, p. 35.
t Dumont Louisiane, i. 208, &c. Oviedo, lib. v. c, 3. Gomara Hist. Gen. c. 28. P. Mart. decad.
304. Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 421. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 3. P. Melchior Hernandez Memor. dq
Cheriqui. Coll. Orig. Papers, i. Chron. de Cleca de Leon, c. 33.  e P. lelch. Hernandez Xni'o
rial de Cheriqui. Collect. Orig. Pap. i.




AMERICA                                 185
the efficacy of these, they predict with confidence what will be the fate
of their deluded patients.  Thus superstition, in its earliest form, flowed
from the solicitude of man to be delivered from present distress, not from
his dread of evils awaiting him in a future life, and was originally ingrafted
on medicine, not on religion.  One of the first and most intelligent historians
of America, was struck with this alliance between the art of divination and
that of physic, among the people of Hispaniola.*  But this was not peculiar
to them.  The A1lexis, the Picayas, the JAutmaoins, or whatever was the
distinguishing name of their diviners and charmers in other parts of
America, were all the physicians of their respective tribes, in the same
manner as the Bubitos of Hispaniola. As their function led them to apply
to the human mind when enfeebled by sickness, and as they found it, in
that season of dejection, prone to be alarmed with imaginary fears, or
amused with vain hopes, they easily induced it to rely with implicit confidence on the virtue of their spells, and the certainty of their predictions.t
Whenever men acknowledge the reality of supernatural power and discernment in one instance, they have a propensity to admit it in others.
The Americans did not long suppose the efficacy of conjuration to be confined to one subject. They had recourse to it in every situation of danger
or distress.  When the events of war were peculiarly disastrous, when
they met with unforeseen disappointment in hunting, when inundations or
drought threatened their crops with destruction, they called upon their
conjurors to begin their incantations, in order to discover the causes of
those calamities, or to foretell what would be their issue.t  Their confidence in this delusive art gradually increased, and manifested itself in
all the occurrences of life.  When involved in any difficulty, or about to
enter upon any transaction of moment, every individual regularly consulted
the sorcerer, and depended upon his instructions to extricate him from the
former, as well as to direct his conduct in the latter. Even among the
rudest tribes in America, superstition appears in this form, and divination
is an art in high esteem.  Long before man had acquired such knowledge
of a deity as inspires reverence, and leads to adoration, we observe him
stretching out a presumptuous hand to draw aside that veil with which
Providence kindly conceals its purposes from human knowledge; and we
find him labouring with fruitless anxiety to penetrate into the mysteries of
the divine administration. To discern and to worship a superintending
power is an evidence of the enlargement and maturity of the human
understanding; a vain desire of prying-into futurity is the error of its
infancy, and a proof of its weakness.
From this weakness proceeded likewise the faith of the Americans in
dreams, their observation of omens, their attention to the chirping of birds,
and the cries of animals, all which they suppose to be indications of future
events; and if any one of these prognostics is deemed unfavourable, they
instantly abandon the pursuit of those measures on which they are most
eas'erly bent.&
gI1t. But if we would form a complete idea of the uncultivated nations
of America, we must not pass unobserved some singular customs, which,
though universal and characteristic, could not be reduced, with propriety,
to any of the articles into which I have divided my inquiry concerning
their manners.
Among savages, in every part of the globe, the love of dancing is a
favourite passion. As, during a great part of their time, they languish in
* Oviedo, lib. v. c. 1.  t Herrera, dec. 1. lib. iii. c. 4; Osborne Coll. ii. 860. Dumont, 1
1.69, &c. Charlev. N. Fr, iii. 361. 364, &c. Lawson, N. Carsol. 2i4. Ribas, Triumf. p. 17. Biet,
386. De la Potherie, ii. 35, &c.    + Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 3. D)umont, i. 173. Fernand, Relac.
de los Chequit. p. 40. Lozano, 84. Margrave, 279.    ~ Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 262.353. Stadius
ap do Bry, iii. 120. Creuxj. Hist. Canad 84. Techo Hist. of Parag. Church. Coll. vi. 37. De la
Potherie, iii. 6.
VOL. [.-24                  10




1I6                       HISTORY OF                       [BooK IV
a state of inactivity and indolence, without any occupation to rouse or
interest them, they delight universally in a pastime which calls forth the
active powers of their nature into exercise;. The Spaniards, when they first
visited America, were astonished at the fondness of the natives for dancing,
and beheld with wonder a people, cold and unanimated in most of their
other pursuits, kindle into life, and exert themselves with ardour, as often
as this favourite amusement recurred. Among them, indeed, dancing
ought not to be denominated an amusement.  It. is a serious and important
occupation which mingles in every occurrence of public or private life.
If any intercourse be necessary between two American tribes, the ambassadors of the one approach in a solemn dance, and present the calumet or
emblem of peace; the sachems of the other receive it with the same
ceremony.* If war is denounced against an enemy, it is by a dance expressive of the resentment which they feel, and of the vengeance which
they meditate.t  If the wrath of their gods is to be appeased, or their bene
ficence to be celebrated; if they rejoice at the birth of a child, or mourn
the death of a friend,4 they have dances appropriated to each'of these
situations, and suited to the different sentiments with which they are then
animated.  If a person is indisposed, a dance is prescribed as the most
effectual means of restoring him to health; and if he himself cannot endure
the fatigue of such an exercise, the physician or conjuror performs it in
his name, as if the virtue of his activity could be transferred to his
patient.~
All their dances are imitations of some action; and though the music
by which they are regulated is extremely simple, and tiresome to the ear
by its dull monotony, some of their dances appear wonderfully expressive
and animated.  The war dance is, perhaps, the most striking.  It is the
representation of a complete American campaign. The departure of the
warriors from their village, their march into the enemy's country, the
caution with which they encamp, the address with which they station
some of their party in ambush, the manner of surprising the enemy, the
noise and ferocity of the combat, the scalping of those who are slain, the
seizing of prisoners, the triumphant return of the conquerors, and the torture of the victims, are successively exhibited. The performers enter
with such enthusiastic ardour into their several parts; their gestures, their
countenance, their voice, are so wild and so well adapted to their various
situations, that Europeans can hardly believe it to be a mimic scene, or
view it without emotions of fear and horror.1i
But however expressive some of the American dances may be, there is
one circumstance in thenl remarkable, and connected with the character
of the race.. The songs, the dances, the amusements of other nations, expressive of the sentiments which animate their hearts, are often adapted
to display or excite that sensbility which mutually attaches the sexes.
Among some people, such is the ardour of this passion, that love is almost
the sole object of festivity and joy; and as rude nations are strangers to
delicacy, and unaccustomed to disguise any emotion of their minds, their
dances are often extremely wanton and indecent. Such is the Calenda, of
which the natives of Africa are so passionately fond;~T and such the feats
of the dancing girls which the Asiatics contemplate with so much avidity
of desire. But among the Americans, more cold and indifferent to their
females, from causes which I have already explained, the passion of love
mingles but little with their festivals and pastimes.  Their songs and
* De la Potherie IIist. ii. 17, &c: Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 211. 297. La Hontan, i. 100 137. Hen.
nepin Decou. 146, &c.   t Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 298. Lafitau, i. 523.  +, Joutel, 343. Gomara
Hist. Gen. c. 196.    ~ Denys Hist. Nat. 189. Brickell, 372. De la Potherie, ii. 36.  Il De la
Potherie, ii. 116. Charlev. N. F. iii. 297. Lafitau, i. 523.   Ir Adanson Voyage to Senegal, iii.
9287. Labat, Voyages, iv. 4163. Sloane Hist. Nat. of Jam. Introd. p. 48. Fernmi Descript. de
Surins i. 139.




AMERICA.                                187
dances are mostly solemn and martial; they are connected with some of
the serious and important affairs of life;? and, having no relation to love or
gallantry, are seldom common to the two sexes, but executed by the men
and women apartt [901. If, on some occasions, the women are permitted
to join in the festival, the character of the entertainment is still the same,
and no movement or gesture is expressive of attachment, or encourages
familiarity.$
An immoderate love of play, especially at games of hazard, which
seems to be natural to all people unaccustomed to the occupations of
regular industry, is likewise universal among the Americans.  The same
causes, which so often prompt persons in civilized life, who are at their
ease, to have recourse to this pastime, render it the delight of the savage.
The former are independent of labour, the latter do not feel the necessity
of it; and as both are unemployed, they run with transport to whatever
is interesting enough to stir and to agitate their minds. Hence the Americans, who at other times are so indifferent, so phlegmatic, so silent, and
animated with so few desires, as soon as they engage in play become
rapacious, impatient, noisy, and almost frantic with eagerness.  Their
furs, their domestic untensils, their clothes, their arms, are staked at the
gaming table, and when all is lost, high as their sense of independence is, in
a wild emotion of despair orof hope, they will often risk their personal
liberty upon a single cast.~  Among several tribes, such gaming parties
frequently recur, and become their most acceptable entertainment at every
great festival. Superstition, which is apt to take hold of those passions
which are most vigorous, frequently lends its aid to confirm and strengthen
this favourite inclination. Their conjurors are accustomed to prescribe a
solemn match at play as one of the most efficacious methods of appeasing
their gods, or of restoring the sick to health.ll
From causes similar to those which render them fond of play,'the
Americans are extremely addicted to drunkenness. It seems to have been
one of the first exertions of human ingenuity to discover some composition
of an intoxicating quality; and there is hardly any nation so rude, or so
destitute of invention, as not to have succeeded in this fatal research. The
most barbarous of the American tribes have been so unfortunate as to
attain this art; and even those which are so deficient in knowledge, as to
be unacquainted with the method of giving an inebriating strength to
liquors by fermentation, can accomplish the same end by other means.
The people of the islands of North America, and of California, used, fbr
this purpose, the smoke of tobacco, drawn up with a certain instrument
into the nostrils, the fumes of which ascending to the brain, they felt all
the transports and phrensy of intoxication~T [91]. In almost every other
part of the New WV orld, the natives possessed the art of extracting an
intoxicating liquor from  maize or the manioc root, the sayne substances
which they convert into bread.  The operation by which they effect this
nearly resembles the common one of brewing, but with this difference,
that, in place of yeast, they use a nauseous infusion of a certain quantity
of maize or manioc chewed by their women. The saliva excites a vigorous
fermentation, and in a few days the liquor becomes fit for drinking.  It is
not disagreeable to the taste, and, when swallowed in large quantities, is
of an intoxicating quality."*   This is the general beverage of the Americans, which they distinguish by various names, and for which they feel
such a violent and insatiable desire as it is not easy either to conceive or
* Descript. of N. France. Osborne Coll. ii. 883. Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 84. t Wafer's Account
of Isthmus, &c. 169. Lery ap. de Bry, iii. 177. Lozano Hist. de Parag. i. 149. Herrera, dec. 2.
lib. vii. c. 8. dec. 4. lib. x. c. 4.    1 Barrere, Fr. Equin. p. 191.    7 Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 261
318. Lafitau, ii. 338. &c. Ribas Triumf. 13. Brickell, 335.  il CharleN. N. Fr. iii. 26t2
1T Oviedo Hist. ap. Ramus, iii. 113. Venegas, i. 68. Naufrag. de Cabeca de Vaca, cp. 6.
** Stadius ap. de Bry, iii. 111. Lery, ibid. 175.




188                       HISTORY OF                       [BooIk IV.
describe.  Among polished nations, where a succession of various functions
and- amusements keeps the mind in continual occupation, the desire for
strong drink is regulated in a great measure by the climate, and increases
or diminishes according to the variations of its temperature. In warm
regions, the delicate and sensible frame of the inhabitants does not require
the stimulation of fermented liquors. In colder countries, the constitution
of the natives, more robust and more sluggish, stands in need of generous
liquors to quicken and animate it. But among savages, the desire of
something that is of power to intoxicate is in every situation the same.
All the people of America, if we except some small tribes near the Straits
of 3Magellan, whether natives of the torrid zone, or inhabitants of its more
temperate regions, or placed by a harder fate in the severe climates towards
its northern or southern extremity, appear to be equally under the dominion
of this appetite.* Such a similarity of taste, among people in such different situations, must be ascribed to the influence of some moral cause, and
cannot be considered as the effect of any physical or constitutional want.
Wrhile engaged in war or in the chase, the savage is often in the most
interesting situations, and all the powers of his nature are roused to the
most vigorous exertions. But those animating scenes are succeeded by
long intervals of repose, during which the warrior meets with nothing that
he deems of sufficient dignity or importance to merit his attention.  He
languishes and mopes in this season of indolence. The posture of his body
is an emblem of the state of his mind. In one climate, cowering over the
fire in his cabin, in another, stretched under the shade of some tree, he
dozes away his time in sleep, or in an unthinking joyless inactivity not far
removed from it. As strong liquors awake him from this torpid state, give a
brisker motion to his spirits, and enliven him more thoroughly than either
dancing or gaming, his love of them  is excessive. A savage, when not
engaged in action, is a pensive melancholy animal; but as soon as he
tastes, or has a prospect of tasting, the intoxicating draught, he becomes
gay and frolicsome.t Whatever be the occasion or pretexts on which the
Americans assemble, the meeting always terminates in a debauch. Many
of their festivals have no other object, and they welcome the return of
them with transports of joy.  As they are not accustomed to restrain any
appetite, they set no bounds to this.  The riot often continues without
intermission several days; and'whatever may be the fatal effects of their
excess, they never cease from  drinking as long as one drop of liquor
remains.  The persons of greatest eminence, the most distinguished warriors, and the chiefs most renowned for their-wisdom, have no greater
command of themselves than the most obscure members of the community.
Their eagerness for present enjoyment renders them blind to its fatal consequences; and those very men, who in other situations seem to possess a
force of mind more than human, are in this instance inferior to children, i.
foresight as well as consideration, and mere slaves of brutal appetite. 
When their passions, naturally strong, are heightened and inflamed by
drink, they are guilty of the most enormous outrages, and the festivity
seldom concludes without deeds of violence or bloodshed.~
But, amidst this wild debauch, there is one circumstance remarkable
the women, in most of the American tribes, are not permitted to partake
of it [92].  Their province is to prepare the liquor, to serve it about to the
guests, and to take care of their husbands and friends when their reason is
overpowered.  This exclusion of the women from an enjoyment so highly
-valued by savages, may be justly considered as a mark of their inferiority,
and as an additional'evidence of that contempt with which they were
* Gumilia, i. 257. Lozano Descrip. del Gran. Chaco, 560. 103. Ribas, 8. Ulloa, i. 249. 337.
Mlarchais, iv. 436. Fernandez Mission. de las Chequit. 35. Barrere, p. 203. Blanco Convers. do
Piritu, 31.    t )Melendez Tesores Veldad. iii. 369.'     Ribas, 9. Ulloa, i 338.    i Lettr
Edif. ii. 178. Torquemada Mond. Ind. i. 339.




AME RI CA.                           189
treated in the New World. The people of North America, when first
discovered, were not acquainted with any intoxicating drink; but as the
Europeans early found it their interest to supply them with spirituous
liquors, drunkenness soon became as universal among them as among their
countrymen to the south; and their women, having acquired this new
taste, indulge it with as little decency and moderation as the men."
It were endless to enumerate all the detached customs which have
excited the wonder of travellers in America; but I cannot omit one
seemingly as singular as any that has been mentioned. When their
parents and other relations become old, or labour under any distemper
which their slender knowledge of the healing art cannot remove, the
Americans cut short their days with a violent hand, in order to be relieved
from  the burden of supporting and tending them. This practice prevailed among the ruder tribes in every part of the continent, from Hudson's
Bay to the river De la Plata; and however shocking it may be to those
sentiments of tenderness and attachment, which, in civilized life, we are
apt to consider as congenial with our frame, the condition of man in the
savage state leads and reconciles him to it. The same -hardships and
difficulty of procuring subsistence, which deter savages, in some cases,
from rearing their children, prompt them to destroy the aged and infirm.
The declining state of the one is as helpless as the infancy of the other.
The former are no less unable than the latter to perform the functions that
belong to a warrior or hunter, or to endure those various distresses in
which savages are so often involved by their own want of foresight and
industry. Their relations feel this; and, incapable of attending to the
wants or weaknesses of others, their impatience under an additional burden
prompts them to extinguish that life which they find it difficult to sustain.
This is not regarded as a deed of cruelty, but as an act of mercy. An
American, broken with years and infirmities, conscious that he can no
longer depend on the aid of those around him, places himself contentedly
in his grave; and it is by the hands of his children or nearest relations
that the thong is pulled, or the blow inflicted, which releases him for ever
from the sorrows of life.t
IX. After contemplating the rude American tribes in such various lights;
after taking a view of their customs and manners from so many different
stations, nothing remains but to form a general estimate of their character
compared with that of more polished nations. A human being, as he
comes originally from the hand of nature, is every where the same. At
his first appearance in the state of infancy, whether it be among the
-rudest savages or in the most civilized nation, we can discern no quality
which marks any distinction or superiority. The capacity of improvement seems to be the same; and the talents he may afterwards acquire,
as well as the virtues he may be rendered capable of exercising, depend,
in a great measure, upon the state of society in which he is placed. To
this state his mind naturally accommodates itself, and from it receives
discipline and culture. In proportion to the wants which it accustoms a
human being to feel, and the functions in which these engage him, his:intellectual powers are called forth. According to the connexions which
it establishes between him and the rest of his species, the affections of his
heart are exerted. It is only by attending to this great principle that we
can discover what is the character of man in every different period of his
pro ress.
If we apply it to savage life, and measure the attainments of the
human mind in that state by this standard, we shall find, according to
an observation which I have already made, that the intellectual powers of
man must be extremely limited in their operations. They are confined
* Hutchinson Hist. of Massachus. 469. Lafitau, ii. 125. Sagard, 146.  f Cassani Histor
de N. Reyno de Gran. p. 300. Piso, p. 6. Ellis Voy.. 191. Gumilla, i. 333.




190                     HISTORY  OFF                   [BooK IV.
within the narrow sphere of what he deems necessary for supplying his
own wants. Whatever has not some relation to these neither attracts his
attention, nor is the object of his inquiries. But however narrow the
bounds may be within which the knowledge of a savage is circumscribed,
he possesses thoroughly that small portion which he has attained. It was
not communicated to him by formal instruction; he does not attend to it
as a matter of mere speculation and curiosity; it is the result of his own
observation, the fruit of his own experience, and accommodated to his
condition and exigencies. While employed in the active occupations of'
war or of hunting, he often finds himself in difficult and perilous situations,
from which the efforts of his own sagacity must extricate him. He is
frequently engaged in measures, where every step depends upon his own
ability to decide, where he must- rely solely upon his own penetration to
discern the dangers to which he is exposed, and upon his own wisdom in
providing against them. In consequence of this, he feels the knowledge
which he possesses, and the efforts which he makes, and either in deliberation or action rests on himself alone.
As the talents of individuals are exercised and improved by such
exertions, much political wisdom is said to be displayed in conducting the
affairs of their small communities. The council of old men in an American tribe, deliberating upon its interests, and determining with respect to
peace or war, has been compared to the senate in more polished republics.
The proceedings of the former, we are told, are often no less formal and
sagacious than those of the latter. Great political wisdom is exhibited
in pondering the various measures proposed, and in balancing their probable advantages against the evils of which they may be productive.
Much address and eloquence are employed by the leaders, who aspire at
acquiring such confidence with their countrymen as to have an ascendant
in those assemblies.*  But, among savage tribes, the field for displaying
political talents cannot be extensive. Where the idea of private property
is incomplete, and no criminal jurisdiction is established, there is hardly
any function of internal government to exercise. Where there is no commerce, and scarcely any intercourse among separate tribes; where
enmity is implacable, and hostilities are carried on almost without intermission; there will be few points of public concern to adjust with their
neighbours; and that department of their affairs which may be denominated foreign, cannot be so intricate as to require much refined policy in
conducting it. Where individuals are so thoughtless and improvident as
seldom to take effectual precautions for self-preservation, it is vain to
expect that public measures and deliberations will be regulated by ths
contemplation of remote events. It is the genius of savages to act from
the impulse of present passion. They have neither foresight nor temper
to form complicated arrangements with respect to their future conduct.
The consultations of the Americans, indeed, are so frequent, and their
negotiations are so many [93], and so long protracted, as to give their
proceedings an extraordinary aspect of wisdom. But this is not owing
so much to the depth of their schemes, as to the coldness and phlegm ot
their temper, which render them  slow in determining.t  If we except
the celebrated league, that united the Five Nations in Canada, into la
federal republic,, which shall be considered in its proper place, we can
discern few such traces of political wisdom, among the rude American
tribes, as discover any great degree of foresight or extent of intellectua
abilities. Even among them, we shall find public measures more fre
quently directed by the impetuous ferocity of their youth, than regulated
by the experience and wisdom of their old men.
As the condition of man in the savage state is unfavourable to the
* Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 269, &c.  t Ibid. iii. 271.




AMERICA.                                191
progress of the understanding, it has a tendency likewise, in some respects,
to check the exercise of affection, and to render the heart contracted. The
strongest feeling in the mlind of a savage is a sense of his own independence.
He has sacrificed so small a portion of his natural liberty by becoming a
member of society, that he remains, in a great degree, the sole master of
his own actions.*  He often takes his resolutions alone, without consulting
or feeling any connection with the persons around him.  In many of his
operations he stands as much detached from the rest of his species as if he
had formed no union with them.  Conscious how little he depends upon
other men, he is apt to view them with a careless indifference. Even the
force of his mind contributes to increase this unconcern; and as he looks
not beyond himself in deliberating with respect to the part which he should
act, his solicitude about the consequences of it seldom  extends further.
He pursues his own career, and indulges his own fancy, without inquiring
or regarding whether what he does be agreeable or offensive to others,
whether they may derive benefit or receive hurt from it. Hence the
ungovernable caprice of savages, their impatience' under any species of
restraint, their inability to suppress or moderate any inclination, the scorn
or neglect with which they receive advice, their high estimation of themselves, and their contempt of other men.  Among them, the pride of independence produces almost the same effects with interestedness in a more
advanced stateof society; it refers every thing toamanhimself, it leadshim to
be indifferent about the mannerin which his actions may affect other men, and
renders the gratification of his own wishes the measure and end of conduct.
To the same cause may be imputed the hardness of heart and insensibility remarkable in all savage nations   Their minds, roused only by strong
emotions, are little susceptible of gentle, delicate, or tender affections.t
Their union is so incomplete that each individual acts as if he retained all
his natural rights entire and undlminished.  If a favour is conferred upon
him, or any beneficial service is performed on his account, he receives it
with much satisfaction, because it contributes to his enjoyment; but this
sentiment extends not beyond himself, it excites no sense of obligation, he
neither feels gratitude, nor thinks of making any returnj [94].  Even among
persons the most closely connected, the exchange of those good offices
which strengthen attachment, mollify the heart, and sweeten the intercourse
of life, is not frequent.  The high ideas of independence among the Americans nourish a sullen reserve, which keeps them at a distance from each
other. The nearest relations are mutually afraid to make any demand,
or to solicit any service,~ lest it should be considered by the other as
imposing a burden, or laying a restraint upon his will.
I have already remarked the influence of this hard unfeeling temper
upon domestic life, with respect to the connection between husband and
wife, as well as that between parents and children.  Its effects are
no less conspicuous, in the performance of those mutual offices of tenderness which the infirmities of our nature frequently  exact.  Among
some tribes, when any of their number are seized with any violent disease,
they are generally abandoned by all around them, who, careless of their
recovery, fly in the utmost consternation from the supposed danger of infection.ll But even where thev are not thus deserted, the cold indifference
with which they are attended can afford them little consolation.  No look
of sympathy, no soothing expressions, no officious services, contribute o
alleviate the distress of the sufferers, or to make them forget what they
endure.~, Their nearest relations will often refuse to submit to the smallest
inconveniency, or to part with the least trifle, however much it may tena
* Fernandez Mission. de los Chequit. 33.   Charlev. Hist. N. Fr. iii. 309.    Oviedo, Hist
ib. xvi. c.2.   q De la Potherie, iii. 28.  1[ Lettre de P, Cataneo ap. Muratori Christian. i.
30. Tortre, ii, 410. Lozano, 100. Herrera, dec. 4. lib. viii. c. 5. dec. 5. lib. iv. c, 2. Falluler'M
Descript. of Patagonia, 98  ff Gumilla, i. 329 Lozano, 100.




192                      HISTORY OF                      [BooK 1V.
to their accommodation or relief.* So, little is the breast of a savage susceptible of those sentiments which prompt men to that feeling attention
which mitigates the calamities of human life, that, in some provinces of
America, the Spaniards have found it necessary to enforce the common
duties of humanity by positive laws, and -to oblige husbands and wives,
parents and children, under severe penalties, to take care of each other
during their sickness.4 The same harshness of temper is still more conspicuous in their treatment of the Animal creation. Prior to their intercourse with the people of Europe, the North Americans had some tame
dogs, which accompanied them in their hunting excursions, and served
them with all the ardour and fidelity peculiar to the species. But,
instead of that fond attachment which the hunter naturally feels towards
those useful companions of his toils, they requite their services with
neglect, seldom  feed, and never caress them.+  In other provinces the
Americans have become acquainted with the domestic animals of Europe,
and availed themselves of their service; but it is universally observed that
they always treat them harshly,~ and never employ any method either for
breaking or managing them, but force and cruelty. In every part of the
deportment of man in his savage state, whether towards his equals of the
human species, or towards the animals below him, we recognise the same
character, and trace the operations of a mind intent on its own gratifications,
and regulated by its own caprice, with little attention or sensibility to the
sentiments and feelings of the beings around him.
After explaining how unfavourable the savage state is to the cultivation
of the understanding, and to the improvement of the heart, I should not
have thought it necessary to mention what may be deemed its lesser
defects, if the character of nations, as well as of individuals, were- not often
more distinctly marked by circumstances apparently trivial than:by those
of greater moment. A savage frequently placed in situations of danger
and distress, depending on himself alone, and wrapped up in his,own
thoughts and schemes, is a serious melancholy animal. His attention to
others is small. The range of his own ideas is narrow. Hence that taciturnity which is so disgusting to men accustomed to the open intercourse of
social conversation. When they are not engaged in action, the Americans
often sit whole days in one posture, without opening their lips.ll When
they go forth to war, or to the chase, they usually march in a line at some
distance from  one another, and without exchanging a word. The same
profound silence is observed when they row together in a canoe.T  It is
only when they are animated by intoxicating liquors, or roused by the
Jollity of the festival and dance, that they become gay and conversible.
To the same causes may be imputed the refined cunning with which
they form and execute their schemes. Men who are not habituated to a
liberal communication of their own sentiments and wishes, are apt to be so
distrustful as to place little confidence in others, and to have recourse to an
insidious craft in accomplishing their own puposes. In civilized life, those
persons who by their situations have but a few objects of pursuit on which
their minds incessantly dwell, are most remarkable for low artifice in carryIng on their little projects. Among savages, whose views are equally
confined, and their attention no less persevering, those circumstances must
operate still more powerfully, and gradually accustom them to a disingenuous subtlety in all their transactions.  The force of this is increased by.habits which they -acquire in carrying on the two most interesting operations
wherein they are engaged. With them war is a system of-craft, in which
they trust for success to stratagem more than to open force, and have their
* Gargia Origen, &c. 90. Herrera, dec. 4. lib. viii. c. 5   t Cogdaiudo Hist. de Yucathan, p. 300.
4 Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 119. 337.   i Ulloa Notic. American. 312   U Voyage de Bouguer, 102
If[ Charlev. iii. 340.




A MERI C A.                          193
invention continually on the stretch to circumvent and surprise their
enemies. As hunters, it is their constant object to ensnare in order that
they may destroy. Accordingly, art and cunning have been universally
observed as distinguishing characteristics of all savages. The people of
the rude tribes of America are remarkable for their artifice and duplicity.
Impenetrably secrect in forming their measures, they pursue them with a
patient undeviating attention, and there is no refinement of dissimulation
which they cannot employ, in order to ensure success. The natives of
Peru were engaged above thirty years, in concerting the plan of that
insurrection which took place under the vice-royalty of the Marquis de
Villa Garcia; and though it was communicated to a great number of
persons, in all different ranks, no indication of it ever transpired during
that long period; no man betrayed his trust, or, by an unguarded look,
or rash word, gave rise to any suspicion of what was intended."  The
dissimulation and craft of individuals is no less remarkable than that of
nations. When set upon deceiving, they wrap themselves up so artificially,
that it is impossible to penetrate into their intentions, or to detect their
designs.t
But if there be defects or vices peculiar to the savage state, there are.
likewise virtues which it inspires, and good qualities, to the exercise ot
which it is friendly. The bonds of society sit so loose upon the members
of the more rude American tribes, that they hardly feel any restraint.
Hence the spirit of independence, which is the pride of a savage, and
which he considers as the unalienable prerogative of man. Incapable of
control, and disdaining to acknowledge any superior, his mind, though
limited in its powers, and erring in many of its pursuits, acquires such
elevation by the consciousness of its own freedom, that he acts on some
occasions with astonishing force, and perseverance, and dignity.
As independence nourishes this high spirit among savages, thie perpetual
wars in which they are engaged call it forth into action. Such long intervals of tranquillity as are frequent in polished societies are unknown in thesavage state. Their enmities, as I have observed, are implacable and
immortal.  The valour of the young men is never allowed to rust in
inaction. The hatchet is always in the hand, either for attack or defence.
Even in-their hunting excursions, they must be on their guard against
surprise from the hostile tribes by which they are surrounded. Accustomed
to continual alarms, they grow familiar with danger; courage becomes an
habitual virtue, resulting naturally from their situation, and strengthened
by constant exertions. The mode of displaying fortitude may not be the
same in small and rude communities, as in more powerful and civilized
states. Their system of war, and standard of valour may be formed upon
different principles; but in no situation does the human mind rise more
superior to the sense of danger, or the dread of death, than in its most
simple and uncultivated state.
Another virtue remarkable among savages, is attachment to the commu-.
nity of which they are members.'From the nature of their political union,
one might expect this tie to be extremely feeble. But there are circumstances which render the influence, even of theirloose mode of association,
verypowerful. The American tribes are small; combined against their
neighbours, in prosecution of ancient enmities, or in avenging recent injuries,
their interests and operations are neither numerous nor complex. These
are objects which the uncultivated understanding of a savage can comrprehend. His heart is capable of forming connections which are so.itt.e;if
fused. He assents with warmth to public measures, dictated by passions
similar to those which' direct his own conduct. Hence the ardour with
which individuals undertake the most perilous service, when the commu* Voyage de Ulloa, ii. 309.  t Gumilla, i. 162. Charlev.
VoL. I.-25




=I4                      HISTORY OP                      [BooK IV
nity deems it necessary. Hence their fierce and deep rooted antipathy to
the public enemies.  Hence their zeal for the honour of their tribe, and
that love of their country, which prompts them to brave danger that it may
triumph, and to endure the most exquisite torments, without a groan, that
it may not be disgraced.
Thus, in every situation where a human being can be placed, even in the
most unfavourable, there are virtues which peculiarly belong to it; there
are affections which it calls forth; there is a species of happiness which it
yields. Nature, with the most beneficent intention, conciliates and forms
the mind to its condition; the ideas and wishes of Iman extend not beyond
that state of society to which he is habituated. What it presents as objects
of contemplation or enjoyment, fills and satisfies his mind, and he can
hardly conceive any other mode of life to be pleasant, or even tolerable.
The Tartar, accustomed to roam over extensive plains, and to subsist on the
product of his herds, imprecates upon his enemy, as the greatest of all
curses, that he may be condemned to reside in one place, and to be nourished
with the top of a weed. The rude Americans, fond of their own pursuits,
and satisfied with their own lot, are equally unable to comprehend the
intention or utility of the various accommodations, which, in more polished
society are deemed essential to the comfort of life. Far from complaining
of their ovn situation, or viewing that of men in a more improved state
with admiration or envy, they regard themselves as the standard of excellence, as beings the best entitled, as well as the most perfectly qualified, to
enjoy real happiness. Unaccustomed to any restraint upon their will or
their actions, they behold with amazement the inequality of rank, and the
subordination which takes place in civilized life, and consider the voluntary submission of one man to another as a renunciation no less base than
unaccountable, of the first distinction of humanity. Void of foresight, as
well as free from care themselves, and delighted with that state of indolent
security, they wonder at the anxious precautions, the unceasing industiy,
and complicated arrangements of Europeans, in guarding against distant
evils, or providing for future wants; and they often exclaim against their
preposterous folly, in thus multiplying the troubles and increasing the
labour of life.'  This preference of their own manners is conspicuous on
every occasion. Even the names, by which the various nations wish to be
distinguished, are assumed from this idea of their own pre-eminence.
The appellation which the Iroquois give to themselves is the chief of men.t
Caraibe, the original name of the fierce inhabitants of the Windward Islands,
signifies the warlikepeople.t  The Cherokees, froml an idea of their own
superiority, call the Europeans Nothings, or the accursed race, and assume
to themselves the namne of the beloved people.~  The same principle regulated the notions of the other Americans concerning the Europeans; for
although at first they were filled with astonishment at their arts, and with
dread of their power, they soon came t6 abate their estimation of men
whose maxims of life were so different from  their own. Hence.thev
called them the froth of the sea, men without father or mother.  They
supposed, that either they had no country of their own, and therefore
invaded that which belonged to others;1 or that, being destitute of the
necessaries of life at home, they were obliged to roam over the ocean, in
order to rob such as were more amply provided.
Men thus satisfied with their condition are far from any inclination to
relinquish their own habits, or to adopt those of civilized life. The transition is too violent to be suddenly made. Even where endeavours have
been used to wean a savage from his own customs, and to render the accommodations of polished society familiar to him; even where he has been
* Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 338. Lahontan, ii. 97.  t Colden, i. 3. 5* Rochefort Itist. des Antiles,
455.  ~ Adair Hist. Amer. Indians, p. 32.  11 Benzon. Hist. Novi Orbis, lib. iii. c 21.




AMERICA.                              19t,
allowed to taste of those pleasures, and has been honoured nith those
distinctions, which are the chief objects of our desire, he droops and languishes under the'restraint of laws and forms, he seizes the first opportu'nity
of breaking loose from them, and returns with transport to the forest or the
wild, where he can enjoy a careless and uncontrolled freedom."
Thus I have finished a laborious delineation of the character and manners of the uncivilized tribes scattered over the vast continent of America,
In this, F aspire not at rivalling the great masters who have painted and
adorned savage life, either in boldness of design, or in the glow and beauty
of their colouring. I am satisfied with the more humble merit of having
persiste::t with patient industry, in viewing my subject in many various
lights, and collecting from the most accurate observers such detached, and
often minute features, as might enable me to exhibit a portrait that resembles;he original.
Before I close this part of my work, one observation more is necessary,
In order to justify the conclusions which I have formed, or to prevent the
mistakes into which such as examine them may fall. In contemplating the
inhabitants of a country so widely extended as America, great attention
should be paid to the diversity of climates under which they are placed.
The influence of this I have pointed out with respect to several important
particulars which have been the object of research; but even where it
has not been mentioned, it ought not to be overlooked.  The provinces of
America are of such different temperament, that this alone is sufficient to
constitute a distinction between their inhabitants. In every part of the
earth where man exists, the power of climate operates, with decisive
influence, upon his condition and character.  In those countries which
approach near to the extremes of heat or cold, this influence is so conspicuous as to strike every eye.  Whether we consider man merely as ani
animal, or as being endowed with rational powers which fit him for activity
and speculation, we shall find that he has uniformly attained the greatest
perfection of which his nature is capable, in the temperate regions of the
globe.  There his constitution is most vigorous, his organs most acute, and
his form most beautiful. There, too, he possesses a superior extent of
capacity, greater fertility of imagination, more enterprising courage, and a
sensibility of heart which gives birth to desires, not only ardent, but persevering. In this favourite situation he has displayed the utmost efforts of
his genius, in literature, in policy, in commerce, in war, and in all the arts
which improve or embellish life.t
This powerful operation of climate is felt most sensibly by rude nations,
and produces greater effects than in societies more improved. The talents
of civilized men are continually exerted in rendering their own condition
more comfortable; and by their ingenuity and inventions, they can in a
great measure supply the defects, and guard against the inconveniences of
any climate. But the improvident savage is affected by every circumstance peculiar to his situation. He takes no precaution either to mitigate
or to improve it. Like a plant or an animal, he is formed by the climate
under which he is placed, and feels the full force of its influence.
In surveying the rude nations of America, this natural distinction between
the inhabitants of the temperate and torrid zones is very remarkable.
They may, accordingly, be divided into two great classes. The one comprehends all the North Americans from the river St. Laurence to the Gullf
of Mexico, together with the people of Chili, and a few small tribes
towards the extremity of the southern continent.  To the other belong
all the inhabitants of the islands, and those settled in the various provinces
which extend from the isthmus of Darien almost to the southern confines
* Charlev. N. Fr. iii. 322.   4 Dr. Ferguson's Essay on the Hist. of Civil Society.
art iii. rh. 1.




196                    HIISTORY  OF                      [BOOK IV
of Brasil, along the east side of the Andes. In the former, which comFrehends all the regions of the temperate zone that in America are inhabited,
the human species appears manifestly to be more perfect. The natives:
are more robust, more active, more intelligent, and more courageous.
They possess, in the most eminent degree, that force of mind, and love of
independence, which I have pointed out as the chief virtues of man: in his
savage state. They have defended their liberty with persevering fortitude
against the Europeans, who subdued the other rude nations of America
with the greatest ease. The natives of the temperate zone are the only
people in the New World who are indebted for their freedom to their- own
vafour. The North Americans, though long encompassed by three formi
dable European powers, still retain part of their original. possessions,.and
continue to exist as: independent nations.  The people of Chili, though
early invaded, still maintain a gallant contest with the Spaniards, and
have set bounds to their encroachments; whereas, in the warmer regions,
men are more feeble in their frame, less vigorous in- the efforts of their
minds, of a gentle but dastardly spirit, more enslaved by pleasure, and
more sunk in indolence. Accordingly, it is in the torrid zone that the
Europeans have most completely established their: dominion over America; the most fertile and desirable  provinces in it are: subjected to their
yoke; and if several tribes there still enjoy independence, it is either
because they have never been attacked by an enemy already satiated with
conquest, and possessed of larger territories than he was able to occupy, or
because they have been saved from oppression by their remote and inaccessible situation.
Conspicuous as this distinction may appear between the inhabitants of
those different regions, it is not, however, universal. Moral and political
causes, as I have formerly observed, affect the disposition and character of
individuals, as well as nations, still more powerfully than the influence of
climate.  There are, accordingly, some tribes, in various parts of the
torrid zone, possessed of courage, high spirit, and th6 love of independence,
in a degree hardly inferior to the natives of more temperate climates. We
are too little acquainted with the history of those people, to be able to trace
the several circumstances in their progress and condition, to which they
are indebted for this remarkable pre-eiminence.  The fact, nevertheless, is
certain. As early as the first vovage of Columbus, he received infbrmatioh
that several of the islands were inhabited by the Caribbees, a fierce race of
men, nowise resembling their feeble and timid neighbours. In his second
expedition to the New~Vorld, he found this information to be just, and was
himself a witness of their intrepid valours-[95]..  The samnecharacter
they have maintained invariably in all, subsequent contests with the people
of Europe;t and even in our own times- wehave seen theln make a gal-;
lant stand in defence of the last terri bry which the rapacity of the invaders
had left in their possession [9.6]. Some nations in Biasil were. no less
eminent for vigour of mind and bravery in war.. The people of the
isthmus of Darien boldly met the Spaniards in the field,. and tifrequently
repelled those formidable invaders.~  Otherinstances might be produced.
It is not by attending to any single cause or principle, how -powertful and
extensive soever its influence may appear, that we can explain the actions,
or account for the character of men. Even the law  of climate, more
universal, perhaps, in its. operation than any that affects the humar species,
cannot be applied, in judging of their conduct, witlout many exceptions.
* Life of Columbus, c. 47, 48.   t Rochefort Ilist. des Antilles, 531  -Lery ap Ile Bry, ill -
S07, &c.    O Herrera, dec, 1. lib. x. c. 15, &c. dec. 2. passimli.




AME1ERICA.                          197
-BOOK V.
WHEN Grijalva:[1518.] returned to Cuba, he found the arrn!menr
destined to attempt the conquestof that rich country which he had discovered
almost complete. Not only ambition, but avarice, had urged Velasquez
to hasten his preparations; and having such a prospect of gratifying both,
he had advanced considerable sums out of his private fortune towards
defraying the expenses of the expedition. At the same time, he exerted
his influence as governor, in engaging the most distinguished persons in the
colony to undertake the service [97]. At a time when the spirit of the
Spanish nation was adventurous to excess, a number of soldiers, eager to
embark in any daring enterprise, soon appeared. But it was not so easy
to find a person qualified to take the command in an expedition of so
much importance; and the character of Velasquez, who had the right of
nomination, greatly increased the difficulty of the choice. Though of most
aspiring ambition, and not destitute of talents for government, he possessed
neither such courage, nor such vigour and activity of mind, as to- undertake
in person the conduct of the armament which he was preparing. In this
embarrassing situation, he formed the chimerical scheme, not only of
achieving great exploits by a deputy, but of securing to himself the glory:f conquests which were to be made by another. In the execution of this
plan, he fondly aimed at reconciling contradictions. He was solicitous
to choose a commander of intrepid resolution, and of superior abilities,
because he knew these to be requisite in order to ensure success; but, at
the same time, from the jealousy natural to little minds, he wished this
person to be of a spirit so tame and obsequious as to be entirely dependent
on his will. But when he came to apply those ideas in forming an opinion
concerning the several officers who occurred to his thoughts as worthy of
being intrusted with the command, he soon perceived that it was impossible to find such incompatible qualities united in one character. Such as
were distinguished for courage and talents were too high spirited to be
passive instruments in his hands. Those who appeared more gentle and
tractable were destitute of capacity, and unequal to the charge. This
augmented his perplexity and his fears. He deliberated long and with
much solicitude, and was still wavering in his choice when Amador de
Lares, the royal treasurer in Cuba, and Andres Duero, his own secretary,
the two persons in whom he chiefly confided, were encouraged by this
irresolution to propose a new candidate; and they supported their recommendation with such assiduity and address, that, no less fatally for Velas.
quez than happily for their country, it proved successful.*
The man whom they pointed out to him was Fernando Cortes. He was
born at Medellin, a small town in Estremadura, in the year one thousand
four hundred and eighty-five, and descended from a family of noble blood,
but of very moderate fortune. Being originally destined by his parents to
the study of law, as the most likely method of bettering his condition, he
was sent early to the university of Salamanca, where he imbibed some
tincture of learning. But he was soon disgusted with an academic life,
which did not suit his ardent and restless genius, and retired to Medellin,
where he gave himself up entirely to active sports and martial exercises
At this period of life he was so impetuous, so overbearing, and so dissipated,
that his father was glad to comply with his inclination, and sent him abroad
as an adventurer in arms.  There were in that age two conspicuous'heatres, on which such of the Spanish youth as courted military glory
* B. Diaz, c. 19. Gomara Cron. c. 7. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. iii. c. 11.




198                    HISTORY  OF                    r[BOOK V
might display their valour; one in Italy, under the command of the Great
Captain; the other in the New World. Cortes preferred the former, but
was prevented by indisposition from embarking with a reinforcement of
troops sent to Naples. Upon this disappointment he turned his views
towards America, whither he was allured by the prospect of the advanta es which he might derive from the patronage of Ovando [98], the
governor of Hispaniola, who was his kinsman. When he landed at St.
Domingo, in one thousand five hundred and four, his reception was such as
equalled his most sanguine hopes, and he was employed by the Governor
in several honourable and lucrative stations. These, however, did not
satisfy his ambition; and, in the year one thousand five hundred and
eleven, he obtained permission to accompany Diego Velasquez in his
expedition to Cuba. In this service he distinguished himself so much,
that, notwithstanding some violent contests with Velasquez, occasioned by
trivial events unworthy of remembrance, he was at length taken into
favour, and received an ample concession of lands and of Indians, the
recompense usually bestowed upon adventurers in the New World.*
Though Cortes had not hitherto acted in high command, he had displayed such qualities in several scenes of difficulty and danger, as raised
universal expectation, and turned the eyes of his countrymen towards him
as one capable of performing great things. The turbulence of youth, as
soon as he found objects and occupations suited to the ardour of his mind,
gradually subsided and settled into a habit of regular indefatigable
activity. The impetuosity of his temper, when he came to act with his
equals, insensibly abated, by being kept under restraint, and mellowed:into a cordial soldierly frankness. These qualities were accompanied
with calm prudence in concerting his schemes, with persevering vigour in
executing them, and with, what is peculiar to superior genius, the art of
gaining the confidence and governing the minds of men. To all which
were added the inferior accomplishments that strike the vulgar, and conm
mand their respect; a graceful person, a winning aspect, extraordinary
address in martial exercises, and a constitution of such vigour as to be
capable of enduring any fatigue.
As soon as Cortes was mentioned to Velasquez by his two confidants,
he flattered himself that he had at length found what he had hitherto
sought in vain, a man with talents for command, but not an object for
jealousy. Neither the rank nor the fortune of Cortes, as he imagined, was
such that he could aspire at independence. He had reason to believe that
by his own readiness to bury ancient animosities in oblivion, as well as his
liberality in conferring several recent favours, he had already gained the
good will of Cortes, and hoped, by this new and unexpected mark of confidence, that he might attach him for ever to his interest.
Cortes, re eiving his commission [Oct. 23], with the warmest expressions
of respect and gratitude to the governor, immediately erected his standard
before his own house, appeared in a military dress, and assumed all the
ensigns of his new dignity. His utmost influence and activity were exerted
in persuading many of his friends to engage in the service, and in urging
forward the preparations for the voyage. All his own funds, together with
what money he could raise by mortgaging his lands and Indians, were
expended in purchasing military stores and provisions, or in supplying the
wants of such of his officers as were unable to equip themselves in a manner
suited to their rank [99]. Inoffensive and even laudable as this conduct
was, his disappointed competitors were malicious enough to give it a turn
to his disadvantage. They represented him as aiming already, with little
disguise, at establishing an independent authority over his troops, and
endeavouring to secure their respect or love by his ostentatious and inter' Gomara Cron. c. 1, 2, 3.




AMERICA.                             199
ested liberality. They reminded Velasquez of his former dissensions with
the man in whom he now reposed so much confidence, and foretold that
Cortes would be more apt to avail himself of the power which the
governor was inconsiderately putting in his hands, to avenge past injuries
than to requite recent obligations. These insinuations made such impression upon the suspicious mind of Velasquez, that Cortes soon observed
some symptoms of a growing alienation and distrust in his behaviour, and
was advised by Lares and Duero to hasten his departure before these
should become so confirmed as to break out with open violence. Fully
sensible of this danger, he urged forward his preparations with such rapidity
that he set sail from St. Jago de Cuba on the eighteenth of November.
Velasquez accompanying him to the shore, and taking leave of him with
an appearance of perfect friendship and confidence, though he had secretly
given it in charge to some of Cortes' officers, to keep a watchful eye upon
every part of their commander's conduct.~
Cortes proceeded to Trinidad, a small settlement on the same side of the
island, where he was joined by several adventurers, and received a supply
of provisions and military stores, of which his stock was still very incomplete. He had hardly left St. Jago, when the jealousy which had been
working in the breast of Velasquez grew so violent that it was impossible
to suppress it. The armament was no longer under his own eye and direction; and he felt that as his power over it ceased, that of Cortes would
become more absolute. Imagination now aggravated every circumstance
which had formerly excited suspicion: the rivals of Cortes industriously
threw in reflections which increased his fear; and with no less art than
malice they called superstition to their aid, employing the predictions of
an astrologer in order to complete the alarm. All these, by their united
operation, produced the desired effect. Velasquez repented bitterly of his
own imprudence, in having committed a trust of so much importance to a
person whose fidelity appeared so doubtful, and hastily despatched instructions to Trinidad, empowering Verdugo, the chief magistrate there,
to deprive Cortes of his commission. But Cortes had already made such
progress in gaining the esteem and confidence of his troops, that, finding
officers as well as soldiers equally zealous to support his authority, he
soothed or intimidated Verdugo, and was permitted to depart from Trinidad
without molestation.
From Trinidad Cortes sailed for the Havana, in order to raise more
soldiers, and to complete the victualling of his fleet. There several persons
of distinction entered into the service, and engaged to supply what
provisions were still wanting; but as it was necessary to allow them some
time for performing what they had promised, Velasquez, sensible that he
ought no longer to rely on a man of whom he had so openly discovered his
distrust, availed himself of the interval which this unavoidable delay
afforded, in order to make one attempt more to wrest the command out of
the hands of Cortes. He loudly complained of Verdugo's conduct, accusing
him either of childish facility, or of manifest treachery, in suffering Cortes
to escape from Trinidad. Anxious to guard against a second disappointment, he sent a person of confidence to the Havana, with peremptory
injunctions to Pedro Barba, his lieutenant-governor in that colony, instantly
o arrest Cortes, to send him prisoner to St. Jago under a strong guard, and
o countermand the sailing of the armament until he should receive further
orders. He wrote likewise to the principal officers, requiring them to
assist Barba in executing what he had given him in charge. But before
the arrival of this messenger, a Franciscan friar of St. Jago had secretly
conveyed an account of this interesting transaction to Bartholomew de
Olmedo, a monk of the same order, who acted as chaplain to the expedition.
* Gomara, Cron. c. 7. B. Diaz, c. 20.




200                    HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK V.
Cortes, forewarned of the danger, had time to take precautions for his
own safety. His first step was to find some pretext for removing-from the
Havana Diego de Ordaz, an officer of great merit, but in whom, on account
of his known attachment to Velasquez, he could not confide in this trying
and delicate juncture. He gave him the command of a vessel destined tc
take on board some provisions in a small harbour beyond Cape Antonio,
and thus made sure of his absence without seeming to suspect his fidelity.
When he was gone, Cortes no longer concealed the intentions of Velasquez
from his troops; and as officers and soldiers were equally impatient to set
out on an expedition, in preparing for which most of them had expended
all their fortunes, they expressed their astonishment and indignation at that
illiberal jealousy to which the governor was about to sacrifice, not only
the honour of their general, but all their sanguine hopes of glory and
wealth. With one voice they entreated that he would not abandon the
important station to which he had such a good title. They conjured him
not to deprive them of a leader whom they followed with such well
founded confidence, and offered to sned the last drop of their blood in
maintaining his authority. Cortes was easily induced to comply with
what he himself so ardently desired. He swore that he would never
desert soldiers who had given him such a signal proof of their,attachment,
and promised instantly to conduct them to that rich country which had
been so long the object of their thoughts and wishes. This declaration
was received with transports of military applause, accompanied with
threats and imprecations against all who should presume to call in question
the jurisdiction of their general, or to obstruct the execution of his designs.
Every thing was now ready for their departure; but though this expedition was fitted out by the united effort of the Spanish power in Cuba;
though every settlement had contributed its quota of men and provisions;
though the governor had laid out considerable sums, and each adventurer
had exhausted his stock, or strained his credit, the poverty of -the preparations was such as must astonish the present age, and bore, indeed, no
resemblance to an armament destined for the conquest of a great empire.
The fleet consisted of eleven vessels; the largest of a hundred tons, which
was dignified by the name of Admiral; three of seventy or eighty tons,
and the rest small open barks. On board of these were six hundred and
seventeen men; of which five hundred and eight belonged to the land
service, and a hundred and nine were seamen or artificers. The soldiers
were divided into eleven companies, according to the number of the ships;
to each of which Cortes appointed a'captain, and committed to him the
command of the vessel while at sea, and of the men when on shore [100].
As the use of fire arms among the nations of Europe was hitherto confined
to a few battalions of regularly disciplined infantry, only thirteen soldiers
were armed with muskets, thirty-two were cross-bow men, and the rest
had swords and spears. Instead of the usual defensive armour, which
must have been cumbersome in a hot climate, the soldiers wore jackets
quilted with cotton, which experience had taught the Spaniards to be a
sufficient protection against the weapons of the Americans. They had
only sixteen horses, ten small field pieces, and four falconets.?
With this slender and ill provided train did Cortes set sail [Feb. 10,
1519], to make war upon a monarch whose dominions were more extensive
than all the kingdoms subject to the Spanish crown. As religious enthusiasm always mingled with the spirit of adventure in the New WVorld, and,
by a combination still more strange, united with avarice, in prompting the
Spaniards to all their enterprises, a large cross was displayed in their
standards, with this inscription, Let us follow the cross, for under this srgn
rwe shall conquer.
B. I)iaz, c. 19.




A M ERR I C A.                       201
So powerfully were Cortes and his followers animated with both:these
passions, that no less eager to plunder the opulent country whither they
were bound, than zealous to propagate the Christian faith among its inhabitants, they set out, not with the solicitude natural to men going upon
dangerous services, but with that confidence which arises from security of
success, and certainty of the divine protection.
As Cortes had determined to touch at every place where Grijalva had
visited, he steered directly towards the island of Cozumel; there he had
the good fortune to redeem Jerome de Aguilar, a Spaniard, who had been
eight years a prisoner among the Indians. This man was perfectly acquainted with a dialect of their language understood through a large extent
of country, and possessing besides a considerable share of prudence and
sagacity, proved extremely'useful as an interpreter.  From Cozumel,
Cortes proceeded to the river of Tabasco [AMarch 4], in hopes of a reception as friendly as Grijalva had met with there, and of finding gold in the
same abundance; but the disposition of the natives, from some unknown
cause, was totally changed. After repeated endeavours to conciliate their
good will, he was constrained to have recourse to violence'. Though the
forces of the enemy were numerous, and advanced with extraordinary
courage, they were routed with great slaughter in several successive actions
The loss which they-had sustained, and still more the astonishment and terror
excited -by the destructive effect of the fire arms, and the dreadful appearance of the horses, humbled their fierce spirits, and induced them to sue
for peace. They acknowledged the King of Castile as their sovereign, and
granted Cortes a supply of provisions with a present of cotton garments,
some gold, and twenty female slaves [101].
Cortes continued his course to the westward, keeping as near the shore
as possible, in order to observe the country; but could discover no proper
place for landing until he arrived at St. Juan de Ulua.*  As he entered
this harbour [April 2], a large canoe full of people, among whom were
two who seemed to'be persons of distinction, approached his ship with
signs of peace and amity. They came on board without fear or distrust,
and addressed him in a most respectful manner, but in a language altogether
unknown to Aguilar. Cortes was in the utmost perplexity and distress at
an event of which he instantly foresaw the consequences, and already felt
the hesitation and uncertainty with which he should carry on the great
schemes which he meditated, if, in his transactions with the natives, he
must depend entirely upon such an imperfect, ambiguous, and conjectural
mode of communication as the use of signs. But he did not remain long
in his embarrassing situation; a fortunate accident extricated him when
his own sagacity could have contributed little towards his' relief. One ot
the female slaves, whom he had received from the cazique of Tabasco,
happened to be present at the first interview between Cortes and his new
guests. ~ She perceived his distress, as well as the confusion of Aguilar;
and, as she perfectly understood the Mexican language, she explained
what they had said in the Yucatan tongue, with which Aguilar was acquainted. This woman, known afterwards by the name of Donna Marina,
and who makes a conspicuous figure in the history of the New World,
where great revolutions were brought about by small causes and inconsiderable instruments, was born in one of the provinces of the Mexican
Empire. Having been sold as a slave in the early part of her life, after
a variety of adventures she fell into the hands of the Tabascans, and had
resided long enough among them to acquire their language without losing
the use of her own. Though it was both tedious and troublesome to
converse by the intervention of two different interpreters, Cortes was so
highly pleased with having discovered this method of carrying on some
* B. Diaz, c. 31-36. Gomara Cron. c, 18-23. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. iv. c. 11, &c.
VOL. I.-26




202                     HISTORY  OF                   [BOOre V.
intercourse with the people of a country into which he was determined
to penetrate, that in the transports of his joy he considered it as a visible
interposition of Providence in his favour. 
He now learned that the two persons whom he had received on board
of his ship were deputies from Teutile and Pilpatoe, two officers intrusted
with the goverlnment of that province by a great monarch whom they
called Montezuma; and that they were sent to inquire what his intentions
were in visiting their coast, and to offer him what assistance he might
need, in order to continue his voyage. Cortes, struck with the appearance
of those people, as well as the tenor of the message, assured them, in
respectful terms, that he approached their country with most' friendly
sentiments, and came to propose inatters of great importance to the welfare
of their prince and his kingdom, which he would unfold more fully, in
person, to the governor and the general. Next morning, without waiting
for any answer, he landed his troops, his horses, and artillery; and, having
chosen proper ground, began to erect huts for his men, and to fortify his
camp. The natives, instead of opposing the entrance of those fatal guests
into their country, assisted them in all their operations-with an alacrity of
which they had ere long good reason to repent.
Next day Teutile and Pilpatoe entered the Spanish camp with a numerous
retinue; and Cortes, considering them as the ministers of a great monarch
entitled to a degree of attention very different from that which the Spaniards
were accustomed to pay the petty caziques with whom they had intercourse
in the isles, received them with much fbrmal ceremony. He informed
them, that he came as ambassador from Don Carlos of Austria, King of
Castile, the greatest monarch of the East, and was intrusted with
propositions of such moment, that he could impart them to none but the
Emperor Montezuma himself, and therefore required them to conduct him,
without loss of time, into the presence of their master. The Mexican
officers could not conceal their uneasiness at a request which they knew
would be disagreeable, and which they foresaw might prove extremely
embarrassing to their sovereign, whose mind had been filled with many
disquieting apprehensions ever since the former appearance of the Spaniards
on his coasts. But before they attempted to dissuade Cortes fromn insisting
on his, demand, they endeavoured to conciliate his good will by entreating
him to accept of certain presents, which, as humble slaves of Montezuma,
they laid at his feet. They were introduced with great parade, and consisted of fine cotton cloth, of plumes of various colours, and of ornaments
of gold and silver to a considerable value; the workmanship of which
appeared to be as curious as the materials were rich. The display of
these produced an effect very different from what the Mexicans intended
Instead of satisfying, it increased the avidity of the Spaniards, and rendered
them so eager and impatient to become masters of a country which
abounded with such precious productions, that Cortes could hardly listen
with patience to the arguments which Pilpatoe and Teutile employed to
dissuade him from visiting the capital, and in a haughty determined tone
he insisted on his demand of being admitted to a personal audience
of their sovereign. During this interview, some painters, in the train
of the Mexican chiefs, had been diligently employed in delineating, upon
white cotton cloths, figures of the ships, the horses, the artillery, the soldiers,
and whatever else attracted their eyes as singular. When Cortes observed
this, and was informed that these pictures were to be sent to Montezuma,
ini order to convey to him a more lively idea of the strange and wonderful
objects now presented to their view than any words could communicate,
he resolved to render the representation still more animating and interest
ing, by exhibiting such a spectacle as might give both them and thei
* B. Diaz, c. 37, 38, 39. Gomara Cron. c. 25, 26. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 4,




AMERICA.                            203
monarch an awful impression of the extraordinary prowess of his followers,
and the irresistible force of their arms. The trumpets, by his order,
sounded an alarm; the troops, in a moment, formed in order of battle,
the infantry performed such martial exercises as were best suited to display
the effect of their different weapons; the horse, in various evolutions,
gave a specimen of their agility and strength; the artillery, pointed towards
the thick woods which surrounded the camp, were fired, and made dreadful havoc among the trees. The Mexicans looked on with that silent
amazement which is natural when the mind is struck with objects which
are both awful and above its comprehension. But, at the explosion of the
cannon, many of them fled, some fell to the ground, and all were so much
confounded at the sight of men'whose power so nearly resembled that of
the gods, that Cortes found it difficult to compose and reassure them. The
painters had now many new objects on which to exercise their art, and
they put their fancy on the stretch in order to invent figures and symbols
to represent the extraordinary things which they had seen.
Messengers were immediately despatched to Montezuma with those
pictures, and a full account of every thing that had passed since the arrival
of the Spaniards, and by them Cortes sent a present of some European'
curiosities to Montezuma, which, though of no great value, he believed
would be acceptable on account of their novelty. The Mexican monarchs,
in order to obtain early information of every occurrence in all the corners
of their extensive empire, had introduced a refinement in police unknown
at that time in Europe. They had couriers posted at proper stations along
the principal roads; and as these were trained to agility by a regular
education, and relieved one another at moderate distances, they conveyed
i-ntelligence with surprising rapidity. Though the capital in which Montezuma resided was above a hundred and eighty miles from St. Juan de
Ulua, Cortes's presents were carried thither, and an answer to his demands
was received in a few days. The same officers who had hitherto treated
with the Spaniards were employed to deliver this answer; but as they
knew how repugnant the determination of their master was to all the
schemes and wishes of the Spanish commander, they would not venture
to make it known until they had previously endeavoured to soothe and
mollify him. For this purpose they renewed their negotiation, by introducing a train of a hundred Indians loaded with presents sent to him by
Montezumna. The magnificence of these was such as became a great
monarch, and far exceeded any idea which the Spaniards had hitherto
formed of his wealth. They were placed on mats spread on the ground
in such order as showed them to the greatest advantage. Cortes and his
officers viewed with admiration the various manufactures of the country;
cotton stuffs so fine, and of such delicate texture as to resemble silk;
pictures of animals, trees, and other natural objects, formed with feathers
of different colours, disposed and mingled with such skill and elegance as
to rival the works of the pencil in truth and beauty of imitation. But
what chiefly attracted their eyes were two large plates of a circular form,
one of massive gold representing the sun, the other of silver, an emblem
of the moon [102]. These were accompanied with bracelets, collars,
rings, and other trinkets of gold; and that nothing might be wanted which
could give the Spaniards a complete idea of what the country afforded,
with some boxes filled with pearls, precious stones, and grains of gold
unwrought, as they had been found in the mines or rivers. Cortes received
all these with an appearance of profound veneration for the monarch by
whom they were bestowed. But when the Mexicans, presuming upon
this, informed him that their master, though he had desired him to accept
of what he had sent as a token of regard for that monarch whom Cortes
represented, would not give his consent that foreign troops should approach
nearer to his capital, or even allow them to continue longer in his dominions,




'204                   HI-STORY  OF                   [Boox V.
the Spanish general declared, in a manner more resolute and peremptory
than formerly, that he must insist on'his first demand, as he could not without
dishonour, return to his own country, until he was admitted into the presence of the prince whom he was appointed to visit in the name of his
sovereign. The Mexicans, astonished at seeing any man dare to oppose
that will which they were accustomed to consider as supreme and irresistible, yet afraid of precipitating their country into an open rupture with
such formidable enemies, prevailed with Cortes to promise that he would
not remove from his present camp until the return of a messenger whom
they sent to Montezuma for further instructions.*
The firmness with which Cortes adhered to his original proposal should
naturally have brought the negotiation between him and Montezuma to a
speedy issue, as it seemed to leave the Mexican monarch no choice, but
either to receive him -with confidence as a friend, or to oppose him openly
as an enemy. The latter was what might have been expected from a
haughty prince in possession of extensive power. The Mexican empire
at this period was at a pitch of grandeur to whicn no society ever attained
in so short a period. Though it had subsisted, according to their own
traditions, only a hundred and thirty years, its dominion extended from the
North to the South Sea, over territories stretching, with some small interruption, above five hundred leagues from east to west, and more than two
hundred from north to south, comprehending provinces not inferior -in fertility, population, and opulence, to any in the torrid zone. The people
were warlike and enterprising; the authority of the monarch unbounded,
and his revenues considerable. If, with the forces which might have been
suddenly assembled -in such an empire, Montezuma had fallen upon the
Spaniards while encamped on a barren unhealthy coast, unsupported by
any ally, without a place of retreat, and destitute of provisions, it seems
to be impossible, even with all the advantages of their superior discipline
and arms, that they could have stood the shock, and they must either have
perished in such an unequal contest, or. have abandoned the enterprise.
As the power of Montezuma enabled him to take this spirited part, his
own dispositions were such as seemed naturally to prompt him to it. Of
all the princes who had swayed the Mexican sceptre, he was the most
haughty, the most violent, and the most impatient of control. His subjects
looked up to him with awe, and his enemies with terror. The former he
governed with unexampled rigour; but they were impressed with such an
opinion of his capacity as commanded their respect; and, by many victories over the latter, he had spread far the dread of his arms, and had
added several considerable provinces to his dominions. But though his
talents might be suited to the transactions of a state so imperfectly polished as the lIexican empire, and sufficient to conduct them while in their
accustomed course, they were altogether inadequate to a conjuncture so
extraordinary, and did not qualify him either to judge with the discernment or to act with the decision requisite in such trying emergence.
From the moment that the Spaniards appeared on his coast, he disco
vered symptoms of timidity and embarrassment. Instead of taking such
resolutions as the consciousness of his own power, or the memory of his
former exploits, might have inspired, he deliberated with an anxiety and
hesitation which did not escape the notice of his meanest courtiers. The
perplexity and discomposure of Montezuma's mind upon this occasion, as
well as the general dismay of his subjects, were not owing wholly to the
impression which the Spaniards had made by the novelty of their appearance and the terror of their arms. Its origin may be traced up to a more
remote source. There was an opinion, if we may believe the earliest and
most authentic Spanish historians, almost universal among the Americans,
* B. Diaz, c. 39 Gomara Cron. c. 27 Herrera, de, 2 lib v. c. 5, 6




AMERIC A.                            205
that some dreadful calamity was impending over their heads, from a race
of formidable invaders, who should come from regions. towards the rising,
sun, to overrun and desolate their country. Whether this disquieting apprehension flowed from the memory of some natural calamity which had
afflicted that part of the globe, and impressed the minds of the inhabitants
with superstitious fears and forebodings, or whether it was. an imagination
accidentally suggested by the astonishment which the first sight of a new
race of men occasioned, it is impossible to determine. But as the Mexicans were more prone to superstition than any people in the New World,
they were more deeply affected by the appearance of the Spaniards,
whom their credulity instantly represented as the instrument destined to
bring about this fatal revolution which they dreaded. Under those circumstances it ceases to be incredible that a handful of adventurers should
alarm the monarch of a great empire, and all his subjects."
Notwithstanding the influence of this impression, when the messenger
arrived from the Spanish camp with an account that the leader of the.
strangers, adhering to his original demand, refused to obey the order enjoining him to leave the country, Montezuma assumed some degree of
resolution; and in a transport of rage natural to a fierce prince unaccustolned to-meet with any opposition to his will, he threatened to sacrifice
those presumptuous men to his gods. But his doubts and fears quickly
returned; and instead of issuing orders to carry his threats into execution,
he again called his ministers to confer and offer their advice. Feeble and
temporising measures will always be the result when men assemble to
deliberate in a situation where they ought to act. The Mexican counsellors took no effectual measure for expelling such troublesome intruders,
and were satisfied with issuing a more positive injunction, requiring them
to leave the country; but this they preposterously accompanied with a
present of such value as proved a fresh inducement to remain there.
Meanwhile, the Spaniards were not without solicitude, or a variety of
sentiments, in deliberating concerning their own future conduct. From
what they had already seen, many of them formed such extravagant ideas
concerning the opulence of the country, that, despising danger or hardships when they had in view treasures which appeared to be inexhaustible, they were eager to attempt the conquest.  Others, estimating the
power of the Mexican empire by its wealth, and enumerating the various
proofs which had occurred of its being under a well regulated administration, contended, that it would be an act of the wildest frenzy to attack
such a state with a small body of men, in want of provisions, unconnected
with any ally, and already enfeebled by the diseases peculiar to the climate, and the loss of several of their number.4  Cortes secretly applauded the advocates for bold measures, and cherished their romantic hopes,
as such ideas corresponded with his own, and favoured the execution of
the schemes which he had formed. From the time that the suspicions of
Velasquez broke out with open violence in the attempts to deprive him
of the command, Cortes saw the necessity of dissolving a connection which.
would obstruct and embarrass all his operations, and watched for a proper
opportunity of coming to a final rupture with him. Having this in view,
-he had laboured by every art to secure the esteem and affection of his
soldiers. With his abilities for command, it was easy to gain their esteem
and his followers were quickly satisfied that they might rely, with perfect
confidence, on the conduct and courage of their leader. Nor was it more
difficult to acquire their affection. Among adventurers nearly of the same
rank, and serving at their own expense, the dignity of command did not
elevate a general above mingling with those who acted under him. Cortes
* Cortes Relatione Seconda, ap. Ramus, iii. 234, 235. Herrera, dec, 2. lib. fil, c. 1. lib. v. c. 11
lib.-vii. c. 6. Gomara Cron. c. 66. 92. 144.  t B. Diaz, c. 40.




206                     HISTORY  OF                     LBoOK V.
availed himself of this freedom of intercourse to insinuate himself intai
their favour, and by his affable manners, by well timed acts of liberality
to some, by inspiring all with vast hopes, and by allowing them to trade
privately with the natives [103], he attached the greater part of his soldiers so firmly to himself, that they almost forgot that the armament had
been fitted out by the authority and at the expense of another.
During' these intrigues, Teutile arrived with the present from Montezuma, and, together with it, delivered the ultimate order of that monarch
to depart instantly out of his dominions; and when Cortes, instead of
complying, renewed his request of an audience, the Mexican turned from
him abruptly, and quitted the camp with looks and gestures which strongly
expressed his surprise and resentment. Next morning, none of the natives,
who used to' frequent the camp in great numbers in order to barter with
the soldiers, and to bring in provisions, appeared. All friendly correspondence seemed now to be at an end, and it was expected every moment
that hostilities would commence. This, though an event that might have
been foreseen, occasioned a sudden consternation among the Spaniards,
which emboldened the adherents of Velasquez not only to murmur and
cabal against their general, but to appoint one of their number to remonstrate openly against his imprudence in attempting the conquest of,
mighty empire with such inadequate force, and to urge the necessity &'
returning to Cuba, in order to refit the fleet and augment the army,
Diego de Ordaz, one of his principal officers, whom the malecontente
charged with this commission, delivered it with a soldierly freedom and
bluntness, assuring Cortes that he spoke the sentiments of the whole army.
He listened to this remonstrance without any appearance of emotion; and
as he well knew the temper and wishes of his soldiers, and foresaw how
they would receive a proposition fatal at once to all the splendid hopes
and schemes which they had been forming with such complacency, he
carried his dissimulation so far as to seem to relinquish his own measures
in compliance with the request of Ordaz, and issued orders that the army
should be in readiness next day to're-embark for Cuba. As soon as this
was known, the disappointed adventurers exclaimed and threatened; the
emissaries of Cortes, mingling with them, inflamed their rage; the ferrnent became general; the whole camp was almost in open mutiny; a,~
demanding with eagerness to see their commander. Cortes was not slow
in appearing; when, with one voice, officers and soldiers expressed their
astonishment and indignation at the orders which they had received. It
was unworthy, they cried, of the Castilian courage to be daunted at the first
aspect of danger, and infamous to fly before any enemy appeared. For
their parts, they were determined not to relinquish an enterprise that had
hiitherto been successful, and which tended so visibly to spread the knowledge of true religion, and to advance the glory and interest of their coun
try. Happy under his command, they would follow him with alacrity
through every danger in quest of those settlements and treasures which he
had so lofig held out to their view; but if he chose rather to return to
Cuba, and tamely give up all his hopes of distinction and opulence to an
envious rival, they would instantly choose another general to conduct them
in that path of glory which he had not spirit to enter.
Cortes, delighted with their ardour, took no offence at the boldness with
which it was uttered. The sentiments were what he himself had inspired,
and the warmith of expression satisfied him that his followers had imbibed
them thomoughly. He affected, however, to be surprised at what he heard,
declaring thcit his orders to prepare for embarking were issued from a persuasion that this was agreeable to his troops; that, from deference to what
he had been informed was their inclination, he had sacrificed his own pri
vate opinion, which was firmly bent on establishing immediately a settle
ment on the sea coast, and then on ( ndeavouring to penetrate into the inte




AMERICA.                             207
rior part of the country; that now he was convinced of his error  and as
he perceived that they were animated with'the generous spirit which
breathed in every true Spaniard, he would resume, with fresh ardour, his
original plan of operation, and doubted not to conduct them, in the career
of victory, to such independent fortunes as their valour merited. Upon
this declaration, shouts of applause testified the excess of their joy. The
measure seemed to be taken with unanimous consent; such as secretly
condemned it being obliged to join in the acclamations, partly to conceal
their disaffection from their general, and partly to avoid the imputation of
cowardice from their fellow-soldiers.*
Without allowing his men time to cool or to reflect, Cortes set about carrying his design into execution. In order to give a beginning to a colony,
he assembled the principal persons in his army, and by their suffrage elect-.
ed a council and magistrates, in whom the government was to be vested.
As men naturally transplant the institutions and forms of the mother country
into their new settlements, this was framed upon the model of a Spanish
corporation. The magistrates were distinguished by the same nanmes and
ensigns of office, and were to exercise a similar jurisdiction. All the persons chosen were most firmly devoted to Cortes, and the instrument of
their election was framed in the king's name, without any mention of' their
dependence on Velasquez. The two principles of avarice and enthusiasm,
which prompted the Spaniards to all their enterprises in the New World,
seem to have concurred in suggesting the name which Cortes bestowed on
his infant settlement. He called it, The Rich Town of the True Cross.?
The first meeting of the new council was distinguished by a transaction
of great moment. As soon as it assembled, Cortes applied for leave to
enter; and approaching with many marks of profound respect, which
added dignity to the tribunal, and set an example of reverence for its authority, he began a long harangue, in which. with much art, and in terms
extremely flattering to persons just entering upon their new function, he
observed, that as the supreme jurisdiction over the colony which they had
planted was now vested in this court, he considered them as clothed with
the authority and representing the person of their sovereign; that accord.
ingly he would communicate to them what he deemed essential to the
public safety, with the same dutiful fidelity as if he were addressing his
royal master; that the security of a colony settled in a great empire, whose
sovereign had already discovered his hostile intentions, depended upon
arms, and the efficacy of these upon the subordination and discipline preserved among the troops; that his right to command was derived from a
commission granted by the governor of Cuba; and as that had been long
since revoked, the lawfulness of his jurisdiction might well be questioned;
that he might be thought to act upon a defective or even a dubious title;
nor could they trust an army which might dispute the powers of its general, at a juncture when it ought implicitly to obey his orders; that, moved
by these considerations, he now resigned all his authority to them, that
they, having both right to choose, and power to confer full jurisdiction,
might appoint one in the king's name to command the army in its future
operations; and as for his own part, such was his zeal for the service in
which they were engaged, that he would most cheerfully take up a pike
with the same hand that laid down the general's truncheon, and convince
his fellow-soldiers, that though accustomed to command, he had not forgotten how to obey. Having finished his discourse, he laid the commission
from Velasquez upon the table, and, after kissing his truncheon, delivered
it to the chief magistrate, and withdrew.
The deliberations of the council were not long, as Cortes had concerted this important measure with his confidants, and had prepared the other
* B1 Diaz; c. 40, 41, 42. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 6, 7,   t Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz.




208                    HISTORY  O F                   [BOOK V.
members with great address for the part which he wished them to take
His resignation was accepted; and as the uninterrupted tenor of their
prosperity under his conduct afforded the most satisfying evidence of his
abilities for command, they, by their unanimous suffrage, elected him chief
justice of the colony, and captain-general of its army, and appointed his
commission to be made out in the king's name, with most ample powers,
which were to continue in force until the royal pleasure should be further
known. That this deed might not be deemed the machination of a junto,
the council called together the troops, and acquainted them with what had
been resolved. The soldiers, with eager applause, ratified the choice
which the council had made; the air resounded with the name: of Cortes,
and all vowed to shed their blood in support of his authority.
Cortes, having now brought his intrigues to the desired issue, and shaken
off his mortifying dependence on the governor of Cuba, accepted of the
commission, which vested in him supreme jurisdiction, civil as well as
military, over the colony, with many professions of respect to the council
and gratitude to the army. Together with this new command, he assumed
greater dignity, and began to exercise more extensive powers. Formerly
he had felt himself to be only the deputy of a subject; now he acted as
the representative of his sovereign. The adherents of Velasquez, fully:
aware of what would be the effect of this change in the situation of
Cortes, could no longer continue silent and passive spectators of his actions.
They exclaimed openly against the proceedings of the council as illegal,
and against those of the army as mutinous. Cortes, instantly perceiving
the necessity of giving a timely check to such seditious discourse by some
vigorous measure, arrested Ordaz, Escudero, and Velasquez de Leon, the
ringleaders of this faction, and sent them prisoners aboard the fleet, loaded
with chains. Their dependants, astonished and overawed, remained
quiet; and Cortes, more desirous to reclaim than to punish his prisoners,
who were officers of great merit, courted their friendship with such assiduity and address, that the reconciliation was perfectly cordial; and on
the most trying occasions, neither their connection with the governor of
Cuba, nor the memory of the indignity with which they had been treated,
tempted them to swerve from an inviolable attachment to his interest. 
In this, as well as his other negotiations at this critical conjuncture, which
decided with respect to his future fame and fortune, Cortes owed much-of
his success to the Mexican gold, which he distributed with a liberal hand
both among his friends and his opponents.t
Cortes, having thus rendered the union between himself and his army
indissoluble, by engaging it to join him in disclaiming any dependence on
the governor of Cuba; and in repeated acts of disobedience to his authority,
thought he now might venture to quit the camp in which he had hitherto
remained, and advance into the country. To this he was encouraged by
an- event no less fortunate than seasonable. Some Indians having approached his camp in a mysterious manner, were introduced into his presence. He found that they were sent with a proffer of friendship from the
cazique of Zempoalla,. a considerable town at no great distance; and from
their answers to a variety: of -questlons which he put to them, according to
his usual practice min every:interview with the people of the country, he
gathered, that their master, though subject to the Mexican empire, was
impatient of' the yoke, and filled with such: dread and hatred of Montezuma, that nothing could be more acceptable to him than any prospect of
deliverance from the oppression- under which he: groaned.: On hearing
this, a ray of light and hope broke in upon the mind of Cortes. He saw
that the great empire which he intended' to attack was neither perfectly
united, nor its sovereign universally beloved. He concluded, that- the"
* B. Diaz,- c. 42, 43. Gomara Cion. c. 30, 31. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 7.   t B. Diaz. c. 44.




AMERICA.                             209
causes of disaffection could not be confined to one province, but that in
other corners there must be malecontents, so weary of subjection, or so
desirous of change, as to be ready to follow the standard of any protector.
Full of those ideas, on which he began to form a scheme that time and
more perfect information concerning the state of the country enabled him
to mature, he gave a most gracious reception to the Zempoallans, and
promised soon to visit their cazique.%
In order to perform this promise, it was not necessary to vary the route
which he had already fixed for his march. Some officers, whom he had
employed to survey the coast, having discovered a village named QuiabisIan, about forty miles to the northward, which, both on account of the fertility of the soil and commodiousness of the harbour, seemed to be a more
proper station for a settlement than that where he was encamped, Cortes
determined to remove thither. Zempoalla lay in his way, where the
cazique received himn in the manner which he had reason to expect; with
gifts and caresses, like a man solicitous to gain his good will; with respect
approaching almost to adoration, like one who looked up to him as a deliverer. From him he learned many particulars with respect to the charac
ter of Montezuma, and the circumstances which rendered his dominion
odious. He was a tyrant, as the cazique told him with tears, haughty,
cruel, and suspicious; who treated his own subjects with arrogance, ruined
the conquered provinces by excessive exactions, and often tore their sons
and daughters from them by violence; the former to be offered as victims
to his gods: the latter to be reserved as concubines for himself or favourites
Cortes, in reply to him, artfully insinuated, that one great object of the
-Spaniards in visiting a country so remote from their own, was to redress
grievances, and to relieve the oppressed; and having encouraged him to
hope for this interposition in due time, he continued his march to QAuia
bisian.
The spot which his officers had recommended as a proper situation
appeared to him to be so well- chosen, that he immediately marked out
ground for a town. The houses to be erected were only huts; but these
~were to be surrounded with fortifications of sufficient strength to resist the
assaults of an Indian army. As' the finishing of those fortifications was
essential to the existence of a colony, and of no less importance in prosecuting the designs which the leader and his followers meditated, both in
order to secure a place of retreat, and to preserve their communication
with the sea, every man in the army, officers as well as soldiers, put his
hand to the work, Cortes himself setting them an example of activity and
perseverance in labour. The Indians of Zempoalla and Quiabislan lent
their aid; and this petty station, the parent of so many mighty settlements,
was soon in a state of defence.t
While engaged in this necessary work, Cortes had several interviews
with the caziques of Zempoalla and Quiabislan; and availing himself of
their wonderand astonishment at the new objects which they daily beheld,
he gradually inspired them with such a high opinion of the Spaniards, as
beings of a superior order, and irresistible in arms, that, relying on their
protection, they ventured to insult the Mexican power, at the very name of
which they were accustomed to tremble. Some of Montezuma s officers
having appeared to levy the usual tribute, and to demand a certain number
of human victims, as an expiation for their guilt in presuming to hold
intercourse with those strangers whom the emperor had commanded to
leave his dominions; instead of obeying the order, the caziques made
them prisoners, treated them with great indignity, and as their superstition
was no less barbarous than that of the Mexicans, they prepared to sacriB. BDiaz. c. 41. Gomara Cron. c. 28.   t B. Diaz, c. 45, 46. 48. Gomara Cron. c. 32, 33. 37.
Herrera, dec. 2. Hb. v. c. 8, 9.
VOL  I.-27              11




210                        HISTORY OF                          [Booe V.
fice them to their gods.  From this last danger.-they were delivered by the
interposition of Cortes, who manifested the utmost horror at the mention of
such a deed.  The two caziques having now been pushed to an act of such
open rebellion, as left them no hope of safety but in attaching themselves
inviolably to the Spaniards, they soon completed their union with them, by
formally acknowledging themselves to be vassals of the same' monarch.
Their example was followed by the Totonaques, a fierce people who
inhabited the mountainous part of the country.  They willingly subjected
themselves to the crowVh of Castile, and offered to accompany Cortes, with
all their forces, in his march towards Mexico.*
Cortes had now  been above three months in New Spain; and though
this period had not been distinguished by martial exploits, every moment
had been employed in operations which, though less splendid, were more
important. By his address in conducting his intrigues with his own army,
as well as his sagacity in carrying on his negotiations with the natives, he
had already laid the foundations of his future success. But whatever confidence he might place in the plan which he had formed, he could not but
perceive, that as his title to command was derived from a doubtful authority, he held it by a precarious tenure.  The injuries which Velasquez
had received were such as would naturally prompt him to apply for
redress to their common sovereign; and such a representation, he foresaw,
might be given of his conduct that, he had reason to apprehend, not only
that he might be degraded from his present rank, but subjected to punishment.  Before he began his march, it was necessary to take the most
effectual precautions against this impending danger.  With this view he
persuaded the magistrates of the colony at Vera Cruz to address a letter
to the king, the chief object of which was to justify their own conduct in
establishing a colony independent on the jurisdiction of Velasquez. In
order to accomplish this, they endeavoured to detract from  his merit in
fitting out the two former armaments under Cordova and Grijalva, affirming
that these had been equipped by the adventurers who engaged in the
expeditions, and not by the governor.  They contended that'the sole
object of Velasquez was to trade or barter with the natives, not to attempt
the conquest of New Spain, or to settle a colony there.  They asserted
that Cortes and the officers who served under him had defrayed the
greater part of the expense of fitting out the armament. On this account,
they humbly requested their sovereign to ratify what they had done in his
name, and to confirm Cortes in the supreme command by his royal cotmmission.  That Charles might be induced to grant more readily what they
demanded, they gave him  a pompous description of the country which
they had discovered; of its riches, the nuimber of its inhabitants, their
civilization and arts; they related the progress which they had already
made in annexing some parts of the country situated on the sea coast to the
crown of Castile: and mentioned the schemes which they had formed, as
well as the hopes which they entertained, of reducing the whole to subJection.t  Cortes himself wrote in a similar strain; and as he knew that
the Spanish court, accustomed to the exaggerated representations of every
new country by its discoverers, would give little credit to their splendid
accounts of New Spain, if these were not accompanied with such a specimen of what it contained as would excite a high idea of its opulence, he
* B. Diaz, c. 47. Gomara Cron. 35, 36. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v,. c. 9, 10, 11.
t'n this letter it is asserted, that though a considerable number of Spaniards have been wounded
In their various encounters with the people of Tobasco, not one of them died, and all had recovered
In a very short time. This seems to confirm what I observe in p. 214, concerning the imperfection
of the offensive weapons used by the Americans. In this letter, the human sacrifices offered by
the Mexicans to their deities are described minutely, and with great horror; some of the Spaniards,
it is said, had been eye-witnesses of those barbarous rites. To the letter is subjoined a catalogue
and description of the presents sent to the emperor. That published by Gomara, Cron. c. 29, seems
to have been copied from it. Pet. Martyl describes nranyof the articles in his treatise,' De Insulis
auper Inventis,' p. 354, &c.




AMERICA.                             211
solicited his soldiers to relinquish what they might claim as their part ot
the treasures w.hich had hitherto been collected, in order that the whole
might be sent to the king. Such was the ascendant which he had acquired
over their minds, and such their own romantic expectations of future
wealth, that an army of indigent and rapacious adventurers was capable
of this generous effort, and offered to their sovereign the richest present
that had hitherto been transmitted from the New World [104]. Portocarrero and Montejo, the chief magistrates of the colony? were appointed
to carry this present to Castile, with express orders not to touch at Cuba
in their passage thither.?
While a vessel was preparing for their departure an unexpected event
occasioned a general alarm. Some soldiers and sailors, secretly attached
to Velasquez, or intimidated at the prospect of the dangers unavoidable in
attempting to penetrate into the heart of a great empire with such unequal
force, formed the design of seizing one of the brigantines, and making
their escape to Cuba, in order to give the governor such intelligence as
might enable him to intercept the ship which was to carry the treasure and
despatches to Spain. This conspiracy, though formed by persons of low
rank, was conducted with profound secrecy; but at the moment when
every thing was ready for execution, they were betrayed by one of their
associates.
Though the good fortune of Cortes interposed so seasonably on this
occasion, the detection of this conspiracy filled his mind with most disquieting apprehensions, and prompted him to execute a scheme which he
had long revolved. He perceived that the spirit of disaffection still lurked
among his troops; that though hitherto checked by the uniform success ot
his schemes, or suppressed by the hand of authority, various events might
occur which would encourage and call it forth. He observed, that many
of his men, weary of the fatigue of service, longed to revisit their settle
ments in Cuba; and that upon any appearance of extraordinary danger
or any reverse of fortune, it would be impossible to restrain them from
returning thither. He was sensible that his forces, already too feeble,
could bear no diminution, and that a very small defection of his followers
would oblige him to abandon the enterprise. After ruminating often, and
with much solicitude, upon those particulars, he saw no hope of success
but in cutting off all possibility of retreat, and in reducing his men to the
necessity of adopting the same resolution with which he himself was
animated, either to conquer or to perish. With this view he determined
to destroy his-fleet; but as he durst not venture to execute such a bold
resolution by his single authority, he laboured to bring his soldiers to adopt
his ideas with respect to the propriety of this measure. His address in
accomplishing this was not inferior to the arduous occasion in which it was
employed. He persuaded some that the ships had suffered so much by
having been long at sea, as to be altogether unfit for service; to others he
pointed out what a seasonable reinforcement of strength they would derive
from the junction of a hundred men, now unprofitably employed as sailors;
and to all he represented the necessity of fixing their eyes and wishes upon
whaty.was before them, without allowing the idea of a retreat once to
enter their thoughts. With universal consent the ships were drawn ashore,
and after stripping them of their sails, rigging, iron works, and whatever
else might be of use, they were broke in pieces. Thus, from an effort cf
magnanimity, to which there is nothing parallel in history, five hundred
men voluntarily consented to be shut up in a hostile country, filled with
powerful and unknown nations; and, having precluded every means of
escape, left themselves without any resource but their own valour and
perseverance.t
* B Diaz, c. 54. Gomara, Cron. c. 40  t Relat. di Cortes. Ramus. iii. 225. B. Diau,
5" 58.  Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 14.




212                     HISTORY OF                      [BOOK V.
Nothing now retarded Cortes; the alacrity of his troops and the dis
position of his allies were equally favourable. All the advantages, how
ever, derived from the latter, though procured by much assiduity and
address, were well nigh lost in a moment, by an indiscreet sally of religious
zeal, which on many occasions precipitated Cortes into actions inconsistent
with the prudence that distinguishes his character. Though hitherto he
had neither time nor opportunity to explain to the natives the errors ot
their own superstition, or to instruct them in the principles of the Christian
faith, he commanded his soldiers to overturn the altars and to destroy the
idols in the chief temple of Zempoalla, and in their place to erect a
crucifix and an image of the Virgin Mary. The people beheld this with
astonishment and horror; the priests excited them to arms: but such was
the authority of Cortes, and so great the ascendant which the Spaniards
had acquired, that the commotion was appeased without bloodshed, and
concord perfectly re-established.*
Cortes began his march from  Zempoalla, on the sixteenth of August,
with five hundred men, fifteen horse, and six field pieces. The rest of his
troops, consisting chiefly of such as from age or infirmity -were less fit for
active service, he left as a garrison in Villa Rica, under the command of
Escalante, an officer of merit, and warmly attached to his interest. The
cazique of Zempoalla supplied him with provisions, and with two hundred
of those Indians called Tamemes, whose office, in a country where tame
animals were unknown, was to carry burdens, and to perform all servile
labour. They were a great relief to the Spanish soldiers, who hitherto
had been obliged not only to carry their own baggage, but to drag along
the artillery by main force. He offered likewise a considerable body of
his troops, but Cortes was satisfied with four hundred; taking care. hovever, to choose persons of such note as might prove hostages for the fidelity
of their master. Nothing mencrable happened in his progress, until he
arrived on the confines of Tlascala. The inhabitants of that province, a
warlike people, were implacable enemies of the Mexicans, and had been
united in an ancient alliance with the caziques of Zempoalla. Though
less civilized than the subjects of Montezuma, they were advanced in
improvement far beyond the rude nations of America whose manners we
have described. They had made considerable progress in agriculture;
they dwelt in large towns; they were not strangers to some species of
commerce; and in the imperfect accounts of their institutions and laws,
transmitted to us by the early Spanish writers, we discern traces both of
distributive justice and of criminal jurisdiction in their interior police.
But still, as the degree of their civilization was incomplete, and as they
depended for subsistence not on agriculture alone, but trusted for it in a
great measure to hunting, they retained many of the qualities natural to
men in this state. Like them they were fierce and revengeful; like them,
too, they were high spirited and independent. In consequence of the
former, they were involved in perpetual hostilities, and had but a slender
and occasional intercourse with neighbouring states. The latter inspired
them with such detestation of servitude, that they not only refused to
stoop to a foreign yoke, and maintain an obstinate and successful contest
in defence of their liberty against the superior power of the Mexican
empire, but they guarded with equal solicitude against domestic tyranny;
and'disdaining to acknowledge any master, they lived under the mild and
limited jurisdiction of a council elected by their several tribes.
Cortes, though he had received information concerning the martial character of this people, flattered himself that his professions of delivering
the oppressed from the tyranny of Montezuma, their inveterate enmity to
the Mexicans, and the example of their ancient allies the Zempoallans,
* B. Diaz, c. 41, 42. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 3, 4.




AMERICA.                            213
might Induce the Tlascalans to grant him a friendly reception. In order
to dispose them to this, four Zempoallans of great eminence were sent
ambassadors, to request in his name, and in that of their cazique, that tney
would permit the Spaniards to pass through the territories of the republic
in their way to Mexico. But instead of the favourable answer which
was expected, the Tlascalans seized the ambassadors, and, without any
regard to, their public character, made preparations for sacrificing them
to their gods. At the same time they assembled their troops, in order to
oppose those unknown invaders if they should attempt to make their
passage good by force of arms. Various motives concurred in precipitating the Tlascalans into this resolution. A fierce people, shut up within
its own narrow precincts, and little accustomed to any intercourse with
foreigners, is apt to consider every stranger as an enemy, and is easily
excited to arms.  They concluded, fiom  Cortes's proposal of visiting
Montezuma in his capital, that, notwithstanding all his professions, he
courted the friendship of a monarch whom they both hated and feared
The imprudent zeal of Cortes in violating the temples in Zempoalla, filled
the Tlascalans with horror; and as they were no less attached to their
superstition than the other nations of New Spain, they were impatient to
avenge their injured gods, and to acquire the merit of offering up to them
as victims, those impious men who had dared to profane their altars; they
contemned the small number of the Spaniards, as they had not yet measured their own strength with that oi these new enemies, and had no idea
of the superiority which they derived from their arms and discipline.
Cortes, after waiting some days, in vain, for the return of his ambassa
dors, advanced [Aug. 30,] into the Tlascalan territories. As the resolutions
of people who delight in war are executed with no less promptitude than
they are formed, he found troops in the field ready to oppose him. They
attacked him with great intrepidity, and, in the first encounter, wounded
some of the Spaniards, and killed two horses; a loss, in their situation, of
great moment, because it was irreparable. From this specimen of their
courage, Cortes saw the necessity of proceeding with caution. His army 
marched in close order; he chose the stations where he halted, with
attention, and fortified every camp with extraordinary care. During fourteen days he was exposed to almost uninterrupted assaults, the Tlascalans
advancing with numerous armies, and renewing the attack in various forms,
with a degree of valour and perseverance to which the Spaniards had
seen nothing parallel in the New World. The Spanish historians describe
those successive battles with great pomp, and enter into a minute detail of
particulars, mingling many exaggerated and incredible circumstances [105]
with such as are real and marvellous. But no power of words can render
the recital of a combat interesting, where there is no equality of danger;
and when the narrative closes with an account of thousands slain on the
one side, while not a single person falls on the other, the most laboured
descriptions of the previous disposition of the troops, or of the various
vicissitudes in the engagement, command no attention.
There are some circumstances, however, in this war, which are memorable, and merit notice, as they throw light upon the character both of
the people of New Spain, and of their conquerors. Though the Tiascalans brought into the field such numerous armies as appear sufficient to
have overwhelmed the Spaniards, they were never able lo make any impression upon their small battalion. Singular as this may seem, it is not
inexplicable. The Tlascalans, though addicted to war, were like all
unpolished nations, strangers to military order and discipline, and lost in a
great measure the advantage which they might have derived from their
numbers, and the impetuosity of their attack, by their constant solicitude
to carry off the dead and wounded. This point of honour, fobunded on a;entimnent of tenderness natural to the human mind, and strengthened by




214                    HISTORY OF                      [BoOOK V.
anxiety to preserve the bodies of their countrymen from being devoured
by their enemies, was universal among the people of New Spain. Attention to this pious office occupied them even during the heat of combat,?
broke their union, and diminished the force of the impression which they
might have made by a joint effort.
Not only was their superiority in number of little avail, but the imper.
fection of their military weapons rendered their valour in a great measure
inoffensive. After three battles, and many skirmishes and assaults, not
one Spaniard was killed in the field. Arrows and spears, headed with
flint or the bones of fishes, stakes hardened in the fire, and wooden swords,
though destructive weapons among naked Indians, were easily turned aside
by the Spanish bucklers, and could hardly penetrate the escaupiles, or
quilted jackets, which the soldiers wore. The Tlascalans advanced
boldly to the charge, and often fought hand to hand. Many of the Spa
niards were wounded, though all slightly, which cannot be imputed to
any want of courage or strength in their enemies, but to the defect of the
arms with which they assailed them.
Notwithstanding the fury with which the Tlascalans attacked the Spaniards, they seemed to have conducted their hostilities with some degree
of barbarous generosity. They gave the Spaniards warning of their
hostile intentions; and as they knew that their invaders wanted provisions,
and imagined, perhaps, like the other Americans, that they had left their
own country because. it did not afford them subsistence, they sent to their
canip a large supply of poultry and maize, desiring them to eat plentifully,
because they scorned to attack an enemy enfeebled by hunger, and it
would be an affront to their gods to offer them famished victims, as well
as disagreeable to themselves to feed on such emaciated prey.~
When they were taught by the first encounter with their new enemies,
that it was not easy to execute this threat; when they perceived, in the
subsequent engagements, that notwithstanding all the efforts of their own
valour, of which they had a very high opinion, not one of the Spaniards
was slain or taken, they began to conceive them to be a superior order of
beings, against whom human power could not avail. In this extremity,
they had recourse to their priests, requiring them to reveal the mysterious
causes of such extraordinary events, and to declare what new means they
should employ in order to repulse those formidable invaders. The priests,
after many sacrifices and incantations, delivered this response: That these
strangers were the offspring of the sun, procreated by his animating energy
in the regions of the east; that, by day, while cherished with the influence
of his parental beams, they were invincible; but by night, when his reviving heat was withdrawn, their vigour declined and faded like the herbs
in the field, and they dwindled down into mortal men.t Theories less
plausible have gained credit with more enlightened nations, and have
influenced their conduct. In consequence of this, the Tlascalans, with
the implicit confidence of men who fancy themselves to be under the
guidance of Heaven, acted in contradiction to one of their most established
maxims in war, and ventured to attack the enemy, with a strong body, in
the night time, in hopes of destroying them when enfeebled and surprised.
But Cortes had greater vigilance and discernment than to be deceived by
the rude stratagems of an Indian army. The sentinels at his outposts,
observing some extraordinary movement among the Tlascalans, gave the
alarm. In a moment the troops were under arms, and sallying out, dispersed the party with great slaughter, without allowing it to approach the
camp. The Tlascalans convinced by sad experience that their priests
had deluded them, and satisfied that they attempted in vain either to
deceive or to vanquish their enemies, their fierceness abated, and they
began to incline seriously to peace.
* B. Diaz, c. 65.   t Herrera, dec 2. Jib. vi. c. 6. Gomara Cron. c. 47.  4* B. Diaz, c. 6t




A MERIC A.                             215
They were at a loss, however, in what manner to address the strangers,
what idea to form of their character, and whether to consider them as
beings of a gentle or of a malevolent nature. There were circumstances
intheir conduct which seemed to favour each opinion. On the one hand,
as the Spaniards constantly dismissed the prisoners whom they took, no
only without injury, but often with presents of European toys, and renewed
their offers of peace after every victory; this lenity amazed people, who
according to the exterminating system  of war known in America, were
accustomed to sacrifice and devour without mercy all the captives taken in
battle, and disposed them to entertain favourable sentiments of the humanity of their new enemies. But, on the other hand, as Cortes had seized
fifty of their countrymen who brought provisions to his camp, and supposing
them to be spies, had cut off their hands;* this bloody spectacle, added to
the terror occasioned by the fire-arms and horses, filled them with dreadful
impressions of the ferocity of their invaders [106].  This uncertainty was
apparent in the mode of addressing the Spaniards. " If," said they," you
are divinities of a cruel and savage nature, wee present to you five slaves,
that you may drink their blood and eat their flesh. If you are Inild deities,
accept an offering of incense and variegated plumes. If you are men,
here is meat, and bread, and fruit to nourish you.t  The peace, which
both parties now desired with equalf ardour, was soon concluded. The
Tlascalans yielded themselves as vassals to the crown of Castile, and engaged to assist Cortes in all his future operations. He took the republic
under his protection, and promised to defend their persons and possessions
from injury or violence.
This treaty was concluded at a seasonable juncture for the Spaniards.
The fatigue of service among a small body of men, surrounded by such a
multitude of enemies, was incredible. Half the army was on duty every
night, and even they whose turn it was to rest, slept always upon their
arms, that they might be ready to run to their posts on a moment's warning. Many of them were wounded; a good number, and among these
Cortes himself, laboured under the distempers prevalent in hot climates, and
several had died since they set out from Vera Cruz. Notwithstanding the
supplies which they received from the Tlascalans, they were often in want
of provisions, and so destitute: of the necessaries most requisite in dangerous service, that they had no salve to dress their wounds, but what was
composed with the fat of the Indians whom they had slain.: Worn out
with such intolerable toil and hardships, many of the soldiers began to
murmur, and when they reflected on the multitude and boldness of their
enemies, more were ready to despair. It required the utmost exertion of
Cortes's authority and address to check this spirit of despondency in its
progress, and to reanimate his followers with their wonted sense of their
own superiority over the enemies with whom they had to contend.~  The
submission of the Tlascalans, and their own triumphant entry into the
capital city, where they were received with the reverence paid to beings
of a superior order, banished at once from the minds of the Spaniards all
me ory of past sufferings, dispelled every anxious thought with respect to
their" future operations, and fully satisfied them that there was not now
any power in America able to withstand their arms.lI
Cortes remained twenty days in Tlascala, in order to allow his troops
a short interval of repose after such hard service.  During that time
he was employed in transactions and inquiries of great momernt withl
respect to his future schemes.  In his daily conferences with the Tlascalan chiefs, he received information concerning every particular relative to the state of the Mexican empire, or to the qualities of its sovereign,
* Cortes Relat. Iamus. iii. 228. C. Gomara Cron. c. 48.  t B. Diaz, c, 70. Gomara'Cro
c. 47. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. vi, c. 7.  + B. Diaz, c. 62. 65.  6 Cortes Relat. Ramus. iii. 229
B Diaz. c. 69. Gomara Cron. c. 51.   [l Cortes Relat. Ramus. iii. 230, B. Diaz, c. 72.




216                    HISTORY   OF                   [Boolt V.
which could be of use in regulating his conduct, whether he should be
obliged to act as a friend or as an ememy. As he found that the antipathy of
his new allies to the Mexican nation was no less implacable than had
been represented, and perceived what benefit he might derive from the aid
of such powerful confederates, he employed all his powers of insinuation
In order to gain their confidence. Nor was any extraordinary exertion of
these necessary. The Tlascalans, with the levity of mind natural to unpolished men, were, of their own accord, disposed to run from the extreme
of hatred to that of fondness. Every thing in the appearance and conduct
of their guests was to them matter of wonder [107]. They gazed with
admiration at whatever the Spaniards did, and, fancying them to be of
heavenly origin, were eager not only to comply with their demands,
but to anticipate their wishes. They offered, accordingly, to accompany
Cortes in his march to Mexico, with all the forces of the republic, under
the command of their most experienced captains.
But, after bestowing so much pains on cementing this union, all the beneficial fruits of it were on the point of being lost by a new effusion of that
intemperate religious zeal with which Cortes was animated no less than
the other adventurers of -the age. They all considered themselves as instruments employed by Heaven to propagate the Christian faith, and the
less they were qualified, either by their knowledge or morals, for such a
function, they were more eager to discharge it. The profound veneration
of the Tlascalans for the Spaniards having encouraged Cortes to explain
to some of their chiefs the doctrines of the Christian religion, and to insist
that they should abandon their own superstitions, and embrace the faith of
their new friends, they, according to an idea universal among barbarous
nations, readily acknowledged the truth and excellence of what he taught;
but contended, that the Teules of Tlascala were divinities no less than the
God in whom the Spaniards believed; and as that Being was entitled to
the homage of Europeans, so they were bound to revere the same powers
which their ancestors had worshipped. Cortes continued, nevertheless, to
urge his demand in a tone of authority, mingling threats with his arguments,
until the Tlascalans could bear it no longer, and conjured him, never to
mention this again, lest the gods should avenge on their heads the guilt of
having listened to such a proposition. Cortes, astonished and enraged at
their obstinacy, prepared to execute by force what he could not accomplish
by persuasion, and was going to overturn their altars and cast down their
idols with the same violent hand as at Zempoalla, if Father Bartholomew
de Olmedo, chaplain to the expedition, had not checked his inconsiderate
impetuosity. He represented the imprudence of such an attempt in a large
city newly reconciled, and filled with people no less superstitious than
warlike; he declared, that the proceeding at Zempoalla had always
appeared to him precipitate and unjust; that religion was not to be propagated by the sword, or infidels to be converted by violence,; that other
weapons were to be employed in this ministry; patient instruction must
enlighten the understanding, and pious example captivate the heart, before
men could be induced to abandon error, and embrace the truth.? Amidst
scenes where a narrow minded bigotry appears in such close union with
oppression and cruelty, sentiments so liberal and hunane soothe the mind
with unexpected pleasure; and at a time when the rights of conscience
were little understood in the Christian world, and the idea of toleration
unknown, one is astonished to find a Spanish monk of the sixteenth century
among the first advocates against persecution, and in behalf of religious
liberty. The remonstrances of an ecclesiastic, no less respectable for
wisdom than virtue, had their proper weight with Cortes. He left the
Tiascalans in the undisturbed exercise of their own rites, requiring only that
*B. Dmrz, c. 77. D. 54, c. 83. p. 61.




AMERICA.                             217
they should desist from their horrid practice of offering human victims in
sacrifice.
Cortes, as soon as his troops were fit for service, resolved to continue his
march towards Mexico, notwithstanding the earnest dissuasives of the Tlascalans, who represented his destruction as unavoidable if he put himself in
the power of a prince so faithless and cruel as Montezuma. As he was
accompanied by six thousand Tlascalans, he had now the command of
forces which resembled a reoular army. They directed their course
towards Cholula [Oct. 13]; Montezuma, who had at length consented to
admit the Spaniards into his presence, having informed Cortes that he had
given orders for his friendly reception there. Cholula was a considerable
town, and though only five leagues distant from Tlascala, was formerly an
independent state, but had been lately subjected to the Mexican empire.
This was considered by all the people of New Spain as a holy place, the
sanctuary and chief seat of their gods, to which pilgrims resorted from every
province, and a greater number of human victims were offered in its principal temple than even in that of Mexico.*  Montezuma seems to have
invited the Spaniards thither, either from some superstitious hope that the
gods would not suffer this sacred mansion to be defiled, without pouring
down their wrath upon those impious strangers, who ventured to insult their
power in the place of its peculiar residence; or from a belief that he himself might there attempt to cut them off with more certain success, under
the immediate protection of his divinities.
Cortes had been warned by the Tiascalans, before he set out on his march,
to keep a watchful eye over the Cholulans. He himself, though received
into the town with much seeming respect and cordiality, observed several
circumstances in their conduct which excited suspicion. Two of the Tlascalans, who were encamped at some distance from the town, as the Cholulans refused to admit their ancient enemies within its precincts, having
found means to enter in disguise, acquainted Cortes that they observed the
women and children of the principal citizens retiring in great hurry every
sight; and that six children had been sacrificed in the chief temple, a rite
which indicated the execution of some warlike enterprise to be approachng. At the same time, Marina the interpreter received information from
In Indian woman of distinction, whose confidence she had gained, that the
Destruction of her friends was concerted; that a body of Mexican troops
ay concealed near the town; that some of the streets were barricaded,
nd in others, pits or deep trenches were dug, and slightly covered over,
_s traps into which the horses might fall; that stones or missive weapons
were collected on the tops of the temples, with which to overwhelm the
infantry; that the fatal hour was now at hand, and their ruin unavoidable.
Cortes, alarmed at this concurring evidence, secretly arrested three of the
chief priests, and extorted from them a confession, that confirmed the intelligence which he had received. As not a moment was to be lost, he instantly resolved to prevent his enemies, and to inflict on them such dreadful
vengeance as might strike Montezuma and his subjects with terror. For
this purpose, the Spaniards and Zempoallans were drawn up in a large
court, which had been allotted for their quarters near the centre of the town;
the Tlascalans had orders to advance; the magistrates and several of the
chief citizens were sent for, under various pretexts, and seized. On a signal
given, the troops rushed out and fell upon the multitude, destitute of leaders, and so much astonished, that the weapons dropping from their hands,
they stood motionless, and incapable of defence.  While the Spaniards
pressed them in front, the Tlascalans attacked them in the rear. The
streets were filled with bloodshed and death. The temples, which afforded a retreat to the priests and some of the leading men, were set on fire,
*Torquemada Monar. Ind. i. 281, 282. ii. 291. Gomara Cron. c. 61. Herrera, dec. 2. lib ii. c. 2
VOL. I.-28




218                    HISTOk.     Y Oi               [IBoo0  IV
and they perished in the flames. This scene of horror continued two days,
during which, the wretched inhabitants suffered all that the destructive
rage of the Spaniards, or the implacable revenge of their Indian allies,
could inflict. At length the carnage ceased, after the slaughter of six thousand Cholulans, without the loss of a single Spaniard. Cortes then released
the magistrates, and, reproaching them bitterly for their intended treachery,
declared, that as justice was now appeased, he forgave the offence, but
required them to recall the citizens who had fled, and re-establish order in
the town. Such was the ascendant which the Spaniards had acquired over
this superstitious race of men, and so deeply were they impressed with an
opinion of their superior discernment, as well as power, that, in obedience
a this command, the city was in a few days filled again with people, who,
amidst the ruins of their sacred buildings, yielded respectful service to
men whose hands were stained with the blood of their relations and fellowcitizens' [1081.
From Cholula, Cortes advanced directly towards Mexico [Oct. 291, which
was only twenty leagues distant. In every place through which he passed,
he was received as a person possessed of sufficient power to deliver the
empire from the oppression under which it groaned; and the caziques or
governors communicated to him all the grievances which they felt under
the tyrannical government of Montezuma, with that unreserved confidence
which men naturally repose in superior beings. WMhen Cortes first observed
the seeds of discontent in the remote provinces of the empire, hope dawned
upon his mind; but when he now discovered such symptoms of alienation
from their monarch near the seat of government, he concluded that the vital
parts of the constitution were affected, and conceived the most sanguine
expectations of overturning a state whose natural strength was thus divided
and impaired. While those reflections encouraged the general to persist
in his arduous undertaking, the soldiers were no less animated by observations more obvious to their capacity. In descending from the mountains
of Chalco, across which the road lay, the vast plain of Mexico opened
gradually to their view. When they first beheld this prospect, one of the
most striking and beautiful on the face of the earth; when they observed
fertile and cultivated fields stretching further than the eye could reach;
when they saw a lake resembling the sea in extent, encompassed with large
towns, and discovered the capital city rising upon an island in the middle,
adorned with its temples and turrets; the scene so far exceeded their
imagination, that some believed the fanciful descriptions of romance were
realized, and that its enchanted palaces and gilded domes were presented
to their sight; others could hardly persuade themselves that this wonderful
spectacle was any thing more than a dream[109]. As they advanced,
their doubts were removed, but their amazement increased. They were
now fully satisfied that the country was rich beyond any conception which
they had formed of it, and flattered themselves that at length they should
obtain an ample recompense for all their services and sufferings.
Hitherto they had met with no enemy to oppose their progress, though
several circumstances occurred which led them to suspect that some design
was formed to surprise and cut them off. Mlany messengers arrived successively from lVIontezuma, permitting them one day to advance, requiring
them on the next to retire, as his hopes or fears alternately prevailed; and
so wonderful was this infatuation, which seems to be unaccountable on any
supposition but that of a superstitious dread of the Spaniards, as beings ot
a superior nature, that Cortes was almost at the gates of the capital, before
the monarch had determined vwhether to receive him as a friend, or to
oppose him as an enemy. But as no sign of open hostility appeared, the
Spaniards, without regarding the fluctuations of Montezuma's sentiments,
* Cortes Relat. Ramus. iii. 231. B. Diaz, c. 83. Gomara Cron. c. 64. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. vi
t. 1,2




AMERICA.                             219
continued their march along the causeway which led to Mexico through
the lake, with great circumspection and the strictest discipline, though
without seeming to suspect the prince whom they were about to visit.
When they drew near the city, about a thousand persons, who appeared
to be of distinction, came forth to meet them, adorned with plunles and
clad in mantles of fine cotton. Each of these in his order passed by
Cortes, and saluted him according to the mode deemed most respectful
and submissive in their country   They announced the approach of Montezuma himself, and soon after his harbingers came in sight. There appeared first two hundred persons in a uniform dress, with large plumes of feathers, alike in fashion, marching two and two, in deep silence, barefooted,
with tLeir eyes fixed on the ground. These were followed by a company
of higher rank, in their most showy apparel, in the midst of whom was
Montezuma, in a chair or litter richly ornamented with gold, and feathers
of various colours. Four of his principal favourites carried him on their
shoulders, others supported a canopy of curious workmanship over his
head. Before him marched three officers with rods of gold in their hands,
which they lifted up on high at certain intervals, and at that signal all the
people bowed their heads 4nd hid their faces, as unworthy to look on so
great a monarch. When he drew near, Cortes dismounted, advancing towards him with officious haste, and in a respectful posture. At the same
time Montezuma alighted from his chair, and, leaning on the arms of two
of his near relations, approached with a slow and stately pace, his attendants covering the streets with cotton cloths, that he might not touch the
ground. Cortes accosted him with profound reverence, after the European
/ashion. He returned the salutation, according to the mode of his country,
by touching the earth with his hand, and then kissing it. This ceremony,
the customary expression of veneration from inferiors towards those who
were above them in rank, appeared such amazing condescension in a proud
monarch, who scarcely deigned to consider the rest of mankind as of the
same species with himself, that all his subjects firmly believed those persons, before whom he humbled himself in this manner, to be something
more than human. Accordingly, as they marched through the crowd, the
Spaniards frequently, and with much satisfaction, heard themselves denominated Teules, or divinities. Nothing material passed in this first inter.
view. Montezuma conducted Cortes to the quarters which he had prepared for his reception, and immediately took leave of him, with a politeness not unworthy of a court more refined. "You are now," says he,
"with your brothers, in your own house; refresh yourselves after your
fatigue, and be happy until I return."9 The place allotted to the Spaniards
for their lodging, was a house built by the father of Montezuma. It was
surrounded by a stone wall, with towers at proper distances, which served
for defence as well as for ornament, and its apartments and courts were so
large as to accommodate both the Spaniards and their Indian allies. The
hrst care of Cortes was to take precautions for his security, by planting the
artillery so as to command the different avenues which led to it, by appointing a farge division of his troops to be always on guard, and by posting
sentinels at proper stations, with injunctions to observe the same vigilant
discipline as if they were within sight of an enemy's camp.
In the evening, Montezuma returned to visit his guests with the same
pomp as in their first interview, and brought presents of such value, not
only to Cortes and to his officers, but even to the private men, as proved
the liberality of the monarch to be suitable to the opulence of his kingdom.
A long conference ensued, in which Cortes learned what was the opinion
of Montezuma with respect to the Spaniards. It was an established tra* Cortes Relat. Ram iii. 232-235. B. Diaz, c. 83-88. Gomara Cron. c.64, 65. Herrera, dec
2. lib. vii, c. 3, 4, 5.




220                       H t.S'1 O R Y  OF               [1BooK V.
dition, he told him, aonrig the Mexicans, that their ancestors came originally froIn a remote region, and conquered the provinces now subject to his
dominion,; that after they were settled there, the great captain who conducted this colony returned to his own country, promising that at sofie-future
period his descendants should visit them, assume the government, and reform
their constitution and laws; that from what he had heard and seen of
Cortes and his fdllowers, he was convinced that they were the very persons
whose appearance the Mexican traditions and prophecies taught them to
expect; that accordingly he had received them, not as strangers, but as
relations of the same blood and parentage, and desired that they might consider themselves as masters in his dominions, for both himself and his subjects should be ready to comply with their will, and even- to prevent their
wishes. Cortes made a reply in his usual style, with respect to the dignity and power of his sovereign, and his intention of sending him into
that country; artfully endeavouring so to frame his discourse, that it might
coincide as much as possible with the idea which Montezuma had formed
concerning the origin of the Spaniards.  Next morning, Cortes and some
of his principal attendants were admitted to a public audience of the emperor. The three subsequent days were employed in viewing the city;
the appearance of which, so far superior in the order of its buildings and
the number of its inhabitants to any place the Spaniards had beheld in
America, and yet so little resembling the structure of a European city, filled
them with surprise and admiration.
Mexico, or Tenuchtitlan, as it was anciently called by the natives, is
situated in a large plain, evironed by mountains of such height that, though
within the torrid zone, the temperature of its climate is mild and healthful.
All the moisture which descends from  the high grounds, is collected in
several lakes, the two largest of which, of about ninety miles in circuit,
communicate with each other.  The waters of the one are fresh, those of
the other brackish. On the banks of the latter, and on some small islands
adjoirning to them, the' capital of Montezuma's empire was built.  The
access to the city was by artificial causeways or streets formed of stones
and earth, about thirty feet in breadth. As the waters of the lake during
the rainy season overflowed the flat country, these causeways were of
considerable length.  That of Tacuba, on the west, extended a mile and
a half; that of l epeaca, on the north-west, three miles; that of Cuoyacan,
towards the south, six miles.  On the east* there was no causeway, and
the city could be approached only by canoes.t  In each of these causeways were openings at proper intervals, through which the waters flowed,
and over these beams of timber were laid, which being covered with earth,
the causeway or street had every where a uniform appearance. As the
approaches to the city were singular, its construction was remarkable.
Not only the temples of their gods, but the houses belonging to the monarch,
and to persons of distinction, were of such dimensions, that, in comparison
with any other buildings which hitherto had been discovered in America,
they might be termed magnificent. The habitations of the common people were mean, resembling the huts of other Indians. But they were all
placed in a regular manner, on the banks of the canals which passed through
the city, in some of its districts, or on the sides of the streets which intersected it in other quarters. In several places were large openings or squares,
one of which, allotted for the great market, is said to have been so spacious,
that forty or fifty thousand persons carried on traffic there. In this city,
* I am indebted to M. Clavigero for correcting an error of importance in my description of Mexico.
From the east, where Tezeuco was situated, there was no causeway, as I have observed, and yet
by some inattention on my part, or on that )f the printer, in all the former editions.one of the
causeways was said to lead to Tezeuco. M. Clavigero's measurement of the length of these
causeways liffers somewhat from that which I have adopted from F. Torribio  Clavig. ii. p. 72
t F. Torribio MS.




AMERICA.                             221
the pride of the New World, and the noblest monument of the industry
and art of man, while unacquainted with the use of iron, and destitute of
aid from any domestic animal, the Spaniards, who are most moderate in
their computations, reckon that there were at least sixty thousand inhabitants.*
But how much soever the novelty of those objects might amuse or
astonish the Spaniards, they- felt the utmost solicitude with respect to
their own situation. From a concurrence of circumstances, no less tunexpected than favourable to their progress, they had been allowed to
penetrate into the heart of a powerful kingdom, and were now lodged in
its capital without having once met with open opposition from its monarch.
The Tlascalans, however, had earnestly dissuaded them from.placing such
confidence in Montezuma, as to enter a city of such peculiar situation as
Mexico, where that prince would have them at mercy, shut up as it were
in a snare, from which it was impossible to escape. They assured them
that the Mexican priests had, in the name of the gods, counselled -their
sovereign to admit the Spaniards into the capital, that he might cut them off
there at one blow with perfect security.' They now perceived too plainly,
that the apprehensions of their allies were not destitute of foundation; that,
by breaking the bridges placed at certain intervals on the causeways, or by
destroying part of the causeways themselves, their retreat would be
rendered impracticable, and they must remain cooped up in the centre of
a hostile city, surrounded by multitudes sufficient to overwhelm them, and
without a possibility of receiving aid from their allies. Montezuma had,
indeed, received them with distinguished respect. But ought they to
reckon upon this as real, or to consider it as feigned? Even if it were
sincere, could they promise on its continuance? Their safety depended
upon the will of a monarch in whose attachment they had no reason to
confide.; and an order flowing from his caprice, or a word uttered by him
in passion, might decide irrevocably concerning their fate.:
These reflections, so obvious as to occur to the meanest soldier, did not
escape the vigilant sagacity'of their general. Before he set out from
Cholula, Cortes had received advice from Villa Rica,~ that Qualpopoca,
one of the Mexican generals on the frontiers, having assembled an army
in order to attack sbme of the people whom the Spaniards had encouraged
to throw off the Mexican yoke, Escalante had marched out with part of
the garrison to supporthis allies; that an engagement had ensued, in which,
though the Spaniards were victorious, Escalante, with seven of his men,
had been mortally wounded, his horse killed, and one Spaniard had been
surrounded by the enemy and taken alive; that the head of this unfortu
nate captive, after being carried in triumph to different cities, in order to
convince the people that their invaders were not immortal, had been sent
to Mexico.ll Cortes, though alarmed with this intelligence, as an indication of Montezuma's hostile intentions, had continued his march. But as
soon as he entered Mexico he became sensible, that, from an excess of
confidence in the superior valour and discipline of his' troops, as well as
fiom the disadvantage of having nothing to guide him  in an unknown
country, but the defective intelligence which he had received from people
with whom his mode of communication was very imperfect, he had pushed
forward into a situation where it was difficult to continue, and from which
it was dangerous to retire. Disgrace, and perhaps ruin, was the certain
consequence of attempting the latter. The success of his enterprise
depended upon supporting the high opinion which the people of New
Spain had formed with respect to the irresistible power of his arms. Upon
* Cortes Relat. Ram. iii. 239. D. Relat. della gran Citta de Mexico, par un Gentelhuomo del
Cortese.    - i. ibid, 304.  E.  Herrera,,dec. 2. lib. vii. c. 14, &c.    t B. Diaz, c. 85, 86.: Ibid,
a, 94.  C os,  s   elat. Ramiii. i. 235. C.  II B. Diaz, c. 93, 94.  Herrera, dec. 2. lib. viii. c. 1.




222                     HISTORY OF                    [BOOK V.
the first symptom of timidity on his part, their veneration would cease,
and Montezuma, whom fear alone restrained at present, would let loose
upon him the whole force of his empire. At the same time, he knew that
the countenance of his own sovereign was to be obtained only by a series
of victories, and that nothing but the merit of extraordinary success could
screen his conduct from the censure of irregularity. From all these considerations, it was necessary to maintain his station, and to extricate himself
out of the difficulties in which one bold step had involved him, by venturing upon another still bolder. The situation was trying, but his mind
was equal to it; and after revolving the matter with deep attention, he
fixed upon a plan no less extraordinary than daring. He determined to
seize Mlontezuma in his palace, and to carry him as a prisoner to the
Spanish quarters. From the superstitious veneration of the Mexicans for
the person of their monarch, as well as their implicit submission to his
will, he hoped, by having Montezuma in his power, to acquire the
supreme direction of their affairs; or, at least, with such a sacred pledge
in his hands, he. made no doubt of being secure from any effort of their
violence.
This he immediately proposed to his officers. The timid startled at a
measure so audacious, and raised objections. The more intelligent and
resolute, conscious that it was the only iresource in which there appeared
any prospect of safety, warmly approved of it, and brought over their
companions so cordially to the same opinion, that it was agreed instantly
to make the attempt. At his usiual hour- of visiting Montezuma, Cortes
went to the palace, accompanied by Alvarado, Sandoval, Lugo, Velasquez
de Leon, and Davila, five of his principal officers, and as many trusty
soldiers. Thirty ohosen men followed, not in regular order, but sauntering
at some distance, as if they had no object but curiosity; small parties
were posted at proper intervals, in all the streets leading from the Spanish
quarters to the court; and the remainder of his troops, with the rlascalan
allies, were under arms ready to sally out on the first alarm. Cortes and
his attendants were admitted without suspicion; the Mexicans retiring, as
usual, out of respect. He addressed the monarch in a tone very different
from that which he had employed in former conferences, reproaching him
bitterly as the author of the violent assault made upon the Spaniards by
one of his officers, and demanded public reparation for the loss which they
had sustained by the death of some of their campanions, as well as for
the insult offered to the great prince whose servants they were. Montezuma, confounded at this unexpected accusation, and changing colour,
either from consciousness of guilt, or from feeling the indignity with which
he was treated, asserted his own innocence with- great earnestness, and, as
a proof of it, gave orders instantly to bring Qualpopoca and his accomplices
prisoners to Mexico. Cortes replied with seeming complaisance, that a
declaration so respectable left no doubt remaining in his own mind, but
that something more was requisite to satisfy his followers, who would
never be convinced that Montezuma did not harbour hostile intentions
against them, unless, as an evidence of his confidence and attachment, he
removed from his own palace, and took up his residence in the Spanish
quarters, where he should be served and honoured as became a great
monarch. The first mention of so strange a proposal bereaved Montezuma
of speech, and almost of motion. At length indignation gave him utterance, and he haughtily answered, "That persons of t is rank were not
accustomed voluntarily to give up themselves as prisoners; and were he
mean enough to do so, his subjects would not permit such an affront to be
offered to their sovereign." Cortes, unwilling to-employ force, endeavoured
alternately to soothe and to intimidate him. The altercation became
warm; and having continued above three hours, Velasquez de Leon, an
impetuous and gallant young man, exclaimed with impatience, "Why




AMERICA.                            223
waste more time in vain? Let us either seize him instantly, or stab him
to the heart." The threatening voice and fierce gestures with which these
words were uttered, struck Montezuma. The Spaniards, he was sensible,
nad now proceeded so far, as left him no hope that they would recede.
His own danger was imminent, the necessity unavoidable. He saw both,
and, abandoning himself to his fate, complied with their request.
His officers were called. He communicated to themn his resolution
Though astonished and afflicted, they presumed not to question the will of
their master, but carried him in silent pomp, all bathed in tears, to the
Spanish quarters. When it was known that the strangers were conveying
away the Emperor, the people broke out into the wildest transports of
grief and rage, threatening the Spaniards with immediate destruction, as
the punishment justly due to their impious audacity. But as soon as Montezuma appeared, with a seeming gayety of countenance, and waved his
hand, the tumult was hushed; and upon his declaring it to be of his own
choice that he went to reside for some time aimong his new friends, the multitude, taught to revere every intimation of their sovereign's pleasure, quietly
dispersed.*
Thus was a powerful prince seized by a few strangers in the midst of
hbs capital, at noonday, and carried off as a prisoner, without opposition or
bloodshed. History contains nothing parallel to this event, either with
respect to the temerity of the attempt, or the success of the execution;
and were not all the circumstances of this extraordinary transaction authenticated by the most unquestionable evidence, they would appear so wild
and extravagant as to go far beyond the bounds of that probability which
must be preserved even in fictitious narrations.
Montezuma was received in the Spanish quarters with all the ceremonious respect which Cortes had promised. He was attended by his own
domestics, and served with his usual state. His principal officers had free
access to him, and he carried on every function of government as if he had
been at perfect liberty. The Spaniards, however, watched him with the
scrupulous, vigilance which was natural in guarding such an important
prize [110], endeavouring at the same time to sooth and reconcile him to
his situation by every external demonstration of regard and attachment.
But from captive princes, the hour of humiliation and suffering is never far
distant. Qualpopoca, his son, and five of the principal officers who served
under him, were brought prisoners to the capital [Dec. 4], in consequence
of the orders which Montezuma had issued. The Emperor gave them up
to Cortes, that he might inquire into the nature of their crime, and determine their punishment. They were formally tried by a Spanish court
martial; and though they had acted no other part than what beca'ne loyal
subjects and brave men, in obeying the orders of their lawful sovereign,
and in opposing the invaders of their country, they were condemned to be
burnt alive. The execution of such atrocious deeds is seldom long suspended. The unhappy victims were instantly led forth. The pile on
which they were laid was composed of the weapons collected in the royal
magazine for the public defence. An innumerable multitude of Mexicans
beheld, in silent astonishment, the double insult offered to the majesty ot
their empire, an officer of distinction committed to the flames by the authority of strangers for having done what he owed in duty to his natural sovereign; and the arms provided by the foresight of their ancestors for
avenging public wrongs, consumed before their eyes.
But these were not the most shocking indignities which the Mexicans
nad to bear. The Spaniards, convinced that Qualpopoca would not have
ventured to attack Escalanfe without orders from his master, were not
* Diaz, c. 95. Gomara Cron. c. 83. Cortes Relat. Ram. iii. p 235,236. Herrera, dec. 2. lb.
ViiL C. 2, 3.




224                     H.ISTOrtY  OF                 [Boox V
satisfied with inflicting vengeance on the instrument employed in committing that crime while the author of it escaped with impunity. Just before
Qualpopoca was led out to suffer, Cortes entered the apartment of Montezuma, followed by some of his officers, and a soldier, carrying a pair of
fetters; and approaching the monarch with a stern countenance told him,
that as, the persons who were now to undergo the punishment which they
merited, had charged him as the cause of the outrage committed, it-was
necessary that he likewise should make atonement for that guilt; then
turning away abruptly, without waiting for a reply, commanded thb soldier to clap the fetters on his legs. The orders were instantly executed.
The disconsolate monarch, trained' up with an idea that his person was
sacred and inviolable, and considering this profanation of it as the prelude
of immediate death, broke out into loud lamentations and complaints. His
attendants, speechless with horror,.fell at his feet, bathing them with their
tears; and, bearing up the fetters in their hands, endeavoured with officious
tenderness to lighten their pressure. Nor did their grief and despondency
abate, until Cortes returned from the execution, and with a cheerful countenance ordered the fetters to be taken off. As Montezuma's spirits had
sunk with unmanly dejection, they now rose into indecent. joy; and with
an unbecoming transition, he passed at once from the anguish of despair to
transports of gratitude and expressions of fondness towards his deliverer.
In those transactions, as represented by the Spanish historians, wesearch
in vain for the qualities which distinguish other parts of Cortes's conduct.
To usurp a jurisdiction which could not belong to a stranger, who assumed
no higher character than that of an ambassador from a foreign prince, and,
under colour of it, to inflict a capital punishment on men whose conduct
entitled them to esteem, appears an act of barbarous cruelty. To put the
monarch of a great kingdom in irons, and, after such ignominious treatment, suddenly to release him, seems to be a display of power no less inconsiderate than wanton. According to the common relation. no account
can be given either of the one action or the other, but that Cortes, intoxicated with success, and presuming on the ascendant which he had acquired
over the minds of the Mexicans, thought nothing too bold for him to undertake, or too dangerous to execute. But, in one view, these proceedings,
however repugnant to justice and humanity, may have flowed from that
artful policy which regulated every part of Cortes's behaviour towards the
Mexicans. They had conceived the Spaniards to be an order of beings
superior to men. It was of the utmost consequence to cherish this illusion,
and to keep up the veneration which it inspired. Cortes- wished that
shedding the blood of a Spaniard should be deemed the most heinous of
all crimes; and nothing appeared better calculated to establish this
opinion than to condemn the first Mexicans who had ventured to commit
it to a cruel death, and to oblige their monarch himself to submit. to: a mortifying indignity as an expiation for being accessary to a deed so atrocious [ii1]
1520.] The rigour with which Cortes punished the unhappy persons
who first presumed to lay violent hands upon his followers, seems accordingly to have made all the impression that he desired. The spirit of Montezuma was not only overawed but subdued. During six months that
Cortes remained in Mexico, the monarch continued in the Spanish quarters
with an appearance of as entire satisfaction and tranquillity as if heh bad
resided there not from constraint, but through choice. His ministers and
officers attended him -as usual. He took cognisance of all affairs; every
order was issued in his name. The external aspect of government appearing the same, and all its ancient forms being scrupulously observed, the
people were so little sensible of any change, that they obeyed the mandates of their monarch with the same submissive reverence as ever. Such
was the dread which both Montezuma and his subjects had of the Span



AMERICA.                           225
iards, or such the veneration in which they held them, that no attempt was
made to deliver their sovereign from confinement; and though Cortes, relying on this ascendant which he had acquired over their minds, permitted
him not only to visit his temples,. but to make hunting excursions beyond
the lake, a guard of a few Spaniards carried with it such a terror as to
intimidate the multitude, and secure the captive monarch.*
Thus, by the fortunate temerity of Cortes in seizing Montezuma, the
Spaniards at once secured to themselves more extensive authority in the
Mexican Empire than it was possible to have acquired in a long course of
time by open force; and they exercised more absolute sway in the name
of another, than they could have done in their own. The arts of polished
nations, in subjecting such as are less improved, have been nearly the same
in every period. The system of screening a foreign usurpation, under the
sanction of authority derived from the natural rulers of a country, the device
of employing the magistrates and forms already established as instruments
to introduce a new dominion, of which we are apt to boast as sublime refinements in policy peculiar to the present age, were inventions of a more early
period, and had been tried with success in the West long before they were
practised in the East.
Cortes availed himself to the utmost of the powers which he possessed
by being able to act in the name of Montezuma. He sent some Spaniards,
whom he judged best qualified for such commissions, into different parts of
the empire, accompanied by persons of distinction, whom Montezuma appointed to attend them, both as guides and protectors. They visited most
of the provinces, viewed their soil and productions, surveyed with particular
care the districts which yielded gold or silver, pitched upon several places
as proper stations for future colonies, and endeavoured to prepare the minds
of the people for submitting to the Spanish yoke. R.hile they were thus
employed, Cortes, in the name and by the authority of Montezuma, degraded some of the principal officers in the empire, whose abilities or independent spirit excited his jealousy, and substituted in their place persons
less capable or more obsequious.
One thing still was wanting to complete his security. He wished to
have such command of the lake as might ensure a retreat if, either from
levity or disgust, the Mexicans should take arms against him, and break
down the bridges or causeways. This, too, his own address, and the
facility of Montezuma, enabled him to accomplish. Having frequently
entertained his prisoner with pompous accounts of the European marine
and art of navigation, he awakened his curiosity to see those moving
palaces which made their way through the water without oars. Under
pretext of gratifying this desire, Cortes persuaded Montezuma to appoint
saome of his subjects to fetch part of the naval stores which the Spaniards
had deposited at Vera Cruz to Mexico, and to employ others in cutting
down and preparing timber. With their assistance, the Spanish carpenters
soon completed two brigantines, which afforded a frivolous amusement to
the monarch, and were considered by Cortes as a certain resource if he
should be obliged to retire.
Encouraged by so many instances of the monarch's tame submission to
his will, Cortes ventured to put it to a proof still more trying. He urged
Montezuma to acknowledge himself a vassal of the king of Castile, to
hold his crown of him as superior, and to subject his dominions to the
payment of an annual tribute. With this requisition, the last and most
humbling that can be made to one possessed of sovereign authority, Mon
tezuma was so obsequious as to comply. He called together the chief
men of his empire, and in a solemn harangue, reminding them of the traditions and prophecies which led them to expect the arrival of a people
* Cortes Relat. p. 236. E. B. Diaz, c. 97, 98, 99.
Vo 1. —29




:226                    HISTORY  OF                     [Boo V.
sprung from the same stock with themselves, in order to take possession
of the supreme power, he declared his belief that the Spaniards were this
promised race; that therefore he recognised the right of their monarch to
govern the Mexican empire; that he would lay his crown at his feet, and
obey him as a tributary. While uttering these words, Montezumila discovered how deeply he was affected in making such a sacrifice.  Tears
and groans frequently interrupted his discourse. Overawed and broken
as his spirit was, it still retained such a sense of dignity as to feel that
pang which pierces the heart of princes when constrained to resign independent power. The first mention of such a resolution struck the assembly
dumb with astonishment. This was followed by a sudden murmur of
sorrow, mingled with indignation, which indicated some violent irruption
of rage to be near at hand. This Cortes foresaw, and seasonably interposed to prevent it by declaring that his master had no intention to deprive
Montezuma of the royal dignity, or to make any innovation upon the constitution and laws of the Mexican empire. This assurance, added to their
dread of the Spanish power and to the authority of their morlarch's example,
extorted a reluctant consent from the assembly [112]. The act of submission and homage was executed with all the formalities which the Spaniards were pleased to prescribe.*
Montezuma, at the desire of Cortes, accompanied this profession of
fealty and homage with a magnificent present to his new sovereign; and
after his example his subjects brought in very liberal contributions  The
Spaniards now collected all the treasures which had been either voluntarily
bestowed upon them at different times by Montezuma, or had been extorted from his people under various pretexts; and having melted the
gold and silver, the value of these, without including jewels and ornaments
of various kinds, which were preserved on account of their curious workmanship, amounted to six hundred thousand pesos. The soldiers were
Impatient to have it divided, and Cortes complied with their desire. A
fifth of the whole was first set apart as the tax due to the king. Another
fifth was allotted to Cortes as commander in chief. The sums advanced
by Velasquez, by Cortes, and by some of the officers, towards defraying
the expense of fitting out the armament, were then deducted. The remainder was divided among the army, including the garrison of Vera
Cruz, in proportion to their different ranks. After so many defalcations,
the share of a private man did not exceed a hundred pesos. This sum
fell so far below their sanguine expectations, that some soldiers rejected it
with scorn, and others murmured so loudly at this cruel disappointment of
their hopes, that it required all the address of Cortes, and no small exertion of his liberality, to appease them. The complaints of the army
were not altogether destitute of foundation. As the crown had contributed
nothing towards the equipment or success of the armament, it was not
without regret that the soldiers beheld it sweep away so great a proportion'of the treasure purchased by their blood and toil. What fell to the share
of the general appeared, according to the ideas of wealth in the sixteenth
century, an enormous sum. Some of Cortes's favourites had secretly
appropriated to their own use several ornaments of gold, which neither
paid the royal fifth, nor were brought into account as part of the common
stock. It was, however, so manifestly the interest of Cortes at this period
to make a large remittance to the king, that it is highly probable those
concealments were not of great consequence.
The total sum amassed by the Spaniards bIears no proportion to the
ideas which might be formed, either by reflecting on the descriptions given
by historians of the ancient splendour of Mexico, or by considering the
productions of its mines in modern times. But among the ancient MexiCortes Relat. 238. D. B. Diaz. c 101 Gomara Cron. c. 92. IHerrera, dec. 2, lib. x. c. 4




AMERICA.                               227
cans, gold and silver were not the standards by which the worth of other
commodities was estimated; and destitute of the artificial value derived
from this circumstance, were no further in request than as they furnished
materials for ornaments and trinkets. These were either consecrated to
the gods in their temples, or were worn as marks of distinction by their
princes and some of their most eminent chiefs. As the consumption of the
precious metals was inconsiderable, the demand for them was not such as
o put either the Ingenuity or industry of the Mexicans on the stretch in
order to augment their store. They were altogether unacquainted with
the art of working the rich mines with which their country abounded.
What gold they had was gathered in the beds of rivers, native, and ripened
into a pure metallic state.   The utmost effort of their labour in search of
it was to wash the earth carried down by torrents from the mountains, and
to pick out the grains of gold which subsided; and even this simple operation, according to the report of the persons whom Cortes appointed to
survey the provinces where there was a prospect of finding mines, they
performed very unskilfully.t From all those causes, the whole mass of
gold in possession of the Mexicans was not great. As silver is rarely found
pure, and the Mexican art was too rude to conduct the process for refining
it in a proper manner, the quantity of this metal was still less considerable.
Thus, though the Spaniards had exerted all the power which they possessed in Mexico, and often with indecent rapacity, in order to gratify their
predominant passion, and though Montezuma had fondly exhausted his
treasures, in hopes of satiating -their thirst for gold, the product of both,
which probably included a great part of the bullion in the empire, did
not rise in value above what has been mentioned [113].
But however pliant Montezuma might be in other matters, with respect
to one point he was inflexible. Though Cortes often urged him, with the
importunate zeal of a missionary, to renounce his false gods, and to embrace the Christian faith, he always rejected the proposition with horror.
Superstition, among the Mexicans, was formed into such a regular and
complete system, that its institutions naturally took fast hold of the mind;
and while the rude tribes in other parts of America were easily induced
to relinquish a few notions and rites, so loose and arbitrary as hardly to
merit the name of a public religion, the Mexicans adhered tenaciously to
their mode of worship, which, however barbarous, was accompanied with
such order and solemnity as to render it an object of the highest veneration. Cortes, finding all his attempts ineffectual to shake the constancy of
Montezuma, was so much enraged at his obstinacy, that in a transport of
zeal he led out his soldiers to throw down the idols in the grand temple
by force. But the priests taking arms in defence of their altars, and the
people crowding with great ardour to support them, Cortes's prudence
overruled his zeal, and induced him to desist from his rash attempt, after
dislodging the idols from one of the shrines, and placing in their stead an
image of the Virgin Mary [114].
From that moment the Mexicans, who had permitted the imprisonment
of their sovereign, and suffered the exactions of strangers without a
struggle, began to meditate how they might expel or destroy the Spaniards,
and thought themselves called upon to avenge their insulted deities. The
priests and leading men held frequent consultations with Montezumrra for
this purpose. But as it might prove fatal to the captive monarch to
attempt either the one or the other by violence, he was willing to try more
gentle means. Having called Cortes into his presence, he observed, that
now, as all the purposes of his embassy were fully accomplished, the gods
had declared their will, and the people signified their desire, that he and
his followers should instantly depart out of the empire. With this he re-, Cortes Relat. p. 2,S6. F. B Diaz, c. 102, 103. Gomara Cron c. 90.  t B. Diaz, c. 103.
[ lierrera, dec. 2. lib. ix. c. 4.




228                    HISTORY  OF                     [BooK V.
quired them to comply, or unavoidable destruction would fall suddenly on
their heads. The tenour of this unexpected requisition, as well as the
determined tone in which it was uttered, left Cortes no room to doubt, that
it was the result of some deep scheme concerted between Montezuma and
his subjects. He quickly perceived that he might derive more advantage
from a seeming compliance with the monarch's inclinations, than from an
ill-timed attempt to change or to oppose it; and replied, with great composure, that he had already begun to prepare for returning to his own
country; but as he had destroyed the vessels in which he arrived, some
time was requisite for building other ships. This appeared reasonable.
A number of Mexicans were sent to Vera Cruz to cut down timber, and
some Spanish carpenters were appointed to superintend the work. Cortes
flattered himself that during this interval he might either find means to
avert the threatened danger, or receive such reinforcements as would
enable him to despise it.
Almost nine months were elapsed since Portocarrero and Montejo had
sailed with his despatches to Spain; and he daily expected their return
with a confirmation of his authority from the King. Without this, his con
dition was insecure and precarious; and after all the great things which
he had done; it might be his doom to bear the name and suffer the plnishment of a traitor. Rapid and extensive as his progress had been, he could
not hope to complete the reduction of a great empire with so small a body
of men, which by this time diseases of various kinds considerably thinned;
nor could he apply for recruits to the Spanish settlements in the islands,
until he received the royal approbation of his proceedings.
While he remained in this cruel situation, anxious about what was past,
uncertain with respect to the future, and, by the late declaration of Montezuma, oppressed with a new addition of cares, a Mexican courier arrived
with an account of some ships having appeared on the coast. Cortes, with
fond credulity, imagining that his messengers were returned from Spain, and
that the completion of al I his wishes and hopes was at hand, imparted the
glad tidings to his companions, who received them with transports of mutual
gratulation. Their joy was not of long continuance. A courier from
Sandoval, whom Cortes had appointed to succeed Escalante in command
at Vera Cruz, brought certain information that the armament was fitted
out by Velasquez, governor of Cuba, and, instead of bringing the aid
which they expected, threatened them with immediate destruction.
The motives which prompted Velasquez to this violent measure are
obvious. From the circumstances of Cortes' departure, it was impossible
not to suspect his intention of throwing off all dependence upon him.
His neglecting to transmit any account of his. operations to Cuba,
strengthened this suspicion, which was at last confirmed beyond doubt by
the indiscretion of the officers whom Cortes sent to Spain. They, from
some motive which is not clearly explained by the contemporary historians,
touched at the island of Cuba, contrary to the peremptory orders of their
general.* By this means Velasquez not only learned that Cortes and his
followers, after formally renouncing all connection with him, had established an independent colony in New Spain, and were soliciting the King
to confirm their proceedings by his authority; but he obtained particular
information concerning the opulence of the country, the valuable presents
which Cortes had received, and the inviting prospects of success that
opened to his view. Every passion which can agitate an ambitious mind;
shame, at having been so grossly overreached; indignation, at being
betrayed by the man whom he had selected as the object of his favour
and confidence; grief, for having wasted his fortune to aggrandize an
enemy; and despair of recovering so fair an opportunity of establishing
* B. Diaz, c. 54, 55. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 14 Gomara Cron. c. 96.




AMERICA.                            229
his fame and extending his power, now raged in the bosom of Velasquez.
All these, with united force, excited him to make an extraordinary effort
in order to be avenged on the author of his wrongs, and to wrest froIn him
his usurped authority and conquests. Nor did he want the appearance of
a good title tojustify such an attempt. The agent whom he sent to Spain
with an account of Grijalva's voyage, had met with a most favourable
reception; and from the specimens which he produced, such high expectations were formed concerning the opulence of New Spain, that Velasquez
was authorized to prosecute the discovery of the country, and appointed
governor of it during life, with more extensive power and privileges than
had been granted to any adventurer from the time of Columbus.?  Elated
by this distinguishing mark of favour, and warranted to consider Cortes
not only as intruding upon his jurisdiction, but as disobedient to the royal
mandate, he determined to vindicate his own rights, and the honour of
his sovereign by force of arms [115]. His ardour in carrying on his preparations was such as might have been expected from the violence of the
passions with which he w as animated; and in a short time an armament was
completed, consisting of eighteen ships which had on board fourscore
horsemen, eight hundred foot soldiers, of which eighty were musketeers,
and a hundred and twenty cross-bow men, together with a train of twelve
pieces of cannon. As Velasquez's experience of the fatal consequence of
committing: to another what he ought to have executed himself, had not
rendered him more enterprising, he vested the command of this formidable' body, which, in the infancy of the Spanish power in America, merits
the appellation of an army, in Pamphilo de Narvaez, with instructions to
seize Cortes and his principal officers, to send them prisoners to him, and
then to complete the discovery and conquest of the country in his name.
After a prosperous voyage, Narvaez landed his men without opposition
near St. Juan de Ulua [April]. Three soldiers, whom Cortes had sent
to search for mines in that district, immediately joined him. By this
accident he not only received information concerning the progress and
situation of Cortes, but, as these soldiers had made some progress in the
knowledge of the Mexican language, he acquired interpreters, by whose
means he was enabled to hold some intercourse with the people of the
country. But, according to the low cunning of deserters, they framed their
intelligence with more attention to what they thought would be agreeable
than to what they knew to be true; and represented the situation of Cortes
to be so desperate, and the disaffection of his followers td be so general,
as increased the natural confidence and presumption of Narvaez. His
first operation, however, might have taught him not to rely on their partial
accounts. Having sent to summon the governor of Vera Cruz to surrender, Guevara, a priest whom he employed in that service, made the
requisition with such insolence, that Sandoval, an officer of high spirit,
and zealously attached to Cortes, instead of complying with his demands,
seized himr and his attendants, and sent them in chains to Mexico.
Cortes received them not like enemies, but as friends, and, condemning
the severity cf Sandoval, set them immediately at liberty. By this well
timed clemency, seconded by caresses and presents, he gained their confidence, and drew "fromn them such particulars concerning the force and
intentions of Narvaez, as gave him a view of the impending danger in its
full extent. He had not to contend now with half naked Indians, no match
for him in war, and still more inferior in the arts of policy, but to take the
field against an army in courage and martial discipline equal to his own,
in number far superior, acting under the sanction of royal authority, and
commanded by an officer of known bravery. He was informed that
Narvaez, more solicitous to gratify the resentment of Velasquez than' Herrera, dec    BE li. iii. c. 11.




230                    HISTORY  OF                     LBooK V.
attentive to the honour or interest of his country, had begun his intercourse
with the natives, by representing him and his followers as fugitives and
outlaws, guilty of rebellion against their ownIsovereign, and of injustice in
invading the Mexican empire; and had declared that his chief object in
visiting the country was to punish the Spaniards who had committed these
crimes, and to rescue the Mexicans from oppression. He soon perceived
that the same unfavourable representations of his character and actions had
been conveyed to Montezuma, and that Narvaez had found means to assure
him, that as the conduct of those who kept him under restraint was highly
displeasing to the King his master, he had it in charge not only to rescue
an injured monarch from confinement, but to reinstate him in the possession
of his ancient power and independence. Animated with this prospect of
being set free from subjection to strangers, the Mexicans in several provinces
began openly to revolt from Cortes, and to regard Narvaez as a deliverer
no less able than willing to save them. Montezuma himself kept up a
secret intercourse with the new commander, and seemed to court him as
a person superior in power and dignity to those Spaniards whom he had
hitherto revered as the first of men [116].
Such were the various aspects of danger and difficulty which presented
themselves to the view of Cortes. No situation can be conceived more
trying to the capacity and firmness of a general, or where the choice of the
plan which ought to be adopted was more difficult. If he should wait the
approach of Narvaez in Mexico, destruction seemed to be unavoidable;
for, while the Spaniards pressed him from without, the inhabitants, whose
turbulent spirit he could hardly restrain with all his authority and attention,
would eagerly lay hold on such a favourable opportunity of avenging all
their wrongs. If he should abandon the capital, set the captive monarch
at liberty, and march out to meet the enemy, he must at once forego the
fruits of all his toils and victories, and relinquish advantages which could
not be recovered without extraordinary efforts and infinite danger. If,
instead of employing force, he should have recourse to conciliating
measures, and attempt an accommodation with Narvaez; the natural
haughtiness of that officer, augmented by consciousness of his present
superiority, forbade him to cherish any sanguine hope of success. After
revolving every scheme with deep attention, Cortes fixed upon that which
in execution was most hazardous, but, if successful, would prove most
beneficial to himself and to his country; and with the decisive intrepidity
suited to desperate situations, determined to make one bold effort for victory
under every disadvantage, rather than sacrifice his own conquests and the
Spanish interests in Mexico.
But though he foresaw that the contest must be terminated finally by
arms, it would have been not only indecent but criminal to have marched
tgainst his countrymen, without attempting to adjust matters by an amicable
negotiation. In this service he employed Olmedo, his chaplain, to whose
character the function was well suited, and who possessed, besides, such
prudence and address as qualified him to carry on the secret intrijoues in'which Cortes placed his chief confidence. N-arvaez rejected with scorn
every scheme of accommodation that Olmedo proposed, and was with
difficulty restrained from laying violent hands on him and his attendants.
lie met, however, with a more favourable reception among the followers of
Narvaez, to many of whom he delivered letters, either from Cortes or his
officers, their ancient friends and companions. Cortes artfully accompanied
these with presents of rings, chains of gold, and other trinkets of value,
which inspired those needy adventurers with high ideas of the wealth
that he had acquired, and with envy of their good fortune who were
engaged in his service. Some, from hopes of becoming sharers in those
rich spoils, declared for an immediate accommodation with Cortes. Others,
from public spirit, lab' ured to prevent a civil war, which, whatever party




AMERI(-A.                           S1
should prevail, must shake, and perhaps subvert the Spanish power in a
country where it was so imperfectly established. Narvaez disregarded'
both, and by a public proclamation denounced Cortes and his adherents
rebels and enemies to their country. Cortes, it is probable, was not much
surprised at the untractable arrogance of Narvaez; and after having given
such a proof of his own pacific disposition as might justify his recourse to
other -means, he determined to advance towards an enemy whom  he had
laboured in vain to appease.
He left a hundred and fifty men in the, capital [May], under the com
mand of Pedro de Alvarado, an officer of distinguished courage, for whom
the Mexicans had conceived a singular degree of respect. Tro the custody
of this slender garrison he committed a great city, with all the wealth he
had amassed, and, what was of still greater importance, the person of-the
imprisoned monarch. His utmost art was employed in concealing from
Montezuma the real cause of his march. He laboured to persuade him, that
the strangers who had lately arrived were his friends and fellow-subjects;
and that, after a short interview with them, they would depart together, and
return to their own country. The captive prince, unable to comprehend.he designs of the Spaniard, or to reconcile what he now heard with the
declarations of Narvaez9 and afraid to discover any symptom of suspicion or
distrust of Cortes, promised to remain quietly in the Spanish quarters, and to
cultivate the same friendship with Alvarado which he had uniformly maintained with him   Cortes, with seeming confidence in this promise, but
relying principally upon the injunctions which he had given Alvarado to
guard his prisoner with the most scrupulous vigilance, set out from Mexico.
His strength, even after it was reinforced by the junction of Sandoval and
the garrison of Vera Cruz, did not exceed two hundred and fifty men. As
he hoped for success chiefly from the rapidity of his motions, his troops
were not encumbered either with baggage or artillery. But as he dreaded
extremely the impression which the enemy might make with their cavalry,
he had provided against this danger with the foresight and sagacity which
distinguish a great commander. Having observed that the Indians in the
province of Chinantla used spears of extraordinary length and force, he
armed his soldiers with these, and accustomed them to that deep and compact arrangement which the use of' this formidable weapon, the best perhaps that was ever invented for defence, enabled them to assume.
With this small but firm battalion, Cortes advanced towards Zempoalla,
of which Narvaez had taken possession. During his march, he made
repeated attempts towards some accommodation with his opponent. But
Narvaez requiring that Cortes and his followers should instantly recognise
his title to be governor of New Spain, in virtue of the powers which he
derived from Velasquez; and Cortes refusing to submit to any authority
which was not founded on a commission from the Emperor himself, under'whose immediate protection he and his adherents had placed their infant
colony; all these attempts proved fruitless. The intercourse, however,
which this occasioned between the two parties, proved of no small advantage to Cortes, as it afforded him an opportunity of gaining some of Narvaez's officers by liberal presents, of softening others by a semblance of
moderation, and of dazzling all by the appearance of wealth among his
troops, most of his soldiers having converted their share of the Mexican gold
into chains, bracelets, and other ornaments, which they displayed w(th
military ostentation. Narvaez and a little junto of his creatures excepted,
all the army leaned towards an accommodation with their countrymen.
This discovery of their inclination irritated his violent temper almost to
madness. In a transport-of rage, he set a price upon the head of Cortes,
and of his principal officers; and having learned that he was now advanced
within a league of Zempoalla with his small body of men, he considered




232                    HISTORY OF                     [Boox V.
this as an insult which merited immediate chastisement, and marched out
with all his troops to offer him battle.
But Cortes was a leader of greater abilities and experience than, on equal
ground, to fight an enemy so far superior in number, and so much better
appointed. Having taken his station on the opposite bank of the river de
Canoas, where he knew that he could not be attacked, he beheld the approach of the enemy without concern, and disregarded this vain bravade.
It was then the beginning of the wet season,* and the rain had poured down,
during a great part of the day, with a violence peculiar to the torrid zone.
The followers of Narvaez, unaccustomed to the hardships of military service,
murmured so much at being thus fruitlessly exposed, that, from their unsoldierlike impatience, as well as his own contempt of his adversary, their
general permitted them to retire to Zempoalla. The very circumstance
which induced them to quit the field, encouraged Cortes to form a scheme
by which he hoped at once to terminate the war. He observed that his
hardy veterans, though standing under the torrents which continued to fall,
without a single tent or any shelter whatsoever to cover them, were so far
from repining at hardships which were become familiar to them, that they
were still fresh and alert for service. He foresaw that the enemy would
naturally give themselves up to repose after their fatigue, and that, judging
of the conduct of others by their own effeminacy, they would deem themselves perfectly secure at a season so unfit for action. He resolved, therefore, to fall upon them in the dead of night, when the surprise and terror of
this unexpected attack might more than compensate the inferiority of his
numbers. His soldiers, sensible that no resource remained but in some des.
perate effort of courage, approved of the measure with such warmth, that
Cortes, in a military oration which he addressed to them before they beganl
their march, was more solicitous to temper than to inflame their ardour,
He divided them into three parties. At the head of the first he placed
Sandoval; intrusting this gallant officer with the most dangerous and important service, that of seizing the enemy's artillery, which was planted befc;te
the principal tower of the temple where Narvaez had fixed his head-quaxrters. Christoval de Olid commanded the second, with orders to assault
the towel; and lay hold on the general. Cortes himself conducted the third
and smallest division, which was to act as a body of reserve, and to support
the other two as there should be occasion. HIaving passed the river de
Canoas, which was much swelled with the rains, not without difficjlty, the
water reaching almost to their chins, they advanced in profound silence,
without beat of drum, or sound of any warlike instrument; ech man
armed with his sword, his dagger, and his Chirantlan spear.:Tarvaez,
remiss in proportion to his security, had posted only two sentinels 1,o watch
the motions of an enemy whom he had such good cause to dread. One of
these was seized by the advanced guard of Cortes's troops; the other
made his escape, and, hurrying to the town with all the precipitation of fear
and zeal, gave such timely notice of the enemy's approach, that there was
full leisure to have prepared for their reception. But, through the arrogance and infatuation of Narvaez, this important interval was lost. He
imputed this alarm to the cowardice of the sentinel, and treated with
derision the idea of being attacked by forces so unequal to his own.. The
shouts of Cortes's soldiers, rushing on to the assault, convinced him at last
that the danger which he despised was real. The rapidity with which
they_ advanced was such that only one cannon could be fired before Sandoval s party closed with the enemy, drove them from their gun,, an)d began
to force their way up the steps of the tower. Narvaez, no Tas brave in
action than presumptuous in conduct, armed himself in haste,;:ad by his
Hakluyt, vol. iii. 467. De Laet Descr. Ind. Occid.!221.




AMERICA.                            233
voice and example animated his men to the combat. Olid advanced to
sustain his companions; and Cortes himself rushing to the front, conducted
and added new vigour to the attack. The compact order in which this
small body pressed on, and the impenetrable front which they presented
with their long spears, bore down all opposition before it. They had now
reached the gate, and were struggling to burst it open, when a soldier
having set fire to the reeds with which the tower was covered, compelled
Narvaez to sally out. In the first encounter he was wounded in the eye
with the spear, and, falling to the ground, was dragged down the steps, and
in a moment clapped in fetters. The cry of victory resounded among the
troops of Cortes. Those who had sallied out with their leader now maintained the conflict feebly, and began to surrender. Among the remainder
of his soldiers, stationed in two smaller towers of the temple, terror and
confusion prevailed. The darkness was so great, that they could not distinguish between their friends and foes. Their own artillery was pointed
against them. Wherever they turned their eyes, they beheld lights galeaming through the obscurity of the night, which, though proceeding only from
a variety of shining insects that abound in moist and sultry climates, their
affrighted imaginations represented as numerous bands of musketeers advancing with kindled matches to the attack. After a short resistance, the
soldiers compelled their officers to capitulate, and before morning all laid
down their arms, and submitted quietly to their conquerors.
This complete victory proved more acceptable, as it was gained almost
without bloodshed, only two soldiers being killed on the side of Cortes, and
two officers, with fifteen private men of the adverse faction. Cortes treated
the vanquished not like enemies, but as countrymen and friends, and offered
either to send them back directly to Cuba, or to take them into his service,
as partners in his fortune, on equal terms with his own soldiers. This
latter proposition, seconded by a seasonable distribution of some presents
from Cortes, and liberal promises of more, opened prospects so agreeable to
the romantic expectations which had invited them to engage in this service,
that all, a few partisans of Narvaez excepted, closed with it, and vied with
each other in professions of fidelity and attachment to a general, whose
recent success had given them such a striking proof of his abilities for comnand. Thus, by a series of events no less fortunate than uncommon, Cortes
lot only escaped from perdition which seemed inevitable, but, when he
tad least reason to expect it, was placed at the head of a thousand
Ipaniards, ready to follow wherever he should lead them. Whoever
reflects upon the facility with which this victory was obtained, or considers
with what sudden and unanimous transition the followers of Narvaez ranged
themselves under the standard of his rival, will be apt to ascribe both
events as much to the intrigues as to the arms of Cortes, and cannot but
suspect that the ruin of Narvaez was occasioned no less by the treachery
of his own followers, than by the valour of the enemy.*
But in one point the prudent conduct and good fortune of Cortes were
equally conspicuous. II, by the rapidity of his operations after he began
his march, he had not brought matters to such a speedy issue, even this
decisive victory would have come too late to have saved his companions
whom he left in Mexico. A few days after the discomfiture of Narvaez,
a courier arrived with an account that the Mexicans had taken arms, and,
having seized and destroyed the two brigantines which Cortes had built
in order to secure the command of the lake, and attacked the Spaniards
in their quarters, had killed several of them, and wounded more, had
reduced to ashes their magazine of provisions, and carried on hostilities
with such fury, that though Alvarado and his men defended themselves
* Cortes Relat. 242, D. B, Diaz, c. 110-125, Herrera, dec. 2. lib. i. c. 18, &cC Gmara Cron,
C. 97, &c.
VOL. L —30!2




234                    HIST ORY  OF                   [BooK V.
with undaunted resolution, they must either be soon cut off by famine, or
sink under the multitude of their enemies. This revolt was excited by
motives which rendered it still more alarming. On the departure of
Cortes for Zempoalla, the Mexicans flattered themselves that the longexpected opportunity of restoring their sovereign to liberty, and of vindicating their country from the odious dominion of strangers, was at length
arrived; that while the forces of their oppressors were divided, and the
arms of one party turned against the other, they might triumph with
greater facility over both. Consultations were held, and schemes formed
with this intention. The Spaniards in Mexico, conscious of their own
feebleness, suspected and dreaded those machinations. Alvarado, though
a gallant officer, possessed neither that extent of capacity nor dignity of
manners, by which Cortes had acquired such an ascendant over the minds
of the Mexicans, as never allowed them to form a just estimate of his
weakness or of their own strength. Alvarado knew no mode of supporting
his authority but force. Inistead of employing address to disconcert the
plans or to soothe the spirits of the Mexicans, he waited the return of
one of their solemn festivals. When the principal persons in the empire
were dancing, according to custom, in the court of the great temple, he
seized all the avenues which led to it; and allured partly by the rich
ornaments which they -wore in honour of their gods, and partly by the
facility of cutting off at once the authors of that conspiracy which he
dreaded, he fell upon them, unarmed and unsuspicious of any danger, and
massacred a great number, none escaping but such as made their way over
the battlements of the temple. An action so cruel and treacherous filled
not only the city, but the whole empire with indignation and rage. All
called aloud for vengeance; and regardless of the safety of their monarch,
whose life was at the mercy of the Spaniards, or of their own danger in
assaulting an enemy who had been so long the object of their terror, they
committed all those acts of violence of which Cortes received an account.
To him the danger appeared so imminent as to admit neither of deliberation nor delay. He set out instantly with all his forces, abd returned
from Zempoalla with no less rapidity than he had advanced thither. At
Tlascala he was joined by two thousand chosen warriors. On entering
the Mexican territories, he found that disaffection to the Spaniards was
not confined to the capital. The principal inhabitants had deserted the
towns through which he passed; no person of note appearing to meet him
with the usual respect; no provision was made for the subsistence of his
troops; and though he was permitted to advance without opposition, the
solitude and silence which reigned in every place, and the horror with
which the people avoided all intercourse with him, discovered a deeprooted antipathy that excited the most just alarm. But implacable as the
en.mity of the Mexicans was, they were so unacquainted with the science
of war, that they knew not how to take the proper measures either for their
own safety or the destruction of the Spaniards. Uninstructed by their
former error in admitting a formidable enemy into their capital, instead of
breaking down the causeways and bridges, by which they might have
enclosed Alvarado and his party, and have effectually stopped the career
of Cortes, they again suffered him to march into the city [June 24] without
molestation, and to take quiet possession of his ancient station.
The transports of joy with which Alvarado and his soldiers received
their companions cannot be expressed. Both parties were so much elated,
the one with their seasonable deliverance, and the other with the great
exploits which they had achieved, that this intoxication of success seems
to have reached Cortes himself; and he behaved on this occasion neither
with his usual sagacity nor attention. I He not only neglected to visit
Montezuma, but embittered the insult by expressions full of contempt for
that unfortunate prince and his people. The forces of which he had now




AMERICA.                            235
the command appeared to him so irresistible that he might assume a
higher tone, and lay aside the mask of moderation under which he had
hitherto concealed his designs. Some Mexicans, who understood the
Spanish language, heard the contemptuous words which Cortes uttered,
and, reporting them to their countrymen, kindled their rage anew. They
were now convinced that the intentions of the general were equally bloody
with those of Alvarado, and that his original purpose in visiting their
country had not been, as he pretended, to court the alliance of their
sovereign, but to attempt the conquest of his dominions. They resumned
their arms with the additional fury which this discovery inspired, attacked
a considerable body of Spaniards who were marching towards the great
square in which the public market was held, and compelled them to retire
with some loss. Emboldened by this success, and delighted to find that
their oppressors were not invincible, they advanced the next day with extraordinary martial pomp to assault the Spaniards in their quarters. Their
number was formidable, and their undaunted courage still more so. Though
the artillery pointed against their numerous battalions, crowded together
in narrow streets, swept off multitudes at every discharge; though every
blow of the Spanish weapons fell with mortal effect upon their naked
bodies, the impetuosity of the assault did not abate. Fresh men rushed
forward to occupy the places of the slain, and, meeting with the same
fate, were succeeded by others no less intrepid and eager for vengeance
The utmost efforts of Cortes's abilities and' experience, seconded by the
disciplined valour of his troops, were hardly sufficient to defend the fortifications that surrounded the post where the Spaniards were stationed, into
which the enemy were more than once on the point of forcing their way.
Cortes beheld with wonder the implacable ferocity of a people who
seemed at first to submit tamely to the yoke, and had continued so long
passive under it. The soldiers of Narvaez, who fondly imagined that
they followed Cortes to share in the spoils of a conquered empire, were
astonished to find that they were involved in a dangerous war with an
enemy whose vigour was still unbroken, and loudly execrated their own
weakness in giving such easy credit to "the delusive promises of their new
leader.* But surprise and complaintswere of no avail. Some immediate and
extraordinary effort was requisite to extricate themselves out of their present
situation. As  soon as the approach of evening induced the Mexicans to
retire in compliance with their national custom of ceasing from hostilities
with the setting sun, Cortes began to prepare for a sally, next day, with
such a considerable force as might either drive the enemy out of the city,
or compel them to listen to terms of accommodation.
He conducted, in person the troops destined for this important service.
Every invention known in the European art of war, as well as every precaution suggested by his long acquaintance with the Indian mode of fighting were employed to ensure success. But he found an enemy prepared
and determined to oppose him. The force of the Mexicans was greatly
~augmented by fresh troops, which poured in continually from the country,
and their animosity was in no degree abated. They were led by their
nobles, inflamed by the exhortatior/ of their priests, and fought in defence
of their temples and famiiies, under the eye of their gods, and in presence of
their wives and children. Notwithstanding their numbers, and enthusiastic
contempt of danger and death, wherever the Spaniards could close with
them, the superiority of their discipline and arms obliged the Mexicans to
give way. But in narrow streets, and where many of the bridges of communication were broken down, the Spaniards could seldom come to a fair
rencounter with the enemy, and, as they advanced, were exposed to
showers of arrows and stones from the tops of houses. After a day of
* B. Diaz, c. 126.




2-36                   HISTORY  OF                    BOOK V.
incessant exertion, though vast numbers of the Mexicans fell, and part of
the city was burnt,- the Spaniards weary with the slaughter, and harassed
by multitudes which successively relieved each other, were obliged at
length to retire, with the mortification of having accomplished nothing so
decisive as to compensate the unusual calamity of having twelve soldiers
killed, and above sixty wounded. Another sally, made with greater force,
was not more effectual, and in it the general himself was wounded in the
hand.
Cortes now perceived, too late, the fatal error into which he had been
betrayed by his own contempt of the Mexicans, and was satisfied that he
could neither maintain his - present station in the centre of a hostile city,
nor retire from it without the most imminent danger. One, resource still
remained, to try what effect the interposition of Montezuma might have
to soothe or overawe his subjects. When the Mexicans approached next
morning to renew the assault, that unfortunate prince, at the mercy of the
Spaniards, and reduced to the sad necessity of becoming the instrument o,
his own disgrace, and of the slavery of his people [117], advanced to the
battlements in his royal robes, and with all the pomp in which he used to
appear on solemn occasions. At sight of their sovereign, whom they had
long been accustomed to honour, and almost to revere as a god, the weapons
dropped from their hands, every tongue was silent, all bowed their heads,
and many prostrated themselves on the ground. Montezuma addressed
them with every argument that could mitigate their rage, or persuade them
to cease from hostilities. When he ended his discourse, a sullen murmur
of disapprobation ran through the ranks; to this succeeded reproaches and
threats; and the fury of the multitude rising in a moment above every
restraint of decency or respect, flights of arrows and volleys of stones
poured in so violently upon the ramparts, that before the Spanish soldiers,
appointed to cover Montezuma with their bucklers, had time to lift them
in his defence, two arrows wounded the unhappy monarch, and the blow
of a stone on his temple struck him to the ground. On seeing him fall, the
Mexicans were so much astonished, that with a transition not uncommon
in popular tumults, they passed in a moment from one extreme to the other,
remorse succeeded to insult, and they fled with horror, as if the vengeance
of heaven were pursuing the crime which they committed. The Spaniards
without molestation carried Montezuma to his apartments, and Cortes hastened thither to console him under his misfortune.  But the unhappy
monarch now perceived how low he wfas sunk; and the haughty spirit
which seemed to have been so long extinct, returning, he scorned to survive
this last humiliation, and to protract an ignominious life, not only as the
prisoner and tool of his enemies, but as the object of contempt or detestation among his subjects. In a transport of rage he tore the bandages from
his wounds, and refused, with such obstinacy, to take any nourishment, that
he soon ended his wretched days, rejecting with disdain all the solicitations
of the Spaniards to embrace the Christian faith.
Upon the death of Montezuma, Cortes, having lost all hope of bringing
the Mexicans to an accommodation, saw no prospect of satety but in attempting a retreat, and began to prepare for it. But a sudden motion of
the Mexicans engaged him in new conflicts. They took possession of a
high tower in the great temple which overlooked the Spanish quarters,
and placing there a garrison of their principal warriors, not a Spaniard
could stir without being exposed to their missile weapons. From this post
it was necessary to dislodge them at any risk; and Juan de Escobar, with
a numerous detachment of chosen soldiers, was ordered to make the attack.
But Escobar, though a gallant officer, and at the head of troops accustomed
to conquer, and who now fought under the eyes of their countrymen, was
thrice repulsed. Cortes, sensible that not only the reputation but the safety




AMERICA.                              237
of his army depended on the success of this assault, ordered a buckler to
be tied to his arm, as he could not manage it with his wounded hand, and
rushed with his drawn sword into the thickest of the combatants. Encouraged by the presence of their general, the Spaniards returned to the charge
with such vigour, that they gradually forced their way up the steps, and
drove the Mexicans to the platform at the top of the tower. There a
dreadful carnage began; when two young Mexicans of high rank, observing
Cortes as he animated his soldiers by his voice and example, resolved to
sacrifice their own lives in order to cut off the author of all the calamities
which desolated their country. They approached him in a suppliant pos
ture, as if they had intended to lay down their arms, and seizing him in a
moment, hurried him towards the battlements, over which they threw
themselves headlong, in hopes of dragging him along to be dashed in pieces
by the same fall. But Cortes, by his strength and agility, broke loose from
their grasp, and the gallant youths perished in this generous though unsuccessful attempt to save their country.' As soon as the Spaniards became
masters of the tower, they set fire to it, and, without farther molestation,
continued the preparations for their retreat.
This became the more necessary, as the.Mexicans were so much astonished at the last effort of the Spanish valour, that they began to change
their whole system of hostility, and, instead of incessant attacks, endeavoured, by barricading the streets and breaking down the causeways, to
cut off the communication of the Spaniards with the continent, and thus to
starve an enemy whom they could not subdue. The first point to be determined by Cortes and his followers, was, whether they should march out
openly in the face of day, when they could discern every danger, and see
how to regulate their own motions, as well as how to resist the assaults of
the enemy; or, whether they should endeavour to retire secretly in the
night?  The latter was preferred, partly from  hopes that their national
superstition would restrain the Mexicans from venturing to attack them in
the night, and partly from their own fond belief in the predictions of a
private soldier, who having acquired universal credit by a smattering of
learning, and his pretensions to astrology, boldly assured his countrymen of
success, if they made their retreat in this manner. They began to move,
towards midnight, in three divisions. Sandoval led the van; Pedro Alvarado and Velasquez de Leon had the conduct of the rear; and Cortes corn
manded in the centre, where he placed the prisoners, among whom were
a son and two daughters of Montezuma, together with several Mexicans of
distinction, the artillery, the baggage, and a portable bridge of timber intended to be laid over the breaches in the causeway. They marched in
profound silence along the causeway which led to Tacuba, because it was
shorter than any of the rest, and, lying most remote from the road towards
Tlascala and the sea-coast, had been left more entire by the Mexicans.
They reached the first breach in it without molestation, hoping that their
retreat was undiscovered.
But the Mexicans, unperceived, had not only watched all their motions
with attention, but had made proper dispositions for a most formidable
attack. While the Spaniards were intent upon placing their bridge in the
breach, and occupied in conducting their horses and artillery along it, they
were suddenly alarmed with a tremendous sound of warlike instruments,
and a general shout from an innumerable multitude of enemies; the lake
was covered with canoes; flights of arrows and showers of stones poured
in upon them from every quarter; the Mexicans rushing forward to the
* M. Clavigero has censured me with asperity for relating this gallant action of the two
Mexicans, and for supposing that there were battlements round the temple of Mexico. I related
the attempt to destroy Cortes on the authority of Her. dec. 2. lib. x. c. 9. and of Torquemado, lib.
iv, c. 69, I followed them likewise in supposing the upperrmst platform of the-temple to be encompIsaed by a battlement or rail.




H38  STORY OF                    [BooK V.
charge with fearless Impetuosity, as if they hoped in that moment to be
avenged for all their wrongs. Unfortunately the wooden bridge, by the
weight of the artillery, was wedged so fast into the stones and mud, that
it was impossible to remove it. Dismayed at this accident, the Spaniards
advanced with precipitation towards the second breach. The Mexicans
hemmed them  in on every side; and though they defended themselves
with their usual courage, yet crowded together as they were on a narrow
causeway, their discipline and military skill were of little avail, nor did
the obscurity of the night permit them to derive great advantage from their
fire-arms, or the superiority of their other weapons. All Mexico was now
in arms; and so eager were the people on the destruction of their oppressors, that they who were not near enough to annoy them in person, impatient of the delay, pressed forward with such ardour as drove on their
countrymen in the front with irresistible violence. Fresh warriors instantly
filled the place of such as fell. The Spaniards, weary with slaughter, and
unable to sustain the weight of the torrent that poured in upon them, began
to give way. In a moment the confusion was universal; horse and foot,
officers and soldiers, friends and enemies, were mingled together; and while
all fought, and many fell, they could hardly distinguish from what hand
the blow came.
Cortes, with about a hundred foot soldiers and a few horse, forced his
way over the two regmaining breaches in the causeway, the bodies of the
dead serving to fill up the chasms, and reached the main land. Having
formed them as soon as they arrived, he returned with such as were yet
capable of service to assist his friends in their retreat, and to encourage
them, by his presence and example, to persevere in the efforts requisite to
effect it.  He met with part of his soldiers who had broke through the
enemy, but found many more overwhelmed by the multitude of their aggressors, or perishing in the lake; and heard the piteous lamentations of others,
whom the Mexicans, having taken alive, were carrying off in triumph to
be sacrificed to the god of war. Before day, all who had escaped assembled at Tacuba. But when the morning dawned, and discovered to the
view of Cortes his shattered battalion reduced to less than half its number, the survivors dejected, and most of them covered with wounds, the
thoughts of what they had suffered, and the remembrance of so many faithful friends and gallant followers who had fallen in that night of sorrow,*
pierced his soul with such anguish, that While he was forming their ranks,
and issuing some necessary orders, his soldiers observed the tears trickling
from his eyes, and remarked with much satisfaction, that while attentive to
the duties of a general, le was not insensible to the feelings of a man.
In this fatal retreat many officers of distinction perished [1181, and among
these Velasquez de Leon, who having forsaken the party of his kinsman,
the governor of Cuba, to follow the fortune of his companions, was, on that
account, as well-as for his superior mnerit, respected by them as the second
person in the army. All the artillery, ammunition, and baggage, were lost;
the greater part of the horses, and above two thousand  1 lascalans, were
killed, and only a very'm'a-l'on    ion- of,the treasure which they had
amassed was saved.  This,;-:ihfl"cTiadT'bIn always       their chief object,
proved a great cause of"'th i I ":lf' it;' for many of the soldiers having so
overloaded themselves'With"basti of gold as rendered them unfit for action,
and retarded their flight,"feIl i;noiniiniously, the victims of their own inconslderate avarice. Amidst so'many disasters, it was some consolation to find
that Aguila'r and Marina,'whose function as interpreters was of such essential importance, had made- their escape.t
The first care of Cortes was to find some shelter for his wearied troops;
*.Noche triste is the name by which it is still distinguished in New Spain.  t Cortes Relat.,
948  B. Diaz c. ]28. Gonlara Cron. c. 109. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. x. c. 11, 12.




AMERICA                              239
tor, as the Mexicans infested them on every side, and the people of Tacuba
began to take arms, he could not continue in his present station., He directed his march towards the rising ground, and, having fortunately discovered a temple situated on an eminence, took possession of it. There he
found not only the shelter for which he wished, but, what was no less
wanted, some provisions to refresh his men; and though the enemy did
not intermit their attacks throughout the day, they were with less difficulty
prevented from making any impression. During this time Cortes was engaged in deep consultation with his officers, concerning the route which
they ought.to take in their retreat. They were now on the west side of'
the lake. Tlascala, the only place where they could hope for a friendly
reception, lay about sixty-four miles to the east of Mexico;* so that they
were obliged to go round the north end of the lake before they could fall
into the road which led thither. A Tlascalan soldier undertook to be their
guide, and conducted them  through a country in some places marshy- in
others mountainous, in all ill cultivated and thinly peopled. They marched
for six days with little respite, and under continual atlarns, numerous bodies
of the Mexicans hovering around them, sometimes harassing them at a-:distance with their missile weapons, and sometimes-attacking themi.lclosely in
front, in rear, in flank, with great boldness, as they now knew that they
were not invincible. Nor were the fatigue and danger of those-incessant
conflicts the worst evils to which they were exposed. As the barren country through which they passed afforded hardly any provisions, they- were
reduced to feed on berries, roots, and the stalks of green maize;.and at
the very time that famine was depressing their spirits and wasting their
strength, their situation required the most vigorous and unremitting exertions of courage and activity. Amidst those complicated distresses, one
circumstance supported and animated the Spaniards. Their commander
sustained this sad reverse of fortune with unshaken magnanimity.  His
presence of mind never forsook him-; his sagacity foresaw every- event,
and his vigilance provided for it. He was foremost in every danger, and
endured every hardship with cheerfulness. The difficulties with which
he was surrounded seemed to call forth new talents; and his soldiers,
though despairing themselves, continued to follow him with increasing confidence in his abilities.
On the sixth day they arrived near to Otumba, not far from the road
between Mexico and Tlascala. Early next morning they began to advance
towards it, flying parties of the enemy still hanging on their rear; and,
amidst the insults with which they accompanied their hosti.ities Marina
remarked that they often- exclaimed with exultation,  G o-onroh bersobr go
to the place where you shall quickly meet the vengeance due to your
crimes."  The meaning of this threat the Spaniards didm-not-comprehend,
until they reached the summit of an eminence before thelnm. -. —T-ihere a
spacious valley opened to their view, covered with a vast army; extending
as far as the eye could reach. The Mexicans, while with' one body of
their troops they harassed the Spaniards in their retreat,.-had:assembled
their principal force on the other side of the lake - and marching-along the
road which led directly to Tlascala, posted it in the. plain. of Otumba,
through which they knew Cortes must pass. At the.sight of this incredible
multitude, which they could survey at once from  the rising ground, the
Spaniards were astonished, and even the boldest began- to despair. But
Cortes, without allowing leisure for their fears to acquire strength by reflection, after warning them briefly that no alternative now'remained but to
conquer or to die, led them instantly to the charge. The Mexicans waited
their approach with unusual fortitude. Such, however, -vwas the superiority
of the Spanish discipline and arms, that the impression of this small body
* Villa Segnor Teatro Americanos, lib.. i. 11.




240                     HISTORY OF                      [BOOK V
was irresistible; and whichever way its force was directed, it penetrated
and dispersed the most numerous battalions. But while these gave way
In one quarter,-new combatants advanced from another, and the Spaniards,
though successful in every, attack, were ready to sink under those repeated
efforts, without seeing any end of their toil, or any hope of victory. At
that time Cortes observed the great standard of the empire, which was
carried before the Mexican general, advancing; and fortunately recollecting
to have heard, that on the fate of it depended the event of every battle,
he assembled a few of his bravest officers, whose horses were still capable
of service, and, placing himself at their head, pushed forward towards the
standard with an impetuosity which bore down every thing before it. A
chosen body of nobles, who guarded the standard, made some resistance,
but were soon broken. Cortes, with a stroke of his lance, wounded the
Mexican general, and threw him  on the ground. One of the Spanish
officers, alighting, put an end to his life, and laid hold of the imperial
standard. The moment that their leader fell, and the standard, towards
which all directed their eyes, disappeared, a universal panic struck the
Mexicans; and, as if the bond which held them together had been dissolved, every ensign was lowered, each soldier threw away his weapons,
and all fled with precipitation to the mountains. The Spaniards unable to
pursue them far, returned to collect the spoils of the field, which were so
valuable as to be some compensation for the wealth which they had lost in
Mexico; for in the enemy's army were most of their principal warriors
dressed out in their richest ornaments as if they had been marching to
assured victory. Next day [July 8], to their great joy, they entered the
Tlascalan territories.*
But amidst their satisfaction in having got beyond the precincts of a
hostile country, they could not look forward without solicitude, as they
were still uncertain what reception they might meet with from allies to
whom they returned in a condition very different from that in which they
had lately set out from their dominions. Happily for them, the enmity of
the Tlascalans to the Mexican name was so inveterate,their desire to avenge
the death of their countrymen so vehement, and the ascendant which
Cortes had acquired over the chiefs of the republic so complete, that, far
from entertaining a thought of taking any advantage of the distressed
situation in which they beheld the Spaniards, they received them with a
tenderness and cordiality which quickly dissipated all their suspicions.
Some interval of tranquillity and indulgence was now absolutely necessary; not only that the Spaniards might give attention to the cure of their
wounds, which had been too long neglected, but in order to recruit their
strength, exhausted by such a long succession of fatigue and hardships.
During this, Cortes learned that he and his companions were not the only
Spaniards who had felt the effects of the Mexican enmity. A considerable
detachment which was marching from Zempoalla towards the capital, had
been cut off by the people of Tepeaca. A smaller party, returning from
Tlascala to Vera Cruz, with the share of' the Mexican gold allotted to the
garrison, had been surprised and destroyed in the mountains. At a juncture
when the life of every Spaniard was of importance, such losses were deeply
felt. The schemes which Cortes was meditating rendered them peculiarly
afflictive to him. While his enemies, and even many of his own followers,
considered the disasters which had befallen him as fatal to the progress of
his arms, and imagined that nothing now remained but speedily to abandon
a country which he had invaded with unequal force, his mind, as eminent
for perseverance as for enterprise, was still bent on accomplishing his
original purpose, of subjecting the Mexican empire to the crown of Castile.
Severe and unexpected as the check was which he had received, it did not
Cortes Relat. p. 219 B Diaz, c. 128. Gomara Cron. c. 110 Herrera, dec. 2. lib. x. c. 12, 13




AMERICA..:41
appear to him a sufficient reason for relinquishing the conquests which he
had already made, or against resuming his operations with better hopes of
success. 1The colony at Vera Cruz was not only safe, but had remained
unmolested. The people of Zempoalla and the adjacent districts had
discovered no symptoms of defection. The Tlascalans continued faithful
to their alliance. On their martial spirit, easily roused to arms, and inflamed with implacable hatred of the Mexicans, Cortes depended for
powerful aid. He had still the command of a body of Spaniards, equal
in number to that with which he had opened his way into the centre of the
empire, and had taken possession of the capital; so that with the benefit
of greater experience, as well as more perfect knowledge of the country,
he did not despair of quickly recovering all that he had been deprived of
by untoward events.
Full of this idea, he courted the Tlascalan chiefs with such attention,
and distributed among them so liberally the rich spoils of Otumba, that he
was secure of obtaining whatever he should require of the republic. He
drew a small supply of ammunition and two or three fieldpieces from his
stores at Vera Cruz. He despatched an officer of confidence with four
ships of Narvaez's fleet to Hispaniola and Jamaica, to engage adventurers,
and to purchase horses, gunpowder, and other military stores. As he knew
that it would be vain to attempt the reduction of 3lexico, unless he could
secure the command of the lake, he gave orders to prepare in the mountains
of Tlascala, materials for building twelve brigantines, so as they might be
carried thither in pieces ready to be put together, and launched when he
stood in need of their service.*
But while, with provident attention, he was taking those necessary steps
towards the execution of his measures, an obstacle arose in a quarter where't was least expected, but most formidable. The spirit of discontent and
mutiny broke out in his own army. Many of Narvaez's followers were
Dlanters rather than soldiers, and had accompanied him to New Spain with
sanguine hopes of obtaining settlements, but with little inclination to engage
in the hardships and dangers of war. As the same motives had induced
them to enter into their new engagements with -Cortes, they no sooner
became acquainted with the nature of the service, than they bitterly
repented of their choice. Such of them as had the good fortune to survive
the perilous adventures in which their own imprudence had involved them,
happy in having made their escape, trembled at the thoughts of being
exposed a second time to similar calamities. As soon as they discovered
the intention of Cortes, they began secretly to murmur and cabal, and,
waxing gradually more audacious, they, in a body, offered a remonstrance
to their general against the imprudence of attacking a powerful empire
with his shattered forces, and formally required him to lead them back
directly to Cuba. Though Cortes, long practised in the arts of command,
employed arguments, entreaties, and presents to convince or to soothe them;
though his own soldiers, animated with the spirit of their leader, warmly
seconded his endeavours; he found their fears too violent and deep rooted
to be removed, and the utmost he could effect was to prevail with them
to defer their departure for some time, on a promise that he would, at a
more proper juncture, dismiss such as should desire it.
That the malecontents might have no-leisure to- brood over the causes of
their disaffection, he resolved instantly to call forth his troops into action.
He proposed to chastise the people of Tepeaca for the outrage which they
had committed; and as the detachment which they had cut off happened
to be composed mostly of soldiers who had served, under Narvaez, their
companions, from the desire of vengeance, engaged the more willingly in
this war. He took the command in person, [August] accompanied by a
* Cortes Relat. p. 253. E. Gomara Cron. c 117
VoI. 1 —31




242                     HISTORY OF                      [BOOK V.
numerous body of Tlascalans, and in the space of a few weeks, after various
encounters, with great slaughter of the Tepeacans, reduced that province
to subjection. During several months, while he waited for the supplies of
men and ammunition which he expected, and was carrying on his preparations for constructing the brigantines, he kept his troops constantly employed in various expeditions against the adjacent provinces, all of which
were conducted with a uniform tenour of success. By these, his men
became again accustomed to victory, and resumed their wonted sense of
superiority; the Mexican power was weakened; the Tlascalan warriors
acquired the habit of acting in conjunction with the Spaniards; and the
chiefs of the republic delighted to see their country enriched with the
spoils of all the people around them; and astonished every day with fresh
discoveries of the irresistible prowess of their allies, they declined no effort
requisite to support them.
All those preparatory arrangements, however, though the most prudent
and efficacious which the situation of Cortes allowed him to make, would
have been of little avail without a reinforcement of Spanish soldiers. 0O
this he was so deeply sensible, that it was the chief object of his thoughts
and wishes; and yet his only prospect of obtaining it from the return ol
the officer whom he had sent to the isles to solicit aid; was both distant and
uncertain. But what neither his own sagacity nor power could have procured, he owed to a series of fortunate and unforeseen incidents. The
governor of Cuba, to whom the success of Narvaez appeared an event ol
infallible certainty, having sent two small ships after him with new instruc
tions, and a supply of men and military stores, the officer whom Cortes had
appointed to command on the coast, artfully decoyed them into the harbour
of Vera Cruz, seized the vessels, and easily persuaded the soldiers to fol
low the standard of a more able leader than him whom they were destined
to join.t  Soon after, three ships of more considerable force came into the
harbour separately. These belonged to an armament fitted out by Francisco de Garay, governor of Jamaica, who, being possessed with the rage
of discovery and conquest which animated every Spaniard settled in
America, had long aimed at intruding into some district of New Spain, and
dividing with Cortes the glory and gain of annexing that empire to the
crown of Castile. They unadvisedly made their attempt on the northern
provinces, where the country was poor, and the people fierce and warlike;
and after a cruel succession of disasters, famine compelled them to venture
into Vera Cruz, and cast themselves upon the mercy of their countrymen
[Oct. 28]. Their fidelity was not proof against the splendid hopes and
promises which had seduced other adventurers; and, as if the spirit of
revolt had been contagious in New Spain, they likewise abandoned the
master whom they were bound to serve, and enlisted under Cortes4t Nor
was it America alone that furnished such unexpected aid; a ship arrived
from Spain, freighted by some private merchants with military stores, in
hopes of a profitable market in a country, the fame of whose opulence
began to spread over Europe. Cortes eagerly purchased a cargo which to
him was invaluable, and the crew, following the general exainple, joined
him at Tlascala.4
From those various quarters, the army of Cortes was augmented with a
hundred and eighty men, and twenty horses, a reinforcement too inconsiderable to produce any consequence which would have entitled it to
have been mentioned in the history of other parts of the globe. But in that
Yf America, where great revolutions were brought about by causes which
seemed to bear no proportion to their effects, such small events rise into importance, because they were sufficient to decide with respect to the fate of
I:B. Diaz, c. 131,   t Cortes Relat. 253 F, B. Diaz, c. 183.   1 Cortes IRelat. 253. F. ]
Diaz, c. 136.




AMERICA.                             243
knagdoms. Nor is it the least remarkable instance of the singular felicity
cokspicuous in many passages of Cortes's story, that the two persons chiefly
instrumental in furnishing him with those seasonable supplies, should be an
avowed. enemny who aimed at his destruction, and an envious rival who
wished to supplant him.
The first effect of the junction with his new followers was to enable him
to disrmsiss such of Narvaez's soldiers as remained with reluctance in his
service. After their departure, he still mustered five hundred and fifty
infantry, of which fourscore were armed with muskets or crossbows, forty
horsemen, and a train of nine field-pieces.?  At the head of these, accorn
panied by ten thousand Tlascalans and other friendly Indians, Cortes began
his march towards Mexico, on the twenty-eighth of December, six months
after his disastrous retreat from that city.4
Nor did he advance to attack an enemy unprepared to receive him
Upon the death of Montezuma, the Mexican chiefs, in whom the right of
electing the emperor was vested, had instantly raised his brother Quetlavaca to the throne. His avowed and inveterate enmity to the Spaniards'
would have been sufficient to gain their suffrages, although he had been less
distinguished for courage and capacity. He had an immediate opportunity
of showing that he was worthy of their choice, by conducting in person those
fierce attacks which compelled the Spaniards to abandon his capital; and
as soon as their retreat afforded him any respite from action, he took
measures for preventing their return to Mexico, with prudence equal:to the
spirit which he had displayed in driving them out of it. As from the
vicinity of Tlascala, he could not be unacquainted with the motions and
intentions of Cortes, he observed the storm that was gathering, and began
early to provide against it. He repaired what the Spaniards had ruined
in the city, and strengthened it with such new fortifications as the skill of
his subjects was capable of erecting. Besides filling his magazines with
the usual weapons of war, he gave directions to make long spears headed
with the swords and daggers taken from the Spaniards, in order to annoy
the cavalry. He summoned the people in every province of the empire to
take arms against their oppressors, and as an encouragement to exert themselves with vigour, he promised them exemption from all the taxes which
his predecessors had imposed.4  But what he laboured with the greatest
earnestness was, to deprive the Spaniards of: the advantages which they
derived from the friendship of the Tlascalans, by endeavouring to persuade
that people to renounce all connexion with men who were not only avowed
enemies of the gods whom they worshipped, but who would not fail to
subject them at last to the same yoke which they were now inconsiderately
lending their aid to impose upon others. These representations, no less.triking than well founded, were urged so forcibly by his ambassadors, that
it required all the address of Cortes' to prevent their making'a dangerous
impression.~
But while Quetlavaca was arranging his plan of defence, with a degree
of foresight uncommon in an American, his days were cut short by the
small-pox. This distemper, which raged at that time in New Spain with
fatal malignity, was unknown in that quarter of the globe until, it was
introduced by the Europeans, and may be reckoned among the greatest
calamities brought upon them by their invaders. In his stead the Mifexicans
raised to the throne Guatimozin, nephew and son-in-law of Montezuma, a
young man of such high reputation for abilities and valour, that in this
dangerous crisis, his countrymen, with one voice, called him to the supreme
command.11
* Cortes Relat. 255. E.  t Relat. 256. A. B. Diaz, c. 137.    $ Cortes Relat. p. 253. E.
254. A. B. Diaz, c. 140.    O B. Diaz, c. 129. Herrera, dec. 2. lib. x. c. 14. 19.  l B. Diaz,
c 130




244                      HISTORY OF                       [Boox V.
1521.] As soon as Cortes entered the enemies territories, he discovered
various preparations to obstruct his progress.  But his troops forced their
way with little difficulty, and took'possession of Tezeuco, the second city
of the empire, situated on the banks of the lake about twenty miles from
Mexico.n  Here he determined to establish his head-quarters, as the most
proper station for launching his brigantines, as well as for making his approaches to the capital. In order to render his residence there more secure,
he deposed the cazique, or chief, who was at the head of that community,
under pretext of some defect in his title, and substituted in his place a person whom a faction of, the nobles pointed out as the right heir of that dignity. Attached to him by this benefit, the cazique and his adherents served
the Spaniards with inviolable fidelity.t
As the preparations for constructing the brigantines advanced slowly
under the unskilful hands of soldiers and Indians, whom Cortes was obliged
to employ in assisting three or four carpenters who happened fortunately to
be in his service; and as he had not yet received the reinforcement which
he expected from Hispaniola, he was not in a condition to turn his arms
directly against the capital. To have attacked at this period, a city so
populous, so well prepared for defence, and in a situation of such peculiar
strength, must have exposed his troops to inevitable destruction. Three
months elapsed before the materials for the brigantines were finished, and
before he heard any thing with respect to the success of the officer whom
he had sent to Hispaniola. This, however, was not a season of inaction to
Cortes. He attacked successively several of the towns situated around the
lake; and though all the Mexican power was exerted to obstruct his
operations, he either compelled them to submit to the Spanish crown, or
reduced them to ruins. rhe inhabitants of other towns he endeavoured
to conciliate by more gentle means; and though he could not hold any
intercourse with them  but by the intervention of interpreters, yet, under
all ~the disadvantages of that tedious and imperfect mode of communication
he had acquired such thorough knowledge of the state of the country, as
well as of the dispositions of the people, that he conducted his negotiations
and intrigues with astonishing dexterity and success. Most of the cities
adjacent to Mexico were originally the capitals-of small independent states
and some of them having been but lately annexed to the Mexican empire,
still retained the remembrance of their ancient liberty, and bore with im
patience the rigorous yoke of their new masters. Cortes, having early
observed symptoms of their disaffection, availed'himself of this knowledge
to gain their confidence and friendship. By offering with confidence to
deliver them from'the odious dominion of the.Mexicans, and by liberal
promises of more indulgent.treatment if they would unite with him against
their oppressors, he prevailed on the people of several considerable districts, not only to acknowledge the King of Castile as their sovereign, but
to supply the Spanish camp with provisions, and to strengthen his army
with auxiliary troops. Guatimozin, on the first appearance of defection
among his subjects, exerted himself-with vigour to prevent or to punish their
revolt; but, in spite of his efforts, the spirit continued to spread. The
Spaniards gradually acquired new allies, and with deep concern he beheld
Cortes arming against his empire those very hands which ought to have
been active in its defence, and ready to advance against the capital at the
head of a numerous body of his own subjects. 
While, by those various methods, Cortes was gradually circumscribing
the Mexican power in such a manner that his prospect of overturning it
seemed neither to be uncertain nor remote, all his schemes were well nigh
* Villa Senor Theatro Americano, i. 156.  t Cortes Relat. 256, &c. B. Diaz, c. 137. Gomara.Cron. c. 121. Herrera, dec. 3. c. 1.  + Cortes Relat. 256-260. B. Diaz, c. 137-140
Gomara Cron. c. 122, 123.: Herrera, dec. 3. lib. i. C. 1, 2.




AM ERICA.                            245
defeated by a conspiracy no less unexpected than dangerous. The soldiers
of Narvaez had never united perfectly with the original companions of
Cortes, nor did they enter into his measures with the same cordial zeal.
Upon every occasion that required any extraordinary effort of courage or
of patience, their spirits were apt to sink; and now, on a near view of
what they had to encounter, in attempting to reduce a city so inaccessible
as Mexico, and defbnded by a numerous army, the resolution even of those
among them who had adhered to Cortes when he was deserted by their
associates, began to fail. Their fears led them to presumptuous and unsoldierlike discussions concerning the propriety of their general's measures,
and the improbability of their success. From  these they proceeded to
censure and invectives, and at last began to deliberate how they might
provide for their own safety, of which they deemed their commander to
be totally negligent. Antonio Villefagna, a private soldier, but bold, intriguing, and strongly attached to Velasquez, artfully fomented this growing
spirit of disaffection. His quarters became the rendezvous of the malecontents, where, after many consultations, they could discover no method
of checking Cortes in his career, but by assassinating him and his most
considerable officers, and conferring the command upon some person who
would relinquish his wild plans, and adopt measures more consistent with
the general security. Despair inspired them with courage. The hour
for perpetrating the crime, the persons whom  they destined as victims,
the officers to succeed them in command, were all named: and the conspirators signed an association, by which tney bound themselves with
riost solemn oaths to mutual fidelity. But on the evening before the appointed day, one of Cortes's ancient followers, who had been seduced into
the conspiracy, touched with compunction at the imminent danger of a
man whom he had long been accustomed to revere, or struck with horror
at his own treachery, went privately to his general, and revealed to him
all that he knew, Cortes, though deeply alarmed, discerned'at once what
conduct was proper in a situation so critical. He repaired instantly to
Villefagna's quarters, accompanied by some of his most trusty officers.
The astonishment and confusion of the man at this unexpected visit anticipated the confession of his guilt. Cortes, while his attendants seized
the traitor, snatched from his bosom a paper, containing the association,
signed by the conspirators. impatient to know how far the infection extended, he retired to read it, and found there names which filled him with
surprise and sorrow. But aware how dangerous a strict scrutiny might
prove at such a juncture, he confined his judicial inquiries to Villefagna
alone. As the proofs of his guilt were manifest, he was condemned after
a short trial, and next morning he was seen hanging before the door of the
house in which he had lodged, Cortes called his troops together, and
having explained to them the atrocious purpose of the conspirators, as well
as the justice of the punishment inflicted on Villefagna, he added, with an
appearance of satisfaction, that he was entirely ignorant with respect to all
the circumstances of this dark transaction, as the traitor, when arrested, had
suddenly torn and swallowed a paper which probably contained an account
of it, and under the severest tortures possessed such constancy as to conceal the names of his accomplices. This artful declaration restored tranquillity to many.a breast that was throbbing, while he spoke, with consciousness of guilt and dread of detection; and by this prudent moderation,
Cortes had the advantage of having discovered, and of being able to
observe such of his followers as were disaffected; while they, flattering
themselves that their past crime was unknown, endeavoured to avert any
suspicion of it by redoubling their activity and zeal in his service.?
Cortes did not allow them leisure to ruminate on what had happened;
* Cortes Relat. 283. C. B. Diaz, c. 146. Herrera, dec 3. lib. i. c. 1




246                     HISTORY   OF                    [BooC VY.
and as the most effectual means of preventing the return of a mutinous
spirit, he determined to call forth his troops immediately to action. Fortunately, a proper occasion for this occurred without his seeming to court
it. He received intelligence that the materials for building the brigantines
were at length completely finished, and waited only for a body of Spaniards
to conduct'them to Teieuco.  The command of this convoy, consisting of
two hundred'foot soldiers, fifteen horsemen, and two field-pieces, he gave
to Sandoval, who, by the vigilance, activity, and courage -which he manifested on every occasion, was growing daily in his confidence, and in the
estimation of his fellow-soldiers. The service was no less singular than
important; the beams, the planks, the masts, the cordage, the sails, the
ironwork, and all the infinite variety of articles requisite for the construction
of thirteen brigantines, were to be carried sixty miles over land, through a
mountainous ountry, by people who were unacquainted with the ministry
of domestic animals, or the aid of machines to facilitate any work of
labour. The Tlascalans furnished eight thousand Tamenes, an inferior
order of men destined for servile tasks, to carry the materials on their
shoulders, and appointed fifteen thousand warriors to accompany and defend
them. Sandoval made the disposition for their progress with great propriety, placing the Tamenes in the centre, one body of warriors in the
front, another in the rear, with considerable parties to cover the flanks.
To each of these he joined some Spaniards, not only-to assist them in danger,
but to accustom them to regularity and subordination. A body so numerous,
and so much encumbered, advanced leisurely but in excellent order; and
in some places, where it was confined by the woods or mountains, the line
of march extended above'six miles. Parties of Mexi'cans frequently appeared hovering around them on the high grounds; but perceiving no
prospect of success in attacking an'enemy continually on his guard, and
prepared to receive them, they did not venture to molest him; and Sandoval
had the glory of conducting safely to Tezeuco, a convoy on which all the
future operations of his countrymen depended.*
This was followed by another event of no less moment. Four ships
arrived at Vera Cruz from Hispaniola, with two hundred soldiers, eighty
horses,-two battering cannon, and a considerable supply of ammunition and
arms.1  Elevated with' observing that all his preparatory'schemes, either
for recruiting his own army, or impairing the force of the enemy, had now
produced their full effect, Cortes, impatient to begin the siege in form,
hastened the launching of the brigantines. To facilitate this, he had employed a vast number of Indians for two months, in deepening the small
rivulet which runs by Tezeuco into the lake, and in forming it into a.candl
near two miles in length [119]; and though the Mexicans, aware of his
intentions, as-well as of the danger which threatened them, endeavoured
frequently to Interrupt.the labourers, or to burn the brigantines, the work
was at last completed. QOn the twenty-eighth of April, all the Spanish
troops, together with the auxiliary Indians, were drawn up on the banks of
the canal; and'with extraordinary military pomp, rendered more solemn
by the celebration of the most sacred rites of religion, the brigantines were
launched. As they fell down the canal in order, Father Olmedo blessed
them, anrr gave each its name. Every eye followed them with wonder and
hope, untiflthey entered the lake, when they hoisted their sails and bore
away before the wind. A general shout of joy was raised; all admiring
teat bold inventive genius, which, by means so extraordinary that their
success almost exceeded belief, had acquired the command of a fleet,
without the aid of which Mexico would have continued to set the Spanish
power and arms at defiance.~
* Cortes Relat. 260. C. E. B. Dlaz, c. 140.   t Cortes Relat. 259. F. 262, D. Gomara Cron,
c. 129.:   B, Diaz, c, 140. 1  Cortes Relat. 266. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. i, c. 5. Gomarm
Cron. c. 129




AMERICA.                             247
Cortes determined to attack the city from three different quarters; from
Tepeaca on the north side of the lake, from Tacuba on the west, and from
Cuyocan towards the south. Those towns were situated on the principal
causeways which led to the capital, and intended for their defence. He
appointed Sandoval to command in the first, Pedro de Alvarado in the
second, and Christoval de Olid in the third; allotting to each a numerous
body of Indian auxiliaries, together with an equal division of Spaniards,
who, by the junction of the troops from Hispaniola, amounting now to
eighty-six horsemen, and eight hundred and eighteen foot soldiers; of
whom one hundred and eighteen were armed with muskets or crossbows.
The train of artillery consisted of three battering cannon, and fifteen fieldpieces.*  He reserved for himself, as the station of greatest importance and
danger, the conduct of the brigantines, each armed with one of his small
cannon, and manned with twenty-five Spaniards.
As Alvarado and Olid proceeded towards the posts assigned them [May
10], they broke down the aqueducts which the ingenuity of the Mexicans
had erected for conveying water into the capital, and, by the distress to
which this reduced the inhabitants, gave a beginning to the calamities which
they were destined to suffer.t Alvarado and Olid found the towns of which
they were ordered to take possession deserted by their inhabitants, who
had fled for safety to the capital, where Guatimozin had collected the chief
force of his empire, as there alone he could hope to make a successful
stand against the formidable enemies who were approaching to assault him.
The first effort of the Mexicans was to destroy the fleet of brigantines,
the fatal effects of whose operations they foresaw and dreaded. Though
the brigantines, after all the labour and merit of Cortes in forming them,
were of inconsiderable bulk, rudely constructed, and manned chiefy with
landsmen hardly possessed of skill enough to conduct them, they must have
been objects of terror to a people unacquainted with any navigation but
that of their lake, and possessed of no vessel larger than a canoe. Necessity, however, urged Guatirnozin to hazard the attack; and hoping to supply by numbers what he wanted in force, he assembled such a multitude
of canoes as covered the face of the lake.' They rowed on boldly. to the
charge, while the brigantines, retarded by a dead calm, could scarcely advance to meet them. But as the enemy drew near, a breeze suddenly
sprung up; in a moment the sails were spread, the brigantines, with the
utmost ease, broke'through their feeble opponents, overset many canoes,
and dissipated the whodle armament with such slaughter, as convinced the
- Mexicans, that the progress of the Europeans in knowledge and arts rendered their superiority greater on this new element than they had hitherto
found it by land.t 
From that tfme Cortes remained master of the lake, and the brigantines
not only preserved a communication between the Spaniards in their different stations, though at considerable distance from each other, but were
employed to cover the causeways on each side, and keep off the canoes
when they attempted to annoy the troops as they advanced towards the
city, Cortes formed the brigantines in three divisions, appointing one to.cover each of the stations from which an attack was to be carried on against
fhe city, with orders to second the operations of the officer who commanded there. From all the three stations he pushed on the attack against the
city with equal vigour; but in a manner so very different from the conduct
of sieges in regular war, that he. himself seems afraid it would appear
no less improper than singular to persons unacquainted with his situation.~
Each morning his troops assaulted the barricades which the enemy had
erected on the causeways, forced their way over the trenches which they
* Cortes Relat 266. C.  t Cortes Relat. 267. B. B. Diaz, c. 150, IHerrera, dec. 3. ib. i. c, 13.
t Cortes Relat. 267. C. B. Diaz, c. 150. Gomara Cron. c. 131. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. i. c. 17
Cortes Relat. 270. F.




248                    HISTORY  OF                    [BooK V.
had dug, and through the canals where the bridges were broken down, and
endeavoured to penetrate into the heart of the city, in hopes of obtaining
some decisive advantage which might force the enemy to surrender, and
terminate the war at once; but when the obstinate valour of the Mexicans
rendered the efforts of the day ineffectual, the Spaniards retired in the
evening to their former quarters  Thus their toil and danger were in some
measure continually renewed; the Mexicans repairing in the night what
the Spaniards had destroyed through the day, and recovering the posts
from which they had driven them. But necessity prescribed this slow and
untoward mode of operation. the number of his troops were so small
that Cortes durst not, with a handful of men, attempt to make a lodgment
in a city where he might be surrounded and annoyed by such a multitude
of enemies. The remembrance of what he had already suffered by the
ill judged confidence with which he had ventured into such a dangerous
situation, was still fresh in his mind. The Spaniards, exhausted with
fatigue, were unable to guard the various posts which they daily gained;
and though their camp was filled with Indian auxiliaries, they durst not
devolve this charge upon them, because they were so little accustomed to
discipline, that no confidence could be placed in their vigilance. Besides
this, Cortes was extremely solicitous to preserve the city as much as possible from being destroyed, both because he destined it to be the capital
of his conquests, and wished that it might remain as a monument of his
glory. From all these considerations, he adhered obstinately, for a month
after the siege was opened, to the system which he had adopted. The
Mexicans, in their own defence, displayed valour which was hardly inferior
to that with which the Spaniards attacked them. On land, on water, by
night and by day, one furious conflict succeeded to another. Several Spaniards were killed, more wounded, and all were ready to sink under the
toils of unintermitting service, which were rendered more intolerable by the
injuries of the season, the periodical rains being now set in with their usual
violence.*
Astonished and disconcerted with the length and difficulties of the siege,
Cortes determined to make one great effort to get possession of the city,
before he relinquished the plan which he had hitherto followed, and had
recourse to any other mode of attack. With this view he sent instructions
to Alvarado and Sandoval to advance with their divisions to a general assault, and took the command in person [July 3] of that posted on the causeway of Cuyocan. Animated by his presence, and the expectation of some
decisive event, the Spaniards pushed forward with irresistible impetuosity.
They broke through one barricade after another, forced their way over
the ditches and canals, and, having entered the city, gained ground incessantly in spite of the multitude and ferocity of their opponents. Cortes,
though delighted with the rapidity of his progress, did not forget that he
might still find it necessary to retreat; and, in order to secure it, appointed
Julien de Alderete, a captain of chief note in the troops which- he had received from IHispaniola, to fill up the canals and gaps in the causeway as
the main body advanced. That officer, deeming it inglorious to be thus
employed, while his companions were in the heat of action and the career
of victory, neglected the important charge committed to him, and hurried
on, inconsiderately, to mingle with the combatants. The Mexicans, whose
military attention and skill were daily improving, no sooner observed this
than they carried an account of it to their monarch.
Guatimnozin instantly discerned the consequence of the error which the
Spaniards had committed, and, with admirable presence of mind, prepared
to take advantage of it. He commanded the troops posted in the front to
slacken their efiorts, in order to allure the Spaniards to push forward, while
* B Diaz, c. 151,




AMERICA.                            249
he despatched a large body of chosen warriors through different streets,
some by land, and others by water, towards the great breach in the causeWay which had been left open. On a signal which he gave, the priests
in the principal temple struck the great drum consecrated to the god of
war. No sooner did the Mexicans hear its doleful solemn sound, calculated
to inspire them with contempt of death,- and enthusiastic ardour, than they
rushed upon the enemy with frantic rage. The Spaniards, unable to resist
men urged on no less by religious fury than hope of success, began to re
tire, at first leisurely, and with a good countenance; but as the enemy
pressed on, and their own- impatience to escape increased, the terror and
confusion became so general, that when they arrived at the gap in the
causeway, Spaniards and Tlascalans, horsemen and infantry, plunged in
promiscuously, while the Mexicans rushed upon them fiercely from every
side, their light canoes carrying them through shoals which the brigantines
could not approach. In vain did Cortes attempt to stop and rally his flying
troops; fear rendered them regardless of his entreaties or commands.
Finding all his endeavours to renew the combat fruitless, his next care was
to save some of those who had thrown themselves into the water; but
while thus employed, with more attention to their situation than to his own,
six Mexican captains suddenly laid hold of him, and were hurrying him
off in triumph; and though two of his officers rescued him at the expense
of their own lives, he received several dangerous wounds before he could
break loose. Above sixty Spaniards perished in the rout; and what rendered the disaster more afflicting, forty of these fell alive into the hands
of an enemy never known to show mercy to a captive.*
The approach of night, though it delivered the dejected Spaniards from
the attacks of the enemy, ushered in what was hardly less grievous, the
noise of their barbarous triumph, and of the horrid festival with which
they celebrated their victory. Every quarter of the city was illuminated;
the great temple shone with such peculiar splendour, that the Spaniards
could plainly see the people in motion, and the priests busy in hastening
the preparations for the death of the prisoners. Through the gloom, they
fancied that they discerned their companions by the whiteness of their
skins, as they were stript naked, and compelled to dance before the image
of the god to whom they were to be offered. They heard the shrieks of
those who were sacrificed, and thought that they could distinguish each
anhappy victim by the well known sound of his voice. Imagination added
Io what they really saw or heard, and augmented its horror. The most
Unfeeling melted into tears of compassion, and the stoutest heart trembled
at the dreadful spectacle which they beheld [120].
Cortes, who, besides all that he felt in common with his soldiers, Was
oppressed with the additional load of anxious reflections natural to a general
on such an unexpected calamity, could not, like them, relieve his mind by
giving vent to its anguish. He was obliged to assume an air of tranquibl
Iity, in order to revive the spirit and hopes of his followers. The junCture, indeed, required an extraordinary exertion of fortitude. The 11eficans, elated with their victory, sallied out next morning to attack him iv
his quarters. But they did not rely on the efforts of their own arms alone
They sent the heads of Spaniards whom' they had sacrificed to the leading
men in the adjacent provinces, and assured tlem that the god of war, a~
peased by the blood of their invaders, which had been shed so plentifully
on his altars, had declared with an audible voice, that in eight days time
those hated enemies should be finally destroyed, and peace and prosperity
re-established in the empire.
A prediction uttered with such confidence, and in terms so void of
ambiguity, gained universal credit among a people prone to superstitioni
Cortes Relat. p. 273. B. Diaz, c. 152. Gomara Cron. c. 138. Herrera, dec. 3. llb. i. c. 23.
VoL. I.-32




250                     HISTORY  OF                     [Boox V.
The zeal of the provinces, which had already declared against the Spa.
niards, augmented; and several which had hitherto remained inactive, took
arms, with enthusiastic ardour, to execute the decree of the gods. The
Indian auxiliaries who had joined Cortes, accustomed to venerate the
same deities with the Mexicans, and to receive the responses of their
priests with the same implicit faith, abandoned the Spaniards as a race of
men devoted to certain destruction. Even the fidelity of the Tlascalans
was shaken, and the Spanish troops were left almost alone in their stations.
Cortes, finding that he attempted in vain to dispel the superstitious fears
of his confederates by argument, took advantage, from the imprudence of
those who had framed the prophecy in fixing i's accomplishment so near
at hand, to give a striking demonstration of its falsity. He suspended all
military operations, during the period marked out by the oracle. Under
cover of the brigantines, which kept the enemy at a distance, his troops
lay in safety, and the fatal term expired without any disaster.*
Many of his allies, ashamed of their own credulity, returned to their
station. Other tribes, judging that the gods, who had now deceived the
Mexicans, had decreed finally to withdraw their protection from them,
joined his standard; and such was the levity of a simple people, moved
by every slight impression, that in a short time after such a general defection of his confederates, Cortes saw himself, if we may believe his own
account, at the head of a hundred and fifty thousand Indians.,Even with
such a numerous army, he found it necessary to adopt a new and more
wary system of operation. Instead of renewing his attempts to become
master of tile city at once, by such bold but dangerous efforts of valour as
he had already tried, he made his advances gradually, and with every
possible precaution against exposing his men to any calarnity similar to
that which they still bewailed. As the Spaniards pushed forward, the
Indians regularly repaired the causeways behind them. As soon as they
got possession of any part of the town, the houses were instantly levelled
with the ground. Day by' day, the Mexicans, forced to retire as their
enemies gained ground, were hemmed in within more narrow limits.
Guatimozin, though unable to stop the career of the enemy, continued to
defend his capital with obstinate resolution, and disputed every inch of
ground. The Spaniards not only varied their mode of attack, but, by
orders of Cortes, changed the weapons with which they fought. They
were again armed with the long Chinantlan spears which they had employed with such success against Narvaez; and, by the firm array in which
this enabled them to range themselves, they repelled, with little danger,
the loose assault of the Mexicans: incredible numbers of them fell in the
conflicts which they renewed every day.]' While war wasted without,
famine began to consume them within the city. The Spanish brigantines
having the entire command of the lake, rendered it almost impossible to
convey to the besieged any supply of provisions by water. The immense
lumber of his Indian auxiliaries enabled Cortes to shut up the avenues to'the city by land. The stores which Guatimozin had laid up were exhausted by the multitudes which had crowded into the capital to defend
their sovereign and the temples of their gods. Not only. the people, but
persons of the highest rank, felt the utmost distresses of famine. What
they suffered brought on infectious and mortal distempers, the last calamity
that visits besieged cities, and which filled up the measure of their woes..
Bult under the pressure of so many and such various evils, the spirit of
Guatimozin remained firm and unsubdued. He rejected with scorn every
overture of peace from Cortes; and, disdaining the idea of submitting
to the oppressors of his country, determined not to survive its ruin. The
Spaniards continued their progress.  At length all the three divisions
* B. Diaz, c. 153. Gomara Cron, c. 138.  t Cortes Relat. p. 275. C. 276. F. B. Diaz, c.
153.    + Cortes Relat. 276. E, 277 F. B. Diaz 155 Gomara Cron. c. 141.




AMERICA.                             251
penetrated into the great square in the centre of the city, and made a
secure lodgment there [July 27]. Three-fourths of the city were now
reduced and laid in ruins. - he remaining quarter was so closely pressed,
that it could not long withstand assailants, who attacked it from their new
station with superior advantage, and more assured expectation of success.
The Mexican nobles, solicitous to save the life of a monarch whom they
revered, prevailed on Guatimozin to retire from a place where resistance
was now vain, that he might rouse the more distant provinces of the empire
to arms, and maintaih there a more successful struggle with the public
enemy. In or(ler to facilitate the execution of this measure, they endeavoured
to amuse Cortes with overtures of submission, that, while his attention
was employed in adjusting the articles of pacification, Guatimozin might
escape unperceived.  But they made this attempt upon a leader of greater
sagacity and discernment than to be deceived by their arts. Cortes, suspecting their intention, and aware of what moment it was to defeat it,
appointed Sandoval, the officer on whose vigilance he could most perfectly rely, to take the command of the brigantines, with strict injunctions
to watch every motion of the enemy. Sandoval, attentive to the charge,
observing some large canoes crowded with people rowing across the lake
with extraordinary rapidity, instantly gave the signal to chase. Garcia
Holguin, who commanded the swiftest sailing brigantine, soon overtook
them, and was preparing to fire on the foremost canoe, which seemed to
carry some person whom all the rest followed and obeyed. At once the
rowers dropped their oars, and all on board, throwing down their arms,
conjured him with cries and tears to forbear, as the emperor was there.
Holguin eagerly seized his prize; and Guatimozin, with a dignified composure, gave himself up into his hands, requesting only that no insult
might be offered to the empress or his children. When conducted to Cortes,
he appeared neither with the sullen fierceness of a barbarian, nor with the
dejection of a supplicant. " I have done," said he, addressing himself to
the Spanish general, "what became a monarch. I have defended, my
people to the last extremity. Nothing now remains but to die. Take
this dagger," laying his hand on one which Cortes wore, " plant it in my
breast, and'put an end to a life which can no longer be of use."*
As soon as the fate of:their.sovereign was:known, the resistance of the
Mexicans ceased; and Cortes took possession of that small part of the
capital which yet remained undestroyed [Aug. 13]. Thus terminated the
siege of Mexico, the most memorable event in the conquest of America.
It continued seventy-five days, hardly one of which passed without some
extraordinary effort of one party in the attack, or of the other in the
defence of a city, on the fate of which both knew that the fortune of the
empire depended. As the struggle here was more obstinate, it was likewise more equal than any between the'inhabitants of the Old and New
Worlds. The great abilities of Guatimozin, the number of his troops,
the peculiar situation of his capital, so far counterbalanced the superiority
of the Spaniards in arms and discipline, that they must have, relinquished
the enterprise if they had trusted for success to themselves alone. But
Mexico was overturned by the jealousy ao neighbours who dreaded' its
power, and by the revolt of subjects impatient to shake off its yoke. By
their effectual aid, Cortes was enabled to accomplish what, without such
support, he would hardly have ventured to attempt. -How much soever
this account of the reduction of Mexico may detract, on the one haand
from the marvellous relations of some Spanish writers, by ascrfibing that
to simple and obvious causes which they attribute to the romantic valour
of their countrymen, it adds, on the other, to the merit and abilities of
Cortes, who, under every disadvantage, acquired such an ascendant over
* Cortes Relat. 279. B. Diaz, c. 156; Gomara Cron. c. 142. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. i. 7. 7,




252                      HISTORY OF                      [BooK V
unknown nations, as to render them insL.ruments towards carrying his
schemes into execution [121].
The exultation of the Spaniards, on accomplishing this arduous -enterprise, was at first excessive. But this was quickly damped by the cruel
disappointment of those sanguine hopes which had animated them amidst
so many hardships and dangers  Instead of the inexhaustible wealth
which they expected from becoming masters of Montezuma's treasures,
and the ornaments of so many temples, their rapaciousness could only
collect an inconsiderable booty amidst ruins and desolation.* Guatimozin,
aware of his impending fate, had ordered what remained of the riches
amassed by his ancestors, to be thrown into the lake. The Indian auxiliaries, while the Spaniards were engaged in conflict with the enemy, had
carried off the most valuable part of the spoil. The sum to be divided
among the conquerors was so small that many of them disdained to accept
of the pittance which fell to their share, and all murmured and exclaimed;
some against Cortes and his confidants, whom they suspected of having
secretly appropriated to their own use a large portion of the riches which
should have been brought into the common stock; others, against Guatimozin, whom they accused of obstinacy in refusing to discover the place
where he had hidden his treasure.
Arguments, entreaties, and promises were employed in order to soothe
them, but with so little effect, that Cortes, from solicitude to check this
growing spirit of discontent, gave way to a deed which stains the glory
of all his great actions. W ithout regarding the former dignity of Guatlmozin, or feeling any reverence for those virtues which he had displayed,
he subjected the uinhappy monarch, together with his chief favourite, to
torture, in order to force from them  a discovery of the royal treasures,
which it was supposed they had concealed. Guatimozin bore whatever
the refined cruelty of his tormentors could inflict, with the invincible fortitude of an American warrior. His fellow-sufferer, overcome by the violence of the anguish, turned a dejected eye towards his master, which
seemed to implore his permission to reveal all that he knew. But the
high spirited prince, darting on him  a look of authority mingled with
scorn, checked his weakness by asking, " Am I now reposing on a bed of
flowers?"  Overawed by the reproach, the favourite persevered in his
dutiful silence, and expired. Cortes, ashamed of a scene so horrid,
rescued the royal victim from the hands of his torturers, and prolonged a
life reserved for new indignities and sufferings.t
The fate of the capital, as both parties had foreseen, decided that of the
empire. The provinces submitted one after another to the conquerors.
Small detachments of Spalihards marching through them without interruption, penetrated in different quarters to the great Southern Ocean, which,
according to the ideas of Columbus, they imagined would open a short
as well as easy passage to the East Indies, and secure to the crown of
Castile all the envied wealth of those fertile regions; and the active
mind of Cortes began already to form schemes for attempting this important
discovery.~
He did not know, that during the progress of his victorious arms in
Mexico, the very scheme, of which he began to form some idea, had been
undertaken and accomplished. As this is one of the most splendid events
in the history of the Spanish discoveries, and has been productive of effects
peculiarly interesting to those extensive provinces which Cortes had now
subjected to the crown of Castile, the account of its rise and progress
merits a particular detail.
* The gold and silver according to Cortes, amounted only to 120.000 pesos. Relat. 280. A. a sum
much inferior to that which the Spaniards had formerly divided in Mexico.    t B. Diaz, c. 157
Gomara Cron. c. 146. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 8. Torquem, Mon. Ind. i. 574.  t Cortes Relatl
280. D, &c. B. Diaz, c. 157.  Q Herrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 17. Gomara Cron. c. 149.




AMERICA.                            253
Ferdinand Magalhaens, or Magellan, a Portuguese gentleman of honourable birth, having served several years in the East Indies, with distinguished valour, under the famous Albuquerque, demanded the recompense
which he thought due to his services, with the boldness natural to a high
spirited soldier. But as his general would not grant his suit, and he
expected greater justice from his sovereign, whom he knew to be a good
iudge and a generous rewarder of merit, he quitted India abruptly, and
returned to Lisbon. In order to induce Emanuel to listen more favourably
to his claim, he not only stated his past services, but offered to add to
them by conducting his countrymen to the Molucca or Spice Islands, by
holding a westerly course; which he contended would be-both shorter and
less hazardous than that which the Portuguese now followed by the Cape
of Good Hope, through the immense extent of the Eastern Ocean. This
was the original and favourite project of Columbus, and Magellan founded
his hopes of success on the ideas of that great navigator, confirmed by
many observations, the result of his own naval experience, as well as that
of his countrymen in their intercourse with the East. But though the
Portuguese monarchs had the merit of having first awakened and encouraged the spirit of discovery in that age, it was their destiny, in the.course
of a few years, to reject two grand schemes for this purpose, the execution
of which would have been attended with a great accession of glory to
themselves, and of power to their kingdom. In consequence of some ill
founded prejudice against Magellan, or of some dark intrigue which contemporary historians have not explained, Emanuel would neither bestow
the recompense which he claimed, nor approve of the scheme which he
proposed; and dismissed him with a disdainful coldness intolerable to a
man conscious of what he deserved, and animated with the sanguine hopes
of success peculiar to those who are capable of forming or of conducting
new and great undertakings. In a transport of resentment [1517], Magellan
formally renounced his allegiance to an ungrateful master, and fled to the
court of Castile, where he expected that his talents would be more justly
estimated. He endeavoured to recommend himself byoffering to execute,
under the patronage of Spain, that scheme which he had laid before the
court of Portugal, the accomplishment of which, he knew, would wound
the monarch against whom he was exasperated in the most tender part.
In order to establish the justness of his -theory, he produced the same
arguments which he had employed at Lisbon; acknowledging, at the
same time, that the undertaking was both arduous and expensive, as it could
not be attempted but with a squadron of considerable force, and victualled
for at least two years. Fortunately, he applied to a minister who was not
apt to be deterred, either by the boldness of a design, or the expense of
carrying it into execution. Cardinal Ximenes, who at that time directed
the affairs of Spain, discerning at once what an increase of wealth and
glory would accrue to his'country by the success of Magellan's proposal,
listened to'it with a most favourable ear. Charles V., on his arrival in his
Spanish dominions, entered into the measure with no less ardour, and orders
were issued for equipping a proper squadron at the public charge, of which
the command was given to Magellan, whom the King honoured with the
habit of St. Jago and the title of Captain general.*
On the tenth of August, one thousand five hundred and nineteen, Magellan sailed from Seville with five ships, which, according to the ideas of
the age, were deemed to be of considerable force, though the burden of
the largest did not exceed one hundred and twenty tons. The crews of
the whole amounted to two hundred and thirty-four men, among whom
were some- of the most skilful pilots in Spain, and several Portuguese
a Herrera, dec. 2. lib. ii. c. 19. lib. iv. c. 9. Gomara Hist.: c, 91. Dalrymple's Collect. of Voyages
to the South Pacific Ocean, vol. i. p. 1, &c.




254                     HISTORY  OF                       [BooK V.
sailors, in whose experience, as more extecsive, M~I'elk.: n!?].ced still
greater confidence.  After touching at the Canaries, hti spod directly
south towards the equinoctial line along the coast of' Alree-'ic;i, L ut w:.s so
long retarded by tedious calms, and spent so much time in serchin' >i.i eriy
bay and inlet for that communication with the Soutiern G(ce,!;n whlich lhe
wished to discover, that he did not reach the river De 1Ac Pl;ita till the
twelfth of January [1520]. That spacious opening throughl-l hich iis vast
body of water pours into the Atlantic allured hrim  to enteir  but atter
sailing up it for some days, he concluded. from  the shallowness of the
stream and the freshness of the water, that the wished-for strait was not
situated there, and continued his course towards the south. Oni the thittyfirst of March he arrived in the Port of St. Julian, about forty-eight degees
south of the line, where he resolved to winter.  In this uncomfortable
station he lost one of his squadron; and the Spaniards suffered so mllch
from  the excessive rigour of the climate, that the crews of three of his
ships, headed by their officers, rose in open mutiny, and insisted on reiinquishing the visionary project of a desperate adventurer, and returning
directly to Spain. This dangerous insurrection Magellan suppressed, by
an effort ot courage no less prompt than intrepid, and inflicted exemplary
punishment on the ringleaders.  With the remainder of his followers,
overawed but not reconciled to his scheme, he continued his voyage towards
the south, and at length discovered, near the fifty-third degree of latitude,
the mouth of a strait, into which he entered, notwithstanding the murmurs
and remonstrances of the people under his command. After sailing twenty
days in that winding dangerous channel, to which he gave his own name,
and where one of his ships deserted him, the great Southern Ocean opened
to his view, and with tears of joy he returned thanks to Heaven for having
thus fax crowned his endeavours with success.*
But he was still at a greater distance than he imagined from the object
of his wishes. He sailed during three months and twenty days in a unifbrm
direction towards the north-west, withcut discovering land.- In this voyage,
the longest that had ever been made in the unbounded ocean, he suffered
incredible distress. His stock of provisions was almost exhausted, the
water became putrid, the men were reduced to the shortest allowance
with which- it was possible to sustain life, and the scurvy, the most dreadful
of all the maladies with which seafaring people are inflicted, began to
spread among the crew. One circumstance alone afforded them  some
consolation; they enjoyed an uninterrupted course of fair weather, with
such favourable winds that Magellan bestowed on that ocean the name of
Pacific, which it still retains. When reduced to such extremity that they
must have sunk under their sufferings, they fell in with a cluster of small
but fertile islands [March 6], which afforded them refieshments in such
abundance, that their health was soon re-established. From these isles,
which he called De los Ladrones, he proceeded on his voyage, and soon
made a more important discovery of the islands now known by the name
of the Philippines.  In one of these he got into an unfortunate quarrel
with the natives, who attacked him with a numerous body of troops well
armed; and while he fought at the head of his men with his usual valour,
he fell [April 26] by the hands of those barbarians, together with several
of his principal officers.
The expedition was prosecuted under other commanders. After visiting
many of the smaller isles scattered in the eastern part of the Indian ocean,
they touched at the great island of Borneo [Nov. 8], and at length landed
in ridore, one of the'Moluccas, to the astonishmeint of the Portuguese,
who could not comprehend how the Spaniards, by holding a westerly
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. iv. c. 10. lib. ix. c. 10, &c, Gomara Hist. c. 92. Pigafetta Viaggio al&
Ramus. ii. p. 352, &c.




AMERICA.                              255
course, had arrived at that sequestered seat of their most valuable commerce, which they themselves had discovered by sailing in an opposite
direction. There, and in the adjacent isles, the Spaniards found a people
acquainted with the benefits of extensive trade, and willing to open an
intercourse with a new nation.  They took in a cargo of the precious
spices, which are the distinguished production of these islands; and with
that, as well as with specimens of the rich commodities yielded by the
other countries which they had visited, the Fictory, which, of the two ships
that remained of the squadron, was most fit for a long voyage, set sail for
Europe [Jan. 1522], under the command of Juan Sebastian del Cano. lHe
followed the course of the Portuguese, by the Cape of Good Hope, and
after many disasters and sufferings he arrived at St. Lucar on the seventh
of September, one thousand five hundred and twenty-two, having sailed
round the globe in the space of three years and twenty-eight days.,
Though an untimely fate deprived Magellan of the satisfaction of
accomplishing this great undertaking, his contemporaries, just to his
memory and talents, ascribed to him not only the honour of having formed
the plan, but of having surmounted almost every obstacle, to the completion
of it; and in the present age his name is still ranked among the highest
in the roll of eminent and successful navigators.  The naval glory of Spain
now eclipsed that of every other nation; and by a singular felicity she had
the merit, in the course of a few years, of discovering a new continent
almost as large as that part of the earth which was formerly known, and
of ascertaining by experience the form and extent of the whole of the
terraqueous globe.
The Spaniards were not satisfied with the glory of having first encompassed the earth; they expected to derive great commercia  advantages
from this new and boldest effort of their maritime skill.  The men of
science among them contended, that the Spice Islands, and several of the
richest countries in the East, were so situated as to belong of right to the
crown of Castile, in consequence of the partitions made by Alexander VI.
The merchants, without attending to this discussion, engaged eagerly in that
lucrative and alluring commerce, which was now open to them. The
Portuguese, alarmed at the intrusion of such formidable rivals, remonstrated
and negotiated in Europe, while in Asia they obstructed the trade of the
Spaniards by force of arms. Charles V., not sufficiently instructed with
respect to the importance of this valuable branch of commerce, or distracted
by the multiplicity of his schemes and operations, did not afford his subjects proper protection. At last, the low state of his finances, exhausted
by the efforts of his arms in every part of Europe, together with the dread
of adding a new war with Portugal to those in which he was already engaged, induced him to make over his claim of the Moluccas to the Portuguese for three hundred and fifty thousand ducats. i He reserved, however,
to the crown of Castile the right of reviving its pretensions on repayment
of that sum; but other objects engrossed his attention and that of his successors; and Spain was finally excluded from a branch of commerce in
which it was engaging with sanguine expectations of profit.t
Though the trade with the Moluccas was relinquished, the voyage of
Magellan was followed by commercial effects of great moment to Spain.
Philip II., in the year one thousand five hundred and sixty-four, reduced
those islands which he discovered in the Eastern ocean to subjection, and
established settlements there; between which and the kingdom of New
Spain a regular intercourse, the nature of which shall be explained In its
groper place, is still carried on. I return now to the transactions in New
pain. 
* Herrera, dec. 3. lib, i. c. 3. 9. lib. iv. c. 1. Gomara Cron. c. 93, &c. Pigafetta ap. Ramu&a i.
p. 361, &c.  t Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iii. c. 5 &c. dec. 4. lib. v. c 7, &c.




256-                     HISTORY OF                       [BOOK V.
At the time that Cortes was acquiring such extensive territories for his.
native country, and preparing the way for future conquests, it was his
singular fate not only to be destitute of any commission or authority from
the sovereign whom he was serving with such successful zeal, but to be
regarded as an undutiful and seditious subject. By the influence of Fon~eca, Bishop of B3urgos, his conduct in assuming the government of New
Spain was declared to be an irregular usurpation, in:contempt of the royal
authority; and Christoval de Tapia received a commission, empowering
him to supersede Cortes, to seize his person, to confiscate his effects, to
make a strict scrutiny into his proceedings, and to transmit the result of
all' the inquiries carried on in New Spain to the Councilof the Indies, of
which the Bishop of Burgos was president. A few weeks after the reduction of Mexico, Tapia landed at Vera Cruz with the royal mandate to
strip its conqueror of his power, and treat him as a criminal. But Fonseca
had chosen a very improper instrument to wreak his vengeance on Cortes.
Tapia had neither the reputation nor the talents that suited the high commind to which he was appointed.  Cortes, while he publicly expressed
the most respectful veneration for the emperor's authority, secretly took
measures to defeat the effect of his'commission; and having involved
Tapia and his followers in a multiplicity of negotiations and conferences,
in which he sometimes had recourse to threats, but -more frequently employed bribes and promises, he at length prevailed upon that weak man
to abandon a province which he was unworthy of governing.*
But notwithstanding the fortunate dexterity with which he had eluded
this danger, Cortes was so sensible of the precarious tenure by which he
held his power, that he despatched deputies to Spain [May 15], with a
pompous account of the success of his arms, with further specimens of the
productions of the country, and with rich presents to the emperor, as the
earnest of future contributions from his new  conquests; requesting, in
recompense for all his services, the approbation of his proceedings, and
that he might be intrusted with the government of those dominions, which
his conduct and the valour of his followers had added to the crown of Castile.
The juncture in which his deputies reached the court was favourable. The 
internal commotions in Spain, which had disquieted the beginning of
Charles's reign, were just appeased.t  The ministers had leisure to turn
their attention towards foreign affairs. The account of Cortes's victories
filled his countrymen with admiration. The extent and value of his conquests became the object of vast and interesting hopes. Whatever stain
he might have contracted, by the irregularity of the steps which he took
in order to attain power, was so fully effaced by the splendour and merit
of the great actions which this had enabled him to perform, that every
heart revolted at the thought of inflicting any censure on a man whose
services entitled him  to the highest marks of distinction. The public
voice declared warmly in favour of his pretensions; and Charles, arriving
in Spain about this time, adopted the sentiments of his subjects with a
youthful ardour. Notwithstanding the claims of Velasquez, and the-partial
representations of the Bishop of Burgos, the emperor appointed Cortes
captain general and governor of New Spain, judging that no person was
so-capable of maintaining the royal authority, or of establishing good order
both among his Spanish and Indian subjects, as the victorious leader whom
the. former had. long been accustomed to obey, and the latter: had been.
taught to fear and to. respect.,+
Even before his jurisdiction received.this legal sanction, Cortes ventured
to exercise all the powers of a governor, and, by various arrangements,
* Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iii. c. 16. 3. dec. 4. c. 1. Cort. Relat. 281. E. B. Diaz. c. 158.   t Hiisr.
of Charles V. b. iii.   + Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c 3. Gomara Cron. c. 164, 165. B. Diaz
167, 168




AMERICA.                             257
endeavoured to render his conquest a secure and beneficial acquisition
to his country. He determined to establish the seat of government in its
ancient station, and to raise Mexico again from its ruins; and having con.
ceived high ideas concerning the future grandeur of the state of which he
was laying the foundation, he began to rebuild its capital on a plan which
bath gradually formed the most magnificent city in the New World. At
the same time, he employed skilful persons to search for mines, in different
parts of the country, and opened some which were found to be richer than
any which the Spaniards had hitherto discovered in America. He detached
his principal officers into the remote provinces, and encouraged them to
settle there, not only by bestowing upon them large tracts of land, but by
granting them the same dominion over the Indians, and the same right to
their service, which the Spaniards had assumed in the islands.
It was not, however, without difficulty that the Mexican empire could
be entirely reduced into the form of a Spanish colony. Enraged and rendered desperate by oppression, the natives often forgot the superiority of
their enemies, and ran to arms in defence of their liberties. In every
contest, however, the European valour and discipline prevailed.  But
fatally for the honour of their country, the Spaniards sullied the glory
redounding from these repeated victories by their mode of treating the
vanquished people. After taking Guatimozin, and becoming masters of
his capital, they supposed that the king of Castile entered on possession of
all the rights of the captive monarch, and affected to consider every effort
of the Mexicans to assert their own independence, as the rebellion of
vassals against their sovereign, or the mutiny of slaves against their master.
Under the sanction of those ill founded maxims, they violated every right
that should be held sacred between hostile nations. After each insurrection, they reduced the common people, in the provinces which they subdued, to the most humiliating of all conditions, that of personal servitude.
Their chiefs, supposed to be more criminal, were punished with greater
severity, and put to death in the most ignominious or the most excruciating
mode that the insolence or the cruelty of their conquerors could devise.
In almost every district of the Mexican empire, the progress of the Spanish arms is marked with blood, and with deeds so atrocious as disgrace
the enterprising valour that conducted them to success. In the country of
Panuco, sixty caziques or leaders, and four hundred nobles, were burned
at one time. Nor was this shocking barbarity perpetrated in any sudden
sally of rage, or by a commander of inferior note. It was the act of Sandoval, an officer whose name is entitled to the second rank in the annals of
New Spain, and executed after a solemn consultation with Cortes; and to
complete the horror of the scene, the children and relations of the wretched
victims were assembled, and compelled to be spectators of their dying
agonies.* It seems hardly possible to exceed in horror this dreadful example of severity; but it was followed by another, which affected the
Mexicans still more sensibly, as it gave them a most feeling proof of their
own degradation, and of the:mnall regard which their haughty masters
retained for the ancient digrity and splendour of their state. On a slight
suspicion, confirmed by v urY iinperfect evidence, that Guatimozin had
formed a scheme to shale off the yoke, and to excite his former subjects
to take arms, Cortes, without the formality of a trial, ordered the unhappy
monarch, together with the caziques of Tezeuco and Tacuba, the two
persons of greatest eminence in the empire, to be hanged; and the
Mexicans, with astonishment and horror, beheld this disgraceful punish
ment inflicted upon persons to whom they were accustomed to look up
with reverence hardly inferior to that which they paid to the gods them
selvest [122]. The example of Cortes and his principal officers encou
* Cortes Relat. 291, C. Gomara Cron. c. 155.  t Gomara Cron; c. 170. B. Diaz, c. 177HIerrera, dec. 3. lib. viii. c. 9.
VOL. I.-33                   13




f.S~:            H          HISTORY OF                    [Book V.
raged and justified persons of subordinate rank to venture upon committing
greater excesses. JNuno de Guzman, in particular, stained anl illustrio-u.
name by deeds of peculiar enormity and rigour, in various expeditions
which he conducted.?
One circumstance, however, saved the Mexicans from further consumption, perhaps from as complete as that which had depopulated the islands.
The first conquerors did not attempt to search for the precious metals in
the bowels of the earth. They were neither sufficiently wealthy to carry
on the expensive works which are requisite for opening those deep recesses
where nature has concealed the veins of gold and silver, nor sufficiently
skilfful to perform the ingenious operations by which those precious metals
are separated from their respective ores. They were satisfied with the
more simple method, practised by the Indians, of washing the earth carried down rivers and torrents from the mountains, and collecting the grains
of native metal deposited there.  The rich mines of New Spain, which
have poured forth their treasures with such profusion on every quarter of
the globe, were not discovered for several years after the conquest.t  By
that time [1552, &c.], a more orderly government and police were introduced into the colony; experience, derived fiom former errors, had suggested many useful and humane regulations for the protection and preservation of the Indians; and though it then became necessary to increase
the number of those employed in the mines, and they were engaged in a
species of labour more pernicious to the human constitution, they suffered
less hardship or diminution than from  the ill judged, but less extensive,
schemes of the first conquerors.
While it was the lot of the Indians to suffer, their new masters seemed
not to have derived any considerable wealth from their ill conducted researches. According to the usual fate of first settlers in new colonies, it
was their lot to encounter langer and to struggle with difficulties; the
fruits of their victories and oils were reserved for times of tranquillity,
and reaped by successors ot'great industry, but of inferior merit. The
early historians of America abound with accounts of the sufferings and of
the poverty of its conquerors.4 In New Spain, their condition was rendered more grievous by a peculiar arrangement. When Charles V. advanced Cortes to the government of that country, he at the same time
appointed certain commissioners to receive and administer the royal revenue there, with independent jurisdiction.~ These men, chosen fiom inferior stations in various departments of public business at Madrid, were sc
much elevated with their promotion, that they thought they were called
to act a part of the first consequence. But being accustomed to the
minute formalities of office, and having contracted the narrow ideas suited
to the sphere in which they had hitherto moved, they were astonished on
arriving in Mexico [1524], at the high authority which Cortes exercised,
and could not conceive that the mode of administration, in a country recently subdued and settled, must be different from what took place in one
where tranquillity and regular government had been long established. In
their letters, they represented Cortes as an ambitious tyrant, who, having
usurped a jurisdiction superior to law, aspired at independence, and, by
his exorbitant wealth and extensive influence, might accomplish those disloyal schemes which he apparently meditated.I1  These insinuations made
such deep impression upon the Spanish ministers, most of whom had beeni
formed to business under the jealous and rigid administration of Ferdi
nand, that, unmindful of all Cortes's past services, and regardless of what
he was then suffering in conducting that extraordinary expedition, in which
he advanced from the lake of Mexico to the western extremities of Hon.
* Herrera, dec. 4 and 5. passim.   t Ibid. dec. 8. lih. x. c. 21.:  Cortes Relat. 283. F. B
Diaz, c. 209.    Q Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 3.    1) Ibid. dec. 3. lilt. v. c 14.




AMERICA.                              259
duras [123], they infused the same suspicions into the minds of their master, and prevailed on him to order a soleInn inquest to be made into his
conduct [1525], with powers to the licentiate Ponce de Leon, iltrusted
with that commission, to seize his person, if he should find that expedient,
and send him prisoner to Spain.?
The sudden death of Ponce de Leon, a few days after his arrival in New
Spain, prevented the execution of this commission. But as the object of
his appointment was known, the mind of- Cortes was deeply wounded
with this unexpected return for services which far exceeded whatever any
subject of Spain had rendered to his sovereign. He endeavoured., however, to maintain his station, and to recover the confidence of the court.
But every person in office, who had arrived front Spain since the conquest,
was a spy upon his conduct, and with malicious ingenuity gave an unfavourable representation of all his actions. The apprehensions of Charles
and h.s ministers increased. A new commission of inquiry was issued
[1528J, with more extensive powers, and various precautions were taken
in order to prevent or to punish him, if he should be so presumptuous as
to attempt what was inconsistent with the fidelity of a subject.t   Cortes
beheld the approaching crisis cf his fortune with all the violent emotions
natural to a haughty mind conscious of high desert, and receiving unworthy
treatment.  But though some of his desperate followers urged him to assert
his own rights against his ungrateful country, and with a bold hand to seize
that power which the courtiers meanly accused him of coveting,~ he retained such self command, or was actuated with such sentiments of loyalty,
as to reject their dangerous counsels, and to choose the only course in
which he could secure his own dignity, without departing from his duty.
He resolved not to expose himself to the ignominy of a trial in that country which had been the scene of his triumphs; but, without waiting for
the arrival of his judges, to repair directly to Castile, and commit hinself
and his cause to the justice and generosity of his sovereign.~
Cortes appeared in his native country with the splendour that suited the
conqueror of a mighty kingdom. He brought with him a great part of his
wealth, many jewels and ornaments of great value, several curious productions of the country [124], and was attended by some Mexicans of the first
rank, as well as by the most. considerable of his own officers. His arrival
in Spain removed at once every suspicion and fear that had been entertained with respect to his intentions. The emperor, having now nothing
to apprehend from the designs of Cortes, received him like a person whom
consciousness of his own innocence had brought into the presence of his
master, and who was entitled, by the eminence of his services, to the
highest marks of distinction and respect. The order of St. Jago, the title
of Marquis del Valle de Guaxaca, the grant of an ample territory in New
Spain, were successively'bestowed upon him; and as his manners were
correct and elegant, although he had passed the greater part of his life
among rough adventurers, the emperor admitted him to the same familiar
intercourse with himself, that was enjoyed by noblemen of the first rankll
But, amidst those external proofs of regard, symptoms of remaining distrust appeared.  Though Cortes earnestly solicited to be reinstated in the
government of New Spain, Charles, too sagacious to commit such an im..
portant charge to a man whom he had once suspected, peremptorily refused to invest him again with powers which he might find it impossible
to control. Cortes, though dignified with new titles, returned to Mexico
[1530], with diminished authority.  The  military  department, with
powers to attempt new discoveries, was left in his hands; but the supreme
direction of civil affairs was placed in a board called The Audience of
*  Herrera, dec. 3. lib. viii. c. 14, 15.  t Ibid. dec. 3. lih. viii. c. 15. dec. 4. lib. ii. c. 1. lib. iv.
c. 9, 10. B. Diaz, c. 172. 196. Gomara Cron. c. 166.  + B. Diaz, c. 194.  S Herrera, dec 3.
lib. iv. c. 8.    I[ Ibid. dec. 3 lib  iv. c. I. lib. vi. c. 4.  B. Diaz, c. 196.  Gomara Cron. c. 192.




260                     HISTORY OF                      tBOOK V.
New,palin. At a subsequent period, when, upon the increase of the
colony, the exertion of authority more united and extensive became necessary, Antonio de Mendoza, a nobleman of high rank, was sent thither as
Viceroy, to take the government into his hands.
This division of power in New Spain proved, as was unavoidable, the
source of perpetual dissension, which imbittered the life of Cortes, and
thwarted all his schemes. As he had now no opportunity to display his
active -talents but in attempting new discoveries, he formed various schemes
for that purpose, all of which bear impressions of a genius that delighted
in what was bold and splendid. He early entertained an idea, that, either
by steering through the Gulf of Florida along the east coast of North
America, some strait would be found that communicated with the western
ocean; or that, by examining the isthmus of Darien, some passage would
be discovered between the North and South Seas.* But having been disappointed in his expectations with respect to both, he now confined his
views to such voyages of discovery as he could make from the ports of
New Spain in the South Sea. There he fitted out successively several
small squadrons, which either perished in the attempt, or returned without
making any discovery of moment. Cortes, weary of intrusting the conduct of his operations to others, took the command of a new armament in
person [1536]; and, after enduring incredible hardships, and encountering
dangers of every species, he discovered the large peninsula of California,
and surveyed the greater part of the gulf which separates it from New
Spain. The discovery of a country of such extent'would have reflected
credit on a common adventurer; but it could add little new honour to the
name of Cortes, and was far from satisfying the sanguine expectations
which he had formed.t Disgusted with ill success, to which he had not
been accustomed, and weary of contesting with adversaries to whom he
considered it as a disgrace to be opposed, he once more sought for redress
in his native country 1l540].
But his reception there was very different from that which gratitude, and
even decency, ought to have secured for him. The merit of his ancient
exploits was already, in a great measure, forgotten or eclipsed by the fame
of recent and more valuable conquests in another quarter of America. No
service of moment was now expected from a man of declining years, and
who began to be unfortunate. The emperor behaved to him with cold
civility; his ministers treated him sometimes with neglect, sometimes with
insolence. His grievances received no redress; his claims were urged
without effect; and after several years spent in fruitless application to
ministers and judges, an occupation the most irksome and mortifying to a
man of high spirit, who had moved in a sphere where he was more accustomed to command than to solicit, Cortes ended his days on-the second
of December, one thousand five hundred and forty-seven, in the sixtysecond year of his age. His fate was the same with that of all the persons who distinguished themselves in the discovery or conquest of the
New World. Envied by his contemporaries, and ill requited by the court
which he served, he has been admired and celebrated by succeeding ages
Which has formed the most just estimate of his character, an impartial
consideration of his actions must determine.
* Cortes Relat. Ram. iii. 294 B.  t Herrera, dec. 5. lib. viii.. 9, 10. dec. 8. lb, vi.d 14 Vo
wagas Hist. of Califon. 1. 125. Lorenziaaa His. p. 322, &c.




AM ERICA.                           261
1523.] FROM the time that Nugnez de Balboa discovered the great
Southern Ocean, and received the first obscure hints concerning the opulent
countries with which it m-ight open a communication, the wishes and
schemes of every enterprising person in the colonies of Darien and Panama were turned towards the wealth of those unknown regions. In an
age when the spirit of adventure was. so ardent and vigorous, that large
fortunes were wasted, and the most alarming dangers braved, in pursuit
of discoveries merely possible, the faintest ray of hope was followed with
an eager expectation, and the slightest information was sufficient to inspire
such perfect confidence as conducted men to the most arduous undertakings [12.5.
Accordingly, several armaments were fitted out in order to explore and
take possession of the countries to the east of Panama, but under the conduct of leaders whose talents and resources were unequal to the attempt.~
As the excursions of those adventurers did not extend beyond the limits
of the province to which the Spaniards have given the name of Tierra
Firme, a mountainous region covered with woods, thinly inhabited, and
extremely unhlealthy, they returned with dismal accounts concerning the
distresses to which they had been exposed, and the unpromising aspect of
the places which they had visited. Damped by these tidings, the rage
for discovery in that direction abated; and it became the general opinion
that Balboa had founded visionary hopes, on the tale of an ignorant Indian,
ill understood, or calculated to deceive.!524.] But there were three persons settled in Panama, on whom the
circumstances which deterred others made s9 little impression, that,'at the
very moment when all considered Balboa's expectations of discovering a
rich country, by steering towards the east, as chimerical, they resolved to
attempt the execution of his scheme. The names of those extraordinary
men were Francisco Pizarro, Diego de Alinagro, and Hernando Luque
Pizarro was the natural son of a gentleman of an honourable family by a
very low woman, and, accordiing to the cruel fate which often attends the
offspring of unlawful love, had been so totally neglected in his youth by
the author of his birth, that he seems to have destined him never to rise
beyond the condition of his mother. In consequence of this ungenerous
idea, he set him, when bordering on manhood, to keep hogs. But the
aspiring mind of young Pizarro disdaining that ignoble occupation, he
abruptly abandoned his charge, enlisted as a soldier, and after serving
some years in Italy, embarked for America, which, by opening such a
boundless range to active talents, allured every adventurer whose fortune
was not equal to his ambitious thcughts. There Pizarro early distinguished
hiraself. With a temper of mnind no less daring than the constitution ot
his body was robust, he was foremost in every danger, patient under the
greatest hardships, and unsubdued by any fatigue. Though so illiterate
that he could not even read, he was soon considered as a man formed to
command. Every operation committed to his conduct proved successful
as, by a happy but rare conjunction, he united perseverance with ardorur,
and was as cautious in executing as he was bold in forming his plans. By
engaging early in active life, without any resource but his own talents and
industry, and by depending on himself alone in his struggles to emerge
from obscurity, he acquired such a thorough knowledge of affairs, and of
* Calancha Coronica, p. 100




262                    H ISTORY   OF                   [BooK VI.
men, that he was fitted to assume a superior part in conducting the former,
and in governing the latter.*
Almagro had as little to boast of his descent as Pizarro. The one was
a bastard, the other a foundling. Bred, like his companion, in the camp,
he yielded not to him in any of the soldierly qualities of intrepid valour,
indefatigable activity, or insurmountable constancy in enduring the hardships inseparable from military service in the New World. But in Almagro
these virtues were accompanied with the openness, generosity, and candour,
natural to men whose profession is arms; in Pizarro, they were united with
the address, the craft, and the dissimulation of a politician, with the art of
concealing his own purposes, and with sagacity to penetrate into those of
other men.
Hernando de Luque was an ecclesiastic, who acted both as priest and
schoolmaster at Panama, and, by means which the conteimporary writers
have not described, had amassed riches that inspired him with thoughts
of rising to greater eminence.
Such were the men destined to overturn one of the most extensive empires on the face of the earth. Their confederacy for this purpose was
authorized by Pedrarias, the governor of Panama. Each engaged to
employ his whole fortune in the adventure. Pizarro, the least wealthy of
the three, as he could not throw so large a sum as his associates into the
common stock, engaged to take the department of greatest fatigue and
danger, and to command in person the armament which was to go first
upon discovery. Almagro offered to conduct the supplies of provisions
and reinforcements of troops, of which Pizarro might stand in need.
Luque was to remain at Panama to negotiate with the governor, and
superintend whatever was carrying on for the general interest. As the
spirit of enthusiasm uniformly accompanied that of adventure in the New
World, and by that strange union both acquired an increase of force, this
confederacy, formed by ambition and avarice, was confirmed by the most
solemn act of religion. Luque celebrated mass, divided a consecrated
host into three, and, reserving one part to himself, gave the other two to
his associates, of which they partook; and thus, in the name of the Prince
of Peace, ratified a contract of which plunder and bloodshed were the
objects.jt
The attempt was begun with a force more suited to the humble condition of the three associates than to the greatness of the enterprise in
which they were engaged. Pizarro set sail trom Panama [Nov. 14], with
a single vessel of small burden and a hundred and twelve men. But in
that age, so little were the Spanish acquainted with the* peculiarities of
the climate in America, that the time which Pizarro chose for his departure
was the most improper in the whole year; the periodical winds, which
were then set in, being directly adverse to the course which he proposed
to steer.4  After beating about for seventy days, with much danger and
incessant fatigue, Pizarro's progress towards the south-east was not greater
than what a skilful navigator will now make in as many hours. He
touched at several places on the coast of Tierra Firme, but found every
where the same uninviting country which forrrer adventurers had described;
the low grounds converted into swamps by an overflowing of rivers; the
higher. covered with impervious woods; few inhabitants, and those fierce
and hostile. Famine, fatigue, frequent rencounters with the natives, and,
above all, the distempers of a moist, sultry climate, combined in wasting
his slender band of followers.  [1525.] The undaunted resolution of their
leader continued, however, for some time, to sustain their spirits, although
no sign had yet appeared of discovering those golden regions to which he
* Herrera, dec. 1 & 2. passim, dec. 4. lib. vi. c. 107. Gomara Hist. c. 144. Zarate, lib. iv. c. 9'3
t Herrera, dec. 3. lib. vi. c. 13.  Zarate, lib. i. c. 1.:  Ibid. dec. 4. lib. ii c. 8,  Xerez, p. 179.




A ME R I CA.                         263
had promised to conduct them. At length he was obliged to abandon that
inhospitable coast, and retire to Chuchama, opposite to the pearl islands,
where he hoped to receive a supply of provisions and troops from Panama.
But Almagro, having sailed from that port with seventy men, stood
directly towards that part of the continent where he hoped to meet with
his associates. Not finding him there, he landed his soldiers, who, in
searching fbr their companions, underwent the same distresses, and were
exposed to the same dangers, which had driven them out of the country.
Repulsed at length by the Indians in a sharp conflict, in which their leader
lost one of his eyes by the wound of an arrow, they likewise were corn
pelled to re-embark. Chance led them to the place of Pizarro's retreat,
where they found some consolation in recounting to each other their adventures, and comparing their sufferings. As Almagro had advanced as
far as the river St. Juan [June 24], in the province of Popayan, where
both the country and inhabitants appeared with a more promising. aspect,
that dawn of better fortune was sufficient to determine such sanguine projectors not to abandon their scheme, notwithstanding all that they had
suffered in prosecuting it' [126].
1526.] Almagro repaired to Panama in hopes of recruiting their shat
tered troops. But what he and Pizarro had suffered gave his countrymen
such an unfavourable idea of the service, that it was with difficulty he could
levy fourscore men.t Feeble as this reinforcement was, Almagro took the
command of it, and, having joined Pizarro, they did not hesitate about
resuming their operations. After a long series of disasters and disappointments, not inferior to those which they had already experienced, part of
the armament reached the Bay of St. Matthew, on the coast of quito, and
landing at Tacamez, to the south of the river of Emeraulds, they beheld
a country more champaign and fertile than any they had yet discovered in
the Southern Ocean, the natives clad in garments of woolien or cotton stuff,
and adorned with several trinkets of' gold and silver.
But notwithstanding those favourable appearances, magnified beyond the
truth, both by the vanity of the persons who brought the report from Tacamez, and by the fond imagination of those wholistened to them, Pizarro
and Almagro durst not venture to invade a country so populous with a
handful of men enfeebled by fatigue and diseases. They retired to the
small island of Gallo, where Pizarro remained with part of the troops, and
his associate returned to Panama, in hopes of bringing such a reinforcement
as might enable them  to take possession of the opulent territories whose
existence seemed to be no longer doubtful.+
But some of the adventurers, less enterprising, or less hardy, than their
leaders, having secretly conveyed lamentable accounts of their sufferings
and losses to their friends at Panama, Almagro met with an unfavourable
reception from Pedro de los Rios, who had succeeded Pedrarias in the
government of that settlement. After weighing the matter with that cold
economical prudence which appears the first of all virtues to persons whose
limited faculties are incapable of conceiving or executing great designs, he
concluded an expedition, attended with such certain waste of men, to be so
detrimental to an infant and feeble colony, that he not only prohibited the
raising of new levies, but despatched a vessel to bring home Pizarro and
his companions fiom the island of Gallo.  Almagro and Luque, though
deeply affected with those measures, which they could not prevent, and
durst not oppose, found means of communicating their sentiments privately
to Pizarro, and exhorted him not to relinquish an enterprise that was the
foundation of all their hopes, and the only means of re-establishing their
reputation and fortune, which were both on the decline. Pizarro's mind,
* Herrera, dec. 3. lib. viii. c. 11, 1.  t Zarate, lib c. l c. 1.  Xerez, 181.  Herrera, dlec.
3. lib. viii. c. 1.3.




264                      HISTORY  OF                     [Book VI.
bent with inflexible obstinacy on all its purposes, needed no incentive to
persist in the scheme. He peremptorily refused to obey the governor of
Panama's orders, and employed all his address and eloquence in persuading
his men not to abandon him. But the incredible calamities to which they
had been exposed were still so recent in their memories, and the thoughts
of revisiting their families and friends, after a long absence, rushed with
such joy into their minds, that when Pizarro drew a line upon the sand
with his sword, permitting such as wished to return home to pass over it,
only thirteen of all the daring veterans in his service had resolution to remain
with their commander.*
This small but determined band, whose names the Spanish historians
record with deserved praise, as the persons to whose persevering fortitude
their country is indebted for the most valuable of all its American possessions, fixed their residence in the island of Gorgona. This, as it was further
removed from the coast than Gallo, and uninhabited, they considered as a
more secure retreat, where, unmolested, they might wait for supplies from
Panama, which they trusted that the activity of their associates would be
able to procure. Almagro and Luque were not inattentive or cold solicitors,
and their incessant importunity was seconded by the general voice of the
colony, which exclaimed loudly against the infamy of exposing brave men,
engaged in the public service, and chargeable with no error but what flowed
from an excess of zeal and courage, to perish like the most odious criminals
in a desert island. Overcome by those entreaties and expostulations, the
governor at last consented to send a small vessel to their relief. But that
he might not seem to encourage Pizarro to any new enterprise, he would
not permit one landman to embark on board of it.
By this time, Pizarro and his companions had remained five months in
an island infamous for the most unhealthy climate in that region of America [127]. During all this period, their eyes were turned towards Panama, in
hopes of succour from their countrymen; but worn out at length with fruitless expectations, and dispirited with suffering hardships of which they saw
no end, they, in despair, came to a resolution of committing themselves to
the ocean on a float, rather than continue in that detestable abode. But, on
the arrival of the vessel from Panama, they were transported with such joy
that all their sufferings were forgotten. Their hopes revived; and, with a
rapid transition not unnatural among men accustomed by their mode of life
to sudden vicissitudes of fortune, high confidence succeeding to extreme
dejection, Pizarro easily induced not only his own followers, but the crew
of the vessel from Panama, to resume his former scheme with fiesh ardour.
Instead of returning to Panama, they stood towards the south-east, and,
more fortunate in this than in any of their past efforts, they, on the twentieth
day after their departure from Gorgona, discovered the coast of Peru.
After touching at several villages near the shore, which they found to be
nowise inviting, they landed at Tumbez, a place of some note about three
degrees south of the line, distinguished for its stately temple, and a palace
of the Incas or sovereigns of the country.t  There the Spaniards teasted
their eyes with the first view of the opulence and civilization of the Peruvian empire. They beheld a country fully peopled, and cultivated with
an appearance of regular industry; the natives decently clothed, and possessed of' ingenuity so far surpassing the other inhabitants of the New World
as to have the use of tame domestic animals. But what chiefly attracted
their notice was such a show of gold and silver, not only in the ornaments
of their persons and temples, but in several vessels and utensils for commor
use, formed of those precious metals, as left no room to doubt that they
abounded with profusion in the country. Pizarro and his companions
Herrera, de. 3. lib. x. c 2, 3. Zarate, lib. i. c. 2. Xerez, 181. Gomara Hist c. 100.   t C
Iancha, p. 103




AMERICA.                             t65
seemed now to have attained to the completion of their most sanguine hopes,
and fancied that all their wishes and dreams of rich domains, and inexhaustible treasures, would soon be realized.
But with the slender force then under his command, Pizarro could only
view the rich country of which he hoped hereafter to obtain possession.
He ranged, however, for some time along the coast, maintaining every
where a peaceable intercourse with the natives, no less astonished at their
new visitants than the Spaniards were with the uniform appearance of opulence and cultivation which they beheld. [1527.] Having explored the
country as far as requisite to ascertain the importance of the discover,
Pizarro procured from the inhabitants some of their Llamas or tame cattle,
to which the Spaniards gave the name of sheep, some vessels of gold and
silver, as well as some specimens of their other works of ingenuity, and two
young men, whom he proposed to instruct in the Castilian language, that
they might serve as interpreters in the expedition which he meditated.
With these he arrived at Panama, towards the close of the third year from
the time of his departure thence.? No adventurer of the age suffered hardships or encountered dangers which equal those to which he was exposed
dcairit this long period. The patience with which he endured the one,
and the fortitude with which he surmounted the other, exceed whatever is
recorded in the history of the New World, where so many romantic displays of those virtues occur.
1528.] Neither the splendid relation that Pizarro gave of the incredible
opulence of the country which he had discovered, nor his bitter complaints
on account of that unreasonable recall of his forces, which had put it out of
hispower to attempt making any settlement there, could move the governor
of Panama to swerve from his former plan of conduct. He still contended,
that the colony was not in a condition to invade such a mighty empire, and
refused to authorize an expedition which he foresaw woud be so alluring
that it might ruin the province in which he presided, by an effort beyond
its strength. His coldness, however, did not in any degree abate the ardour
of the three associates; but they perceived that they could not carry their
scheme into execution without the countenance of superior authority, and
must solicit their sovereign to grant that permission which they could not
extort from his delegate. With this view, after adjusting among themselves
that Pizarro should claim the station of governor, Almagro that of lieutenantgovernor, and Luque the dignity of bishop in the country which they proposed to conquer, they sentPizarro as their agent to Spain, though their
fortunes were now so much exhausted by the repeated efforts which they
had made, that they Found some difficulty in borrowing the small sum
requisite towards equipping him for the voyage.t
Pizarro lost no time in repairing to court; and new as the scene
might be to him, he appeared before the emperor with the unembarrassed
dignity of a man conscious of what his services merited; and he conducted
his negotiations with an insinuating dexterity of address, which could not
have been, expected either from his education or former habits of life. His
feeling description of his own sufferings, and his pompous account of the
country which he had discovered, confirmed by the specimens of its productions which he exhibited, made such an impression both on Charles and
his ministers, that they not only approved of the intended expedition, but
seemed to be interested in the success of its leader. Presuming on those
dispositions in his favour, Pizarro paid little attention to the interest of his
associates. As the pretensions of Luque did not interfere with his own, he
obtained for him the ecclesiastical dignity to which he aspired. For Almagro he claimed only the command of the fortress which sbould be erected
* Herrera, dec. 3. lib. x. c. 3-6. dec. 4. lib. ii. c. 7, 8.   Vega, 2. lib. i. c. 10-14.   Zarate, lib, 1.
c 2.  Benzo Hist. Novi Orbis, lib. iii. c. 1.  t Herrera, dec. 4. 4ib. iii. c. 1.  Vega, 2 lib. i. c. 14.
VOL. I. —34




266                     HISTORY OF                     [BOOK VI.
at Tumbez. To himself he secured whatever his boundless ambition
could desire. He was appointed [July 26], governor, captain-general, and
adelantado of all the country which he had discovered, and hoped to conquer, with supreme authority, civil as well as military; and with full right
to all the privileges and emoluments usually granted to adventurers in the
New World. His jurisdiction was declared to extend two hundred leagues
along the coast to the south of the river St. Jago; to be independent of the
governor of Panama; and he had power to nominate all the officers who
were to serve under him. In return for those concessions, which cost the
court of Spain nothing, as the enjoyment of them depended upon the success
of Pizarro's own efforts, he engaged to raise two hundred and fifty men,
and to provide the ships, arms, and warlike stores requisite towards subjecting to the crown of Castile the country of which the government was
allotted him.
1529.]  Inconsiderable as the body of men was which Pizarro had undertaken to raise, his funds and credit were so low that he could hardly
complete half the number; and after obtaining his patents from the crown,
he was obliged to steal privately out of the port of Seville, in order to
elude the scrutiny of the officers, who had it in charge to examine whether
he had fulfilled the stipulations in his contract.  -Before his departure,
however, he received some supply of money from Cortes, who having
returned to Spain about this time, was willing to contribute his aid towards
enabling an ancient companion, with whose talents and courage he was
well acquainted, to begin a career of glory similar to that which he himself
had finished.t
He landed at Nombre de Dios, and marched across the isthmus to
Panama, accompanied by his three brothers Ferdinand, Juan, and Gonzalo, of whom the first was born in lawful wedlock, the two latter, like
himself, were of illegitimate birth, and by Francisco de Alcantara, his
mother's brother. They were all in the prime of life, and of such abilities
and courage as fitted them to take a distinguished part in his subsequent
transactions.
1530.] On his arrival at Panama, Pizarro found Almagro so much exasperated at the manner in which he had conducted his negotiation, that he
not only refused to act any longer in concert with a man by whose perfidy
he had been excluded from the power and honours to which he had a just
claim, but laboured to form  a new association, in order to thwart or to
rival his former confederate in his discoveries. Pizarro, however, had
more wisdom and address than to suffer a rupture so fatal to all his schemes,
to become irreparable. By offering voluntarily to relinquish the office of
adelantado, and promising to concur in soliciting that title, with an independent government fbr Almagro, he gradually mitigated the rage of an
open-hearted soldier, which had been violent, but was not implacable.
Luque, highly satisfied with having been successful in all his own pretensions, cordially seconded Pizarro's endeavours.  A reconciliation was
effected, and the confederacy renewed on its original terms, that the enterprise should be carried on at the common expense of the associates, and
the profits accruing from it should be equally divided among them.:
Even after their reunion, and the utmost efforts of their interest, three
small vessels, with a hundred and eighty soldiers, thirty-six of whom were
horsemen, composed the armament which they were able to fit out. But
the astonishing progress of the Spaniards in America had inspired them
with such ideas of their own superiority, that Pizarro did not hesitate to
sail with this contemptible fbrce, [Feb. 1531] to invade a great empire.
Almagro was left at Panama, as formerly, to follow him with what rein* Herrera, dec. 4. lib. vii. c. 9.    t Ibid. lib. vii. c. 10.  t Ibid, dec. 4. lib. vii. c. 9.  Zarat
fib. iL c. 3. Vega, 2. lib. i. c. 14.




A MERICA.                            267
forcement of men he should be able to muster. As the season for embarking
was properly chosen, and the course of navigation between Panama and
Peru was now better known, Pizarro completed the voyage in thirteen
days; though by the force of the winds and currents he was carried above
a hundred leagues to the north of Tumnbez, the place of his destination,
and obliged to land his troops in the bay of Saint Matthew. Without
19sing a nloment, he began to advapce towards the south, taking care, however, not to depart far from the seashore, both that he might easily effect a
junction with the supplies which he expected from Panama, and secure a
retreat in case of any disaster, by keeping as near as possible to his ships.
But as the country in several parts on the coast of Peru is barren, unhealthfu], and thinly peopled; as the Spaniards had to pass all the rivers near
their mouth, where the body of water is greatest; and as the imprudence
of Pizarro, in attacking the natives when he should have studied to gain
their confidence, had forced them  to abandon their habitations; famine,
fatigue, and diseases of various kinds brought upon him and his followers,
calamities hardly inferior to those which they had endured in their former
expedition. What they now experienced corresponded so ill with the
alluring description of the country given by Pizarro, that many began to
reproach him, and every soldier must have become cold to the service, if
even in this unfertile region of Peru, they had not met with some appearances of wealth and cultivation, which seemed to justify the report of
their leader. At length they reached the province of Coaque [April 14];
and having surprised the principal settlement of the natives, they seized
their vessels and ornaments of gold and silver, to the amount of thirty
thousand pesos, with other booty of such value as dispelled all their doubts,
and inspired the most desponding with sanguine hopes.*
Pizanro himself was so much delighted with this rich spoil, which he
considered as the first fruits of a land abounding with treasure, that he
instantly despatched one of his ships to Panama with a large remittance to
Almagro; and another to Nicaragua with a considerable sum -to several
persons of. influence in that province, in hopes of alluring adventurers by
this e.rly display of the wealth which he had acquired. Meanwhile, he
continued his march along the coast, and disdaining to employ any mleans
of reducing the natives but force, be attacked them with such violence in
thei-rscattered habitations, as compelled them either to retire into the interior country, or to submit to his yoke. This sudden appearance of invaders,
whose aspect and manners were so strange, and whose power seemed to
be so irresistible, made the same dreadful impression as in other parts of
America. Pizarro hardly met with resistance until he attacked the island
of Puna in the bay of Guayaquil.  As that was better peopled than the
country through which he had passed, and its inhabitants fiercer and less
civilized than those of the continent, they defended themselves with such
obstinate valour, that Pizarro spent six months in reducing them to subjection. From. Puna he proceeded to Tumbez, where the distempers
which raged among his men compelled him to remain for three months.t
While he was thus employed, he began to reap advantage from his
attention to spread the fame of his first success to Coaque. Two different detachments arrived from Nicaragua [1532], which, though neither
exceeded thirty men, he considered as a reinforcement of great consequence
to his feeble band, especially as the one Was under the command of Sebastian Benalcazar, and the other of Hernando Soto, officers not inferior in
merit and reputation to any who had served in America. From Tumbez
he proceeded to the river Piura [May 16], and in an advantageous station
near the mouth of it he established the first Spanish colonIy in PeIu; to
which he gave the name of St. Michael.
* Herrera, dec. 4. lib. vii. c. 9. lib. ii. c. 1. Xerez, 182.  t P. Sancho ap Kamus. iii. p. 371. F
Herrera, dee. 4. lib. vii. c. 18. lib. ix. c. 1.  Zarate, lib. ii. c. 2, 3.  Xerez, p. 182, &c.




268                    HISTORY  OF                    LBoo cl-1.
As Pizarro continued to advance towards the centre of the Peruvian
empire, he gradually received more full information cor: erning ils extent
and policy, as well as the situation of its affairs at thatjuncture. Without
some knowledge of these, he could not have conducted his operations with
propriety; and without a suitable attention to them, it is impossible to
account for the progress which the Spaniards had already made, or to
unfold the causes of their subsequent success.
At the time when the Spaniards invaded Peru, the dominions of its
sovereigns extended in length, fi'om north to south, above fifteen hundred
miles along the Pacific Ocean. Its breadth, from east to west, was much
less considerable; being uniformly bounded by the vast ridge of the Andes,
stretching from its one extremity to the other. Peru, like the rest of the
New World, was originally possessed by small independent tribes, differing
from each other in manners, and in their forms of rude policy. All, however, were so little civilized, that, if the traditions concerning their mode
of life, preserved among their descendants, deserve credit, they must
be classed among the most unimproved savages of America. Strangers
to every species of cultivation or regular industry, without any fixed
residence, and unacquainted with those sentiments and obligations which
formn the first bonds of social union, they are said to have roamed about
naked in the forests, with which the country was then covered, more like
wild beasts than like men. After they had struggled for several ages
with the hardships and calamities which are inevitable in such a state, and
when no circumstance seemed to indicate the approach of any uncommon
effort towards improvement, we are told that there appeared, on the banks
of the lake Titiaca, a man and woman of majestic form, clothed in decent
garments. They declared themselves to be children of the Sun, sent by
their beneficent parent, who beheld with pity the miseries of the human
race, to instruct and to reclaim them. At their persuasion, enforced by
reverence for the divinity in whose name they were supposed to speak,
several of the dispersed savages united together, and, receiving theihf commands as heavenly injunctions, followed them to Cuzco, where they setiled,
and began to lay the foundations of a city.
Manco Capac and Mama Ocollo, for such were the names of those
extraordinary personages, having thus collected some wandering tribes,
formed that social union which, by multiplying the desires and uniting the
efforts of the human species, excites industry and leads to improvement.
Manco Capac instructed the men in agriculture, and other useful arts.
Mama Ocollo taught the women to spin and to weave. By the labour of
the one sex, subsistence became less precarious; by that of the other,
life was rendered more comfortable. After securing the objects of first
necessity in an infant state, by providing food, raiment, and habitations for
the rude people of whom he took charge, Manco Capac turned his attention
towards introducing such laws and policy as might perpetuate their happiness.  By his institutions, which shall be more particularly explained
hereafter, the various relations in private life were established, and the
duties resulting from them prescribed with such propriety, as gradually
formed a barbarous people to decency of manners. In public adminis
tration, the functions of persons in authority were so precisely defined, anid
the subordination of those under their jurisdiction maintained with such a
steady hand, that the society in which he presided soon assumed the aspect
of a regular and well governed state.
Thus, according to the Indian tradition, was founded the empire of the
Incas or Lords of Peru. At first its extent was small. The territory of
Manco Capac did not reach above eight leagues from Cuzco. But within
its narrow precincts he exercised absolute and uncontrolled authority.
His successors, as their dominions extended, arrogated a similar jurisdiction




AMERICA.                            269
over the new subjects which they acquired; the despotism of Asia was
not more complete. The Incas were not only obeyed as monarchs, but
revered as divinities. Their blood was held to be sacred, and, by prohibiting intermarriages with the people, was never contaminated by mixing
with-that of any other race. The family, thus separated from the rest of
the nation, was distinguished by peculiarities in dress and ornaments, which
it was unlawful for others to assume. The monarch himself appeared
with ensigns of royalty reserved for him alone; and received from his
subjects marks of obsequious homage and respect which approached almost
to adoration.
Blt, among the Peruvians, this unbounded power of their monarch
seems to have been uniformly accompanied with attention to the good o
their subjects. It was not the rage of conquest, if we may believe the
accounts of their countrymen, that prompted the Incas to extend their
dominions, but the desire of diffusing the blessings of civilization, and the
knowledge of the arts which they possessed, among the barbarous people
whom they reduced. During a succession of twelve monarchs, it is said
that hot one deviated from this beneficent character.*
When the Spaniards first visited the coast of Peru, in the year one
thousand five hundred and twenty-six, Huana Capac, the twelfth monarch
from the founder of the state, was seated on the throne. He is represented
as a prince distinguished not only for the pacific virtues peculiar to the race,
but eminent for his martial talents. By his victorious arms the kingdom
of Quito was subjected, a conquest of such extent and importance as almost
doubled the power of the Peruvian empire. He was fond of residing in
the capital of that valuable province which he had added to his dominions;
and notwithstanding the ancient and fundamental law of the monarchy
against polluting the royal blood by any foreign alliance, he married the
daughter of the vanquished monarch of Quito. She bore him a son named
Atahualpa, whom, on his death at QGuito, which seems to have happened
about the year one thousand five hundred and twenty-nine, he appointed
his successor in that kingdom, leaving the rest of his dominions to Huascar,
his eldest son by another of the royal race. Greatly as the Peruvians
revered the memory og a monarch who had reigned with greater reputation
and splendour than any of his predecessors, the destination of Huana Capac
concerning the s'uccession appeared so repugnant to a maxim coeval with the
empire, and founded on authority deemed sacred, that it was no sooner
known at Cuzco than it excited general disgust. Encouraged by those sentiments of his subjects, Huascar required his brother to renounce the government of Quito, and to acknowledge him as his lawful superior. But it had
been the first care of Atahualpa to gain a large body of troops which had
accompanied his father to Quito. These were the flower of the Peruvian
warriors, to whose valour Huana Capac had been indebted for all his victories. Relying on their support, Atahualpa first eluded his brother's
demand, and then marched against him in hostile array.
Thus the ambition of two young men, the title of the one founded on
ancient usage, and that of the other asserted by the veteran troops, involved
Peru in a civil war, a calamity to which, under a succession of virtuous
princes, it had hitherto been a stranger. In such a contest the issue was
obvious.  The force of arms triumphed over the authority of laws
Atahualpa remained victorious, and made a cruel use of his victory. Conscious of the defect in his own title to the crown, he attempted to exterminate the royal race, by putting to death all the children of the Sun
descended from Manco Capac, whom he could seize either by force or
stratagem. From  a political motive, the life of his unfortunate rival
Huascar, who had been taken prisoner in a battle which decided the fate
* Cieca de Leon, Chron. c. 44, Herrera, dec. 3. lib. x. c. 4. dec. 5. lib. iii. c. 17,




270                      HISTORY  OF                     [Boox VI.
of the empire, was prolonged for some time, that by issuing orders in his
name, the usurper might more easily establish his own authority.*
When Pizarro landed in the bay of St. Matthew, this civil war raged
between the two brothers in its greatest fury. Had he made any hostile
attempt in his former visit to Peru, in the year one thousand five hundred
and twenty-seven, he must then have encountered the force of a powerful
state, united under a monarch possessed of capacity as well as courage,
and unembarrassed with any care that could divert him from opposing his
progress. But at this time, the two competitors, though they received
early accounts of the arrival and violent proceedings of the Spaniards,
were so intent upon the operations of a war which they deemed more
interesting, that they paid no attention to the motions of an enemy, too
inconsiderable in number to excite any great alarm, and to whom it would
be easy, as they imagined, to give a check when more at leisure.
By this fortunate coincidence of events, whereof Pizarro could have no
foresight, and of which, from his defective mode of intercourse with the
people of the country, he remained long ignorant, he was permitted to
carry on his operations unmolested, and advanced to the centre of a great
empire before one effort of its power was exerted to stop his career.
During their progress, the Spaniards had acquired some imperfect know-'
ledge of this struggle between the two contending factions.  The first
complete information with respect to it th-ey received from messengers
whom Huascar sent to Pizarro, in order to solicit his aid against Atahualpa,
whom he represented as a rebel and a usurper.'  Pizarro perceived at
once the importance of this intelligence, and foresaw so clearly all the
advantages which might be derived fromn this divided state of the kingdom
which he had invaded, that without waiting for the reinforcement which
he expected from Panama, he determined to push forward, while intestine
discord put it out of the power of the Peruvians to attack himn with their
whole force, and while, by taking part, as circumstances should incline
him, with one of the competitors, he might be enabled with greater ease
to crush both.  Enterprising as the Spaniards of that age were in all their
operations against Americans, and distinguished as Pizarro was amon- his
countrymen for daring courage, we can hardly suppose that, after having
proceeded hitherto slowly, and with much caution, he would. have changed
at once his system of operation, and have ventured upon a measure so
hazardous, without some new motive or prospect to justify It;
As he was obliged to divide his troops, in order'to leave a garrison in
St. Michael, sufficient to defend a station of equal importance as a place of
retreat in case of any disaster, and as a port for receiving any supplies
which should come from Panama, he began his march with a very slender
and ill-accoutred train of followers. They cohsisted of sixty- two horsemen [128], and a hundred and two foot soldiers, of whorni twenty were
armed with cross bows, and three wi'th muskets. He directed his course
towards Caxamalca, a small town at the distance of twelve days' march
from St. Michael, where Atahualpa was encamped with a considerable
body of troops. Before he had proceeded far, an officer despatched by
the Inca met him with a valuable present from that prince, accompanied
with a proffer of his alliance, and assurances of a friendly reception at
Caxamalca.  Pizarro, according to the usual artifice of his countrymen in
America, pretended to come as the ambassador of a very powerful lmonarch,
and declaring that he was now  advancing with an intention to offer
Atahualpa his aid against those enemies who disputed his title' to the
throne.I
As the object of the Spaniards in entering their country was altogether
* Zarate, lib. i. c. 15. Vega, 1. lib. ix. c. 1. and 32-40. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. i. c. 2. D. iil. c. 17,
t Zarate, lib. ii. c. 3.  1 Herrera, dec. 5. lib. i. c. 3. Xerez, p. 189




AMERICA.                              271
incomprehensible to the Peruvians, they had formed various conjectures
concerning it without being able to decide whether they should consider
their new gu'-sts as beings of a superior nature, who had visited them from
some beneficnt motive, or as formidable avengers of their crimes, and
enemies to their repose and liberty. The continual professioons of the
Spaniards, that they came to enlighten them with the knowledge of truth,
and lead them in the way of happiness, favoured the former opinion; the
outrages which they committed, their rapaciousness and cruelty, were
awful confirmations of the latter. While in this state of uncertainty,
Pizarro's declaration of his pacific intentions so far removed all the Inca'a
fears that.Ja he determined to give hirh a friendly reception. In consequence
of this resolution, the Spaniards were allowed to march in tranquillity
across the sandy desert between St. Michael and Motupe, where the most'feeble eiTort of an enemy, added to the unavoidable distresses which they
suffered in passing through that comfortless region, must have proved fatal
to them [129]. Fromn Motupe they advanced towards the mountains which
encompassed the low  country of Peru, and passed through a defile so
narrow ant-id inaccessible, that a fews men might have defended it against a
numerous army. But here likewise, from the same inconsiderate criedulity
of the Inca, the Spaniards met with no opposition; and took quiet possession
of a fort erected for the security of that important station. As they now
approached near to Caxamalca, Atahualpa renewed his professions of
friendship; and, as an evidence of their sincerity, sent them  presents of
greater value than the fobrmer.
On entering Caxamalca, Pizarro took possession of a large court, on one
side of which was a house which the Spanish historians call a palace of
the Inca, and on the other a temple of the Sun, the whole surrounded with
a strong rampart or wall of earth.  When he had posted his troops in this
advantageous station, he despatched his brother Ferdinand and Hernando
Soto to the camp of Atahualpa, which was about a league distant from
the town. He instructed them  to confirm the declaration which he had
formerly made of his pacific disposition, and to desire an interview with
the Inca, that he might explain more fully the intention of the Spaniards
in visiting his country. They were treated with all the respectful hospitality usual among the Peruvians in the reception of their most cordial
friends, and Atahualpa promised to visit the Spanish commander next day
in his quarters.  The decent deportment of the Peruvian monarch, the
order of his court, and the reverence with which his subjects approached
his person and obeyed his commands, astonished those Spaniards who had
never met in America with any thing more dignified than the petty cazique
of a barbarous tribe.  But their eyes were still powerfully attracted by
the vast profusion of wealth which they observed in the Inca's camp.
The rich ornaments worn by him and his attendants, the vessels of gold
and silver in which the repast offered to them was served up, the multitude
of utensils of every kind formed of those precious metals, opened prospects
far exceeding any idea of opulence-that a European of the sixteenth century could form.
On their return to Caxamalca, while their minds were yet warm with
admiration and desire of the wealth which they had beheld, they gave
such a description of it to their countrymen as confirmed Pizarro in a resolution which he had already taken. From his own observation of American manners during his long service in the New World, as well as from
the advantages which Cortes had derived from seizing Montezumna, he
knew. of what consequence it was to have the Inca in his power. For
this purpose, he formed a plan as daring as it was perfidious. Notwithstanding the character that he had assumed of an ambassador from a powerful rmonarch, who courted an alliance with the Inca, and in violation of the
repeated offers which he had made to him of his own friendship and assist



272                   HIST ORY  OF                   [BOOK VI.
ance, he determined to avail himself of the unsuspicious simplicity with
which Atahualpa relied on his professions, and to seize the person of the
Inca during the interview to which he had invited him. He prepared tor
the execution of his scheme with the same deliberate arrangement, and
with as little compunction as if it had reflected no'disgrace on himself or
his country. He divided his cavalry into three small squadrons, under the
command of his brother Ferdinand, Soto, and Benalcazar; his infantry
were formed in one body, except twenty of most tried courage, whom he
kept near his own person to support him in the dangerous service, which
he reserved for himself; the artillery, consisting of two fieldpieces,* and
the cross bowmen, were placed opposite to the avenue by which Atahualpa was to approach. All were commanded to keep within the square,
and not to move until the signal for action was given.
Early in the morning [Nov. 16] the Peruvian camp was all in motion.
But as Atahualpa was solicitous to appear with the greatest splendour and
magnificence in his first interview with the strangers, the preparations for
this were so tedious that the day was far advanced before he began his
march. Even then, lest the order of the procession should be deranged,
he moved so slowly, that the Spaniards became impatient, and apprehensive that some suspicion of their intention might be the cause of this delay.
In order to remove this, Pizarro despatched one of his officers with fresh
assurances of his friendly disposition. At length the Inca approached.
First of all appeared four hundred men, in a uniform dress, as harbingers
to clear the way before him. He himself, sitting on a throne or couch
adorned with plumes of various colours, and almost covered with plates of
gold and silver enriched with precious stones, was carried on the shoulders of his principal attendants. Behind him came some chief officers of
his court, carried in the same manner. Several bands of singers and
dancers accompanied this cavalcade; and the whole plain was covered
with troops, amounting to more than thirty thousand men.
As the Inca drew near the Spanish quarters, Father Vincent Valverde,
chaplain to the expedition, advanced with a crucifix in one hand, and a
breviary in the other, and in a long discourse explained to him the doctrine
of the creation, the fall of Adam, the incarnation, the sufferings and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the appointment of St. Peter as God's vicegerent
on earth, the transmission of his apostolic power by succession to the
Popes, the donation made to the King of Castile by Pope Alexander of
all the regions of the New Werld. In consequence of all this, he required
Atahualpa to embrace the Christian faith, to acknowledge the supreme jurisdiction of the Pope, and to submit to the King of Castile as his lawful
sovereign; promising, if he complied instantly with this requisition, that
the Castilian monarch would protect his dominions, and permit him to
continue in the exercise of his royal authority; but if he should impiously
refuse to obey this summons, he denounced war against him in his master's
name, and threatened him with the most dreadful effects of his vengeance.
This strange harangue, unfolding deepnmysteries, and alluding to unknown
facts, of which no power of eloquence could have conveyed at once a distinct idea to an American, was so lamely translated by an unskilful interpreter, little acquainted with the idiom of the Spanish tongue, and incapable of expressing himself with propriety in the language of the Inca, that
its general tenour was altogether incomprehensible to Atahualpa. Some
parts in it, of mnore obvious meaning, filled him with astonishment and indignation. His reply, however, was temperate. He began with observing,
that he was lord of the dominions over which he reigned by hereditary
succession; and added, that he could not conceive how a foreign priest
should pretend to dispose of territories which did not belong to him; that
* Xerez, p. 194




AMERICA.                             273
if such a preposterous grant had been made, he, who was the rightful possessor, refused to confirm it; that he had no inclination to renounce the
religious institutions established by his ancestors; nor would he forsake
the service of the Sun, the immortal divinity whom he and his people revered, in order to worship the God of the Spaniards, who was subject to
death; that with respect to other matters contained in his discourse, as he
had never heard of them before, and did not now understand their meaning, he desired to know where the priest had learned things so extraordi
nary. "In this book," answered Valverde, reaching out to him his breviary. The Inca opened it eagerly, and, turning over the leaves, lifted it
to his ear: " This," says he, " is silent; it tells me nothing;" and threw
it with disdain to the ground. The enraged monk, running towards his
countrymen, cried out, " To armst Christians, to arms; the word of God
is insulted; avenge this profanation on those impious dogs" [130].
Pizarro, who, during this long conference, had with difficulty restrained
his soldiers, eager to seize the rich spoils of which they had now, so near
a view, immediately gave the signal of assault. At once the martial music
struck up, the cannon and muskets began to fire, the horse sallied out
fiercely to the charge, the infantry rushed on sword in hand. The Peruvians, astonished at the suddenness of an attack which they did not expect,
and dismayed with the destructive effect of the firearms, and the irresistible impression of the cavalry, fled with universal consternation on every
side, without attempting either to annoy the enemy, or to defend themselves. Pizarro, at the head of his chosen band, advanced directly towards the Inca; and though his nobles crowded around him with officious
zeal, and ftll in numbers at his feet, while they vied one with another in
sacrificing their own lives, that they might cover the sacred person of
their sovereign, the Spaniards soon penetrated to the royal seat; and Pizarro, seizing the Inca by the arm, dragged him to the ground, and carried
him as a prisoner to his quarters. The fate of the monarch increased ihe
precipitate flight of his followers. The Spaniards pursued them towards
every quarter, and with deliberate and unrelenting barbarity continued to
slaughter wretched fugitives, who never once offered to resist. The carnage did not cease until the close of day. Above four thousand Peruvians were killed. Not a single Spaniard fell, nor was one wounded but
Pizarro himself, whose hand was slightly hurt by one of his own soldiers,
while struggling eagerly to lay hold on the Inca [131].
The plunder of the field was rich beyond any idea which the Spaniards
had yet formed concerning the wealth of Peru; and they were so transported with the value of the acquisition, as well as the greatness of their
success, that they passed the night in the extravagant exultation natural to
indigent adventurers on such an extraordinary change of fortune.
At first the captive monarch could hardly believe a calamity which-he
so little expected to be real. But he soon felt all the misery of his fate,
and the deiection into'which he sunk was in proportion to the height of
grandeur from which he had fallen. Pizarro, afraid of losing all the advantages which he hoped to derive from the possession of such a prisoner,
laboured to console him with professions of kindness and respect, that corresponded ill with his actions. By residing among the Spaniards, the Inca
quickly discovered their ruling passion, which indeed they were nowise
solicitous to conceal, and, by applying to that, made an attempt to recover
his liberty. He offered as a ransom what astonished the Spaniards, even
after all they now knew concerning the opulence of his kingdom. The
apartment in which he was confined was twenty-two feet in length and
sixteen in breadth; he undertook to fill it with vessels of gold as high as
he could reach. Pizarro closed eagerly with this tempting proposal, and
a line was drawn upon the walls of the chamber, to mark the stipulated
height to which the treasure was to rise.
XVoL I.-35




274                     H I S T O R Y  0 F               [BOOK VI.
-Atahualpa, transported with having obtained some prospect of liberty
took measures instantly for fulfilling his part of the agreement, by sending
messengers to Cuzco, Quito, and other places, where gold had been amassed in largest quantities, either for adorning the temples of the gods, or the
houses of the Inca, to bring what was necessary for completing his ransom
directly to Caxamalca. Though Atahualpa was now in the custody of his
enemies, yet so much were the Peruvians accustomed to respect every
mandate issued by their sovereign, that his orders were executed with the
greatest alacrity.  Soothed with hopes of recovering his liberty by thi.s
means. the subjects of the Inca were afraid of endangering his life by
forming any other scheme for his relief; and though the force of the empire was still entire, no preparations were mnade, and no army assembled
to avenge their own wrongs or those of their monarch.*  The Spaniards
remained in Caxainalca tranquil and unmolested. Small detachments of
their number marched into remote provinces of the empire, and, instead of
meetingT wvith any opposition, were every where received with marks of
the most submissive respect [132].
Inconsiderable as those parties were, and desirous as Pizarro might be
to obtain some knowledge of the interior state of the country, he could
not have ventured upon any diminution of his main body, if he had riot
about this time [December], received an account of AImagro's having
landed at St. Michael with such a reinforcement as would almnost double the
number of his followers.t  The arrival of this long expected succour was
not more agreeable to the Spaniards than alarming to the Inca.  He saw
the power of his enemies increase; and as he knew  neither the source
whence they derived their supplies, nor the means by which they were
conveyed to Peru, he could not foresee to what a height the inundation that
poured in upon his dominions might rise [1533]. AWhile disquieted with
such apprehensions, he learned that some Spaniards, in their way to Cuzco,
had visited his brother Huascar in the place where he kept him confined,
and that the captive prince had represented to them the justice of his own
cause, and, as an inducement to espouse it, had promised them a quantity
of treasure greatly beyond that which Atahualpa had engaged to pay for his
ransom. If the Spaniards should listen to this proposal, Atahualpa perceived his own destruction to be inevitable; and suspecting that their
insatiable thirst for gold would tempt them to lend a favourable ear to it,
he determined to sacrifice his brother's life that he might save his own;
and his orders for this purpose were executed, like all his other commands,
with scrupulous punctuality.~
Meanwhile, Indians daily arrived at Caxamalca from different parts of
the kingdom, loaded with treasure. A great part of the stipulated quantity
was now amassed, and Atahualpa assured the Spaniards that the only thing.which plrevented the whole from being brought in, was the remoteness of
the provinces where it was deposited.  But such vast piles of gold.presented continually to the view of needy soldiers, had so inflamed their
avarice, that it was impossible any longer to restrain their impatience to
obtain possession of this rich booty. Orders were given for melting down
the whole, except some pieces of curious fabric reserved as a present for
the emperor.  After setting apart the fifth due to the crown, and a hundred
thousand pesos as a donative to the'soldiers which arrived with Almagro,
there remained one million five hundred and twenty-eight thousand five
hundred pesos to Pizarro and his followers.  The festival of St. James
[July 251, the patron saint of Spain, was the day chosen for the partition
of this enormous sum, and the manner of conducting it strongly marks the
strange alliance of fanaticism with avarice, which I have more than once
* Xerez, 205.  t Ibid. 204.  Herrera, dec. 5. lib. Iii. c. 1, 2.  ~   Zarate, lib. ii. c. 6
Gomara, Ilist. c. 115., HBerrera, dec. 5. lib. iii. c. 2.




AMERICA.                              275
had occasion to point out as a striking feature in the character of the conquerors of' the New VWorld. Though assembled to divide the spoils of an
innocent people, procured by deceit, extortion, and cruelty, the transaction
began with a solemn invocation of the name of God,` as if they could have expected the guidance of heaven in distributing those wages of iniquity. Inl this
division above eight thousand pesos, at that time not inferior in effective
value to as many pounds sterling in the present century, fell to. the share
of each horseman, and half that sum to each foot soldier. Pizarro himself,
and his officers, received dividends in proportion to the dignity of their rank.
There is no example in history of such a sudden acquisition of wealth
by military service, nor was ever a sum so great divided among so small
a number of soldiers.  Many of them  having received a recompense for
their services far beyond their- most sanguine hopes, were so impatient to
retire from fatigue and danger, in order to spend the remainder of their
days in their native country in ease and opulence, that they demanded
their discharge with clamorous importunity. Pizarro, sensible that from
such men he could expect neither enterprise in action nor fortitude in
suffering, and persuaded that wherever they went the display of their
riches would allure adventurers, less opulent but more hardy, to his
standard, granted their suit without reluctance, and permitted above sixty
of them to accompany his brother Ferdinand, whom he sent to Spain with
an account of his success,.and the present destined for the emperor.t
The Spaniards having divided among them the treasure amassed for the
Inca's ransom, he insisted with themrto fulfil their promise of setting him
at liberty. But nothing was further from Pizarro's thoughts. During his
long service in the New World, he had imbibed those ideas and maxims
of his fellow-soldiers, which led them  to consider its inhabitants as an
inferior race, neither worthy of the name, nor entitled to the rights of
men. In his compact with Atahualpa, he had no other object than to
amuse his captive with such a prospect of recovering his liberty, as might
induce him to lend aIl the aid of his authority towards collecting the wealth
of his kingdom. Having now accomplished this, he no longer regarded
his plighted faith; and at the very tinme when the cledulous prince hoped
to be replaced on his throne, he had secretly resolved to bereave him of
life. Many circumstances seem  to have concurred in prompting him to
this action, the most criminal and atrocious that stains the Spanish name,
amidst all the deeds of violence committed in carrying on the conquests
of the New Worid.
Though Pizarro had seized the Inca in imitation of Cortes's conduct
towards the Mexican monarch, he did not possess talents for carrying on
the same artful plan of policy. Destitute of the temper and address
requisite for gaining the confidence of his prisoner, he never reaped all
ihe advantages which might have been derived from being master of his
person and authority. Atahualpa was, ildeed, a prince of greater abilities
and discernment than Montezuma, and seems to have penetrated nmore
thoroughly into the character and intentions of the Spaniards.  Mutual
suspicion and distrust accordingly took place between them. The strict
attention with which it was necessary to guard a captive of such importance, greatly increased the fatigue of military duty. The utility of keeping him appeared inconsiderable; and Pizarro felt him as an encumbrance,
from which he wished to be delivered.+
Almagro and his followers had maIe a demand of an equal share in
the Inca's ransom; and though Pizarro had bestowed upon the private
men the large gratuity which I have mentioned, and endeavoured to soothe
their leader by presents of great value, they still continued dissatisfied.
They were apprehensive, that as long as Atahualpa remained a prisoner
T Herrera, (dec. 5. lib. iii. c. 3.   t Ibid. dec. 5. lib. iii. c,4.  Vega, p. 2. lib  i. c. 38.
] Hctrera, dee. 5. lib. iii. c. 4.




276                     HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK VI.
Pizarro's soldiers would apply whatever treasure should be acquired, to
make up what was wanting of the quantity stipulated for his ransom, and
under that pretext exclude them frorm any part of it. They insisted eagerly
on putting the Inca to death, that all the adventurers in Peru might thereafter be on an equal footing.*
Pizarro himself began to be alarmed with accounts of foices assembling
In the remote provinces of the empire, and suspected Atahualpa of having
issued orders for that purpose. These tears and suspicions were artfully
increased by Philippillo, one of the Indians, whom Pizarro had carried
off from Tumbez in the year one thousand five hundred and twenty-seven,
and whom  he employed as an interpreter. The function which he
performed admitting this man to familiar intercourse with the captive
monarch, he presumed, notwithstanding the meanness of his birth, to raise
his affections to a Coya, or descendant of the Sun, one of' Atahualpa's
wives; and -seeing no prospect of gratifying that passion during the life
of the monarch, he endeavoured to fill the ears of the Spaniards with such
accounts of the Inca's secret designs and preparations, as might awaken
their jealousy, and excite them to cut him off.
While Almagro and his followers openly demanded the life of the Inca,
and Philippillo laboured to ruin him by private machinations, that unhappy
prince inadvertently contributed to hasten his own fate. During his confinement he had attached himself with peculiar affection to Ferdinand
Pizarro and Hernando Sdto; who, as they were persons of birth and
education superior to the rough adventurers with whom they served, were
accustomed to behave with more decency and attention to the captive
monarch. Soothed with this respect from persons of such high rank, he
delighted in their society. But in the presence of the governor he was
always uneasy and overawed. This dread soon came to be mingled with
contempt. Among all the European arts, what he admired most was that
of reading and writing; and he long deliberated with himself, whether he
should regard it as a natural or acquired talent. In order to determine this,
he desired one of the soldiers, who guarded him, to write the name of
God on the nail of his thumb. This he showed successively to several
Spaniards, asking its meaning; and to his amazement, they all, without
hesitation, returned the same answer. At length Pizarro entered; and,
on presenting it to him, he blushed, and with some confusion was obliged
to acknowledge his ignorance. From that moment Atahualpa considered
him as a mean person less instructed than his own soldiers; and he had
not address enough to conceal the sentiments with which this discovery
inspired him. To be the object of a barbarian's scorn, not only mortified the
pride of Pizarro, but excited such resentment in his breast, as added force
to all the other considerations which prompted him to put the Inca to
death.t
But in order to give some colour of justice to this violent action, and
that he himself might be exempted from standing singly responsible for
the commission of it, Pizarro resolved to try the Inca with all the formalities
observed in the criminal courts of Spain. Pizarro himself, and Almagro,
with two assistants, were appointed judges, with full power to acquit or to
condemn; an attorney-general was named to carry on the prosecution in
the king's name; counsellors were chosen to assist the prisoner in his
defence; and clerks were ordained to record the proceedings of court.
Before this strange tribunal, a charge was exhibited still more amazing.
It consisted of various articles; that Atahualpa, though a bastard, had dispossessed the rightful owner of the throne, and usurped the regal power;
that he had put his brother and lawful sovereign to death; that he was an
idolater, and had not only permitted but comnmanded the offering of human
* Zarate, lib. ii. c. 7.  Vega, p. 2. lib. i. c. 7.  Herrera, dec. 5. lib. ii c. ii 4.    Herrera, de
5. lib iii. c. 4. Vega, p. 11. lib. i. c. 38.




AMERICA.                              277
sacrifices; that he had a great number of concubines; that since hips imprisonment he had w:-.sted and embezzled the royal treasures.vhiilch no w
belonged of right to the conquerors; that he had incited his subjects to
take arms against the Spaniards. On these heads of accusation, some of
which are so ludicrous, others so absurd, that the effrontery of Pizarro, in
making them the foundation of a serious procedure, is not less surprising
than his injustice, did this strange court go on to try the sovereign of a
great empire, over whom it had no jurisdiction. With respact - e,-:o. of
the articles, witnesses were examined; but as they delivered t: i, i{L dence
in their native tongue, Philippillo had it in his power to give their words
whatever turn best suited his malevolent intentions. To judges pre-determined in their opinion, this evidence appeared sufficient. They pronounced Atahualpa guilty, and condemned him to be burnt alive. Friar
Valverde prostituted the authority of his sacred function to confirm this
sentence, and by his signature warranted it to be just. Astonished at his
fate, Atahualpa endeavoured to avert it by tears, by promises, and by entreaties that he might be sent to Spain, where a monarch would be the
arbiter of his lot. But pity never touched the unfeeling heart of Pizarro.
Ie ordered him to be led instan-ly to xec:tio~i; ad. -~ wat added to the
bitterness of his last moments, the same monk who had just ratified his
doom, offered to console and attempted to convert him.  The most
powerful argument Valverde employed to prevail with him to embrace
the Christian faith, was a promise of mitigation in his punishment.  The
dread of a cruel death extorted from the trembling victim a desire of
receiving baptism.  The ceremony was performed; and Atahualpa, instead
of being burnt, was strangled at the stake.*
Happily for the credit of the Spanish nation, even among the profligate
adventurers which it sent forth to conquer and desolate the New World,
there were persons who retained some tincture of the Castilian generosity
and honour. Though, before the trial of Atahualpa, Ferdinand Pizarro
had set out for Spain, and Soto was sent on a separate command at a distance from Caxamalca, this odious transaction was not carried on without
censure and opposition. Several officers, and among those some of the
greatest reputation and most respectable families in the service, not only
remonstrated but protested against this measure of their general, as disgraceful to their country, as repugnant to every maxim of equity, as a
violation of public faith, and a usurpation of jurisdiction over an independent monarch, to which they had no title. But their laudable endeavours
were vain. Numbers, and the opinion of such as held every thing to be
lawful which they deemed advantageous, prevailed. History, holwever,
records even the unsuccessful exertions of virtue with applause; and the
Spanish writers, in relating events where the valour of their nation is more
conspicuous than its humanity, have not failed to preserve the names of
those who made this laudable effort to save their country from the infamy
of having perpetrated such a crime.t
On the death of Atahualpa, Pizarro invested one of his sons with the
ensigns of royalty, hoping that a young mrn without experience might
prove a more passive inst:rument in his hands than an ambitious monarch,
who had been accustomed to independent command. The people'of
Cuzco, and the adjacent country, acknowledged Manco Capac, a brother
of Huascar, as inca.1  But neither possessed the authority which belonged
to a sovereign of Peru. The violent convulsions into which the emp ire
had been thrown, first by the civil war between the two brothers, and then
by the invasion of the Spaniards, had not only deranged the order of the
Peruvian government, but almost dissolved its firame. When they beheld
* Zarate, lib. ii. c. 7. Xerez, p. 233. Vega, p. 11. lib. i. c 36, 37. Gomara Hist. c. 117. Herrera,
dec. 3. lib. iii. c. 4.   Vega, p. 11. lib. i. c. 37.  Xerez, i. 235.  Herrera, dec, 5. lib. iii. c. 5.
t Voga, p. 11. fib. ii. e 7.




278                      HIST ORY  OF                   [BooK VI.
their monarch a captive in the power of strangers, and at last suffering an
ignominious death, the people in several provinces, as if they had been set
free from every restraint of law and decency, broke out into the most
licentious excesses.~  So many descendants of the Sun, after being treated
with the utmost indignity, had been cut off by Atahualpa, that not only
their influence in the state diminished with their numbers but the accustomed reverence for that sacred race sensibly decreased. In consequence
of this state of things, ambitious men in different parts of the empire
aspired to independent authority, and usurped jurisdiction to which they
had no title. The general who commanded for Atahualpa in Quito, seized
the brother and children of his master, put them to a cruel death, and, disclaiming any connection with either Inca, endeavoured to establish a
separate kingdom for himself.t
The Spaniards with pleasure beheld the spirit of discord diffusing itself,
and the vigour of government relaxing among the Peruvians.  They considered those disorders as symptomns of a state hasteninm towards its dissolution. Pizarro no longer hesitated to advance towards Cuzco, and he
had received such considerable reinforcements, that he could venture, with
little danger, to penetrate so far into the interior part of the country. The
account bf' the wealth acquired at Caxamalca operated as he had fbreseen.
No sooner did his brother Ferdinand, with the officers and soldiers to whom
he had given their discharge after the partition of the Inca's ransom, arrive
at Panama, and display their riches% in the view of their astonished countrymen, than fame spread the account with such exaggeration through all
the Spanish settlements on the South Sea, that the governors of Guatimala,
Panama, and Nicaragua, could hardly restrain the people under their j urisdiction, from abandoning their possessions, and crowding to that inexhaustible
source of wealth which seemed to be opened in Peru.: In spite of every
check and regulation, such numbers resorted thither, that Pizarro began
his march at the head of five hundred men, after leaving a considerable
garrison in St. Michael, under the command of Benalcazar. The Peruvians
had assembled some large bodies of troops to oppose his progress.  Several
fierce encounters happened. But they terminated like alP the actions in
America; a few Spaniards were killed or wounded; the natives were put
to flight with incredible slaughter. At length Pizarro forced his way to
Cuzco, and took quiet possession of that capital. The riches found there,
even after all that the natives had carried off and concealed, either from a
superstitious veneration for the drnaments of' their temples, or out of hatred
to their rapacious conquerors, exceed in value what had been received as
Atahuilpa's ransom. But as the Spaniards were now accustomed to the
wealth of the country, and it came to be parcelled out among a great
number of adventurers, this dividend did not excite the same surprise,
either from novelty, or the largeness of the sum that fell to the share of
each individual [133].
During the march to Cuzco, that son of Atahualpa whom Pizarro treated
as Inca, died; and as the Spaniards substituted no person in his place, the
title of Manco Capac seems to have been universally recognised.~
While his fellow-soldiers were thus employed, Benalcazar, governor of
St. Michael, an able and enterprising officer, was ashamed of remaining
inactive, and impatient to have his name distinguished among the disloverers and conquerors of the New World. The seasonable arrival of a
fresh body of recruits from Panama and Nicaragua put it in his power to
gratify this passion. Leaving a sufficient force to protect the infant settle.
ment intrusted to his care, he placed himself at the head of the rest, and
set out to attempt the reduction of Quito, where, according tc the report of
* Ierrera, dec. 5. Jib. ii. c. 12. lib. iii. c. 5.  t Zarate, lib. ii. c. 8.  Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 3, 4,: Goinara llist. c. 125.  Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c  1. 1. Ierera, de,. 5. lib. iii. c. 5.  Q Herrera,
dee. 5. lib. v. c. 2.




AMERICA.                              279
die natives, Atahualpa had left the greatest part of his treasure. Notwithstanding tUle distance of that city from  St. Michacel, the difficulty of
marching through a mountainous country covered with Woods, and the
frequent and fierce attacks of the best troops in Peru commnanded by a
skilful leader, the valour, good conduct, and perseverance of Benalcazar
surmounted every obstacle, and he ertered Quito with his victorious troops.
But they met with a cruel mortification there. The natives now acquainted
to their sorrow with the predominant passion of their invaders, and knowinghow to disappoint it, had carried oft all those treasures, the prospect of
which had prompted them to undertake this arduous expedition, and had
supported them under all the dangers and hardships wherewith they had
to struggle in carrying it on.*
Benalcazar was not the only Spanish leader who attacked the kingdom
of Quito.  The fame of its riches attracted a more powerful enemy.
Pedro de Alvarado, who had distinguished himself so eminently in the
conquest of Mexico, having obtained the government of Guatinlala as a
recompense for his valour, soon became disgusted with a life of uniform
tranquillity, and longed to be again engaged in the bustle of military
service.  The glory and wealth acquired by the conquerors of Peru
heightened this passion, and gave it a determined direction. Believing, or
pretending to believe, that the kingdom of Quito did not lie within the
limits oi the province allotted to Pizarro, lie resolved to invade it. The
high reputation of the commander allured volunteers from every quarter.
He embarked with five hundred men, of whom above two hundred were
of such distinction as to serve onr horseback. He landed at Puerto Viejo,
and without sufficient knowledge of the country, or proper guides to conduct him, attempted to march directly to Quito, by following the course
of the river Guayoquil, and crossing the ridge of the Andes towards its
head. But in this route, one of the most impracticable in all America, his
troops endured such fatigue in forcing their way through forests and
marshes on the low grounds, and suffered so much from excessive cold
when they began to ascend the mountains, that before they reached the
plain of Quiito, a fifth part of the men and half their horses died, and the
rest were so much dispirited and worn out, as to be almost unfit for service [134].  There they met with a body, not of Indians, but of Spaniards,
drawn in hostile array against them. Pizarro having received an account
of Alvarado's armament, had detached Almagro with some troops to oppose
this formidable invader of his jurisdiction; and these were joined by Benalcazar and his victorious party. Alvarado, though surprised at the sight
of enemies whom he did not expect, advanced boldly to the charge. But,
by the interposition of some moderate men in each party, an amicable
accommodation took place; and the fatal period when Spaniards suspended their conquests to imbrue their hands in the blood of their countrymen, was postponed a few years. Alvarado engaged to return to his
goverment, upon Almagro's paying him a hundred thousand pesos to defray
the expense of his armament. Most of his followers remained in the
country; and an expedition, which threatened Pizarro and his colony with
ruin, contributed to augment its strength t
1534.] By this time Ferdinand Pizarro had landed in Spain. The immense quantities of gold and silver which he imported [135k filled the kingdom with no less astonishment than they had excited in ranalna and the
adjacent provinces. Pizarro was received by the emperor with the attention due to the bearer of a present so rich as to exceed any idea which the
Spaniards had formed concerning the value of their acquisitions in America,
*  Zarate, lib. ii. c. 9.  Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 9.  IHerrera, dec. 5. lib. iv. c. 11, 12. lib. v. c. 2, 3
inb. vi. c. 3,'  t Zarate, lib. ii. e. c. 10 —3. Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 1, 2. 9, &c. Gomara Hist. c.
126, &c. Rcmesa, Hist. Guatimal, Jib. iii. c. 6. Herrera, dec. 5. lib, vi. c, 1a 2, 7, 8.




280                      HI ST O RY   OF                [Boox VI.
even after they had been ten years masters of Mexico. In recompense of
his brother's services, his authority was confirmed with new powers and
privileges, and the addition of seventy leagues, extending along the coast,
to the southward of the territory granted in his former patent. Almagro
received the honours which he had so long desired. The title of Adelantado, or governor, wvas conferred upon him, with jurisdiction over two hundred leagues of country, stretching beyond the southern limits of the province
allotted to Pizarro. Ferdinand himself did not go unrewarded. He was
admitted into the military order of St. Jago, a distinction always accepta
ble to a Spanish gentleman, and soon set out on his return to Peru, accom
panied by many persons of higher rank than had yet served in that
country.*
Some account of his negotiations reached Peru before he arrived there
himself. Almagro no sooner learned that he had obtained the royal grant
of an independent government, than pretending that Cuzco, the imperial
residence of the Incas, lay within its boundaries, he attempted to render
himself master of that important station. Juan and Gonzalez Pizarro pre
pared to oppose him. Each of the contending parties was supported by
powerful adherents, and the dispute was on the point of being terminated
by the sword, when Francis Pizarro arrived in the capital. The reconciliation between him and Alinagro had never been cordial. The treache
of Pizarro in engrossing to himself all the honours and emoluments, which
ought to have been divided with his associate, was always present in both
their thoughts. The former, conscious of his own perfidy, did not expect
forgiveness; the latter feeling, that he had been deceived, was impatient
to be avenged; and though avarice and ambition had induced them not
only to dissemble their sentiments, but even to act in concert while in pursuit of wealth and power, no sooner did they obtain possession of these,
than the same passions which had formed this temporary union, gave rise
to jealousy and discord. To each of them was attached a small band of
interested dependants, who, with the malicious art peculiar to such men,
heightened their suspicions, and magnified every appearance of offence.
But with all those seeds of enmity in their minds, and thus assiduously
cherished, each was so thoroughly acquainted with the abilities and
courage of his rival, that they equally dreaded the consequences of an open
rupture. The fortunate arrival of Pizarro at Cuzco, and the address mingled with firmness which he manifested in his expostulations with Almagro
and his partisans, averted that evil for the present. A new reconciliation
took place; the chief article of which was, that Almagro should attempt
the conquest of Chili; and if he did not find in that province an establishment adequate to his meiit and expectations, Pizarro, by way of indemni
fication, should yield up to him  a part of Peru. This new agreement,
though confirmed [June 12] with the same sacred solemnities as their first
contract, was observed with as little fidelity.;
Soon after he concluded this important transaction, Pizarro marched
back to the countries on the seacoast; and as he now enjoyed an interval
of tranquillity undisturbed by any enemy, either Spaniard or Indian, he
applied himself with that persevering ardour, which distinguishes his character, to introduce  form of regular government into the extensive provinces subject to his authority.  Though ill qualified by his education
to enter into any disquisition concerning the principles of civil policy, and
little accustomed by his former habits of life to attend to its arrangements,
his natural sagacity supplied the want both of science and experience. He
distributed the country into various districts; he appointed proper inagistrates to preside in each; and established regulations concerning the ad* Zarate, lib. iii. c. 3.   Vega, p. l, lib. ii. c. 19,    Herrera, da!c, 5. lib. vi.. 13.  t Za
tate, lib. ii. c. 13.  Vega, p. 11. iib. ii. t. 19.  Belizo, lib. ii. c. 6.  Herrera, dec. 5. li;  vii. c. 8




AMERICA.                              281
ministration of justice, the collection of the royal revenue, the working of
the mines, and the treatment of the Indians, extremely simple, but well
calculated to promote the public prosperity. But though, for the present,
he adapted his plan to the infant state of his colony, his aspiring mind
looked forward to its future grandeur. He considered himself as laying
the foundation of a great empire, and deliberated long, and with much solicitude, in what place he should fix the seat of government. Cuzco, the
-imperial city of the Incas, was situated in a corner of the empire, above
four hundred miles from the sea, and much further from Quito, a province
of whose value he had formed a high idea. No other settlement of the
Peruvians was so considerable as to merit the name of a town, or to allure
the Spaniards to fix their residence in it. But in marching through the
country, Pizarro had been struck with the beauty and fertility of the valley of Rimac, one of the most extensive and best cultivated in Peru.
There, on the banks of a small river of the same name with the vale which
it waters and enriches, at the distance of six miles from Callao, the most
commodious harbour in the Pacific Ocean, he founded a city which he
destined to be the capital of his government [Jan. 18, i535]. He gave it
the name of Ciudad de los Reyes, either from the circumstance of having
laid the first stone at that season when the church celebrates the festival of
the Three Kings, or, as is more probable, in honour of Juana and Charles,
the joint sovereigns of Castile. This name it still retains among the
Spaniards, in all legal and formal deeds; but it is better known to
foreigners by that ot Limra, a corruption of the ancient appellation of the
valley in which it is situated. Under his inspection, the buildings advanced
with such rapidity, that it soon assumed the form of a city, which, by a magnificent palace that he erected for himself, and by the stately houses built
by several of his officers, gave, even in its infancy, some indication of its
subsequent grandeur.*
In consequence of what had been agreed with Pizarro, Almagro began
his march towards Chili; and as he possessed in an eminent degree the
virtues most admired by soldiers, boundless liberality and fearless courage,
his standard was followed by five hundred and seventy men, the greatest
body of Europeans that had hitherto been assembled in Peru. From impatience to finish the expedition, or from  that contempt of hardship and
danger acquired by all the Spaniards who had served long in America,
Almagro, instead of advancing along the level country on the coast, chose
to march across the mountains by a route that was shorter indeed, but
almost impracticable.  In this attempt his troops were exposed to every
calamity which men can suffer, from  fatigue, from famine, and from  the
rigour of the climate in those elevated regions of the torrid zone, where the
degree of cold is hardly infekror to what is felt within the polar circle.
Many of them perished; and the survivors, when they descended into the
fertile plains of Chili, had new difficulties to encounter. They found there
a race of men very different from the people of Peru, intrepid, hardy, independent, and. in their bodily constitution, as well as vigour of spirit,
nearly resembling the warlike tribes in North America. Though filled
with wonder at the first appearance of the Spaniards, and still more
astonished at the operations of their cavalry and the effects of their firearms, the Chilese soon recovered so far from their surprise, as not only to
defend themselves with obstinacy, but to attack their new enemies with
more determined fierceness than any American nation had'itherto discovered. The Spaniards, however, continued to penetrate into the country, and collected some considerable quantities of gold; but were so far
from thinking of making any settlement amidst such formidable neighbours,
that, in spite of all the experience and valour of their leader, the final issue
* Herrera, dec. 5. lib. vi. c. 12. lib. vii. c. 13. Calancho, Coronica, lib. i. c. 37. Bameuvo, Lima
fundata, ii. 294.
VOL. L. —36             14




282-                    HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK VI.
of the expedition still remained extremely dubious, when they were recalled
from it by an unexpected revolution at Peru.*  The causes of this impor
tant event I shall endeavour to trace to their source.
So many adventurers had flocked to Peru from every Spanish colony in
America, and all with such high expectations of accumulating independent
fortunes at once, that, to men possessed with notions so extravagant, any
mention of acquiring wealth gradually, and by schemes of patient industry,
would have been not only a disappointment, but an insult. In order to find
occupation for men who could not with safety be allowed to remain inactive, Pizarro encouraged some of the most distinguished officers who had
latelyjoined him, to invade different provinces of the empire, which the
Spaniards had not hitherto visited. Several large bodies were formed for
this purpose; and about the time that Almaoro set out for Chili, they
marched into.remote districts of the country. Ro sooner did Manco Capac,
the Inca, observe the inconsiderate security of the Spaniards in thus dispersing their troops, and that only a handful of soldiers remained in Cuzco,
under Juan and Gonzalez Pizarro, than he thought that the happy period
was at length come for vindicating his own rights, for avenging the wrongs
of his country, and extirpating its oppressors. Though strictly watched
by the Spaniards who allowed him to reside in the palace of his ancestors
at Cuzco, he found means of communicating his scheme to the persons
who were to be intrusted with the execution of it. Among people accustomed to revere their sovereign as a divinity, every hint of his will carries
the authority of a command; and they themselves were now convinced,
by the daily increase in the number of their invaders, that the fond hopeg
which they had long entertained of their voluntary departure were altogether vain. All perceived that a vigorous effort of the whole nation was
requisite to expel them, and the preparations for it were carried on with
the secrecy and silence peculiar to Americans.
After some unsuccessful attempts of the Inca to make his escape, Ferdinand Pizarro happening to arrive at that time in Cuzco [1536], he obtained
permission from him to attend a great festival which was to be celebrated a
few leagues from the capital. Under pretext of that solemnity, the great
men of the empire were assembled. As soon as the Inca joined them, the
standard of war was erected; and in a short time all the fighting men,
from: the confines of Quito to the frontier of Chili, were in arms. Many
Spaniards, living securely on the settlements allotted them, were massacred.
Several detachments, as they marched carelessly through a country which
seemed to be tamely submissive to their dominion, were cut off to a man.
An army amounting (if we may believe the Spanish writers) to two hundred thousand men, attacked Cuzco, which the three brothers endeavoured
to defend with only one hundred and seventy Spaniards. Another formi
dable body invested Lima, and kept the governor closely shut up.- There
was no longer any communication between the two cities; the numerous
forces of the Peruvians spreading over the- country, intercepted every
messenger; and as the parties in Cuzco and Lima were equally unacquainted with the fate of their countrymen, each boded the worst concerning
the other, and imagined that they themselves were the only persons who
kad: survived the general extinction of the Spanish name in Peru.t
It was at Cuzco, where the Inca commanded in person, that the Peruvians'made their chief efforts.' During, nine months they carried on the
siege with incessant ardour, and in various forms; and though they displayed not the same undaunted ferocity as the'Mexican warriors, they conducted some of their operations in a manner which discovered greater
sagacity, and a genius more susceptible of improvement' in the military
* Zarate, lib. iii. c. 1, Gomara Hist. c. 131. Vega, p. 2. lib. ii. c. 20. Ovale Hist, de Chile, libh
iv. c. 15, &c. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. vi.. 9. lib. x. c. 1, &c.  t Vega, p. 11, lib. ii. c. 2B. Zarate,
ib. iii. c. 3. Cieca de Leon, c. 82. Gomara Hist. c. 135. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. viii. c. 5.




AMERICA.                             283
art. They not only observed the advantages which the Spaniards derived
from their discipline and their weapons, but they endeavoured to imitate
the former, and turned the latter against them. They armed a considerable body of their bravest warriors with the swords, the spears, and bucklers, which they had taken from the Spanish soldiers whom they had cut
off in different parts of the country. These they endeavoured to marshal
in that regular compact order, to which experience had taught them that
the Spaniards were indebted for their irresistible force in action. Some
appeared in the field with Spanish muskets, and had acquired skill and
resolution enough to use them. A few of the boldest, among whom was
the Inca himself, were mounted on the horses which they had taken, and
advanced briskly to the charge like Spanish cavaliers, with their lances in
the rest. It was more by their numbers, however, than by those imperfect essays to imitate European arts and to employ European arms, that
the Peruvians annoyed the Spaniards [136]. In spite of the valour,
heightened by despair, with which the three brothers defended Cuzco,
Manlco Capac recovered possession of one-half of his capital; and in their
various efforts to drive him out of it, the Spaniards lost Juan Pizarro, the
best' beloved of all the brothers, together with some other persons of note.
Worn out with the fatigue of incessant duty, distressed with want of provisions, and despairing of being able any longder to resist an eneny whose
numbers daily increased, the soldiers became impatient to abandon Cuzco,
in hopes either of joining their countrymen, if any of them yet survived,
or of forcing their way to the sea, and finding some means of escaping
from a country which had been so fatal to the Spanish namne.? While they
were brooding over those desponding thoughts, which their officers laboured in vain to dispel, Almnagro appeared suddenly in the neighbourhood of
Cuzco.
The accounts transmitted to Almagro concerning the general insurrection
of'the Peruvians, were such as would have induced him, without hesitation,
to relinquish the conquest of Chili, and hasten to the aid of his countrynien. But in this resolution he was confirmed by a motive less generous,
but more interesting. By the same messenger who brought him  intelligence of the Inca's revolt, he received the royal patent creating him governor of Chili, and defining the limits of his jurisdiction. Upon considering the tenor of it, he deemed it manifest beyond contradiction, that
Cuzco lay within the boundaries of his government, and he was equally
solicitous to prevent the Peruvians from recovering possession of their
capital, and to wrest it out of the hands of the Pizarros. From impatience
to accomplish both, he ventured to return by a new route; and in march.
ing through the sandy plains on the coast, he suffered from heat and drought,
calamities of a new species hardly inferior to those in which he had been
involved by cold and famine on the summits of the Andes.
1537.] f is arrival at Cuzco was in a critical moment. The Spaniards
and Peruvians fixed their eyes upon him with equal solicitude. The
former, as he did not study to conceal his pretensions, were at a loss whether to welcome him as a deliverer, or to take precautions against him as
an enemy. The latter, knowing the points in contest between him and
his countrymen, flattered themselves that they had more to hope than to
dread from his operations. Almagro himself, unacquainted with the detail
of the events which had happened in his absence, and solicitous to learn
the-precise posture of affairs, advanced towards the'capital slowly, and
with great circumspection. Various negotiations with both parties were
set on foot. The Inca conducted them on his part with much address
At first he endeavoured to gain the friendship of Almagro; and after many
fruitless overtures, despairing of any cordial union with a Spaniard, he
*Herrera, dec. 5. lib. viii. c. 4.




284                     HISTORY OF                     [BOox VI
attacked him by surprise with a numerous body of chosen troops. But the
Spanish discipline and valour maintained their wonted superiority.  The
Peruvians were repulsed with such slaughter that a great part of their
army dispersed, and Almagro proceeded to the gates of Cuzco without
interruption.
The Pizarros, as they had no longer to make head against the Peruvians, directed all their attention towards their new enemy, and took measures to obstruct his entry into the capital. Prudence, however, restrained
both parties for some time from turning their arms against one another,
while surrounded by common enemies, who would rejoice in the mutual
slaughter. Different schemes of accommodation were proposed. Each
endeavoured to deceive the otlier, or to corrupt his followers. The generous, open, affable temper of Almagro gained many adherents of the
Pizarros, who were disgusted with their harsh, domineering manners.
Encouraged by this defection, he advanced towards the city by night, surprised the sentinels, or was admitted by them, and, investing the house
where the two brothers resided, compelled them, after an obstinate defence,
to surrender at discretion. Almagro's claim of jurisdiction over Cuzco
was universally acknowledged, and a form of administration established in
his name.*
Two or three persons only were killed in this first act of civil hostility;
but it was soon followed by scenes more bloody. Francisco Pizarro
having dispersed the Peruvians who had invested Lima, and received
some considerable reinforcements from Hispaniola and Nicaragua, ordered
five hundred men, under the command of Alonzo de Alvarado, to march
to Cuzco, in hopes of relieving his brothers, if they and their garrison
were not already cut off by the Peruvians. This body, which at that
period of the Spanish power in America must be deemed a considerable
force, advanced near to the capital before they knew that they had any
enemy more formlidable than Indians to encounter. It was with astonishment that they beheld their countrymen posted on the barnks of the river
Abancay to oppose their progress. Almagro, however, wished rather to
gain than to conquer them, and by bribes and promises, endeavoured to
seduce their leader. The fidelity of Alverado remained unshaken; but
his talents for war were not equal to his virtue. Almagro amused him
with various movements, of which he drid not comprehend the meaning,
while a large detachment of chosen soldiers passed the river by night
[July 12l, fell upon his camp by surprise, broke his troops before they had
time to form, and took him prisoner, together with his principal officers.t
By the sudden rout of this body,-the contest between the two rivals
must have been decided, if Almagro had known as well how to improve
as how to gain a victory. Rodrigo Orgognez, an officer of great abilities,
who having served under the Constable Bourbon, when he led the imnperial
army to Rome, had been accustomed to bold and decisive measures, advised him instantly to issue orders for putting to death Ferdinand and Gonzalo Pizarros, Alvarado, and a few other persons whom he could not hope
to gain, and to march directly with his victorious troops to Lima, before
the governor had time to prepare for his defence. But Almagro, though
he discerned at once the utility of the counsel, and though he had courage
to have carried it into execution, suffered himself to be Influenced by sentiments unlike those of a soldier of fortune grown old in service, and by
scruples which suited not the chief 9f a party who had drawn his sword
in civil war. Feelings of humanity restrained him from shedding the blood
of his opponents; and. the dread of being deemed a rebel deterred him
from entering a province which the King had allotted to another. Though
* Zarate, lib. iii. c. 4.  Vega, p. 11, lib. ii. c. 29. 31.  Gomara Hist. c. 134.  Herrera, deo. 6, d iet.
Ii. c. 1-5.  f Zarate, lib. iii. c. 6.   Gom. Hist. c. 138.  Vega, p. 11. ib, ii,. c. 32. 34.  Herrera3
dec. 6. lib. ii. e. 9.




AMERICA.                             285
he kneva that arms must terminate the dispute between him and Pizarro,
and resolved not to shun that mode of decision; yet, with a'timid delicacy,
preposterous at such a juncture, he was so solicitous that his rival should
be considered as the aggressor, that he marched quietly back to Cuzco, to
wait his approach.*
Pizarro was still unacquainted with all the interesting events which had
happened near Cuzco. Accounts of Almagro's return, of the loss of the
capital, of the death of -one brother, of the imprisonment of tile other two,
and of the defeat of Alvarado, were brought to him at once. Such a tide
of misfortunes almost overwhelmed a spirit which had continued firm and
erect under the rudest shocks of adversity. But the necessity of attending
to his own safety, as well as the desire of revenge, preserved him from
sinking under it. He took measures for both with his wonted sagacity.
As he had the command of the seacoast, and expected considerable supplies both of men and mili'tary stores, it was no less his interest to gain
time, and to avoid action, than it was that of Almahgro to precipitate operations, and bring the contest to a speedy issue. He had recourse to arts
which he had formerly practised with success; and Almagro was again
weak enough to suffer himself to be amused with a prospect of terminating
their differences by some amicable accommodation. By varying his overtures, and shifting his ground as often as it suited his purpose, sometimes
seeming to yield to every thing which his rival could desire, and then
retracting all that he had granted, Pizarro dexterously protracted the negotiation to such a length, that, though every day was precious to Almagro,
several months elapsed without corning to any final agreement. While
the attention of Almagro, and of the officers with whom he consulted, was
occupied in detecting and eluding the fraudulent intentions of the governor,
Gonzalo Pizarro and Alvarado found means to corrupt the soldiers to whose
custody they were committed, and not only made their escape themselves,
but persuaded sixty of the men who formerly guarded them to accompany
their flight.t Fortune having thus delivered one of his brothers, the
governor scrupled not at one act of perfidy more to procure the release of
the other. He proposed that every point in controversy between Almagro
and himself should be submitted to the decision of their sovereign; that
until his award was known, each should retain undisturbed possession of
whatever part of the country he now occupied; that Ferdinand Pizarro
should be set at liberty, and return instantly to Spain, together with the
officers whom Almagro purposed to send thither to represent the justice of
his claims. Obvious as the design of Pizarro was in those propositions,
and familiar as his artifices might now have been to his opponent, Almagro,
with a credulity approaching to infatuation, relied on his sincerity, and
concluded an agreement on these terms.:
The moment that Ferdinand Pizarro recovered his liberty, the gove:nor,
no longer fettered in his operations by anxiety about his brother's life,
threw off every disguise which his concern for it had obliged him to assume
The treaty was forgotten; pacific and conciliating measures were no more
mentioned; it was in the field he openly declared, and not in the cabinet,
-by arms and not by negotiation,-that it must now be determined who
should be master of Peru. The rapidity of his preparations suited such a
decisive resolution. Seven hundred men were soon ready to march towards
Cuzco. The command of these was given to his two brothers, in whom
he could perfectly confide for the execution of his most violent schemes,
as they were urged on, not only by the enmity flowing from the rivalship
between their family and Almagro, but animated with the desire of vengeance, excited by recollection of their own recent disgrace and sufferings.
* Herrera, dec. 6. lib. ii. c. 10, 11.  t Zarate, lib. iii. 8.  Herrera, dec. 6. lib. ii. c. 14.
l Herrera, dec. 6. lib. iii. 9.  Zarate, lib; iii. c. 9.  Gomara tlist. c. 140. Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c, 35




286                     HISTORY  OF                    [BooK VI.
After an unsuccessful attempt to cross the mountains in the direct road between Lima and Cuzco, they marched towards the south along the coast
as far as Nasca, and then turning to the left, penetrated through the defiles
in that branch of the Andes which lay between them and the capital.
Almagro, instead of hearkening to some of his officers, who advised him
to attempt the defence of those difficult passes, waited the'approach of
the enemy in the plain of Cuzco. Two reasons seem to have induced
him to take this resolution. His followers amounted hardly to five hundred,
and he was afraid of weakening such a feeble body by sending any detachment towards the mountains. His cavalry far exceeded that of the
adverse party, both in number and discipline, and it was only in an open
country that he could avail himself of that advantage.
The Pizarros advanced without any obstruction, but what arose from
the nature of the desert and horrid regions through which they marched.
As soon as they reached the plain, both factions were equally impatient to
bring this long protracted contest to an issue. Though countrymen and
friends, the subjects of the same sovereign, and each with the royal
standard displayed; and though they beheld the mountains that surrounded
the plain in which they were drawn up, covered with a vast multitude of
Indians assembled to enjoy the spectacle of their mutual carnage, and
prepared to attack whatever party remained master of the field; so fell
and implacable was the rancour which had taken possession of every
breast, that not one pacific counsel, not a single overture towards accommodation proceeded from either side.  Unfortunately for Almagro, he was
so worn out with the fatigues of service, to which his advanced age was
unequal, that, at this crisis of his fate, he could not exert his wonted activity,
and he was obliged to commit the leading his troops to Orgognez, who,
though an officer of great merit, did not possess the same ascendant either
over the spirit or" affections of the soldiers, as the chief whom they had
long been accustomed to follow and revere.
The conflict was fierce, and maintained by each party with equal
courage [April 26]. On the side of Almagro were more veteran soldiers,
and a larger proportion of cavalry; but these were counterbalanced by
Pizarro's superiority in numbers, and by two companies of well disciplined
musketeers, which, on receiving an account of the insurrection of the
Indians, the emperor had sent from Spain.?  As the use of fire-arms was
not frequent among the adventurers in America,4 hastily equipped for service, at their own expense, this small band of soldiers regularly trained
and armed, was a novelty in Peru, and decided the fate of the day.
Wherever it advanced, the w6ight of a heavy and well sustained fire
bore down horse and foot before it; and Orgognez, while he endeavoured
to rally and animate his troops, having received a dangerous wound, the
route became general. The barbarity of the conquerors stained the glory
which they acquired by this complete victory. The violence of civil rage
hurried on some to slaughter their countrymen with indiscriminate cruelty;
the meanness of private revenge instigated others to single out individuals
as the objects of their vengeance. Orgognez and several officers of distinction were massacred in cold blood; above a hundred and fbrty soldiers
fell in the field; a large proportion, where the number of combatants was
few, and the heat of the contest soon over. Almagro, though so feeble
that he couldl not bear the motion of a horse, bad insisted on being carried
in a litter to an eminence which overlooked the field of battle. From
thence, in the utmost agitation of mind, he viewed the various movements
of both parties, and at last beheld the total defeat of his own troops, with
all the passionate indignation of a veteran leader long accustomed tc
* ilerrera. dec. 6. lib. iii. c. 8.  t Zarate, lib. lii. c, 8




AMERICA.                               287
victory. He endeavoured to save himself by flight, but was taken prisoner,
and guarded with the strictest vigilance.)
The Indians, instead of executing the resolution which they had formed,
retired quietly after the battle was over; and in the history of the New
World, there is not a more striking instance of the wonderful ascendant
which the Spaniards had acquired over its inhabitants, than that, after'
seeing one of the contending parties ruined and dispe.sed, and the other
weakened and fatigued, they had not courage to fall upon their enemies,
when fortune presented an opportunity of attacking theml with such advantage.t
Cuzco was pillaged by the victorious troops, who found there a con
siderable booty, consisting partly of the gleanings of the Indian treasures,
and partly of the wealth amassed by their antagonists from  the spoils of
Peru and Chili. But so far did this, and whatever the bounty of their
leader could add. to it, fall below the high ideas of the recompense which
they conceived to be due to their mnerit, that Ferdinand Pizarrno, unable to
gratify such extravagant expectations, had recouse to the same expedient
which his brother had employed on a similar occasion, and endeavoured
to find occupation for this turbulent assumning spirit, in order to prevent it
from breaking out into open mutiny.  With this view, he encouraged his
most active officers to attempt the discovery and reduction of various provinces which had not hitherto submitted to the Spaniards.  To every
standard erected by the leaders who undertook any of those new expeditions, volunteers resorted with the ardour and hope peculiar to the age.
Several of Almagro's soldiers joined them, and thus Pizarro had the satisfaction of being delivered both from  the importunity of his discontented
friends, and the dread of his ancient enemies.]
Almagro himself remained for several months in custody, under all the
anguish of suspense. For although his doom  was determined by the
Pizarros from  the moment that he fell into their hands, prudence constrained them to defer gratifying their vengeance, until the soldiers who
had served under him, as well as several of their own followers in -whom
they could not perfectly confide, had left Cuzco. As soon as they set out
upon their different expeditions,'Alnagro was impeached of treason,
formally tried, and condemned to die.  The sentence astonished him; and
though he had often braved death with undaunted spirit in the field, its
approach under this ignominious form appalled him so much, that he had
recourse to abject supplications unworthy of his former fame.  He besought the Pizarros to remember the ancient friendship between their brother and him, and how much he had contributed to the prosperity of their
family; he reminded them of the humanity with which, in opposition to
the repeated remonstrances of his own most attached friends, he had
spared their lives when he had them in his power; he conjured them  to
pity his age and infirmities, and to suffer him  to pass the wretched remainder of his days in bewailing his crimes, and in making his peace with
Heaven.  The entreaties, says a Spanish historian, of a man so much beloved touched many an unfeeling heart, and drew tears from many a stern
eye. But the brothers remained inflexible. As soon as Almagro knew
his fate to be inevitable, he met it with the dignity and fortitude of a
veteran. He was strangled in prison, and afterwards publicly beheaded.
He suffered in the seventy-fifth year of his age, and left one son by an
Indian woman of Panama, whom, though at that time a. prisoner in Lima,
he named as successor to his government, pursuant to a power which the
emperor had granted him.~
* Zarate, lib. iii. c. 11, 12. Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 36-38. Herrera, dec. 6. lib. iii. c. 10-12. lib. iv.
c. 1-6.     t Zarate, lih. iii. c. 11. Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 38.  ~ Zarate,;ib. iii. e. 1l
Gomara llist. c. 141. Herrera, dec. 6. lib. iv. c. 7.  t Zarate, lib. iii. c. 12. Goimara tlist. a
141   Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 39.  Herrera, dec. 6. lib. iv. c. ib. v. c. 1.




288                     HISTORY  OF                   [BooK Vi.
1539.] As, during the civil dissensions in Peru, all intercourse with Spain
was suspended, the detail of the extraordinary transactions there did not
soon reach the court. Unfortunately for the victorious faction, the first
intelligence was brought thither by some of Altnagro's officers. who left the
country upon the ruin of their cause; and they related what had happened,
with every circumstance, unfavourable to Pizarro and his brothers. Their
ambition, their breach of the most solemn engagements, their violence and
cruelty, were painted with all the malignity and exaggeration of party
hatred. Ferdinand Pizarro, who arrived soon after, and appeared in court
with extraordinary splendour, endeavoured to efface the impression which
their accusations had made, and to justify his brother and himself by repre
senting Almagro as the aggressor. The emperor and his ministers, though
they could not pronounce which of the contending factions was most
criminal, clearly discerned the fatal tendency of their dissensions. It was
obvious, that while the leaders, intrusted with the conduct of two infant
colonies, employed the arms which should have been turned against the
common enemy, in destroying one another, all attention to the public good
must cease, and there was reason to dread that the Indians might improve
the advantage which the disunion of the Spaniards presented to them,
and extirpate both the victors and vanquished. But the evil was more
apparent than the remedy. Where the information which had been
received was so defective and suspicious, and the scene of action so remote,
it was almost impossible to chalk out the line of conduct that ought to be
followed; and before any plan that should be approved of in Spain could
be carried into execution, the situation of the parties, and the circumstances
of affairs, might alter so entirely as to render its effects extremely
pernicious.
Nothing therefore remained, but to send a person to Peru, vested with
extensive and discretionary power, who, after viewing deliberately the posture of affairs with his own eyes, and inquiring upon the spot into the conduct of the different leaders, should be authorized to establish the govern
ment in that fcz.m which he deemed most conducive to the interest of the
parent state, and the welfare of the colony. The man selected for this
important charge was Christoval Vaca de Castro, a judge in the court of
royal audience at Valladolid; and his abilities, integrity, and firmness justified the choice. His instructions, though ample, were not such as to fetter
him in his operations. According to the different aspect of affairs, he had
power to take upon him different characters. If he found the governor
still alive, he was to assume only the title of judge, to maintain the appearance of acting in concert with him, and to guard against giving any just
cause of offence to a man who had merited so highly of his country. But if
Pizarro were dead, he was intrusted with a commission that he might then
produce, by which he was appointed his successor in the government of
Peru. This attention to Pizarro, however, seems to have flowed rather
from dread of his power than from any approbation of his measures; for, at
the very time that the court seemed so solicitous not to irritate him, his
brother Ferdinand was arrested at Madrid, and confined to a prison, where
he remained above twenty years.
1540.] While Vaca de Castro was preparing for his voyage, events of
great moment happened in Peru. The governor, considering himself, upon
the death of Almagro, as the unrivalled possessor of that vast empire, proceeded to parcel out its territories among the conquerors; and had this
division been made with any degree of impartiality, the extent of country
which he had to bestow was sufficient to have gratified his friends, and to
have gained his enemies. But Pizarro conducted this transaction, not with
the equity and candour of a judge attentive to discover and to reward
* Gomara Hist. c. 142.   Vega, p. 11. lib. ii. c. 40.  Herrera, dec. 6. lib. viii. c  10, 11. lib. x. c I




AMERI C A.                            89
merit, but with the illiberal spirit of a party leader. Large districts, i;
parts of the country most cultivated and populous, were set apart as his own
property, or granted to his brothers, his adherents, and favourites. To
others, lots less valuable and inviting were assigned. The followers of
Almagro, amongst whom were many of the original adventurers to whose
valour and perseverance Pizarro was indebted for his success, were totally
excluded fror any portion in those lands, towards the acquisition of which
they had contributed so largely. As the vanity of every individual set
an immoderate value upon his own services, and the idea of each concerning the recompense due to tilem rose gradually to a more exorbitant height
in proportion as their conquests extended, all who were disappointed in
their expectations exclaimed loudly against the rapaciousness and partiality
of the governor. The partisans of Almagro murmured in secret, and medi.
tated revenge.*
Rapid as the progress of the Spaniards in South America Lad been since
Pizarro landed in Peru, their avidity of dominion was not yet satisfied.
The officers to whom Ferdinand Pizarro gave the command of different
detachments, penetrated into several new provinces; and though some of
them were exposed to great hardships in the cold and barren regions of the
Andes, and others suffered distress not inferior amidst the woods and marshes
of the plains, they made discoveries and conquests which not only extended
their knowledge of the country, but added considerably to the territories
of Spain and the New World. Pedro de Valdivia reassumed Almagro's
scheme of invading Chili, and notwithstanding the fortitude of the natives
in defending their possessions, made such progress in the conquest of the
country, that he founded the city of St. Jago, and gave a beginning to the
establishment of the Spanish dominion in that province.t  but of all the
enterprises undertaken about this period, that of Gonzalo Pizarro was the
most remarkable. T'he governor, who seems- to have resolved that no
person in Peru should possess any station of distinguished eminence or authority but those of his own family, had deprived Benalcazar, the conqueror
of Quito, of his command in that kingdom, and appointed his brother Gonzalo to take the government of it. He instructed him to attempt the
discovery and conquest of the country to the east of the Andes, which,
according to the information of the Indians, abounded with cinnamon and
other valuable spices. Gonzalo, net inferior to any of his brothers in
courage, and no less ambitious of acouiring distinction, eagerly engaged in
this difficult service. He set out from Quito at the head of three hundred
and forty soldiers, near one half of wnom were horsemen; with four thousand Indians to carry. their provisions. In forcing their way through the
defiles, or over the ridges of the Andes, excess of cold and fatigue, to
neither of which they were accustomrred. proved fatal to the greater part ot
their wretched attendants. The Spanlards, though more robust, and inured
to a variety of climates, suffered considerably, and lost some men: but
when they descended into the low country, their distress increased. During
two months ii rained incessantly, without any interval of fair weather long
enough to dry their clothes.4  The immense plains upon which they were
nowv entering, either altogether without inhabitants, or occupied by the
rudest and least industrious tribes in the New World, yielded little subsistence. They could not advance a step but as they cut a road through woods,
Cr made it through marshes. Such incessant toil, and continual scarcity of
food, seem more than sufficient to have exhausted and dispirited any troops.
But the fortitude and perseverance of the Spaniards in the sixteenth century were insuperable. Allured by frequent but false accounts of rich
countries before them, they persisted in struggling on, until they reached
* Vega, p. 1. lib iii. c. 2. Hen'era, dec. 6. lib. viii. e. 5.  t Zarate, lib. iii. c. 13. Ovalle,
Jib. ii. c. I, &c.  4 Zarate, lib. iv,. 2.
VOL. I. —37




290                     HISTORY OF                       [BooK VI.
the banks of the Coca or Napo, one of the large rivers whose waters pour
into the Maragnon, and contribute to its grandeur. There, with infinite
labour, they built a bark, which they expected would prove of great utility
in conveying them over rivers, in procuring provisions, and in exploring the
country.  r'Ihis was manned with fifty soldiers, under the command of
Francis Orellana, the officer next in rank to Pizarro. The stream carried
them down with such rapidity, that they were soon far ahead of their
countrymen, who followed slowly and with difficulty'by land.
At this distance from his commander, Orellana, a young man of an aspiring mind, began to fancy himself independent; and transported with the
predoiminant passion of the age, he formed the scheme of distinguishing
himself as a discoverer, by following the course of the Maragnon until it
jLined the ocean, and by surveying the vast regions through which it flows.
1 his scheme of Orellana's +was as bold as it was treacherous.  For, if he be
cha:rgeable with the guilt of having violated his duty to his commander, and
with having abandoned his fellow soldiers in a pathless desert, where they
had hardly any hopes of success, or even of safety, but what were founded
on the service which they expected from the bark-; his crime is in some
measure balanced by the glory of having ventured upon a navigation of
near two thousand leagues, through unknown nations, in a vessel hastily constructed, with green timber, and by very unskilful hands, without provisions, without a compass, or a pilot. but his courage and alacrity supplied
every defect. Committing himself fearlessly to the guidance of the stream,
the Napo bore him along to the south, until he reached the great channel of
the Maragnon.  Turning with it towards the coast, he held on his course
in that direction. He made frequent descents on both sides of the river,
sometimes seizing by force of arms the provisions of the fierce savages
seated onr its banks; and sometimes procuring a supply of food by a friendly
intercourse with more gentle tribes. After a long series of dangers, which
he encountered with amazing fortitude, and of distresses which he sup-ported with no less magnanimity, he reached the ocean [137], where new
perils awaited him. These he likewise surmounted, and got safely to the
Spanish settlement in the island of Cubagua; from thence he sailed to
Spain.  The vanity natural to travellers who visit regions unknown to the
rest of mankind, and the art of an adventurer solicitous to magnify his own
merit, concurred in prompting him to mingle an extraordinary proportion
of the marvellous in the narrative of his voyage. He pretended to have discovered nations so rich that the roofs of their temples were covered with
plates of gold; and described a republic of women so warlike and powerful, as to have extended their dominion over a considerable tract of the' fertile
plains which he had visited. Extravagant as those tales were, they gave rise
to an opinion, that a region abounding with gold, distinguished by the name
of El Dorada, and a community of Amazons, were to be found in this part
of the world; and such is the propensity of mankind to believe what is
wonderful, that it has been slowly and with difficulty that reason and observation hlave exploded those fables. The voyage, however, even when
stripped of every romantic embellishment, deserves to be recorded not
only as one of the most memorable occurrences in that adventurous age,
but as the first event which led to any certain knowledge of the extensive
counitries that stretch eastward from the Andes to the ocean.*
No words can describe the consternation of Pizarro, when he did nct
find the bark at the confluence of the Napo and Maragnon, where he had
ordered Orellana to wait for himn. He would not allow himself to suspect
that a man, whom he had intrusted with such an important command,
could be so base and so unfeeling as to desert him at such a juncture.
But imputing his absence from the place of rendezvous to some unknown
* Zarate, lib. iv. c. 4. Gomara Hist. c. 86. Vega, p. 11. lib. iii. c. 4. Herrera, dec. 6. lib. xi. c.
2-5. Rodriguez el Maragnon y Amaizonas, lib. i. c. 3.




AMERICA.                             291
accident, he advanced above fifty leagues along the banks of the Maragnon,
expecting every moment to see the bark appear with a supply of provisions [1541]. At length he came up with an officer whom Orellana had
left to perish In the desert, because he had the courage to remonstrate
against his perfidy. From him he learned the extent of Orellana's crime,
and his followers perceived at once their own desperate situation, when
deprived of their only resource. The spirit of the stoutest hearted veteran sunk within him, and all demanded to be led back instantly. Pizarro,
though he assumed an appearance of tranquillity, did not oppose their inclination. But he was now twelve hundred miles friom Quito; and in that
long march the Spaniards encountered hardships greater than those which
they had endured in their progress outward, without the alluring hopes
which then soothed and animated them under their sufferings. fHunger
compelled them to feed on roots and berries, to eat all their dogs and
horses, to devour the most loathsome reptiles, and even to gnaw the leather
of their saddles and swordbelts. Four thousand Indians, and two hundred
and ten Spaniards, perished in this wild disastrous expedition, which continued near two years; and as fifty men wvere aboard the bark with Orellana, only fourscore got back to Quito. These were naled like savages,
and so emaciated with famine, or worn out with fatig'-,nat they had more
the appearance of spectres than of men.But, instead of returning to enjoy the repose which his condition re
quired, Pizarro, on entering Quito, received accounts of a fatal event that
threatened calamities more dreadful to him than those through which he
had passed. From the time that his brother made that partial division of
his conquests which has been mentioned, the adherents of Almagro, considering themselves as proscribed by the party in power, no longer entertained any hope of bettering their condition. Great numbers in despair
resorted to Lima, where the house of young Almagro was always open to
them, and the slender portion of his father's fortune, which the governor
allowed him to enjoy, was spent in affording them subsistence. The warm
attachment with which every person who had served under the elder Almagro devoted himself to his interests, was quickly transferred to his son,
who was now grown up to the age of manhood, and possessed all the
qualities which captivate the affections of soldiers. Of a graceful appearance, dexterous at all martial exercises, bold, open, generous, he seemed to
be formed for command; and as his father, conscious of his own inferiority
from the total want of education, had been extremely attentive to have
him instructed in every science becoming a gentleman; the accomnplishments which he had acquired heightened the respect of his followers, as
they gave him distinction and eminence among illiterate adventurers. In
this young man the Almagrians found a/point of union which they wanted,
and, looking up to him as their head, were ready to undertake anlly thing
for his advancement. Nor was affection for Almagro their only incitement; they were urged on by their own distresses. Many of them, destitute of common necessaries [138], and weary of loitering away life, a
burden to their chief, or to such of their associates as had saved some
remnant of their fortune from pillage and confiscation, longed impatiently
for an occasion to exert their activity and courage, and began o deliberate
how they might be avenged on the author of all their misery. Their fieque.nt cabals did not pass unobserved; and the governor was warned to
be on his guard against men who meditated some desperate deed, and had
resolution to execute it.  But either from the native intrepidity of his
mind, or fiom contempt of persons whose poverty seemed to render their
machinations of little consequence, he disregarded the admonitions of his
triends. " Be in no pain," said he carelessly, " about my life; it is per* Zarate, lib. iv. c. 2-5. Vega, p. 11. lib. iii. c. 3, 4, 5. 14. Herrera, dec. 6. lib. viii. c. 7, 8.
lib. Ix, c. 2 —5 dec 7. lib. iii c. 14. Pizar. Varones [I1ust. 349, &c.




292                     HISTORY OF                       [BOOK VI.
fectly safe, as long as every man in Peru knows that 1 can in a moment
cut off any head which dares to harbour a thought against it." This security gave the Almagrians full leisure to digest and ripen every part of
their scheme; and Juan de Herrada, an officer of great abilities, who had
the charge of Almagro's education, took the direction of their consulta
tions with all the zeal which this connection inspired, and with all the authority which the ascendant that he was known to have over the mind of
his pupil gave him.
On Sunday the twenty-sixth of June, at mid-day, the season of tranquillity and repose in all sultry climates, Herrada, at the head of eighteen
of the most determined conspirators, sallied out of Almagro's house, in
complete armour; and, drawing thei-r swords, as they advanced hastily
towards the governor's palace, cried out, "Long live the King, but let the
tyranlt die!"  Their associates, warned of their motions by a signal, were
in arms at different stations ready to support them. Thouoh Pizarro was
usually surrounded by such a numerous train of attendants as suited the
magnificence of the most opulent subject of the age in which he lived;
yet as he was just risen from table, and most of his domestics had retired
to their own apartments, the conspirators passed through the two outer
courts of' the palace unobserved. They were at the bottom of the staircase before a page in waiting could give the alarm to his master, who was
conversing with a few friends in a large hall. The governor, whose steady
mind no form of danger could appal, starting up, called for arms, and
commanded Francisco de Chaves to make fast the door. But that officer,
who did not retain so much presence of mind as to obey this prudent
order, running to the top of the staircase, wildly asked the conspirators
what they meant, and whither they were going? Instead of answering,
they stabbed him to the heart, and burst into the hall. Some of the persons who were there threw themselves fiom the windows; others attempted to fly; and a few drawing their swords followed their leader into an
inner apartment. The conspirators, animated with having the object of
their vengeance now in view, rushed forward after them. Pizarro, with
no other arms than his sword and buckler, defended the entry; and, supported by his half brother Alcantara, and his little knot of friends, he
maintained the unequal contest with intrepidity worthy of his past exploits,
and with the vigour of a youthful combatant. "Courage," cried he,
" companions! we are yet enow to make those traitors repent of their audacity."  But the armour of the conspirators protected them, while every
thrust they made took effect. A]cantara fell dead at his brother's feet
his other defenders were mortally wounded. The governor, so weary
that he could hardly wield his sword, and no longer able to parry the many
weapons furiously aimed at him, received a deadly thrust full in his throat,
sunk to the ground, and expired.
As soon as he was slain, the assassins-ran out into the streets, and, waving
their bloody swords, proclaimed the death of the tyrant. Above two
nundred of their associates having joined them, they conducted young Almagro in solemn procession through the city, and, assembling: the magistrates and principal citizens, compelled them to acknowledge him as lawful
successor to his father in his government. The palace of Pizarro, together
with the houses of several of his adherents, was pillaged by the soldiers,
who had the satisfaction at once of being avenged: on their enemies, and
of enriching themselves by the spoils of those through whose hands al the
wealth of Peru had passed.,'
The boldness and success of the conspiracy, as well as the name and
popular qualities of Almagro, drew many soldiers to his standard. Every
adventurer of desperate fortune, all who were dissatisfied with Pizarro
* Zarate, lib. iv. c. 6-8. Comrnar Hist. c. 144, 145. Vega, p. 11. lib. iii. c. 5-7. Herrera, dec
6 lib. x. c. 4-7. Pizarro Var. Illust. r.. 183.




AMERIC A.                             293
hand from the rapaciousness of his government in the latter years of his
life the numbrer of malecontents wvas considerable), declared v;:ii!.A.-; hesitation in favour of Almagro, and he was soon at the head of eight hundred
of the most gallant veterans in Peru. As his youth and inexperience disqualified him from taking the command of them himself; he appointed
HIerrada to act as general. But though Almagro speedily collected such
a respectable force, the acquiescence in his government was far from being
general.  Pizarro had left many friends to whom his memonnry atras dear;
the barbarous assassination of a man to whom  his country Was so highly
indebted, filled every impartial person with horror. The ignormiious
birth of Almagro, as well as the doubtful title on which le founded his
pretensions, led others to consider him  as a usurper.  The officers who
commanded in some provinces refused to recognise his authority until it
was confirmed by the emperor. In others, particularly at Cuzco, the royal
standard was erected, and preparations were begun in order to revenge
the murder of their ancient leader.                           r
Those seeds of discord, which could not have lain long dormant, acquired
great vigour and activity when the arrival of Vaca de Castro was known.
After a long and dlsastl.us'ae,!Vaa: wVas ca; n k L      st:es of weather
into a small harbour in the province of Popayan; and proceeding from
thence by land, after a journey no less tedious than difficult, he reached
OQuito. In his way he received accounts of Pizarro's death, and of the
events which followed upon it. He immediately produced the royal
commission appointing him governor of Peru, with the same privileges and
authority; and his jurisdiction was acknowledged Awithout hesitation by
Benalcazar, adelantado or lieutenant-general for the emperor in Popayan,
and by Pedro de Puelles, who, in the absence of Gonzalo Pizarro, had
the command of the troops left in Quito. Yaca de Castro not only assumed
the supreme authority, but showed that he possessed the talents which the
exercise of it at that juncture required. By his influence and address he
soon assembled such a body of troops, as not only to set him above all
fear of being exposed to any insult from the adverse party, but enabled
him to advance from Quito with the dignity which became his character.
By despatching persons of confidence to the different settlements in Peru
with a formal. notification of his arrival and of his commission, he communicated to his countrymen the royal pleasure with respect to the government of the country. By private emissaries, he excited such officers as
had discovered their disapprobation of Almagro's proceedings, to manifest
their duty to their sovereign by supporting the person honoured with his
commission.  Those measures were productive of great effects.  Encouraged by the approach of the new governor,'or prepared by his
machinations, the loyal twere confirmed in their principles, and avowed
them wdith greater boldness; the timid ventured to declare their sentiments;
the neutral and wavering, finding it necessary to choose a side, began
to lean to that which now appeared to be the safest as well.as the most
just.U
Almagro observed the rapid progress of this spirit of disaffection to his
cause; and in order to give an effectual check to it before the arrival of
Vaca de Castro. he set out at the head of his troops for Cuzco [1542],
where the most considerable body of 6pponents had erected the royal
standard, under the command of Pedro Alvarez Holguin.  During his
march thither, Herrada, the skilful guide of his youth and of his counsels,
died; and from that time his measures were conspicuous for their violence,
but concerted with little sagacity, and executed with no address. Holguin,
who, with forces far inferior to those of the opposite party, was descend* Benzon, lib. iii. c. 9. Zarate, lib. iv. c. 11. Gomara, c. 146,147 Herrera, dec. 6. lib. x. c. L
2,3.7, &c.




294                     HISTORY OF                      [Book VI.
mg towards the coast at the very time that Almagro was on his way to
Cuzco, deceived his inexperienced adversary by a very simple stratagem,
avoided an engagement, and eftected a junction with Alvarado, an officei
of note, who had been the first to declare against Almagro as a usurper.
Soon after, Vaca de Castro entered their camp with the troops vvhicb
he brought from Quito; and erecting the royal standard before his own
tent, he declared that, as governor, he would discharge in person all
the functions of general of their combined forces.  Though fbroled by
the tenor of his past life to the habits of a sedentary and pacific profession.
he at once assumed the activity and discovered the decision of an officei
l?ng accustomed to command. Knowing his strength to be now far superior to that of the enemy, he was impatient to terminate the contest b' a
battle. Nor did the followers of Almagro, who had no hopes of obtaining
a pardon for a crime so atrocious as the murder of the governor, decline
that mode of decision. They met at Chupaz [Sept. 16], about two hun
dred miles from Cuzco, and fought with all the fierce animosity inspired
by the violence of civil rage, the rancour of private enmity, the eagerness
of revenge, and the last efforts of despair. Victory, after remaining long
doubtful, declared at last for Vaco de Castro. The superior number of
his troops, his own intrepidity, and the martial talents of Francisco de
Carvajal, a veteran officer formed under the great captain in the wars of
Italy, and who on that day laid the foundation of his future fame in Peru,
triumphed over the bravery of his opponents, though led on by young
Almagro with a gallant spirit worthy of a better cause, and deserving
another fate. The carnage was great in proportion to th;e number of the
combatants. Many of the vanquished, especially such as were conscious
that they might be charged with being accessary to the assassination of
Pizarro, rushing on the swords of the enemy, chose to fall like soldiers
rather than wait an ignominious doom. Of fourteen hundred men, the
total amount of combatants on both sides, five hundred lay dead on the
field, and the number of the wounded was still greater.~
If the military talents displayed by Vaca de Castro, both in the council
and in the field, surprised the adventurers in Peru, they were still more
astonished at his conduct after the victory. As he was by nature a rigid
dispenser of justice, and persuaded that it required examples of extraordinary severity to restrain the licentious spirit of soldiers so far removed
from the seat of government, he proceeded directly to try his prisoners as
rebels. Forty were condemned to suffer the death of traitors, others were
banished from Peru.  Their leader, who made his escape from the battle,
being betrayed by some of his officers, was publicly beheaded in Cuzco;
and in him the name of Almagro, and the spirit of the party, was extinct.t
During those violent convulsions in Peru, the emperor and his ministers
were intently employed in preparing regulations, by which they hoped not
only to re-establish tranquillity there, but to introduce a more perfect system
of internal policy into all their settlements in the New World. It is
manifest from all the events recorded in the history of America, that,
rapid and extensive as the Spanish conquests there had been, they were
not carried on by any regular exertion of the national force, but by the
occasional efforts of private adventurers. After fitting out a few of the
first armaments for discovering new regions, the court of Spain, during the
busy reigns of Ferdinand and Charles V., the former the most intriguing
prince of the age, and the latter the most ambitious, was encumbered with
such a multiplicity of schemes, and involved in war with so many nations
of Europe, that he had not leisure to attend to distant and less interesting
* Zarate, lib. i. c. 12-19. Gomara, c. 148. Vega, p. 11 Uib. iii. c. 11-18. Herrea, dec. 7,
lib. i. c. 1, 2, 3.!ib. iii. c. 1-11.   t Zarae, lib. iv. c, 21. G(omra, c. 150, Herrera, dec. 7, ib. iii
c 12. Uib. vi. c. 1.




AMERICA.                             295
objects. The care of prosecuting discovery, or of attempting conquest,
was abandoned to individuals; and with such ardour did men push foiward in
this new career, on which novelty, the spirit of adventure, avarice, ambition,
and the hope of meriting heaven, prompted them with combined influence
to enter, that in less than half a century almost the whole of that extensive
empire which Spain now possesses in the New World, was subjected to
its dominion. As the Spanish court contributed nothing towards the various
expeditions undertaken in America, it was not entitled to claim -much from
their success. The sovereignty of the conquered provinces, with the fifth
of the gold and silver, was reserved for the crown; every thing else was
seized by the associates in each expedition as their own right.  The
plunder oi the countries which they invaded served to indemnify them for
what they had expended in equipping themselves for the service, and the
conquered territory was divided among them, according to rules which
custom had introduced, as permanent establishments which their successful
valour merited. In the infancy of those settlements, when their extent as
well as their value was unknown, many irregularities escaped observation,
and it was found necessary to connive at many excesses. The conquered
people were firequently pillaged with destructive rapacity, and their country
parcelled out among its new masters in exorbitant shares, far exceeding
the highest recompense due to their services. The rude conquerors of
America, incapable of forming their establishments upon any general or
extensive plan of policy, attentive only to private interest, unwilling to
forego present gain from the prospect of remote or public benefit, seem to
have had no object but to amass sudden wealth, without regarding what
might be the consequences of the means by which they acquired it. But
when time at length discovered to the Spanish court the importance of its
American possessions, the necessity of new-modelling their whole frame
became obvious, and in place of the maxinls and practices prevalent
among military adventurers, it was found requisite to substitute the institutions of regular government;
One evil in particular called for an immediate remedy. The conquerors
of Mexico and Peru imitated the fatal example of their countrymen settled
in the islands, and employed themselves in searching for gold and silver
with the same inconsiderate eagerness. Similar effects followed. The
natives employed in this labour by masters, who in imposing tasks had no
regard either to what they felt or to what they were able to perform, pined
away and perished so fast, that there was reason to apprehend that Spain,
instead of possessing countries peopled to such a degree as to be susceptible of progressive improvement, would soon remain proprietor only of a
vast uninhabited desert.
The emperor and his ministers were so sensible of this, and so solicitous
to prevent the extinction of the Indian race, which threatened to render
their acquisitions of no value, that from tilme to time various laws, which
I have mentioned, had been made for securing to that unhappy people
more gentle and equitable treatment. But the distance of America from'the seat of empire, the feebleness of government in the new colonies, the
avarice and audacity of soldiers unaccustomed to restraint, prevented these
salutary regulations from operating with any considerable influence. The
exvil continued to grow, and at this time the emperor found an interval ot
leisure from the affairs of Europe to take it into attentive consideration.
He consulted not only with his ministers and the members of the council
of the Indies, but called upon several persons who had resided long in the
New World to aid them with the result of their experience and observa
tion. Fortunately for the people of America, among these was Bartholo
mew de las Casas, who happened to be then at Madrid on a mission-from
a Chapter of his order at Chiapa.*  Though since the fhiscarriage of his
* Itemesal HiEt. de Chliapa, p. 146.




2t96                    H ISTORY   O F                  [BOOK VI.
former schemes for the relief of the Indians, he had continued shut up in
his cloister, or occupied in religionas ftinctions, his zeal in behalf of the
former objects of his pity was so far firom abating, that, from an increased
knowledge of their sufferings, its ardour had augmented. He seized
eagerly this opportunity of reviving his favourite maxims concerning the
treatment of the Indians. With the moving eloquence natural to a man
en whose mind the scenes which he had beheld had made a deep impression, he described the irreparable waste of the human species in the ~New
World, the Indian race almost totally swept away in the islands in less
than fifty years, and hastening to extinction on the continent with the same
rapid decay. With the decisive tone of one strongly prepossessed with
the truth of his own system, he imputed all this to a single cause, to the
exactions and cruelty of his countrymen, and contended that nothing could
prevent'the depopulation of America, but the declaring of its natives to be
freernen, and treating them as subjects, not as slaves. Nor did he confide
for the success of this proposal in the powers of his oratory alone. In
order to enforce them, he composed his famous treatise concerning the
destruction of America,? in which he relates, with many horrid circumstances, but with apparent marIs of exaggerated description, tile devastation of every province which had been visited by the Spaniards.
The emperor was deeply afflicted with the recital of so many actions
shocking to humanity. But as his views extended far beyond those of Las
Casas, he perceived that relieving the Indians from oppression was but one
step towards rendering his possessions in the New World a valuable acquisition, and would be of little avail, unless he could circumscribe the power
and usurpations of his own subjects there. The conquerors of America,
however great their merit had been towards their countryv, were mostly,
persons of such mean birth, and of such an abject rank in society, as gave no
distinction in the eye of a monarch. The exorbitant wealth with which
some of them returned, gave umbrage to an age not accustomed to see men
in inferior condition elevated above their level, and rising to emulate or to
surpass the ancient nobility in splendour.  The territories which their
leaders had appropriated to themselves were of such enormous extent [139],
that, if the country should ever be improved in proportion to the fertility
of-the soil, they must grow too wealthy and too powerful for subiects. It
appeared to Charles that this abuse required a remedy no less'than the
other, and that the regulations concerning both must be enforced by a mode
of government more vigorous than had yet been introduced into America.
With this view  he framed a body of laws, containing many salutary
appointments with respect to the constitution and powers of the supreme
council of the Indies; concerning the station and jurisdiction of the royal
audiences in different parts of America; the administration of justice; the
order of government, both ecclesiastical and civil. These were approved
of by all ranks of men. But together with them were issued the following
regulations, which excited universal alarm, and occasioned the most violent
convulsions. " That as the repartirnientos or shares of land seized by several
persons appeared to be excessive, the royal audiences are empowered to
reduce them to a moderate extent: That upon the'death of any conqueror
or planter, the lands and Indians granted to him shall not descend to his
widow or ehildren, but return to thei crown: T'hat the Indians shall hence-:forth be exempt from personal service, and shall not be compelled to carry
the baggage of travellers, to labour in the mines, or to dive in the pearl
fisheries: That the stated tribute due by them to their superior shall be
ascertained. and they shall be paid as servants for any work they voluntarily
perform: That all persons who are or have been in public offices, all
ecclesiastics of every denomination, all hospitals and monasteries, shall be
deprived of the lands and Indians allotted to them, and these be annexed
* Remesal, p. 192. 199.




A;ME R-IC A.                            297'o the crown: That every person in Peru, who had any criminal concern
in the contest between Pizarro and Almagro should forfeit his lands and
Indians."'
All the Spanish ministers who had hitherto been intrusted with the
direction of American affairs, and who were best acquainted with the state
of the country, remonstrated against those regulations as ruinous to their'infant colonies. They represented, that the number of Spaniards who
had hitherto emigrated to the New World was so extremely small, that
nothing could be expected from any effort of theirs towards improving the
vast regions over which they were scattered; that the success of every
scheme for this purpose must depend upon the ministry and service of the
Irdians, whose native indolence and aversion to labour, no prospect of
benefit or promise of reward could surmount; that the moment the right of
imposing a task, and exacting the performance of it, was taken from their
masters, every work of industry must cease, and all the sources from which
wealth began to pour in upon Spain must be stopped for ever. But Charles,
tenacious at all times of his own opinions, and so much impressed at present
with the view of the disorders which reigned in America, that he was
willing to hazard the application even of a dangerous remedy, persisted in
his resolution of publishing the laws. That they might, be carried into
execution with greater vigour and authority, he authorized Francisco Tello
de Sandoval to repair to Mexico as Visitador, or superintendent of that
country, and to co-operate. with Antonio de Mendoza, the viceroy, in enforcing them. He appointed Blasco Nugnez Vela to be governor of
Peru, with the title of viceroy; and in order to strengthen his administration, he established a court of royal audience in Lima [15431, in which
four lawyers of eminence were to preside as judges.t
The viceroy and superintendent sailed at the same time; and an account
of the laws which they were to enforce reached America before them.
The entry of SandovaT into Mexico was viewed as the prelude of general
ruin. The unlimited grant of liberty to the Indians affected every Spaniard
in America without distinction, and there was hardly one who might not on
some pretext be included under the other regulations, and suffer by them.
But the colony in New Spain.had now been so long accustomed to the
restraints of law and authority under the steady and prudent administration
of Mendoza, that, how much soever the spirit of the new statutes was detested and dreaded, no attempt was made to obstruct the publication of
them by any act of violence unbecoming subjects. The magistrates arid
principal inhabitants, however, presented dutiful addresses to the viceroy
and superintendent, representing the fatal consequences of enforcing them.
Happily for them Mendoza, by long residence in the country, was so thoroughly acquainted with its state, that he knew what was for its interest as'well as what it could bear; and Sandoval, though new in office, displayed
a degree of moderation seldom possessed by persoas just entering upon the
exercise of power. They engaged to suspend, for some time, the execution
of what was offensive in the new laws, and not only consented that a deputation of citizens should be sent to Europe to lay before the emperor the
apprehensions of his subjects in New Spain with respect to their tendency
and effects, but they concurred with them in supporting their sentiments.
Charles, moved by the opinion of men whose abilities and integrity entitled
them to decide concerning what fell immediately under their own view,
granted such a relaxation of the rigour of the laws as re-established the
COlony in its former tranquillity.4
In Peru the storm gathered with an aspect still more fierce and threaten* Herrera, dec. 7. lib. vi. c. 4. Fernandez Hist. lib, i. c. 1, 2.    t Zarate, lib. iii. c. 24. Goinara. c. 151. Vega, p. 2. lib. iii. c. 20.   i Fernandez Hist. lib. i. c. 3, 4, 5. Vega, p. 11. lib. iii.
e. 21, 22. Herrera, dec. 7. lib. v. c. 7. lib. vii. c. 14, 15. Torquem. Mond. Ind. lib. v. c. 13.
VOL. I.-38




298                      HISTORY    ]                    [fBooK'VI.
mtg, and was not so soon dispelled. The conhierors of' Peru, of a rank
much inferior to those who had subjected Mexico to the Spanish crown,
further removed from the inspection of the parent state, and intoxicated
with the sudden acquisition of wealth, carried on all their operations with
greater license and irregularity than any body of adventurers in the New
World. Amidst the general subversion of law and order, occasioned by
two successive civil wars, when each individual was at liberty to decide
for himself, without any guide but his own interest or passions, this turbulent
spirit rose above all sense of subordination.  To men thus corrupted by
anarchy, the introduction of regular government, the power of a viceroy,
and the authority of a respectable court of judicature, would of themselves
have appeared formidable restraints, to which they would have submitted
with reluctance. But they revolted with indignation against the idea of
complying,vltli laws, by which they were to be stripped at once of all
they had earned so hardly during-many years of service and suffering. As
the account of the new laws spread successively through the different settlements, the inhabitants ran together, the women in tears, and the men
exclaiming against the injustice and ingratitude of their sovereign in depriving them, unheard and unconvicted, of' their possessions.  " Is this,"
cried they, " the recompense due to persons, who, without public aid, at
their own expense, and by their own valour, have subjected to the crown of
Castile territories of such immense extent and opulence? Are these the
rewards bestowed for having endured unparalleled distress, for having
encountered every species of danger in the service of their country? NWNhose
merit is so great, whose conduct has been so irreproachable, that he may
not be condemned by some penal clause in regulations, conceived in terms
as loose and comiprehensive, as if it had been intended that all should be
entangled ri their snare? Every Spaniard of note in Peru has held some
public office, and all, without distinction, have been constrained to take an
active part in the contest between the two rival chiefs. Were the former
to be robbed of their property- because they had done their duty? Were the
latter to be punished on account of what they could not avoid? Shall the
conquerors of this great empire, instead of receiving marks of distinction,
be deprived of the natural consolation of providing for their widows and
children, and leave them to depend for subsistence on the scanty supply
they can extort from unfeeling courtiers?* We are not able now," continued
they,' to explore unknown regions in quest of more secure settlexments;
our constitutions debilitated with age, and our bodies covered with wounds,
are no longer fit for active service; but still we possess vigour sufficient to
assert our just rights, and we will not tamely suffer them  to be wrested
from us."'t
By discourses of this sort, uttered with vehemence, and listened to with
universal approbation, their passions were inflamed to such a pitch that
they were prepared for the most violent measures; and began to hold consultations in different places, how they might oppose the entrance of the
viceroy and judges, and prevent not only the execution but the promulgation of the new laws. From this, however, they were diverted by the
address of Vaca de Castro, who flattered them with hopes, that, as soon as
the viceroy and judges should arrive, and had leisure to examine their petitions and remonstrances, they would concur with them in endeavouring
to procure some mitigation iln the rigour of laws which had been framed
without due attention either to the state of the country, or to the sentiments of the people. A greater degree of accommodation to these, and
even some concessions on the part of government, were now become requisite to compose the present ferment, and to soothe the colonists into sub* lterrera, dec. 7. lib. i. c. 14, 15.  t Gomara, c. 152. Herrera, dec. 7. lib. vi. c. 1tq, 1,L
Vega p. 1. lib. iii. c. 20.22. lib. iv. c. 3,4.




AMERICA.                              299
mission, by inspiring them with confidence in their superiors. But without
profound discernment, conciliating manners, and flexibility of temper, such
a plan could not be carried on.'The viceroy possessed none of these.
Of all the qualities that fit men for high command, he was endowed only
with integrity and courage; the former harsh and uncomplying, the latter
bordering so frequently on rashness or obstinacy, that, in his situation, they
were defects rather than virtues. From  the moment that he landed, at
Tumbez [March 4], Nugnez Vela seems to have considered himself
merely as an executive officer, without any discretionary power; and, regardless of whatever he observed or heard concerning the state of the
country, he adhered to the letter of the regulations with unrelenting rigour.
In all the towns through which he passed, the natives were declared to
be free, every person in public office was deprived of his lands and servants; and as an example of obedience to others, he would not suffer a
single Indian to be employed in carrying his own baggage in his march towards Lima. Amazement and consternation went before him as he approached; and so little solicitous was he to prevent these from augmenting,
that, on entering the capital, he openly avowed that he came to obey the
orders of his sovereign, not to dispense with his laws. This harsh declaration was accompanied with what rendered it still more intolerable,
haughtiness in deportment, a tone of arrogance and decision in discourse,
and an insolence of office grievous to men little accustomed to hold civil
authority in high respect. Every attempt to procure a suspension or mitigation of the new laws, the viceroy considered as flowing from a spirit of
disaffection that tended to rebellion.  Several persons of rank were confined, and some put to death, without any form of trial. Vaca de Castro
was arrested; and- notwithstanding the dignity of his former rank, and his
merit, in having prevented a general insurrection in the colony, he was
loaded with chains, and shut up in the common jail.?
But however general the indignation was against such proceedings, it is
probable the hand of authority would have been strong enough to suppress
it, or to prevent it bursting out with open violence, if the malecontents had
not been provided with a leader of credit and eminence to unite and to
direct their efforts. From the time that the purport of the new regulations
was known in Peru, every Spaniard there turned his eyes towards Gonzalo Pizarro, as the only person able to avert the ruin with which they
threatened the colony. From all quarters, letters and addresses were sent
to him, conjuring him to stand forth as their common protector, and offer.
ing to support him in the attempt with their lives and fortunes. Gonzalo,
though inferior in talents to his other brothers, was equally ambitious, and
of courage no less daring. The behaviour of an ungrateful court towards
his brothers and himself dwelt continually on his mind. Ferdinand a state
prisoner in Europe, the children of the governor in custody of the viceroy,
and sent aboard his fleet, himself reduced to the condition of a private
citizen in a country for the discovery and conquest of which Spain was indebted to his family-these thoughts prompted him to seek for vengeance,
and to assert the rights of his family, of which he now considered himself
as the guardian and the heir. But as no Spaniard can easily surmount that
veneration for his sovereign which seems to be interwoven in his frame,
the idea of marching in arms against the royal standard filled him with
horror. He hesitated long, and was still unresolved, when the violence of
the viceroy, the universal call of his countrymen, and the certainty of becoming soon a victim himself to the severity of the new laws, moved him
to quit his residence at Chuquisaca de la Plata, and repair to Cuzco. All
the inhabitants went out to meet him, and received him with transports of
* Zarate, lib. iv. c. 23, 24, 25. Gomara, c. 153-155. Vega, p. 11. lib. iv c. 4, 5. Fernnde;




300                    HISTORY  OF                     [BooK VI.
oy as the deliverer of the colony. In the fervour of their zeal, they elect.
ed him procurator-general of the Spanish nation in Peru, to s.lit the re-.
peal of the late regulations.  They empowered him to lay their remonstrances before the royal audience in Lima, and, upon pretext of danger
from the Indians, authorized him to march thither in arms [15441. Under
sanction of this nomination Pizarro took possession of the royal treasure,
appointed officers, levied soldiers, seized a large train of artillery which
VTaca de Castro had deposited in Gum.n;anga, and set out for Lima as if he
had been advancing against a public e.ciily. Disaffection having now assumed a regular form, and being uniteci under a chief of such distinguished name, many persons of note resorted to his standard; and a considerable
part of the troops, raised by the viceroy to oppose his progress, deserted
to him in a body.'~
Before Pizarro reached Lima, a revolution had happened there, which
encouraged him to proceed with almost certainty of success. The violence
of the viceroy's administration was not more formidable to the Spaniards
of Peru than his overbearing haughtiness was odious to his associates, the
judges of the royal audience. During their voyage from Spain, some symrptoms of coldness between the viceroy and them began to appear.t But
as soon as they entered upon the exercise of their respective offices, both
parties were so much exasperated by frequent contests, arising from interference of jurisdiction and contrariety of opinion, that their mutual disgust
soon grew into open enmity. The judges thwarted the viceroy in every
measure, set at liberty prisoners'whomr he had confined, justified the malecontents, and applauded their remonstrances. At a time when both departments of government should have united against the approaching
enemy, they were contending with each other for superiority. The
judges at length prevailed. The viceroy, universally odious, and abandoned even by his own guards, was seized in his palace [Sept. 18], and carried
to a desert island on the coast, to be kept there until he could be sent home
to Spain.
Thejudges, in consequence of this, having assumed the supreme direction of affairs into their own hands, issued a proclamation suspending the
execution of the obnoxious laws, and sent a message to Pizarro, requiring
him, as they had already granted whatever he could request, to dismiss
his troops, and to repair to Lina with fifteen or twenty attendants. They
could hardly expect that a man so daring and ambitious would tamely
comply with this requisition. It was made, probably, with no such intention, but only to throw a decent veil over their own conduct; for Cepeda,
the president of the court of audience, a pragmatical and aspiring lawyer,
seems to have held a secret correspondence with Pizarro, and had already
formed the plan, which he afterwards executed, of devoting himself to
his service. The imprisonment of the viceroy, the usurpation of the
judges, together with the universal confusion and anarchy consequent upon
events so singular and unexpected, opened new and vastprospects to Pizarro. He now beheld the supreme power within his reach. Nor did he
want courage to push on towards the object which fortune presented to
his view. Carvajal, the prompter of his resolutions, and guide of all his
actions, had long fixed his eye.upon it as the only end at which Pizarro
ought to aim. Instead of the inferior function of procurator for the Spanish settlements in Peru, he openly demanded to be governor and captaingeneral of the whole province, and required the court of audience to grant
him a commission to that effect. At the head of twelve. hundred men,
within a mile of Lima, where-there was neithernleader nor army:to oppose
him, such a request carried with it the authority of a command. But the
* Zarate, lib. v. c. 1. Gomara, c. 156, 157. Vega, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 4-12. Fernandez, lib. i.:O
12 —1. tierrera, dec. 7. lib. vii. c. 18, &c. lib. viii. c. 1-5.  t Gomara, c. 171.




AMERICA.                              301
judges, either from unwillingness to relinquish power, or from a desire of
preserving some attt:ntion to appearances, hesitated, or seemed to hesitate,
about complying with what he demanded.  Carvajal, impatient of delay,
and impetuous in all his operations, marched into the city by night, seized
several officersof distinction obnoxious to Pizarro, and hlanged them without the formality of a trial. Next morning the court of audience — issued
a commission in the emperor's name, appointing Pizarro governor of Peru,
with full powers, civil as well as military, and he entered the town that
day with extraordinary pomp, to take possession of his new dignity.*
Oct. 28.] But amidst the disorder and turbulence which accompanied
this total dissolution of the frame of government, the minds of men, set
loose from the ordinary restraints of law and authority, acted with such
capricious irregularity, that events no less extraordinary than unexpected
followed in a rapid succession.  Pizarro had scarcely begun to exercise
the new powers with which he was inveated, when he beheld formidable
enemies rise up to oppose him. The viceroy having been put on board a
vessel by the judges of the audience, in order that he might be carried to
Spain under custody of Juan Alvarez one of their own number; as soon
as they were out at sea, Alvarez, either touched with remorse, or moved
by fear, kneeled down to his prisoner, declared him from that moment to
be free, and that he himself, and every person in the ship, would obey him
as the legal representative of their sovereign. Nugnez Vela ordered the
pilot of the vessel to shape his course towards Tumbez, and as soon as he
landed there, erected the royal standard, and resumed his functions of
viceroy. Sevcral persons of note, to whom the contagion of the seditious
spirit which reigned at Cuzco and Lima had not reached, instantly avowed
their resolution to support his authority.t  The violence of Pizarro's government, who observed every individual with the jealousy natural to
usurpers, and who punished every appearance of disaffection with unforgiving severity, soon augmented the number of the viceroy's adherents, as
it forced some leading men in the colony to fly to him for refuge. While
he was gathering such strength at Tumbez, that his forces began to assume
the appearance of what was considered as an army in America, Diego
Centeno, a bold and active officer, exasperated by the cruelty and oppression of Pizarro's lieutenant-governor in the province of Charcas, formed a
conspiracy against his life, cut him off, and declared for the viceroy..
1545.] Pizarro, though alarmed with those appearances of.hostility in
the opposite extremes of the empire, was not disconcerted. He prepared
to assert the authority, to which he had attained, with the spirit and conduct of an officer accustomed to command, and marched directly against
the viceroy as the enemy who was nearest as well as most formidable.
As he was master of the public revenues in Peru, and most of the military
men were attached to his family, his troops were so numerous, that the
viceroy, unable to face them, retreated towards Quito. Pizarro followed
him; and in that long march, through a wild, mountainous country, suffered
hardships, and encountered difficulties, which no troops but those accustomed to serve in America could have endured or surmounted [140]. The
viceroy had scarcely reached Quito, when the vanguard of Pizarro's
forces appeared, led by Carvajal, who, though near fourscore, was as
hardy and active as any young soldier under his command. Nugnez Vela
instantly abandoned a town incapable of defence, and, with a rapidity
more resembling a flight than a retreat, marched into the province of Popayan. Pizarro continued to pursue; but, finding it impossible to overtake
him, returned to Quito. From thence he despatched Carvajal to oppose
* Zarate, lib. v. c. 8-10. Vega, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 13-19. Gomara, c. 159-163. Fernandez, lib.
I. c. 18-25. Herrera, dec. 7. lih. viii. c. 10-20.  t Zarate, lib. v. c. 9. Gomara, c. 165.
Fernandez, lib. i. c. 23. Herrera, dec. 7. lib. viii. c. 15.  f Zarate, lib. v. c. 18. Gomara, c,
1ti.  lerrera, dec. 7. lib. ix. c. 27.




302                      HIS T ORY  OF                    [Boox VI.
Centeno. who was growing formidable in the southern provinces of the
empire, and he himself remained there to make head against the viceroy *
By his own activity, and the assistance of Benalcazar, Nugnez Vela
soon assembled four hundred men in Popayan. As he retained, amidst all
his disasters, the same elevation of mind, and the same high sense of his
own dignity, he rejected with disdain the advice of some of his followers
who urged him to make overtures of accommodation to Pizarro, declaring
that it was only by the sword that a contest-with rebels could be decided.
With this intention he marched back to Quito [15461. Pizarro, relying on
the superior number, and still more on the discipline and valour of his
troops, advanced resolutely to meet him [Jan. 18]. The battle was fierce
and bloody, both parties fighting like men who knew that the possession
of a gre~at empire, the fate of their leaders, and their own future fortune,
depended upon the issue of that day. But Pizarro's veterans pushed forward with such regular and well directed force, that they soon began to
make impression on their enemies.  The viceroy, by extraordinary exertions, in which the abilities of a commander and the courage of a soldier
were equally displayed, held victory for some time in suspense. At -length
he fell, pierced with many wounds; and the route of his followers became
general.  They were hotly pursued.  His head was cut off, and placed
on the public gibbet in Quito, which Pizarro entered in triumph.  The
troops assembled by Centeno were dispersed soon after by Carvajal, and
he himself compelled to fly to the mountains, where he remained for
several months concealed in a cave.  Every person in Peru, fromr the
frontiers of Popayan to those of Chili, submitted to Pizarro; and by his
fleet, under Pedro de Hinojosa, he had not only the unrivalled commnand
of the South Sea, but had taken possession of Panama, and placed a garrison in Nombre de Dios. on the opposite side of the isthmus, which rendered
him master of the only avenue of communication between Spain and Peru,
that was used at that period.f
After this decisive victory, Pizarro and his followers remained for some
kime at Quito; and during the first transports of their exultation, they ran
into every excess of licentious indulgence, with the riotous spirit usual
among low adventurers upon extraordinary success.  But amildst this dissipation, their chief and his confidants were obliged to turn their thoughts
sometimes to what was serious, and deliberated with much solicitude concerning the part that he ought now to take.  Carvajal, no less bold and
decisive in council than in the field, had from the beginning warned Pizarro,
that in the career on which he was entering, it was vain to think oft holding
a middle course; that he must either boldly aim at all, or attempt nothing.
From  the time that Pizarro obtained possession of the governnment of
Peru, he inculcated the same maxim with greater earnestness.  Upcn receiving an account of the victory at Quilo, he remonstrated with him in a
tone still more peremptory.  " You have usurped," said he, in a letter
written to Pizarro on that occasion. " the supreme power in this country,
in contempt of the emperor's colmmission to the viceroy.  You have
marched in hostile array against the royal standard; you have attacked
the representative of your sovereign in the field, have defeated him, and
cut off his head.  Think not that ecvcr a monarch will forgive such itsults
on his dignity, or that any reconciliation with him can be cordial or sincere.
Depend no longer on the precarious favour of another.  Assume youirself
the sovereignlty over a country to the dominion of which your family has
a title founded on the rights both of discovery and conquest.  It is inl your
power to attach every Spaniard in Peru of any consequence inviolably to
* Zarate, lib. v. c. 15, 16-24. Gomara, c. 167. Vega, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 25-28. Fernanclez, lib
1. c. 34. 40. Herrera, dec. 7. lib. viii. c. 16. 20-27.  t Zarate, lib. v. c. 31,:32. Gm(Tara, c
170. Vega, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 33, 34. Fernan dez, lib. i.c. 51-54. Herrera, dec. 7. lii. 2,. c, 12. 1922. dec 8. Jib. i. c. 1-3. Benzo, iib. iii. c. 12.




AMERICA.                              303
your itlte? t;, rr;,i oere I grants of lands and of Indians, or by instituting
ranks of  /,*.:,?d creating titles of honour similar to those which are
courted wl:'!, re,,nuch eagerness in Europe.  By establishing orders of
knighthood, f?.ft privileges and distinctions resembling t.hose in Spain, you
may bestow r. gr.tification upon the officers in your service, suited to the
ideas of niirtall'y men. Nor is it to your countrymen only that you ought
to attend; enrdeavour to gain the natives. By marrying the Coya or
daughter of the Sun next in succession to the crown, you will induce the
Indians, out of veneration for the blood of their ancient princes, to unite
with the Spaniards in support of your authority. —Thus, at the head of the
ancient inhabitants of Peru, as well as of the-new settlers there, you may
set at dcfiance the power of Spain, and repel with ease any feeble force
which it can send at such a distance."  C(epeda, the lawyer, who was
bow  Pizarro's confidential counselior, warmly seconded Carvajal's exbortations, and employed whatever learning he possessed in demonstrating,
that all the founders of great monarchies had been raised to pre- eminence,
biot by the antiquity of their lineage, or the validity of their rights, but by
eheir own aspiring valour and personal merit.*
Pizarro listened attentively to both, and could not conceal the satisfaction
with which he contemplated the object that they presented to his view.
But, happily for the tranquillity of the world, few  men possess that
superior strength of mind, and extent of abilities, which are capable of
forming and executing such daring schemes, as cannot be accomplished
without overturning the established order of society, and violating those
maxims of duty which men are accustomed to hold sacred. The mediocrity of Pizarro's talents circumscribed his ambition within more narrow
limits.  Instead of aspiring at independent power, he confined his views
to the obtaining from  the court of Spain a confirmation of the authority
which he now possessed; and for that purpose he sent an officer of distinction thither, to give such a representation of his conduct, and of the
state of' the country, as might induce the emperor and his ministers, either
from inclination or from necessity, to continue him in his present station.
While Pizarro was deliberating with respect to the part which he should
take, consultations were held in Spain, with no less solicitude, concerning
the measures which ought to be pursued in order to re-establish the enmperor's authority in Peru. Though unacquainted with the last excesses of
outrage to which the malecontents had proceeded in that country, the
court had received an account of the insurrection against the viceroy, ot
his imprisonment, and the usurpation of the government by Pizarro.  A
revolution so alarming called for an immediate interposition of the emperor's abilities and authority. But as he was fully occupied at that time
in Germany, in conducting the war against the famous league of Smalkalde,
one of the most interesting and arduous enterprises in his reign, the care
of providing a remedy for the disorders in Peru devolved upon his son
Philip, and the counsellors whom Charles had appointed to assist him in
the government of Spain during his absence. At first view, the actions ot
Pizarro and his adherents appeared so repugnant to the duty of subjects
towards their sovereign, that the greater part of the ministers insisted on
declaring them instantly to be guilty of rebellion, and on proceeding to
punish them with exemplary rigour.  But when the fervour of their zeal
and indignation began to abate, innumerable obstacles to the execution of
this measure presented themselves. The veteran bands of infantry, the
strength and glory of the Spanish armies, were then employed in Germany. Spain, exhausted of men and money by a long series of wars, in
which she had been involved by the restless ambition of two successive
monarchs, could not easily equip an armament of sufficient force to reduce
* Vega, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 40.  Fernandez, lib. i. c. 34 lib. ii. c. 1 49.  Herrera, dec. 8. lib. ii, C, 10




304                     HI-STORY  OF                   [BOOK VI.
Pizarro. To transport any respectable body of troops to a country so
remote as Peru, appeared almost impossible. While Pizarro continued
master of the South Sea, the direct route by Nombre de Dios and Panama
was impracticable. An attempt to march to Quito by land through the
new kingdom of Granada, and the province of Popayan, across regions of
prodigious extent, desolate, unhealthy, or inhabited by fierce and hostile
tribes, would be attended with insurmountable danger and hardships. The
passage to the South Sea by the Straits of Magellan was so tedious, so uncertain, and so little known in that age, that no confidence could be placed
in any'effort carried on in a course of navigation so remote and precarious.
Nothing then remained but to relinquish the system which the ardour of
their loyalty had first: suggested, and to attempt by lenient neasures what
could not be -effected by force. It was manifest from Pizarro's solicitude
to represent his conduct in a favourable light to the emperor, that notwithstanding the excesses of which he had been guilty, he still retained sentiments of veneration for his sovereign. By a proper application to these,
together with some such concessions as should discover a spirit of moderation and forbearance in government, there was still room to hope that he
might be yet reclaimed, or the ideas of' loyalty natural to Spaniards might
so far revive among his followers, that they would no longer lend their aid
to uphold his usurped authority.
The success, however, of this negotiation, no less delicate than it was
important, depended entirely on the abilities and address of the person to
whom it should be committed. After weighing with much attention the
comparative merit of various persons, the Spanish ministers fixed with
unanimity of choice upon Pedro de la Gasca, a priest in no higher station
than that of counsellor to the Inquisition. Though in no public office, he
had been occasionally employed by government in affairs of trust and consequence, and had conducted them with no less skill than success; displaying a gentle anld insinuating temper, accompanied with much firmness;
probity, superior to any feeling of private interest; and a cautious circumspection in concerting measures, followed by such vigour in executing
them as is rarely found in alliance with the other. These qualities marked
him out for the function to which he was destined. The emperor, to
whom Gasca was not unknown, warmly approved of the choice, and
communicated it to him in a letter containing expressions of good will and
confidence, no less honourable to the prince who wrote, than to the subject
who received it. Gasca, notwithstanding his advanced age and feeble
constitution, and though, from the apprehensions natural to a man, who,
during the course of his life, had never beein out of his own country, he
dreaded the effects of a long voyage, and of an unhealthy climate,* did
not hesitate a moment about complying with the will of his sovereign.
But as a proof that it was from this principle alone he acted, he refused a
bishopric which was offered to him in order that he might appear in Peru
with a more dignified character; he would accept of no higher title than
that of President of the Court of Audience in Lima; and declared that he
would receive no salary on account of his discharging the duties of that
office. All he required was, that the expense of supporting his family
should be defrayed by the public; and as he was to go like a minister ofpeace with his gown and breviary, and without any retinue but a few
domestics, this would not load the revenue with any enormous burden.t
But while he discovered such disinterested moderation with respect to
whatever related personally to himself, he demanded his official powers mII
a very different tone. He insisted, as he was to be employed in a country
so remote from the seat of government, where he could not have recourse
to his sovereign for new instructions on every emergence; and: as the whole
* Fernandez, lib. ii, c. 17.  t Zarate, lib. vi c, 6. Gomara, c. 174. Fernandez, lib. i. 
14-16. VYoa, p. 11. lib. v. c. 1. Herrera, dec. 8. lib. i. c. 4, &c,




AMERICA.                             305
success of his negotiations must depend upon the confidence which the
people with whom he had to treat could place in the extent of his powers,
that he ought to be invested with unlimited authority; that his jurisdiction
must reach to all persons and to all causes; that he must be empowered
to pardon, to punish, or to reward, as circumstances and the behaviour of
different men might require; that in case of resistance from the malecontents, he might be authorized to reduce them to obedience by force of
arms, to levy troops for that purpose, and to call for assistance from the
governors of all the Spanish settlements in America.  These powers,
though manifestly conducive to the great objects of his mission, appeared
to the Spanish ministers to be inalienable prerogatives of royalty, which
ought not to be delegated to a subject, and they refused to grant them.
But the emperor's views were more enlarged. As, fromt the nature of his
employment, Gasca must be intrusted with discretionary power in several
points, and all his efforts might prove ineffectual if he was circumscribed
m any one particular, Charles scrupled not to invest him with authority to
the full extent that he demanded. Highly satisfied with this fresh proof of
his nmaster's confidence, Gasca hastened his departure, and, without either
money or troops, set out to quell a formidable rebellion. I
On his arrival at Nombre de Dios [July 271, he found Herman Mexia,
an officer of note posted there, by order of Pizarro, with a considerable
body of men, to oppose the landing of any hostile forces. But Gasca appeared in such pacific guise, with a train so little formidable, and with a
title of no such dignity as to excite terror, that he was received with much
respect. From Nombre de Dios he advanced to Panama, and met with a
similar reception from Hinojosa, whom Pizarro had intrusted with the
government of that town, and the command of his fleet stationed there.
In both places he held the same language, declaring that he was sent by
their sovereign as a messenger of peace, not as a minister of vengeance;
that he came to redress all their grievances, to revoke the laws which had
excited alarm, to pardon past offences, and to re-establish order and justice
in the government of Peru. His mild deportment, the simplicity of his
manners, the sanctity of his profession, and a winning appearance of candour, gained credit to his declarations. The veneration due to a person
clothed with legal authority, and acting in virtue of a royal commission,
began to revive among men accustomed for some time to nothing more
respectable than a usurped jurisdiction. Hinojosa, Mexia, and several other
officers of distinction, to each of whom Gasca applied separately, were
gained over to his interest, and waited only for some decent occasion of
declaring openly in his favour.t
This the violence of Pizarro soon afforded them. As soon as he heard
of Gasca's arrival at Panama, though he received, at thie same time, an
account of the nature of his commission, and was informed of his offers not
only to render every Spaniard in Peru easy concerning what was past, by,
an act of general oblivion, but secure with respect to the future, by repealing the obnoxious laws; instead of accepting with gratitude his sovereign's gracious concessions, he was so much exasperated on finding that
he was not to be continued in his station as governor of the country, that
he instantly resolved to oppose the president's entry into Peru, and to prevent his exercising any jurisdiction there. To this desperate resolution he
added another highly preposterous. He sent a new deputation to Spain
to justify this conduct, and to insist, in name of all the communities in
Peru, for a confirmation of the government to himself during life, as the
only means of preserving tranquillity there. The persons intrusted with
this strange commission, intimated the intention of Pizarro to the president,
and required him, in his name, to depart from Panama and return to Spain.
* Fernandez, lib. ii, c. 16-18.  t Ibid. Jib. ii.. 21 &c. Zarate, hib. vi. c. 6, 7. Gomars,
V. 175.  Vega, p. 11. Jib. v. c. 3
VOL. I.-39                   15




306                     H1IISTORY  OF                    [BOOK VI.
They carried: likewise-secret -instructions to Hinojosa, directing him to offer
Gasca a present of fifty thousand pesos, if he would comply voluntarily:with what was demanded of him; and if he should continue obstinate, to
cut himn of either by assassination or poison.?
Many circumstances concurred in pushing on Pizarro to those wild measures. Having been once accustomed to supreme command, he could not
bear the thoughts of descending toa private station.  Conscious of his
own demerit, he suspected that the emperor studied only to deceive him,
and would never pardon the outrages which he had committed.  His chief
confidants, no less guilty, entertained the same apprehensions.  The approach of Gasca without any military force excited no terror.  There
were now above six thousand Spaniards settled in Peru;t and at the head
of these he doubted not to maintain his own independence, if the court of
Spain should refuse to grant -what he required.  iBut he knew not that a
spirit of defection had already begun to spread among those whom  he
trusted most. Hinojosa, amazed at Pizarro's precipitate resolution of setting
himself in opposition to the emperor's commission, and disdaining to be
his instrument in perpetrating the odious crimes pointed out in his secret
instructions, publicly recognised the title of thle president to the supreme
authority in Peru.  The officers under his command did the same.  Such
was tihe contagious influence o' the example, that it reached even the de
puties who had been sent from Peru; and at the time when Pizarro expected to hear either of Gasca's return to Spain, or of his death, he
receivedr an account of his being master of the fleet, of Panama, and of
the troops stationed there.
1547.] Irritated almost to madness by events so unexpected, he openly
prepared for war; and in order to give some colour of justice to his arms,
he appointed the court of audience in Lima to proceed to the trial of
Gasca, for the crimes of having seized his ships, seduced his officers, and
prevented his deputies from proceeding in their voyage to Spain. Cepeda,
though acting as a judge in virtue of the royal commission, did not scruple
to prostitute the dignity of his function by finding Gasca guilty of treason,
and condemning him to death on that account.. Wild and even ridiculous
as this proceeding was, it imposed on the low illiterate adventurers, with
whom  Peru was filled, by the semblance of a legal sanction warranting
Pizarro to carry on hostilities against a convicted traitor. Soldiers accordingly resorted from every quarter to his standard, and he was soon at the
head of a thousand men, the best equipped that had ever taken the field
in Peru.
Gasca, on his part, perceiving that force must be employed in order to
accomplish the purpose of his mission, was no less assiduous in collecting
troops from Nicaragua, Carthagena, and other settlements on the continent; and with such success, that he was soon in a condition to detach a
squadron of his fleet, with a considerable body of soldiers, to the coast of
Peru [April]. Their appearance excited a dreadful alarm: and though
they did not attempt for some time to make -any descent, they did more
effectual service by setting ashore in different places persons who dispersed
copies of the act of general indemnity; and the revocation of the late
edicts; and who made known every where the pacific intentions, as well
as mild temper, of the president. The effect of spreading this information was wonderful.  All who were dissatisfied with Pizarro's violent
administration, all who retained any sentiments of fidelity to their sovereign,
began to meditate revolt. Some openly deserted a cause which they now
deemed to be unjust. Centeno, leaving the -cave in which he lay concealed.
* Zarate, lib. vi. c.:8. Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 33, 34. Herrera, dec. 8. lib. il c. 9, c1.   t Herrera,
dec. 8. iib. iii. c. 1.  + Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 55.  Vega, p. 11. lib. v. c. 7.  He. rera, dec. 8  Jib
iii. c. 6




AM ER-I CA.                           307
assembled abou t fifty of his former adherents, and with this feeble half-armed
band advanced boldly to Cuzco. By a sudden attack in the night-time,
in which he displayed no less military skill than valour, he rendered himself master of that capital, though defended by a garrison of five hundred
men. Most of these having ranged themselves under his banners, he had
soon the command of a respectable body of troops.*
Pizarro, though astonished at beholding one enemy approaching by sea,
and another by land, at a time when he trusted to the union of all Peru
in -his favour, was of a spirit more undaunted, and more accustomed to the
Vicissitudes of fortune, than to be disconcerted or appalled. As the danger
from Centeno's operations was the most urgent, he instantly set out to
oppose him. Havin- provided horses for all his soldiers, he marched
with amazing rapidity. But every morning he found his force diminished,
by numbers who had left him during the night; and though he became
suspicious to excess, and punished without mercy all whon he suspected,
the rage of desertion was too violent to be checked. Before he got
within sight of the enemy at Huarina, near the lake of Titiaca, he could
not muster more than four hundred soldiers. But these he justly considered as men of tried attachment, on whom he might depend.  They,
were indeed the boldest and most desperate of his followers, conscious,
like himself, of crimes for which they could hardly expect forgive-ess,
and without any hope but in the success of their arms. With these he
did not hesitate to attack Centeno's troops [Oct. 201, though double to
his own in number. The royalists did not decline the combat.  It was
the most obstinate and bloody that had hitherto been fought in Peru.  At
length the intrepid valour of Pizarro, and the superiority of Carvaial's
military talents, triumphed over numbers, and obtained a complete victory.
The booty was immense [141], and the treatment of the vanquished cruel.
By this signal success the reputation of Pizarro was re-established; and
being now deemed invincible in the field, his army increased daily in
numbert
But events happened in other parts of Peru, which more than counter-'balanced the splendid victory-at Huarina.  Pizarro had scarcely left Lima,
when the citizens, weary of his oppressive dominion, erected the royal
standard, and Aldana, with a detachment of soldiers from the fleet, tcok
possession of the town. About the same tinme,  -asca landed at Tu llt ez
with five hundred men. Encouraged by his presence, every settlement in
the low country declared for the king. The situation of the two parties
was now perfectly reversed; Cuzco and the adjacent provinces were
possessed by Pizarro; all the rest of the empire, fiom Quito southward, acknowledged the jurisdiction of the president. As his numbers
augmnenlted fast, &asca advanced into the interior part of the country.'His behaviour still continued to be gentle and unassuming; he expressed,
on every occasion, his ardent wish of terminating the contest without
bloodshed.  More solicitous to reclaim  than to punish, he upbraided no
man for past offences, but received them  as a father receives penitent
children returning to a sense of their duty. Though desirous of peace,
he did not slacken his preparations for war. He appointed the general
rendezvous of his troops in the fertile valley of X.auxa, on the road to
Cuzco.~  There he remained for some months, not only that he might
have tine to make another attempt towvards an accommodation with
Pizarro, but that he might train his new soldiers to the use of arms, and
accustom them to the discipline of a camp, before he led them against a
body of victorious veterans. Pizarro, intoxicated with the success which
* Zarat, fib. vi. c. 13-16. Gomara, c. 180,181. Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 28. 64, &c.  t Zarate,.ib. vii. c. 2,'?   Gomara, c. 181.  Vega, p. 11. lib. v. c. 18, &c.  Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 79.  Herrera,
dec. 8. lib. iv. c. 1, 2.    Zarate, lib. vi. c. 17.  l Ibid. lib. vii. c. 9.  Fernandez, lib  ii. c. 77.82




$00                     HISTORY   OF                  [Boo3K VI.
had hitherto accompanied his arms, and elated with having again near a
thousand men under his command, refused to listen to any terms, although
Cepeda. together with several of his officers, and even Carvajal himself [1421, gave it as their advice, to close with the president's offer of a
general indemnity, and the revocation of the obnoxious laws.*'  Gasca,
having tried in vain every expedient to avoid imbruing his hands in the
blood of his countrymen, began to move towards Cuzco [Dec. 29] at the
head of sixteen hundred men.
Pizarro, confident of victory, suffered the royalists to pass all the rivers
which lie between Guamanga and Cuzco without opposition [1548], and
to advance within four leagues of that capital, flattering himself that a
defeat in such a situation as rendered escape impracticable would at once
terminate the war. He then marched out to meet the enemy, and Carvajal chose his ground, and made the disposition of the troops with the
discerning eye and profound knowledge in the art of war conspicuous in
all his operations. As the two armies moved forward slowly to the charge
[April 9], the appearance of each was singular. In that of Pizarro,
composed of men enriched with the spoils of the most opulent country in
America, every officer, and almost all the private men, were clothed in
stuffs of silk, or brocade, embroidered with gold and silver; and their
horses, their arms, their standards, were adorned with all the pride of
military pomp.t That of Gasca, though not so splendid, exhibited what
was no less striking. He himself, accompanied by the archbishop of Lima,
the bishops of Quito and Cuzco, and a great number of ecclesiastics,
marching along the lines, blessing the men, and encouraging them to a
resolute discharge of their duty.
When both armies were just ready to engage, Cepeda set spurs to his
horse, galloped off, and surrendered himself to the president. Garcilasso de
la Vega, and other officers of note, followed his example. The revolt of
persons in such high rank struck all with amazement. The mutual conr
idence on which the union and strength of armies depend, ceased at once.
Distrust and consternation spread from rank to rank. Some silently slipped
away, others threw down their arms, the greatest number went over to
the royalists. Pizarro, Carvajal, and some leaders, employed authority,
threats, and entreaties, to stop them, but in vain. In less than half an
hour, a body of men, which might have decided the fate of the Peruvian
empire, was totally dispersed. Pizarro, seeing all irretrievably lost, cried
out in amazement to a few officers who still faithfully adhered to him,
"What remains for us to do?"-" Let us rush," replied one of them,
"upon the enemy's firmest battalion, and die like Romans."  Deiected
with such a reverse of fortune, he had not spirit to follow this soldierly
counsel, and with a tameness disgraceful to his former fame he surrendered
to one of Gasca's officers. Carvajal, endeavouring to escape, was overtaken and seized.
Gasca, happy in this bloodless victory, did not stain it with cruelty.
Pizarro, Carvajal, and a small number of the most distinguished or notorious offenders, were punished capitally. Pizarro was beheaded the day
after he surrendered. He submitted to his fate with a composed dignity,
and seemed desirous to atone by repentance for the crimes which he had
committed. The end of Carvajal was suitable to his life. On his trial
ne offered no defence. When the sentence adjudging him to be hanged
was pronounced, he carelessly replied, " One can die but once." During
the interval between the sentence and execution, he discovered no sign
either of remorse for the past, or of solicitude about the future; scoffing
at all who visited him, in his usual sarcastic vein of mirth, with the same
quickness of repartee and gross pleasantry as at any other period of his
* Zarate, lib. vii. c. 6   Vega, p. 11. lib. v  c. 27.  Zarate, lib. vi. c. 11.




AMERICA.                                309
life. Cepeda, more criminal than either, oua;ht to have shared the same fate,
but the merit of having deserted his associates at such a critical moment,
and with such decisive effect, saved him from immediate punishment.
He was sent, however, as a prisoner to Spain, and died in confinenent.?
In the minute details which the contemporary historians have given of
the civil dissensions that raged in Peru, with little interruption, during ten
years, many circumstances occur so striking, and which indicate such an
uncommon state of manners as to merit particular attention.
Though the Spaniards who first invaded Peru were of the lowest order
In society, and the greater part of those who afterwards joined them were
persons of desperate fortune, yet in all the bodies of troops brought into
the field by the different leaders who contended for superiority, not one
man acted as a hired soldier, that follows his standard for pay. Every
adventurer in Peru considered himself as a conqueror, entitled by his services, to an establishment in that country which had been acquired by his
valour. In the contests between the rival chiefs, each chose his side as
he was directed by his own judgment or affections.  He joined his commander as a companion of his fortunes, and disdained to degrade himself
by receiving the wages of a mercenary.  It was to their sword, not to
pre-eminence in office, or nobility of birth, that most of the leaders whom
they followed were indebted for their elevation; and each of their adherents hoped, by the same means, to open a way for himself to the pos
session of power and wealth.t
But though the troops in Peru served without any regular pay, they
were raised at immense expense. Among men accustomed to divide the
spoils of an opulent country, the desire of obtaining wealth acquired incredible force. The ardour of pursuit augmented in proportion to the
hope of success. Where all were intent on the same object, and under
the dominion of the same passion, there was but one mode of gaining men,
or of securing their attachment.  Officers of name and influence, besides
the promlise of future establishments, received in hand large gratuities from
the chief with whom they engaged. Gonzalo Pizarro, in order to raise a
thousand men, advanced five hundred thousand pesos.1  Gasca expended
in levying the troops which he led against Pizarro nine hundred thousand
pesos.6 The distribution of property, bestowed as the reward of services,
was still more exorbitant.  Cepeda, as the recompense of his perfidy and
address, in persuading the court of royal audience to give the sanction of
its authority to the usurped jurisdiction of Pizarro, received, a grant of
lands which yielded an annual income of a hundred and fifty thousand
pesos.ll  Hinojosa, who by his early defection from Pizarro, and surrender
of the fleet to Gasca, decided the fate of Peru, obtained a district of country affording two hundred thousand pesos of' yearly value.~ While such
rewards were dealt out to the principal officers, with more than royal munificence, proportional shares were conferred upon those of inferior rank.
Such a rapid change of fortune produced its natural effects.  It gave
birth to new wants and new desires. Veterans, long accustomed to hardship andjtoil, acquired of a sudden, a taste for profuse and inconsiderate
dissipation, and indulged in all the excesses of military licentiousness.
The riot of low debauchery dccupied some; a relish for expensive luxuries
spread among others.""   The meanest soldier in Peru would have thought
himself degraded by marching on foot; and at a time when the prices of
horses in that country were exorbitant, each insisted on being furnished
with one before he would take the field.  But though less patient under
the fatigue and hardships of service, they were ready to face danger and
* Zarate, lib. vii. c. 6, 7, 8. Gomara, c. 185, 186. Vega, p. 11. lib. v. c. 30, &c. Fernandez,
lib. ii. c.8, &c. Herrera, dec. 8. lih. iv. c. 14, &c.   t Vea, p. 11. lib. iv. c. 38. 41.  + Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 54.. Zarate, lib. vii. c. 10. Herrera, dec. 8. lib. v. c. 7.  II Gomara, c. 164.
If Vega, p. 11. lib. vi. c. 3.  ** Herrera, dec. 5. lib. ii. c. 3. dec. 8. iib. viii. c. 10.,




310                    HISTORY  OF                     [BooK VI.
death with as much intrepidity as ever; and animated by the hope of
new rewards, they never failed, on the day of battle, to display all their
ancient valour.
Together with their courage, they retained all the ferocity by which
they were originally distinguished. Civil discord never raged with a more
fell spirit than amonlg the Spaniards in Peru. To all the passions which
usually envenom contests among county men, avarice was added, and tendered their enmity more rancorous. Eagerness to seize the valuable forfeitures, expected upon the death of every opponent, shut the door against
mercy. To be wealthy was of itself sufficient to expose a man to accusation, or to subject him to punishment. On the slightest suspicions, Pizarro condemned many of the most opulent inhabitants in Peru to death.
Carvajal, without searching for any pretext to justify his cruelty, cut off
many more. The number of those who suffered by the hands of the executioner was not much inferior to what fell in the field [143]; and the
greater part was condemned without the formality of any legal trial.
The violence with which the contending parties treated their opponents
was not accompanied with its usual attendants, attachment and fidelity to
those with whom they acted. The ties of honour, which ought to be
held sacred among soldiers, and the principle of integrity, interwoven as
thoroughly in the Spanish character as in that of any nation, seem to have
been equally forgotten.  Even regard for decency, and the sense of
shame, were totally lost. During their dissensions, there was hardly a
Spaniard in Peru who did not abandon the party which he had originally
espoused, betray the associates with whom he had united, and violate the
engagements under which he had come. The viceroy Nuornez Vela was
ruined by the treachery of Cepeda and the other judges oF the royal audience, who were bound by the duties of their function to have supported
his authority. The chief advisers and companions of Gonzalo Pizarro's
revolt were the first to forsake him, and submit to his enemies. His fleet
was given up to Gasca by the man whom he had singled out among his
officers to intrust with that important command. On the day that was to
decide his fate,. an army of veterans, in sight of the enemy, threw down
their arms without striking a blow, and deserted a leader who had often
conducted them to victory. Instances of such general and avowed contempt of the principles and obligations which attach man to man, and bind
them together in social union, rarely occur in history. It is only where
men are far removed from the seat of government, where the restraints of
law and order are little felt, where the prospect of gain is unbounded, and
where immense wealth may cover the crimes by which it is acquired,
that we can find any parallel to the levity, the rapaciousness, the perfidy,
and corruption prevalent among the Spanlards in Peru.
On the death of Pizarro, the malecontents in every corner of Peru laid
down their arms, and tranquillity seemed to be perfectly re-established.
But two very interesting objects still remained to occupy the president's
attention. The one was to find immediately such employment for a multitude of turbulent and daring adventurers with which the country was
filled, as might prevent them from exciting new commotions. The other,
to bestow proper gratifications upon those to whose loyalty and valour he
had been indebted for his success. The former of these was in some
measure accomplished, by appointing Pedro de Valdivia to prosecute the
conquest of Chili; and by empowering Diego Centeno to undertake the
discovery of the vast regions bordering on the river De la Plata. The reputation of those leaders, together with the hopes of acquiring wealth, and
of rising to consequence in some unexplored country, alluring many of the
most indigent and desperate soldiers to follow their standards, drained off
no inconsiderable portion of that mutinous spirit which Gasca dreaded
The latter was an affair of greater difficulty and to be adjusted witn a




A MIE RICA.:                           311
more attentive and delicate hand. The reparti7rientos; or allotments ot
lands and Indians which fell to be distributed, in consequence of the death
or forfeiture of the former possessors, exceeded two millions of pesos of
yearly rent.*  Gasca, when now absolute master of this immense property,
retained the same disinterested sentiments which he had originally professed, and refused to reserve the smallest portion of it- for himself  But
the number of claimants was great; and whilst the vanity or avarice of
every individual fixed the value of his own services, and estimated the
recompense which he thought due to him, the pretensions of each were so
extravagant that it: was~ impossible to satisfy all. Gasca listened to them
one by one, with the most patient attention; and that he rnight have
leisure to weigh the comparative merit of their several claims with accuracy,. he retired, with the archbishop of Lima and a single secretary, to a
village twelve leagues from Cuzco. There he spent several days in allotting to each a district of lands and number of Indians, in proportion to his
idea of their past services and future importance.. But that he might get
beyond the reach of the fierce storm of clamour and rage, which he foresaw would burst out on the. publication of his decree, notwithstanding the
impartial equity with which he had framed it, he set out for Lima, leaving
the instrument of partition sealed up, with orders not to open it for some
days after his departure.
J'rhe indignation excited by publishing the decree of partition [Aug. 24]
was. not less than Gasca had expected. Vanity, avarice, emulation, envy,
shame, rage, and all the other passions which most vehemently agitate the
minds of men when both their honour and their interest are deeply affected., conspired in adding to its violence. It broke out with all the fury of
military insolence.  Calumny, threats, and curses, were poured out openly
upon the president.  He was accused of ingratituae, of partiality, and of
injustice. Among soldiers prompt to action, such seditious discourse would
have been soon followed by deeds no less violent, and they already began
to turn their eyes towards some discontented leaders, expecting them to
stand forth in redress of their wrongs. By some vigorous interpositions of
government, a timely check was given to this mutinous spirit, and the danger of another civil war was averted for the present.4
1549.] Gasca, however, perceiving that the flame was suppressed,
rather than extinguished, laboured with the utmost assiduity to soothe the
malecontents, by bestowing large gratuities on some, by promising repartimrnientos, when they fell vacant, to others, and by caressing and flattering
all. But. that the public security might rest on a foundation more stable
than their good affection, he endeavoured to strengthen the hands of his
successors in office, by re-establishing the regular administration of justice
in every part of the empire. He introduced order and simplicity into the
mode of collecting the royal revenue. He issued regulations concerning
the treatment of the indians, well calculated to protect them from oppression, and to provide for their instruction in the principles of religion, without depriving the Spaniards of the benefit accruing from  their labour.
Having now accomplished every object of his mission, Gasca, longing to
return again to a private station, committed the government of Peru to
the court of audience, and set out for Spain [Feb. 1, 1550]. As, during
the anarchy and turbulence of the four last years, there had been no remittance made of the royal revenue, he carried with him thirteen hundred
thousand pesos of public money, which the economy and order of his administration enabled him to save, after paying all the expenses of the
war.
He was received in his native country with universal admiration of his
* Vega, p 11. lii. vi. 4. t. tZarate, lib. vii. c. 9. Gomara, c. 187. Vega, p. 11. lib. vii. 
I, &c. Eernandez, p. 11. lib. L. I, &c.  Herrera, c.. 8. lib. iv. c. 17, &;c.




312                     HISTORY  OF                    [BooK VI
abilities and of his virtue. Both were, indeed, highly conspicuous. With.
out army, or fleet, or public funds; with a train so simple, that only three
thousand ducats were expended in equipping him,? he set out to oppose a
formidable rebellion. By his address and talents he supplied all those
defects, and seemed to create instruments for executing his designs. He
acquired such a naval force as gave him the command of the sea. He
raised a body of men able to cope with the veteran bands which gave law
to Peru. He vanquished their leader, on whose arms victory had hitherto
attended, and in place of anarchy and usurpation, he established the
government of laws, and the authority of the rightful sovereign. But the
praise bestowed on his abilities was exceeded by that which his virtue
merited. After residing in a country where wealth presented allurements
which had seduced every person who had hitherto possessed power there,
he returned from that trying station with integrity not only untainted but
unsuspected. After distributing among his countrymen possessions of
greater extent and value than had ever been in the disposal of a subject in
any age or nation, he himself remained in his original state of poverty; and
at the very time when he brought such a large recruit to the royal treasury,
he was obliged to apply by petition for a small sum to discharge some
petty debts which he had contracted during the course of his service.'
Charles was not insensible to such disinterested merit. Gasca was received by him with the most distinguishing marks of esteem; and being
promoted to the bishopric of Palencia, he passed the remainder of his days
in the tranquillity of retirement, respected by his country, honoured by his
sovereign, and beloved by all.
Notwithstanding all Gasca's wise regulations, the tranquillity of Peru
was not of long continuance.  In a country where the authority of
government had been almost forgotten during the long prevalence of
anarchy and misrule, where there were disappointed leaders ripe for revolt, and seditious soldiers ready to follow them, it was not difficult to
raise combustion. Several successive insurrections desolated the country
for some years. But as those, though fierce, were only transient storms,
excited rather by the ambition and turbulence of particular men, than by
general or public motives, the detail of them is not the object of this history. These commotions in Peru, like every thing of extreme violence
either in the natural or political body, were not of long duration; and by
carrying off the corrupted humours which had given rise to the disorders,
they contributed in the end to strengthen the society which at first they
threatened to destroy. During their fierce contests, several of the first
invaders of Peru, and many of those licentious adventurers whom the fame
of their success had allured thither, fell by each other's hands. Each of
the parties, as they alternately prevailed in the struggle, gradually cleared
the country of a number of turbulent spirits, by executing, proscribing, or
banishing their opponents.  Men less enterprising, less desperate, and
more accustomed to move in the path of sober and peaceable industry,
settled in Peru; and the royal authority was gradually established as
firmly there as in other Spanish colonies.
* Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 18.  t MS. penes me.




AM E R I C A.                        313
BOOK VII.
As the conquest of the two great empires of Mexico and Peru forms tle
most splendid and interesting period in the history of America, a view of
their political institutions, and a description of their national manners, will
exhibit the human species to the contemplation of intelligent observers in
a very singular stage of its progress. [144]
When compared with other parts of the New World, Mexico and Peru
may be considered as polished states. Instead of small, independent, hostile tribes, struggling for subsistence amidst woods and marshes, strangers
to industry and arts, unacquainted with subordination, and almost without
the appearance of regular government, we find countries of great extent
subjected to the dominion of one sovereign, the inhabitants collected together
in cities, the wisdom and foresight of rulers employed in providing for the
maintenance and security of the people, the empire of laws in some
measure established, the authority of religion recognised, many of the arts
essential to life brought to some degree of maturity, and the dawn of such
as are ornamental beginning to appear.
But if the comparison be made with the people of the ancient continent,
the inferiority of America in improvement will be conspicuous, and neither
the Mexicans nor Peruvians will be entitled to rank with those nations
which merit the name of civilized. The people of both the great empires
in America, like the rude tribes around them, were totally unacquainted
with the useful metals, and the progress which they had made in extending their dominion over the animal creation was inconsiderable. The
Mexicans had gone no further than to tame and rear turkeys, ducks, a
species of small dogs, and rabbits.' By this feeble essay of ingenuity, the
means of subsistence were rendered somewhat niore plentiful and secure
than when nien depend solely on hunting; but they had no idea of attempting to subdue the more robust animals, or of deriving any aid from
their ministry in carrying on works of labour. The Peruvians seem to
have neglected the inferior animals, and had not rendered any of them
domestic except the duck; but they were more fortunate in taming the
Llama, an animal peculiar to their country, of a form which I)Uars some
resemblance to a deer, and some to a camiel, and is of a size somewhat
larger than a sheep. Under the protection of man, this species multiplied
greatly. Its wool furnished the Peruvians with clothing, its flesh with
Tood. It was even employed as a beast of burden, and carried a moderate
load with much patience and docility.t It was never used for draught;
and the breed being confined to the mountainous country, its service, if we
may judge by incidents which occur in the early Spanish writers, was not
very extensive among the Peruvians in their original state.
In tracing the line by which nations proceed towards civilization, the
discovery of the useful metals, and the acquisition of dominion over the
animal creation, have been marked as steps of capital importance in their
progress. In our continent, long after men had attained both, society continued in that state which is denominated barbarous. ~ Even with all that
command over nature which these confer, many ages elapse before industry becomes so regular as to render subsistence secure, before the arts
which supply the wants and furnish the accommodations of life are brought
to any considerable degree of perfection, and before any idea is conceived
of various institutions requisite in a well ordered society. The Mexicans
* Herrera, dec. 11. lib. vil. c. 12,.  t Vega, p. 1. lib. viii. c. 1,.  Zarate, lib, 1.. 14.
VOL. I.-40




314                       HISTORY OF                      LBooK 1II.
and Peruvians, without knowledge of the useful metals, or the aid of domestic
animals, laboured under disadvantages which must have greatly retarded
their progress, and in their highest state of improvement their power was
so limited, and their operations so feeble, that they can hardly be considered as having advanced beyond the infancy of civil life.
After this general observation concerning the most singular and distinguishing circumstance in the state of both the great empires in America, I
shall endeavour to give such a view of' the constitution of the interior
police of each as may enable us to ascertain their place in the political
scale, to allot them- their proper station between the rude tribes in the
New World, and the polished states of the ancient, and to determine how
far they had risen above the former, as well as how much they fell below
the latter.
Mexico was first subjected to the Spanish crown. But our acquaintance
with its laws and manners is not, froln that circumstance, more complete.
What I have remarked concerning the defective and inaccurate information on; which we must rely with respect to the condition and customs of
the savage tribes in America, may be applied likewise to our knowledge
of the Mexican empire.  Cortes, and the rapacious adventurers who accompanied him, had not leisure or capacity to enrich either civil or natural -history with new observations. They undertook their expedition in
quest of one object, and seemed hardly to have turned their eyes towards
any other. Or, if during some short interval of tranquillity, when the occupations of war ceased, and the ardour of plunder was suspended, the
institutions and manners of the people whom  they invaded, drew  their
attention, the inquiries of illiterate soldiers were conducted with so little
sagacity and precision, that.the accounts given by them of the policy and
order established in the Mexican monarchy are superficial, confused, and
inexplicable.  It is rather from incidents which they relate occasionally,
than from their own deductions and remarks, that we are enabled to form
some idea of the genius and manners of that people. The obscurity in
which the ignorance of its conquerors involved the annals of Mexico, was
augmented by the superstition of those who succeeded them.  As- the
memory of past events was preserved among the Mexicans by figures
painted on skins, oil cotton cloth, on a kind of pasteboard,. or on the bark
of trees, the early missionaries, unable to comprehend their meaning, and
struck with their uncouth forms, conceived them to be monuments of
idolatry, which ought to be destroyed in order to facilitate the conversion
of the Indians.  In obedience to an edict issued by Juan de Zummaraga, a
Franciscan monk, the first bishop of Mexico, as many records of the ancient
Mexican story as could be collected were committed to the flames.  In
consequence of this fanatical zeal of the monks who first visited New
Spain (which their successors soon began to lament), whatever knowledge
of remote events such rude monuments contained was almost entirely lost,
and no information remained concerning the ancient revolutions and policy
of the empire, but what was derived from tradition,. or from some fragments
of their historical paintings that escaped the barbarous researches of Zummaraga.*  Fromn the experience of all nations it is manifest, that the
memory of past transactions can neither be long preserved, nor be transmitted with any fidelity, by tradition.  The Mexican paintings which are
supposed to have served as annals of their empire, are few in niumber, and
of ambiguous meaning.  Thus, amidst the uncertainty of the, forimer, and
the obscurity of the latter, we must glean what intelligence can be collected from the scanty materials scattered in: the Spanishli writers.t
* Acosta, lib. vi. c.. 7. Torquem. Proem. lib ii. lib. iii. c. 6. iib. xiv. c. 6.
t In the first edition, I observed that in consequence of the destruction of the ancient Mexican
paintings, occasioned by the zeal of Zumimaraga, whatever knowledge they might have conveyed
was entirely lost. Every'candid reader must have perceived that the. exressionawas inaccurate;




AMERICA.                                       Slb
According to the account of the Mexicans  themselves, their empire was
not of long duration. Their country, as they relate, was originally possessed, rather than peopled, by small independent tribes, whose  mode of
life and  manners resembled  those of the rudest savages which we have
described.  But about a period  corresponding  to the beginning of the
tenth century in the Christian era, several tribes moved in successive migrations from unknown regions towards the north and north-west, and settied in different provinces of Anahuac, the ancient name of New  Spain.
These, more civilized than the original inhabitants, began to form  them  to
the arts of social life.  At length, towards the commencenent of the thirteenth century, the Mexicans, a people more polished than.any of the
former, advanced from  the border of the Californian gulf, and  took  possession of the plains adjacent to the great lake near the centre of the country.  After residing  there about: fitty years, they founded a town, since
distinguished  by the name of.1Mexico, which, from  humble  beginnings,
soon  grew  to  be  the most considerable  city in the New  World.  The
Mexicans, long after they were established in their new  possessions, continued, like other martial tribes in America, unacquainted with regal
dominion, and were governed in peace, and conducted in war, by such as
were entitled to pre-emmnence by their wisdom or their valour. But among
them, as in other states whose power and territories become extensive, the
supreme authority centred at last in a single person; and when the Spaniards under Cortes invaded the country, Montezuma was the ninth monarch
in order who had swayed the Mexican  sceptre, not by hereditary right,
but by election.
Such is the traditional tale of the Mexicans concerning the progress of
their own empire. According to this, its duration was very short. From
the first migration of their parent tribe, they can reckon little more than
three hundred years.  From the establishment of monarchical government,
not above a hundred and thirty years according to one account,? or a hundred  and ninety-seven according to  another computation,t had elapsed.
If, on one hand, we  suppose  the Mexican state  to have been of higher
antiquity, and to have subsisted during such a length of time as the Spanish accounts of its civilization would naturally lead us to conclude, it is
difficult to conceive how, among a people who possessed the art of recordas in a few lines afterwards I mention some ancient paintings to be still extant. M. Clavigero, not
satisfied with laying hold of this inaccuracy, which I corrected in the subsequent editions, labours
to render it more glaring by the manner in which he quotes the remaining-part of the sentence. He
reprehends with great asperity the account which I gave of the scanty materials for writing the'
ancient history of Mexico. Vol. I. Account of Writers, p. xxvi. Vol. iI. 380. NAy words, however,
are almost the same with those of Torquenlada,. who seems to have been better acquainted with the
ancient monuments of the Mexicans than any S-panish author whose works I have seen. Lib. xiv.
c. 6. M. Clavigero himself' gives a description of the destruction of ancient paintings in almost the
same terms I have used; and mentions as an additional reason of there being so small a number of
ancient paintilngs known to the Spaniardsi that the natives have become so solicitous to preserve
and conceal them, that it is " difficult, if not impossible, to make them part with one of them." Vol.
1. 407. II. 194. No point can be more ascertained than that few of the Mexican historical paintings
have been preserved. Though several Spaniards have carried on inquiries into the antiquities of
the Mexican empire, no engravings from Mexican paintings have been communicated to the public,
except those by Purchas, Gemelli Carreri, and Lorenzana. It affords me some satisfaction, that in
the course of my researches I have discovered two collections of Mexican paintings which were
unknown to former inquirers. The cut which I ptblished is an exact copy of the original, and gives
no high idea of the progress which the Mexicans had made in the art of painting, I cannot conjecture wihat could induce M. Clavigero to express some dissatisfaction with me for having published
it without the same colours it has in the original painting, p. xxix. He might have recollected, that
neither Pturchas, nor Gemelli Carreri, nor Lorenzana, thought it necessary to colour the prints which
they have published, and they have never been censured on that account. Ile may rest assured,
that though the colours in the paintings, in the Imperial Library are remarkably bright, they are laid
on without art, and without "any of that regard to light and shade, or the rules of perspective,"
which Dt. Clavigero requires. Vol. n. 378. If the public express any desire to have the seven
paintings still in my possession engraved, I am ready to communicate them. Tile print published
by Geemelli Carreri, of the route of the ancient Mexicans when they travelled towards the lake on
which they built the capital of their empire, (Churchill, Vol. IV. p. 481.) is the most finished monument of art brought from the New World, and yet a very slight inspection of it will satisfy every
one, that the snna!s of a nation conveyed in this manner must be very meagre and imperfect.
* Acost. Hist. Jib. vii. c. 8, &e.  t Purchas F ilgr. iii. p. 1068, &c.




316                     HISTORY  OF                     [BooK VII.
ing events by pictures, and who considered it as an essential part of their
national education, to teach their children to repeat the historical songs
which celebrated the exploits of their ancestors,* the knowledge of past
transactions should be so.slender and limited. If, on the other hand, we
adopt their own system with respect to the antiquities of their nation, it is
no less difficult to account either for that improved state of society, or for
the extensive dominion to which their empire had attained when first visited by the Spaniards. The infancy of nations is so long, and, even when
every circumstance is favourable to their progress, they advance so slowly
towards any maturity of strength or policy, that the recent origin of the
Mexicans seems to be a strong presumption of some exaggeration in the
splendid descriptions which have been given of their government and
manners.
But it is not by theory or conjectures that history decides with regard to
the state or character of nations. It produces facts as the foundation of
every judgment which it ventures to pronounce. In collecting those which
must regulate our opinion in the present iriquiry, some occur that suggest
an idea of considerable progress in civilization in the Mexican empire,
and others vwic} seem to indicate that it had advanced but little beyond
the savage tribes around it. Both shall be exhibited to the view of the
reader, that, from comparing them, he may determine on which side the
evidence preponderates.
In the Mexican empire, the right of private property was perfectly understood, and established in its full extent. Among several savage tribes,
we have seen, that the idea of a title to the separate and exclusive possession of any object was hardly known; and that among all it was
extremely limited and ill defined. But in Mexico, where agriculture and
industry had made some progress, the distinction between property in land
and property in goods had taken place. Both might be transferred from
one person to another by sale or barter; both might descend by inheritance. Every person who could be denomtinated'a freeman had property
in land. This, however, they held by various tenures. Some possessed
it in full right, and it descended to their heirs. The title of others to
their lands was derived from  the office or dignity which they enjoyed;
and when deprived of the latter, they lost possession of the former. Both
these modes of occupying land were deemed noble, and peculiar to citizens of the highest class. The tenure by which the great body of the
people held their property, was very different.; In every district a certain
quantity of land was measured out in proportion to the number of families.
This was cultivated by the joint labour of the whole; its produce was
deposited in a common storehouse, and divided among them according to
their respective exigencies. The members of the Calpullee, or associations, could not alienate their share of the common estate; it was an indivisible permanent property, destined for the support of their famiiies.t
In consequence of this distribution of the territory of the state, every man
had an interest in its welfare, and the happiness of the individual was
connected with the public security.
Another striking circumstance, which distinguishes the Mexican empire
from those nations in America we have already described, is the number
and greatness of its cities. While society continues in a rude state, the
wants of men are so few, and they stan'd so little in need of mutual as
sistance, that their inducements to crowd together are extremely feeble.
Their industry at the same time is so imperfect, that it cannot secure subsistence for any considerable number of families settled in one spot.
They live dispersed, at this period, from choice, as well as from necessity, or at the utmost assemble in small hamlets on the banks of the river
* Hlerrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 18.  t Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 15. Torquem. Mon. Ind. lib. xlv.
c 7. Corita MS.




AMERICA.                             317
which supplies them with food, or on the border of some plain left open
by nature, or cleared by their own labour. The Spaniards, accustomed
to this mode of habitation among all the savage tribes with which they
were hitherto acquainted, were astonished, on entering New Spain, to find
the natives residing in towns of such extent as resembled those of Europe.
In the first fervour of their admiration, they compared Zempoalla, though
a town only of the second or third size, to the cities of greatest note in
their own country. When, afterwards, they visited in succession Tlascala,
Cholula, Tacuba, Tezeuco, and Mexico itself. their amazement increased
so much, that it led them to convey ideas of their magnitude and populousness bordering on what is incredible. Even when there is leisure for
observation, and no interest that leads to deceive, conjectural estimates of
the number of people in cities are extremely loose, and usually much
exaggerated. It is not surprising, then, that Cortes and his companions,
little accustomed to such computations, and powerfully tempted to magnify, in order to exalt the merit of their own discoveries and conquests,
should have been betrayed into this common error, and have raised their
descriptions considerably above truth. For this reason, some considerable
abatement ought to be made from their calculations of the number of inhabitants in the Mexican cities, and we may fix the standard of their population much lower than they have done; but still they will appear to be
cities of such consequence as are not to be found but among people who
have made some considerable progress in the arts of social life [145].
From their accounts, we can hardly suppose Mexico, the capital of the
empire, to have contained fewer than sixty thousand inhabitants.
The separation of professions among the Mexicans is a symptom of improvement no less remarkable. Arts, in the early ages of society, are so
few and so simple, that each man is sufficiently master of them all, to
gratify every demand of his own limited desires. The savage can form
his bow, point his arrows, rear his hut, and hollow his canoe, without calling
in the aid of any hand more skilful than his own. Time must have
augmented the wants of men, and ripened their ingenuity, before the productions of art became so complicated in their structure, or so curious in
their fabric, that a particular course of education was requisite towards
forming the artificer to expertness in contrivance and workmanship. In
proportion as refinement spreads, the distinction of professions increases,
and they branch out into more numerous and minute subdivisions. Among
the Mexicans, this separation of the arts necessary in life had taken place
to a considerable extent. The functions of the mason, the weaver, the
goldsmith, the painter, and of several other crafts, were carried on by
different persons. Each was regularly instructed in his calling. To it
alone his industry was confined, and by-assiduous application to one object,
together with the persevering patience peculiar to Americans, their artisans
attained to a degree of neatness and perfection in work, far beyond what
could have been expected from the rude tools which they employed.
rheir various productions were brought into commerce; and by the exchange of them in the stated markets held in the cities, not only were
their muitual wants supplied,? in such orderly intercourse as characterizes
an improved state of society, but- their industry was daily rendered per
severing and i-.ventive.
The distinctlon of ranks established in the Mexican empire, is the next circumstance that merits attention. In surveying the savage tribes of America,
wve observed, that consciousness of equality, and impatience of subordi
nation, are sentiments natural to man in the infancy of civil life. During
peace, the authority of a superior is hardly felt among them, and even in
* Cortes Relat. ap. Ramus, iii. 239, &c. Gom. Cron. c. 79. Torquem. Iib. xiii. c. 34. Herrera,
dec. 2. lib. vii. c. 15, &c.




'218                     HI S TO RY  OF                 [BooK VII.
war it is but little acknowledged. Strangers to the idea of property, the
difference in condition resulting from the inequality of it is unknown. Birth
or titles confer no pre-eminence; it is only by personal merit and accom
plishments that distinction can be acquired.  The form of society was
very different among the Mexicans. rThe great body of the people was
in a most humiliating state. A considerable number, known by the name
of A'ayeques, nearly resembled in condition those peasants who, under
various denorninations, were considered, during the prevalence of the
feudal system, as instruments of laLour attached to the soil. The Mlayeques
could not change their place of residence without permission of the superior on whom  they depended.  They were conveyed, together with the
lands on which they were settled, from one proprietor to another; and
were bound to cultivate the ground, and to perfbrm several kinds of servile
work.a  Others were reduced to the lowest form of subjection, that of
domestic servitude, and felt the utmost rigour of that wretched state.
Their'condition was held to be so vile, and their lives deemed of so little
value, that a person who killed one of these slaves was not subjected to
any punishment.t Even those considered as freemen were treated by
their haughty lords as beings of an inierior species. The nobles, possessed
of ample territories, were divided into various classes, to each of which
peculiar titles of honour belonged. Some of these titles, like their lands,
descended from father to son in perpetual succession. Others were annexed
to particular offices, or conferred during life as marks of personal distinc-tion.4  The monarch, exalted above all, enjoyed extensive power and
supreme dignity. Thus the distinction of ranks was completely established,
in a line of regular subordination, reaching from the highest to the lowest
member of the community. Each of these knew what he could claim,
and what he owed. The people, who were not allowed to wear a dress
of the same fashion, or to dwell.in houses of a form similar to those of the
nobles, accosted them with the most submissive reverence. In the presence of their sovereign, they durst not lift their eyes from the ground, or
look him in the face.~ The nobles themselves, when admitted to. an
audience of their sovereign, entered barefooted, in mean garments, anid, as
his slaves, paid him homage approaching to adoration. T'his respect, due
frotm inferiors to those above them  in rank, was prescribed with such.ceremoniolus accuracy, that it incorporated with the language, and influenced
its genius and idiom. The Mexican tongue abounded in expressions of
reverence and courtesy.'The style antl apl)ellations used in the intercourse
between equals would have been so unbecoming in the mouth of one in a
lower sphere, when he accosted a person in higher rank, as to be deemed
an insult [146]. It is only in societies, which time and the institlation of
regular government have moulded into lbrm, that we find.such an orderly
arrangement of men into different ranks, and such nice attention paid to
their various rig'hts.
The spirit ot the Mexicans, thus familiarized and bended to subordina
tion, was prepared for submitting to - onarchical government.  But the
description of their policy and laws, by the Spaniards who overturned
them, are so inaccurate and contradictory, that it is difficult to delineate
the form of their constitution with any precision.  Sometimes they represent the monarchs of Mexico as absolute, deciding according to their pleasure with respect to every operation of the state. On other occasions,  ei,
discover the traces of established culstoms and laws, framed in order to
circumscribe the power of the crown, and we meet with. rights and privileges of the nobles which seemed to be opposed as barriers against its
encroachments. This appearance of inconsistency has arisen from inatten* Herrera, dec:3, lib. iv. c. 17. Corita MS.   t Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 7.    D Iid c, 15.
Coxita MS.  Q flerrera, dec. 3. lib ii c. 14.




AMERIC A.                              319
tion to the innovations of Montezuma upon the Mexican policy. His
aspiring ambition subverted the original system of government, and introduced a pure despotism. He disregarded the ancient laws, violated the
privileges held most sacred, and reduced his subjects of every order to the
level of slaves.*  The chiefs, or nobles of the first rank, submitted to the
yoke with such reluctance that, fromn impatience to shake It off, and hope
of recovering their rights, many of them courted the protection of Cortes,
and joined a foreign power against their domestic oppressor.1  It is not
then under the dominion of Montezuma, but under the government of his
predecessors, that we can discover what was the original form and genius
of Mexican policy.  From the foundation of the mxonarchy to tihe election
of Montezuma, it seems to have subsisted with little variation.  That body
of citizens, which may be distinguished by the name of nobility, formed
the chief and most respectable order in the state.  They were of various
ranks, as has been already observed, and their honours were acquired and
transmitted in different manners.  Their nuimber seems to have been great.
According to an author accustomed to examine with attention what he
relates, there were in the Mexican empire thirty of this order, each of
whom had in his territories about a hundred thousand people; and subordinate to these, there were about three thousand nobles of a lower class,t
The territories belonging to the chiefs of Tezeuco and Tacuba were hardly
inferior in extent to those of the Mexican monarch.~  Each of these possessed complete territorial jurisdiction, and levied taxes firom their own
vassals.  But allifollowed the standard of Mexico in war, serving with a
number of men in proportion to their domrain, and most ot' them  paid
tribute to its monarch as their superior lord.
In tracing those great lines of the Mexican constitution, an image of
feudal policy, in its most rigid form, rises to view, and -we discern its three
distinguishing characteristics, a nobility possessing almost independent
authority, a people depressed into the lowest state of subjection, and'a
king intrusted with the executive power of the state. Its spirit and principles seem to have operated in the New World in the same manner as in
the ancient.  The jurisdiction of the crown was extremely limited. All
real and effective authority was retained by the Mexican nobles:intheir
own hands, and the shladow of it only left to the king. Jealous to excess
of their own rights,they guarded with the most vigilant anxiety against
the encroachments of their sovereigns.  By a fundamental law ot the empire, it was provided that the king should not determine concerning any
r'illn. ot general importance without the approbation of a council composed of the prime nobility.1l  Unless he obtained their consent, he could
not engage the nation in war, nor could he dispose of the most considerable branch of the public revenue at pleasure; it was appropriated to certain purposes from Wvhich it could not be diverted by the regal authority
alone.1 In order to secure full effect to those constitutional restraints, the
Mexican nobles did not permit their crown to descend by inheritance, but
disposed of it by election. The right of election seems to have been
originally vested in the whole body of nobility, but was afterwards corr
mitted to six electors, of whom  the chiefs of Tezeuco and Tacuba were
always two.  From  respect for'the family of theil monarchs, the choice
fell generally upon some person sprung from  it. But as the activity and
valour of their prince were of greater moment to a people perpetually
engaged in war, than a strict adherence to the order of birth, collaterals
of mature age or of distinguished merit were often preferred to those
who were nearer the throne in direct descent.'     To this maxim in their
* Herrera, dec, 3. lib. ii. c 14. Torquem. lib. ii. c. 69.  t Herrera, dec. 2. lib. v. c. 10, 11,
VTorqueml. lib. iv. c. 49,  * Herrera, dec.'2. lib. viii. c. 12.    Torquemr. lib. ii. c. 57.
Corita W!S.    11 Herrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 19)!ib.' iv. c. 16. Corita MS.    If Herrera, dec.
3. lib. iv. c. 17.  ** Acosta, lib. vi. c. 24. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 13. Corita MS.




320                    HISTORY   OF                   [Boox VIi.
policy, the Mexicans appear to be indebted for such a succession ot able
and warlike princes, as raised their empire in a short period to that extraordinary height of power which it had attained when Cortes landed in
New Spain.
While the jurisdiction of the Mexican monarch continued to be limited.
it is probable that it was exercised with little ostentation. But as their
authority became more extensive, the splendour of their government augmented. It was in this last state that the Spaniards beheld it; and struck
with the appearance of Montezuma's court, they describe its pomp at great
length, and with much admiration. The number of his attendants, the
order, the silence, and the reverence with which they served him; the
extent of his royal mansion, the variety of its apartments allotted to different officers, and the ostentation with which his grandeur was displayed,
whenever he permitted his subjects to behold him, seem to resemble' the
magnificence of the ancient monarchies in Asia, rather than the simplicity
of the infant states in the New World.
But it was not in the mere parade of royalty that the Mexican potentates
exhibited their power; they manifested it more beneficially in the order
and regularity with which they conducted the internal administration and
police of their dominions. Complete jurisdiction, civil as well as criminal,
over its own immediate vassals, was vested in the crown. Judges were
appointed for each department; and' if we may rely on the account which
the Spanish writers give of the maxims and laws upon which they founded
their decisions with respect to the distribution of property and the punishment of crimes, justice was administered in the Mexican empire with a
degree of order and equity resembling what takes place in societies highly
civilized.
Their attention in providing for the support of government was not
less sagacious. Taxes were laid upon land, upon the acquisitions of industry, and upon commodities of every kind exposed to sale in the public
markets. Thiese duties were considerable, but not arbitrary or unequal.
They were imposed according to established rules, and each knew what
share of the common burden he had to bear. As the use of money was
unknown, all the taxes were paid in kind-; and thus not only the natural
productions of all the different provinces in the empire, but every species
of manufacture, and every work of ingenuity and art, were collected in
the public storehouses. From those the emperor supplied his numerous
train of attendants in peace, and his armies during war, with food, with
clothes, and ornaments. People of inferior condition, neither possessing
land nor engaged in commerce, were bound to the performance of various
services.. By their stated labour the crown lands were cultivated, public
works were carried on, and the various houses belonging to the emperor
were built and kept in repair* [147].
The improved state of government among the Mexicans is conspicuous,
not only in points essential to the being of a well-ordered society, but in
several regulations of inferior consequence with respect to police. The
institution which I have already mentioned, of public couriers, stationed
at proper intervals, to convey intelligence from one part of the empire to
the other. was a refinement in police not introduced into any kingdom of
Europe at that period. The structure of the capital city in a lake, with
artificial dykes, and causeways of great length, which served as avenues
to it from different quarters, erected in the water, with no less ingenuity
than labour, seems to be an idea that could not have occurred to any
but a civilized people. The same observation may be applied to the
structure of the aqueducts, or conduits, by which they conveyed a stream
of fresh water from a considerable distance, into the city, along one of the
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. vii. c. 13 dec. 3. lib. iv c. 16, 17.




AMERICA.                                      321
causeways [1481. The appointment of a number of persons to clean the
streets, to light them by fires kindled in different places, and to patrol as
watchmen during the night," discovers a degree of attention which even
polished nations are late in acquiring.
The progress of the Mexicans in various arts is considered as the most
decisive proof of their superior refinement. Cortes and the early Spanisn
authors describe this with rapture, and maintain, that the- most celebrated
European  artists could not surpass or even equal them  in ingenuity and
neatness of workmanship. They represented men, animals, and other
objects, by such a disposition of various coloured feathers, as is said to
have produced all the effects of light and shade, and to have imitated
nature with truth and delicacy.  Their ornaments of gold and silver have
been described to be of a fabric no less curious. But in formir g any idea,
from general descriptions, concerning the state of arts among nations imperfectly  polished, we are extremely  ready  to err.  In  examining the
works of people whose advances in improvement are nearly the sarne with
our own, we view them with a critical and often with a jealous eye.
Whereas, when conscious of our own superiority, we survey the arts of
nations comparatively rude, we are astonished at works executed by
them under such manifest disadvantages, and, in the warmth of our admiration, are apt to represent them as productions more finished than they
really are.  To the influence of this illusion, without supposing any intention to deceive, we may impute the exaggeration of some Spanish authors,
in their accounts of the Mexican arts.
It is not froin those descriptions, but from  considering such specimens of
their arts as are still preserved, that we must decide concerning their degree
of merit.  As the ship in which Cortes sent to Charles V. the most curious
productions of the Mexican artisans, which were collected by the Spaniards
when they first pillaged the empire, was taken by a French corsair,t the
remains of their ingenuity are less numerous than those of the Peruvians.
Whether any of their works with feathers, in imitation of painting, be still
extant in Spain, I have not learned; but many of their ornaments in gold
and silver, as well as various utensils employed in common life, are deposited in the' magnificent cabinet of natural and artificial productions lately
opened'by the king of Spain; and I am informed by persons on whose
judgment and taste I can rely, that these boasted efforts of their art are
urcouth representations of common objects, or very coarse images of the
human and some other forms, destitute of grace and propriety [149].  The
iustness of these observations is confirmed by inspecting the wooden prints
and copper plates of their paintings, which have been published by various
authors. In them every figure of men, of quadrupeds, or birds, as well as
every representation of inanimated nature, is extremely rude and awkward.t
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. viii. c. 4. Torribio MS.  t Relat. de Cort. Ramus, iii. 294. F.: As a specimen of the spirit and style in which M. Clavigero makes his strictures upon my
History of America, I shall publish his remarks upon this passage. "Thus far Robertson; to
whonl we answer-, first, That there is no reason to believe that those rude works were really
Mexican: secondly, Tnat neither do we know whether those persons in whose judgment he conhdes,
mnay be persons fit to merit our faith, because we have observed that Robertson trusts frequently to
the testinony of Gage, Correal, lbagnez, and other such authors, who are entirely undeserving of
credit: thirdly, It is tnore probable that the arms of copper, believed by those intelligent judges to
be certainly Oriental, are really Mexican."  Vol. II. 391.-When an author, not entirely destitute
of integrity or discernment, and who has some solicitude about his own character, asserts that he
received his information concerning any particular point from persons "on whose judgment and
taste he can rely;' a very slender degree of candour, one should think, might induce the reader to
believe that he does rot endeavour to impose upon tile public by an appeal to testimony altogether
unworthy of credit. My information concerning the Mexican works of art, deposited in the king
of Spain's cabinet, was received from the late Lord Granitham, ambassador extraordinary from the
court of London to that of Madrid, and from Mr. Archdeacon Waddilove, chaplain to the enmbassy;
and it was upon their authority that I pronounced thle coat of armour, mentioned in the note, to be
of Oriental fabric. As they were both at Madrid in their public character, when the first edition of
the History of Anmerica was published, I thought it improper at that time to mention their names.
Did their decision concermning a matter of taste, or their testimony concerning a point of fact, stand
in need of confiltna:ion, I might produce the evidence of an intelligent traveller, who, in describina
Vo, I.-41




322                         HISTORY OF                           [BooK VII.
The hardest Egyptian style, stiff and imperfect as it was, is more elegant.
The scrawls of children delineate objects almost as accurately.
But however low the Mexican paintings may be ranked, when viewed
merely as works of art, a very different station belong-s to them when considered as the records of their country, as historical monuments of its policy
and transactions; and they become curious as well as interesting objects
of attention.  Tbhe noblest and most beneficial invention of which human
ingenuity can boast, is that of writing.  But the first' essays of this art,
which hath contributed more than all others to the improvement of the
species, were very rude, and it advanced towards perfection slowly, and by
a gradual progression.   When  the, warrior, eager for fame, wished to
transmit some knowledge of his exploits to succeeding ages; when the
gratitude of a people to their sovereign prompted them to hand down an
account of his beneficent deeds to posterity; the first method of accomplishing this, which seems to have occurred to them, was to delineate, in
the best manner they could? figures representing the action, of which they
were solicitous to preserve the memory.  Of this, which  has very properly been called picture Zriting-,* wve find traces among some of the most
savage tribes of America.  When a leader returns fiom  the field, he strips
a tree of its bark, and with red paint scratches upon it some uncouth figures
which represent the order of his march, the number of his followers, the
enemy whom he attacked, the scalps and captives which he brought home.
To those simple annals he trusts for renown, and soothes himself with hope
that bty their means he shall receive praise- from the warriors of future
times.
Compared with those awkward essays of their savage countrymen, the
paintings of the Mexicans may be considered as works of composition and
design.  They were not acquainted, it is true, with  any other method of
recording transactions than that of delineating the objects which they wished
to represent. But they could exhibit a more complex series of events in
progressive order, and describe, by a proper disposition of figures, the occurrences of a king's reign from his accession to his death; the progress of
an infant's education from its birth until it attain to the years of maturity;
the different recompenses and marks of distinction conferred upon warriors, in proportion to the exploits which they had performed. Some singular specimens of this picture writing have been preserved, which  are
iustly considered as the most curious monuments of art brought from the
New World. The most valuable of these was published by Purchas in
sixty-six  plates.  It is divided into three parts.  The first contains the
history of the Mexican empire under its ten monarchs. The second is a
tribute roll, representing what each conquered town paid into the royal
treasury. The third is a code of their institutions, domestic, political, and
military.  Another specimen of Mexican painting has been published in
thirty-two plates, by the present archbishop of Toledo.  To both is annexed a full explanation of what the figures were intended to represent,
which was obtained by the Spaniards from  Indians well acquainted with
their own arts. The style of painting in all these is the same. They
the royal cabinet of Madrid, takes notice that it contains " specimens of Mexican and Peruvian
utensils, vases, &c. in earthenware, wretched both ill taste and execution."  Dillon's Travels
1irough Spain, p. 77. As Gage composed his Survey of New Spain wit all the zeal and acrimony
of a new convert, [ have paid little regard to his testimony with respect to points relating to religion.
But as he resided in several provinces in New Spain, which travellers se!dom visit, and as he seems
to have observed their manners and laws with an intelligent eye, I have availed myself ot his
information with respect to matters where religious opinion could have little influence. Correal I
have seldom quoted, and never rested'pon his evidence alone. The station in which Ibagnez was
employed in America, as well as the credit given to his veracity, by printing his Regno Jesuitico
among the large collection of documents published (as I believe by authority) at Madrid, A. D. 1767,
justifies me for appealing to his authority.
* Divine LegL,. of Mloses, iii. 73.  t Sir WV. Johnson, Philos. Transact. vol. lxiii, p. 143
Mom. de la Hontan, ii. 191. Lafitau Mmurs de Sauv. it. 4;j.




A M ERICA.                           323
epresent things, not words. They exhibit images to the eye, not ideas to
he understanding. They may therefore be considered as the earliest and
iost Imperfect essay of men in their progress towards discovering the art
)f writing. The defects in this mode of recording transactions must have
been early felt. To paint every occurrence was from its nature a very
tedious operation; and as affairs became more complicated, and events
multiplied in any society, its annals must have swelled to an enormous
bulk. Besides this, no objects could be delineated but those of sense; the
conceptions of the mind had no corporeal form; and as long as picture
writing could not convey an idea of these, it must have been a very imper.fect art. The necessity of improving it must have roused and sharpened
invention; and the human mind, holding the same course in the New
World as in the Old, might have advanced by the same successive steps,
first, from an actual picture to the plain hieroglyphic; next to the allego.
rical symbol; then to the arbitrary character; until, at length, an alphabet
of letters was discovered, capable of expressing all the various combinations
of sound employed in speech. In the paintings of the Mexicans we accordingly perceive that this progress was begun among them. Upon an
attentive inspection of the plates, which I have mentioned, we may observe
some approach to the plain or simple hieroglyphic, where some principal
part or circumstance in the subject is made to stand for the whole. In the
annals of their kings, published by Purchas, the towns conquered by each
are uniformly represented in the same manner by a rude delineation of a
house; but in order to point out the particular towns which submitted to their
victorious arms, peculiar emblems, sometimes natural objects, and sometimes
artificial figures, are employed. In the tribute-roll published by the Archbishop of Toledo, the house which was properly the picture of the town, is
omitted, and the emblem alone is employed to represent it. The Mexicans
seem even to have made some advances beyond this, towards the use of the
more figurative and fanciful hieroglyphic. In order to describe a monarch
who had enlarged his dominions by torce of arms, they painted a target ornamented with darts, and placed it betwVeen him and those towns which he
subdued. But it is only in one instance, the notation of numbers, that we
discern any attempt to exhibit ideas which had no corporeal form. I The
Mexican painters had invented artificial marks, or signs of convention, for
this purpose. By means of these, they computed the years of their kings'
reigns, as well as the amount of tribute to be paid into the royal treasury.
The figure of a circle represented unit; and in small numbers, the coinputation was made by repeating it. Larger numbers were expressed by a
peculiar mark; and they had such as denoted all integral numbers, from
twenty to eight thousand. The short duration of their empire prevented
the AMexicans from advancing further in that long course which conducts
men from the labour of delineating real objects, to the simplicity and ease
of alphabetic writing. Their records, notwithstanding some dawn of such
ideas as might have led to a mnore perfect style, can be considered as little
more than a species of picture-writing, so far improved as to mark their
superiority over the savage tribes of America; but still so defective as to
prove that they had not proceeded far beyond the first stage in that progress
which must be completed before any people can be tanked among polished
nations [150].
Their mode of computing time may be considered as a more decisive
evidence of their progress in improvement. They divided their year into
eighteen months, consisting of twenty days; amounting in all to three hundred and sixty. But as they observed that the course of the sun was not
completed in that time, they added five days to the year. These, which
were properly intercalary days, they termed supernumerary or waste; and
as they did not belong to any month, no work was dones and no sacred rite




324                      HISTORY  OF                      [BOOK VII.
performed on them; they were devoted wholly to festivity and pastime.*
This near approach to philosophical accuracy is a remarkable proof, that
the Mexicans had bestowed some attention upon inquiries and speculations
to which men in a very rude state never turn their thoughts.t
Such are the most striking particulars in the manners aIld policy of the
Mexicans, which exhibit them to view as a people considerably refined.
But from other circumstances, one is apt to suspect that their character,
and many of their institutions. did not differ greatly from those of the other
inhabitants of America.
Like the rude tribes around them, the Mexicans were incessantly engaged in war, and the motives which prompted them to hostility seem to
have been the same.  They fought in order to gratify their vengeance by
shedding the blood of their enemries.  In battle they were chiefly intent on
taking prisoners; and it was by- the number of these that they estimated
the glory of victory. No captive was ever ransomed or spared. All were
sacrificed without mercy, and their flesh devoured with the same barbarous
joy as among the fiercest savages. On some occasions it arose to even
wilder excesses.  Their principal warriors covered themselves with the
skins of the unhappy victims, and danced about the streets, boasting of
their own valour, and exulting over their enemies.T  Even in their civil
institutions we discover traces of that barbarous disposition which their
system of war inspired.  The four chief counsellors of the empire were
distinguished by titles, which could have been assumed only by a people
who delighted in blood [151]. This ferocity of character prevailed among
all the nations of New Spain.  The Tlascalans, the people of Mechoacan,
and other states at enmity with the Mexicans, delighted equally in war,
and treated their prisoners with the same cruelty. In proportion as mankind combine in social union, and live under the influence of equal laws
and regular policy, their manners soften, sentiments of humanity arise, and
the rights of the species come to be understood. The fierceness of war
abates, and even while engaged in hostility, men remember what they owe
one to another.  The savage fights to destroy, the citizen to conquer.  The
former neither pities nor spares, the latter has acquired sensibility which
tempers his rage.  To this sensibility the Mexicans seem  to have been
perfect strangers; and among thenr war was carried on with so much of
its original barbarity, that we cannot but suspect their degree of civilization to have been very imperfect.
Their funeral rites were not less bloody than those of the most savage
tribes. On the death of any distinguished personage, especially of the
emperor, a certain number of his attendants were chosen to accompany
him to the other world; and those unfortunate victims were put to death
without mercy, and buried in the same tomb.~
Though their agriculture was more extensive than that of the roving
tribes who trusted chiefly to their bow for food, it seems not to have supplied them with such subsistence as men require when engaged in efforts
of active industry. The Spaniards appear not to have been struck with
any superiority of the Mexicans over the other people of America in bodily
vigour. Both, according to their observation, were of such a feeble. frame,
as to be unable to endure fatigue, and the strength of one Spaniard ex
ceeded' that of several Indians. This they imputed to their scanty diet,
on poor fare, sufficient to preserve life, but not to give firmness to their
constitution.  Such a remark could hardly have been made with' respect
to any people furnished plentifully with the necessaries of life. The difit.
* Acosta, lib vi. c. 2.
t The Mexican mode of computing time, and every other particular relating to their chronology,
have been considerably elucidated by M. Clavigero, voi. i. 288; vol. ii. 225, &c. The observations
and theories of the Mexicans concerning those subjects discover a greater progress in speculative
science than we find among any people in the New Woerld.  l Hlerrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. 15.
Goin. Cron. c. 217.   I 1erreia. dec. 3. lib. ii,. c. 18. Gore. Cron. c. 2U2.




AMERiCA.                               325
culty which Cortes found in procuring subsiste-):ce for his small body of
soldiers, who were often constrained to live on the spontaneous productions
of the earth, seems to confirm the remark of the Spanish writers, and gives
no high idea of the state of cultivation in the Mexican empire.*
A practice that was universal in New Spain appears to favour this opinion.  The Mexican women gave suck to their children for several years,
and during that time they did not cohabit witha i:: r husbands.t  This precaution against a burdensome increase of prJeerloy, though necessary, as I
have already observed, among savages, who from the hardships of their
condition, and the precariousness of'their subsistence, find it impossible to
rear a numerous family, can hardly be supposed to have continued among
a people who lived at ease and in abundance.
The vast extent of the Mexican empire, which has been considered, and
with justice, as the most decisive proof of a considerable progress in regular government and police, is one of those facts in the history of the New
World which seems to have been admitted without due examination or
sufficient evidence.  The Spanish historians, in order to magnify the valour
of their co-un'mr.m'mje, -re reccuistomned to rapresent the dominion of liontezuma as stretching over all the provinces of New Spain from the Northern
to the Southern Ocean.  But a great part of the mountainous country was
possessed by the Otomies, a fierce uncivilized people, who seem to have
been the residue of the original inhabitants.  The provinces towards the
north and west of Mexico, were occupied by the Chichermecas, and other
tribes of hunters. None of these recognised the Mexican monarch as their
superior. Even in the interior and more level country, there were several
cities and provinces which had never submitted to the Mexican yoke.
Tlascala, though only' twenty-one leagues from the capital of the empire,
-was an independent and hostile republic.  Cholula, though still nearer,
had been subjected only a short time before the arrival of the Spaniards.
Tepeaca, at the distance of thirty leagues from  Mexico, seems to have
been a separate state, governed by its own laws.$  Mechoacan, the frontier of which extended within forty leagues of M1exico, was a powerful
kingdom, remarkable for its implacable enmity to the 3fexican nalne.~
By these hostile powers the Mexican empire was circumscribed on every
quarter, and the high ideas which we are apt to form of it from the description of the Spanish historians, should be considerably moderated.
In consequence of this independence of several states in New Spain
upon the Mexican empire, there was not any considerable intercourse between its various provinces. Even in the interior country not far distant
from the capital, there seems to have been no roads to facilitate the communication of one district with another; and when the Spaniards first attempted to penetrate into its several provinces, they had to open their way
through forests and marshes.l Cortes, in his adventurous march from
Mexico to Honduras, in 1525, met with obstructions, and endured hardships little interior to those with which he must have struggled in the most
uncivilized-regions of America.  In some places he could hardly force a
passage through impervious woods, and plains overflowed with water.
In others he found so little cultivation, that his troops were frequently in
danger of perishing by famine. Such facts correspond ill with the pompous description which the Spanish writers give of Mexican police and
industry, and convey an idea of a country nearly similar to that possessed
by the Indian tribes in North America. Here and there a trading or a
war path, as they are called in North America, led from one settlement to
another;~ but generally there appeared no sign of any established commllnication, few marks of industry, and fewer monuments of art.
* IRclat. ap. l? -mus, iii. 30;. A. HIerrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 17. dec. 2. lih. vi. c. 16.    t G-om.
Cron. c. 2(35. Herrera, dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 16.  t lerrera, dec. 3. l.b. x. c. 15. 21. B. Diaz, c. 130,
H Lerrera, dec. 3. lib. ii. c. ID.    1i B. Diaz, c. 166. 176.    Il Heliera, dec. 3. lib. vii c 8.




S26                     HISTORIY  ovI                 [BooK VII.
A proof of this imperfection in their commercial intercourse no less striking is their want of money, or some universal standard by which to esti.
mate the value of commodities. The discovery of this is among the
steps of greatest consequence in the progress of nations. Until it has been
made, all their transactions must be so awkward, so operose, and so limited,
that we may boldly pronounce that they have advanced but a little way
in their career. The invention of such a commercial standard is of such
high antiquity in our hemisphere, and rises so far beyond the era of authentic history, as to appear almost coeval with the existence of society.
The precious metals seem to have been early employed for this purpose;
and from their permanent value, their divisibility, and many other qualities,
they are better adapted to serve as a common standard than any other substance of which nature has given us the command. But in the New
World, where these metals abound most, this use of them was not known.
The exigencies of rude tribes, or of monarchies imperfectly civilized, did
not call for it. All their commercial intercourse was carried on by barter,
and their ignorance of any common standard by which to facilitate that
exchange of commodities which contributes so much towards the comfort
of life, may be justly mentioned as an evidence of the infant state of their
policy. But even in the New World the inconvenience of wanting some
general instrument of commerce began to be felt, and some efforts were
making towards supplying that defect. The Mexicans, among whom the
number and greatness of their cities gave rise to a more extended commerce than in any other part of America, had begun to employ a common
standard of value, which rendered smaller transactions much imore easy.
As chocolate was the favourite drink of persons in every rank of life, the
nuts or almonds of cacao, of which it is composed, were of such universal
consumption, that, in their stated markets, these were willingly received
in return for commodities of small price. Thus they came to be considered as the instrument of commerce, and the value of what one wished to
dispose of was estimated by the number of nuts of the cacao, which he
might expect in exchange for it. This seems to be the utmost length
which the Americans had advanced towards the discovery of any expedient for supplying the use of money. And if the want of it is to be held,
on one hand, as a proof of their barbarity, this expedient for supplying
that want should be admitted, on the other, as an evidence no less satisfying of some progress which the Mexicans had made in refinement and
civilization beyond the savage tribes around them.
In such a rude state were many of the Mexican provinces when first
visited by their conquerors. Even their cities, extensive and populous as
they were, seem more fit to be the habitation of men just emerging from
barbarity, than the residence of a polished people.  The description of
Tlascala nearly resembles that of an Indian village. A number of low
straggling huts, scattered about irregularly, according to the caprice of
each proprietor, built with turf and stone, and thatched with reeds, without any light but what they received by a door, so low that it could not
be entered upright.?  In Mexico, though, from the peculiarity of its situation, the disposition of the houses was more orderly, the structure of the
greater part was equally mean. Nor does the fabric of their temples, and
other public edifices, appear to have been such as entitled them to the
high praise bestowed upon them by many Spanish authors. As far as one
can gather from their obscure and inaccurate descriptions, the great temple
of Mexico, the most famous in New Spain, which has been represented as
a magnificent btuilding, raised to such a height, that the ascent to it was by
a flight of a hundred and fourteen steps, was a solid mass of earth of a
square form, faced partly with stone. Its base on each side extended
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. vi. c. 12.




AMERICA.                             327
ninety feet; and decreasing gradually as it advanced in height, it termi.
nated in a quadrangle of about thirty feet, where were placed a shrine of
the deity, and two altars on which the victims were sacrificed.*  All the
other celebrated temples of New Spain exactly resembled that of Mexico [152]. Such structures convey no high idea of progress in art and ingenuity; and one can hardly conceive that a form more rude and simple
could have occurred to a nation in its first efforts towards erecting any
great work.
Greater skill and ingenuity were displayed, if we may believe the Spanish historians, in the houses of the emperor, and in those of the principal
nobility. There, some elegance of design was visible, and a commodious
arrangement of the apartments was attended to. But if buildings corresponding to such descriptions had ever existed in the Mexican cities, it is
probable that some remains of them would still be visible. From the
manner in which Cortes conducted the siege of Mexico, we can indeed
easily account for the total destruction of whatever had any appearance
of splendour in that capital. But as only two centuries and a half have
elapsed since the conquest of New Spain, it seems altogether incredible
that in a period so short, every vestige of this boasted elegance and grandeur should have disappeared; and that in the other cities, particularly in
those which did not sutffr by the destructive hand of the conquerors, there
are any ruins which can be considered as monuments of their ancient magnificence.
Even in a village of the rudest Indians, there are buildings of greater
extent and elevation than common dwelling houses. Such as are destined
for holding the council of the tribe, and in which all assemble on occasions
of public festivity, may be called stately edifices, when compared with
the rest. As among the Mexicans the distinction of ranks was established,
and property was unequally divided, the number of distinguished structures in their towns would of course be greater than in other parts of America. But these seem not to have been either so solid or magnificent as to
merit the pompous epithets which some Spanish authors employ in describing them. It is probable that, though more ornamented, and built on
a larger scale, they were erected with the same slight materials which the
Indians employed in their common buildings [153], and Time, in a space
much less than two hundred and fifty years, may have swept away all
remains of them [154].
From this enumeration of facts, it seems, upon the whole, to be evident,
that the state of society in Mexico was considerably advanced beyond
that of the savage tribes which we have delineated. But it is no less manifest that, with respect to many particulars, the Spanish accounts of their
progress appear to be highly embellished. There is not a more frequent
or a more fertile source of deception in describing the manners and arts of
savage nations, or of such as are imperfectly civilized, than that of applying to them the names and phrases appropriated to the institutions and re.
finements of polished life.  When the leader of a small tribe, or the head
of a rude community, is dignified with the name of King or Emperor, the
place of his residence can receive no other name but that of his palace;
and whatever his attendants may be, they must be called his court
Under such appellations they acquire, in our estimation, an importance
and dignity which does not belong to them. The illusion spreads; and
giving a false colour to every part of the narrative, the imagination is so
much carried away with the resemblance, that it becomes difficult to discern objects as they really are. The Spaniards, when they first touched
on the Mexican coast, were so much struck with the appearance of attainments in policy and in the arts of life, far superior to those of the rude
* Herrera, dec. 2. lib. vii. c. 17,




-328                   H ISTORY  O 1                  [BOOK VII.
tribes with which they were hitherto acquainted, that they fancied they
had at length discovered a civilized people in the New World. This
comparison between the people of Mexico and their uncultivated neighbours, they appear to have kept constantly in view; and observing with
admiration many things which marked the pre-eminence of the former,
they employ, in describing their imperfect policy and infant arts, such terms
as are applicable to the institutions of men far beyond them in improvement.'Both these circumstances concur in detracting from the credit due
to the descriptions of Mexican manners by the early Spanish writers. By
drawing a parallel between them and those of people so much less civil
ized, they raised their own ideas too high. By their mode of describing
them, they conveyed ideas to others no less exalted above truth. Later
writers have adopted the style of the original historians, and improved
upon it. The colours with which De Solis delineates the character and
describes the actions of Montezuma, the splendour of his court, the laws
and policy of his empire, are the same that he must have employed in
exhibiting to view the monarch and institutions of a highly polished people.
But though we may admit, that the warm imagination of the Spanish
writers has added some embellishment to their descriptions, this will not
justify the decisive and peremptory tone with which several authors pronounce all their accounts of the Mexican power, policy, and laws, to be.he fictions of men who wished to deceive, or who delighted in the marvellous. Trhere are few historical facts that can be ascertained by evidence
more unexceptionable, than may be produced in support of the material
articles in the description of the Mexican constitution and manners. Eyewitnesses relate what they beheld. Men who had resided among the
Mexicans, both before and after the conquest, describe institutions and
customs which were familiar to them. Persons of professions so different
that objects must have presented themselves to their view under every
various aspect; soldiers, priests, and lawyers, all concur in their testimony.
Had Cortes ventured to impose upon his sovereign, by exhibiting to him a
picture of imaginary manners, there wanted not enemies and rivals who
were qualified to detect his deceit, and who would have rejoiced in
exposing it. But according to the just remark of an author, whose ingenuity has illustrated, and whose eloquence has adorned, the history of
America,* this supposition is in itself as improbable as the attempt would
have been audacious.- Who, among the destroyers of' this great empire,
was so enlightened by science, or so attentive to the progress and operations
of men in social life, as to frame a fictitious system of policy so well combined and so consistent, as that which they delineate in their accounts of
the Mexican government? Where could they have borrowed the idea of
many institutions in legislation and police, to which, at that period, there
was nothing parallel in the nations with which they were acquainted?
There was not, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, a regular establishment of posts for conveying intelligence to the sovereign of any
kingdom  in Europe.  The same observation will apply to what the
Spaniards relate with respect to the structure of the city of Mexico, the
regulations concerning its police, and various laws established for the
administration of justice, or securing the happiness of the community.
Whoever is accustomed to contemplate the progress of nations will often,
at very early stages of it, discover a premature and unexpected dawn of
those ideas which gave rise to institutions that are the pride and ornament
of its most advanced period. Even in a state as imperfectly polished as
the Mexican empire, the happy genius of some sagacious observer, excited
or aided by circumstances unknown to us, may have introduced institutions
which are seldom found but in societies highly refined. But it is almost
* MN,'Abbe Raynal Hist. phils. et polit. &c. iii. 127.




AMERICA.                             329
Impossible that the illiterate conquerors of the New World should have
formed in any one instance a conception of customis and laws beyond the
standard ot  improvement in their own age and country. Or if Cortes had
been capable:of -this, what inducement had those by whom he was superseded to continue the deception-? Why should Corita, or Motolinea, or
Acosta, have amused their sovereign or their fellow-citizens with a tale
purely fabulous?
In one particular, however, the guides whom we must follow have represented the Mexicans to be more barbarous, perhaps, than they really were.
Their religious tenets and the rites of their worship are described by them
as wild and cruel in an extreme degree. Religion, which occupies no
considerable place in the thoughts of a savage, whose conceptions of any
superior power are obscure, and his sacred rites few as well as simple,
was formed, among the Mexicans, into a regular system, with its complete
train of priests, temples, victims, and festivals. This, of itself, is a clear
proof that the state of the Mexicans was very different from that of the
ruder American tribes.  But from  the extravagance of their religious
nations, or the barbarity of their rites, no conclusion can be drawn with
certainty concerning the degree of their civilization. For nations, long
after their ideas begin to enlarge, and their manners to refine, adhere to
systems of superstition founded on the crude conceptions of early ages.
From the genius of the Mexican religion we may, however, form a most
just conclusion with respect to its influence upon the character of the
people. The aspect of superstition in Mexico was gloomy and atrocious.
Its divinities were clothed with terror, and delighted in vengeance. They
were exhibited to the people under detestable forms, which created horror.
The figures of serpents, of tigers, and of other destructive animals, decorated their temples.  Fear was -the only principle that inspired their
votaries. Fasts, mortifications, and penances, all rigid, and many of them
excruciating to an extreme degree, were the means employed to appease
the wrath of their gods, and the Mexicans never approached their altars
without sprinkling themrn with blood drawn from their own bodies. But, of
all -offerings, human sacrifices were deemed the most acceptable. This
religious belief mingling with the itnplacable spirit of vengeance, and
adding new force to it, every captive taken in war was brought to the
temple, was devoted as a victim to the deity, and sacrificed with rites no
less solemn than cruel* [155].  The heart and head were the portion
consecrated to the gods; the warrior, by whose prowess the prisoner had
been seized, carried off the body to feast upon it with his friends. Under
the impression of ideas so dreary and terrible, and accustomed daily to
scenes of bloodshed rendered awful by religion, the heart of man must
harden and be steeled to every sentiment of humanity. The spirit of the
Mexicans-was accordingly unfeeling; and the genius of their religion so
far counterbalanced the influence of policy and arts, that notwithstanding
their progress in hoth, their manners, instead of softening, became more
fierce. To what circumstances it was owing that superstition assumed such
a dreadful form among the Mexicans, we have not sufficient knowledge of
their history to determine. But its influence is visible, and produced an
effect that is singular in the history of the human species. The manners of
the people in the New World, who had made the greatest progress in the
arts of policy, were, in several respects, the most ferocious, and the barbarity
of sotrme of their customs exceeded even those of the savage state.
The empire of Peru boasts of a higher antiquity than that of Mexico.
According to the traditionary accounts collected by the Spaniards, it had
subsisted four hundred years, under twelve successive monarchs. But the
~ Cort. Relat. ap Ramus. iii. 240, &e;. B. Dia, c. 82. Acosta, lib. v. c. 13, &c ferrera, dec.
3. lib. ii. c. 15, &c. Gomara Chron. c. 80, &;c.
VoL. 1. —42




330                    H ISTORY OF                  [BooK V1I.
knowledge of their ancient story, which the Peruvians could communicate
to their conquerors, must have been both imperfect and uncertain [1561
Like the other American nations, they were totally unacquainted with the
art of writing, and destitute of the only means by which the menmoyr of
past transactions can be preserved with any degree of accuracy. Even
among people to whom the use of letters is known, the era where the
authenticity of history commences is much posterior to the introduction of
writing. That noble invention continued every where to be long subservient to the common business and wants of life, before it was employed in
recording events, with a view of conveying information from one age to
another. But In no country did ever tradition alone carry down historical
knowledge, in any full continued stream, during a period of. half the length
that the monarchy of Peru is said to have subsisted.
The Quipos, or knots on cords of different colours, which are celebrated
by authors fond of the marvellous, as if they had been regular annals of
the empire, imperfectly supplied the place of writing. According to the
obscure description of them by Acosta,* which Garcilasso de la Vega has
adopted with little variation and no improvement, the quipos seem to have
been a device for rendering calculation more expeditious and accurate.
By the various colours different objects were denoted, and by each knot a
distinct number. Thus an account was taken, and a kind of register kept,
of the inhabitants in each province, or of the several productions collected
there for public use. But as by these knots, however varied or combined,
no moral or abstract idea, no operation or quality of the mind could be
represented, they contributed little towards preserving the memory of
ancient events and institutions. By the Mexican paintings and symbols,
rude as they were, more knowledge of remote transactions seems to have
been conveyed than the Peruvians could derive from their boasted quipos.
Had the latter been even of more extensive use, and better adapted to
supply the place of written records, they perished so generally, together
with othei, monuments of Peruvian ingenuity, in the wreck occasioned by
the Spanish conquest, and the civil wars subsequent to it, that no accession
of light or knowledge comes from them. All the zeal of Garcilasso de la
Vega, for the honour of that race, of monarchs from whom he descended,
all the industry of his researches, and the superior advantages with which
he carried them on, opened no source of information unknown to the
Spanish authors who wrote before him. In his Royal Commentaries, he
confines himself to illustrate what they had related concerning the antiqui
ties and institutions of Peru;t and his illustrations, like their accounts, are
derived entirely from the traditionary tales current among his countrymen.
Very little credit then is due to the minute details which have been
given, of the exploits, the battles, the conquests, and private character of
the early Peruvian monarchs. We can rest upon nothing in their story as
authentic, but a few facts so interwoven in the system of their religion and
policy, as preserved the memory of them froin being lost; and upon the
description of such customs and institutions as continued in force at the
time of the conquest, and fell under the immediate observation of the
Spaniardk. By attending carefully to these, and endeavouring to separate
them from what appears to be fabulous or of doubtful authority, I have
labourod to form an idea of the Peruvian government and manners.
The people of Peru, as I have already observed,T had not advanced
beyond the rudest form of savage life, when Manco Capac, and his consort Mama Ocollo, appeared to instruct and to civilize them. Who these
extraordinary personages were, whether they imported their system of
legislation and knowledge of arts from some country more improved, or, if
natives of Peru, how they acquired ideas so far superior to those of the
* Hist. Jib. vi c. 8.  t Lib. i. e. 10., Book vi




AM I E RI CA.                       331
people whom they addressed, are circumstances with respect to which the
Peruvian tradition conveys no information. Manco Capac and his consort,
taking advantage of the propensity in the Peruvians to superstition, and
particularly of their veneration for the Sun, pretended to be children of thzt
glorious luminary, and to deliver their instructions in his name, and by authornty from him. The multitude listened and believed. What reformation in policy and manners the Peruvians ascribe to those founders of their
empire, and how, from the precepts of the Inca and his consort, their ancestors gradually acquired some knowledge of those arts, and some relish
for that industry, which render subsistence secure and life comfortable,
hath been formerly related. Those blessings were originally confined
within narrow precincts; but in process of time, the successors of Manco
Capac extended their dominion over all the regions that stretch to the
west of the Andes from Chili to Quito, establishing in every province their
peculiar policy and religious institutions.
The most singular and striking circumstance in the Peruvian government is the influence of religion upon its genius and laws. Religious ideas
make such a feeble impression on the mind of a savage, that their effect
upon his sentiments and manners is hardly perceptible. Among the
Mexicans, religion, reduced into a regular system, and holding a considerable place in their public institutions, operated with conspicuous efficacy
in forming the peculiar character of that people. But in Peru, the whole
system of policy was founded on religion. The Inca appeared not only
as a legislator, but as the messenger of Heaven. His precepts were re,
ceived not merely as the injunctions of a superior, but as the mandates of
the Deity. His race was to be held sacred; and in order to preserve it
distinct, without being polluted by any mixture of less noble blood, the
sons of Manco Capac married their own sisters, and no person was ever
admitted to the throne who could not claim it by such a pure descent.
To those Children of the Sun, for that was the appellation bestowed upon
all the offspring of the first Inca, the people looked up with the reverence
due to beings of a superior order. They were deemed to be under the
immediate protection of the deity from whom they issued, and by him
every order of the reigning Inca was supposed to be dictated.
From those ideas two consequences resulted. The authority of the
Inca was unlimited and absolute in the most extensive meaning of the
words. Whenever the decrees of a prince are considered as the commands of the Divinity, it is not only an act of rebellion, but of impiety, to
dispute or oppose his will. Obedience becomes a duty of religion; and as
it would be profane to control a monarch who is believed to be under the
guidance of Heaven, and presumptuous to advise him, nothing remains but
to submit with implicit respect. This must necessarily be the effect of
every government established on pretensions of intercourse with superior
powers. Such accordingly was the blind submission which the Peruvians
yielded to their sovereigns. The persons of highest rank and greatest
power in their dominions acknowledged them to be of a more exalted
nature; and in testimony of this, when admitted into their presence, they
entered with a burden upon their shoulders, as an emblem of their servitude, and willingness to bear whatever the Inca was pleased to impose.
Among their subjects, force was not requisite to second their commands.
Every officer intrusted with the execution of them was revered, and,
according to the account* of an intelligent observer of Peruvian manners,
be might proceed alone from one extremity of the empire t-o another without meeting opposition; for, on producing a fringe from the royal borla, an
ornament of the head peculiar to the reigning Inca, the lives and fortunes
of the people were at his disposal.
* Zarate, lib. i. c. 13.




332                     H 1 S T OR Y  OF              [Boox VII.
Another consequence of establishing government in Peru on the founda.
tion of reii,'iOn was, that all crimes were punished capitally. They were
rot considered as transgressions of human laws, but as insults offered to
the Deity. Each, without any distinction between such as were slight and
such as were atrocious, called for vengeance, and could be expiated only
by the blood of the offender. Consonantly to the same ideas, punishment
ifollowed the trespass with inevitable certainty, because an offence against
Heaven was deemed such a high enormity as could not be pardoned.z
Among a people of corrupted morals, maxims of jurisprudence so severe
and unrelenting, ly rendering men ferocious and desperate, would be
more apt to multiply crimes than to restrain them. But the Peruvians, of
simple manners and unsuspicious faith, were held in such awe by this rigid
discipline, that the number of offenders was extremely small  Veneration
for monarchs enlightened and directed, as they believed, by the divinity
whom they adored, prompted them to their duty; the dread of punishment, which they were taught to consider as unavoidable vengeance
inflicted by offended Heaven, withheld them from evil.
The system of superstition, on which the Incas ingrafted their pretensions to such high authority, was of a genius very different from that
established among the Mexicans. Manco Capac turned the veneration of
his followers entirely towards natural objects. The Sun, as the great
source of light, of joy, and fertility in the creation, attracted their plrincipal
homage. 1The Moon and Stars, as co-operating with him, were entitled
to secondary honours. Wherever the propensity in the human mind to
acknowledge and to adore some superior power takes this direction, and
is employed in contemplating the order and beneficence that really exists
in nature, the spirit of superstition is mild. Wherever imaginary beings,
created by the fancy and the fears of men, are supposed to preside in
nature, and become the objects of worship, superstition always assumes a
more severe and atrocious form. Of the latter we have an example among
the Mexicans, of the former among the people of Peru. The Peruvians
had not, indeed, made such progress in observation or inquiry, as to have
attained just conceptions of the Deity; nor was there in their language any
proper name or appellation of the Supreme Power, which intimated that
they had formed any idea of him as the Creator and Governor of the
world.t
But by directing their veneration to that glorious luminary, which, b
its universal and vivifying energy, is the best emblem of Divine benefcence, the rites and observances which they deemed acceptable to him
were innocent and humane. They offered to the Sun a part of those productions which his genial warmth had called forth from the bosom of the
earth, and reared to maturity. They sacrificed, as an oblation of gratitude, some of the animals which were indebted to his influence for nourishment. They presented to him choice specimens of those works of ingenuity which his light had guided the hand of man in forming. But the Incas
never stained his altars with human blood, nor could they conceive that
their beneficent father, the Sun, would be delighted with such horrid victims [157]. Trhus the Peruvians, unacquainted with those barbarous rites
which extinguish sensibility, and suppress the feelings of nature at the sight
of human sufferings, were formed by the spirit of the superstition which
they had adopted, to a national character more gentle than that of any
people in America.
The influence of this superstition -operated in the sa;ne manner upon
their civil institutions, and tended to correct in themn whatever was adverse
to gentleness of character. Thedorminion of the Incas, though the most absolute of all despotisms, was mitigated by its alliance with religion. The
* Vega, lib. ii. c. 6.  t Acosta, lib, v. c. 3.




AMERICA.                             333
mind was not humbled and depressed -by the idea of a forced subjection to
the will of a superior; obedience, paid to one who was believed to be clothed
with Divine authority, was willingly yielded, and implied no degradation.
The sovereign, conscious that the submissive reverence of his people'
flowed from their belief of his heavenly descent, was continually reminded
of a distinction which prompted him to imitate that beneficent power
which he was supposed to represent. In consequence of those impressions,
there hardly occurs in the traditional history of Peru, any instance of rebellion against the reigning prince, and among twelve successive monarchs
there was not one tyrant.
Even the wars in which the Incas engaged were carried on with a -spirit
very different from that of other American nations. They fought not, like
savages, to destroy and to exterminate; or, like the Mexicans, to glut bloodthirsty divinities with human sacrifices. They conquered, in order to reclaim
and civilize the vanquished, and to diffuse the knowledge of their own
institutions and arts. Prisoners seem not to have been exposed to the insults
and tortures which were their lot in every other part of the New World.
The Incas took the people whom they subdued under their protection, and
admitted them to a participation of all the advantages enjoyed by their
original subjects. This practice, so repugnant to American ferocity, and
resembling the humanity of the most polished nations, must be ascribed,
like other peculiarities which we have observed in the Peruvian manners,
to the genius of their religion. The Incas, considering the homage paid to
any other object than to the heavenly powers which they adored as impious, were fond of gaining proselytes to their favourite system. The idols
of every conquered province were carried in triumph to the great temple
at Cuzco,* and placed there as trophies of the superior power of the
divinity who was the protector of their empire. The people were treated
with lenity, and instructed in the religious tenets of their new masters,t
that the conqueror might have the glory of having added to the number of
the votaries of his father the Sun.
The state of property in Peru was no less singular than that of religion,
and contributed, likewise, towards giving a mild turn of character to the
people. All the lands capable of cultivation were divided into three shares.
One was consecrated to the Sun, and the product of it was applied to the
erection of temples, and furnishing what was requisite towards celebrating
the public rites of religion. The second belonged to the Inca, and was
set apart as the provision made by the community for the support of
government. The third and largest share was reserved for the maintenance
of the people, among whom it was parcelled out. Neither individuals,
however, nor communities had a right of exclusive property in the portion
set apart for their use. They possessed it only for a year, at the expiration
of which a new division was made in proportion to the rank, the number,
and exigencies of each family. All those lands were cultivated by the
joint industry of the community. The people summoned by a proper
officer, repaired in a body to the fields, and performed their common task.
while songs and musical instruments cheered them to their labour.$T By
this singular distribution of territory, as well as by the mode of cultivating
it, the idea of a common interest, and of mutual subserviency, was cor.tinually inculcated. Each individual felt his connexion with those around him,
and knew that he depended on their friendly aid for what increase he was
to reap. A state thus constituted may be considered as one great family,
in which the union of the members was so complete, and the exchange of
good offices so perceptible, as to create stronger attachment, and to bind
man to man in closer intercourse than subsisted under any form of society
* Herrera, dec. 5. lib. iv. c. 4.  Vega, lib. v. c. 12. 1   Herrera, dec. 5. lib. iv. c.  +.    + lb. c. 2.
Vega, lib. v. c. 5.




334                      HISTORY OF                       [BOOK VII.
established in America. From  this resulted gentle manners and mild
virtues unknown in the savage state, and with which the Mexicans Were
-little acquainted.
But, though the institutions of the Incas were so framed as to strengthen
the bonds of affection among their subjects, there was great inequality in
their condition. The distinction of ranks was fully established in Peru.
A great body of the inhabitants, under the denomination of Yanaconas,
were held in a state of servitude.  Their garb and houses were of a form
different from those of freemen. Like the Tamenes of Mexico, they were
employed in carrying burdens, and in performing every other work of'
drudgery.? Next to them, in rank, were such of the people as were free,
but distinguished by no official or hereditary honours. Above them were
raised those whom the Spaniards call Orejones, from the ornaments worn in
their ears. They formed what may be denominated the order of nobles,
and in peace as well as war held every office of power or trust.t  And
the head of all were the children of the Sun, who, by their high descent
and peculiar privileges, were as much exalted above the Orejones, as these
were elevated above the people.
Such a form of society, from the union of its members, as well as from
the distinction in their ranks, was favourable to progress in the arts. But
the Spaniards, having been acquainted with the improved state of various
arts in Mexico several years before they discovered Peru, were not so
much struck with what they observed in the latter country, and describe
the appearances of ingenuity there with less warmth of admiration. The
Peruvians, nevertheless, had advanced far beyond the Mexicans, both in
thei necessary arts of life, and in such as have some title to the namne of
elegant.
In Peru, agriculture, the art of primary necessity in social life, was more
extensive, and carried on with greater skill than in any part of America.
The Spaniards, in their progress through the country, were so fully supplied with provisions of every kind, that in the relation of their adventures
we meet with few of those dismal scenes of distress occasioned by famine,
in which the conquerors of Mexico were so often involved.  The quantity
of soil under cultivation was not left to the discretion of individuals, but
regulated by public authority in proportion to the exigencies of the cornmunity. Even the calamity of an unfruitful season was but little felt; for
the product of the lands consecrated to the Sun, as well as those set apart
for the Incas, being deposited in the Tamrbos, or public storehouses, it
remained there as a-stated provision for times of scarcity.+  As the extent
of cultivation was determined with such provident attention to the demands
of the state, the invention and industry of the Peruvians were called forth
to extraordinary exertions, by certain defects peculiar to their climate and
soil. All the vast rivers that flow from the Andes take their course eastwardto the Atlantic Ocean.  Peru is watered only by some streams which
rush down from the mountains like torrents.  A great part of the low
country is sandy and barren, and never refreshed with rain. In order to
render such an unpromising region fertile, the ingenuity of the Peruvians
had recourse to various expedients. By means of artificial canals, conducted
with much patience and considerable art from the torrents that poured across
theircountry, they conveyed a regularsupply of moisture to their fields~ [1583.
They enriched the soil by manuring it with the dung of sea fowls, of which
they found an inexhaustible store on all the islands scattered along the
coasts.ll  In describing the customs of any nation thoroughly civilized, such
practices would hardly draw attention, or be mentioned as in any degree
* LIerrera, dec. 5. lib. iii. c. 4. lib. x. c. 8.  t Ib.lih. iv. c, 1.  t Zarate, lib. i. c. 14.  Vega,
lib i. c. 8. 8   Zarate, lib. i. c. 4  Vega, lib. v. c. I & 24   1] Acosta, lib, iv. c. 37. Vega,
lb. v. c. 3




AMERICA.                             335
remarkable; but in the history of the improvident race of men in the New
World, they are entitled to notice as singular proofs of industry and of art.
The use of the plough, indeed, was unknown to the Peruvians. They turned
up the earth with a kind of mattock of hard wood.Y  Nor was this laboue
deemed so degrading as to be devolved wholly upon the women. Bott
sexes joined in performing this necessary work. Even the children of the
Sun set an example of industry, by cultivating a field near Cuzco with their
own hands, and they dignified this function by denominating it their triumph
over the earth.t
The superior ingenuity of the Peruvians is obvious, likewise, in the construction of their houses and public buildings. In the extensive plains which
stretch along the Pacific Ocean, where the sky is perpetually serene, and the
climate mild, their houses were very properly of a fabric extremely slight.
But in the higher regions, where rain falls, where the vicissitude of seasons
is known, and their rigour felthouses were constructed with greater solidity.
They were generally of a square form, the walls about eight feet high, built
with bricks hardened in the sun, without any windows, and the door low
and straight. Simple as these structures were, and rude as the materials
may seem to be of which they were formed, they were so durable that many
of them still subsist in different parts of Peru, long after every monument
that might have conveyed to us any idea of the domestic state of the other
American nations has vanished from the face of the earth. But it was in the
temples consecrated to the Sun, and in the buildings destined for the residence
of their monarchs, that the Peruvians displayed the utmost extent of their
art and contrivance. The descriptions of them by such of the Spanish
writers as had an opportunity of contemplating them, while in some measure
entire, might have appeared highly exaggerated, if the ruins which still
remain did not vouch the truth of their relations. These ruins of sacred or
royal buildings are found in every province of the empire, and by their irequency demonstrate that they are monuments of a powerful people, who
must have subsisted, during a period of some extent, in a state of no inconsiderable improvement. They appear to have been edifices various in their
dimensions: some of a moderate size, many of immense extent, all remarkable for solidity, and resembling each other in the style of architecture. The
temple of Pachacamac, together with a palace of the Inca, and a fortress,
were so connected together as to form one great structure above half a
league in circuit. In this prodigious pile, the same singular taste in building
is conspicuous as in other works of the Peruvians. As they were unacquainted with the use of the pulley, and other mechanical powers, and
could not elevate the large stones and bricks which they employed in building to any considerable height, the walls of this edifice, in which they seem
to have made their greatest effort towards magnificence, did not rise above
twelve feet from the ground. Though they had not discovered the use of
mortar or of any other cement in building, the bricks or stones were joined
with so much nicety, that the seams can hardly be discerned [159]. The
apartments, as far as the distribution of them can be traced In the ruins,
were ill disposed, and afforded little accommodation. There was not a
single window in any part of the building; and as no light could enter but
by the door, all the apartments of largest dimensions must either have been
perfectly dark, or illuminated by some other means. But with all these,
and many other imperfections that might be mentioned in their art of building, the works of the Peruvians which still remain must be considered as
stupendous efforts of a people unacquainted with the use of iron, and convey
to us a high idea of the power possessed by their ancient monarchs
These, however, were not the noblest or most useful works of the Incas
The two great roads from Cuzco to Quito, extending in an uninterrupted
* Zarate, lib. i. c. 8     t Vega, lib. v. c. 2.




336                    H I S TORY  OF                    ooK VIi.
stretch above fifteen hundred miles, are entitled to still higher praise. The
one was conducted through the interior and mountainous country, the other
through the plains on the sea coast. From the language of admiration in
which some of the early writers express their astonishment when they first
viewed those roads, and from the more pompous description of later writers,
who labour to support some favourite theory concerning America, one;
might be led to compare this work of the Incas to the famous military,
ways which remain as monuments of the Roman power; but in a country
where there was no tame animal except the llama, which was never used
for draught, and but little as a beast of burden, where the high roads were
seldom trod by any but a human foot, no great degree of labour or art was
requisite in fornming them. The Peruvian roads were only fifteen feet in
breadth,? and in many places so slightly formed, that time has effaced every
vestige of, the course in which they ran. In the low country, little more
seems to have been done than to plant trees or to fix posts at certain intervals, in order to mark the proper route to travellers. To open a path
through the mountainous country was a more arduous task. Eminences
were levelled, and hollows filled up, and for the preservation of the road
it was fenced with a bank of turf. At proper distances, Tambos, or storehouses, were erected for the accommodation of the Inca and his attendants,
in their progress through his dominions. From the manner in which the
road was originally formed in this higher and more impervious region, it
has proved more durable; and though, from the inattention of the Spaniards
to every object but that of working their mines, nothing has been done
towards keeping it in repair, its course may still be traced.t Such was
the celebrated road of the Incas; and even from this description, divested
of every circumstance of manifest exaggeration or of suspicious aspect,:it
must be considered as a striking proof of an extraordinary progress in im
provement and policy. To the savage tribes of America, the idea of
facilitating communication with places at a distance had never occurred.
To the Mexicans it was hardly known. Even in the most civilized countries in Europe, men had advanced far in refinement, before it became a
regular object of national police to form such roads as render intercourse
commodious. It was a capital object of Roman policy to open a communication with all the provinces of their extensive empire by means of those
roads which are justly considered as one of the noblest monuments both of
their wisdom and their power. But during the long reign of barbarism,
the Roman roads were neglected or destroyed; and at the time when the
Spaniards entered Peru, no kingdom in Europe could boast of any work
of public utility that could be compared with the great roads formed by
the Incas.
The formation of those roads introduced another improvement in Peru
equally unknown over all the rest of America, In its course from south
to north, the road of the Incas was intersected by all the torrents which
roll from the Andes towards the Western Ocean. From the rapidity of
their course, as well as from the frequency and violence of their inundation, these were not fordable. Some expedient, however, was to be found
for passing them. The Peruvians from their unacquaintance with the use
of arches, and their inability to work in wood, couid not construct bridges
either of stone or timber. But necessity, the parent of invention, suggested
a device which supplied that defect.  They formed cables or great
strength, by twisting together some of the pliable withs, or! osiers, with
which their country abounds; six of these cables they stretched across the
stream parallel to one another, and made them fast on each side. These
they bound firmly together by interweaving smaller ropes so close as to
* Cieca, c. 60.,  t Xerez, p. 189. 191. Zarate, lib. i. c, 13, 14. Vega, lib. i. e. 13. Bourgue
Voyage, p. 105. Ulloa Entretenemrientos, p. 36,5,




A AMERICA.                             337
form a compact piece of net-work, which being covered with branches of
trees and earth, they passed along it with tolerable security [160]. Proper
persons were appointed to attend at each bridge, to keep it in repair, and
to assist passengers.* In the level country, where the rivers became deep
and broad and still, thev are passed in balzas, or floats; in the construction,
as well as navigation of which the ingenuity of the Peruvians appears to
be far superior to that of any people in America. These had advanced
no further in naval skill than the use of the paddle or oar; the Peruvians
ventured to raise a mast, and spread a sail, by means of which their balzas not only went nimbly before the wind, but could veer and tack with
great celerity.
Nor were the ingenuity and art of the Peruvians confined solely to objects of essential utility. They had made some progress in arts, which
may be called elegant.  They possessed the precious metals in greater
abundance than any people of America. They obtained kold in the same
manner with the Mexicans, by searching in the channels of rivers, or washing the earth in which particles of it were contained. But in order to
procure silver, they exerted no inconsiderable degree of skill and invention. They had not, indeed, attained the art of sinking a shaft into the
bowels of the earth, and penetrating to the riches concealed there; but
they hollowed deep caverns on the banks of rivers and the sides of mountains, and emptied such veins as did not dip suddenly beyond their reach.
In other places, where the vein lay near the surface, they dug pits to such
a depth, that the person who worked below could throw out the ore, or
hand it up in baskets..  They had discovered the art of smelting, and
refining this, either by the simple application of fire, or, where the ore was
more stubborn or impregnated with foreign substances, by placing it in
small ovens or furnaces, on high grounds, so artificially constructed that the
draught of air performed the function of a bellows, an engine with which
they were totally unacquainted.; By this simple device, the purer ores
were smelted with facility, and the quantity of silver in Peru was so considerable, that many of the utensils employed in the functions of common
life were made of it.6 Several of those vessels and trinkets are said to
have merited no smallf degree of estimation, on account of the neatness of
the workmanship, as well as the intrinsic value of the materials. But as
the conquerors of America were well acquainted with the latter, but had
scarcely any conception of the former, most of the silver vessels and trinkets were melted down, and rated according to the weight and fineness of
the metal in the division of the spoil.
In other works of mere curiosity or ornament, their ingenuity has been
highly celebrated. Many specimens of those have been du- out of the
Gucacas, or mounds of earth, with which the Peruvians covered the bodies
of the dead. Among these are mirrors of various dimensions, of hard
shining stones highly polished; vessels of earthen ware of different forms;
hatchets, and other instruments, some destined for war, and others for
labour. Some were of flint, some of copper, hardened to such a degree
by an unknown process, as to supply the place of iron on several occasions.
Had the use of those tools, formed of copper, been general, the progress
of the Peruvians in the arts might have been such as to emulate that of
more cultivated nations. But either the metal was so rare, or the opera
tion by which it was hardened so tedious, that their instruments of copper
were few, and so extremely small, that they seem to have been employed
only in slighter works. But even to such a circumscribed use of this im.
perfect metal, the Peruvians were indebted for their superiority to the
Sancho ap. Ram. iii. 376. B. Zarate, lib. i. c. 14, Vega, lib. iil. c. 7. 8. Herrera, dec. 5. lib
iv. c. 3, 4.   t UJlloa Voy. i. 167, &c.   + Ramusio, iii. 414. A.   O Acosta, lib. iv. c. 4, 5.
Vega, p. 1. lib. viii. c 25. Ulloa Entreten. 258.
VOL. I.-43




398                      HISTORY OF                       [BooKi Vl
other people of America in various arts.* The same observation, how
ever, may be applied to them, which I formerly made with respect to the
arts of the Mexicans.  From several specimens of Peruvian utensils and
ornaments, which are deposited in the royal cabinet of Madrid, and from
some preserved in different collections in other parts of Europe, I have
reason to believe that the workmanship is more to be admired on account
of the rude tools with which it was executed, than on account of its intrinsic neatness and elegance; and that the Peruvians, though the most
Improved of all the Americans, were not advanced beyond:the infancy of
arts.
But notwithstanding so many particulars, which seemed to indicate a
high degree of improvement in Peru, other circumstances occur that sugg.st the idea of a society still in:the first stages of its transition from barbanismf to civilization.  In all the dominions of the Incas, Cuzco was the
only place that had the appearance, or was entitled to the name, of a
city. Every where else the people lived mostly in detached habitations,
dispersed over the country, or, at the utmost, settled together in small villages.t But until men are brought to assemble in numerous bodies, and
incorporated in such close union as to enjoy frequent intercourse, and to
feel mutual dependence, they never imbibe perfectly the spirit, or assume
the manners of social life.  In a country of immense extent, with only one
city, the progress of manners, and the improvement either of the necessary or more refined arts, must have been so slow, and carried on under
such disadvantages, that it is more surprising the Peruvians should have
advanced so far in refinement, than that they did not proceed further.
In consequence of this state of imperfect union, the separation of professions in Peru was not so complete as among the Mexicans. The less
closely men associate, the more simple are their manners, and the fewer
their wants.  The crafts of common and most necessary use in life do not,
in such a state, become so complex or difficult as to render it requisite that
men should be trained to them by any particular course of education. All
the arts, accordingly, which were of daily and indispensable utility, were
exercised by every Peruvian indiscriminately.  None but the artists employed in works of mere curiosity, or ornament, constituted a separate
order of men, or were distinguished from other citizens.t
From the want of cities in Peru, another consequence followed. There
was little commercial intercourse among the inhabitants of that great empire.  The activity of commerce is coeval with the foundation of cities;
and from  the moment that the members of any community settle in considerable numbers in one place, its operations become vigorous.. The citizen must depend for subsistence on the labour of those who cultivate the
ground.  They, in return, must receive some equivalent.  Thus mutual
intercourse is established, and the productions of art are regularly exchanged for the fruits of agriculture.  In the towns of the Mexican empire,
stated markets- were held, and whatever could supply any want or desire
of man was an object of commerce.  But in Peru, from the singular mode
of dividing property, and the manner in which the people were settled,
there was hardly any species of commerce carried on between different
provinces,~ and the community was less acquainted with that active intercourse, which is at once a bond of union and an incentive to improvement.
But the unwarlike spirit of the Peruvians was the most remarkable as
well as the most fatal defect in their character.1 The greater part of the
rude nations of America opposed their invaders with undaunted ferocitv,
though with little conduct or success. The Mexicans maintained the
struggle in defence of their liberties, with such persevering fortitude, that
* Ulloa, Voy. tom. i. 381, &c. Id. Entreten. p. 369, &c.  t Zarate, lib. i. c. 9. Herrera, dec. 5.
lib. vi. c, 4.: Acosta, lib. vi. c. 15. Vega, lib. v. c. 9. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. iv. c. 4.  Q Vega
lib. vi. c. 8. 8.     Xerez, 190. Sancho, ap. Ram. iii. 372. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. i. c. 3.




AMERICA                               339
tt was with difficulty the Spaniards triumphed over them. Peru was
subdued at once, and almost without resistance; and the most favourable
opportunities of regaining their freedom, and of crushing their oppressors,
were lost through the timidity of. the people. Though the traditional
history of the Peruvians represents all the Incas as warlike princes, frequently at the head of armies, which they led to victory and conquest,
few symptoms of such a martial spirit appear in any of their operations
subsequent to the invasion of the Spaniards. rThe influence, perhaps, of
those institutions which rendered their manners gentle, gave their minds
this unmanly softness; perhaps the constant serenity and' mildness of the
climate may have enervated the vigour of their frame; perhaps some
principles in their government, unknown to us, was the occasion of this
political debility. Whatever may have been the cause, the fact is certain;
and there is not an instance in history of any people so little advanced in
refinement, so totally destitute of military enterprise. This character had
descended to their posterity. The Indians of Peru are now more tame
and depressed than any people of America. Their feeble spirits, relaxed
in lifeless inaction, seem hardly capable of any bold or manly exertion.
But, besides those capital defects in the political state of Peru, some
detached circumstances and facts occur in the Spanish writers, which discover a considerable remainder of barbarity in their manners. A cruel
custom, that prevailed in some of the most savage tribes, subsisted among
the Peruvians. On the death of the Incas, and of other eminent persons,
a considerable number of their attendants were put to death, and interred
around their Guacas, that they might appear in the next world with their
former dignity, and be served with the same respect. On the death of
Huana-Capac, the most powerful of their monarchs, above a thousand
vcitims were doomed to accompany himl to the tomnb.*  In one particular
their manners appear to have been more barbarous than those of most rude
tribes. Though acquainted with the use of fire in preparing maize and other
vegetables for food, they devoured both flesh and fish perfectly raw, and
astonished the Spaniards with a practice repugnant to the ideas of all
civilized people.'
But though Mexico and Peru are the possessions of Spain in the New
World, which, on account both of their ancient and present state, have
attracted the greatest attention; her other dominions there are far from
being inconsiderable either in extent or value. The greater part of them
was reduced to subjection during the first part of the sixteenth century,
by private adventurers, who fitted out their small armaments either in
Hispaniola or in Old Spain: and were we to follow each leader in his
progress, we should discover the same daring courage, the sinme persevering ardour, the same rapacious desire for wealth, and the same capacity
for enduring and surmounting every thing in order to attain it, which dis
tinguished the operations of the Spaniards in their greater American con
quests. But, instead of entering into a detail, which, from their similarity
of the transactions, would appear almost a repetition of what has been
already related, I shall satisfy myself with such a view of those provinces of the Spanish empire in America, which have not hitherto been
mentioned, as may convey to my readers an adequate idea of its greatness,
fertility, and opulence.
I begin with the countries contiguous to the two great monarchies o.
whose history and institutions I have given some account, and shall then
briefly describe the other d-stricts of Spanish America. The jurisdiction
of the viceroy of New Spain extends over several provinces which were
not subject to the dominion of the Mexicans.  The countries of Cinaloa
and Sonora that stretch along the east side of the Vermilion Sea, or Gull
* Acosta, lib. v. c. 7.  t Xerez, p. 190. Sancho, Ranm. iii. 372. C  hcrrera, dec. 5.,ib i.c. 3.




340                     HIST ORY  OF                    [Boox VII.
of California, as well as the immense kingdoms of New Navarre, and
New Mexico, which bend towards the west and north, did not acknowledge
the sovereignty of Montezuma, or his predecessors. These regions, not
inferior in magnitude to all the Mexican empire, are reduced some to a
greater, others to a less degree of subjection to the Spanish yoke. They
extend through the most delightful part of the temperate zone; their soil
is, in general, remarkably fertile; and all their productions, whether animal
or vegetable, are most perfect in their kind. They have all a conrmmunication
either with the Pacific Ocean, or with the Gulf of Mexico, and are watered
by, rivers which not only enrich therl, but may become subservient to
commerce. The number of Spaniards settled in those vast countries is
indeed extremely smnall. They may be said to have subdued rather than
to have occupied them. But if the population in their ancient establishments in America shall continue to increase, they may gradually spread
over those provinces, of which, however inviting, they have not hitherto
been ab'e to takle full possession.
One circumstance may contribute to the speedy population of some
districts. Very rich mines both of gold and silver have been discovered
in many of the regions which I have-mentioned.  Wherever these are
opened, and worked with success, a multitude of people resort. In order
to supply them with the necessaries of life, cultivation miust be increased,
artisans of various kinds must assemble, and industry as well as wealth
will be gradually diffused.  Many examples of this have occurred in
different parts of America, since they fell under the dominion of the
Spaniards.  Populous villages and large towns have suddenly arisen
amidst uninhabitable wilds and mountains; and the working of mines,
though far from being the most proper object towards which the attention
of an infant society should be turned, may become the means both of promoting useful activity, and of augmenting the number of people.  A recent
and. singular instance of this has happened, which, as it is but little known
in Europe, and may be productive of great effects, merits attention.  The
Spaniards settled in the provinces of Cinaloa and Sonora had been long
disturbed by the depredations of some fierce tribes of Indians.  In the
year 1X765, the incursions of those savages became so frequent and so de
structive, that the Spanish inhabitants, in despair, applied to the Marquis
de Croix, viceroy of Mexico, for such a body of troops as might enable
them to drive those formidable invaders from their places of retreat in the
mountains. ~ But the treasury of Mexico was so much exhausted by tie
large sums drawn froln it, in order to support the late war against Greal
Britain, that the viceroy could afford them no aid.  The respect due to
his virtues accomplished what his official power could not effect. He
prevailed with the merchants of New Spain to advance about two hundlred
thousand'pesos for defraying the expenses of the expedition. The war
was conducted by an officer of abilities; and after being protracted for
three years, chiefly by the difficulty of pursuing the fugitives over mountains, and through defiles which were almost impassable, it terminated, in
the year 1771, in the final submission of the tribes which had been so long
the object of terror to the two provinces, In the course of this service,
the Spaniards marched through countries into which they seem not to have
penetrated before that time, and discovered mines of such value as was
astonishinZ even to men acquainted with the riches contained in the mountains of the New World.  At Cinleguilla, in the province of Sonora, they
entered a plain of fourteen leagues in extent, in which, at the depth of
only sixteen inches, they found gold in grains of such a size, that some of
them  weighed nine marks, and, in such quantities, that in a short tinihe
with a few labourers, they collected a thotsand marks of gold in grains,
even without taking time to wash the ear0th that had been dug:, which
appeared to be so rich, that persons of skill computed that it might yield




AMERICA.                              241
what would be equal in value to a million of pesos. Before the end of
the year 1771, above two'thousand persons were settled in Cineguilla,
under the government of proper magistrates, and the inspection of several
ecclesiastics. As several other mines, not inferior in richness to that of
Cineguiila, have been discovered; both in Sonora and Cinaloa [161], it is
probable that these neglected and thinly inhabited provinces may soon
become as populous and valuable as any part of the Spanish'empire of
America.
The peninsula of California, on the other side of the Vermilion Sea,
seems to have been less known to the ancient Mexicans than the provinces
which I have mentioned. It was discovered by Cortes in the year* 1536.
During a long period it continued to be so little frequented, that even its
form was unknown, and in most charts it was represented as an island, not
as a peninsula [162J. Though the climate of this country, ift' we may
judge from its situation, must be very desirable, the Spaniards have made
small progress in peopling it. Towards the close of the last century, the
Jesuits, who had great merit in exploring this neglected province, and in
civilizing its rude inhabitants, imperceptibly acquired a dominion over it
as complete as that which they possessed in their missions in Paraguay,
and they laboured to introduce into it the same policy, and to govern the
natives by the same maxims. In order to prevent the court of Spain from
conceiving anyjealousy of their designs and operations, they seem  studiously to have depreciated the country, by representing the climate as so
disagreeable and unwholesome, and the soil as so barren, that nothing but
a zealous desire of converting the natives could have induced them to settle
there.t Several public spirited citizens endeavoured to undeceive their
sovereigns. and to give them a better view of California; but in vain. At
length, on the expulsion of the Jesuits from the Spanish dominions, the court
of Madrid, as prone at that juncture to suspect the purity of the Order's
intentions, as formerly to confide in them  with implicit trust, appointed
Don Joseph Galvez, whose abilities have since raised him to the high rank
of minister for the Indies, to visit that peninsula. His account of the
country was favourable; he found the pearl fishery on its coast to be
valuable, and he discovered mines of gold of a very promising appearance.t
From  its vicinity to Cinaloa and Sonora, it is probable that, if the
population of these provinces shall increase in the manner which I have
supposed, California may, by degrees, receive from them such a recruit ot
inhabitants, as to be no longer reckoned among the desolate and useless
districts of the Spanish empire.
On the east of Mexico, Yucatan and Honduras are comprehended in the
government of New Spain, though anciently they can hardly be said to
have formed a part of the Mexican empire.  These large provinces,
stretching from the bay of Campeachy beyond Cape Gracias a Dios, do not,
like the other territories of Spain in the New World, derive their value
either from the fertility of their' soil, or the richness of their mines; but
they produce in greater abundance than any part of America, the logwood
tree, which, in dying some colours, is so far preferable to any other
material, that the consumption of it in Europe is considerable, and it has
become an article in commerce of great value. During a long period, no
European nation intruded upon Whe Spaniards in those provinces, or
attempted to obtain any share in this branch of trade. But after the con..
quest of Jamaica by the English, it soon appeared that a formidable rival
was now  seated in the neighbourhood of the Spanish territories. One of
the first objects which tempted the English settled in that island, was the
great profit ar'sing from the logwood trade, and the facility of wresting
some portion of it from the Spaniards. Some adventurers from Jamaica
* Book v    t Vcneras, Hist. of California, i. ~6.   + Lorenzano, 3149, 350.




342                     HISTORY  01  SIooIC VII
made the first attempt at Cape Catoche, the south-east pronontory of
V ucdtan, and by cutting logwood there carried on a gainful traffic. When
most of the trees near the coast in that place were felled, they removed to
the island of Trist. in the bay of Campeachy, and in later times their principal station has been in the bay of Honduras. The Spaniards, alarmed
at this encroachment, endeavoured by negotiation, remonstrances, and open
force, to prevent the English from obtaining any footing on that part of the
American continent. But after struggling against it for more than a
century, the disasters of the last war extorted prom the court of Madrid a
reluctant consent to tolerate this settlement-of foreigners in the heart of its
territories.' The pain which this humbling concession occasioned seems
to have prompted the Spaniards to devise a method of rendering it of little
consequence, more effectual than all the efforts of negotiation or violence.
The logwood produced on the west coast of Yucatan, where the soil is drier,
is in quality far superior to that which grows on the marshy grounds where
the English are settled. By encouraging the cutting of this, and permitting the importation of it into Spain without paying any duty,t such vigour
has been given to this branch of commerce, and the logwood which the
English bring to market has sunk so much in value, that their trade to the
bay of Honduras has gradually declined [1631 since it obtained a legal
sanction; and, it is probable, will soon be finally abandoned.  In that
event, Yucatan and Honduras will become possessions of considerable
importance to Spain.
Still further east than Honduras lie the two provinces of Costa Rica and
Veragua, which likewise belong to the viceroyalty of New Spain; but
both have been so much neglected by the Spaniards, and are apparently
of such small value, that they merit no particular attention.
The most important province depending on the viceroyalty of Peru is
Chili. The Incas had established their dominion in some of ils northern
districts; but in the greater part of the country, its gallant and high spirited
inhabitants maintained their independence. The Spaniards, allured by
the fame of its opulence, early attempted the conquest of it under Diego
Almagro; and after his death Pedro de Valdivia resumed the design.
Both met with fierce opposition. The former relinquished the enterprise
in the manner which I have mentioned.4 The latter, after having given
many displays both of courage and military skill, was cut off, together
with a considerable body of troops under his command. Francisco de
Villagra, Valdivia's lieutenant, by his spirited conduct checked the natives
in their career, and saved the remainder of the Spaniards from destruction.
By degrees, all the champaign country along the coast was subjected to
the Spanish dominion. The mountainous country is still possessed by the
Puelches, Araucos, and other tribes of its original inhabitants, formidable
neighbouts to the Spaniards: with whom, during the course of two centuries, they have been obliged to maintain an almost perpetual hostility,
suspended only by a few intervals of insecure peace.
That part of Chili, then, which may properly be deemed a. Spanish
province, is a narrow district, extended along the coast from the desert of
Atacarnas to the island of Chiloe, above nine hundred miles. Its climate is
the most delicious in the New World, and is hardly equalled by that of
any region on the face of the earth. Though bordering on the Torrid Zone,
It never feels the extremity of heat, being screened on the east by the
Andes, and refreshed from  the west by cooling sea breezes.  The
temperature of the air is so mild and equable, that the Spaniards give it the
preference to that of the southern provinces in their native country. The
fertility of the soil corresponds with the benignity of the climate, and is
wonderfully accommodated to European productions. The most valuable
Treaty of Paris, Art. xviii.   t Real Cedula, Campomanes, iii. 145.   1 Book vI.




AMERICA.                            343
of these, corn, wine, and oil, abound in Chili as if they had been native to
the country. All the fruits imported firom Europe attained to full maturity
there. The animals of our hemisphere not only multiply, but in. prove in
this delightful region. The horned cattle are of larger size than those of
Spain. Its breed of horses surpasses, both in beauty and spirit. the famous
Andalusian race, from which they sprung. Nor has nature exhausted her
bounty on the surface of the earth; she has stored its bowels with riches.
Valuable mines of gold, of silver, of copper, and of lead, have been discovered in various parts of it.
A country distinguished by so many blessings, we may be apt to conclude, would early become a favourite station of the Spaniards, and must
have been cultivated with peculiar predilection and care. Instead of this,
a great part of it remains unoccupied. In all this extent of country,
there are not above eighty thousand white inhabitants, and about three
times that number of Negroes and people of a mixed race. The most fe1rtile soil in America lies uncultivated, and sorne of its most promising mines
remain unwrought. Strange as this neglect of the Spaniards to avail
themselves of advantages which seemed to court their acceptance may
appear, the causes of it can be traced. The only intercourse of Spain with
its colonies in the South Sea was carried on during two centuries by the
annual fleet to Porto Bello. All the produce of these colonies was shipped
in the ports of Callao or Arica in Peru, for Panama, and carried from
thence across the isthmus. All the commodities which they received from
the mother countries were conveyed fromn Panama to the same harbours.
Thus both the exports and imports of Chili passed through the halnds of
merchants settled in Peruz. These had of course a profit on each; and in
both transactions the Chilese felt their own subordination; and having no
direct intercourse with the parent state, they depended upon another province for the disposal of their productions, as well as for the supply of
their wants. Under such discouragements, population could not increase,
and industry was destitute of one chief incitement. But now that Spain,
from motives which I shall mention hereafter, has adopted a new system,
and carries on her commerce with the colonies in the South Sea by ships
which go round Cape Horn, a direct intercourse is opened between Chili
and the mother country. The gold, the silver, and the other commodities
of the province, will be exchanged in its wn harbours for the manufactures of Europe. Chili may speedily rise into that importance among the
Spanish settlements to which it is entitled by its natural advantages. It
may become the granary of Peru, and the other provinces along the Pacific
Ocean. It may supply them with wine, with cattle, with horses, with
hemp, and many other articles for which they now depend upon Europe.
Though the new system has been established only a few years, those
effects of it begin already to be observed."  If it shall be adhered to with
any steadiness for half a century, one may venture to foretell that populatioi
industry, and opulence will advance in this province with rapid progress
To the east of the Andes, the provinces of Tucuman and Rio de la Plata
border on Chili, and like it were dependent on the viceroyalty of Peru
These regions of immense extent stretch in length from north to south
above thirteen hundred miles, and in breadth more than a thousand. This
country, which is larger than most European kingdoms, naturally forms
itself into two great divisions, one on the north and the other on the south
of Rio de la Plata. The former comprehends Paraguay, the famous
missions of the Jesuits, and several other districts. But as disputes have
long subsisted between the courts of Spain and Portugal, concerning its
boundaries, which, it is probable, will be soon finally ascertained, either
amicably or by the decision of the sword, I choose to reserve my account
* Campomanes, ii. 157.




344                     HISTORY  OF                   [BoOK VII.
of this northern division, until I enter upon the history of Portuguese
America, with which it is intimately connected; and in relating it, I shall
be able, from authentic materials supplied both by Spain and Portugal, to
give a full and accurate description of the operations and views of the
Jesuits, in rearing that singular fabric of policy in America, which has
drawn so much attention, and has been so imperfectly understood. The
latter division of the province contains the governments of Tucuman and
Buenos Ay-res, and to these I shall at present confine my observations.
The Spaniards entered this part of America by the river De la Plata,
and though a succession of cruel disasters befell them in their early attempts
to establish their dominion in it, they were encouraged to persist in the
design, at first by the hopes of discovering mines in the interior country,
and afterwards by the necessity of occupying it, in order to prevent any
other nation from settling there, and penetrating by this route into their
rich possessions in Peru. But except at Buenos Ayres, they have made
no settlement of any consequence in all the vast space which I have
mentioned. There are indeed, scattered over it, a few places on which
they have bestowed the name of towns, and to which they have endeavoured
to add some dignity, by erecting them into bishoprics; but they are no
better than paltry villages, each with two or three hundred inhabitants
One circumstance, however, which was not originally foreseen, has
contributed to render this district, though thinly peopled, of considerable
importance. The province of Tucuman, together with the country to the
south of the Plata, instead of being covered with wood like other parts of
America, forms one extensive open plain, almost without a tree. The soil
is a deep fertile mould, watered by many streams descending from  the
Andes, and clothed in perpetual verdure.  In this rich pasturage, the
horses and cattle imported by the Spaniards from Europe have multiplied
to a degree which almost exceeds belief. This has enabled the inhabitants
not only to open a lucrative trade with Peru, by supplying it with cattle,
horses, and mules, but to carry on a commerce no less beneficial, by the
exportation of hides to Europe. From both, the colony has derived great
advantages. But its commodious situation for carrying on contraband trade
has been the chief source of its prosperity. While the court of Madrid
adhered to its ancient system, with respect to its communication with
America, the river De la Plata lay so much out of the course of Spanish
navigation, that interlopers, almost without any risk of being either observed
or obstructed, could pour in European manufactures in such quantities, that
they not only supplied the wants of the colony, but were conveyed into all
the eastern districts of Peru. When the Portuguese in Brazil extended
their settlements to the banks of Rio de la Plata, a new channel was
opened, by which prohibited commodities flowed into the Spanish territories
with still more facility, and in greater abundance.  This illegal traffic,
however detrimental to the parent state, contributed to the increase of the
settlement which had the immediate benefit of it, and Buenos Ayres became
gradually a populous and opulent town. What may be the effect of the
alteration lately made in the government of this colony, the nature of
which shall be described in the subsequent Book, cannot hitherto be known.
All the other territories of Spain in the New World, the islands excepted,
of whose discovery and reduction I have formerly given an account, are
comprehended under two great divisions; the former denominated the
kingdom of Tierra Firme, the provinces of which stretch along the Atlantic, from the eastern frontier of New Spain to the mouth of the Orinoco;
the latter, the New Kingdom of Granada, situated in the interiior country.
With a short view of these I shall close the, part of my work.
To the east of Veragua, the last province subject to the viceroy of
Mexico, lies the isthmus of Darien. Though it was in this part of the con
tinent that the Spaniards first began to plant colonies, they have made nc




AMERIC A.                           345
considerable progress in peopling it. As the country is extremely mountainous, deluged with rain during a good part of the year, remarkably unhealthful, and contains no mines of great value, the Spaniards would probably have abandoned it altogether, if they had not been allured to continue
by the excellence of the harbour of Porto Bello on the one sea, and that of
Panama on the other. These have been called the keys to the comInunication between the north and south sea, between Spain and her most valuable colonies. In consequence of this advantage, Panama has become a
considerable and- thriving town. The peculiar noxiousness of its climate
has prevented Porto Bello from increasing in the same proportion. As the
intercourse with the settlements in the Pacific Ocean is now carried on by
another channel, it is probable that both Porto Bello and Panama will decline, when no longer nourished and enriched by that commerce to which
they were indebted for their prosperity, and even their existence.
The provinces of Carthagena and Santa Martha stretch to the eastward
of the isthmus of Darien. The country still continues mountainous, but its
valleys begin to expand, are well watered, and extremely fertile. Pedro
de Heredia subjected this part of America to the crown of Spain about the
year 1532. It is thinly peopled, and of course ill cultivated. It produces,
however, a variety of valuable drugs, and some precious stones, particularly emeralds. But its chief importance is derived from the harbour of
Carthagena, the safest and best fortified of any in the American dominions
of Spain. In a situation so favourable, commerce soon began to flourish.
As early as the year 1544, it seems to have been a town of some note.
But when Carthagena was chosen as the port in which the galeons should
first begin to trade on their arrival from Europe, and to which they were
directed to return, in order to prepare for their voyage homeward, the commerce of its inhabitants were so much favoured by this arrangement, that
it soon became one of the most populous, opulent, and beautiful cities in
America. There is, however, reason to apprehend that it has reached its
highest point of exaltation, and that it will be so far affected by the change
in tAle Spanish system of trade with America, which has withdrawn from
it the desirable visits of the galeons, as to feel at least a temporary decline.
But the wealth now collected there will soon find or create employment for
itself, and may be turned with advantage into some new channel. Its
harbour is so safe, and so conveniently situated for receiving commodities
from Europe, its merchants have been so long accustomed to convey these
into all the adjacent provinces, that it is probable they will still retain this
branch of trade, and Carthagena continue to be a city of great importance.
The province contiguous to Santa Martha on the east, was first visited
by Alonso de Ojeda, in the year 1499;* and the Spaniards, on their landing there, having observed some huts in an Indian village, built upon piles,
in order to raise them above the stagnated water which covered the plain,
were led to bestow upon it the name of Venezuela, or little Venice, by
their usual propensity to find a resemblance between what they discovered
in America, and the objects which were familiar to them in Europe. They
made some attempts to settle there, but with little success. The final
reduction of the province was accomplished by means very different from
those-to which Spain was indebted for its other acquisitions in the New
World. The ambition of Charles V. often engaged him in operations of
such variety and extent, that his revenues were not sufficient to defray the
expense of carrying them into execution. Among other expedients for
supplying the deficiency of his funds, he had borrowed large sums from
the YVelsers of Augsburg, the most opulent merchants at that time in Europe.
By way of retribution for these, or in hopes, perhaps, of obtaining a new
loan, he bestowed upon them the Province of Venezuela, to be held as an
* Book ii. p. 48.
VOL. I. —44




~46                    HISTORY   OF                  [tOOK VII.
hereditary fief from the crown of Castile, on condition that within a limited
time they should render themselves masters of the country, and establish a
colony there. Under the direction of such persons, it might have been
expected that a settlement would have been established on maxims very
different from those of the Spaniards, and better calculated to encourage
such useful industry, as mercantile proprietors might have known to be the
most certain source of prosperity and opulence. But unfortunately fhey
committed the execution of their plan to some of those soldiers of fortune
with which Germany abounded in the sixteenth century. These advent
turers, impatient to amass riches, that they might speedily abandon a
station which they soon discovered to be very uncomfortable, instead of
planting a colony in order to cultivate and improve the country, wandered
from district to district in search of mines, plundering the natives with unfeeling rapacity, or oppressing them by the imposition of intolerable tasks
In the course of a few years, their avarice and exactions, in comparison
with which those of the Spaniards were moderate, desolated the province
so completely, that it could hardly afford them subsistence, and the Velsers
relinquished a property from which the inconsiderate conduct of their agents
left them no hope of ever deriving any advantage.* When the wretched
remainder of the Germans deserted Venezuela, the Spaniards again took
possession of it; but notwithstanding many natural advantages, it is one of
their most languishing and unproductive settlements.
The provinces of Caraccas and Cumana are the last of the Spanish ter
ritories on this coast; but in relating the origin and operations of the mercantile company in which an exclusive right of trade with them has been
vested, I shall hereafter have occasion to consider their state and productions.
The New Kingdom of Granada is entirely an inland country of great
extent. This important addition was made to the dominions of Spain about
the year 1536, by Sebastian de Benalcazar and Gonzalo Ximenes de Quesada, two of the bravest and most accomplished officers employed in the
conquest of America. The former, who commanded at that time in Quito,
attacked it from the south; the latter made his invasion from Santa Martha
on the north. As the original inhabitants of this region were fu.rther advanced in improvement than any people in Americabut the Mexicans and
Peruvians,t they defended themselves with great resolution and good conduct. The abilities and perseverance of Benalcazar and Quesada surmounted all opposition, though not without encountering many dangers,
and reduced the country into the form of a Spanish province.
The New Kingdom of Granada is so far elevated above the level of the
sea that though it approaches almost to the equator, the climate is remarkably temperate. The fertility of its valleys is not inferior to that of
the richest districts in America, and its higher grounds yield gold and
precious stones of various kinds. It is not by digging into the bowels of
tihe-earth that this gold is found; it is mingled with the soil near the surface, and separated from it by repeated washing with water. This operation is carried on wholly by Negro slaves; for though the chill subterranean air has been discovered, by experience, to be so fatal to them, that
they cannot be employed with advantage in the deep silver mines, they
are more capable of performing the other species of labour than Indians
As the natives in the New Kingdom of Granada are exempt from. that
service, which has wasted their race so rapidly in other parts of America,
the country is still remarkably populous. Some districts yield gold with a
profusion no less wonderful than that in the vale of Cineguilla, which i have
formerly mentioned, and it is often found in large petitas, or grains, which
manifest the abundance in which it is produced. On a rising ground near
* Civedo y Bagnos Hist. de Venezwelaaj). 11, &c.  t Book iv. p. 111, &c.




AMERI CA.                           347
Pamplona, single labourers have collected in a day what was equal in
value to a thousand pesos.?  A late governor of Santa Fe brought with
him to Spain a lump of pure gold, estimated to be worth seven hundred
and forty pounds sterling. This, which is perhaps the largest and finest
specimen ever found in the New World, is now deposited In the royal
cabinet of Madrid. But without founding any calculation on what is rare
and extraordinary, the value of the gold usually collected in this country,
particularly in the provinces of Popayan and Choco, is of considerable
amount. Its towns are populous and flourishing. The number of inhabitants
in almost every part of the country daily increases. Cultivation and industry of various kinds begin to be encouraged, and to prosper. A considerable trade is carried on with Carthagena, the produce of the mines,
and other commodities, being conveyed down the great river of St. MIagdalene to that city. On another quarter, the New Kingdom of Granada has a
communication with the Atlantic by the river Orinoco; but the country
which stretches along its banks towards the east, is little known, and in)
perfectly occupied by the Spaniards.
1100K VIII.
AFTER tracing the progress of the Spaniards in their discoveries and
conquests during more than half a century, I have conducted them to that
period when their authority was established over almost all the vast
regions in the New World still subject to their dominion. The effect of
their settlements upon the countries of which they took possession, the
maxims which they adopted iri forming their new colonies, the interior
structure and policy of these, together with the influence of their progressive improvement upon the parent state, and upon the commercial intercourse of nations, are the objects to which we now tllrn our attention.
The first visible consequence of the establishments made by the Spanlards in America, was the diminution of the ancient inhabitants, to a degree
equally astonishing and deplorable. I have already, on different occasions,
mentioned the disastrous influence under which the connection of the Ame
ricans with the people of our hemisphere commenced, both in the islands
and in several parts of the continent, and have touched upon various calses
of their rapid consumption. Wherever the inhabitants of America had
resolution to take arms in defence of their liberty and rights, many perished
in the unequal contest, and were cut off by their fierce invaders. But the
greatest desolation followed after the sword was sheathed, and the conquerors were settled in tranquillity. It was in the islands, and in those
provinces of the continent which stretch from the Gulf of Trinidad to the
confines of Mexico, that the fatal effects of the Spanish dominion were first
and most sensibly felt. All these were occupied either by wandering tribes
of hunters, or by such as had made but small progress in cultivation and
industry. When they were compelled by their new masters to take up a
fixed residence, and to apply to regular labour; when tasks were imposed
upon them disproportioned to their strength, and were enacted with unrelenting severity, they possessed not vigour either of mind or of body to
sustain this unusual load of oppression. Dejection and despair drove many
to end their lives by violence. Fatigue and famine destroyed more. In
*Piedrahita ibst. del N. Reyno, p. 481. MS. penes me.




348                     HISTORY  OF                    [BooIc VII1
all those extensive re-ions, the original race of inhabitants wasted away a
in some it was totally extinguished. In Mexico, where a powerful and
martial people distinguished their opposition to the Spaniards by efforts of
courage worthy of a better fate, great numbers fell in the field; and there,
as well as in Peru, still greater numbers perished under the hardships of
attending the Spanish armies in their various expeditions and civil wars,
worn out with the incessant toil of carrying their baggage, provisions, and
military stores.
But neither the rage nor cruelty of the Spaniards was so destructive to
the people of Mexico and Peru, as the inconsiderate policy with which
they established their new settlements. The former were temporary calamities, fatal to individuals: the latter was a permanent evil, which, with
gradual consumption, wasted the nation. When the provinces of Mexico
and Peru were divided among the conquerors, each was eager to obtain a
district from which he might expect an instantaneous recompense for all
his services. Soldiers, accustomed to the carelessness and dissipation of a
military life, had neither industry to carry on any plan of regular cultivation, nor patience to wait for its slow but certain returns. Instead of settling in the valleys occupied by the natives, where the fertility of the soil
would have amply rewarded the diligence of the planter, they chose to
fix their stations in some of the mountainous regions, frequent both in New
Spain and in Peru. To search for Iin-es of gold and silver was the chief
object of their activity. The prospects which this opens, and the alluring
hopes which it continually presents, correspond wonderfully with the spirit
of enterprise and adventure that animated the first emigrants to America in
every part of their conduct. In order to push forward those favourite
projects, so many hands were wanted, that the service of the natives became indispensably requisite.  They were accordingly compelled to
abandon their ancient habitations in the plains, and driven in crowds to the
mountains. This sudden transition from the sultry climate of the valleys
to the chill penetrating air peculiar to high lands in the torrid zone; exorbitant labour, scanty or unwholesome nourishment, and the despondency
occasioned by a species of oppression to which they were not accustomed,
and of which they saw no end, affected them nearly as much as their less
industrious countrymen in the islands. They sunk under the united pressure of those calamities, and melted away with almost equal rapidity.*
In consequence of this, together with the introduction of the smallpox, a
malady unknown in America, and extremely fatal to the natives,t the number of people both in New Spain and Peru was so much reduced, that in
a few years the accounts of their ancient population appeared almost incredible.T
Such are the most considerable events and causes which, by their corn
bfned operation, contributed to depopulate America. Without attending
to these, many authors, astonished at the suddenness of the desolation, have
ascribed this unexampled event to a system of policy no less profound than
atrocious. The Spaniards, as they pretend, conscious of their own inability
to occupy the vast regions which they had discovered, and foreseeing the
impossibility of maintaining their authority over a people infinitely superior to themselves in number, in order to preserve the possession of America, resolved to exterminate the inhabitants, and, by converting a great
part of the country into a desert, enideavoured to secure their own dominion over it [165].  But nations seldom extend their views to objects so
remote, or lay their plans so deep; and for the honour of humanity we
may observe, that no nation ever deliberately formed such an execrable
scheme. The Spanish monarchs, far from acting upon any such system of
* Torquemada, i 613.   t +B. Diaz, c. 124. 1Herrera, dec, 2. lib. x. c. 4. Ulloa Entreten 206
Torquerni, 615, 6412, 643 [164].




AMERICA.:M
destruction, were uniformly solicitous for the preservation of their new
subjects. With Isabella, zeal for propagating the Christian faith, together
with the desire of comrmunicating the knowledge of truth, and the consolations of religion, to people destitute of spiritual light, were more than
ostensible motives for encouraging Columbus to attempt his discoveries.
Upon his success, she endeavoured to fulfil her pious purpose, and main-l
fested the most tender concern to secure not only religious instruction, but
mild treatment, to that inoffensive race of men subjected to her crown [166],
Her successors adopted the same ideas; and, on many occasions, which I
have mentioned, their authority was interposed, in the most vigorous ex
ertions, to protect the people of America from the oppression of their Spanish subjects. Their regulations for this purpose were numerous, and often
repeated. They were framed with wisdom, and dictated by humanity.
After their possessions in the New World became so extensive as might
have excited some apprehensions of difficulty in retaining their dominion
over them, the spirit of their regulations was as mild as when their settlements were confined to the islands alone. Their solicitude to protect
the Indians seems rather to have augmented as their acquisitions increased:
and from ardour to accomplish this, they enacted, and endeavoured to enforce
the execution of laws, which excited a formidable rebellion in one of their
colonies, and spread alarm and disaffection through all the rest. But the
avarice of individuals was too violent to be controlled by the authority of
laws. Rapacious and daring adventurers, far removed from the seat of
government, little accustomed to the restraints of military discipline while
in service, and still less disposed to respect the feeble jurisdiction of civil
power in an infant colony, despised or eluded every regulation that set
bounds to-their exactions and tyranny. The parent state, with persevering
attention, issued edicts to prevent the oppression of the Indians; the colonists, regardless of these, or trusting to their distance for impunity, continued to consider and treat them as slaves. The governors themselves,
and other officers employed in the colonies, several of whom were as indigent and rapacious as the adventurers over whom they presided, were too
apt to adopt their contemptuous ideas of the conquered people; and, instead of checking, encouraged or connived at their excesses. The desolation of the New World should not then be charged on the court of Spain,
or be considered as the effect of any system of policy adopted there. It
ought to be imputed wholly to the indigent and often unprincipled adven.
turers, whose fortune it was to be the conquerors and first planters of
America, who, by measures no less inconsiderate than unjust, counteracted the edicts of their sovereign, and have brought disgrace upon their
country.
With still greater injustice have many authors represented the intolerating spirit of the Roman Catholic religion, as the cause of exterminating
the Americans, and have accused the Spanish ecclesiastics of animating
their countrymen to the slaughter of that innocent people, as idolaters and
enemies of God. But the first missionaries who visited America, though
weak and illiterate, were pious men. They early espoused the defence
of the natives, and vindicated their character from the aspersions of their
conquerors, who, describing them as incapable of being formed to the
offices of civil life, or of comprehending the doctrines of religion, contended, that they were a subordinate race of men, on whom the hand of
nature had set the mark of servitude. From the accounts which I have
given of the humane and persevering zeal of the Spanish missionaries, In
protectino the helpless flock committed to their charge, they appear in a
light which reflects lustre upon their function. They were ministers o.
peace, who endeavoured to wrest the rod fromn the hands of oppressors.
To their powerful interposition the Americans were indebted for every
regulation tending to mitigate the rigour of their fate. The clergy in the




350                      HISTORY  OF                    I3ooK VIII.
Spanish settlements, regular as well as secular, are still considered by the
Indians as their natural guardians, to whom they have recourse under the
hardships and exactions to which they are too often exposed [167].
But, notwithstanding the rapid depopulation of America, a very considerable number of the native race still remains both in Mexico and Peru,
especially in those parts which were not exposed to the first fury of the
Spanish arms, or desolated by the first efforts of their industry, still more
ruinous. In Guatimala, Chiapa, Nicaragua, and the other delightful provinces of the Mexican empire, which stretch along the South Sea, the race
of Indians is still numerous. Their settlements in some places are so
populous as to merit the name of cities [168]. In the three audiences into
which New Spain is divided, there are at least two millions of Indians; a
pitiful remnant, indeed, of its ancient population, but such as still formd a
body of people superior in number to that of all the other inhabitants of
this extensive country [169]. In Peru several districts, particularly in the
kingdom of Quito, are occupied almost entirely by Indians. In other provinces they are mingled with the Spaniards, and in many of their settlements are almost the only persons who practise the mechanic arts, and fill
most of the inferior stations in society. As the inhabitants both of Mexico
and Peru wvere accustomed to a fixed residence, and to a certain degree of
regular industry, less violence was requisite in bringing them to some conformity with the European modes of civil life. But wherever the Spaniards settled among the savage tribes of America, their attempts to incorporate with them have been always fruitless, and often fatal to the natives.
Impatient of restraint, and disdaining labour as a mark of servility, they
either abandoned their original seats, and sought for independence in
mountains and forests inaccessible to their oppressors, or perished when
reduced to a state repugnant to their ancient ideas and habits. In the
districts adjacent to Carthagena, to Panama, and to Buenos Ayres, the
desolation is more general than even in those parts of Mexico and Peru of
which the Spaniards have taken most full possession.
But the establishments of the Spaniards iln the New World, though fatal
to its ancient inhabitants, were made a ta period when that monarchy was
capable of forming them  to best advantage.  By the union of all its petty
kingdoms, Spain was become a powerful state, equal to so great an undertaking.  Its monarchs, having extended their prerogatives far beyond the
limits which once circumscribed the regal power in every kingdom of
Europe, were hardly subject to control, either in concerting or in executing
thsir measures.  In every wide-extended empire, the form of government
must be simple, and the sovereign authority such, that its resolutions may
be taken-with promptitude, and may pervade the whole with sufficient
force.  Such was the power of the Spanish monarchs when they were
called to deliberate concerning the mode of establishing their dominions
over the most remote provinces which had ever been subjected to any
European state.  Ii this deliberation, they felt themselves under no constitutional restraint, and that, as independent masters of their own resolves,
they might issue the edicts requisite for modelling the government of the
new colktnies, by a mere act of prerogative.
This early interiposition of the Spanish crown, in order to regulate the
policy and trade of its colonies, is a peculiarity which distilnguishes their
progress firom that of the colonies of any other European nation.  When
the PortuglWuese, the English, andl French took possession of the regions in
America which they now occupy, the advantages which these promised
to yield were so remnote and uncertain, that their colonies were suftered to
struggle tlhrough a hard infancy, almost without guidance or protection fiom
the parent state. But gold and silver, the first productions of the Spanish
settlements in the New World, were n:ore alluring, and inmmediately attracted the attention of their monarchs. Thougf they had contributed




AMERICA.                              351!ittle to the discovery, and almost nothing to the conquest of the New
World, they instantly assumed the finction of its legislators; anid having
acquired a species of dominion formerly unknown, they formed a plan for
exercising it, to which nothing similar occurs in the history of' human
affairs.
The fundamental maxim of the Spanish jurisprudence, with respect to
America, is to consider what has been acquired there as vested in the
crown, rather than in the state. By the bull of Alexander VI., on which,
as its great charter, Spain founded its right, all the regions that had been
or should be discovered were bestowed as a free gift upon Ferdinand and
Isabella. They and their successors were uniformly held to be the universal proprietors of the vast territories which the arms of their subjects
conquered in the New World. From them all grants of land there flowed,
and to them they finally returned. The leaders who conducted the various
expeditions, the governors who presided over the different colonies, the
officers of justice, and the ministers of religion, were all appointed by
their authority, and removable at their.pleasure.  The people who composed infant settlements were entitled to no privileges independent of the
sovereign, or that served as a barrier against the power of the crown. It
is true, that when towns were built, and formed into bodies corporate, the
citizens were permitted to elect their own magistrates, who governed them
by laws which the community enacted. Even in the most despotic states,
this feeble spark of liberty is not extinguished.  But in the cities ol
Spanish America, this jurisdiction is merely municipal, and is confined to
the regulation of their own interior commerce and police.  In whatever
relates to public government, and the general interest, the will of the
sovereign is law. No political power originates from the people. All
centres in the crown, and in the officers of its nomination.
When the conquests of the Spaniards in America were completed, their
monarchs, in forming the plan of internal policy for their new dominions,
divided them into two immense governments, one subject to the viceroy
of New Spain, the other to the viceroy of Peru. The jurisdiction of the
former extended over all the provinces belonging -to Spain in the northern
division of the American continent.  Under that of the latter, was com.
prehended whatever she possessed in South America. This arrangement,
which, from the beginning, was attended with many inconveniences, became
intolerable when the remote provinces of each viceroyalty began to im
prove in industry and population. The people complained of their sub
jection to a superior, whose place of residence was so distant, or so inaccessible, as almost excluded them  from any intercourse with the seat ot
government. The authority of the viceroy over districts so far removed
from his own eye and observation, was unavoidably both feeble and ill
directed. As a remedy for those evils, a third viceroyalty has been established in the present century, at Santa Fe de Bogota, the capital of the
new  kingdoin of Granada, the jurisdiction of -which extends over the
whole kingdom  of Tierra Firme and the province of Quito.*  Those
viceroys not only represent the person of their sovereign, but possess his
regal prerogatives within the precincts of their own governments in their
utmost extent. Like him, they exercise supreme authority In every department of government, civil, military, and criminal. They have the
sole right of nominating the persons who hold many offices of the highest
importance, and the occasional privilege of supplying those which, whon
theyxbecome vacant by death, are in the royal gift, intil the successor
appointed by the king shall arrive. The external pomp of their government is suited to its real dignity and power. Their courts are formed upon
the model of that at Madrid, with horse and foot guards, a household
Voy. de Ulloa, i. 23. 255




352                     HIST  ) RY  OF                  [BOOK VIII
regularly established, numerous attendants, and ensigns of command,
displaying such magnificence as hardly retains the appearance of delegated
authority. 
But as the viceroys cannot discnarge in person the functions of a supreme
magistrate in every part of their extensive jurisdiction, they are aided in
their government by officers and tribunals similar to those in Spain. The
conduct of civil affairs in the various provinces and districts, into which the
Spanish dominions in America are divided, is committed to magistrates of
various orders and denominations; some appointed by the king, others by.
the viceroy, but all subject to the command of the latter, and almenable to
his jurisdiction. The administration of justice is vested in tribunals, known
by the name of Audiences, and formed upon the model of the court of
Chancery in Spain, These are eleven in number, and dispense justice to
as many districts into which the  Spanish dominions in America are
divided [170]. The number of judges in the Court of Audience is variousj according to the extent and importance of their jurisdiction. The
station is no less honourable than lucrative, and is commonly filled by persons of such abilities and merit as render this tribunal extremely respectable.  Both civil and criminal causes come under their cognizance, and
for each peculiar judges are set apart. Though it is only in the most
despotic governments that the sovereign exercises in person the formidable
prerogative of administering justice to his subjects, and, in absolving or
condemning, consu4ts no law but what is deposited in his own breast;
though, in all the monarchies of Europe, judicial authority is committed to
magistrates, whose decisions are regulated by known laws and established
forms; the Spanish viceroys have often attempted to intrude themrnself'es
into the seat of justice, and, with an ambition which their distance from
the control of a superior rendered bold, have aspired at a power which
their master does not venture to assume. In order to check a usurpation
which must have annihilated justice and security in the Spanish colonies,
by subjecting the lives and property of all to the will of a single man, the
viceroys have been prohibited in the most explicit terms, by repeated laws,
from interfering in the judicial proceedings of the Courts of Audience, or
from delivering an opinion, or giving a voice, with respect to any point
litigated before them.t  In some particular cases, in which any question
of civil right is involved, even the political regulations of the viceroy may
be brought under the review of the Court of Audience, which in those
instances may be deemed an intermediate power placed between him and
the people, as a constitutional barrier to circumscribe his jurisdiction. But
as legal restraints on a person who represents the sovereign, and is clothed
with his authority, are little suited to the genius of Spanish policy; the
hesitation and reserve with which it confers this power on the Courts of
Audience are remarkable. They may advise, they may remonstrate; but,
in the event ol a direct collision between their opinion and the will of the
viceroy, what he determines must be carried into execution, and nothing
remains for them, but to lay the matter before the king and the Council of
the Indies.:   But to be entitled to remonstrate, and inform against a person
before whom all others must be silent, and tamely submit to his decrees, is a
privilege which adds dignity to the Courts of Audience.  This is further
augmented by another circumstance.  Upon the death of a viceroy, without any provision of a successor by the king, the supreme power is vested
in the Court of Audience resident in the capital of the viceroyalty; and
the senior judge, assisted by his brethren, exercises all the functions of the
viceroy while the office continues vacant.~  In matters which come under
* UIcIa, Voy. i. 432.  Gage, 61.  t Recop. lib. ii. tit. xv. 1. 35. 38. 44. lib. iii. tit. iii. 1. 36, 37.
T Solorz. de Jure Ind. lib. iv. c. 3. n. 40, 41.   Recop. lib. ii. tit. xv.'1. 6. ib. iii. tit. iii. 1. 34. lib  v
tit ix.. 1.    Recop. lib. ii. tit. xv  1. 57  &c.




AMERICA.                              353
the cognizance of the Audiences, in the course of their oidinary jurisdictlon, as courts of justice, their sentences are final in every litigation concerning property of less value thansix thousand pesos; but when the subject
in dispute exceeds that sum, their:decisions are subject' to review, and may
be carried by appeal before the royal Council of the Indies.*
In this council, one of the most considerable in the monarchy for dignity
and power, is vested the supreme government of all the Spanish dominions
in America. It was first established by Ferdinand in the year 1511, and
brought into a more perfect- form by Charles V. in the year 1524. Its
jurisdiction extends to every department, ecclesiastical, civil, military, and
commercial. All laws and ordinances-relative to the government and police
of the colonies originate there, and must be approved of by two-thirds oI
the members before* they are issued in the name of the king. All  the
offices, of wlhich the nomination is reserved to the crown, are conferred in
this council. To it each person employed in America, from the viceroy
downwards, is accountable.  It reviews their conduct, rewards their services, and inflicts the punishments due to their malversations.t Before it
is laid whatever intelligence, either public or secret, is received from
America; and every scheme of improving the administration, the police,
or the commerce of the colonies, is submitted to its consideration. From
the first institution of the Council of the Indies, it has been the constant
object of the Catholic monarchs to maintain its authority, and to make
such additions from time to time, both to its power and its splendour, as
might render it formidable to all their subjects in the New World. Whatever degree: of public order and virtue still remains- in that country, where
so many circumstances conspire: to relax the former, and to corrupt the
latter, may be ascribed in a great measure to the wise regulations and
vigilant inspection of this respectable tribunal.,
As the king is supposed to be always present in his Council of the
Indies, its meetings are held in the place:where he resides. Another
tribunal has been instituted in order to regulate such commercial affairs,
as required the immediate and personal inspection of those appointed to
superintend them. This is called Casa, de la Contrafacion, or the house
of trade, and was established in Seville, the: port to which commerce with,the New World was confined, as' early as the year 1501. It may be considered both as a board of trade, and as: a court of judicature. In the
former capacity, it takes cognizance of whatever relates to the intercourse
of Spain with America, it regulates-what commodities should be exported
thither, and has the inspection of such-as are received in return.  It decides
concerning the departure of the fleets for the West Indies, the freight' and
burden of the ships, their equipment and destination. In the latter capacity, it judges with respect to every question, civil, commercial, or criminal,
arising in consequence of the transactions of Spain with America; and in
both these departments its: decisions are exempted from the review of any
court but that of the Council of the:Indies.~
Such is the great outline of that-system of government which Spain has
established in her American colonies.  To enumerate the various subordinate boards and officers employed in the. administration of justice, in
collecting the public revenue, and in regulating the interior police of the
country;'to- describe their different functions, and to inquire into the mode
and effect of their operations; would prove a detail no less intricate than
minute and uninteresting.
The first object of the Spanish monarchs was to secure the productions
of the colonies to the parent state, by an absolute prohibition of any inter
course with foreign nations. They took possession of America by right
* Recop, lib. v. tit xiii. 1. 1, &c.  t Ibid. lib. ii. tit. ii. 1, 1, 2, &c.  St olorz. de Jure
mud. lib. iv. c. 12.  i Recop. lib. ix. tit. i. Vcitia Norte de la Contrataeion, lib. i. 1.
VOL. I.-45                    17




354                     HISTORY  O F                 [BooK VIll.
of conquest, and conscious not only of the feebleness of their infant settlements, but aware of the difficulty in establishing their dominions over
regions so extensive, or in retaining so many reluctant nations under the yoke,
they dreaded the intrusion of strangers; they even shunned their inspection,
and endeavoured to keep them at a distance from their coasts. This spirit
of jealousy and exclusion, which at first was natural, and perhaps necessary,
augmented as their possessions in America extended, and the value of then
came to be more fully understood. In consequence of it, a system of
colonising was introduced, to which there had hitherto been nothing similar
among mankind. In the ancient world, it was not unconmmon to send forth
colonies. But they were of two kinds only. They were either migrations,
which served to disburden a state of its superfluous subjects, when they
multiplied too fast for the territory which they occupied; or they were
military detachments, stationed as garrisons in a conquered province. The
colonies of some Greek republics, and the swarms of northern barbarians
which settled in different parts of Europe, were of the first species. The
Roman colonies were of the second. In the former, the connection with
the mother country quickly ceased, and they became independent states.
In the latter, as the disjunction was not complete, the dependence continued.
In their American settlements, the Spanish monarchs took what was peculiar to each, and studied to unite them. By sending colonies to regions so
remote, by establishing in each a form of inferior policy and administration,
under distinct governors, and with peculiar laws, they disjoined them from
the mother country. By retaining in their own hands the rights of legislation, as well as that of imposing taxes, together with the power of
nominating the persons who filled every department of executive govern
ment, civil or military, they secured their dependence upon the parent
state. Happily for Spain, the situation of her colonies was such as ren
dered it possible to reduce this new idea into practice. Almost all the
countries which she had discovered and occupied, lay within the tropics.
The productions of that large portion of the globe are different fiom those
of Europe, even in its most southern provinces. The qualities of the
climate and of the soil naturally turn the industry of such as settle there
into new channels. When the Spaniards first took possession of their
dominions in America, the precious metals which they yielded were the
only object that attracted their attention. Even when their efforts began
to take a better direction, they employed themselves almost wholly in
rearing such peculiar productions of the climate as, from their rarity or
value, were of chief demand in the mother country. Allured by vast
prospects of immediate wealth, they disdained to waste their industry on
what was less lucrative, but of superior moment. In order to render it
impossible to correct this error, and to prevent them from making any
effoirts in industry which might interfere with those of the mother country,
the establishment of several species of manufactures, and even the culture
of the vine or olive, are. prohibited in the Spanish colonies [171], under
severe penalties."  They must trust entirely to the mother country fobr the
objects of primary necessity. Their clothes, their furniture, their instruments of labour, their luxuries, and even a considerable part of the provisions which they consume, were imported from Spain. During a great
part of the sixteenth century, Spain, possessing an extensive commerce
and flourishing manufactures, could supply with ease the growing demands
of her colonies from her own stores. The produce of their mines and
plantations was given in exchange for these. But all that the colonies
received, as well as all that they gave, was conveyed in Spanish bottoms
No vessel belonging to the colonies was ever permitted to carry the commodities of America to Europe. Even the commercial intercourse of one
B Ulloa Retab. des Manuf. &c. p 206




AMERICA.                              355
colony with another was either absolutely prohibited, or limited by many
je dons restrictions. All that America yields flows into the ports of Spain;
al] that it consumes must issue from them. No foreigner can enter its
colonies without express permission; no vessel of any foreign nation is
received into their harbours; and the pains of death, with confiscation of
moveables, are denounced against every inhabitant who presumes to trade
with them.*  Thus the colonies are kept in a state of perpetual pupilage;
and by the introduction of this commercial dependence, a refinement in
policy of which Spain set the first example to European nations, the
supremacy of the parent state hath been maintained over remote colonies
during two centuries and a half.
Such are the capital maxims to which the Spanish monarchs seem to
have attended in forming their new settlements in America.  But they
could not plant with the same rapidity that they had destroyed; and from
many concurring causes, their progress has been extremely slow in filling
up the immense void which their devastations had occasioned. As soon as
the rage for discovery and adventure began to abate, the Spaniards opened
their eyes to dangers and distresses which at first they did not perceive,
or had despised. The numerous hardships with which the members of
infant colonies have to struggle, the diseases of unwholesome climates fatal
to the constitution of Europeans; the difficulty of bringing a country
covered with forests into culture; the want of hands necessary for labour
in some provinces, and the slow reward of industry in all, unless where
the accidental discovery of mines enriched a few fortunate adventurers,
were evils universally felt and magnified. Discouraged by the view of
these, the spirit of migration was so much damped, that sixty years after
the discovery of the New World, the number of Spaniards in all its provinces is computed not to have exceeded fifteen thousand [172].
The mode in which property was distributed in the Spanish colonies,
and the regulations established with respect to the transmission of it, whether by descent or by sale, were extremely unfavourable to population.
In order to promote a rapid increase of people in any new settlement,
property in land ought to be divided into small shares, and the alienation
of it should be rendered extremnely easy.t  But the rapaciousness of the
Spanish conquerors of the New World paid no regard to this fundamental
maxim of policy; and, as they possessed power which enabled them to
gratify the utmost extravagance of their wishes, many seized districts of
great extent, and held them as encomiendas. By degrees they obtained the
privilege of converting a part of these into MJcyorasgos, a species of fief,
introduced into the Spanish system of feudal jurisprudence,4 which can
neither be divided nor alienated. Thus a great portion of landed property
under this rigid form of entail, is withheld from circulation, and descends
from father to son unimproved, and of little value either to the proprietor
or to the community. In the account which I have given of the reduction
of Peru, various examples occur of enormous tracts of country occupied
by some of the conquerors.~ The excesses in other provinces were similar; for, as the value of the lands which the Spaniards acquired was originally estimated according to the number of Indians which lived upon
them, America was in general so thinly peopled, that only districts of
great extent could afford such a number of labourers as might be employed
in the mines with any prospect of considerable gain. The pernicious
effects of those radical errors in the distribution and nature of property In
the Spanish settlements are feit through every department of industry, and
may be considered as one great cause of a progress in population so milch
slower than that which has taken place in better constituted colonies [1731
*' Recopil lib. ix. tit. xxvii, 1. 4. 7, &c,   t Dr. Smith's Inquliry; ii. 106.   t Recop. lib. iv.
rt. iii. 1. 24.  ~ Book vi.




356                      HISTORY  OF                   [Boonc VIII.
To this we may add, that the support of the enormous and expl;en-sive
fabric of their ecclesiastical establishment-has been a burden on the Span
ishl colonies, which has greatly retarded the progress of population and
industry. The payment of tithes is. a heavy tax on industtryl: and if the
exaction of them be not regulated and circumscribed by the wisdorn of the,
civil magistrate, it becomes intolerable and ruinous. But, instead of any
restraint on the claims- of ecclesiastics, the inconsiderate zeal of the Spanish legislators admitted them into America in their full extent, and at once
imposed on their infant colonies a burden which is in no: slight degree
oppressive to society, even in its most improved state. As early as the
year 1501, the payment of tithes in the colonies was enjoined, and the
mode of it regulated by law. Every article of primary necessity, towards
which the attention of new settlers. must naturally be: turned, is: subjected
to that grievous exaction.* Nor were the demands of the clergy confined
to articles of simple and easy culture. Its more: artificial and operose productions, such as sugar, indigo, and cochineal, were soon declared to be
titheable;t and thus the industry of the planter was taxed- in every stage
of its progress, from its rudest essay to its highest improvement. To the
weight of this legal imposition, the bigotry of the- American Spaniards has
made many voluntary additions- From. their fond delight in the-external
pomp and parade of religion, and fiom. superstitious reverence for ecclesiastics of every denomination, they have bestowed proft;se donatives on
churches and monasteries, and have unprofitably wasted a large proportion
of that wealth, which might have nourished and given vigour to productive
labour in growing colonies.
But so fertile and inviting are the regions of America, which the Spanlards have occupied, that, notwithstanding all the circumstances which have
checked and retarded population, it has gradually increased, and filled the
colonies of Spain with citizens of various orders. Among these, the Spaniards who arrive from Europe, distinguished by the name of Chacpetones,
are the first in rank and power. From the jealous attention of the Spanish court to secure the dependence of the colonies on the parent state, all
departments of consequence are filled by persons sent from Europe; and in
order to prevent any of dubious fidelity from being employed, each must
bring proof of a clear descent- from a family of Old Christians, untainted
with any mixture of Jewish or, Mahometan blood, and never disgraced by
any censure of the Inquisition4.  In such pure hands power is deemed to
be safely lodged, and almost. every function, from  the viceroyalty downwards, is committed to them alone. Every person, who, by his birth or
residence in America, may be suspected of any attachment or interest
adverse to the mother country, is the object of distrust to such a degree,
as amounts nearly to an exclusion from al offices of confidence or authority [174]. By this conspicuous predilection-of the court, the Chapetones
are raised to such pre-eminence in America, that they look down with disdain on every other order of men.
The character and state of. the Creoles, or descendants of Europeans set-,
tied in America, the second class of subjects in the Spanish colonies, have
enabled the Chapetones to acquire other advantages, hardly less considerable than those which they derived from the partial favour of government.
Though some of the Creolian race are descended; from the conquerors of
the New World; though others. can trace up their pedigree to the noblest
families in Spain; though maniy are possessed of ample fortunes; yet, by
the enervating influence of a sultry climate, by. the rigour of a Jealous
government, and by their despair of attaining that distinction to which
mankind naturally aspire, the vigour of their minds is so entirely broken,
* Recop. lib. i. tit. xiv. 1.2.  t Recop. lib. i. tit. xiv. 1. 3,4.  t Recop. ib. ix. tit. xxvi.
1. 15,.16.




AMER I CA.                              357
that a great part of them wa ate iIfe in luxurious indulgences, mingl.-d with
an illiberal superstition still more debasing.
Languid and unenterprising, the operations of an active extended corn.
merce would be to them  so cumbersome and oppressive, that in almost
every part of America they decline engaging in it.  The interior traffic of
every colony, as well as any trade which is permitted -with the neighbouring provinces, and Swith Spain itself, is carried on chiefly by the Chapetones;" who, as the recompense of their industry, am-ass immense wealth,
while the Creoles, sunk in sloth, are satisfied with the revenues of their
paternal estates.
From this stated competition for power and wealth between those two
orders of citizens, and the various passions excited by a rivalship so interesting, their hatred is violent and implacable.  On every occasion, symptoms of this aversion break out, and the common appellations which each
bestows on the other are as contemptuous as those which flow from the
most deep-rooted national antipathy.' The court of Spain, from a refinement of distrustful policy, cherishes those seeds of discord, and foments
this mutual jealousy, which not only prevents the two most powerful
classes of its subjects in the New World from combining against the parent
state, but prompts each, with the most vigilant zeal, to observe the motions
and to counteract the schemes of the other.
The third class of inhabitants in the Spanish colonies is a mixed race,
the offspring either of a European and a Negro, or of a European and
Indian, the former called Jlulattoes, the latter AMfestizos.  As the court of
Spain, solicitous to incorporate its new vassals with its ancient subjects,
early encouraged the Spaniards settled in America to marry the natives of
that country, several alliances of this kind were formed in their infant colonies.$  But it has been more owing to licentious indulgence, than to compliance with this injunction of their sovereigns, that this mixed breed has
multiplied so greatly as to constitute a considerable part of the population
in all the Spanish settlements.  The several stages of descent in this race,
and the gradual variations of shade until the African black or the copper
colour of America brighten into a European complexion, are accurately
marked by the Spaniards, and each distinguished by a peculiar name.
Those of the first and second generations are considered and treated as
mere Indians and Negroes; but in the third descent, the characteristic hue
of the former disappears; and in the fifth, the deeper tint of the latter is
so entirely effaced, that they can no longer be distinguished from Europeans, and become entitled to all their privileges.~ It is chiefly by this
mixed race, whose frame is remarkably robust and hardy, that the mechanic arts are carried on in the Spanish settlements, and other active fiunctions in society are discharged, which the two higher classes of citizens,
from pride, or from indolence, disdain to exercise.lj
- The Negroes hold the fourth rank among the inhabitants of the Spanish
colonies.  The introduction of that unhappy part of the human species
into America, together with their services and sufferings there, shall be
fully explained in another place; here they are mentioned chiefly in order
to point out a peculiarity in their situation under the ESpanish dominion.  In
several of their settlements, particularly in New Spain, Negroes are mostly
employed in domestic service. They form a principal part in the trainot
luxury, and are cherished and caressed by their superiors, to whose vanity
and pleasures they are equally subservient. Their dress and appearance
are hardly less splendid than that of their masters, whose manners they
imitate, and whose passions they imbibe.~  Elevated by this distinction,
* Voy. de Ulloa, i. 27. 251. Voy. de Frezier, 227.  t Gagme's Survey, p. 9. Frezier, 226.
$ Recopil. iib. vi. tit. i. 1. 2. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. v. c. 12. dec. 3. lib vii. c. 2. 0 Voy. de Ulloa,
p. 27.   11 Ibid. i 29. Voyage de Bouguer, p. 104. Melendez, Te.oros Verdaderos, i..54.
S Gage, p. 56. Voy. de Ulloa, i. 451.




35                     HISTO R Y  OF                  [BooK VIII.
they have assumed such a tone of superiority over the Indians, and treat
them with such insolence and scorn, that the antipathy between the two
races has become implacable. Even in Peru, where Negroes seem to be
more numerous, and are employed in field work as well as domestic sesvice, they maintain their ascendant over the Indians, and the mutual hatred
of one to the other subsists with equal violence. The laws have inldustriously fomented this aversion, to which accident gave rise, and, by most
rigorous injunctions, have endeavoured to prevent every intercourse that
might form a bond of union between the two races. Thus, by an artful
policy, the Spaniards derive strength from that circumstance in population
which is the weakness of other European colonies, and have secured, as
associates and defenders, those very persons who elsewhere are objects of
jealousy and terror.*
The Indians form the last and most depressed order of men in the coun
try which belonged to their ancestors. lhave already traced the progress
of the Spanish ideas with respect to the condition and treatment of that
people; and have mentioned the most important of their more early regulations, concerning a matter of so much consequence in the administration
of their new dotminions. But since the period to which I -have brought
down the history of America, the information and experience acquired
during two centuries have enabled the court of Spain to make such improvements in this part of its American system, that a short view of the
present condition of the Indians may prove both curious and interesting,
By the famous regulations of Charles V. in 1542, which have been so
often mentioned, the high pretensions of the conquerors of the New World,
who considered its inhabitants as slaves to whose service they had acquired 
a full right of property, were finally abrogated. From that period, the
Indians have been reputed freemen, and entitled to the privileges of subjects. When admitted into this rank, it was deemed just that they should
contribute towards the support and improvement of the society which had
adopted them as members. But as no considerable benefit could be expected from the voluntary efforts of men unacquainted with regular industry, and averse to labour, the court of Spain found it necessary to fix and
secure, by proper regulations, what it thought reasonable to exact fromn
them. With this view, an annual tax was imposed upon every male, from
the age of eighteen to fifty; and at the same time the nature as well as
the extent of the services, which they might be required to perform, was
ascertained with precision. This tribute varies in different provinces;
but if we take that paid in New Spain as a medium, its annual amount is
nearly four shillings a head; no exorbitant sum in countries where, as at
the source of wealth, the value of money is extremely lowt [175]. The
right of levying this tribute likewise varies. In America, every Indian is
either an immediate vassal of' the crown, or depends upon some subject to
whom the district in which he resides has been granted for a limited time,
under the denomination of an encomienda. In the former case, about
three-fourths of the tax is paid into the royal treasury; in the latter, the
same proportion of it belongs to the holder of the grant.  When Spain first
took possession of America, the greater part of it was parcelled out among
its conquerors, or those who first settled there, and but a small portion
reserved for the crown. As those grants, which were made for two lives
only, reverted successively to the sovereign, he had it in his power either
to diffuse his favours by grants to new proprietors, or to augment his own
revenue by valuable annexations [176]. Of these, the latter has been
frequently chosen; the number of Indians now depending immediately on
* Iecopil. lib. vii. tit. v. 1. 7  Herrera, dec. 8. lib. vii. c. 12. Frezier, 244. t' Reccpil. hb.
vi. tPt. v. 1. 42.  Hakluyt, vol. iii. p. 461.  1 Rnccpil. lib. vi. tit. t viii. 1, 48.  Solorz. de Ind. Jure.
jib. ii.    116




AMERICA                                  359
the c'xwn is much greater than in the first stage after the conquest, and
this branch of the royal revenue continues to extend.
The benefit arising from the services of the Indians accrues either to the
crown, or to the holder of the encomienda, according to the same rule observed in the payment of tribute. Those services, however, which can
now  be legally exacted, are very different from the taslks originally imposed upon the Indians.  The nature of the work which they must perform
is defined, and an equitable recompense is granted for their labour. The
stated services demanded of the Indians may be divided into two branches
They are either employed in works of primary necessity, without which
society cannot subsist comfortably, or are compelled to labour in the mines,
from which the Spanish colonies derive their chief value and importance.
In consequence of the former, they are obliged to assist in the culture of
maize, and other grain of necessary consumption; in tending cattle; in
erecting edifices of public utility; in building bridges; and in forming bigh
roads;* but they cannot be constrained to labour in raising vines, o/ives,
and sugar-canes, or any species of cultivation which has for its object the
gratification of luxury or commercial profit.t  In consequence of the latter,
the Indians are compelled to undertake the more unpleasant task of extracting ore from the bowels of the earth, and of refining it by successive
processes, no less unwholesome than operose [177].
The mode of exacting both these services is the same, and is under
regulations framed with a view of rendering it as little oppressive as possible to the Indians. They are called out successively in divisions, termed
Mitas, and no person can be compelled to go but in his turn. In Peru, the
number called out must not exceed the seventh part of the inhabitants in
any district.t  In New Spain, where the Indians are more numerous, it is
fixed at four in the hundred.~  During what time the labour of such Indians
as are employed in agriculture continues, I have not been able to learn [178].
But in Peru, each mnita, or division, destined for the mines, remains there
six months; an'd while engaged in this service, a labourer never receives
less than two shillings a day, and often earns more than double that sum.ll
No Indian, residing at a greater distance than thirty miles from a mine, is
included in the mita, or division employed working it;~ nor are the inhabitants of the low country exposed now to certain destruction, as they
were at first when under the dominion of the conquerors, by compelling
them to remove from that warm climate to the cold elevated regions where
minerals abound*" [179].
The Indians who live in the principal towns are entirely subject to the
Spanish laws and magistrates; but in their own villages they are governed
by caziques, some of whom  are the descendants of their ancient lords,
others are named by the Spanish viceroys. These regulate the petty affairs
of the people under them, according to maxims of justice transmitted to
them by tradition from their ancestors.  To the Indians this jurisdiction,
lodged in such friendly hands, affords some consolation; and so little formidable is this dignity to their new masters, that they often allow it to descend
by hereditary right.tt  For the further relief of men so much exposed to
oppression, the Spanish court has appointed an officer in every district with
the title of Protector of the Indians.  It is his function, as the name implies,
to assert the rights of the Indians; to appear as their defender in the courts
of justice; and, by the interposition of his authority, to set bounds to the
encroachments and exactions of his countrymen.TT A certain portion of
the reserved fourth of the annual tribute is destined for the salary of the
* Recop lib. vi. tit xiii 1. 19, Solorz. de Ind. Jure, ii. lib. i. c. 6, 7. 9.    t Recop. lib. vi. tit.
xiii. 1. 8. Solorz. lib. i. c. 7. No. 41, &c.   + Recop. lib. vi. tit. xii. 1.'21.    M ]bid. lib. vi. i. 22.
1t lIlloa Entreten. 265, 266.  T Riecop. lib. vi tit. xii. 1. 3.  ** Ibid. lib. vi. tit. xii. 1. 29, tit. I.
1. 13.  ft Solorz. de Jure Ind. lib. i. c. 26. Recopil. lib. vi. tit. vii.   * Solorz. lib. i. c. 17. p,
201. Recop. lib. vi. tit. vi.




360                       HIS TORY  Or  [Boox VIII.
caziques and protectors; another is applied to the maintenance of the
clergy employed in the instruction of the Indians.*  Another part seems
to be appropriated for the benefit of the Indians themselves, and is applied
for the payment of their tribute in years of famine, or when a particular
district is affected by any extraordinary local calamity.t Besides this,
provision is made by various laws, that hospitals shall be founded in
every new settlement for the reception of Indians.4 Such hospitals have
accordingly been erected, both for the indigent and infirm, in Lima, in
Cuzco, and in Mexico, where the Indians are treated with tenderness
and humanity.~
Such are the leading principles in the jurisprudence and policy by which
the Indians are now governed in the provinces belonging to Spain. In
those regulations of the Spanish monarchs, we discover no traces of that
cruel system of extermination, which they have been charged with adopting; and if we admit that the necessity of securing subsistence for their
colonies, or the advantages derived from working the mines, give them a
right to avail themselves of the labour of the Indians, we must allow, that
the attention with which they regulate and recompense that labour is provident and sagacious. In no code of laws is greater solicitude dis.:layed,
or precautions multiplied with more prudent concern, for the preservation,
the security, and the happiness of the subject, than we discover in the collection of the Spanish laws for the Indies.  But those latter regulations,
like the more early edicts which have been already mentioned, have too
often proved ineffectual remedies against the evils which they were intended to prevent. In every age, if the same causes continue to operate, the
same effects must follow.' rom thle immense distance between the power
intrusted with the execution of laws, and that by whose authority they. are
enacted, the vigour even of the most absolute government must relax, and
the dread of a superior, too remote to observe with accuracy or to punish
with despatch,n must insensibly abate. Notwithstanding the numerous
injunctions of the Spanish monarch, the Indians still suffer, on many occasions, both from the avarice of individuals, and from the exactions of the
magistrates who ought to have protected them; unreasonable tasks are
imposed; the term of their labour is prolonged beyond the period fixed
by law, and they groan under many of the insults and wrongs which are
the lot of a dependent people [180]. From some information on which I
can depend, such oppression abounds more in Peru than in any other colony.
But it is not general. According to the accounts even of those authors
who are most disposed to exaggerate the sufferings of the Indians, they, in
several provinces, enjoy not only ease but affluence;- they possess large
farms; they are -masters of numerous herds and flocks; and, by the knowledge which they have acquired of European arts and industry, are sup
plied not only with the necessaries but with many luxuries of life.11
After explaining the form of civil government in the Spanish colonies, and
the state of the various orders of persons subject to it, the peculiarities in
their ecclesiastical constitution merit consideration.  Notwithstanding the
superstitious veneration with which the Spaniards are devoted to the Holy
See, the vigilant and jealous policy of Ferdinand early prompted him to
take precautions against the introduction of the Papal dominion in America.
With this view, he solicited Alexander VI. for a grant to the crown of the
tithes in all the newly-discovered countries,~ which he obtained on condition of his making provision for the religious instruction of the natives.
Soon -after Julius II. conferred on him  and his successors, the right of
patronage, and the absolute disposal of all ecclesiastical benefices there."*
* rIecop. lib. vi. tit. v. 1. 30. tit. xvi. I. 12-15.  t Ibid. lib. vi. tit. iv. 1. 13.  + Ibid. lib. i. tit
iv. l. 1, &c..  Voy. de Ulloa, i. 439. 509. Churchill, iv. 496.  1i Gage's Survey, p. 85. 90. 104,
119, &c.  Ir 11Bulla Alex. VI. A.D. 1501, ap. Solorz. de Jure Ind. ii. p. 498.   ** Bulla Julii I]
I 1.508, ap. Solorz. de Jure Ind. ii. 509.




AMERI (.A                           831
ijut these Pontiffs, unacquainted with the value of what he demanded,
bestowed these donations with an inconsiderate liberality, which their
successors have often lamented, and wished to recall. In consequence of
those grants, the Spanish monarchs have become in effect the heads of the
American church. In them the administration of its revenues is vested.
Their nomination of persons to supply vacant benefices is instantly confirmed by the Pope. Thus, in all Spanish America, authority of every
species.centres in the crown. There no collision is known between
spiritual and temporal jurisdiction. The King is the only- superior, his
name alone is heard of; and no dependence upon any foreign power has
been introduced. Papal bulls cannot be admitted into America, nor are
they of any force there until they have been previously examined and
approved of by the royal council of the Indies;* and if any bull should
be surreptitiously introduced and circulated in America without obtaining
that approbation, ecclesiastics are required not only to prevent it from
taking effect, but to seize all the copies of it, and transmit them to-the
council of the Indies.t  To this limitation of the Papal jurisdiction,
equally singular, whether we consider the age and nation in which it was
devised, or the jealous attention with which Ferdinand and his successors have studied to maintain it in full forcei, Spain is indebted, in a
great measure, for the uniform tranquillity which has reigned in her Ame-'
rican dominions.
The hierarchy is established in America. in the same form as in Spain,
with its full train of archbishops, bishops, deans, and other dignitaries.
The inferior clergy are divided into three classes, under the denomination
of Curas, Doctrimneros, and.Missioneros. The first are parish priests in
those parts of the country where the Spaniards have settled. The second
have the charge of such districts as are inhabited by Indians subjected to
the Spanish government, and living under its protection. The third are
employed in instructing and converting those fiercer tribes which disdain
submission to the Spanish yoke, and live in remote or inaccessible regions
to which the Spanish arms have not penetrated. So numerous are the
ecclesiastics of all those various orders, and such the profuse liberality
with which many of them are endowed, that the revenues of the church
in America are immense. The Romish superstition appears with its utmost
pomp in the New World. Churches and convents there are magnificent,
and richly adorned; -and on high festivals, the display of gold and silver,
and precious stones, is such as exceeds the conception of a European.~
An ecclesiastical establishment so splendid and extensive is unfavourable,
as has been formerly observed, to the progress of rising colonies; but in
countries where riches abound, and the people are so delighted with parade
that religion must assume it in order to attract their veneration, this propensity to ostentation has been indulged, and becomes less pernicious.
The early institution of monasteries in the Spanish colonies, and the
inconsiderate zeal in multiplying them, have been attended with consequences- more fatal. In every new settlement, the first object should be to
encourage population, and to incite every citizen to contribute towards
augmenting the number and strength of the community. During the youth
and vigour of society, while there is room to spread, and sustenance is
procured with facility, mankind increase with amazing rapidity. But the
Spaniards had hardly taken possession of America, when, with a most
preposterous policy, they began to erect convents, where persons of both
sexes were shut up, under a vow to defeat the purpose of nature, and to
counteract the first of her laws. Influenced by a, misguided piety, which
ascribes transcendent merit to a state of celibacy, or allured by the prospect
* Iecopil. lib. i. tit. ix. 1. 2. and Autas del Consrjo de las Indias, clxi.  I Recop. lib. i. tit. vii
i, 55.  $ Id. lib. i. tit. vii. 1. 55. passim.  O Voy. de Ulloa, i. 430.
VOL. I. —46




362                     HISTORY  O F                   [Boox VIII.
of that listless ease which in sultry climates is deemed supreme felicity,
numbers crowded into those mansions of sloth and superstition, and are
lost to society. As none but persons of Spanish extract are admitted into
the monasteries of the New World, the evil is more sensibly felt, and
every monk or nun may be considered as an active person withdrawn from
civil life.  The impropriety of such foundations in any situation where the
extent of territory requires additional hands to improve it, is so obvious,
that some Catholic states have expressly prohibited any person in their
colonies from  taking the monastic vows.*  Even the Spanish monarchs,
on some occasions, seem  to have been alarmed with the spreading of a
spirit so adverse to the increase and prosperity of their colonies, that they
have endeavoured to check it.t But the Spaniards in America, more
thoroughly under the influence of superstition than their countrymen in
Europe, and directed by ecclesiastics more bigoted and illiterate, have
conceived such a high opinion of monastic sanctity, that no regulations can
restrain their zeal; and, by the excess of their ill judged bounty, religious
houses have multiplied to a degree no less amazing than pernicious to
society [181].
In viewing the state of colonies, where not only the number but influence of ecclesiastics is so great, the character of this powerful body is an
object that merits particular attention. A considerable part of thesecular
clergy in Mexico and Peru are natives of Spain. As persons long accustomed, by their education, to the retirement and indolence of academic
life are more incapable of active enterprise, and less disposed to strike into
new paths than any order of men, the ecclesiastical adventurers by whom
the American church is recruited, are commonly such as, from merit or rank
in life, have little prospect of success in their own country. Accordingly,
the secular priests in the New World are still less distinguished than their
brethren in Spain for literary accomplishments of any species; and though,
by the ample provision which has been made for the Amerlcan church,
many of its members enjoy the ease and independence which are favourable
to the cultivation of science, the body of secular clergy has hardly, during
two centuries and a half, produced one author whose works convey such
useful information, or possess such a degree of merit, as to be ranked
among those which attract the attention of enlightened nations. But the
greatest part of the ecclesiastics in the Spanish settlements are regulars.
On the discovery of America, a new field opened to the pious zeal of the
monastic orders; and, with a becoming alacrity, they immediately sent
forth missionaries to labour in it. The first attempt to instruct and convert
the Americans was made by monks; and as soon as the conquest of any
province was completed, and its ecclesiastical establishment began to
assume some form, the Popes permitted the missionaries of the four mendicant orders, as a reward for their services, to accept of parochial charges
in America, to perform all spiritual functions, and to receive the tithes and
other emoluments of the benefice, without depending on the jurisdiction
of the bishop of the diocess, or being subject to his censures. In consequence of this, a new career of usefulness, as well as new objects of ambition, presented themselves. Whenever a call is made for a fresh supply
of missionaries, men of the most ardent and aspiring minds, impatient
under the restraint of a cloister, weary of its insipid uniformity, and
fatigued with the irksome repetition of its frivolous functions, offer their
service with eagerness, and repair to the New World in quest of liberty
and distinction. Nor do they pursue distinction without success  The
highest ecclesiastical honours, as well as the most lucrative preferments in
Mexico and Peru, are often in the hands of regulars; and it is chiefly to
* Voy. de Uilloa, ii. 124.    t Herrera, dec. v. lib. ix. c. 1, 2.  Rscop. lib, i. tit. iii. 1. 1, 2. tit. iv. c.
Ui. Solorz. lib. iii. c. 23.




AMERICA.                              363
the monastic orders that the Americans are indebted for any portion of
science which is cultivated among them.  They are almost the only
Spanish ecclesiastics from whom we have received any accounts either of
the civil or natural history of the various provinces in America. Some of
them, though deeply tinged with the indelible superstition of their profession, have published books which give a favourable idea of their abilities.
The natural and moral history of the New World, by the Jesuit Acosta,
contains more accurate observations, perhaps, and more sound science, than
are to be found in any description of remote countries published in the sixteenth century.
But the same disgust with monastic life, to which America is indebted
for some instructers of worth and abilities, filled it with others of a very
different character. The giddy, the profligate, the avaricious, to whom
the poverty and rigid discipline of a convent are intolerable, consider a
mission to America as a release from mortification and bondage. There
they soon obtain some parochial charge; and far removed, by their situation, from the inspection of their monastic superiors, and exempt, by their
character, from  the jurisdiction of their diocesan,' they are hardly subjected to any control. According to the testimony of the most zealous
catholics, many of the regular clergy in the Spanish settleIents are not
only destitute of the virtues becoming their profession, but regardless of
that external decorum and respect for the opinion of mankind, which preserve a semblance of worth where the reality is wanting. Secure of impunity, some regulars, in contempt of their vow of poverty, engage openly
in commerce, and are so rapaciously eager in amassing wealth, that they
become the most grievous oppressors of the Indians whom it was their
duty to have protected. Others, with no less flagrant violation of their
vow of chastity, indulge with little disguise in the most dissolute licentiousness [182].
Various schemes have been proposed for redressing enormities so manl
test and so offensive. Several persons, no less eminent for piety than
discernment, have contended, that the regulars, in conformity to the canons
of the church, ought to be confined within the walls of their cloisters, and
should no longer be permitted to encroach on the functions of the secular
clergy. Some public-spirited magistrates, from conviction of its being
necessary to deprive the regulars of a privilege bestowed at first with
good intention, but of which time and experience had discovered the pernicious effects, openly countenanced the secular clergy in their attempts
to assert their own rights. The prince D'Esquilache, viceroy of Peru
under Philip III., took measures so decisive and effectual for circumscribing
the regulars within their proper sphere as struck them with general consternation [183]. They had recourse to their usual arts. They alarmed
the superstitious, by representing the proceedings of the viceroy as innovations fatal to religion. They employed all the refinements of intrigue in
order to gain persons in power; and seconded by the powerful influence
of the Jesuits, who claimed and enjoyed all the privileges which belonged to
the Mendicant orders in America, they made a deep impression on a bigoted
prince and a weak ministry. The ancient practice was tolerated.  The
abuses which it occasioned continued to increase, and the corruption of
monks, exempt from the restraints of discipline, and the inspection of any
superior, became a disgrace to religion. At last, as the veneration of the
Spaniards for the monastic orders began to abate, and the power of the
Jesuits was on the decline, Ferdinand VI. ventured to apply the only
effectual remedy, by issuing an edict [June 23, 17571, prohibiting regulars
of every denomination from taking the charge of any parish with the cure
of souls; and declaring that on the demise of the present incumbents,
* Avendano Thee. Indic. ii. 253.




364                     LIISTO hY OF                   [BooK VIII.
none but secular priests, subject to the jurisdiction of their diocesans, shall
be presented to vacant benefices.?  If this regulation is carried into execution with steadiness in any degree proportional to the wisdom with which
it is framed, a very considerable'reformation may take place in the ecclesiastical state of Spanish Anerica, and the secular clergy may gradually
become a respectable body of men. The deportment of many ecclesiastics,
even at present, seems to be decent and exemplary; otherwise we can
hardly suppose that they would be held in such high estimation, and possess such a wonderfill ascendant over the minds of their countrymen
throughout all the Spanish settlements.
But whatever merit the Spanish ecclesiastics in America may possess,
the success of their endeavours in communicating the knowledge of true
religion to the Indians, has been more imperfect than might have been
expected, either from the degree of their zeal, or from the dominion which
they had acquired over that people. For this, various reasons may be
assigned.  The first missionaries, in their ardour to make proselytes,
admitted the people of America into the Christian church without previous
instruction in the doctrines of religion, and even before they themlselves
had acquired such knowledge in the Indian language, as to be able to
explain to the natives the mysteries of faith, or the precepts of duty.
Resting upon a subtle distinction in scholastic theology, between that degree
of assent which is founded on a complete knowledge and conviction of
duty, and that which may be yielded when both these are imperfect,
they adopted this strange practice, no less inconsistent with the spirit of a
religion which addresses itself to the understanding of men, than repugnant to the dictates of reason. As soon as any body of people overawed
by dread of the Spanish power, moved by the example of their own
chiefs, incited by levity, oryielding from mere ignorance, expressed the
slightest desire of embracing the religion of their conquerors, they were
instantly baptized. While this rage of conversion continued, a single
clergyman baptized in one day above five thousand Mexicans. and did not
desist until -he was so exhausted by fatigue that he was unable to lift his
hands.t  In the course of a few years after the reduction of the Mexican
empire, the sacrament of baptism  was administered to more than'four
milhons.t Proselytes adopted with such inconsiderate haste, and who were.neither instructed in the nature of the tenets to which it was supposed they
had given assent, nor taught the absurdity of those which they were required
to relinquish, retained their veneration for their ancient superstitions in full
force, or mingled an attachment to its doctrine andrites with that slender
knowledge of Christianity which they had acquired.  These -sentiments
the new converts transmitted to their posterity, into whose minds they
have sunk so deep, that the Spanish ecclesiastics, with all their industry,
have not been able to eradicate them.  The religious institutions of their
ancestors, are still remembered and held in honour;by many of the Indians,
both in Mexico and Peru; and whenever they think themselves out of
reach of inspection by the'Spaniards, they assemble and;celebrate their
idolatrous rites.~
But this is not the most unsurnilountable obstacle to the progress of' Christianity among the Indians. The.powers of their uncultiv:ated understandinzgs
are so limited, their observations and reflections reach so liittle beyond the
mere objects of sense, that-they seem'-hardly to have the capacity of forming
abstract ideas, and possess not language to express them.'To such men the
sublime and spiritual doctrines oftChristianity-must be,'in a great mueasure,
incomprehensible.   The numerous and- splendid ceremonies of the Popish
* Real Cerlhla MS. penes me.  t P. Torribio, 5IS. Torquem. Mond. Ind. lih. xvi. c. 6.
* Torribio, M-2. Torquem. lib. xvi. c.A..   Voy. de Ulloa, i. 341. Torqucm. lib. xv. c
23 lib. xvi. c. 2. Gage, 171.




AME.R-I C A.                            365
worship catceh the: eye, please: and interest them; but when their instructers
attempt -to explain: the articles of:faithvwith which those external' observances
are connected, though the Indians may listens- withl patiience, they so little
conceive-thei meaning of what they hear, that their acquiescence: does:not
merit the name of belief.  Their indifference is, still greater. than their
incapacity.  Attentive only to the present moment, aiid engrossed-by-thie
objects before. them, the. Indians so seldom reflect upon what is past, or
take thought- for what is to come, that neither the promises nor::threats-of
religion make much impression upon them-; and:while their foresight rarely
extends so far as the next day, it is almost impossible to -inspire them: with
solicitude about the concerns- of- a future world. Astonished equally at
their slowness of comprehension, and'at their insensibility, some: of the
early missionaries pronounced them a race of men-so brutish as to be inca-.
pable of understanding the first principles of religion. A council: held at
Lima. decreed, that, on: account of: this incapacity, they ought to be excluded from the sacrament of: the Eucharist.c  Thoughi Paul II., by his
famous bull issued in the year 1537, declared them to-be rational creatures
entitled to all the privileges of Christians;t yet, after the- lapse of' two
centuries, during which they have been members of the church, so imperfect are -their attainments in knowledge that very few possess such a portion
of spiritual discernment as to be deemed worthy of being-admitted to the
holy communion.  From  this idea of their incapacity and imperfect
knowledge of religion, when the zeal of Philip iT. established the inquisition in America in the year 1570, the Indians were exempted from  the
jurisdiction of that severe tribunal,~ and still continue under the inspection
of their diocesans.' Even after the most perfect instruction, their faith is
held to be feebleand dubious; and though some of them have been taught
the learned'languages, and. have gone through the ordinary course of
academic education with applause, their'frailty is still so much suspected,
that few Indians are either ordained' priests, or received into any religious
orderll [184].
From  this brief survey some idea- may be formed of the interior state
of the Spanish colonies,  The various productions -with which they supply
and enrich the mother country, and the system of commercial intercourse
between them, come next in order to be explained.  If thee dominions of
Spain in the New World had been of such moderate extent as bore -a due
proportion to the parent state, the progress of her colonising might have
been attended with the same benefit as that of other nations. But when,
in less than half a century, her:inconsiderate rapacity had' seized on countries larger than all Europe, her inability to fill such vast regions with a
number of inhabitants sufficient for the cultivation of them was so obvious,
as to give a wrong direction to'all the efforts of the colonists.  They did
not form compact settlements, where industry, circumscribed within proper
limits, both in its views and operations, is conducted with that sober persevering spirit which gradually converts whatever is in its possession to a
proper use, and derives thence the greatest advantage.  Instead of this,
the-Spaniards, seduced by the boundless prospect which opened to them,
divided their possessions in America into governments of great extent. As
their number was too small to attempt the regular culture of the immense
provinces which they occupied rather than peopled, they bent their attention to a few objects that allured them with hopes of sudden and exorbitant
gain, and turned away with contempt from the humbler paths of industry,
which lead more slowly, but with greater certainty, to wealth and increase
oft national strength.
Of all the methods by which riches may be acquired, that of searching
* Torquem. lib. xvi. c. 20.   t Id. lib. xvi. c. 25. Garcia Origin 311.  Voy. de Ulloa, i
343.   Q Recop. lib. vi. tit. i. 1. 35.   U Toruem. lib. xvii. c. 13.




366                    HISTORY  OF                   [BOOK VIII.
for the precious metals is one of the most inviting to men who are either
unaccustomed to the regular assiduity with which the culture of the earth
and the operations of commerce must be carried on, or who are so enterprising. and rapacious as not to be satisfied with the gradual returns of profit
which they yield. Accordingly, as soon as the several countries in America
were subjected to the dominion of Spain, this was almost the only method
of acquiring wealth which occurred to the adventurers by whomr they
were conquered. Such provinces of the continent as did not allure them
to settle, by the prospect of their affording gold and silver, were totally
rnelected. Those in which they met with a disappointment of the sanguine expectations they had formed, were abandoned. Even the value of
the islands, the first fruits of their discoveries, and the first object of their
attention, sunk so much in their estimation, when the mines which had
been opened in them were exhausted, that they were deserted by many
of the planters, and left to be occupied by more industrious possessors. All
crowded to Mexico and Peru, where the quantities of gold and silver found
among the natives, who searched for them with little industry and less
skill, promised an unexhausted store, as the recompense of more intelligent
and persevering efforts.
During several years, the ardour of their researches was kept up by
hope rather than success. At length, the rich silver mines of Potosi in
Peru were accidentally discovered in the year 1545* by an Indian, as he
was clambering up the mountains in pursuit of a llama which had strayed
from his flock. Soon after, the mines of Sacotecas in New Spain, little
inferior to the other in value, were opened. Fronl that time successive
discoveries have been made in both colonies, and silver mines are now so
numerous, that the working of them, and of some few mines of gold in the
provinces of Tierra Firme, and the new kingdom of Granada, has become
the capital occupation of the Spaniards, and is reduced into a system no
less complicated than interesting. To describe the nature of the various
ores, the mode of extracting them from  the bowels of the earth, and to
explain the several processes by which the metals are separated from the
substances with which they are mingled, either by the action of fire, or the
attractive powers of mercury, is the province of the natural philosopher or
chymist, rather than of the historian.
The exuberant profusion with which the mountains of the New World
poured forth their treasures astonished mankind, who had been accustomed
hitherto to receive a penurious supply of the precious metals from the more
scanty storts contained in the mines of the ancient hemisphere.  According
to principles of computation, which appear to be extremely moderate, the
quantity of gold and silver that has been regularly entered in the ports of
Spain, is equal in value to four millions sterling annually, reckoning from
the year 1492, in which America was discovered, to the present time.
This, in two hundred and eighty-three years, amounts to eleven hundred
and thirty-two millions. Immense as this sum is, the Spanish writers contend, that as much more ought to be added to it in consideration of treasure
which has been extracted f'rom the minfes, and imported fraudulently into
Spain without paying duty to the King. By this account, Spain has drawn
from the New World a supply of weaikhI amounting at least to two thousand
millions of pounds sterling] [185].
The mines, which have yie!ded this amazing quantity of treasure, are
not worked at the expense of the crown or of the public. In order to
encourage private advent',ir'r:, the person who discovers and works a new
vein is entitled to the properity of it. Upon laying his claim to such a discovery before the gover/rme of the province, a certain extent of land is
* Fernandez, p. 1. lib. xi c. 11.  t Uztariz Theor. y Pract, de Commercia, c 3 Herrera,
dec. viii. lib. xi. c. 15.




AMERICA.                               367
measured off, and a certain number of Indians allotted him, under the
obligation of his opening the mine within a limited time, and of his paying
the customary duty to the King for what it shall produce.  Invited by the
facility with which such grants are obtained, and encouraged by some
striking examples of success in this line of adventure, not only the sanguine
and the bold, but the timid and diffident, enter upon it with astonishing
ardour.  With vast objects always in view, fed continually with hope, and
expecting every moment that fortune will unveil her secret stores, and give
up the wealth which they contain to their wishes, they deem  every other
occupation insipid and uninteresting.  The charms of this pursuit, like the
rage for deep play, are so bewitching, and take such full possession of the
mind, as even to give a new bent to the natural temper. Under its influence the cautious become enterprising, and the covetous profuse. Pow
erful as this charm  naturally is, its force is augmented by the arts of an
order of men known in Peru by the cant name of searchers.  These are
commonly persons of desperate fortune, who, availing themselves of some
skill in mineralogy, accompanied with the insinuating manner and confident
pretensions peculiar to projectors, address the wealthy and the credulous
By plausible descriptions of the appearances which they have discovered
ot rich veins hitherto unexplored; by producing, when requisite, specimens
of promising ore; by affirming, with an imposing assurance, that success is
certain, and that the expense must be trifling, they seldom fail to persuade.
An association is formed; a small sum is advanced by each copartner; the
mine is opened; the searcher is intrusted with the sole direction ct evely
operation: unforeseen difficulties occur; new demands of money are made;
but, amidst a succession of disappointments and delays, hope is never extinguished, and the ardour of expectation hardly abates. For it is observed,
that if any person once enters this seducing path, it is almost impossible to
return; his ideas alter, he seems to be possessed with another spirit;
visions of imaginary wealth are continually before his eyes, and he thinks,
and speaks, and dreams of nothing else.*
Such is the spirit that must be formed, wherever the active exertions of
any society are chiefly employed in working mines of gold and silver. No
spirit is more adverse to such improvements in agriculture and commerce
as render a nation really opulent. If the system of administration in the
Spanish colonies had been founded upon principles of sound policy, the
power and ingenuity of the legislator would have been exerted with as
much ardour in restraining its subjects from such pernicious industry, as is
now employed in alluring them towards it. " Projects of mining," says a
good judge of the political conduct of nations, " instead of replacing the
capital employed in them, together with the ordinary profit of stock,
commonly absorb both capital and profit. They are the projects, therefore, to which, of all others, a prudent lawgiver, who desired to increase
the capital of his nation, would least choose to give any extraordinary
encouragement, or to turn towards them  a greater share of that capital
than would go to themr of its own accord. Sutch, in reality, is the absurd
confidence which all men have in their own good fortune, that wherever
there is the least probability of success, too great a share of it is apt to go
to them of its own accord?'t But in the Spanish colonies, government is
studious to clherish a spirit which it should have laboured to depress, and
by the sanction of its approbation, augments that inconsiderate credulity
which has turned the active industry of Mexico and Peru into such an improper channel.  To this may be imputed the slender progress which
Spanish America has made, during two centuries and a half, either in useful
manufactures, or in those lucrative branches of cultivation which furnish
* Uttoa Entreten. p, 223.  t Dr. Smith's Inquiry, &ec. ii. 155.




368                      HISTO  RY  OF                 [BooK VIII.
the colonies of other nations with their staple commodities. In comparison
with the precious metals every bounty of nature is so much despised, that
this extravagant idea of their value has mingled with the idiom of language
in America, and the Spaniards settled there, denominate a country rich, not
from the fertility of its soil, the abundance of its crops, or the exuberance
of. its pastures, but. on account of the minerals which its mountains contain  in quest of these, they abandon the delightful. plains of Peru and
Mexico, and resort to barren and uncomfortable regions, where they have.
built some of the largest towns which they possess in the New  World.
As the activity and enterprise of the Spaniards originally. took. this dlrection, it is now so difficult to bend them a different way, that although, from
various causes, the gain of working mines is much decreased, the fascination
continues, and almost every person, who takes any active part in the corn
merce of New Spain or Peru, is still engaged in some adventure of this.
kind [186].
But thou-h mines are the chief object of the Spaniards, and the precious
metals which these yield form the principal article in their commerce
with America; the fertile countries which they possess there abound with
other commodities of such value, or scarcity, as to attract a.considerabledegree of attention. Cochineal is a production almost. peculiar to New
Spain, of such demand in commerce that the sale is always certain, and
yet yields such profit as amply rewards the labour and care employed in
rearing the curious insects of which this valuable drug is composed, and
preparing it for the market. Quinquina, or Jesuits' Bark, the most salutary
simple, perhaps, and of most restorative virtue, that Providence, in compassion to human infirmity, has made known unto man, is found only in:
Peru, to which it affords a lucrative branch of commerce. The Indigo ot
Guatimala is superior in quality to that of any province in America,' and:
cultivated to a considerable extant.  Cacao, thouoh not peculiar to the
Spanish colonies, attains to its highest state of perfection there, and, from,
the great consumption of chocolate in Europe, as well as. in America, is a
valuable commodity.  The Tobacco of Cuba, of more: exquisite; flavour
than any brought from the New World; the. Sugar raised in that island,
in Hispamliola, and in New Spain, together with drugs ofr various kinds
may be mentioned among: the natural productions of America which enrici
the Spanish comnmerce.  To these.must be' added an article of no incon
siderable account, the exportation of hides; for which, as well as for many
of those which 1 have enumerated, the Spaniards are,more indebted to the
wonderful fertility of the country, than to their own foresight:and industry.
Th}e domestic aniimals of Europe, particularly horned cattle, have multipliedc
in the New World with a rapidity which almost exceeds belief. A' few
years after the Spaniards settled there, the herds of tame cattle became so
numerous that their proprietors reckoned the!n by thousands-.*  Less atten.
tion being paid, to them as they contiilued to increase, they were suffered
to run wild; and spreading over a country of boundless extent, under amild climate and covered with rich pasture, their number became irm.
mense.  They rainge over the vast plains which extend from Buenos Ayres
towards the Andes, in herds of thirty or forty thousand; and the unlucky
traveller who once falls in among them, may proceed several days before
he cani disentang!'e himself from:among the crowd that covers the face ol
the earth, and seems to have no end. They are- hardly less -numerous in
New Spain, and: in several other provinces: they are killed merely fol.
tle sake of their hides; and the slaughter at certain seasons is so ~reat
th-at the stench of the carcasses, which are left in the field,, would infect'
the air, if large packs of wild' dogs, anld vast flocks. of gallizazos, or.
* Oviedo ap. Ramus. iii. 101, B. IItaklu!t, iiA.' 466 511.




AMERICA                              369
American vultures, the most voracious of all the feathered kind, did not
instantly devour them. The number of those hides exported in every
fleet to Europe, is very great, and is a lucrative branch of commerce.*
Almost all these may be considered as staple commodities peculiar to
America, and different, if we except that last mentioned, from the productions of the mother country.
When the importation into Spain of those various articles from her coloinles first became active and considerable, her interior industry and manufactures were in a state so prosperous, that with the product of these she
was able both to purchase the commodities of the New World, and to
answer its growing demands. Under the reigns of Ferdinand and Isabella,
and Charles V., Spain was one of the most industrious countries in Europe.
Her manufactures in wool, and flax, and silk, were so extensive, as not only
to furnish what was sufficient for her own consumption, but to afford a surplus for exportation. When a market for them, formerly unknown, and
to which she alone had access, opened in America, she had recourse to hei
domestic store, and found there an abundant supply [187]. This new employment must naturally have added vivacity to the spirit of industry.
Nourished and invigorated by it, the manufactures, the population, and
wealth of Spain, might have gone on increasing in the same proportion
with the growth of her colonies. Nor was the state of the Spanish marine
at this period less flourishing than that of its manufactures. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Spain is said to have possessed above a
thousand merchant ships,t a number probably far superior to that of any
nation in Europe in that age. By the aid which foreign trade and domestic industry give reciprocally to each other in their progress, the augmentation of' both must have been rapid.and extensive, and Spain might have
received the same accession of opulence and vigour from her acquisitlonq
in the New World that other powers have derived from their colonies
there.
But various causes prevented this. The same thing happens to nations
as to individuals. Wealth, which flows in gradually, and with moderate
increase, feeds and nourishes that activity which is friendly to commerce,
and calls it forth into vigorous and well conducted exertions; but when
opulence pours in suddenly, and with too full a stream, it overturns all
sober plans of v.dustry, and brings along with it a taste for what is wild
and extravagant and daring in business or in action. Such was the great
and sudden augmentation of power and revenue that the possession of
America brought into Spain; and some symptoms of its pernicious influence upon the political operations of that monarchy soon began to appear.
For a considerable time, however, the supply of treasure from the New
World was scanty and precarious; and the genius of Charles V. conducted
public measures with such prudence, that the effects of this influence were
little perceived. But when Philip II. ascended the Spanish throne, with
talents'far inferior to those of his father, and remittances from the colonies
became a regular and considerable branch of revenue, the fatal operation
of this rapid change in the state of the kingdom, both on the monarch and
his people, was at once conspicuous. Philip, possessing that spirit of unceasing assiduity which often characterizes the ambition of men of moderate talents, entertained such a high opinion of his own resources that he
thought nothing too arduous for him to undertake. Shut up himself in
the solitude of the Escurial, he troubled and annoyed all the nations around
him. He waged open war with the Dutch and English: he encouraged
and aided a rebellious faction in France; he conquered Portugal, and
maintained armies and garrisons in Italy, Africa, and both the Indies. By
* Acosta, lib. iii c.. 33.  Ovallo Hist. of Clili.   Church. Collect. iii 47, sept   Ibid  v. p 680
i392. Lettres Edif. xiii. 235. Feuille., i. Da4   t Caamtuomanes, ii. 140.
VOL. I.-47




370                     HISTORY  OF                    [BooK VIII.
such a multiplicity of great and complicated operations, pursued with
ardour during the course of a long reign, Spain was drained both of men
and money. Under the weak administration of his successor, Philip III.
[A. D. 16111, the vigour of the nation continued to decrease, and sunk into
the lowest decline, when the inconsiderate bigotry of that monarch expel
led at once near a million of his most industrious subjects, at the very time:
when the exhausted state of the kingdom required some extraordinary exertion of political wisdom to augment its numbers, and to revive its strength.
Early in the seventeenth century, Spain felt such a diminution in the numil
ber of her people, that from inability to recruit her armies she was obliged
to contract her operations. Her flourishing manufactures were -fallen into
decay. Her fleets, which had been the terror of all Europe, were ruined.
tIer extensive foreign commerce was lost. The trade between different
parts of her own dominions was interrupted, and the ships which attempted to carry it on were taken and plundered by enemies whom she once
despised. Even agriculture, the primary object of industry in ever prosperous state, was neglected, and one of the most fertile countries in Europe
hardly.raised what was sufficient for the support of its own inhabitants.
In proportion as the population and manufactures of the parent state declined, the demands of her colonies continued to increase.  The Spaniards,
like their monarchs, intoxicated with the wealth which poured in annually
upon them, deserted the paths of industry to which they had been accus-.
tomed, and repaired with eagerness to those regions from which this opulence issued. By this rage of emigration another drain was opened, and
the strength of the colonies augmented by exhausting that of the mother
country.  All those emigrants, as well as the adventurers who-had at first
settled in America, depended absolutely upon Spain for almost every article of necessary consumption.  Engaged in more alluring and lucrative
pursuits, or prevented by restraints which government imposed, they could
not turn their own attention towards establishing the manufactures requisite
for comfortable subsistence. They received (as I have observed in another
place) their clothing, their furniture, whatever ministers to the ease or luxury of life, and even their instruments of labour, from Europe. Spain,
thinned of people and decreasing in industry, was unable to supply their
growing demands.  She had recourse to her neighbours. The manufactures oof the Low Countries, of England, of France, and of Italy, which
her wants called into existence or animated with new vivacity, furnished
in abundance whatever she required. In -vain did the fundamental law,
colcerning the exclusion of foreigners from  trade with America, oppose
this innovation. Necessity, more powerful than any statute, defeated its*
operation, and constrained the Spaniards themselves to concur in eluding'
it. The English, the French, and Dutch, relying on the fidelity and hopour
of Spanish merchants, who lend their names to cover the deceit, send out
their manufactures to America, and receive the exorbitant price for which
they are sold there, either in specie, or in the rich commodities of the
New World. Neither the dread of danger, nor the allurement of profit
ever induced a Spanish factor to betray or defraud the person who confided
in. him;' and that probity, which is the pride and distinction of the nation,
contributes to its ruin. In a short time, not above a twentieth part of the
commodities exported to America, was of Spanish growth or fabric.t All
the rest was the property of foreign merchants, though entered in the
name of Spaniards. The treasure of the New World may be said henceforward not to have belonged to Spain. Before it reached Europe it was
anticipated as the price of goods purchased from foreigners.- That wealth
which by an internal circulation, would have spread through each vein of
industry, and have conveyed life and movement to every branch of manu* Zavala Representacion, p. 5226.   t Campomanes, ii. 138.




AMERE IC A..                         371
facture, flowed out of the kingdom with such a rapid course as neither
enriched nor animated it. On the other hand, the artisans of rival nations,
encouraged by this quick sale of their commodities, improved so much in
skill and industry as to be able to afford them at a rate so low, that the
manufactures of Spain, which could not vie with theirs either in quality
or cheapness of work, were still further depressed.  This destructive
commerce drained off the riches of the nation faster and more completely
than even the extravagant schemes of ambition carried on by its monarchs.
Spain was so much astonished and distressed at beholding her American
treasures vanish almost as soon as they were imported, that Philip III., unable to supply what was requisite in circulation, issued an edict, by which
he endeavoured to raise. copper money to a value in currency nearly equal
to that of silver?; and the lord of the Peruvian and Mexican nines was
reduced to a wretched expedient, which is the last resource of petty im
poverished states.
Thus the possessions of Spain in America have not proved a source oi
population and of wealth to her in the same manner as those of other
nations. In the countries of Europe, where the spirit of indllstry subsists
in full vigour, every person settled in such colonies as are similar' in their
situation to those of Spain, is supposed to give employment to three or
four at homle in supplying his wants.t But wherever the mother country
cannot afford this supply, every emigrant may be considered as a citizen
lost to the community, and strangers must reap all the benefit of answering his demands.
Such has been the internal state of Spain from the close of the sixteenth
century, and such her inability to supply the growing wants of her colonies.
The fatal effects of this disproportion between their demands, and her
capacity of answering them, have been much increased by the mYode in
which Spain has endeavoured to regulate the intercourse between the
mother country and her colonies. It is from her idea of monopolising the
trade with America, and debarring her subjects there from any communication with foreigners, that all her jealous and systematic arrangements
have arisen. These are so singular in their nature and consequences as
to merit a particular explanation.  In order to secure the Inolopoly at
which she aimed, Spain did not vest the trade with her colonies in an
exclusive company, a plan which has been adopted by nations more commercial, and at a period when mercantile policy was an object of greater
attention, and ought to have been better understood. The Dutch gave up
the whole trade with their colonies, both in the East and West Indies, to
exclusive companies. The English, the French, the Danes, have imitated
their example with respect to the East Indian commerce; and the two
former have laid a similar restraint upon some branches of their trade with
the New World. The wit of man cannot, perhaps, devise a method for
checking the progress of industry and population in a new colony more effectual than this. The interest of the colony, and of the exclusive company,
must in every point be diametrically opposite; and as the latter possesses
such advantages in this unequal contest, that it can prescribe at pleasure
the terms of intercourse, the former must not: only buy dear and sell cheap,
but must suffer the mortification of having the increase-of its surplus stock
discouraged by those very persons to whom alone it can dispose of its
productions.T
Spain, it is probable, was preserved from falling into this error of pol cy
by the high ideas which she early formed concerning the riches of the
NYew World. Gold and silver were commodities of too high a value to
vest a monopoly-of them in private hands. The crown wished to retain the
direction of a commerce so inviting; and, in order to secure that, ordainei
*Uztarez. -  law   t Child on Trade and Colonies.  + Smith's Inqlqrv, ii. 171.




372                     HISTO R Y OF                 [BooK VIIthe cargo of every ship fitted out for America to be inspected by the
officers of the Casa de Contratacion in Seville before it could receive a
license to make the voyage; and that, on its return, a report of the cornmodities which it brough-t should be made to the same board before it
could be permitted to land them. In consequence of' this regulation, all
the trade of Spain with the New World centred originally in the port of
Seville, and was gradually'brought into a form, in which it has been con
ducted, with little variation, from the middle of the sixteenth century almost
to our own times. For the greater security of the valuable cargoes sent
to America, as well as for the more easy prevention of fraud, the commerce
of Spain with its colonies is carried on by fleets which sail under strong
convoys. These fleets, consisting of two squadrons, one distinguished by
the name of the Galeons, the other by that of the Flotra, are equipped
annually. Formerly they took their departure from Seville; but as fhe
port of Cadiz has been tound more commodious, they have sailed from it
since the year 1720.
The Galeons destined to supply Tierra Firme, and the kingdoms of
Peru and Chili, with almost every article of luxury or necessary consump
tion, that an opulent people can demand, touch first at Carthagena, and
then at Porto Bello. To the former, the merchants of Santa Martha,
Caraccas. the New Kingdom  of Granada, and several other provinces,
resort. The latter is the great mart for the rich commerce of Peru and
Chili. At the- season when, the Galeons are expected, the product of all
the mines in these two kingdoms, together with their other valuable commodities, is transported by sea to Panama. From  thence, as soon as the
appearance of the fleet from Europe is announced, they are conveyed
across the isthmus, partly on mules and partly down the river Chagre to
Porto Bello. This paltry village, the climate of which, from the pernicious
union of excessive heat, continual moisture, and the putrid exhalations
arising from a rank soil, is more fatal to life than any perhaps in the known
world, is immediately filled with people. From being the residence of a
few Negroes and Mulattoes, and of a miserable garrison relieved every
three months, Porto Bello assumes suddenly a very different aspect, and
its streets are crowded with opulent merchants from every corner of Peru
and the adjacent provinces. A fair is opened, the wealth of America is
exchanged for the manufactures of Europe; and, during its prescribed term
of forty days, the richest traffic on the face of the earth is begun and
finished with that simplicity of transaction, and that unbounded cotnfidence,
which accompany extensive commerce [188]. The Flota holds its course
to Vera Cruz.'he treasures and commodities of New Spain, and the
depending provinces, which were deposited at Puebla de los Angeles, in
expectation of its arrival, are carried thither; and the commercial operations of Vera Cruz, conducted in the same manner with those of Porto
Bello, are inferior to them only in importance and value. Both fleets, as
soon'as they have completed their cargoes from America, rendezvous at
the Havana, and return in company to Europe.
The trade of Spain with her colonies, while thus fettered and restricted,
came necessarily to be conducted. with the same spirit, and upon the same
principles as that of an exclusive company. Being confined to a single
port, it was of course thrown into a few hands, and almost the whole of it
was gradually engrossed by a small number of wealthy houses, formerly
in Seville, and now in Cadiz. These by combinations, which they can
easily form, mnay altogether prevent that competition which preserves
commodities at their natural price; and by acting in concert, to which
they are prompted by their mutual interest, they may raise or lower the
value of them at pleasure. In consequence of this, the price of European
goods in America is always high, and often exorbitant. A hundred, two
hundred, and even three hundred per cent., are profits not uncommon in




AMERICA.                              373
heo commerce of Spain with her colc!-nies.*  From  the same engrossing'
spirit it frequently happens that traders of the second order, whose warehouses do not contain a complete assortment of commodities for the American market, cannot purchase from the more opulent merchants such goods
as they want at a lower price than that for which they are sold in the
colonies. With the same vigilant jealousy that an exclusive company
guards against the intrusion of the free trader, those overgrown monopolists
endeavour to check the progress of every one A'hose encroachments they
dread.t  This restraint of the American commerce to one port not only
affects its domestic state, but limits its foreign operations. A monopolist may
acquire more, and certainly will hazard less, by a confined trade which
yields exorbitant profit, than by an extensive commerce in which he receives
only a moderate return of gain.  It is often his interest not to enlarge, but
to circumscribe the sphere of his activity; and instead of calling forth
more vigorous exertions of commercial industry, it may be the object ot
his attention to check and set bounds to them. By some such maxim the
mercantile policy of Spain seems to have regulated its intercourse with
America.  Instead of furnishing the colonies with European goods in such
quantity as might render both the price and the profit moderate, the merchants of' Seville and Cadiz seem to have supplied them with a sparing
hand, that the eagerness of competition, among customers obliged to purchase in a scanty market, mliht enable the Spanish factors to dispose of
their cargoes with exorbitant gain.  About the middle of the last century,
when the exclusive trade to America from Sevifle was in its most flourishing
state, the burden of the two united squadrons of the Galeons and Flota did
not exceed twenty-seven thousand five hundred tons.$  The supply which
such a fleet could carry must have been very inadequate to the demands
of those populous and extensive colonies, which depended upon it for all
the luxuries and many of the necessaries of life.
Spain early became sensible of her declension from her former prosperity; and many respectable and virtuous citizens employed their thoughts
in devising methods for reviving the decaying industry and commerce of
their country.  From  the violence of the remedies proposed, we may
judge how desperate and fatal the malady appeared.  Some, confounding
a violation of police with criminality against the state, contended that, in
order to check illicit commerce, every person convicted of carrying it on
should be punished with death, and confiscation of all his effects.~ others,
forgetting the distinction between civil offences and acts of impiety, insisted
that contraband trade should be ranked among the crimes reserved for the
cognisance of the Inquisition; that such as were guilty of it might be
tried and punished according to the secret and summary form in which
that dreadful tribunal exercises its jurisdiction.l[ Others, uninstructed by
observing the pernicious effects of monopolies in every country where they
have been established, have proposed to vest the trade with America in
exclusive companies, which interest would render the most vigilant guardians
of the Spanish commerce against the encroachment of the interlopers.~
Besides these wild projects, many schemes, better digested and more
beneficial, were suggested.  But under the feeble monarchs with whom,
the reign of the Austrian line' in Spain closed, incapacity and indecision
are conspicuous in every department of government. Instead of taking
for their model the active administration of Charles V., they affected to
imitate the cautious procrastinating wisdom of Philip II.; and destitute of
his talents, they deliberated perpetually, but determined nothing. No
remedy was applied to the evils under which the national commerce,
* B. Ulioa P:etabliss. part ii p. 191.   t Smith's Inquiry, ii. 171. Campomanes, Educ. Popul,
i. 4:3.  t Ibid. i. 435. ii. 140..  M. de Santa Cruz Comrnmercia Sielto, p. 14.   ii Mloncada
Restauracion politica de Espagna, p. 41.  1[ Zava!la y Augncn Representacion, &c. p. 190




374                    HISTORY   OF                  [BooK VIII
domestic as well as foreign, languished. These evils continued to increase
and Spain, with dominions more extensive and more opulent than any
European state, possessed neither vigour, nor money [189], nor industry.; At
length, the violence of a great national convulsion roused the slumbering
genius of Spain. The efforts of the two contending parties in the civil
war kindled by the dispute concerning the succession of the crown at the
beginning of this century, called forth, in isome degree, the ancient spirit
and vigour of the nation. While men were thus formling, capable of
adopting sentiments more liberal than those which had influenced the
councils of the monarchy during the course of a century, Spain derived
from an unexpected source the means of availing itself of their talents.
The various powers who favoured the pretensions either of the Austrian
or Bourbon candidate for the Spanish throne, sent formidable fleets and
armies to their support; France, England, and Holland remitted imlmense
sums to Spain. These were spent in the provinces which became the
theatre of war. Part of the American treasure, of which foreigners had
drained the kingdom, flowed back thither. From this era one of the most
intelligent Spanish authors dates the revival of the monarchy; and, however humiliating the truth may be, he acknowledges, that it is to her
enemies his country is indebted for the acquisition of a fund of: circulating
specie in some measure adequate to the exigencies of the public.-''
As soon as the Bourbons obtained quiet possession of the throne, they
discerned this change in the spirit of the people and in the state of the
nation, and took advantage of it; for although that family has not given
monarchs to Spain remarkable for superiority of genius, they have all been
beneficent princes, attentive to the happiness of their subjects, and solicitous to promote it. It was, accordingly, the first object of Philip V. to
suppress an innovation which had crept in during the course of the war,
and had overturned the whole system  of the Spanish commerce with
America. The English and Dutch, by their superiority in naval power,
having acquired such command of the sea as to cut off all intercourse between Spain and her colonies, Spain, in order to furnish her subjects in
America those necessaries of life without which they could not exist, and
as the only means of receiving from thence any part of their treasure, departed so far from the usual rigour of its maxims as to opeh the trade with.Peru to her allies the French. The merchants of St. Malo, to whom
Louis XIV. granted the privilege of this lucrative commerce, engaged in
it with vigour, and carried it on upon principles very different from those
of the Spaniards. They- supplied Peru with European commodities at a
moderate price, and not in stinted quantity. The goods which they imported were conveyed to every province of Spanish America in such abundance as had never been known in any former period. If this intercourse
had been continued, the exportation of European commodities from Spain
must hlave ceased, and the dependence of the colonies on the mother country have been at an end. The most peremptory injunctions were therefore
issued [1713], prohibiting the admission of foreign vessels into any port of
Peru or Chili,t and a Spanish squadron was employed to clear the South
Sea of intruders, whose aid was no longer necessary.
But though, on the cessation of the war which was terminated by the
treaty of lUtrecht, Spain obtained relief from one encroachment on her
commercial system, she was exposed to another which she deemed hardly
less pernicious. As an inducement that might prevail with Queen Anne
to conclude a peace, which France and Spain desired with equal ardourg
Philip V. not only conveyed to Great Britain the.Assiento, or contract for
supplying the Spanish colonies with Negroes, which had formerly been
* Campomanes, 1. 420.  tFrezier Voy. 256. B. Ulloa Retab. ii. 104, &c. Alcedo y Herrera,
Avi-o, &c. 236.




AMERICA.                             375
enjoyed by France, but granted it the more extraordinary privilege ot
sending annually to the fair of Porto Bello a ship of five hundred tons,
laden -with European commodities. In consequence of this, British factories were established at Carthagena, Panama, Vera Cruz, Buenos Ayres,
and other Spanish settlements. The veil with which Spain had hitherto
covered the state and transactions of her colonies was removed. The
agents of a rival nation, residing in the towns of most extensive trade, and
of chief resort, had the best opportunities of becoming acquainted with
the interior condition of the American provinces, of observing their stated
and occasional wants, and of knowing what commodities might be imported
into them with the greatest advantage. In consequence of information
so authentic and expeditious, the merchants of Jamaica and other English
colonies who traded to the Spanish main were enabled to assort and proportion their cargoes so exactly to the demands of the market, that the
contraband commerce was carried on with a facility and to an extent unknown in any former period. This, however, was not the most fatal consequence of the Assiento to the trade of Spain. The agents of the British
South Sea Company, under cover of the importation which they were authorized to make by the ship sent annually to Porto Belle, poured.in their
commodities on the Spanish continent without limitation or restraint. Instead of a ship of five hundred tons, as stipulated in the treaty, they usually,employed one which exceeded nine hundred tons in burthen.'She was
accompanied by two or three smaller vessels, which, mooring in some neighbouring creek, supplied her clandestinely with fresh bales of goods to
replace such as were sold. The inspectors of the fair, and officers of the
revenue, gained by exorbitant presents, connived at the fraud [190]. Thus,
-partly by the operations of the company, and partly by the activity of
private interlopers, almost the whole trade of Spanish America was engrossed by foreigners. The immense commerce of the Galeons, formerly the
pride of Spain, and the envy of other nations, sunk to nothing [17371; and
the squadron itself, reduced from fifteen thousand to two thousand tons,?
served hardly any purpose but to fetch home the royal'revenue arising
from the fifth on silver.
While Spain observed those encroachments, and felt so sensibly their*
pernicious effects, it was impossible not to make some effort to restrain
them. Her first expedient was to station ships of force, under the appellation of guarda costcas, upon the coasts of those provinces to which interlopers most frequently resorted. As private interest concurred with the
duty which they owed to the public, in rendering the officers who com
manded those vessels vigilant and active, some check was given to the
progress of the contraband trade, though in dominions so extensive and so
accessible by sea, hardly any number of cruisers was sufficient to guard
against its inroads in every quarter. This interruption of an intercourse
which had been carried on with so much facility, that the merchants in the
British colonies were accustomed to consider it almost as an allowed branch
of commerce, excited murmurs and complaints. These, authorized in
some measure, and rendered more interesting by several unjustifiable acts
of violence committed by the captains of the Spanish guarda costas, precipitated Great Britain into a war with Spain [17393; in consequence of
which the latter obtained a final release from the Asslento, and was left at
liberty to regulate the commerce of her colonies without being restrained
by any engagement with a foreign power.
As the formidable encroachments of the English on their American
trade, had discovered to the Spaniards the vast consumption of European
goods in their colonies, and taught them the advantage of accommodating
their importations to the occasional demand of the various provinces, they
* Alcedo y Herrera, p. 359. Campomanes, i. 436




27G                    HISTORY OF                  [BooK VIII.
perceived the necessity of devising some method of supplying their colo.
nies, different from their ancient one of sending thither periodical fleets.
That mode of communication had been found not only to be uncertain, as
the departure of the Galeons and Flota was sometimes retarded by various
accidents, and often prevented by the wars which raged in Europe; but
long experience had shown it to be ill adapted to a ord America a regular and timely supply of what it wanted. The scarcity of European
goods in the Spanish settlements frequently became excessive; their price
rose to an enormous height; the vigilant eye of mercantile attention did
not fail to observe this favourable opportunity; an ample supply was poured
in by interlopers from the English, the French, and Dutch islands; and
when the Galeons at length arrived, they found the markets so glutted by
this illicit commerce, that there was no demand for the commodities with
which they were loaded. In order to remedy this, Spain has permitted a
considerable part of her commerce with America to be carried on by regis-.
ter ships. These are fitted out during the intervals between the stated
seasons when the Galeons and Flota sail, by merchants in Seville or Cadiz,
upon obtaining a license from the council of the Indies, for which they pay
a very high premium, and are destined for those ports in America where
any extraordinary demand is foreseen or expected. By this expedient,
such a regular supply of the commodities for which there is the greatest
demand is conveyed to the American market, that the interloper is no
longer allured by the same prospect of excessive gain, or the people in the
colonies urged by the same necessity to engage in the hazardous adventures
of contraband trade.
In proportion as experience manifested the advantages of carrying on
trade in this mode, the number of register ships increased; and at length,
in the year 1748, the Galeons, after having been employed upwards of
two centuries, were finally laid aside. From that period there has been
no intercourse with Chili and Peru but by single ships, despatched from
time to time as occasion requires, and when the merchants expect a profitable market will open. These ships sail round Cape Horn, and convey
directly to the ports in the South Sea the productions and manufactures ol
Europe, for which the people settled in those countries were formerly
obliged to repair to Porto Bello or Panama. These towns, as has been
formerly observed, must gradually decline, when deprived of that commerce to which they owed their prosperity. This disadvantage, however,
is more than compensated by the beneficial effects of this new arrangenment, as the whole continent of South America receives new supplies of
European commodities with so much regularity, and in such abundance, as
must not only contribute greatly to the happiness, but increase the population of all the colonies settled there. But as all the register ships destined
for the South Seas must still take their departure from Cadiz, and are
obliged to return thither,? this branch of the American commerce, even in
its new and improved form, continues subject to the restraints of a species
of monopoly, and feels those pernicious effects of it which I have already
described.
Nor has the attention of Spain been confined to regulating the trade
with its more flourishing colonies; it has extended likewise to the reviving
commerce in those settlements where it was neglected, or had decayed.
Among tile new tastes which the people of Europe have acquired in consequence of importing the productions of those countries which they
conquered in America, that for chocolate is one of the most universal
The use of this liquor, made with a paste formed of the nut or almolnd
of the cacao tree- compounded with various ingredients, the Spaniards first
learned from the Mexicans; and it has appeared to them, and to the other
Campomanes, i 434. 440




AMERICA.                             377
European nations, so palatable, so nourishing, and. so wholesome, that it
has become a commercial article of considerable importance. The cacao
tree grows spontaneously in several parts of the torrid zone; but the nuts
of the best quality, next to those of Guatimala on the South sea, are produced in the rich plains of Caraccas, a province of Tierra Firme. In
consequence of this acknowledged superiority in the quality of cacao in
that province, and its communication with the Atlantic, which facilitates
the conveyance to Europe, the culture of the cacao there is more extensive
than in any district of America. But the Dutch, by the vicinity of their
settlements in the small islands of Curazoa and Buenos Ayres, to the coast
of Caraccas, gradually engrossed the greatest part of the cacao trade.
The traffic with the mother country for this valuable commodity ceased
almost entirely; and such was the supine negligence of the Spaniards, or
the defects of their commercial arrangements, that they were obliged to
receive from the hands of foreigners this production of their own colonies
at an exorbitant price. In order to remedy an evil no less disgraceful than
pernicious to his subjects, Philip V., in the year 1728, granted to a body
of merchants an exclusive right to the commerce with Caraccas and
Cumana, on condition of their employing, at their own expense, a sufficient
number of armed vessels to clear the coast of interlopers. This society,
distinguished sometimes by the name of the Company of Guipuscoa, from
the province of Spain in which it is established, and sometimes by that of
the Company of Caraccas, from the district of America to which it trades,
has carried on its operations with such vigour and success, that Spain has
recovered an important branch of commerce which she had suffered to be
wrested from her, and. is plentifully_supplied with an article of extensive
consumption at a moderate price. Not only the parent state, but the colony
of Caraccas, has derived great advantages from  this institution; for
although, at the first aspect, it may appear to be one of those monopolies
whose tendency is to check the spirit of industry instead of calling it forth
to new exertions, it has been prevented from operating in this manner by
several salutary regulations framed upon foresight of such bad effects, and
on purpose to obviate them. The planters in the Caraccas are not left to
depend entirely on the company, either for the importation of European
commodities or the sale of their own productions. The inhabitants of the
Canary islands have the privilege of sending thither annually a register
ship of considerable burden; and from Vera Cruz, in New Spain, a free
trade is permitted in every port comprehended in the charter of the
company. In consequence of this, there is such a competition, that both
with respect to what the colonies purchase and what they sell, the price
seems to be fixed at its natural and equitable rate. The company has not
the power of raising the former, or of degrading the latter, at pleasure;
and accordingly, since it was established, the increase of culture, of population, and of live stock, in the province of Caraccas, has been very considerable [1911.
But as it is slowly that nations relinquish any system which time has
rendered venerable, and as it is still more slowly that commerce can be
diverted from the channel in which it has long been accustomed to flow,
Philip V in his new regulations concerning the American trade, paid such
deference to the ancient maxim of Spain, concerning the — limitation ot
Importation from the New World to one harbour, as to oblige both the
register ships which returned from Peru, and those of the Guipuscoan
Company from Caraccas, to deliver their cargoes in the port of Cadiz.
Since his xeign, sentiments more liberal and enlarged begin to spread in
Spain. r'lhe spirit of philosophical inquiry, which it is the glory of the
present age to have turned from frivolous or abstruse speculations to the
business and affairs of men, has extended its influence beyond the Pyrenees. In the researches of ingenious authors concerning the police or
VOL. I. —-48                 18




~378                   HISTORY  OF                   [Boox VIII.
commerce of nations, the errors and defects of the Spanish system with
respect to both met every eye, and have not only been exposed with.severity, but are held up as a warning to other states. The Spaniards, stung
with the reproaches of these authors,orr convinced by their arguments,
and admonished by several enlightened writers of their own country, seem
at length to have discovered the destructive tendency of those narrow
maxims, which, by cramping commerce in all its operations, have so long
retarded its progress. It is to the monarch now on the throne that Spainis
indebted for the first public regulation formed in consequence of such
enlarged ideas.'While Spain adhered with rigour to her ancient maxim concerning her
commerce with America, she was so much afraid of opening any channel
by which an illicit trade might find admission into the colonies, that she
almost shut herself out from any intercourse with them but that which was
carried on by her annual fleets. There was no establishment, for a regular
communication of either public or private intelligence,between;the mother
country and its American settlements. From the want of this necessary
institution, the operations of the state, as well as the business of individuals,
vere retarded, or' conducted unskilfully, and Spain often received from
foreigners her first information with respect to very interesting events in
her own colonies. But though this defect in police was sensibly felt, and.the remedy for it was obvious, that jealous spirit.with which the Spanish
monarchs guarded the exclusive trade, restrained them from applying it.
At length Charles Ill. surmounted those considerations which had deterred
his predecessors, and in the year 1764 appointed packet boats to be
des atched on the first day of each month from Corugna to the Havanna
or orto Rico. From thence letters are conveyed in smaller vessels to
Vera Cruz and Porto Bello, and transmitted by post:through the kingdoms
of Tierra'Firme, Granada, Peru, and New Spain.'With no -less regularity
packet boats sail once in two months to Rio de la.Plata, for the accommodation of the provinces to the east of the Andes. Thus provision is made
for a speedy and certain circulation of intelligence throughout the vast
dominions of Spain, from which equal advantages must redound to the
political and mercantile interest of the kingdom.*  With this new arrangement a scheme of extending commerce has been more immediately
connected. Each of the packet boats, which are vessels of some conslderable burden, is allowed to take in' half a loading of such commodities
as are the piroduct of Spain, and most in demand in the ports whither they
are bound. In return for these, they may bring home to Cortugna an equal
quantity of American productions.t This may be considered as the first
relaxation of those rigid laws, which confined the trade with tihe New
World to a single port, and the'first attempt to admit the rest of the kingdom
to some share in it.
It was soon followed by one more decisive. In the year 1765, Charles
III. laid open the trade to the windward islands, Cuba, Hispaniola, Porto
Rico, Margarita, and Trinidad, to his subjects in every province of Spain.
He permitted them to sail from certain ports in each province, which are
specified in the edict, at any season, and with whatever cargo they deemed
most proper, without any other warrant than a simple clearance from the
custom-house of the place whence they took their departure. He released
them from the numerous and oppressive duties imposed on goods exported
to America, and in place of the whole substituted a moderate tax of six
in the hundred on the commodities sent from Spain. He allowed them to
return either to the same port, or to any other where they might hope for a
more advantageous market, and there to enter the homeward cargo or
payment of the usual duties. This ample privilege, which at once brok;
* Pontz Viage de Espagna, vi. Prol. p. 15  t Append. ii. a Ia Educ. Pop. p. 31.




AMER ICA                             379
through all the fences which the jealous policy of Spain had been labourlng
for two centuries and a half to throw round its commercial intercourse
with the New World, was soon after extended to Louisiana, and to the
provinces of Yucatan and Campeachy.*
The propriety of this innovation, which may be considered as the most
liberal effort of Spanish legislation, has appeared from its effects. Prior
to the edict in favour of the free trade, Spain derived hardly any benefit
from its neglected colonies in Hispaniola, Porto Rico, Margarita,'and Trinidad. Its commerce with Cuba was inconsiderable, and that of Yucatan
and Campeachy was engrossed almost entirely by interlopers. But as soon
as- a general liberty of trade was permitted, the intercourse with those provinces revived, and has gone on with a rapidity of progression of which
there are few examples in the history of nations. In less than ten years,
the trade of Cuba has been more than tripled. Even in those settlements
where, from the languishing state of industry, greater efforts were requisite
to restore its activity, their commerce has been doubled. It is computed
that such a number of ships is already employed in the free trade, that the
tonnage of them far exceeds that of the Galeons and Flota at the most
flourishing era of their commerce. The benefits of this arrangement are
not confined to a few merchants established in a favourite port. They are
d;ffused through every province of the kingdom; and, by opening a new
market for their various productions and manufactures, must encourage
and add vivacity to the industry of the farmer and artificer. Nor does
the kingdom profit only by what it.exports; it derives advantage likewise
from what it receives in return, and has the prospect of being soon able to
supply itself with several commodities of extensive consumption, for which
it formerly depended on foreigners. The consumption of sugar in Spain
is perhaps as great, in proportion to the number of its inhabitants, as that
of any European kingdom.  But though possessed of countries in the
New World whose soil and climate are most proper for rearing the sugarcane; though the domestic culture of that valuable plant in the kingdomn of
Granada was once considerable; such: has been the fatal tendency of ill
judged institutions in America, and-such the pressure of improper taxes in
Europe, that Spain has lost almost entirely this branch of industry, which
has enriched other nations. this connmodity, which has now become an
article of primary necessity in Europe, the Spaniards were obliged to purchase of foreigners, and had the mortification to see their country drained
annually of great sums on that account.4  But, if that spirit which the permission of free trade has put in motion shall persevere in its efforts with the
same vigour, the cultivation of sugar in Cuba and Porto Rico may increase
so much, that in a few years it is probable that their growth of sugars may
be equal to the demand of the kingdom.
Spain has been induced, by'her experience of the beneficial consequences resulting from having relaxed somewhat of the rigour of her ancient
laws, with respect to the commerce of the mother country with the colonies, to permit a more liberal intercourse of one colony with another. By
one of the jealous maxims of the old system, all the provinces situated on
the South seas were prohibited, under the most severe penalties, from
holding any communication with one another. Though each of these yields
peculiar productions, the reciprocal exchange of which might have added
to the happiness of their respective inhabitants, or have facilitated their
progress in industry, so solicitous was the Council of the Indies to prevent
their receiving any supply of their wants but by the periodical fleets from
Europe, that, in order to guard against this, it cruelly debarred the Spaniards in Peru, in the southern provinces of New Spain, in Guatimala, and
the new kingdom of Granada, from such a correspondence with their fellow
* Append. ii. a la Educ. Pop. 37. 54. 91.    tJztariz, c. 94.




380                     HISTOR Y  OF                   [BooK VIII.
subjects as tended manifestly to their mutual prosperity. Of all the numerous restrictions devised by Spain for securing the exclusive trade v "thb her
American settlements, none perhaps was more illiberal, none seems to
have been more sensibly felt, or to have produced more hurtful effects.
This grievance, coeval with the settlements of Spain in the countries situated on the Pacific Ocean, is at last redressed. In the year 1774, Charles
III. published an edict, granting to the four great provinces which I have
mentioned the privilege of a free trade with each other.* [192]  RWhat
may be the effects of opening this communication between countries des-tined by their situation fobr reciprocal intercourse, cannot yet be determined
by experience. They can hardly fail of being beneficial and extensive.
The motives for granting this permission are manifestly no less laudable
than the principle on which it is founded is liberal; and both discover the
progress of a spirit in Spain, far- elevated above the narrow prejudices and
maxims on which her system for regulating the trade and conducting the
government of her colonies was originally bounded.
At the same time that Spain has been intent on introducing regulations,
suggested by more enlarged views of policy, into her system of American
commerce, she has not been inattentive to the interior government of her
colonies. Here, too, there was much room for reformation and improvement; and Don Joseph Galvez, who has now the direction of the department of Indian affairs in Spain, has enjoyed the best opportunities, not only
of observing the defects and corruption in the political frame of the colonies, but of discovering the sources of those evils. After being employed
seven years in the New World on an extraordinary mission, and with very
extensive powers, as inspector-general of New Spain; after visiting in person the remote provinces of Cinaloa, Sonora, and California, and making
several important alterations in the state of the police and revenue; lihe
began his ministry with a general reformation of the tribunals of justice in
America. In consequence of the progress of population and wealth in the
colonies, the business of the Courts of Audience has increased so much
that the number of judges of which they were originally composed has
been found inadequate to the. growing labours and duties of the office, and
the salaries settled upon them have been deemed inferior to the dignity of
the station. As a remedy fobr both, he obtained a royal edict, establishing
an additional number of judges in each Court of Audience, with higher
titles, and more ample appointments.4
To the same intelligent minister Spain is indebted for a new distribution
of government in its American provinces. Even since the establishment ot
a third viceroyalty in the new kingdom of Granada, so great is the extent
of the Spanish dominions in the New World, that several places subject to
the jurisdiction of each viceroy were at such an enormous distance from
the capitals in which they resided, that neither their attention nor their
authority could reach so far. Some provinces subordinate to the viceroy
of New Spain lay above two thousand miles from Mexico. There were
countries subject to the viceroy of Peru still further from Lima.  The
people in those remote districts could hardly be said to enjoy the benefit
of civil government. The oppression and insolence of its interior ministers
they often feel, and rather submit to these in silence than involve themselves in the expense and trouble of resorting to the distant capital, where
alone they can find redress. As a reniedy for this, a fburth viceroyalty
has been erected, [Aug. 1776] to the jurisdiction of which are subjected
the provinces of Rio de la Plata, Buenos Ayres, Paraguay, Trucutan,
Potosi, St. Cruz de la Sierra Charcas, and the towns of KIendoza and St.
Juan. By this well judged arrangement two advantages are gained. All
* Real Cedula penes me. Pontz Viage de Espagna vi. Prologo, p. 2.    t Gazeta de Madrid
19thb March, 177




AMERICA.                             381
the Inconveniences occasioned by the remote situation of those provinces,
which had been long felt, and long complained of, are in a great measure
removed. The countries most distant from Lima are separated from the
viceroyalty of Peru, and united under a superior, whose seat of government at Buenos Ayres will be commodious and accessible. The contraband
trade with the Portuguese, which was become so extensive as must have
put a final stop to the exportation of commodities from  Spain to her
southern colonies, may be checked more thoroughly, and with greater
facility, when the supreme magistrate, by his vicinity to the places'n
which it is carried on, can view its progress and effects with his own eyts
Don Pedro Zevallos, who has been raised to this new  dignity, with
appointments equal to those of the other viceroys, is well acquainted both
with the state and the interests of the couintries over which he is to preside,
having served in them long, and with distinction. By this dismemberment,
succeeding that which took place at the erection of the viceroyalty of the
new kingdoin of Granada, almost twvo-third parts of the territories originally subject to the viceroys of Peru, are now lopped off from their
]urisdiction.
The limits of the viceroyalty of New Spain have likewise been considerably circumscribed, and with no less propriety and discernment. Four of
its most remote provinces, Sonora, Cinaloa, California, and New Navarre,
have been formed into a separate government. The Chevalier de Croix,
who is intrusted with this command, is not dignified with the title of viceroy, nor does he enjoy the appointments belonging to that rank; but his
Jurisdiction is altogether independent on the viceroyalty of New Spain.
The erection of this last government seems to have been suggested not only
by the consideration of the remote situation of those provinces from Mexico,
but by attention to the late discoveries made there which I have mentioned.*  Countries containing the richest mines of gold that have hitherto
been discovered in the New World, and which probably may rise into
greater importance, required the immediate inspection of a governor to
whom  they should be specially committed. As every consideration of
duty, of interest, and of vanity, must concur in prompting those new
governors to encourage such exertions as tend to diffuse opulence and prosperity through the provinces committed to their charge, the beneficial
effects of this arrangement may be considerable. Many districts in America, long depressed by the languor and feebleness natural to provinces
which compose the extremities of an overgrown empire, may be animated
with vigour and activity when brought so near the seat of power as to feel
its invigorating influence.
Such, since the accession of the princes of the house of Bourbon to the
throne of Spain, has been the progress of their regulations, and the gradua
expansion of their views with respect to the commerce and government of
their American colonies. Nor has their attention been so entirely engrossed
by what related to the more remote parts of their domicions, as to render
them neglectful of what was still more important, the reformation of domestic errors and defects in policy. Fully sensible of the causes to which the
declension of Spain from her former prosperity ought to be imputed, they
have made it a great object of their policy to revive a spirit of industry
among their subjects, and to give such extent and perfection to their manufactures as may enable them to supply the demands of America from their
own stock, and to exclude foreigners from a branch of commerce which has
been so fatal to the kingdom. This they have endeavoured to accomplish
by a variety of edicts issued since the peace of Utrecht. They have
granted bounties for the encouragement of some branches of industry; they
have lowered the taxes on others; they have either entirely prohibited, or
~ Book vii.




382                    HIt  TORY  OF                   [BooK VIII.
have loaded with additional duties, such foreign manufactures as come in
competition with their own; they have instituted societies for the improvement of trade and agriculture; they have planted colonies of husbandmen
in some uncultivated districts of Spain, and divided among them the waste
fields; they have had recourse to every expedient devised by commercial
wisdom or commercial jealousy, for reviving their own industry, and discountenancing that of other nations. These, however, it is not my province to explain, or to inquire into their propriety and effects. There is
no effort of legislation more arduous, no experiment in policy more uncertain than an attempt to revive the spirit of industry where it has declined,
or to introduce it where it is unknown. Nations, already possessed of
extensive commerce, enter into competition with such advantages, derived
from the large capitals and extensive credit of their merchants, the dexterity
of their Inanufacturers, and the alertness acquired by habit in every department of business, that the state which aims at rivalling or supplanting them,
must expect to struggle with many difficulties, and be content to advance
slowly. If the quantity of productive industry, now in Spain, be compared
with that of the kingdom under the last listless monarchs of the Austrian
line, its progress must appear considerable, and is sufficient to alarm  the
jealousy, and to call forth the most vigorous efforts of the nations now in
possession of the lucrative trade which the Spaniards aim at wresting from
themn. One circumstance may render those exertions of Spain an object
of more serious attention to the other European powers. T'hey are not to
be ascribed wholly to the influence of the crown and its ministers.  The
sentiments and spirit of the people seem to second the provident care of
their monarchs, and to give it greater effect.  The nation has adopted more
liberal ideas, not only with respect to commerce, but domestic policy. In
all the later Spanish writers, defects in the arrangement of their country
concerning both are acknowledged, and remedies proposed, which ignorance
rendered their ancestors incapable of discerning, and pride would not have
allowed them  to confess [193]. But after all that the Spaniards have
done, much remains to do. Many pernicious institutions and abuses, deeply
incorporated with the system of internal policy and taxation, which has
been long established in Spain, must be abolished before industry and
manufactures can recover an extensive activity.
Still, however, the commercial regulations of Spain with respect to her
colonies are too rigid and systematical to be carried into complete execution. The legislature that loads trade with impositions too heavy, or fetters it by restrictions too severe, defeats its own intention, and is only multiplying the inducements to violate its statutes, and proposing a high premium  to encourage illicit traffic. The Spaniards, both in Europe and
America, being circumscribed in their mutual intercourse, by the jealousy
of the crown, or oppressed by its exactions, have their invention continually
on the stretch how to elude its edicts.  The vigilance and ingenuity of
private interest discover means of effecting this, which public wisdomn cannot foresee nor public authority prevent.  This spirit, counteracting that
of' the laws, pervades the commerce of Spain with America in all its
branches; and from the highest departments in government descends to
the lowest.  The very officers appointed to check contraband trade are
Often employed as instruments in carrying it on; and the boards instituted
to restrain and punish it are the channels through which it flows. The
King is supposed, by the most intelligent Spanish writers, to be defrauded,
by various artifices, of more tharn one half of the revenue which he ought
to receive from America;' and as long as it is the interest of so rmany
persons to screen those artifices from detection, the knowledge of them
will never reach the throne. " How many ordinances," says Corita,'" how
* Solorz. de Ind. Jure, ii, lib. v.




AME R I CA.                           383
iany instructions, how many letters from our sovereign, are sent in order
to correct abuses! and how little are they observed, and what smiall advantage is derived from them'! To me the old observation appears just,
thai. where there are many physicians and many medicines, tllere is a want
of health; where there are many laws and many judges, there is want
of justice.  We have viceroys, presidents, governors, oydors, corrigidors,
alcaldeS; and thousands of alguazils abound every where; but notwvithstanding all these, public abuses continue to mutiply.' Timre  las- increased the evils which he lamented as early as the reign of Philip 11.
A' spirit of corruption has infected all the colonies of Spain in America.
Men farremoved from the seai of government; impatient to acquire wealth,
that they may return speedily from what they are apt to consider as a state
of exile in a remote unhealthful country; allured by opportunities too
tempting to be resisted, and seduced by the example of those around them:;
find their sentiments of honour and of duty gradually relax.  In private
life they give themselves up to a dissolute luxury, while in their public
conduct they become unmindful of what they owe to their sovereign and
to their country.
Before I close this account of the Spanish trade in Amrerica- there remains
one detached but important branch of it to be mentioned. Soon after his
accession to the throne, Philip II. formed a scheme of planting a colony in
the Philippine islands which had been neglected since the tire of their
discovery;, and he accomnplished it by means of an armament fitted o ut
from Nev Spaint [1564]. Manila, in the island of Lucolia, was the sta':
tion chosen -for the capital of this new' establishment. From  it an active
commercial intercourse began with' the Chinese. and a considerable num
ber'o that industrious people, allured by the prospect of gain, settled in
the Philippine islands under the Spanish protection.  They supplied the
colony so amply with all the valuable productions and manufactures of the
East as enabled it to open a trade with America, by a course of navigation
the longest from land to land on our globe. In the infancy of this trade,
it was carried on with:Callao, on the coast of Peru; but experience having
discovered the ilipropiriety cf:fixing upon that as the port of comimunication'With Manila, the staple of the'conmmerce between the:East and West
was removed from Callao to Acapulco, on the coast of New Spain.
After various arrangements it has been brought into a regular form. One
or two ships depart annually frfom' Acapulco, which' are permitted to carry
out silver to the- amount of:five'hundred thousand pesos;I but they ha:ve
hardly any thing else of-value on board; i return for which they bring
back spices, drugs, china, and japan wares, calicoes, chintz, muslins, silks,
and every precious article with which the benignity of the climate, or the
ingenuity of its people has enabled the East to supply the rest of the
world. For some time the merchants of Peru were' admitted to' participate. in' this traffic, and might send annually a ship to Acapulco, to wait
the arrival of the vessels from Manila, and receive a proportional share of
the commodities' which they imported.'. At' length the Peruvians were excluded from this' trade by most rigorous edicts, and all the commodities
from the East'reserved'solely for'the consumption of New Spain.
In consequence of this indulgence, the inhabitants of that country enjoy
advantages unknown in the other Spanish colonies. The manufactures of
the East are not only more suited to a warm climate, and more shoVwy
than those of' Europe, but can be sold at a lower price; while, at the same
time, the profits upon them are so considerable as to enrich all those who
are employed either in briinging them  fromr  Manila or vending themi in
New Spain. As the interest both of the buyer and seller concurred in
favouriig this branch of commerce, it has continued' to extend in spite of
M IS. penes mle.  t Torquem. i. lib. v. c. 14.'  Recop. lib. ix. c. 45.1. 6.




a4                     HISTORY  OF                  [Boox VIII.
regulations concerted with the most anxious jealousy to circumscribe it.
Under cover of what the laws permit to be imported, great quantities of
India goods are poured into the markets of New Spain [194]; and when
the Flota arrives at Vera Cruz from Europe, it often finds the wants of the
peole already supplied by cheaper and more acceptable commodities.
There is not, in the commercial arrangements of Spain, any circumstance more inexplicable than the permission of this trade between New
Spain and the Philippines, or more repugnant to its fundamental maxim
of holding the colonies in perpetual dependence on the mother country, by
prohibiting any commercial intercourse that might suggest to them the idea
of receiving a supply of their wants from any other quarter. This permission must appear still more extraordinary, from considering that Spain
herself carries on no direct trade with her settlements in the Philippines,
and grants a privilege to one of her American colonies which she denies to
her subjects in Europe. It is probable that the colonists, who originally
took possession of the Philippines, having been sent out from New Spain
began this intercourse with a country which they considered, in some
measure, as their parent state, before the court of Madrid was aware of
its consequences, or could establish regulations in order to prevent it.
Many remonstrances have been presented against this trade, as detrimental
to Spain, by diverting into another channel a large portion of that treasure which ought to flow into the kingdom, as tending to give rise to a
spirit of independence in the colonies, and to encourage innumerable
frauds, against which it is impossible to guard, in transactions so far removed from the inspection ofgovernment. But as it requires no slight
effort of political wisdom and vigour to abolish any practice which numbers are interested in supporting, and to which time has added the sanction of its authority, the commerce between New Spain and Manila seems
to be as considerable as ever, and may be considered as one chief cause
of the elegance and splendour conspicuous in this part of the Spanish
dominions.
But notwithstanding this general corruption in the colonies of Spain, and
the diminution of the income belonging to the public, occasioned by the
illicit importations made by foreigners, as well as by the'various frauds of
which the colonists themselves are guilty in their commerce with the parent
state, the Spanish monarchs receive a very considerable revenue from their
American dominions. This arises from taxes of various kinds, which may
be divided into three capital branches. The first contains what is paid
to the King, as sovereign, or superior lord of the New World: to this class
belongs the duty on the gold and silver raised from the mines, and the
tribute exacted from the Indians; the former is termed by the Spaniards
the right of signiory, the latter is the duty of vassalacge. The second
branch comprehends the numerous duties upon commerce which accompany and oppress it in every step of its progress, from the greatest transactions
of the wholesale merchant to the petty traffic of the vender by retail. The
third includes what accrues to the king, as head of the church, and administrator of ecclesiastical funds in the New World. In consequence of this
he receives the first fruits, annates, spoils, and other spiritual revenGes,
levied by the apostolic chamber in Europe; and is entitled likewise to the
profit arising from the sale of the bull of Cruzado. This bull, which is
ublished every two years, contains an absolution from past offences by the
ope, and, among other immunities, a permission to eat several kinds of
prohibited food during Lent, and on meagre days. The monks employed
in dispersing those bulls extol their virtues with all the fervour of interested
eloquence; the people, ignorant and credulous, listen with implicit assent;
and every person in the Spanish colonies, of European, Creolian, or mixed
race, purchases -a bull, which is deemed essential to his salvation, at the
rate set upon it by government [1951




AME R ICA.                           85
What may be the amount of those various funds, it is almost impossible
to determine with precision. The extent of the Spanish dominions in
America, the jealousy of government, which renders themr inaccessible to
foreigners, the mysterious silence which the Spaniards are accustomed
to observe with respect to the interior state of their colonies, combine in
covering this subject with a veil which it is not easy to remove. But an
account, apparently no less accurate than it is curious, has lately been
published of the royal revenue in New Spain, from which we may form
some idea with respect to what is collected in the other provinces.
According to that account the crown does not receive firom all the departments of taxation in New Spain above a million of our money, from which
one half must be deducted as the expense of the provincial establishment [196]. Peru, it is probable, yields a  sum not inferior to this; and i
we suppose that all the other regions of America, including the islands,
furnish a third share of equal value, we shall not perhaps be far wide
from th*e truth if we conclude that the net public revenue of Spain, raised
in America, does not exceed a million and a half sterling. This falls far
short of the immense sums to which suppositions, founded upon conjecture,
have raised the Spanish revenue in America [197]. It is remarkable,
however, upon one account. Spain and Portugal are the only European
powers who derive a direct revenue from their colonies. All the advantage that accrues to other nations from their American dominions arises
from the exclusive enjoyment of their trade: but besides this, Spain has
brought her colonies towards increasing the power of the state, and, in
return for protection, to bear a proportional share of the common burden.
Accordingly, the sum which I have computed to be the amount of the
Spanish revenue from America arises wholly from the taxes collected
there, and is far from being the whole of what accrues to the king from
his dominions in the New World. The heavy duties imposed on the commodities exported from Spain to America [198], as well as what is paid
by those which she sends home in return; the tax upon the Negro slaves
with- which Africa supplies the New World, together with several smaller
branches of finance, bring large sums into the treasury, the precise extent
of which I cannot pretend to ascertain.
But if the revenue which Spain draws from America be great, the
expense of administration in her colonies bears proportion to it. In every
department, even of her domestic police and finances, Spain has adopted
a system more complex, and more encumbered with a variety of tribunals
and a multitude of officers, than that of any European nation in which the
sovereion possesses such extensive power. From the jealous spirit with
which 9pain watches over her American settlements, and her endeavours
to guard against fraud in provinces so remote from inspection, boards
and officers have been multiplied there with still more anxious attention.
In a country where the expense of living is great, the salaries allotted to
every person in public office must be high, and must load the revenue with
an immense burden. The parade of government greatly augments the
weight o6f it. The viceroys of Mexico, Peru, and the new kingdom of
Granada, as representatives of the king's person, among people fond of
ostentation, maintain all the state and dignity of royalty. Their courts
are formed upon the model of that at Madrid, with horse and foot guards,
a household regularly established, numerous attendants, and ensigns of
power, displaying such pomp as hardly retains the appearance of a delegated authority. All the expense incurred by supporting the external and
permanent order of government is defrayed by the crown. The viceroys
have, besides, peculiar appointments suited to their exalted station. rfhe
salaries fixed by law  are indeed extremely moderate; that of the
viceroy of Peru is only thirty thousand ducats; and that of the vicerov
VOL. I.-49




386                    HISTORY  OF                   [BooK VIII.
of Mexico twenty thousand ducats.*  Of late they have been raised to forty
thousand.
These salaries, however, constitute but a small part of the revenue
enjoyed by the viceroys. The exercise of an absolute authority extending
to every department of government, and the power of disposing of many
lucrative offices, afford them many opportunities of accumulating wealth.
To these, which may be considered as legal and allowed emoluments,
large sums are often added by exactions, which, in countries so far removed
from the seat of government, it is not easy to discover, and impossible to
restrain. By monopolising some branches of commerce, by a lucrative
concern in others, by conniving at the frauds of merchants, a viceroy ma
raise such an annual revenue as no subject of any European monarch
enjoys [199]. From the single article of presents made to him on the
anniversary of his Name-day (which is always observed as a high festival),
I am informed that a viceroy has been known to receive sixty thousand
pesos.  According to a Spanish saying, the legal revenues of a viceroy are
unknown, his real profits depend upon his opportunities and his conscience.
Sensible of this. the kings of Spain, as I have formerly observed, grant a
commission to their viceroys only for a few years. This circumstance,:
however, renders them often more rapacious, and adds to the ingenuity and
ardour wherewith they labour to improve every moment of a power which
they know is hastenilng fast to a period; and short as its duration is, it
usually affords sufficient time for repairing a shattered fortune,- or for
creating a new one. But even in situations so trying to human frailty, there
are instances of virtue that remains unseduced. In the, year 1772, the
Marquis de Croix finished the term ol his viceroyalty in New Spain with
unsuspected integrity; and, instead of bringing home exorbitant weal'h,
returned with the admiration and applause of a grateful people, whom his
government had rendered happy.
Rop. fib iii. tit.. c. M.2




HISTORY OF AMERICA.
BOOKS IX. AND X.
CONTAINING THE
HISTORY OF VIRGINIA
TO THE YEAR 1688;
AND THE
HISTORY OF NEW ENGLtA.NI)
TO THE YEAR. J5S




ADVERTISEMENT.
THE original plan of my father. the late Dr. Robertson, with respect to
the history of America, comprehended not only an account of the discovery
of that country, and of the conquests and colonies of the Spaniards, but
embraced also the history of the British and Portuguese establishments in
the New World, and of the settlements made by the several nations of
Europe in the West India Islands. It was his intention not to have published any part of the Work until the whole was completed. In the
Preface to his History of America, he has stated the reasons which induced
him to depart from that resolution, and to publish the two volumes which
contain an account of the discovery of the New World, and of the progress
of the Spanish arms and colonies in that quarter of the globe. He says,
"he had made some progress in the History of British America;" and he
announces his intention to return to that part of his Work as soon as the
ferment which at that time prevailed in the British colonies in America
should subside, and regular government be re-established. Various causes
concurred in preventing him from fulfilling his intention.
During the course of a tedious illness, which he early foresaw would
have a fatal termination, Dr. Robertson at different times destroyed many
of his papers. But after his death, I found that part of the History of
British America which he had wrote many years before, and which is now
offered to the Public. It is written with his own hand, as all his Works
were; it is as carefully corrected as any part of his manuscripts which I
have ever seen; and he had thought it worthy of being preserved, as it
escaped the flames to which so many other papers had been committed.
I read it with the utmost attention; but, before I came to any resolution
about the publication, I put the MS. into the hands of some of those friends
whom my father used to consult on such occasions, as it would have been
rashness and presumption in me to have trusted to my own partial decision.
It was perused by some other persons also, in whose taste and judgment
I have the g;reatest confidence: by all of them I was encouraged to offer it
to the Public, as a fragment curious and interesting in itself, and not inferior
to any of my father's works.
When I determined to follow that advice, it was a circumstance of great
weight with ne, that as I never could think myself at liberty to destroy
those paperw which my father had thought worthy of being preserved, and
as I could not know into whose hands they might hereafter fall, I considered It as certain that they would be published at some future period,
when they inight meet with an editor who, not being actuated by the same
sacred regard fTr the reputation of the Author, which I feel, might make
alterations and additions, and obtrude the whole on the public as a genuine
and authentic work. The MS. is now published, such as it was left by
the Author; nor have I presumed to make any addition, alteration, or correction whatever.
WM. ROBERTSON.
Q.UEEN-ST., EDINBURGH, April, 1796




THE
HISTORY OF: AMERICA.
1BOOK IX.
TH~E dominions of Great Britain in America are next in extent to those
of Spain. Its acquisitions there are a recompense due to those enterprising
talents which prompted the English to enter early on the career of discovery,
and to pursue it with persevering ardour. England was the second nation
that ventured to visit the New World. The account of Columbus's successful voyage filled all Europe with astonishment and admiration. But
in England it did something more; it excited a vehement desire of emulating the glory of Spain, and of aiming to obtain some share in those advantages which were expected in this new field opened to national activity.
The attention of the English court had been turned towards the discovery
of unknown countries by Its negotiation with Bartholomew Columbus
Henry VII. having listened to his propositions with a more favourable ear
than could have been expected from a cautious, distrustful prince, averse
by habit as well as by temper to new and hazardous projects, he was more
easily induced to approve of a voyage for discovery proposed by some
of his own subjects soon after the return of Christopher Colulnbus.
But though the English had spirit to form the scheme, they had not at
that period attained to such skill in navigation as qualified them for carrying it into execution. From the inconsiderate ambition of its monarchs,
the nation had long wasted its genius and inactivity in pernicious and ineffectual efforts to conquer France. When this ill-directed ardour began to
abate, the fatal contest between the houses of York and Lancaster turned
the arms of one half of the kingdom against the other, and exhausted the
vigour of both. During the course of two centuries, while industry and
commerce were making gradual progress, both in the south and north of
Europe, the English continued so blind to the advantages of their own
situation that they hardly began to bend their thoughts towards those
objects and pursuits to which they are indebted for their present opulence
and power. While the trading vessels of Italy, Spain, and Portugal, as
well as those of the Hans Towns, visited the most remote ports in Europe,
and carried on an active intercourse with its various nations, the English
did little more than creep along their own coasts, in small barks, which
conveyed the productions of one country. to another. Their commerce
was almost wholly passive. Their wants were supplied by strangers;
and whatever necessary or luxury of life their own country did not yield
was imported hn foreign bottoms. The cross of St. George was seldo,
displayed beyond the precincts of the narrow seas. Hardly any English




390                    HISTORY  OF                   [Book IX.
ship traded with Spain or Portugal before the beginning of the fifteenth
century; and half a century more elapsed before the English marines
became so adventurous as to enter the Mediterranean.
In this infancy of navigation, Henry could not commit the conduct of
an armament destined to explore unknown regions to his own subjects.
He invested Giovanni Gaboto, a Venetian adventurer, who had settled in
Bristol, with the chief command; and issued a commission to him and his
three sons, empowering them to sail, under the banner of England, towards
the east, nortn, or west, in order to discover countries unoccupied by any
Christian state; to take possession of them in his name, and to carry on an
exclusive trade with the inhabitants, under condition of paying a fifth part
of the free profit on every voyage to the crown. This commission was
granted on March 5th, 1495, in less than two years after the return of
I olumbus from America.*  But Cabot (for that is the name le assumed
in England, and by which he is best known) did not set out on his voyage
for two years. He, together with his second son Sebastian, embarked at
Bristol [May, 1497], on board a ship furnished by the king, and was accompanled by four small barks fitted out by the merchants of that city
As in that age the most eminent navigators, formed by the instructions of
Columbus, or animated by his example, were guided by ideas derived
from his superior knowledge and experience, Cabot had adopted the system
of that great man concerning the probability of opening a new and shorter
passage to the East Indies by holding a western course. The opinions
which Columbus had formed with respect to the islands which he had
discovered; were universally received. They were supposed to lie contiguous to the great continent of India, and to constitute a part of the vast
countries comprehended under that general name. Cabot accordingly
deemed it probable, that, by steering to the north-west, he might reach
India by a shorter course than that which Columbus had taken, and hoped
to fall in with the coast of Cathay, or China, of whose fertility and opu
lence the descriptions of Marco Polo had excited high ideas. After sailing
for some weeks due west, and nearly on the parallel of the port from which
lihe took his departure, he discovered a large island, which he called Prima
Vista, and his sailors JNewfoundland: and in a few days he descried a
smaller isle, to which he gave the name of St. John.  He landed on
both these [June 24], made some observations on their soil and productions,
and brought off three of the natives. Continuing his course westward,
he soon reached the continent of North America, and sailed along it from
the fifty-sixth to the thirty-eighth degree of latitude, from the coast of
Labrador to that of Virginia. As his chief object was to discover some
inlet that might open a passage to the west, it does not appear that he
landed any where during this extensive run; and he returned to England
without attempting either settlement or conquest in any part of that con,
tinent.f
If it had been Henry's purpose to prosecute the object of the commission given by him to Cabot, and to take possession of the countries which
he had discovered, the success of this voyage must have answered his most
sanguine expectations. His subjects were undoubtedly the first Europeans
who had visited that part of the American continent, and were entitled to
whatever right of property prior discovery is supposed to confer. Countries which stretched in an uninterrupted course through such a large
portion of the temperate zone, opened a prospect of settling to advantage
under mild climates, and in a fertile soil. By the time that Cabot returned
to England, he found both the state of affairs and the king's inclination
unfavourable to any scheme the execution of which would have required
tranquillity and leisure. Henry was involved in a war with Scotland, and
* Hakluyt, iii 4.  t Mmson's Naval Tracts, in Churchill's Collect iii. 211.




AMERIC A.                               391
V:t kingdom was not yet fil ly composed after the conmmotion excited by a
tirmidable insurrection of his own subjects in the west.  An ambassador
from Ferdinand of Arragon was then in London; and as Henry set a high
value upon the friendship of that monarch, for whose character he professed
much admiration, perhaps from its similarity to his own, and was endeavouring to strengthen their union by negotiating the marriage which afterwards took place between his eldest son and the Princess Catharine, he
was cautious of' giving any offence to a prince jealous to excess of all his
rights. From the position of the islands anl continent which Cabot had
discovered, it was evident that they lay within the limits of the ample
donative which the bounty of Alexander VI. had conferred upon Ferdinand
and Isabella.  No person in that age questioned the validity of a papal
grant; and Ferdinand was not of a temper to relinquish any claim to
which he had a shadow of title.  Submission to the authority of the Pope,
and deference for an ally whom he courted, seem to have concurred with
Henry's own situation in determining him to abandon a scheme in which
he had engaged with some degree of ardour and expectation.  No attempt
towards discovery was made in England during the remainder of his reign;
and Sebastian Cabot, finding no encouragement for his active talents there,
entered into the service of Spain.*
This is the most probable account of the sudden cessation of Hemnry's
activity, after such success in his first essay as might have encouraged
him to persevere. The advantages of commerce, as well as its nature,
were so little understood in England about this period, that by an act of
parliament in the year 1488, the taking of interest for the use of money
was prohibited under severe penalties.t And by another law, the profit
arising from dealing in bills of exchange was condemne i as savouring of
usury.t It is not surprising, then, that no great effort should be made to
extend trade by a nation whose commercial ideas were still so crude and
illiberal. But it is more difficult to discover what prevented this scheme
of Henry VII. from being resumed during the reigns of his son and grandson; and to give any reason why no attempt was made, either to explore
the northern continent of America more fully, or to settle in it. Henry
VIII. was frequently at open enmity with Spain: the value of the Spanish
acquisitions in America had become so well known, as might have excited
his desire to obtain some footing in those opulent regions; and during a
considerable part of his reign, the prohibitions in a papal bull would not
have restrained him from making encroachment upon the Spanish dominions.
But the rei'gn of Henry was not favourable to the progress of discovery.
During one period of it, the active part which he took In the affairs of the
continent, and the vigour with which he engaged in the contest between
the two mighty rivals, Charles V. and Francis I., gave full occupation to
the enterprising spirit both of the king and his nobility.  During another
period of his administration, his famous controversy with the court of
Rome kept the nation in perpetual agitation and suspense.  Engrossed by
those objects, neither the king nor the nobles had inclination or leisure to
turn their attention to new pursuits; and without their patronage and aid,
the commercial part of the nation was too inconsiderable to make any
effort of consequence.  Though England by its total separation from  the
church of Rome soon after the accession of Edward VI., disclaimed that
authority which, by its presumptuous partition of the globe between two
* Some schemes of discovery seem to have been formed in England towards the beginning qf
the sixteenth century. But as there is no othei mlelorlal of them than what remains in a patent
granted by the King to the adventurers, it is probah  that they were feeble or abortive projects.
If any attempt had been made in consequence of this ptnent, it would not have escaped the knowledge of a compiler so industrious and inquisitive as Hanluyt. In his patent, Henry restricts the
adventurers from encroaching on the countries discovered by the kings of Portugal, or any other
prince in confederacy with England. Rymer's Federa, vol. xiii. p. 37.
2 Hen.'VII. c 5.    $ 3 Hen. VII. c. 6.




39~2                    HISTORY  OF                    [BOOK IX.
favourite nalions, circumscribed the activity of evrery other state within
very narrow limits; yet a feeble minority, distracted with iaction, was not
a juncture for forming schemes of doubtful success and remote utility.
The bigotry of Mary, and her marriage with Philip, disposed her to pay
a sacred regard to that grant of the Holy See, which vested in a husband,
on whom she doted, an exclusive right to every part of the New World.
Thus, through a singular succession of various causes, sixty-one years
elapsed from the time that the English discovered North America, during
which their monarchs gave little attention to that country which was
destined to be annexed to their crown, and to be a chief source of its
opulence and power.
But though the public contributed little towards the progress of disco
very, naval skill, knowledge of commerce, and a spirit ot enterprise, began
to spread among the English. During the reign of Henry VII1. several
new channels ot trade were opened, and private adventurers visited remote
countries, with which England had formerly no intercourse. Some mer
chants of Bristol, having hitted out two ships for the southern regions of
America, committed the conduct of them to Sebastian Cabot, who had
quitted the service of Spain. He visited the coasts of Brazil, and touched
at the islands of Hispaniola and Puerto Rico; and though this voyage
seems not to have been beneficial to the adventurers, it extended the sphere
of English navigation, and added to the national stock of nautical science.*
Though disappointed in their expectations of profit in this first essay, the
merchants were not discouraged. They sent, successively, several vessels
from different ports towards the same quarter, and seem to have carried on
an interloping trade in the- Portuguese settlements with success.t Nor
was it only towards the West, that the activity of the English was directed.
Other merchants began to extend their commercial views to the East; and
by establishing an intercourse with several islands in the Archipelago, and
with some of the towns on the coast of Syria, they found a new market
for woollen cloths (the only manufacture which the nation had begun to
cultivate,) and supplied their countrymen with various productions of the
East, formerly unknown, or received from the Venetians at an exorbitant
price.T
But the discovery of a shorter passage to the East Indies, by the north
west, was still the favourite project of the nation, which beheld with envy
the vast wealth that flowed into Portugal from its commerce with those
regions. The scheme was accordingly twice resumed under the long
administration of Henry VIII. [1527 and 1536]; first, with some slender
aid from the king, and then by private merchants. Both voyages were
disastrous and unsuccessful. In the former, one of the ships was lost. In
the latter, the stock of provisions was so ill proportioned to the number of
the crew, that, although they were but six months at sea, many perished
with h'unger, and the survivors were constrained to support life by feeding
on the bodies of their dead companions.~
The vigour of a commercial spirit did not relax in the reign of Edward
VI.  The great fishery on the banks of Newfoundland became an object
of attention; and from some regulations for the encouragement of that
branch of trade, it seems to have been prosecuted with activity and suecess.I But the prospect of opening a communication with China and the
Spice Islands, by some other route than round the Cape of Good Hope,
still continued to allure the English more than any scheme of adventure.
Cabot, whose opinion was deservedly of high authority in whatever
related to naval enterprise, warmly urged the English to make another
attempt to discover this passage.  As it had been thrice searched Ifor
in vain, by steering towards the north-west, he proposed that a trial
* Hakluyt, ili 498. - Id. iii 700   + Id. ii. 96, &c,    Id ih. 213, &C. iii. 129, 130  l Id.
Ili  131.




ik[ E RL CA.                        393
should now be made by the north-east; and suplportA:d this advice by
such plausible reasons and conjectures as excited sanguine expectations
of success. Several noblemen and persons of rank, together with some
principal merchants, having associated for this purpose,were incorporated
by a charter from the King, under the title of The Company of Merchant
Adventurers for the Discovery of Regions, Dominions, Islands, and Places
unknown. Cabot, who was appointed governor of this company, soon
fitted out two ships and a bark, furnished with instructions in his own
hand, which discover the great extent both of his naval skill and mercantile
sagacity.
Bir Hugh Willoughby, who was intrusted with the command, stood
dir ctly northwards along the coast of Norway [Mlay 10], and doubled the
North Cape. But in that tempestuous ocean, his small squadron was separated in a violent stormn. Willoughby's ship and bark took refuge in an
obscure harbour in a desert part of Russian Lapland, where he and all his
companions were frozen to death. Richard Chancelour, the captain of
the other vessel, was more fortunate; he entered the White Sea, and winteled in safety at Archangel. TLouAgh no vessel of any foreign nation bad
ever visited that quarter of the globe before, the inhabitants received their
new visiters with an hospitality which would have done honour to a more
polished people. The English learned there, that this was a province of
a vast empire, subject to the Great Duke or Czar of Muscovy, who resided
in a great city twelve hundred miles from Archangel. Chancelour, with
a spirit becoming an officer employed in an expedition for discovery, did
not hesitate a moment about the part which he ol.ght to take, and set out
for that distant capital. On his arrival in Moscow, he was admitted to
audience, and delivered a letter which the captain of each ship had received
from Edward VI. for the sovereign of w-hatever country they should discover, to John Vasilowitz, who at that time filled the Russian throne.
John, though he ruled over his subjects with the cruelty and caprice of a
barbarous despot, was not destitute of political sagacity. He instantly
perceived the happy consequences that might flow from opening an intercourse between his dominions and the western nations of Europe; and.
delighted with the fortunate event to which he was indebted for this unexpected benefit, he treated Chancelour with great respect; and. by a letter
to the King of England [Feb. 1554], invited his subjects to trade in the
Russian dominions, with ample promises of protection and favour.*
Chancelour, on his return, found Mary seated on the English throne.
The success of this voyage, the discovery of a new course of navigation,
the establishment of commnerce with a vast empire, the name of which
was then hardly krnown in the West, and the hope of arriving, in this direction, at those regions which-had been so long the object of desire, excited
a wonderfihl ardour to prosecute the design with greater vigour. Mary,
implicitly guided by her husband in every act of administration, was not
unwilling to turn the commercial activity of her subjects towards a quarter
where it could not excite the jealousy of Spain by encroaching on its possessions. in the New World. She wrote to John Vasilowitz in the most
respectful terms, courting his friendship. She confirmed the charter of
Edward VI., empowered Chancelour, and two agents appointed by the
company, to negotiate with the Czar in her name; and, according to the
spirit of that age, she granted an exclusive right of trade with Russia to
the Corporation of Merchant Adventurers.t In virtue of this, they not
onlv established an active and gainful commerce with Russia, but, in hopes
of reaching China, they pushed their discoveries eastwaid to the coast of
Nova Zembla, the Straits of Waigatz, and towards the mouth of the great
river Oby. But'in those frozen seas, which Nature seems not to have
* IIak!uyt i. 226, &c.  t Id. i. 258, &c.'OL. I -50




394                     HISTORY  OF                    [Boox IX.
destined for navigation, they were exposed to innumerable disasters, and
met with successive disappointments.
Nor were their attempts to open a communication with India made only
in this channel. They appointed somle of their factors to accompany the
Russian caravans which travelled into Persia by the way of Astracan and
the Caspian Sea, instructing them to penetrate as far as possible towards
the cast, and to endeavour not only to establish a trade with those coun
tries, but to acquire every information that might afford ally light towards
the discovery of a passage to China by the north-east.*  Notwithstanding
a variety of dangers to which they were exposed in travelling through so
many provinces inhabited by fierce and licentious nations, some of these
factors reached Bokara in the province of Chorassan; and though prevented
from advancing further by the civil wars which desolated the country, they
returned to Europe with some hopes of extending the commerce of the
Company into Persia, and with much intelligence concerning the state of
those remote regions of the East.S
The successful progress of the Merchant Adventurers in -discovery
roused the emulation of their countrymen, and turned their activity into
new channels. A commercial intercourse, hitherto unattempted by the
English, having been opened with the coast of Barbary, the specimens
which that afforded of the valuable productions of Africa invited some
enterprising navigators to visit the more remote provinces of that quarter
of the globe. They sailed along its western shore, traded in difterent
ports on both sides of the Line, and, after acquiring considerable knowledge
of those countries, returned with a cargo of gold diust, ivory, and other rich
commodities little known at that time in England. This commerce with
Africa seems to have been pursued with vigour, and was at that time no
less innocent than lucrative; for, as the English had then no demand foi
slaves, they carried it on for many years without violating the rights of
humanity. Thus far did the English advance during a period which may
be considered as the infant state of their navigation and commerce; and
Feeble as its steps at that time may appear to us, we trace them with an
interesting curiosity, and look back with satisfaction to the early essays of
that spirit which we now behold in the full maturity of its strength. Even
in those first efforts of the English, an intelligent observer will discern presages of their future improvement. As soon as the activity of the nation
was put in motion, it took various directions, and exerted itself in each,
with that steady, persevering industry which is the soul and guide of commerce. Neither discouraged by the hardships and dangers to which they
were exposed in tlose northern seas which they first attempted to explore,
nor afraid of venturing into the sultry climates of the torrid zone, the English, during the reigns of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Mary, opened
sonle of the most considerable sources of their commercial opulence, and
gave a beginning to their trade with Turkey, with Africa, with Russia, and
with Newfoundland.
By the progress which England had already made in navigation and
commerce, it was now prepared for advancing further; and on the accession of Elizabeth to the throne, a period commenced extremely auspicious
to this spirit which was rising in the nation. The domestic tranquillity of
the kingdom, maintained, almost without interruption, during the course of
a long and prosperous reign; the peace with foreign nations, that subsisted
more than twenty years after Elizabeth was seated on the throne; the
Queen's attentive economy, which exempted her subjects fioIn the burden
of taxes oppressive to trade; the popularity of her administration; were
all favourable to commercial enterprise, and called it forth into vigorous
exertion. The discerning eye of Elizabeth having early perceived that
* Hakluyt, i. 301  t Id. L. 310, &c.




AMERI CA.                            39s
the security of a kingdom environed by the sea depended on its naval
force, she began her government with adding to the number and strength oi
the royal navy; which, during a factious minority, and a reign intent on
no object but that of suppressing heresy, had been neglected, and suffered
to decay. She filled her arsenals with naval stores; she built several
ships of great force, according to the ideas of that age, and encouraged
her subjects to inmitate her example, that they might no longer depend on
foreigners, from whorn the English had hitherto purchased all vessels ot
any considerable burden."  By those efforts the skill of the English artificers
was improved, the number of sailors increased, and the attention of the
public turned to the navy, as the most important national object. Instead
of abandoning any of the new channels of commerce wlhich had been'
opened in the three preceding reigns. the English frequented them with
greater assiduity, and the patronage of their sovereign added vigour to all
their efforts. In order to secure to them the continuance of their exclusive
trade with Russia, Elizabeth cultivated the connection with John Vasilowitz, which had been formed by her predecessor, and, by successive embassies gained his confidence co thoroughly, that the English enjoyed that
lucrative privilege during his long reign. She encouraged the Company
of Merchant Adventurers, whose monopoly of the Russian trade was confirmed by act of parliament,t to resume their design of penetrating into
Persia by land. Their second attempt, conducted with greater prudence,
or undertaken at a more favourable juncture than the first, was more successful. Their agents arrived in the Persian court, and obtained such protection and immunities from  the Shah, that for a course of years they
carried on a gainful commerce in his kingdom;t and by frequenting the
various provinces of Persia, became so well acquainted with the vast riches
of the East, as strengthened their design of opening a more direct intercourse with those fertile regions by sea.
But as every effort to accomplish this by the north-east had proved
abortive, a scheme was formed, under the patronage of the Earl of Warwick, the head of the enterprising family of Dudley, to make a new
attempt, by holding an opposite course by the north-west. The conduct
of this enterprise was committed to Martin Frobisher, an officer of experience and reputation. In three successive voyages [1576, 1577, and
1578,1 he explored the inhospitable coast of Labrador, and that of Green.
land (to which Elizabeth gave the name of JMeta Incognita), without dis
covering any probable appearance of that passage to India for which he
sought.  This new disappointment was sensibly felt, and might have
damped the spirit of naval enterprise among the English, if it had not
resumed fresh vigour, amidst the general exultation of the nation, upon the
successful expedition of Francis Drake. That bold navigator, emulous of
the glory which Magellan had acquired by sailing round the globe, formed
a scheme of attempting a voyage, which all Europe had admired for sixty
years, without venturing to follow the Portuguese discoverer in his adventurous course. Drake undertook this with a feeble squadron, in which
the largest vessel did not exceed a hundred tons, and he accomplished it
with no less credit to himself than honour tq his country. Even in this
voyage, conducted with other views, Drake seems not to have been
inattentive to the favourite object of his countrymen, the discovery of a
new route to India. Before he quitted the Pacific Ocean, in order to stretch
towards the Philippine Islands, he ranged along the coast of California, as
high as the latitude of forty-two degrees north, in hopes of discovering, on
that side, the communication between the two seas, which had so often
been searched for in vain on the other. But this was the only unsuccessftul
attempt of Drake. The excessive cold of the climate, intolerable to men
* Camd Annales, p. 70. edit. 1615; fol.'t slakluyt i. 369.  + Id. i. 344, &c.




396                      HIST ORY  OF                   IBoox IX
who had long been accustomed to tropical heat, obliged him to stop short
in his progress towards the north; and whether or not there be any passage
from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean in that quarter is a point still unascertained.*
From  this period, the English seem  to have confided in their own
abilities and courage, as equal to any naval enterprise. They had now
visited every region to which navigation extended in that age, and had
rivalled the nation of highest repute for naval skill in its most splendid exploit. But notwithstanding the knowledge which they had acquired of
the different quarters of the globe, they had not hitherto attempted any
settlement out of their own country. Their merchants had not yet acquired such a degree either of wealth or of political influence, as was
requisite towards carrying a scheme of colonization into execution. Persons of noble birth were destitute of the ideas and information which might
have disposed them to patronise such a design. The growing power of
Spain, however, and the ascendant over the other nations of Europe to
which it had attained under Charles V. and his son, naturally turned the
attention of mankind towards the importance of those settlements in the
New World, to which they were so much indebted for that pre-eminence.
The intercourse between Spain and England, during the reign of Philip
and Mary; the resort of the Spanish nobility to the English court, while
Philip resided there; the study of the Spanish language, which became
fashionable; and the translation of several histories of America into English, diffused gradually through the nation a more distinct knowledge of the
policy of Spain in planting its colonies, and of the advantages which it
derived from them. When hostilities commenced between Elizabeth and
Philip, the prospect of annoying Spain by sea opened a new career to the
enterprising spirit of the English nobility. Almost every eminent leader
of the age aimed at distinguishing himself by naval exploits. That service,
and the ideas connected with it, the discovery of unknown countries, the
establishment of distant colonies, and the enriching of commerce by new
commodities, became familiar to persons of rank.
In consequence of all those concurring causes, the English began seriously
to form plans of settling colonies in those parts of America which hitherto
they had only visited. The projectors and patrons of these plans were
mostly persons of rank and influence. Among them, Sir Humphry Gilbert,
of Compton in Devonshire, ought to be mentioned with the distinction due
to the conductor of the first English colony to America. He had early
rendered himself conspicuous by his military services both in France and
Ireland; and having afterwards turned his attention to naval affairs, he
published a discourse concerning the probability of a north-west passage,
which discovered no inconsiderable portion both of learning and ingenuity,
mingled with the enthusiasm, the credulity, and the sanguine expectations
which incite nlen to new and hazardous undertakings.'  With those talents
he was deemed a proper person to be employed in establishing a new
colony, and easily obtained fiom the Queen letters patent [June 11, 1578,]
vesting in him sufficient powers for this purpose.
As this is the first charter to a colony granted by the crown of England,
the articles in it merit particular attention, as they unfold the ideas of that
age with respect to the nature of such settlements. Elizabeth authorizes
him to discover and take possession of all remote and barbarous lands, unoccupied by any Christian prince or people. She vests in him, his heirs
and assigns for ever, the full right of property in the soil of those countries
whereof he shall take possession. She permits such of her subjects as
owere willing to accompany Gilbert in his voyage, to go and settle in the
countries which he shall plant. She empowers him, his heirs and assigns,
* Hakluyt, ii. 440. Camd. Annal. 301, &c.  t lIakluyt, iii. II,




AMERICA.                             39T
to dispose of whatever portion of those lands he shall judge meet, to per-.
sons settled there, in fee simple, according to the laws of England. She
ordains, that all the lands granted to Gilbert shalt hold of the crown of
England by homage, on payment of the fifth part of the gold or silver ore
found there. She confers upon him, his heirs and assigns, the complete
jurisdictions and royalties, as well marine as other, within the said lands
and seas thereunto adjoining; and as their common safety and interest
would render good government necessary in their new settlements, she
gave Gilbert, his heirs and assigns, full power to convict, punish, pardon,
govern, and rule, by their good discretion and policy, as well in causes
capital or criminal as civil, both marine and other, all persons who shall,
from time to time, settle within the said countries, according to such
statutes, laws, and ordinances, as shall be by him, his heirs and assigns,
devised and established for their better government. She declared, that
all who settled there should have and enjoy all the privileges of free denizens
and natives of England, any law, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding. And finally, she prohibited all persons from attempting to
settle within two hundred leagues of any place which Sir Humphry Gile
bert, or his associates, shall have occupied during the space of six years.*
With those extraordinary powers, suited to the high notions of authority
and prerogative prevalent in England during the sixteenth century, but
very repugnant to more recent ideas with respect to the rights of free men,
who voluntarily unite to form a colony, Gilbert began to collect associates,
and to prepare for embarkation. His own character, and the zealous
efforts of his half brother Walter Ralegh, who even in his early youth displayed those splendid talents, and that undaunted spirit, which create
admiration and confidence, soon procured him a sufficient number of followers. But his success was not suited either to the sanguine hopes of his
countrymen, or to the expense of his preparations. Two expeditions, both
of which he conducted in person, ended disastrously [1580]. In the last
he himself perished, without having effected his intended settlement on the
continent of America, or performing any thing more worthy of notice, than
the empty formality of taking possession of the Island of Newfoundland in
the name of his sovereign. F'he dissensions among his officers; the licentious and ungovernable spirit of some of his crew; his total ignorance of
the countries which he purposed to occupy; his misfortune in approaching
the continent too far towards the north, where the inhospitable coast of
Cape Breton did not invite them to settle; the shipwreck of his largest
vessel; and, above all, the scanty-provision which the funds of a private
man could make of what was requisite for establishing a new colony, were
the true causes to which the failure of the enterprise must be imputed, not
to any deficiency of abilities or resolution in its leader.t
But the miscarriage of a scheme, in which Gilbert had wasted his fortune,
did not discourage Ralegh. He adopted all his brother's ideas; and
applying to the Queen, in whose favour he stood high at that time, he procured a patent [March 26, 1584], with jurisdiction and prerogatives as
ample as had been granted unto Gilbert.  Ralegh, no less eager to execute
than to; undertake the scheme, instantly despatched two small vessels
[April 27], under the command of Amadas and Barlow, two officers of
trust, to visit the countries which he intended to settle, and to acquire some
previous knowledge of their coasts, their soil, and productions. In order
to avoid Gilbert's error, in holding too far north, they took their course by
the Canaries and the West India islands, and approached the North
American continent by the Gulf of Florida. Unfortunately, their chief
researches were made in that part of the country now known by the name
af North Carolina, that province in America most destitute of commodious
* Hakluyt, iii. 135.  (t Ibid. iii. 243, &c.  ~ Ibid. iii. 243.




398                    HISTORY  OF                     [BooK IX.
harbours. They touched first at an island, which they call Wokocon
(probably Ocakoke,) situated on the inlet into Pamplicoe sound, and then
at Roanoke, near the mouth of Albermarle sound. In botl they had some
intercourse with the natives, whomn they found to be, savages with all the
characteristic qualities of uncivilized life, bravery, aversion to labour, hos
pitality, a propensity to admire, and a willingness to exchange their rude
productions for English commodities, especially for iron, or any of the
useful mletals of which they were destitute. After spending a few weeks
in this traffic, and in visiting some parts of the adjacent continent, Amadas
and Barlow returned to England [Sept. 15], with two of the natives, and
gave such splendid descriptions of the beauty of the country, the fertility
of the soil, and the mildness of the climate, that Elizabeth, delighted with
the idea of occupying a territory superior, so far, to the barren regions
towards the north hitherto visited by her subjects, bestowed on it the name
of Vih.inia; as a melnorial that this happydiscovery had been made under
a virgnll queen.*.'l'fheir report encouraged Ralegh to hasten his preparations for taking
possession of such an inviting property. lie fitted out a squadron of seven
small ships, under the command ot Sir Richard Greenville, a man of honour
able birth, and of courage so undaunted as to be conspicuous even in that
gallant age. But the spirit of that predatory war which the English carried
on agaiist Spain, mingled with - this scheme of settlement; and on this
account, as well as from unacquaintance with a more direct and shorter
course to North America, Greenville sailed by the West India islands.
He spent some time in cruising amnong these, and in taking prizess so that
it was towards the close of June before he arrived on the coast of North
America. He touched at both the islands where Amadas and Barlow had
landed, and made some excursions into different parts of the continent
round Painplicoe and Albermarle sounds. But as, unfortunately, he did not
advance tar enough towards the north, to discover the noble bay of Chesapeak, he established the colony [Aug. 25], which he left on the island of
Roanoke, an incomnmodious station, without any safe harbour, and almost
uninhabited.t
This colony consisted only of one hundred and eighty persons, under the
command of Captain Lane, assisted by some men of note, the most distinguished of whom was Hariot, an eminent mathematician. Their chief
employment, during a residence of nine months, was to obtain a niore exten-,
swve know- ledge of the country; and their researches were carried on with
greater spirit, and reached further than could have been expected from. a
colony so feeble, and in a station so disadvantageous. But irom the same
impatience of indigent adventurecr lo acquire tudden wealth which gave
a wrong direction to the. industry of the Spaniards in their settlements, the
greater part of the-English seem to have considered nothing as. worthy of
attention but mines of gold and silver. These they sought for wherever
they came: these they inquired after with unwearied eagerness. The
savages soon discovered the favourite objects which alluled them, and- artfully amused them with so many tales concerning pearl fisheries, and rich
mines of various metals, that Lane and his companions wasted their time
and activity in the chimerical pursuit of these, instead of labouring to raise
provisions for their own subsistence. On discovering the deceit of the
Indians, they were so much exasperated, that from expostulations and
reproaches they proceeded to open hostility [1586]. The supplies of provision which they had been accustomed to receive from the natives were
of course withdrawn. Through their own negligence no other precaution
had been taken for their support. Ralegh, having engaged in a scheme
too expensive for his narrow funds, had not been able to send them that
* Hakluyt, iii. 246               t Id. iii.'151




AMERICA.                              399
recruit of stores with which Greenville had promised to furnish them early
in the spring. The colony, reduced to the utmost distress, and on the
point of perishing with famine, was preparing to disperse into different
districts of the country in quest of food, when Sir Francis Drake appeared
with his fleet [June 1], returning from a successful expedition against the
Spaniards in the West Indies. A scheme which hie formed, of furnishing
Lane and his associates with such supplies as might enable them to remain
with comfort in their station, was disappointed by a sudden storm, in
which a small vessel that he destined for their service was dashed to pieces,
and as he could not supply them with another, at their joint request, as. they
were worn out with fatigue and famine, he carried them home to Englandx
[June 19].
Such was the inauspicious beginning of the English settlements in the
New World; and, after exciting high expectations, this first attempt produced no effect but that of affording a more complete knowledge of the
country; as it enabled Hariot, a man of science and observation, to
describe its soil, climate, productions, and the manners of its inhabitant,,
with a degree of accuracy which merits no inconsiderable praise, when
compared with the childish and marvellous tales published by several
of the early visitants of the New World. There is another consequence
of this abortive colony imlportant enough to entitle it to a place in history.  Lane and his associates, by their constant intercourse with the
Indians, had acquired a relish for their favourite enjoyment of smoking
tobacco; to the use of which, the credulity of that people not only ascribea
a thousand imaginary virtues, but their superstition considered the plant
itself as'a gracious gift of the gods, for the solace of human kind, and the
most acceptable offering which man can present to heaven.t They brought
with them a specimen of this new commodity to England, and taught their
countrymen the method of using it; which Ralegh. and some young men of
fashion fondly adopted. From imitation of them, from love of novelty, and
from the favourable opinion of its salutary qualities entertained by several
physicians, the practice spread among the English. The Spaniards and
Portuguese had, previous to this, introduced it into other parts of Europe.
This habit of taking tobacco gradually extended from the extremities of
the north to those of the south, and in one form or other seems to be equally
grateful to the inhabitants of every climate; and by a singular caprice of
the human species, no less inexplicable than unexampled (so bewitching
is the acquired taste for a weed of no manifest utility, and at first not only
unpleasant but nauseous), that it has become almost as universal as the
demands of those appetites originally implanted in our nature. Smoking
was the first mode of taking tobacco in England; and we learn firom the
comic writers towards the close of the sixteenth century and the beginning
of the seventeenth, that- this was deemed one of the accomplishments of a
man of fashion and spirit.
A few days after Drake departed from Roanoke, a small bark, despatched
by Ralegh with a supply of stores for the colony, landed at the place
where the English had settled; but: on finding it deserted by their countrymen they returned to England. The bark was hardly gone, when Sir
Richard Greenville appeared with three ships. After searching in vain
for the colony which he had planted, without being able to learn what
had befallen it, he left fifteen of his crew to keep posstssion of the island.
This handful of men was soon overpowered and cut in pieces by the
savages.T
Though all Ralegh's efforts to establish a colony in Virginia had hitherto
proved abortive, and had been defeated by a succession of disasters and
~ ffakluyt, ii. 255. Camd. Annal. 387.  t Hariot ap. Hakluyt, iii. 271. Ie Bry. America, pars L
Hakluyt, iii. 265. 283.




400                     HISTORY  OF                    fBook IX.
disappointments, neither his hopes nor resources were exhausted. Early
in the following year [1587], he fitted out three ships, under the command
of Captain John White, who carried thither a colony more iunuerous than
that which had been settled under Lane. On their arrival in Virginia,
after viewing the face of the country covered with one continued forest,
which to them appeared an uninhabited wild, as it was occupied only by
a few scattered tribes of savages, they discovered that they were destitute
of many things which they deemed essentially necessary towards their
subsistence in such an uncomu artal)le situation;- and with one voice,requested
White, their commander, to retu::n to England, as the person among them
most likely to solicit, with efficacy, the supply on which depended the
existence of the colony. White landed in his native country at'a most
unfavourable season or the negotiation which he had undertaken. He
found the nation in universal alarm  at the formidable preparations of
Philip -II. to invade England, and collecting all its force to oppose the
fleet to which he had arrogantly given the name of the Invincible Armada.
Ralegh, Greenville, and all the most zealous patrons of the new settlement,
were called to act a distinguished part in the operations of a year [1588],
equally interesting and glorious to England. Amidst danger so imminent,
and during a contest for the honour of their sovereign and the independence
of their country, it was impossible to attend to a less important and remote
object. The unfortunate colony in Roanoke received no supply, and
perished miserably by famine, or by the unrelenting cruelty of those barbarians by whom they were surrounded.
During the remainder of Elizabeth's reign, the scheme of establishing a
colony in Virginia was not resumed. l1alegh, with'a most aspiring mind
and extraordinary talents, enlightened by knowledge no less uncommon,
had the spirit and the defects of a projector. Allured by new objects,
and always giving the preference to such as were most splendid and
arduous, he was apt to engage in undertakings so vast and so various as
to be far beyond his power of accomplishing. He was now intent on
peopling and improving a large district of country in Ireland, of which he
had obtained a grant from the Queen. He was a dleep adventurer in the
scheme of fitting out a powerful armament against Spain, in order to
establish Don Antonio on the throne of Portugal. He had begun to form
his favourite but visionary plan, of penetrating into the province of Guiana,
where he fondly dreamed- of taking possession of inexhaustible wealth
flowing from the richest mines in the New World. Amidst this multi
plicity of projects, of such promising appearance, and recommended by
novelty, he naturally became cold towards his ancient and hitherto unpro
fitable scheme of settling a colony in Virginia, and was easily induced to
assign his right of property in that country, which he had never visited,
together with all the privileges contained in his patent, to Sir Thomas Smith
and a company of merchants in London [March, 1596]. This company,
satisfied with a paltry traffic carried on by a few small barks, made no
attempt to take possession of the country. Thus, after a period of a
hundred and six years from the time that Cabot'discovered North America
in the name of Henry VIl., and of twenty years from the time that Ralegh
planted the first colony, there was not a single Engolishman settled there at
the demise of Queen Elizabeth, in the year one thousand six hundred and
three,
I have already explained the (ause of this during the period previous to
the accession of Elizabeth. Other causes produced the same effect under
her administration. Thougn for one half of her reign England was engaged
in no foreign war, and commerce enjoyed that perfect security which is
friendly to its progress; though the glory of her later years gave the
highest tone of elevation and vigour to the national spirit; the Queen hersetf, from her extreme parsimony, and her aversion to demand extraordinary




AW ME R I CA.                       401
supplies of her subjects, was more apt to restrain than to second the ardent
genius of her people. Several of the most splendid enterprises in her
reign were concerted and executed by private adventurers.  All the
schemes for colonization were carried on by the funds of individuals,
without any public aid. Even the felicity of her government was averse
to the establishment of remote colonies. So powerful is the attraction ot
our native soil, and such our fortunate partiality to the laws and manners of
our own country, that men seldom choose to abandon it, unless they be driven
away by oppression, or allured by vast prospects of sudden wealth. But
the provinces of America, in which the English attempted to settle, did
not, like those occupied by Spain, invite them thither by any appearance
of silver or gold mines. All their hopes of gain were distant; and they
saw that nothing could be earned but by persevering exertions of industry.
The maxims of Elizabeth's administration were, in their general tenor,:so popular, as did not force her subjects to emigrate in order to escape
from the heavy or vexatious hand of power. It seems to have been with
difficulty that these slender bands of planters were collected, on which
the writers of that age bestow the name of the first and second Virginian
colonies.  The fulness of time for English colonization was not yet
arrived,
But the succession of the Scottish line to the crown of England [1603]
hastened its approach. James was hardly seated on the throne before he
discovered his pacific intentions, and he soon terminated the long war
which had been carried on between Spain and England, by an amicable'treaty. From that period, uninterrupted tranquillity continued during his
reign. Many persons of high rank, and of ardent ambition, to whom the
war with Spain had afforded constant employment, and presented alluring
prospects not only of fame but of wealth, soon became so impatient of
languishing at home without occupation or object, that their invention was
on the stretch to find some exercise for their activity and talents. To
both'these North America seemed to open a new- field, and schemes of
carrying colonies thither became more general and- more popular.
A voyage undertaken by Bartholomew Gosnold, in the last year of the
Queen, facilitated as well as encouraged the execution of these schemes.
He sailed from Falmouth in a small bark with thirty-two men. Instead
of following former navigators in their unnecessary circuit by the West
India isles and the Gulf of Florida, Gosnold steered due west as nearly as
the winds would permit, and was the first English commander who reached
America by this shorter and more direct course. That part of the continent which he first descried was a promontory in the province now called
Massachusets Bay, to which he gave the name of Cape Cod. Holding
along the coast as it stretched towards the south-west, he touched at two
islands, one of which he called Martha's Vineyard, the other Elizabeth's
Island; and visited the adjoining continent, and traded with its inhabitants.
He and his companions were so much delighted every where with the
inviting aspect of the country, that notwithstanding the smallness of their
number, a part of them consented to remain there. But when they had
leisure to reflect upon the fate of former settlers in America, they retracted
a resolution fbormed'in the first warmth of their admiration; and Gosnold
returned to England in less than four months from  the time of his
departure.*
This voyage however inconsiderable it may appear, had important
effects. The English now discovered the aspect of the American continent
to be extremely inviting far to the north of the place where they had
formerly attempted to settle. The coast of a vast country, stretching through
the most desirable climates, lay before them. The richness of its virgin
* Purchas, iv. p. 1647
VOL. I. —51




402                       HISTORY OF                    [BooK IX.
soil promised a certain recompense to their industry. In its interior provinces unexpected sources of wealth might open, and unknown otbects of
commerce might be found. Its distance from England was diminished
almost a third part by the new course which Gosnold had pointed out.
Plans for establishing colonies began to be formed in different parts of the
kingdom; and befibre these were ripe for execution, one small vessel was
sent out by the merchants of Bristol, another by the Earl of Southampton
and Lord Arundel of Wardour, in order to learn whether Gosnold's account
of the country was to be considered as a iust representation of its state,
or as the exaggerated description of a fond discoverer. Both returned
with a full confirmation of his veracity, and with the addition of so many
new circumstances in favour of the country, acquired by a more extensive
view of it, as greatly increased the desire of planting it.
The most active and efficacious promoter of this was Richard Hakluyt,
prebendary of Westminster, to whom  England is more indebted for its
American possessions than to any man of that age. Formed under a kinsman of the same name, eminent for naval and commercial knowledge, he
imbibed a similar taste, and applied early to the study of geography and
navigation. These favourite sciences engrossed his attention, and to diffuse
a relish for them was the great object of his life. In order to excite his
countrymen to naval enterprise, by flattering their national vanity, he
published, in the year one thousand five hundred and eig-hty-Wine, his
valuable collection of voyages and discoveries made by Englisnnren.  In
order to supply them with what information might be derived from the
experience of the most successful foreign navigators, he translated some of
the best accounts of the progress of the Spaniards and Portuguese in their
voyages both to the East and West Indies, into the English tongue. He was
consulted with respect to many of the attempts towards discovery or colonization during the latter part of Elizabeth's reign. He corresponded with
the officers who conducted them, directed their researches to proper objects,
and published the history of their exploits.  By the zealous endeavours of
a person equally respected by men of rank and men of business, many of
Doth orders formed an association to establish colonies in America, and
petitioned the king for the sanction of his authority to warrant the execution
of their plans.
James, who prided himself on his profound skill in the science of government, and who had turned his attention to consider the advantages which
mnight be derived from colonies, at a time when he patronized his scheme
for' planting them in some of the ruder provinces of his ancient kingdom,
with a view of introducing industry and civilization there,? was now no
less fond of directing the active genius of his English subjects towards
occupations not repugnant to his own pacific maxims, and listened with a
favourable ear to their application. But as the extent as well as value of
the American continent began now to be better known, a grant of the
whole of such a vast region to any one body of men, however respectable,
appeared to him an act of impolitic and profuse liberality. For this reason he divided that portion of North America, which stretches from the
thirty-fourth to the fifty-fifth degree of latitude, into two districts nearly
equal; the one called the first or south colony of Virginia, the other, the
second or north colony [April 10, 1616].  He authorized Sir Thomas
Gates, Sir George Summers, Richard Hakluyt, and their associates, mostly
resident in London, to settle any part of the former which they should
choose, and vested in thernm a right of property to the land extending along
the coast fifty miles on each side of the place of their first habitation, and
reaching into the interior country a hundred miles. The latter district he
allotted, as the place of settlement to sundry knights, gentlemen, and mer* Hist. of Scotland, vol. ii.




AMERICA.                              403
chants of Bristol, Plymouth, and other parts in the west of England, with
a similar grant of territory.  Neither the monarch'who issued this charter,
nor his subjects who received it, had any conception that they were proceeding to lay the foundation of mighty and opulent states.  What James
granted was nothing more than a simple charter of corporation to a trading
-company, empowering the- members of it to have a common seal, and to
act as a body politic. But as the object for which they associated was
new, the plan established for the administration of their affairs was uncommon. Instead of the power usually granted to corporations, of electing
officers and framing by-laws for the conduct of their own operations, the
supreme government of the colonies to be settled was vested in a council
resident in England, to be named by the king, according to such laws and
ordinances as should be given under his sign manual; and the subordinate
jurisdiction was committed to a council resident in America, which was
likewise to be nominated by the king, and to act confbormably to his
instructions.  To this important clause, which regulated the form of their
constitution, was added the concession of several immunities to encourage
persons to settle in the intended colonies. Some of those were the same
which had been granted to Gilbert and Ralegh; such as the securing to
the emigrants and their descendants all the rights of denizens, in the same
manner as if they had remained or had been born in England; and granlting them the privilege of holding their lands in America by the freest and
least burdensome tenure. Others were more favourable than those granted
by Elizabeth.  He permitted whatever was necessary for the sustenance
or commerce of the new colonies to be exported from England, during the
space of seven years, without paying any duty; and, as a further incitement to industry, he granted them liberty of trade with other nations, and
appropriated the duty to be levied on foreign commodities, for twenty-one
years, as a fund for the benefit of the colony.*
In this singular charter, the contents of which have been little attended
to by the historians of America, some articles are as unfavourable to the
rights of the colonists as others are to the interest of the parent state. By
placing the legislative and executive powers in a council nominaled by the
crown, and guided by its instructions, every person settling it America
seems to be bereaved of the noblest privilege of a free man; by the
unlimited permission of trade with foreigners, the parent state is deprived
of that exclusive commerce which has beeni deemed the chief advantage
resulting from the establishment of colonies. But in the infancy of colonization, and without the guidance of observation or experience, the ideas
of men, with respect to the mode of forming new settlements, were not
fully unfolded or properly arranged. At a period when they could not
foresee the future grandeur and importance of the communities which they
were about to call into existence, they were ill qualified to concert the best
plan for governing them.  Besides, the English of that age, accustonled tc
the high prerogative and arbitrary rule of their monarchs, were not animated with such liberal sentiments, either concerning their own personal or
political rights, as have become familiar in the more mature and improved
state of their constitution.
Without hesitation or reluctance the proprietors of both colonies prepared
to execute their respective plans; and under the authority of' a charter,
which would now be rejected with disdain as a violent invasion of the
sacred and inalienable rights of liberty, the first permanent settlements of
the English in America were established. From this period, the progress
of the two provinces of Virginia and New England forms a regular and
connected story. The former in the south, and the latter in the north, may
be considered as the original and parent colonies; in imitation of which,
* Stithl Hist. of Virginia, p. 35 Avvend. p. 1. Purchas, v. 1683.




404                    HISTORY OF                      [Book 1
and under whose shelter, all the others have been successively planted and
reared.
The first attempts to occupy Virginia and New England were made by
very feeble bodies of emigrants. As these settled under great disadvantages, among tribes of savages, and in an uncultivated desert; as they
attained gradually, after long struggles and many disasters, to that maturity
of strength, and order of policy, which entitle them to be considered as
respectable states, the history of their persevering efforts merits particular
attention. It will exhibit a spectacle no less striking than instructive, and
presents an opportunity which rarely occurs, of contemplating a society in
the first moment of its political existence, and of observing how its spirit
forms in its infant state, how its principles begin to unfold as it advances,
and how those characteristic qualities which distinguish its maturer age
are successively acquired.  The account of the establishment of the other
English colonies, undertaken at periods when the importance of such possessions was better understood, and effected by more direct and vigorous
exertions of the parent state, is less interesting. I shall therefore relate
the history of the two-original colonies in detail. With respect to the subsequent settlements, some more general observations coricerning the time,
the motives, and circumstances of their' establishment will be sufficient.
I begin with the history of Virginia, the most ancient and most valuable of
the British colonies in North America.
Though many persons of distinction became proprietors in the company
which undertook to plant a colony in Virginia, its funds seem not to have
been considerable, and its first effort was certainly extremely feeble. A
small vessel of a hundred tons, and two barks, under the command of
Captain Newport, sailed [Dec. 19] with a hundred and five men destined
to remain in the country. Some of these were ot respectable families,
particularly a brother of the Earl of Northumberland, and several officers
who had served with reputation in the reign of Elizabeth. Newport, I
know not for what reason, followed the ancient course by the West Indies,
and did not reach the coast of North America for four months [April 26,
16071. But he approached it with better fortune than any former navigator; for, having been driven, by the violence of' a storm, to the northward of Roanoke, the place of his destination, the first land he discovered
was a promontory which he called Cape Henry, the southern boundary of
the Bay of Chesapeak. The English stood directly into that spacious inlet,
which seemed to invite them  to enter; and as they advanced, contemplated, with a mixture of delight and admiration, that grand reservoir,
into which are poured the waters of all the vast rivers, which not:only
diffuse fertility through that district of America, but open the interior parts
of the country to navigation, and render a commercial intercourse more
extensive and commodious than in any other region of the globe. New.
port, keeping along the southern shore, sailed up a river which the natives
called Powhatan, and to which he gave the name of James River. After
viewing its banks, during a run of above forty miles from its mouth, they
all concluded that a country, where safe and convenient harbours seemed
to be numerous, would be a more suitable station for a trading colony than
the shoaly and dangerous coast to the south, on which their countrymen
had formerly settled. Here then they determined to abide; and ha.ing
chosen a proper spot for their residence, they gave this- infant settlement
the name of James Town, which it still retains; and thoiugh it basnever
become either populous or opulent, it can boast of being the most ancient
habitation of the English in the New World. But however well chosen
the situation might be, the members of the colony were far from availing
themselves of its advantages. Violent animosities had broke out among
some of their leaders, during their voyage to Virginia. These did not sub
side on their arrival there   The first deed of the council, which assumec'




AMERICA.                              405
the government in virtue of a commission brou!git from England under the
seat of t.he company, and cplned on the day  fiter they landed, was an
act of injustice. Captain Smith, who had been appointed a member of
the council, was excluded from his seat at the board, by the mean jealousy
of his colleagues, and not only reduced to the condition of a private man,
but of one suspected and watched by his superiors. This diminution ot
his influence, and restraint on his activity, was an essential injury to the
colony, which at that juncture stoiod in need of the aid of both. For soon
after they began to settle, the English were involved in a war with the
natives, partly by their own indiscretion, and partly by the suspicion and.
ferocity of' those barbarians. And although the Indians, scattered over the
countries adjacent to James River, were divided into independent tribes,
so extremely feeble that hardly one of them could muster above two hundred warriors,* they teased and annoyed an infant colony by their incessar: hostilities. To this was added a calamity still more dreadful; the
stock of,)provisions left for their subsistence, on the departure of their ships
for England [June 15], was so scanty and of such bad quality, that a
scarcity, approachinfr almost to absolute famine, soon followed. Such poor
unwholesoilme fare broughit en diseases, the violence of which was so much
increased by the sultry heat of the climate, and the moisture of a country
covered with wood, that before the beginning of September one half of
their number died, and most of the survivors were sickly and dejected.
In such trying extremities, the comparative powers of every individual are
discovered and called forth, and each naturally takes that station, and
assumes that ascendant, to which he is entitled by his talents and force of
mind.  Every eye was now  turned towards Smith, and all willingly
devolved on him that authority of which they had formerly deprived him.
His undaunted temper, deeply tinctured with the wild romantic spirit characteristic of military adventurers in that age, was peculiarly suited to such
a situation. The vigour of his constitution continued fortunately still unimpaired by disease, and his mind was never appalled by danger. He instantly
adopted the only plan that could save them from destruction. He began
by surrounding James Town with such rude fortifications as were a sufficient defence against the assaults of savages. He then marched, at the
head of a smalf detachment, in quest of their enemies. Some tribes he
gained by caresses and presents, and procured from  them  a supply of
provisions. Others he attacked with open force; and defeating them on
every occasion. whatever their superiority in numbers might be, compelled
them to impart to him some portion of their winter stores. As the recompense of all his toils and dangers, he saw  abundance and contentment
re-established in the colony, and hoped that he should be able to niaintain
them in that happy state, until the arrival of ships from England in the
spring; but in one of his excursions he was surprised by a numerous body
of Indians, and in making his escape from them, after a gallant defence, he
sunk to the neck in a swarnp, and was obliged to surrender. "'lhough he
knew well what a dreadful fate awaits the prisoners of savages. his presence of rnind did not forsake him. He showed those who had taken
him captive a mariner's compass, and amused them with so many wonderful accounts of its virtues as filled them with astonishment and veneration,
which began to operate very powerfully in his favour. They led him,
however, in triumph through various parts of the country, and conducted
him  at last to Powhatan, the most considerable Sachim  in that part of'
Virginia. There the doom of death being pronounced' he was led to the
place of execution, and his head already bowed down to receive the fatal
blow. when that fond attachment of the American women to their Euron
* Purchas, vol. iv. 1692. Smith's Travels, p. 23.




406                    HISTORY  OF                     L[BIk IX
pean invaders, the beneficial effects of which the Spaniards often experienced, interposed in his behalf. The favourite daughter of Powhatan
rushed inll between him and the executioner, and by her entreaties and
tears prevailed on her father to spare his life. rT he beneficence of his
deliverer, whom  the early English writers dignify with the title of the
Princess Pocahuntas, did not terminate here; she soon after procured his
liberty, and sent from time to time seasonable presents of provisions.*
Smith, on his return to James Town, found the colony reduced to thirtyeight persons, who, in despair were preparing to abandon a country which
did not seem destined to be the habitation of Englishmen. He employed
caresses, threats, and even violence, in order to prevent them from executing
this fatal resolution. With difficulty he prevailed on them to defer it so
long, that the succour anxiously expected from England arrived.  Plenty
was instantly restored; a hundred new planters were added to their
number; and an ample stock of whatever was requisite for clearing and
sowing the vround was delivered to them. But an unlucky incident turned
their attention from that species of industry which alone could render their
situation comfortable. In a small stream of water that issued from a bank
of sand near James Town, a sediment of some shining mnineralssubstance,
which had some resemblance of gold, was discovered. At a time when
the precious metals were conceived to be the peculiar and only valuable
productions of the New World, when every mountain was supposed to
contain a treasure, and every rivulet was searched for its golden sands,
this appearance was fondly considered as an infallible indication of a mine.
Every hand was eager to dig; large quantities of this glittering dust were
amassed. From some assay of its nature, made by an artist as unskilful
as his companions were credulous, it was pronounced to be extremely rich.
"There was now," says Smith, " no talk, no hope, no work, but dig gold,
wash gold, refine gold."t  With this imaginary wealth the first vessel
returning to England was loaded, while the culture of the land and every
useful occupation were totally neglected.
The effects of this fatal delusion were soon felt. Notwithstanding all
the provident activity of Smith, in procuring corn from the natives by traffic
or by force, the colony began to suffer as much as formerly from scarcity
of food, and was wasted by the same distempers. In hopes of obtaining
some relief, Smith proposed, as they had not hitherto extended their
researches beyond the countries contiguous to James River, to open an.
intercourse with the more remote tribes, and to examine into the state of
culture and population among them. The execution of this arduous design
ne undertook himself, in a small open boat, with a feeble crew, and a very
scanty stock of provisions. He began his survey at Cape Charles, and in
two different excursions, which continued above four months, he advanced
as far as the river Susquehannah, which flows into the bottom of the bay.
tie visited all the countries both on the east and west shores; he entered
most of the considerable creeks; he sailed up many of the great rivers as
far as their falls. He traded with some tribes; he fought with others; he
observed the nature of the territory which they occupied, their mode of
subsistence, the peculiarities in their manners; and left among all a won
derful admiration either of the beneficence or vAlour of the English. After
sailing above three thousand miles in a paltry vessel, ill fitted fobr such an
extensive navigation, during which the hardships to which he was exposed,
as well as the patience with which he endured, and the fortitude with
which he surmounted them, equal whatever is related of the celebrated
Spanish discoverers in their most daring enterprises, he returned to James
Town; he brought with him  an account of that large portion of the
* Smith's Travels, p. 44, &c. Purchas, iv. 1704. Stith, p. 45, &c.  t Smith's Travels, p. 53




AME RI CA.                           40't
American continent now comprehended in the two provinces of Virginia
and Maryland,? so full and exact, that after the progress of information and
research for a century and a half, his map exhibits no inaccurate view of
both countries, and is the original upon which all subsequent delineations
and descriptions have been formed.'t
But whatever pleasing prospect of future benefit might open upon this
complete discovery of a country formed by nature to be the seat of an
exclusive commerce, it afforded but little relief for their present wants.
The colony still depended for subsistence chiefly on supplies from the
natives; as, after all the efforts of their own industry, hardly thirty acres
of ground were yet cleared so as to be capable of culture.4  By Smith's
attention, however, the stores of the Engolish were so regularly filled tkat
for some time they felt no considerable distress; and at this juncture a
change was made in the constitution of the company, which seemed to
promise an increase of their security and happiness. That supreme direction of all the company's operations, which the King by his charter had
reserved to himself, discouraged persons of rank or property from becoming
members of a society so dependent on the arbitrary will of the crown.
Upon a representation of this to James, he granted them a new charter
[May 23, 1609], with more ample privileges. He enlarged the boundaries
of the colony; he rendered the powers of the company, as a corporation,
more explicit and complete; he abolished the jurisdiction of the council
resident in Virginia; he vested the government entirely in a council residing in London; he granted to the proprietors of the company the right
of electing the persons who were to compose this council, by a majority
of voices; he authorized this council to establish such laws, orders, and
forms of government and magisitracy, for the colony and plantation, as they
in their discretion should think to be fittest for the good of the adventurers
and inhabitants there; he empowered them to nominate a governor to have
the administration of affairs in the colony; and to carry their orders into
execution.~  In consequence of these concessions, the company having
acquired the power of regulating all its own transactions, the number of
proprietors increased, and among them we find the most respectable names
in the nation.
The first deed of the new council was to appoint Lord Delaware governor and captain-general of their colony in Virginia. To a. person of
his rank those high sounding titles could be no allurement; and by his
thorough acquaintance with the progress and state of the settlement, he
knew enough of the labour and difficulty with which an infant colony is
reared, to expect any thing but anxiety and care in discharging the duties
of that delicate office. But, from zeal to promote an establishment which
he expected to prove so highly beneficial to his country, he was willing to
relinquish all the comforts of an honourable station,ato undertake a long
voyage to settle in an uncultivated region, destitute of -every accommoda.
tion to which he had been accustomed, and where he foresaw that toil,
and trouble, and danger awaited himi. But as he could not immediately
leave England, the council despatched Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George
Summers, the former of whom had been appointed lieutenant-general and
the latter admiral, with nine ships and five hundred planters. They
carried with them commissions by which they were empowered to supersede the jurisdiction of the former council, to proclaim  Lord Delaware
governor, and until he should arrive, to take the administration of affairs
into their own hands. A violent hurricane separated the vessel in which
Gates'and Summers had embarked from the rest of the fleet, and stranded
it on the coast of Bermudas [Aug. 11]. The other ships arrived safely
at James Town. But the fate of their commanders was unknown. Their
* Smith's Travels, p. 65. &c   t Stith, p. 83    t Ibid 0 97.   Q Ibid. Append. 8.




408                    HISTORY  OF                     [BOOK IX.
commission for new modelling the government, and all other public papers,
were supposed to be lost together with them. The present form of
government, however, was held to be abolished. No legal warrant could
be produced for establishing any other. Smith was not in a condition at
this juncture to assert his own rights, or to act with his wonted vigour.
By an accidental explosion of gunpowder, he had been so miserably
scorched and mangled that he was incapable of moving, and under the
necessity of committing himself to the guidance of his friends, who
carried him aboard one of the ships returning to England, in hopes that
he might recover by more skilful treatment than he could meet with in
Virginia.*
After his departure, every thing tended fast to the wildest anarchy.
Faction and discontent had often risen so high among the old settlers that
they could hardly be kept within bounds. The spirit of the new comers
was too ungovernable to bear any restraint. Several among them of better
rank were such dissipated hopeless young men, as their fi'iends were glad
to send out in quest of whatever fortune might betide them in a foreign
land. Of the lower order many were so profligate, or desperate, that their
country was happy to throw themr out as nuisances in society. Such persons were little capable of the regular subordination, the strict economy,
and persevering industry, which their situation required. The Indians
observing their misconduct, and that every precaution for sustenance or
safety was negflected, not only withheld the supplies of provisions which
they were accustomed to furnish, but harassed them with continual hostilities.  All their subsistence was derived from the stores which they had
brought from  England; these were soon- consumed; then the domestic
animals sent out to breed in the country were devoured; and by this inconsiderate waste, they were reduced to such extremity of famine, as no
only to eat the most nauseous and unwholesome roots and berries, but to
feed on the bodies of the Indians whom they slew, and even on those of
their companions who sunk under the oppression of such complicated distress. In less than six months, of five hundred persons whom Smith left in
Viroinia, only sixty remained; and these so feeble and dejected that they
could not have survived for ten days, if succour had not arrived from a
quarter whence they did not expect it.t
When Gates and Summers were thrown ashore on Berinudas, fortunately
not a single person on board their ship perished. A considerable part of
their provisions and stores too, was saved, and in that delightful spot,
Nature, with spontaneous bounty, presented to them such a variety of her
productions, that a hundred and fifty people subsisted in affluence for ten
months on an uninhabited island. Impatient, however, to escape from a
place where they were cut off from all intercourse with mankind, they set
about building tywo barks with such tools and materials as they had, and
by amazing efforts of perseverance and ingenuity they finished them. In
these they embarked, and steered directly towards Virginia, in hopes of
finding an ample consolation for all their toils and dangers in the embraces
of their companions, and amidst the comforts of a flourishing colony. After
a more prosperous navigation than they could have expected in their ill
constructed vessels, they landed at James Town [May 231. But instead
of that joyful interview for which they fondly looked, a spectacle presented itself which struck them with horror. They beheld the miserable
remainder of their countrymen emaciated with famine and sickness, sunk
in. despair, and in their figure and looks rather resembling spectres than
human beings. As Gates and Summers, in full confidence of finding plenty
of provisions-in Virginia, had brought with them no larger stock than was
* Purchas, iv. 1734, &c. Smith's Travels, p. 89. Stith, p. 102, &c.  t Stith, p. 116
Purchas, iv. 1748




AM E R 1 CA.                          409
deemed necessary for their own support during the voyage, their inability
to afford relief to their countrymen added to the anguish with which they
viewed this unexpected- scene of distress. Nothing now remained but instantly to abandon a country where it was impossible to subsist any longer;
and though all that could be found in the stores of the colony when added
to what remained: of the stock brought from Bermudas, did not amount to
more than what was sufficient to support them for sixteen days, at the most
scanty allowance, they set sail, in hopes of being able to reach Newfoundland, where they expected to, be relieved by their countrymen employed
at that season in the fishery there.y'
But it was not the will of Heaven that all the labour of the Enrglish, in
planting this colony, as well as all their hopes of benefit from  its future
prosperity, should be for ever lost. Before Gates and the melancholy
companions of his voyage had reached the mouth of James River, they
were met by Lord Delaware with three ships, that brought a large recruit
of provisions, a considerable number of new settlers, and every thing requisite for defence or cultivation. A By persuasion and authority.he prevailed
on. them to return to James Town, where they found their fort, their magazines, and houses entire, which Sir Thomas Gates, by some happy
chance, had preserved from being set on fire at the time of their departure.
A society so feeble and disordered in its'frame required a tender and
skilful hand to cherish it, and restore its vigour. This it found in Lord
Delaware: he searched into the causes of their misfortunes, as far as he
could discover them, amidst the violence of their mutual accusations; but
instead of exerting his power in punishing crimes that were past, he employed his prudence in healing their dissensions, and in guarding against a
repetition of the same fatal errors. By unwearied assiduities, by the
respect due to an amiable and beneficent character, by knowing bow to
mingle severity' with indulgence, and when to assume the dignity of his
office, as well as when to display the gentleness natural to his own temper,
he gradually reconciled men corrupted by anarchy to subordination- and
discipline, he turned the attention of the idle and profligate to industry,
and taught the Indians again to reverence and dread the English name.
Under such an administration, the colony began once more to. assume a
promising appearance; when unhappily for it, a complication of diseases
brought on by the climate obliged Lord Delaware to quit the countryt
[March 28, 1611]; the government of which he committed to Mr. Percy.
-eIn was soon superseded by the arrival [May 10] of Sir Thomas Dale;
in whom the company had vested more absolute authority than in any of
his predecessors, empowering him to rule by martial law; a short code of
which, founded on the practice of the armies in the Low Countries, the
most rigid military school at that time in Europe, they sent out with him.
This system of government is so violent and arbitrary, that even the Spaniards themselves had not ventured to introduce it into their settlements;
for among them, as soon as a plantation began, and the arts of peace succeeded to the operations of war, the jurisdiction of the civil magistrate
was uniformly established. But however unconstitutional or oppressive
this may appear, it was adopted by the advice of Sir Francis Bacon, the
most enlightened philosopher, and one of the most eminent lawyers of the
age.; The company, well acquainted with the inefficacy of every metnod
which they had hitherto employed for restraining the unruly mutinous
spirits which they had to govern, eagerly adopted a plan that had the
sanction of such high authority to recommend it. Happily for the colony,
Sir Thomas Dale, who was intrusted with this dangerous power, exercised' A minute and curious account of the shipwreck of Gates and Summers, and of their adven-!eres in Permudas, was composed by Strachy, a gentleman who accompanied them, and was pubiashcd by Purchas, iv. 1734.  t Stith, p. 117. Purchas, iv. 1764.: Bacon1 Essay on
Plantations, p. 3.
VOL. I.-52




410                    HISTORY  OF                     [Boox IX.
it with prudence and moderation. By. the vigour which the sumnmary
mode of military punishment gave to his administration, he introduced into
the colony more perfect order than had ever been established there; and
at the same time he tempered his vigour with so much discretion, that no
alarm seems to have been given by this formidable innovation.*
The regular form which the colony now began to assume induced the
king to issue a new charter for the encouragement of the adventurers [March
12, 1612], by which he not only confirmed all their former privileges, and
prolonged the term of exemption fi-om payment of duties on the commodities exported by them, but granted them more extensive property, as well
as more ample jurisdiction. All the islands lying within three hundred
leagues of the coast were annexed to the province of Virginia. In consequence of this, the company took possession of Bermudas and the other
small islands discovered by Gates and Summers, and at the same time
prepared to send out a considerable reinforcement to the colony at James
Town. The expense of those extraordinary efforts was defrayed by the
profits of a lottery, which amounted nearly to thirty thousand pounds.
This expedient they were authorized to mrrploy by their few charter;t
and it is remarkable, as the first instance in the English history of any public
countenance given to this pernicious seducing mode of levying money.
But the House of Commons, which towards the close of this reign began
to observe every measure of government with jealous attention, having
remonstrated against the institution, as unconstitutional and impolitic, James
recalled the license under the sanction of which it had been established.1
-By the severe discipline of martial law, the activity of the colonists was
forced into a proper direction, and exerted itself in useful industry. This,
aided by a fertile soil and favourable climate, soon enabled them to raise
such a large stock of provisions, that they were no longer obliged to trust
for subsistence to the precarious supplies which they obtained or extorted
from the Indians. In proportion as the English became more independent,
the natives courted their friendship upon more equal ternis. The happy
effects of this were quickly felt. Sir Thomas Dale concluded a treaty
with one of their most powerful and warlike tribes, situated on the river
Chickahominy, in which they consented to acknowledge themselves subjects to the King of Great Britain, to assume henceforth the name of Englishmen, to send a body of their warriors to the assistance of the English
as often as they took the field against any enemy, and to deposite annually
a stipulated quantity of Indian corn in the storehouses of the colony.~
An event, which the early historians of Virginia relate with peculiar satisfaction, prepared the way for this union.  Pocahuntas. the favourite
daughter of the great Chief Powhatan, to whose intercession Captain
Smith was indebted for his life, persevered in her partial attachment to
the English; and as she frequently visited their settlements, where she
was alwavs received with respectful hospitality, her admiration of their
arts and manners continued to increase.  During this intercourse, her
beauty, which is represented as far superior to that of'her countrywomen,
made such impression on the heart of Mr. Rolfe, a young man of rank in
the colony, that he warmly solicited her to accept of him as a husband.
Where manners are simple, courtship is not tedious. Neither artifice pre-'
vents, nor ceremony forbids, the heart from  declaring its sentiments
Pocahuntas readily gave her consent; Dale encouraged the alliance, and
Powhatan did not disapprove it. The marriage was celebrated with ex.
traordinary pomp; and from that period a friendly correspondence sub.
sisted between the colony and all the tribes subject to Powhatan, or that
stood in awe of his power. Rolfe and his princess (for by that name the
* Stith, p. 112.  t Ib. p. 191. Appendix 23, &c..  Chalmers' Annals, i. 32,
Tauner Solida Narratio, ap. de Bry, pars x. p. 33. Stith, p. 130.




AMERICA.                              411
writers of the last age always distinguish her,) set out for England, where
she was received by Jarmles and his qleen with the respect suited to her
birth. Being carefully instructed in the principles of the Christian faith,
she was publicly baptized, but died a few years after, on her return to
America, leaving one son, from whom are sprung some of the most respectable families in Virginia, who boast of their descent from the race of
the ancient rulers of their country?.  But notwithstanding the visible good
effects of that alliance, none of Rolfe's countrymen seem to have imitated
the example which he set them, of intermarrying with the natives. Of all
the Europeans who have settled in America, the English have availed
themselves the least of this obvious method of conciliating the affection of
its original inhabitants; and, either from the shyness conspicuous in their
national character, or from the want of that pliant facility of manners which
accommodates itself to every situation, they have been more averse than
the French' and Portuguese, or even the Spaniards, from incorporating with
the native Americans. The Indians, courting such a union, offered their
daughters in marriage to their new guests: and when they did not accept
of the proffered alliance, they naturally imputed it to pride, and to their
contempt of them as an inferior order of beings.t
During the interval of tranquillity procured by the alliance with Powhatan, an important change was made in the state of the colony.  Hitherto
no right of private property in land had been established. - The fields that
were cleared had been cultivated by the joint labour of the colonists; their
product was carried to the common storehouses, and distributed weekly
to every family, according to its number and exigencies. A society, destitute of the first advantages resulting from social union, was not formed to
prosper.  Industry, when not excited by the idea of property in what was
acquired by its own efforts, made no vigorous exertion. The head had no
inducement to contrive, nor the hand to labour. The idle and improvident
trusted entirely to what was issued from the common store; the assiduity
even of the sober and attentive relaxed, when they perceived that others
were to reap the fruit of their toil; and it was computed, that the united
industry of the colony did not accomplish as much work in a week as
might have been performed in a day, if each individual had laboured on
his own account. In order to remedy this, Sir Thomas Dale divided a
considerable portion of the land into small lots, and granted one of these to
each individual in fill property.  From the moment that industry had the
certain prospect of a recompense, it advanced with rapid progress. The
articles of primary necessity were cultivated with so much attention as
secured the means of subsistence; and such schemes of imnprovement were
formed as prepared the way for the introduction of opulence into the colony:.
The industrious spirit which began to rise among the planters was soon
directed towards a new object; and they applied to it for some tiime with
such inconsiderate ardour as was productive of fatal consequences.  The
culture of tobacco, which has since become the staple of Virginia, and the
source of its prosperity, was introduced about this time [1616], into the
colony. As the taste for that weed continued to increase in England, notwithstanding the zealous declamations of James against it, thle tobacco
imported from Virginia came to a ready market; and thoughl it wvas so
much inferior in quality or in estimation to that raised by the Spaniards in
the West Indian islands, that a pound of the latter sold for eig'hteeni shillings
and of the former for no more than three shillings, it yielded a conlsiderable
profit. Allured by the prospect of such a certain and quick return, every
other species of industry was neglected. The land vlwhich ought to have
been reserved for raising provisions, and even the streets of James Troxvri
*  Hamer Solida Narratio, ap. de Bry, pars x. p. 23.1 Stith, p. 1'29. 146. Smitl's Travels, p. 11Zi
f2L    t Bfeverley's Hist. of Virg. p. 25.    1 Snmithl's T'ravels, p. 114. Stithl, p. 1'31.




412                    HI STORY  OF                    [BooKr IX.
were planteid wTv;h tobacco. Various regulations were framed to restrain
this ill directed activity.  But, from eagerness ior present gain, the planters disregarded every admonition. The means of subsistence became so
scanty, as forced them  to renew their demands upon the Indians, who
seeing no end of those exactions, their antipathy to the English name
revived with additional rancour, and they began to form schemes of venseance, with a secrecy and silence peculiar to Americans.?
Meanwhile the colony, notwithstanding this error in its operations, and
the cloud that was gathering over its head, continued to wear an aspect of
prosperity. Its numbers increased by successive migrations; the quantity
of tobacco exported became every year more considerable, and several
of the planters were not only in an easy situation, but advancing fast to
opulence;t and by two events, which happened nearly at the same time,
both population and industry were greatly promoted. As few women had
hitherto ventured to encounter the hardships which were unavoidable in an
unknown and uncultivated country, most of the colonists, constrained to
live single, considered themselves as no more than sojourners in a land to
which they were not attached by the tender ties of a family and children.
In order to induce them to settle there, the company took advantage of the
apparent tranquillity in the country, to send out a considerable number of
young women of humble birth indeed, but of unexceptionable character,
and encouraged the planters, by premiums and immunities, to marry them.
These new companions were received with such fondness, and many of
themn so comfortably established, as invited others to follow their example;
and by degrees thoughtles-:  adventurers, assuming the sentiments of vir
tuous citizens and of provident fathers of families, became solicitous about
the prosperity of a country which they now considered as their own. As
the colonists began to form more extensive plans of industry, they were
unexpectedly furnished with means of executing them with greater facility.
A Dutch ship from the coast of Guinea, having sailed up James River,
sold a part of her cargo of Negroes to the planters;~ and as that hardy
race was found more capable of enduring fatigue under a sultry climate
than Europeans, their number has been increased by continual importation;
their aid seems now to be essential to the existence of the colony, and the
greater part of field labour in Virginia is performed by servile hands.
But as the condition of the colony improved, the spirits of its members
became more independent. To Englishmen the summary and severe
decisions of martial law, however tempered by the mildness of their
governors, appeared intolerably oppressive; and they longed to recover
the privileges to which they had been accustomed under the liberal form
of government in their native country. In compliance with this spirit, Sir
George Yeardly, in the year 1619 [June], called the first general assembly
that was ever held in Virginia; and the numbers of the people were now
so increased, and their settlements so dispersed, that eleven corporations
appeared by their representatives in this convention, where they were
permitted to assume legislative power, and to exercise the noblest functions
of free men. The laws enacted in it seem neither to have been many nor
of great importance; but the meeting was highly acceptable to the people,
as they now beheld among themselves an image of the English constitution,
which they reverenced as the most perfect model ot free government. In
order to render this resemblance more complete, and the'rights of the
planters more certain, the company issued a charter of ordinance [July 24],
which gave a legal and permanent formn to the government of the colony.
The supreme legislative authority in Virginia, in imitation bf that in Great
Britain, was divided and lodged partly in' the governor, who held the
* Stith, p. 140. 1.17. 164. 168. Snmith, p. 130. Purchas, iv 1787  t Smith, p. 139
{ Stith, p. 166.197.: Beverley, p. 37.




AMERICA.                                 413
place of the sovereign; partly in a council of'sfate named by the company,
which possessed some of the diStinctions, and'i xeircised sobm'"e o'f the unctions belonging to the peerage; partly in a general' council or assembly
composed of the representatives of the people, in.'which were vested
powers and privileges similar to those of the i. ouse of Commonrs.  In' both
these councils all questions were to be determined by the m"ajority of
voices, and a negative was reserved to the governor; but no lawor or dinance, though approved of by'all -the three memberis of -the legislature,
was to he of force until it was ratified in England by a general court of the
company, and returned under its seal.].Thus the constitution-of the colony
was fixed, and the'members of it are henceforth to be considered, not
merely as servants of a commercial company dependent on the will and
orders of their superior, but as free men and citizens.
The natural effect-of that happy change in their condition was an increase
of their industry.  The product of tobacco in Virginia was now  equal,
not only to the consumption of it in Great' Britain,t but coulid furnish some
quantity for a foreign market.  The company opened a trade for it with
Holland, and established warehouses for it in'Middelburg and Flushing.
James and his privy council, alarmed at seeing the commerce of a comnmodity, for which the demand was daily increasing, turned into a channel
that tended to the diminution of the revenue, by depriving it of a considerable duty imposed on the importation of tobacco, interposed with vigour to
check this innovation.  Some expedient was found, by which the matter
was adjusted for the present; but it is remarkable as the first instance of
a difference in sentiment between the parent state and the colony, concerning their respective rights.  The former concluded, that the trade of the
colony should be confined to England, and all its productions be landed
there.  the latter claimed, not only the general privilege of Englishmen
to carry their commodities to the best market, but pleaded the particular
concessions in their charter, by which an unlimited treedom of commerce
seemed to be granted to them.$  The time for a more full discussion of this
important question was not yet arrived.
But while the colony continued to increase so fast that settlements were
scattered, not only along the banks of James and York rivers, but began
to extend to the Rapahannock, and even to the Potowmack, the English,
relying on their own numbers, and deceived by this appearance of prosperity, lived in full security. They neither attended to the movements of
the Indians, nor suspected their machinations; and though surrounded by
a people whom they might have known from experience to be both artfiul
and vindictive, they neglected every precaution for their own safety that
was requisite in such a situation.  Like the peaceful inhabitants of a
society completely established, they were no longer soldiers but citizens,
and were so intent on what was subservient to the comfort or embellishment
of civil life that every martial exercise began to be laid aside as unnecessary. The Indians, whom they commonly employed as hunters, were
furnished with fire arms, and taught to use them with dexterity.   They
were permitted to frequent the habitations of the English at all hours, and
received as innocent visitants whom there was no reason to dread.  This
inconsiderate security enabled the Indians to prepare for the execution of
* Stith, Appendix, p. 32, &c.
t It is a nmatter of some curiosity to trace the progress of the consumption of this unnecessary
commodity. The use of tobacco seems to have been first introduced into Enaland about the year
1586. Possibly a few seafaring persons may have acquired a relist for it by their intercourse with
the Spaniards previous to that period; but the vse of it cannot be denominated a national habit
sooner than the time I have mentioned. Upon amn. —ge of the seven years immediately preceding the year 1622, the whole import of tobacco into England amounted to a hundred and forty-two
thousand and eighty-five pounds weight. Stith, p. 246. From this it appears, that the taste had
spread with a rapidity which is remarkable. But how inconsiderable is that quantity to what is
now consumed in Great Britain!
t Stith, p. 200, &c.




414                     HISTORY   OF                    [LBooI  IX.
that plan of vengeance, which they meditated with all the deliberate forethought which is agreeable to their temper. Nor did they want a leader
capable of conducting their schemes with address. On the death of
Powhatan, in the year 1618, Opechancanough succeeded him, not only as
wirowanee, or chief of his own tribe, but in that extensive influence over
all the Indian nations of Virginia, which induced the English writers to
distinguish him by the name of Emperor. According to the Indian tradition, he was not a native of Virginia, but came from a distant country to
the south-west, possibly from  some province of the Mexican empire.
But as he was conspicuous for all the qualities of highest estimation among
savages, a fearless courage, great strength and agility of body, and crafty
policy, he quickly rose to eminence and power.-Soon after his elevation
to the supreme command, a general massacre of the English seems to have
been resolved upon; and during four years, the means of perpetrating it
with the greatest facility and success were concerted with amazing secirecy
All the tribes contiguous to the English settlements were successively gained,
except those on the eastern shore, from whom, on account.of their peculiar
attachment to their new neighbours, every circumstance that might discover
what they intended was carefully concealed. To each tribe its station
was allotted, and the part it was to act prescribed. On the morning of
the day consecrated to vengeance [March 22], each was at the place of
rendezvous appointed, while the English were so little aware of the
impending destruction that they received with unsuspicious hospitality
several persons sent by Opechancanough, under pretext of delivering
presents of veniston and fiuits, but in reality to observe their motions.
Finding thern perfectly secure, at midday, the moment that was previously 
fixed for this deed of horror, the Indians rushed at once upon them in all
their different settlements, and murdered nien, women, and children,.with
undistinguishing rage, and that rancorous cruelty with which savages treat
their enemies.  In one hour nearly a fourth part of the whole colony was
cut off, almost without knowing by whose hands they fell. The slaughter
would have been universal, if compassion, or a sense of duty, had'not
moved a converted Indian, to whomin the secret was communicated the
night before the massacre, to reveal it to hin master in such time as to save
James Town and some adjacent settlements; and if the English in other
districts had not run to their arms with resolution prompted by despair,
and defended themselves so bravely as to repulse their assailants, who,
in the execution of their plan, did not discover courage equal to the sagacity
and art wvith which they had concerted it.t
But though the blow was thus prevented from descending.' with its full
effect, it proved very grievous to an infant colony.'In some settlements
not a single Englishman escaped.  Many persons of prime note in the
colony, and among these several mellbers of the council, were slain.
The survivors, overwhelmed with grief, astonishment, and terror, aban.
doned all their remnote settlements, and, crowding together for safety to
James Trown, did not occupy a territory of greater extent than had been
planted soon after the arrival of their countrymen in Virginia.  Confined
within those narrow boundaries, they were less intent on schemes of industry
than on thoughts of revenge. Every rman took arms. A bloody war
against the Indians commenced; and, bent on exterminating the -whole
race, neither old nor young were spared.  The conduct of the Spaniards
in the southern regions of America wias openly proposed as the most proper
model to imitate;t and regardless, like them, of those principles of faith,
honour, and hunmanity'  which regulate hostility among civilized nations
and set bounds to its rage, the English deemed every thing allowable that
tended to accomplish their design. They hunted the Indians like wild
* Beverley, p. 51.   t Stith, p. 208, &c. Purchas, iv. 1788, &C:  Stith, p. 233.




AMERICA.'             415
beasts rather than enemies; and as the pursuit of them to their places of
retreat in the woods, which covered their country, was both difficult and
dangerous, they endeavoured to allure them from their inaccessible fastness
by offers of peace and promises of oblivion, made with such an artful
appearance of sincerity as deceived their crafty leader, and induced them
to return to their former settlements, and resume their usual peaceful occupations [1623].  The behaviour of the two people seemed now to be
perfectly reversed. The Indians, like men acquainted with the principles
of integrity and good faith, on which the intercourse between nations is
founded, confided in the reconciliation, and lived in absolute security without suspicion of danger; while the English, with perfidious craft, were
preparing to imitate savages in their revenge and cruelty.  On the approach
of harvest, when they knew a hostile attack would be most formidable
and fatal, they fell suddenly upon all the Indian plantations, murdered
every person on whom  they could lay hold, and drove the rest to the
woods, where so many perished with hunger, that some of the tribes
nearest to the English were totally extirpated.  This atrocious deed,
which the perpetrators laboured to represent as a necessary act of retaliation, was followed by some happy effects. It delivered the colony so
entirely from any dread of the Indians, that its settlements began again to
extend, and its industry to revive.
But unfortunately at this juncture the state of the-company in England,
m  which the property of Virginia and the government of the colony
settled there were vested, prevented it from seconding the efforts of the
planters, by such a reinforcement of men, and such a supply of necessaries, as were requisite to replace what they had lost. The company was
originally composed of many adventurers, and increased so fast by the
Junction of new members, allured.by the prospect of gain, or the desire of
promoting a scheme of public utility, that its general courts formed a
numerous assembly.*  The operation of every political principle and
passion, that spread through the kingdom, was felt in those popular meetings, and influenced their decisions. As towards the close of James's
reign more just and enlarged sentiments with respect to constitutional
liberty were diffused among the people, they came to understand their
rights better and to assert them with greater boldness; a distinction formerly
little known, but now familiar in English policy, began to be established
between the court and country parties, and the leaders of each endeavoured to derive power and consequence from  every quarter.  Both
exerted themselves with ernulation, in order to obtain the direction of a
body so numerous and respectable as the company of Virginian adventurers. In consequence of this, business had been conducted in every
general court for some years, not with the temperate spirit of merchants
deliberating concerning their mutual interest, but with the animosity and
violence natural to numerous assemblies, by which rival factions contend
for superiority.t
As the king did not often assemble the great council of the nation in
parliament, the general courts of the company became a theatre on which
popular orators displayed their talents; the proclamations of the crown,
and acts of the privy council, with respert to the commerce and police of
the colony, were canvassed there with treedom, and censured with severity, ill suited to the lofty ideas which Jarnme entertained of his own
wisdom, and the extent of his prerogative. In order to check this growing
spirit of discussion, the ministers employed all their address and influence
to gain as many members of the company as might give them the direction of their deliberations. But so unsuccessful were they in this attempt,
that every measure proposed by them was reprobated by a vast majority,
- Stith, p. 272. 276.    t Tbid. D. 2M9, &c. Chalmers,p. 59.




416                      HISTORY OF                     [BooK IX
and sometimes without any reason but because they were the proposers
of it. James, little favourable to the power of any popular assembly,
and weary of contending with one over which he hal laboured in vain to
obtain an ascendant, began to entertain thoughts of dissolving the company, and new modelling its constitution. Pretexts, neither unplausible
nor destitute of some foundation, seemed to justify this measure.  The
slow progress of the colony, the large sums of money expended, and great
number of men who had perished in attempting to plant it, the late massacre
by the Indians, and every disaster that had befallen the English from their
first migration to America, were imputed solely to the inability of a numerous company to conduct an enterprise so complex and arduous. The
nation felt sensibly its disappointment in a scheme in which it-had engaged
with sanguine expectations of advantage, and wished impatiently for such
an impartial scrutiny into former proceedings as might suggest -more
salutary measures in the future administration of the colony. The prep
sent state of its affairs, as well as the wishes of the people,seemed to call
for the interposition of the crown; and James, eager to display the superiority of his royal wisdonl, in correcting those errors into which  the
company had been betrayed by inexperience in'the arts of government,
boldly undertook the work of reformation [May 9, 1623].  Without
regarding the rights conveyed to the company by their charter, and without
the formality of any judicial proceeding for annulling it,: he, by virtue of
his prerogative, issued a comnmission, empowering some of' the judges, and
other persons of note, to examine into all the transactions of the company
from its first establishment, and to lay the result of their inquiries, together
with their opinion concerning the most effectual means of rendering thie
colony more prosperous," before the privy council. At the' same time, by
a strain of authority still higher, he ordered all the records and papers of
the company to be seized, and two of its principal officers to be: arrested.
Violent and arbitrary as these acts of. authority may now appear, the commissioners carried on. their inquiry without any obstruction, but What- arose
from  some feeble and ineffectual remonstrances of the company.  The
commissioners, though they conducted their scrutiny with much activity
and vigour,t did not communicate any of their proceedings to the company; but their report, with respect to its operations,- seems to have -been
very unfavourable, as the king, in consequence of it, signified to the company [Oct. 8], his intention of veEting the supreme government of the
company in a governor and twelve assistants, to be resident in England,
and the executive power in a council of twelve, which should reside in
Virginia. The governor and assistants were to be originally appointed by
the king. Future vacancies'were to be supplied by the governor and his
assistants, but their nomination weas not to take effect until it should be
ratified by the privy council. The twelve counsellors in Virginia were to
be Chosen by the:governor: and assistants; and this choice was likewise
subjected to the review of the prixy council. With an intention to quiet
the minds of the colonists, it was declared that private property should
be deemed sacred; and for the more effectual security of it, all grants of
lands from: the former company Were to be confirmed by'the new one.
In order to facilitate the execution of this plan, the king required the company instantly to surrender its charter into his hands.1
But here James and.his ministers encountered a spirit of which they
seem not to have been aware. They found the members of: the company
unwilling tamely to relinquish rights of franchises, conveyed to them with
such leg'al formality, that upon faith in theirvalidity they had expended
considerable sums;~ and still more averse to the abolition of a popular
form of government, in which every proprietor had a voice, in order-to
* Stith, p. 288.  t Smith's Travels, p. 165, &c., Stith, p 293, &c.' Chalmers, p. 61




AMER1C A.                            417
subject a colony, in which they were deeply Interested, to the, dominion
of a small junto absolutely dependent on the crown. Neither promises
nor threats could induce them  to depart from these sentiments; and in a
general court [Oct. 20], the king's proposal was almost unanimously
rejected, and a resolution taken to defend to the utmost their chartered
rights, if these should be called in question in any court of justice. James,
highly offended at their presumption in daring to oppose his will, directed
[Nov. 10] awrit of quo warranto to be issued against the company, that
the validity of its charter might be tried in the Court of King's Bench 
and in order to aggravate the charge, by collecting additional proofs of
Inal-administration, he appointed some persons in whom he could confide,
to repair to Virginia to inspect the state of the colony, and inquire into the
conduct of the company, and of its officers there.
The lawsuit in the King's Bench did not hang long in suspense. It
terminated, as was usual in that reign, in a decision perfictly consonant to
the wishes of the monarch. The charter was forfeited, the company was
dissolved [June, 1624], and all the rights and privileges conferred upon it
returned to the King, from whom they flowed.*
Sonle writers, particularly Stith, the most intelligent and best informed.
historian of Virginia, mention the dissolution of the company as a most
disastrous event to the colony. Animated with liberal sentiments, imbibed
in an age when the principles of liberty were more fully unfolded than
under the reign of James, they viewed his violent and arbitrary proceedings on this occasion-with such indignation that their abhorrence of the
means which he employed to accomplish his designs, seems to have rendered them incapable of contemplating its effects with discernment and
candour. There is not perhaps any mode of governing an infant colony
less friendly to its liberty than the dominion of an exclusive corporation.possessed of all the powers which James had conferred upon the company
of adventurers in Virginia. During several years the colonists can hardly be
considered in any other light than as servants to the company, nourished
out of its stores, bound implicitly to obey its orders, and subjected to the
most rigorous of all forms of government, that of martial law. Even after
the native spirit of Englishmen began to rouse under oppression, and had
extorted from their superiors the right of enacting laws for the government
of that community of which they were members, as no act, though
approved of by all the branches of the provincial legislature, was held to
be of legal force until it was ratified by a general court in England, the
company still retained the paramount authority in its own hands. Nor
was the power of the company more favourable to the prosperity of the
colony than to its freedom. A numerous body of merchants, as long as its
operations are purely commercial, may carry them on with discernment
and success. But the mercantile spirit seems ill adapted to conduct an
enlarged and liberal plan of civil policy, and colonies have seldom grown
up to maturity and vigour under its narrow and interested regulations.
To the unavoidable effects in administration which this occasioned, were
added errors arising from inexperience.  The English merchants of that
age had not those extensive views which a general commerce opens to such as
have the direction of it. When they first began to venture out of the beaten
track, they groped their way with timidity and hesitation.  Unacquainted
with the climate and soil of America, and ignorant of the productions best
suited to them, they seem to have had no settled plan of improvement, and
their schemes were continually varying. Their system of government
was equally fluctuating. In the course of eighteen years ten different
persons presided over the province as chief governors. No wonder that,
under such administration, all the efforts to give vigour and stability -to the
* Itymer, vol. xvii. p. 618, &c. Chalmers, p. 62
VOL. I-53




418                      HISTORY OF                      [BOOK IX.
colony should prove abortive, or produce only slender effects. These
efforts, however, when estimated according to the ideas of that age, either
with respect to commerce or to policy, were very considerable, and conducted with astonishing perseverance.
Above a hundred and fifty thousand pounds were expended in this first
attempt to plant an English colony in America;, and more than nine
thousand persons were sent out from the mother country to people this new
settlement. At the dissolution of the company, the nation, in return for
this waste of treasure and of people, did not receive from Virginia an
annual importation of commodities exceeding twenty thousand pounds in
value; and the colony was so far from having added strength to the state
by an increase of population, that in the year one thousand six hundred
and twenty-(our, scarcely two thousand persons survived;t a wretched
remnant of the numerous emigrants who had flocked thither with sanguine
expectations of a very different fate.
The company, like all unprosperous societies, fell unpitied. The violent
hand with which prerogative had invaded its rights was forgotten, and new
prospects of success opened, under a form of government exempt from all
the defects to which past disasters were imputed.  The King and the
nation concurred with equal ardour in resolving to encourage the colony.
Soon after the final judgment in the Court of King's Bench <aainst the
company, James appointed a council of twelve persons [Aug. 26], to take
the tempc;rary direction of affairs in Virginia that he might have leisure to
frame with deliberate consideration proper regulations for the permanent
government of the colony.: Pleased with such an opportunity of' exercising
his talents as a legislator, he began to turn his attention towards the
subject; but death prevented him from completing his plan.
Charles I., on his accession to the throne [March 27, 1625], adopted all
his father's maxims with respect to the colony in Virginia. He declared
it to be a part of the empire annexed to the crown, and immediately
subordinate to its jurisdiction: he conferred the title of Governor on Sir
George Yardely, and appointed him, in conjunction with a council of
twelve, and a secretary, to exercise supreme authority there, and enjoined
them to conform, in every point, to such instructions as from time to time
they might receive from him.~  From the tenor of the king's connission,
as well as from the known spirit of his policy, it is apparent that he intended
to invest every power of governmlent, both legislative and executive, in
the governor and council, without recourse to the representatives of the
people, as possessing a right to enact laws for the community, or to impose
taxes upon it. —Yardely and his council, who seem to have been fit instruments for carrying this system of arbitrary rule into execution, did not fail
to put such a construction on the words of their commission as was most
favourable to their own jurisdiction. During a great part of Charles's
reign, Virginia knew no other law than the will of the Sovereign.  Statutes
were published and taxes imposed, without once calling the representatives
of the people to authorize them by their sanction. At the samne timne that
the colonists were bereaved of their political rights, which they deemed
essential to freemen and citizens, their private property was violently invaded.
A proclamation was issued, by which, under pretexts equally absurd and
fi'iolous, they were prohibited from selling tobacco to any person but
certain conmissioners appointed by the king to purchase it on his account;l
and they had the cruel mortification to behold the sovereign, who should
have afforded them protection, engross all the profits of their industry, by
seizing the only valuable commodity which they had to vend, and retain
ing the monopoly of it in his own hands.  While the staple of the colony
* Smith's Travels, p. 42. 167.    t Chalmers' Annals, p. 69.  + ymer, xvii 618, &o
6 Ibid. xviii. 72. 311.  1! Ibid. xviii. 19.




AMERICA.                              41%
ma Virginia sunk in value under the oppression and restraints of a monopoly,
property in land was rendered insecure by various grants of it, which
Charles inconsiderately bestowed upon his favourites.  These were not
only of such exorbitant extent as to be unfavourable to the protrress ot
cultivation, but from  inattention, or imperfect acquaintance with the
geography of the country, their boundaries were so inaccurately defined,
that large tracts already occupied and planted were often included in
them.
The murmurs and complaints which such a system of administration
excited, were augmented by the rigour with which Sir John Harvey, who
succeeded Yardely in the government of the colony,? enforced every act
of power [1627]. Rapacious, unfeeling, and haughty, he added insolence
to oppression, and neither regarded- the sentiments nor listened to the
remonstrances of the people under his command. The colonists, far from
the seat of government, and overawed by authority derived firolm a roya.
commission, submitted long to his tyranny and exactions. Their patience
was at last exhausted; and in a transport of popular rage and indignation,
they seized their governor, and sent him a prisoner to England, accompanied by two of their number, whom they deputed to prefer their accusations against him to the king. But this attempt to redress their own
wrongs, by a proceeding so summary and violent as is hardly consistent
with any idea of regular government, and can be justified only in cases of
such urgent necessity as rarely occur in civil society, was altogether repugnant to every notion which Charles entertained with respect to the obedience due by subjects to their sovereign. To him the conduct of the
colonists appeared to be not only a usurpation of his right tojudge and to
punish one of his own officers, by an open and audacious act of rebellion
against his authority.  Without deigning to admit their deputies into his
presence, or to hear one article of their charge against Harvey, the king
instantly sent him back to his former station, with an ample renewal of all
the powers belonging to it. But though Charles deelned this vigorous
step necessary in order to assert his own authority, and to testify his displeasure with those who had presumed to offer such an insult to it, he
seems to have been so sensible of the grievances under which the colonists
groaned, and of the chief source from which they flowed, that sour after
[1639] he not only removed a governor so justly odious to them, but named
as a successor Sir William Berkeley, a person far superior to Hairvey in
rank and abilities, and still more distinguished. by possessing all the popu
tar virtues to which the other was a stranger.t
Under his government the colony in Virginia remained, with some short
intervals of interruption, almost forty years; and to his mild and prudent
administration its increase and prosperity are in a great measure to be
ascribed.  It was indebted, however, to the king himself for such a reform
of its constitution and policy, as gave a different aspect to the colony, and
animated all its operations with new spirit.  Though the tenor of Sir William Berkeley's commission was the same with that of his predecessor, he
received instructions under the great seal, by which he was empowered to
declare, that in all its concerns, civil as well as ecclesiastical, the colony
was to be governed according to the laws of England: he was directed to
Issue writs for electing representatives of the people, who, in conjunction
with the governor and council, were to form a general assembly, and to
possess supreme legislative authority in the community: he was ordered
to establish courts of justice, in which all questions, whether civil or criminal, were to be decided agreeably to the forms of judicial procedure in the
mother country. It is not easy to discover what were the, motives which
induced a monarch, tenacious in adhering to any opinion or system which
* Rymer, xviii. 980.  t Beverley's Hist. of Virg. p. 50. Chalmers's Annals, p. 118, &c




420                     HISTORY OF                       [Boox IX.
he had once adopted, jealous to excess of his own rights, and adverse on
every occasion to any extension of the privileges claimed by his people,
to relinquish his original plan of administration in the colony, and to grant
such immunities to his suljects settled there. From the historians of Virgiilia, no less superficial than ill informed, no light can be derived with
respect to this point. It is most probable, the dread of the spirit then
rising in Great Britain, extorted fromn Charles concessions so favourable to
Virginia. After an intermission of almost twelve years, the state of his
affairs compelled him to have recourse to the great council of the nation.
There his subjects would find a jurisdiction independent of the crown,
and able to control its authority. There they hoped for legal redress of
all their grievances. As the colonists in Virginia had applied for relief to
a former parliament, it might be expected with certainty that they would
lay their case before the fir st meeting of an assembly in which they were
secure of a favourable audience. Charles knew that, if the spirit of his
administration in Virginia were to be tried by the maxims of the English
constitution, it must be severely reprehended.  He was aware that many
measures of greater moment in his government would be brought under a
strict review in parliament; and, unwilling to give malecontents the advantage of adding a charge of oppression in the remote parts of his dominions
to a catalogue of domestic grievances, he artfully endeavoured to take the
merit of having granted voluntarily to his people in Virginia such privileges as he foresaw would be extorted from him.
But though Charles established the internal government of Virginia on
a model similar to that of the English constitution, and conferred on his
subjects there all the rights of freemen and citizens, he was extremely
solicitous to maintain its connexion with the parent state. With this view
he instructed Sir William Berkeley strictly to prohibit any commerce of
the colony with foreign nations; and in order more certainly to secure
exclusive possession of all the advantages arising from the sale of its productions, he was required to take a bond from the master of each vessel
that sailed from Virginia, to land his cargo in some part of the King's
dominions in Europe."  Even under this restraint, such is the kindly inguence of free government on society, the colony advanced so rapidly in
industry and population that at the beginning of the civil war the English
settled in it exceeded twenty thousand.4'
Gratitude towards a monarch from whose hands they had received
immunities which they had long wished but hardly expected to enjoy, the
influence and example of a popular governor passionately devoted to the
interests of his master, concurred in preserving inviolated loyalty among
the colonists.  Even after monarchy was abolished, after one King had
been beheaded, and another driven into exile, the authority of the crown
continued to be acknowledged and revered in'Virginia [1650]. Irritated
at this open defiance of its power, the parliament issued an ordinance,
declaring, that as the settlement in Virginia had been made at the cost and
by the people of England, it ought to be subordinate to and dependent upon
the English commonwealth, and subject to such laws and regulations as are
or shall be made in parliament; that, instead of this dutiful submission, the
colonists had disclaimed the authority of the state, and audaciously rebelled against it; that on this account they were denounced notorious traitors,
and not only all vessels belonging to natives of England, but those of
foreign nations, were prohibited to enter their ports, or carry on any commerce with them.
It was not the mode of that age to wage a war of words alone. The
efforts of a high spirited government in asserting its own dignity were
prompt and vigorous. A powerful squadron, with a considerable body of
* Chalmers's Annals, p. 219. 232.   t Ibid. p. 125,.




AM E RI CA                             42
land forces, was despatched to Ireduce the Virg'inians to ob)edience.  After
compelling the colonies in Barbadoes and the other islands to submit to the
commonwealth, the squadron  entered the Bay of Chesapeak [1651].
Berkeley, with more courage than prudence, took arms to oppose this
formidable armament; but he could not long maintain such an unequal
contest.  His gallant resistance, however, procured favourable terlns to the
people under his government. A general indemnity for all past offences
was gra'ted; they acknowledged the authority of the commonwealth,
and wsere admitted to a participation of all the righnts enjoyed by citizens."*
Berkeley, firnm to his principles of loyalty, disdained to make any stipulation for himse-lf; and, choosing to pass his days far removed fiom the seat
of a governmelt vwhich he detested,- continued to reside in Virginia as a
private man, beloved and respected by all over whom  he had formerly
presided.
Not satisfied with talkitng measures to subject the colonies, the commonwealth turned its attention towards the most effectual mode of retaining
hernm in dependence on the parent states and of securing to it the benefit
of their increasin comnmerce.  With this view the pari-ament framred two
laws, one of nwhich expressly prohibited all mercantile intercourse between
the colonies and foreign states, and the other ordained that no production
of Asia, Africa, or America, should be imported into the dominions of the
commonwealth but in vessels belonging to Enoglish owners, or to the people
of the colonies settled there, and navigated by an English commander,t
and by crews of' which the greater part must be Englishmen. But while
the wisdom of the commonwealth prescribed the channel in which the
trade of the colonies was to be carried on, it was solicitous to encourage
the cultivation of the staple commodity of Virginia, by an act of parliament [1652], which gave legal force tt. all the injunctions of James and
Charles against planting tobacco in England.t
Under governors appointed by the commonwealth, or by Cromwell when
he usurped the supreme power, V irginia remained almost nine years in
perfect tranquillity.  During that period, many adherents to the royal
party, and among these some gentlemen of good families, in order to avoid
danger and oppression, to which they were exposed in England, or in hopes
of repairing their ruined fortunes, resorted thither.  Warmly attached to
the cause for which they had fought and suffered, and animated with all
the passions natural to men recently engaged in a fierce and long protracted civil war, they, by their intercourse with the colonists, confirmed
them in principles of loyalty, and added to their impatience and indignation
under the restraints imposed on their commerce by their new masters.
On the death of Matthews, the last governor nanmed by Cromwell, the
sentiments and inclination of the people, no longer under the control of
authority, bulrst out with violence.  They forced Sir William Berkeley to
quit his retirement; they unanimously elected him governor of the colony:
and as he refused to act under a usurped authority, they boldly erected
the royal standard, and acknowledging Charles It. to be their lawful sovereign, proclaimed him with all his titles; and the Virginians lon- boasted,
that as they were the last of the king's subjects who renounced their allegiance, they were the first who returned to their duty.~
Happily for the people of Virginia, a revolution in England, no less
sudden than unexpected, seated Charles on the throne of his ancestors, and
saved them from the severe chastisement to which their premature declaration in his favour must have exposed them.  On receiving the firs'
account of this event, the joy and exultation of the colony were universal
and unbounded.  These, however, were not of long continuance. Gracious
~ Thurlow's State Papers, i. 197. Chalmers' Annals, p. 1L2. Beverley's Hist. p. 53.   t Sco
bel's Acts, p. 132. 167.  + lb. p. 117.  p Beverley, p. 55. Chalmers, p. 124




422                      HISTORY  OF                   [BooK IX
but unproductive professions of esteem and good will were the only return
made by Charles to loyalty and services which ir. their own estimation
were so distinguished that no recompense was beyond what they might
claim. If the king's neglect and ingratitude disappointed all the sanguine
hopes which their vanity had founded on the merit of their past conduct,
the spirit which influenced parliament in its commercial deliberations
opened a prospect that alarmed them with respect to their future situation.
In framing regulations for the encouragement of trade, which, during the
convulsions of civil war, and amidst continual fluctuations in government,
had met with such obstruction that it declined in every quarter; the House
of Commons, instead of granting the colonies that relief which they expected from the restraints in their commerce imposed by the commonwealth and Cromwell, not only adopted all their ideas concerning this
branch of legislation, but extended them further. This produced the act
of navigation, the most important and memorable of any in the statute-book
with respect to the history of English commerce. By it, besides several
momentous articles foreign to the subject of this work, it was enacted,
that no commodities should be imported into any settlement in Asia, Africa,
or America, or exported from them, but in vessels of English or plantation
built, whereof the master and three-fourths of the mariners shall be English
subjects, under pain of forfeiting ship and goods; that none but natural
born subjects, or such as have been naturalized, shall exercise the occupation of merchant or factor in any Ernglish settlement, under pain of forfeiting their goods and chattels; that no sugar, tobacco, cotton, wool,
indigo, ginger, or-woods used in dyeing, of the growth or manufacture of
th colonies, shall be shipped from them to any other country but England;
and in order to secure the performance of this, a sufficient bond, with one
surety, shall be given before sailing by the owners, for a specific sum proportional to the rate of the vessel employed by them."  The productions
subjected to this restriction are distinguished, in the language of commerce
and finance, by the name of enumerated commodities; and as industry in
its progress furnished new articles of value, these have been successively
added to the roll, and subjected to the same restraint. Soon after [1663J,
the act of navigation was extended, and additional restraints were imposed,
by a new law, which prohibited the importation of any European commodity into the colonies, but what was laden in England in vessels navigated and manned as the act of navigation required. More effectual provision was made by this law for exacting the penalties to which the
transgressors of the act of navigation were subjected; and the principles
of policy, on which the various regulations contained in both statutes are
founded, were openly avowed in a declaration, that as the plantations
beyond seas are inhabited and peopled by subjects of England, they may
be kept in a firmer dependence upon it, and rendered yet more beneficial
and advantageous unto it, in the further employment and increase of English shipping and seamen, as well as in the vent of English woollen and
other manufactures and commodities; and in making England a staple, not
only of the commodities of those plantations, but also of the commodities
of other countries and places, for the supplying of them; and it being the
usage of other nations to keep the trade of their plantations to themselves.1
In prosecution of those favourite maxims, the English legislature pro.
ceeded a step further. As the act of navigation had left the people of the
colonies at liberty to export the enumerated commodities from one plantation to anothe' without paying any duty [1672], it subjected them to a tax
equivalent to what was paid by the consumers of these commodities in
Enjgland.:
By these successive regulations, the plan of securing to England a mn
Car.ll c 18.    t J5 Car.II. c. 7.  + 25 Car. II. c. 7




AMERICA.                               423
nopoly of the commerce with its colonies, and of shutting up every other
channel into which it might be diverted, was perfected, and reduced into
complete system. On one side of the Atlantic these regulations have been
extolled as an extraordinary effort of political sagacity, and have been
considered as the great charter of national commerce, to which the parent
state is indebted for all its opulence and power. On the other, they have
been execrated as a code of oppression, more suited to the illiberality of
mercantile ideas than to extensive views of legislative wisdom. Which of
these opinions is best founded, I shall examine at large in another part of
this work.  But in writing the history of the English settlements in
America, it was necessary to *race the progress of those restraining laws
with accuracy, as in every subsequent transaction we may observe a perpetual exertion, on the part of the mother country, to enforce and extend
them; and on the part of the colonies, endeavours no less unremitting to
elude or to obstruct their operation.
Hardly was the act of navigation known in Virginia, and its effects begun
to be felt, when the colony remonstrated against it as a grievance, and
petitioned earnestly for relief. But the commercial ideas of Charles and
his ministers coincided so perfectly with those of parliament, that, instead
of listening with a favourable ear to their applications, they laboured
assiduously to carry the act into strict execution. For this purpose, instructions were issued to the governor, forts were built on the banks of the
principal rivers, and small vessels appointed to cruise on the coast. The
Virginians, seeing no prospect of obtaining exemption from  the act, set
themlselves to evade it; and found mleans, notwithstanding the vigilance
with which they were watched, of carrying on a considerable clandestine
trade with foreigners, particularly with the Dutch settled on Hudson's
River.  Emboldened by observing disaffection spread through the colony,
some veteran soldiers who had served under Cromwell, and had been
banished to Virginia, formed a design of rendering themselves masters of
the country, and of asserting its indeperdence on England.  This rash
project was discovered by one of their associates, and disconcerted by
the vigorous exertions of Sir William  Berkeley. But the spirit of discontent, though repressed, was not extinguished. Every day something
occurred to revive and to nourish it. As it is with extreme difficulty that
commerce can be turned into a new channel, tobacco, the staple of the
colony, sunk prodigiously in value when they were compelled to send it all
to one market. It was some time before England could furnish them regularly full assortments of those necessary articles, without which the
industry of the colony could not be carried on, or its prosperity secured.
Encouraged by the symptoms of general languor and despondency which
this declining state of the colony occasioned, the Indians seated towards
the heads of the rivers ventured first to attack the remote settlements,'and
then to make incursions into the interior parts of the country. Unexpected
as these hostilities were, from a people who during a long period had lived
in friendship with the English, a measure taken by the king seems to have
excited still greater terror among the most opulent people of the colony.
Charles had imprudently imitated the example of his father, by granting
such large tracts of lands in Virginia to several of his courtiers, as tended
to unsettle the distribution of property in the country, and to render the
title of the most ancient planters to their estates precarious and questionable.
From those various causes, which in a greater or less degree affected
every individual in the colony, the indignation of the people became
general, and was worked up to such a pitch, that nothing was wanting to
precipitate them into the most desperate acts but some leader qualified to
unite and to direct their operations.*
* Chalmers's Annals, ch. 10. 13, 14, passim, Beverley's list, of Virg. p. 58, &c.




4a4                    HISTORY  OF                   [BooK IX.
Such a leader they found in Nathaniel Bacon, a colonel of militia, who,
though he had been settled in Virginia only three years, had acquired, by
popular manners, an insinuating address, and the consideration derived
from having been regularly trained in England to the profession of law,
such general esteem that he had been admitted into the council, and was
regarded as one of the most respectable persons in the colony. Bacon
was ambitious, eloquent, daring, and, prompted either by honest zeal to
redress the public wrongs, or allured by hopes of raising' himself to distinction and power, he mingled with the malecontents; and by his bold
harangues and confident promises of removing all their grievances, he
inflamed them almost to madness. As the devastations committed by the
Indians was the calamity most sensibly felt by the people, he accused the
governor of having neglected the proper measures for repelling the invasions of the savages, and exhorted them to take arms in their own defence,
and to exterminate that odious race. Great numbers assembled, and chose
Bacon to be their general. He applied to the governor for a commission,
confirming this election of the people, and offering to march instantly against
the commnon enemy. Berkeley, accustomed byIong possession of supreme
command to high ideas of the respect due to his station, considered this
tumultuary armament as an open insult to his authority, and suspected that,
under specious appearances, Bacon concealed most dangerous designs.
Unwilling, however, to give farther provocation to an incensed multitude
by a direct refusal of what they demanded, he thought it prudent to negotiate in order to gain time; and it was not until he found all endeavours
to soothe them ineffectual, that he issued a proclamation, requiring them in
the king's name, under the pain of being denounced rebels, to disperse.
But Bacon, sensible that he had now advanced so far as rendered it
impossible to recede with honour or safety, instantly took the only resolution that remained in his situation. At the head of' a chosen body of his
followers, he marched rapidly to James Town, and surrounding the house
where the governor and council were assembled, demanded the commission
for which he had formerly applied. Berkeley, with the proud indignant
spirit of a cavalier, disdaining the requisitions of a rebel, peremptorily
refused to comply, and calmly presented his naked breast to the weapons
which were pointed against it. The council, however, foreseeing the fatal
consequences of driving an enraged multitude, in whose power they were,
to the last extremities of violence, prepared a commission constituting'
Bacon general of all the forces in Virginia, and by their entreaties prevailed
on the governor to sign it. Bacon with his troops retired in triumph.
Hardly was the council delivered by his departure from the dread of
present danger, when, by a transition not unusual in feeble minds, presumptuous boldness succeeded to excessive fear. The commission granted
to Bacon was declared to be null, having been extorted by force; he was
proclaimed a rebel, his followers were required to abandon his standard,
and the militia ordered to arm, and to join the governor.
Enraged at conduct which he branded with the name of base and treacherous, Bacon, instead of continuing his march towards the Indian country,
instantly wheeled about, and advanced with all his forces to James Town.
The governor, unable to resist such a numerous body, made his escape,
and fled across the bay to Acomack on the eastern shore. Some of the
counsellors accompanied him thither, others retired to their own plantations.
Upon the flight of Sir William Berkeley, and dispersion of the council, the
frame of civil government in the colony seemed to be dissolved, and Bacon
became possessed of supreme and uncontrolled power. But as he was
sensible that his countrymen would not long submit with patience to
authority acquired and held merely by force of arms, he endeavoured to
found it on a more constitutional basis, by obtaining the sanction of the
people's approbation. With this view he called together the most con



A MERIC A.                           425
siderable gentlemen in the colony, and having prevailed on them to bind
themselves by oath to maintain his authority, and to resist every enemy
that should-oppose it, he from that time considered his jurisdiction as legally
established.
Berkeley, meanwhile,. having collected some forces, made inroads into
different parts of the colony where Bacon's authority was recognised.
Several sharp conflicts happened with various success. Janles Town was
reduced to ashes, and the best cultivated districts in the province were laid
waste, sometimes by one party and sometimes by the other. But it was
not by hiis own exertions that the governor hoped to terminate the contest.
He had early transmitted an account of the-transactions in Virginia to the
king, and demanded such a body of soldiers as would enable him to quell
the insurgents whom he represented as so exasperated by the restraint
imposed on their trade, that they were impatient to shake offall dependence
on the parent state. Charles, alarmed at a commotion no less dangerous
than unexpected, and solicitous to maintain his authority over a colony the
value of which was daily increasing and more fully understood, speedily
despatched a small squadron with such a number of regular troops as
Berkeley had required. Bacon-and his followers received information of
this armament, but were not intimidated at its approach. They boldly
determined to oppose it with open force, and declared it to be consistent
with their duty and: allegiance, to treat all who should aid Sir William
Berkeley as enemies, until they should have an opportunity of laying their
Yrievainces before their sovereign.!
But while both parties prepared, with equal animosity, to involve their
country in the horrors of civil war (1677], an event happened, which quieted
the commotion almost as suddenly as It had been excited. Bacon, when
ready to take the field, sickened and died. None of his followers possessed such talents, or were so much objects of the people's confidence, as
entitled them to aspire to the supreme command. Destitute of a leader to
conduct and animate them, their sanguine hopes of success subsided;
mutual distrust accompanied this universal despondency; all began to wish
for an accommodation; and after a short negotiation with Sir William
Berkeley, they laid down their arms, and submitted to his government, on
obtaining a promise of general pardon.
Trhus terminated an insurrection, which, in the annals of Virginia, is distinguished by the name of Bacon's rebellion. During seven months this
daring leader was master of the colony, while the royal governor was shut
up in a remote and ill-peopled corner of it. What were the real motives
that prompted him to take arms, and to what length he intended to carry
his plans of reformation, either in commerce or government, it is not easy
to discover, in the scanty materials from which we derive our information
with respect to this transaction. It is probable,. that his conduct, like that
of other adventurers in faction, would have been. regulated chiefly by
events; and accordingly as these proved favourable or adverse, his views
and requisitions would have been extended or circumscribed.
Sir Williamn Berkeley, as soon as he was reinstated in his office, called
together the representatives of the people, that by their advice and authority public tranquillity and order might be perfectly established. Though
this assembly met a few weeks after the death of Bacon, while the memory
of reciprocal injuries was still recent, and when the passions excited by
such a fierce contest had but little time to subside, its proceedings were
conducted with a moderation seldom exercised by the successful party in
a civil war. No man suffered capitally; a small: number were subjected
to fines; others were declared incapable of holding any office of trust;
and with those exceptions the promise of general idemnity was confirmed
* Beverley's Hist. p. 75, 76
VOL. I.-54                     20




426                     HISTORY  OF                     [BooK  X.
by law. Soon after Berkeley was recalled, and Colonel Jeffreys was
appointed his successor.
From that period to the Revolution in 1688, there is scarcely any memorable occurrence in the history of Virginia. A peace was concluded with
the Indians. Under several successive governors, administration was carried
on in the colony with the same arbitrary spirit that distinguished the latter
years of Charles II. and the precipitate councilsof James II. The Virgintans, with a constitution which in form resembled that of England, enjoyed
hardly any portion of the liberty which that admirable system of policy is
framed to secure. They were deprived even of the last consolation of
the oppressed, the power of complaining, by a law which, under severe
penalties, prohibited them from speaking disrespectfully of the governor,
or defaming, either by words or writing, the administration of the colony.*
Still, however, the laws restraining their commerce were felt as an intole
rable grievance, and they nourished in secret a spirit of discontent, which,
from the necessity of concealing it, acquired a greater degree of acrimony.
But notwithstanding those unfavourable circumstances, the colony continued
to increase. The use of tobacco was now become general in Europe;
and though it had fallen considerably in price, the extent of demand compensated that diminution, and by giving constant employment to the industry
of the planters diffused wealth among them. At the Revolution the number
of inhabitants in the colony exceeded sixty thousand,' and in the course
of twenty-eight years its population had been more than doubled.4
BOOK X.
WHrEN James I., in the year one thousand six hundred and six, made
that magnificent partition, which has been mentioned, of a vast region in
North America, extending from the thirty-fourth to the forty-fifth degree
of latitude, between two trading companies of his subjects, he established
the residence of the one in London, and of the other in Plymouth. The
former was authorized to settle in the southern, and the latter in the
northern part of this territory, then distinguished by the general name of
Virginia. This arrangement seems to have been formed upon the idea of
some speculative refiner, who aimed at diffusing the spirit of industry, by
fixing the seat of one branch of the trade that was now to be opened, on
the east coast of the island, and the other on the west. But London possesses such advantages of situation, that the commercial wealth and activity
of England have always centered in the capital. At the beginning of the
last century, the superiority of the metropolis in both these respects was so
great, that though the powers and privileges conferred by the king on the
two trading companies were precisely the same, the adventurers settled in
Plymouth fell far short of those in London in the vigour and success of their
efforts towards accomplishing the purpose of their institution. Though the
operations of the Plymouth company were animated by the public-spirited
zeal of Sir John Popham, chief justice of England, Sir Ferdinando Gorges,
and some other gentlemen of the west, all its exertions were feeble and
unfortunate.
The first vessel fitted out by the company was taken by the Spaniards
[1606]. In the year one thousand six hundred and seven, a feeble settleinent was made at Sagahadoc; but, on account of the rigour of the climate,
*i Beverley, p. 81. Chalmers p 341.    + Chalmers's Annals, p. 356.   + Ibid. p. 125.




AMERI CA.                             427
was soon relinquished, and for some time nothing further was attempted
than a few fishing voyages to Cape Cod, or a pitifill traffic with the natives
for skins and oil. One of the vessels equipped for this purpose [l614J
was commanded by Captain Smith, whose name has been so often
mentioned with distinction in the History of Virginia.'The adventure was
prosperous and lucrative. But his ardent enterprising mind could not
confine its attention to objects so unequal to it as the petty details of a
trading voyage. Hfe employed a part of his time in exploring the coast,
and in delineating its bays and harbours. On his return, he laid a map of
it before  rince dharles, and, with the usual exaggeration of discoverers,
painted the beauty and excellence of the country in such glowing colours,
that the young prince, in the warmth of admiration, declared, that it should
be called New England;? a name which effaced that of Virginia, and by
which it is still distinguished.
The favourable accounts of the country by Smith, as well as the success
of his voyage, seem to have encouraged private adventurers to prosecute
the trade on the coast of New England with greater briskness; but did
not inspire the languishing company of Plymouth with such vigour as to
make any new attempt towards establishing a permanent colony there.
Something more than the prospect of distant gain to themselves, or of
future advantages to their country, was requisite in order to induce men to
abandon the place of their nativity, to migrate to another quarter of the
globe, and endure innumerable hardships under an untried climate, and
in an uncultivated land, covered with woods, or occupied by fierce and
hostile tribes of savages.  But what mere attention to private emolument or to national utility could not effect, was accomplished by the
operation of a higher principle.  Religion had gradually excited anlong a
great body of the people a spirit that fitted them remarkably for encountering the dangers, and surmounting the obstacles, which had hitherto
rendered abortive the schemes of colonization in that part'of America
allotted to the company of Plymouth. As the various settlements in New
England are indebted for their origin to this spirit, as in the course of our
narrative we shall discern its influence mingling in all their transactions,
and giving a peculiar tincture to the character of the people, as well as
to their institutions both civil and ecclesiastical, it becomes necessary to
trace its rise and progress with attention and accuracy.
When the superstitions and corruptions of the Romish church prompted
different nations of Europe to throw off its yoke, and to withdraw from
its communion, the mode as well as degree of their separation was various.
Wherever reformation was sudden, and carried on by the people without
authority from their rulers, or in opposition to it, the rupture was violent
and total. Every part of the ancient fabric was overturned, and a different
system, not only with respect to doctrine, but to church government, and
the external rites of worship, was established. Calvin, who, by his abilities, learning, and austerity of manners, had acquired high reputation and
authority in the Protestant churches, was a zealous advocate for this plan oi
thorough reformation. He exhibited a model of that pure form of ecclesiastical policy which he approved in the constitution of the church of
Geneva. The simplicity of its institutions, and still more their repugnancy
to those of the Popish church, were so much admired by all the stricter
reformers, that it was copied, with some small variations, in Scotlandtl, in
the republic of the United Provinces, in the dominions of the House of
Brandenburgh, in those of the Elector Palatine, and in the churches of the
Hugonots in France.
But in those countries where the steps of departure from the church of
Rome were taken with greater deliberation, and regulated by the wisdom
* Smith's Trav. book vi. p. 203, &c. Purchas, iv. p. 1837.




428                        HISTORY  OF                         [BOOK X.
or policy of the'supreme rm  rislrate, the separation was not so wTride    Of
all the reformed churches, that of England has deviated least froril the
ancient institutions. The violent but capricious spirit of Henry VIII., who,
though he disclaimed the supremacy, revered the tenets of the Papal see,
checked innovations in doctrine or worship during his reign. When his
son ascended the throne, and the Protestant religion was established by
law, the cautious prudence of Archbishop Cranmer moderated the zeal of
those who had espoused the new opinions.  Though the articles to be
recognised as the system of national faith were framed conformably to the
doctrines of Calvin, his notions with respect to church government and the
mode of worship were not adopted. As the hierarchy in England was
incorporated with the civil policy of the kingdom, and constituted a
member of the legislature, archbishops, and bishops, with all the subordinate ranks of ecclesiastics Subject to them, were continued according to
ancient form, and with the same dignity and jurisdiction. The peculiar
vestments in which the clergy performed their sacred functions, bowing
at the name of Jesus, kneeling at receiving the Sacrament of the Lord's
Supper, the sign of the Cross in baptism, the use of the Ring in marriage,
with several other rights to which long usage had accustomed the people,
and which time had rendered venerable, were still retained. But though
Parliament enjoined the observance of these ceremonies under very severe
penalties," several of the more zealous clergy entertained scruples with
respect to the lawfulness of complying with this injunction: and the vigilance and authority of Cranmer and Ridley, with difficulty saved their
infarnt church from the disgrace of a schism on this account.
On tlhe accession of Mary, the furious zeal with which she persecuted
all who had adopted the tenets of the reformers forced many eminent
-proie:ants, laymen as well as ecclesiastics, to seek an asylum  on the
ccmimnent.  Francfort,. Geneva, Basil, and Strasburgh received them with
affectionate hospitality as sufferers in the cause of truth, and the magistrates
permitted them  to assemble by themselves for religious worship.  The
exiles who took up their residence in the two former cities, modelled their
little congregations according to the ideas of Calvin, and with a spirit
natural to men in their situation, eagerly adopted institutions which appeared
to be further removed from the superstitions of Popery than those of their
own church.  They returned to England as soon as Elizabeth re-established
the protestant religion, not only with more violent antipathy to the opinions
and practiceq of that church by which they had been oppressed, but with
a strong attachment to that mode of worship to which they had been for
some years accustomed. As they were received by their countrymen with
the veneration due to confessors, they exerted all the influence derived from
that opinion in order to obtain such a reformation in the English ritual as
might bring it nearer to the standard of purity in foreign churches.  Some
of the Qiueen's most confidential ministers were warmly disposed to
co-operate with them in this measure. But Elizabeth paid little regard to
the inclinations of the one or the sentiments. of the other. Fond of pomp
and ceremony, accustomed, according to the mode of that age, to study
religious controversy,.and possessing, like her father, such confidence in her
own understanding, that she never doubted her capacity to judge and
decide with respect to every point in dispute between contending sectst
~: 2and 3'Edw. VI. c. 1.
t Of the high idea which Elizabeth entertained-withrcspect to her own superior skill.in theology,
as well as the haughty tone in which she dictated to her subjects what thev ought to believe, we
have a striking picture in. her speech at the close of the parliament, A. D. 155. —" One thing I may
not overskip-Religion, the ground on which all other matters ought to take root; arid, being corrupted, may mar all the tree. And that there be some fault-finders with the order of the clergy,
which so may make a slander to myself, and to the church, whose overruler God hath made me,
whose negiligence cannot be excused, if any schisms or errors heretical were suffbred. Thus much
I must say, that some faults and negligencesmust grow and be, as in all other great charges it happeneth; and whaL vocation without 1 All which, if you, my lords of the clergy, do not amend,




AMERICA.                                 42-6
she chose to act according to her own ideas, which led her rather to ay,proach
nearer to the church of Rome, in the parade of external worship, than to
widen the breach by abolishing any: rite already established.~ An act of
parliament, in the first year of her reign, not only required an~ exact conformity to the mode of worship prescribed in the service book, under
most rigorous penalties, but empowered the Queen to enjoin the observance
of such additional ceremonies as might tend, in her opinion, -to render the
public exercises of devotion more decent and edifying.t
The advocates for a further reformation, notwithstanding:this cruel
disappointment of the sanguine hopes with which they returned to their
native country, did not relinquish their design.  They disseminated their
opinions with great industry among the people.  They extolled the purity
of foreign churches, and inveighed against the superstitious practices with
which religion was defiled in their own church.  In vain did the defenders
of the established system represent that these forms and ceremonies were
in themselves things perfectly indifferent, which, from  long usage, were
viewed with reverence; and by their impression upon the senses and
imagination, tended not only to fix the attention, but to affect the heart,
and to warm  it with devout and worthy sentiments.  The Puritans (for
by that name such as scrupled to comply with what was enjoined by the
Act of Uniformity were distinguished) maintained that the rites in question
were inventions of men, superadded to the simple and reasonable services
required in the word of God; that from  the excessive solicitude with
which conformity to them was exacted, the multitude must conceive such
a high opinion of their value and importance as might induce them to rest
satisfied with the mere form  and shadow of religion, and to imagine that
external observances may compensate for the want of inward sanctity;
that ceremonies which had been long employed by a society manifestly
corrupt, to veil its own defects, and to seduce and fascinate mankind, ought
now to be rejected as relics of superstition unworthy of a place in a church
which gloried in the name of Reformed.
The people, to whom in every religious controversy the final appeal is
made, listened to the arguments of the contending  parties; and it is
obvious to which of them, men who-had lately beheld the superstitious
spirit of popery, and felt its persecuting rage, would lend the most favourable ear. The desire of a further separation from the church of Rome
spread wide through the nation. The preachers who contended for this,
and who refused to wear the surplice, and other vestments peculiar to their
order, or to observe the ceremonies enjoined - by law, were followed and
admired, while the ministry of the zealous advocates for conformity was
deserted, and their persons often exposed to insult.  For some time the:nonconformists were connived at; but as their number and boldness
increased, the interposition both of spiritual and civil authority was deemed
necessary in order to check their progress. To the disgrace of Christians,
the sacred rights of conscience and private judgment, as well as the charity
and mutual forbearance suitable to the mild spirit of:the religion which
they professed, were in that age little understood.  Not only the idea of
toleration, but even the word itself in the sense now affixed to it, was then
unknown.  Every church claimed a right to employ the hand of power
for the protection of truth and the extirpation of error.  The laws of her
I mean to depose youm. Look ye, therefore, well to your charges. This may bhe amended without
needless or open exclamations. I am supposed to have many studies, but most philosophical.
I must yield this to be true, that I suppose few (that be not professors) have read more.
And I need not tell you, that I am not so simple that I understand not, nor so forgetful that
I remember not; and yet amidst my many volumes, I hope God's book hath not been my seldomest
lectures, in which we find that by which reason all ought to believe. I see many over-bold with
God Almighty, making too many subtle scannings of his blessed will. The presumption is so great
that I may not suffer it," &c. D'Ewes's Journal, p. 328.
* Neal's IisAt. of the Pulitans, i. 138. 176.  1 1 Eliz. c. 2.




430                     HISTORY OF                       tBoox X.
kingdom armed Elizabeth with ample authority for this purpose, and she
was abundantly disposed to exercise it with full vigour. Many of the
most eminent among the puritan clergy were deprived of their benefices,
others were imprisoned, several were fined, and some put to death. But
persecution, as usually happens, instead of extinguishing, inflamed their
zeal to such a height, that the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts of law
was deemed insufficient to suppress it, and a new tribunal was established
under the title of the High Commission for Ecclesiastical JqAihirs, whose
powers and mode of procedure were hardly less odious or less hostile to
the principles of justice than those of the Spanish Inquisition.  Several
attempts were made in the House of Commons to check these arbitrary
proceedings, and to moderate the rage of' persecution; but the Queen
always imposed silence upon those who presumed to deliver any opinion
with respect to a matter appertaining solely to her prerogative, in a tone as
imperious and arrogant as was ever used by Henry VIIL in addressing his
parliaments; and so tamely obsequious were the guardians of the people's
rights that they not only obeyed those unconstitutional commands, but consented to an act, by which every person who should absent himself from
church during a month was subjected to punishment by fine and imprisonment; and if after conviction he did not within three months renounce his
erroneous opinions and conform to the laws, he was then obliged to abjure
the realn; but if he either refused to comply with this condition, or returned
from banishment, he should be put to death as a felon without benefit of
clergy. 
By this iniquitous statute, equally repugnant to ideas of civil and of religious liberty, the puritans were cut off from any hope of obtaining either
reformation in the church or indulgence to themselves. Exasperated by
this rigorous treatment, their antipathy to the established religion increased,
and with the progress natural to violent passions, carried them far beyond
what was their original aim. The first puritans did not entertain any scruples with respect to the lawfulness of episcopal government, and seem  to
have been very unwilling to withdraw from colmmunion with the church
of which they were members. But when they were thrown out of her
bosom, and constrained to hold separate assemblies for the worship oI
God, their followers no longer viewed a society by which they were
oppressed, with reverence or affection. Her government, her discipline,
her ritual, were examined with minute attention. Every error was pointed
out, and every defect magnified.'The more boldly any preacher inveighed
against the corruptions of the church, he was listened to with greater approbation; and the further he urged his disciples to depart from such an
impure community, the more eagerly did they follow him. By degrees,
ideas of ecclesiastical policy, altogether repugnant to those of the established church, gained footing in the nation. The more sober and learned
puritans inclined to that form which is known by the name of Presbyterian.
Such as were more thoroughly possessed with the spirit of imlovatjor,
however much they might approve the equality of pastors which that system establishes, reprobated the authority which it vests in various judicatories, descending from one to another in regular subordination, as incon~istent with Christian liberty.
These wild notions floated for some time in the minds of the people, and
amused them with many ideal schemes of ecclesiastial policy. At length
Robert Brown [1580], a popular declaimer in high estimation, reduced
them to a systemn, on which he modelled his own congregation.  He taught
that the church of England was corrupt and antichristian, its ministers not
lawfully ordained, its ordinances snd sacramenfs invalid; and therefore
he prohibited his people to hold communion with it in any religious func* 35 Eliz. c. 1.




AM E R I C A.                         431
tion. He maintained, that a society of Christians, uniting together to worship God, constituted a church possessed of complete jurisdiction in the
conduct of its own affairs, independent of any other society, and unaccountable to any superior; that the priesthood was neither a distinct order in
the church, nor conferred an indelible character; but that every-man qualified to teach might be set apart for that office by the election of the brethren, and by imposition of their hands; in like manner, by their authority,
he might be discharged from that function, and reduced to the rank of a
private Christian; that every person when admitted a member of a church,
ought to make a public confession of his faith, and give evidence of his
being in a state of favour with God; and that all the affairs of a church
were to be regulated by the decision of the majority of its members.
This demlocratical form of government, which abolished all distinction
of ranks in the church, and conferred an equal portion of power on every
individual, accorded so perfectly with the levelling genius of' fanaticism,
that it was fondly adopted by many as a complete model of Christian
policy. From  their founder they were denominated Brownists; and as
their tenets were more hostile to the established religion than those of other
separatists, the fiercest storm of persecution fell upon their heads.  Many
of them  were fined or imprisoned, and some put to death; and though
Brown, with a levity of which there are few examples anmong enthusiasts
whose vanity has been soothed by being recognised as heads of a party,
abandoned his disciples, conformed to the established religion, and accepted
of a benefice in the.church, the sect not only subsisted, but continued to
spread, especially among persons in the middle and lower ranks of life.
But as all their motions were carefully watched, both by the ecclesiastical
and civil courts, which, as often as they were detected, punished them
with the utmost rigour, a body of them, weary of living int a state of continual danger and alarm, fled to Holland, and settled in Leyden, under the
care of Mr. John Robinson their pastor. There they resided for several
years unmolested and obscure. But many of their aged members dying,
and some of the younger marrying into Dutch families, while their church
received no increase, either by recruits from England or by proselytes
gained in the country, they began to be afraid that all their high attainments in spiritual knowledge would be lost, and that perfect fabric of
policy which they had erected would be dissolved, and consigned to oblivion, if they remained longer in a strange land.
Deeply affected with the prospect of an event which to them appeared
fatal to the interests of truth, they thought themselves called, in order to
prevent it, to remove to some other place, where they might profess and
propagate their opinions with greater success. America, in which their
countrymen were at that time intent on planting colonies, presented itself
to their thoughts. They flattered themselves with hopes oft' being permitted, in that remote region, to follow their own ideas in religion without
disturbance. The dangers and hardships to which all former emigrants to
America had been exposed did not deter them. "1 They were well weaned
(according to their own description,) from the delicate milk of their mother
country, and inured to the difficulties of a strange land. They were knit
together in a strict and sacred band, by virtue of which they held themselves obliged to take care of the good of each other, and of the whole.
It was not with them, as with other men, whom small things could discourage, or small discontents cause to wish themselves at home again."* The
first object of their solicitude was to secure the free exercise of their religion. For this purpose they applied to the king; and, though James
refused to give them any explicit assurance of toleration, they seem to have
obtained from him some promise of his connivance, as long as they con* Hutchinlson's Hist. of Massach. p. 4.




432                    HISTORY  OF                     BooK X.
tinued to demean themselves quietly. So eager were they to accomplish
their favourite scheme, that, relying on this precarious security, they began
to negotiate with the Virginian company for a tract of land within the
limits of their patent. This they easily procured from a society desirous
of encouraging migration to a vast country, of which they had hitherto
occupied only a few spots.
After the utmost efforts, their preparations fell far short of what was
requisite for beginning the settlement of-a new colony. A hundred and
twenty persons sailed from England [Sept. 6, 16201, in a single ship on
this arduous undertaking. The place of their destination was Hudson's
River, where they intended to settle; but their captain having been
bribed, as is said, by the Dutch, who had then formed a scheme, which
they afterwards accomplished, of planting a colony there, carried them
so far towards the north, that the first land in America which they made
[Nov. 11], was Cape Cod. Theywere now not only beyond the precincts of the territory which had been granted to them, but beyond those
of the company from which they derived their right. The season, however, was so far advanced, and sickness raged so-violently among men
unaccustomed to the hardships of a long voyage, that it became necessary
to take up their abode there. After exploring the coast, they chose for
their situation a place now belonging to the province of Massachusetts Bay,
to which they gave the name of New Plymouth, probably out of respect
to that company within whose jurisdiction they now found themselves
situated.*
No season could be more unfavourable to settlement than that in which
the colony landed. The winter, which, from the predominance of cold
in America, is rigorous to a degree unknown in parallel latitudes of our
hemisphere, was already set in; and they were slenderly provided with
what was requisite for comfortable subsistence, under a climate considerably more severe than that for which they had made preparation. Above
one half of them was cut off before the return of spring, by diseases, or by
famine: the survivors, instead of having leisure to attend to the supply of:their own wants, were compelled to take arms against the savages in their
neighbourhood. Happily for the English, a pestilence which raged in
America the year before they landed, had swept off so great a number
of the natives that they were quickly repulsed and humbled. The privilege of professing their own opinions, and of being governed by laws:of
their own framing, afforded consolation to the colonists amidst all their
dangers and hardships. The constitution of their church was the same
with that which they had established in Holland. Their system of civil
government was founded on those ideas of the natural equality among
men, to which their ecclesiastical policy had accustomed them. Every
free man, who was a member of the church, was admitted into the supreme
legislative body. The laws of England were adopted as the basis of their
jurisprudence, though with some diversity in the punishments inflicted
upon crimes, borrowed from the Mosaic institutions. The executive power
was vested in a governor and some assistants, who were elected annually
by the members of the legislative assembly.t 3So far their institutions
appear to be founded on the ordinary. maxims of human prudence. But
it was a favourite opinion with all the enthusiasts of that age, that the
Scriptures contained a complete system not only of spiritual instruction,
but of civil wisdom and polity; and without attending to the peculiar
circumstances or situation of the people whose history is there recorded,
they often deduced general rules for-their own conduct from what happened
among men in a very different state. Under the influence of this wild
* Huhard's Pres. State, p. 3. Cotton's Magnalia, p. 7. Hutchinson's Hist.p. 3 &c.
t Chalners's Annals, p. 87.




AIMER1 C(A.                          433
notion, the colonists of New Plymouth, in imitation of the primitive Chris.
tians, threw all their property into a common stock, and, like members of
one family, carried on every work of industry by their joint labour for
public behoof.i  But, however this resolution might evidence the sincerity
of their faith, it retarded the progress of their colony. The same fatal
effects flowed from this community of goods, and of labour, which had
formerly been experienced in Virginia; and it soon became necessary to
relinquish what was too refined to be capable of being accommodated to
the affairs of men. But though they built a small town, and surrounded
it with such a fence as afforded sufficient security against the assaults of
Indians, the soil around it was so poor, their religious principles were so
unsocial, and the supply sent them by their friends so scanty, that at the
end of ten years the number of people belonging to the settlement did
not exceed three hundred.t  During some years they appear not to have
acquired right by any legal conveyance to the territory which they had
occupied. At'length [1630], they obtained a grant of property from the
council of the New Plymouth Company, but were never incorporated as
a body politic by royal charter.T Unlike all the other settlements in
America, this colony must be considered merely as a voluntary association,
held together by the tacit consent of its members to recognise the authority of laws, and submit to the jurisdiction of magistrates, framed and
chosen by themselves. In this state it remained an independent but feeble
community, until it was united to its more powerful neighbour, the colony,
of Massachusetts Bay, the origin and progress of which I now proceed to
relate.
IThe original company of Plymouth having done nothing effectual towards establishing any permanent settlement in America, James I., in the
year one thousand six hundred and twenty, issued a new charter to the'Duke of Lenox, the Marquis of Buckingham, and several other persons
of distinction in his court, by which he conveyed to them a right to a territory in America, still more extensive than what had been granted to the
former patentees, incorporating them as a body politic, in order to plant
colonies there, with powers and jurisdictions similar to those contained in
his charters to the companies of South and North Virginia. This society
was distinguished by the name of the Grand Council of Plymouth for
planting and governing New England. What considerations of public
utility could induce the king to commit such an undertaking to persons
apparently so ill qualified for conducting it, or what prospect of private
advantage prompted them to engage in it, the information we receive from
contemporary writers does not enable us to determine. Certain it is, that
the expectations of both were disappointed; and after many schemes and
arrangements, all the attempts of the new associates towards colonization
proved unsuccessful.
New England must have remained unoccupied, if the same causes
which occasioned the emigration of the Brownists had not continued to
operate. Notwithstanding the violent persecution to which puritans of
every denomination were still exposed, their number and zeal daily increased. As they now despaired of obtaining in their own country any
relaxation of the penal statutes enacted against their sect, many began to
turn their eyes towards some other place ofretreat, where they might pro.
fess their own opinions with impunity. From the tranquillity which their
brethren had hitherto enjoyed in New Plymouth, they hoped to find this
desired asylum  in New England; and by the activity of Mr. White, a
nonconformist minister at Dorchester, an association was formed by several
gentlemen who had imbibed puritanical notions) in order to conduct a
* Chalmers's Annals, p. 89. Douglas's Summary, i. p. 370.    t Chalmers's Annals, p 9O
IbilO. p. 97. 107.
VOL. — -55




434                     HISTORY OF                        [BOOK X.
colony thither. They plirchased from  the council of Plymouth [March
19, 1627], all the territory, extending in length from three miles north ot
the river Merrimack, to three miles south of Charles River, and in breadth,
from the Atlantic to the Southern Orean. Zealous as these proprietors
were to accomplish their favourite purpose, they quickly perceived their
own inability to attempt the population of such an immense region, and
deemed it necessary to call in the aid of more opulent copartners.*
Of these they found without difficulty, a sufficient number, chiefly in the
capital, and among persons in the commercial and other industrious walks
of life, who had openlyjoined the sect of the puritans, or secretly fax oured
their opinions.  These new adventurers, with the caution natural to men
conversant in business, entertained doubts concerning the propriety of
founding a colony on the basis of a grant from Ia private company of patentees, who might convey a right of property in the soil, bugt could not
confer jurisdiction, or the privilege of governing that society which they
had in contemplation to establish. As it was only from royal autihority that
such: powers could be derived, they applied for these; and Charles granted
their request, with a facility wvhich appeals astonishing, when we conrsider
the principles and views of the men who were suitors orthe favour.
~ Time has been considered as the parent of political -wisdom, but its
instructions are communicated slowly. Although the experience of above"
twenty years might have taught the English the impropriety of committing
the government of settlements in America to exclusive corporations resident
in Europe, neither the king nor his subjects had profited so much by what
passed before their eyes as to have extended their ideas beyond those
adopted by James in his first attempts towards colonization.  The charter
of Charles I. to the adventurers associated for planting the province of
Massachusetts Bay, was perfectly similar to those granted by his father to
the two Virginian companies and to the council of Plymouth.  The new
adventurers were incorporated a-s a body politic, and their right to the
territory, which they had purchased from the council at Plymo.uth, being
confirmed by the king, they were empowered to dispose of lands, and to
govern the people who should settle upon them. The first governor of
the company and his assistants were named by the crown; the right of
electing their successors was vested in the members of the corporation.
The executive power was committed to the governor and assistants; that
of legislation to the body of proprietors, who might make statutes and
orders for the good of the community, not inconsistent with the laws of
E}ngland, and enforce the observance of them, according to the course of
other corporations within the realm. Their lands were to be hleld by the
same liberal tenure with those granted to the Virginian company.  Jhey
obtained the same temporary exemption from  internal taxes, and from
duties on gocds exported or imported; and notwithstanding their migration to America, they and their descendants were declared to be entitled to
all the rights of natural born subjects.t
The manifest object of this charter was to confer on the adventurers who
undertook to people the territory on Massachusetts Bay, all the corporate
rights possessed by the council of Plymouth, from which they had purchlased it, and to form them  into a public body, resembling other great
trading companies, which the spirit of monarchy had at that time multiplied
in the kiiigdom. The king seems not to have foreseen, or to have suspectel thle secret intentions of those who projected the measure; for so
iar was he from alluring emigrants, by any hopes of indulgence with respect to their religious scruples, or from promising any relaxation from the
rigour of the penal statutes against nonconfor mists, that he expressly pro* Neal's Hist. of New England, i. p. 12"..  t Hutchinson's Collect. of Original PaperNa
~. i' &,C.




AMER C  RCA.                               435
vides for having the oath of supremacy administered to eveiy person who
shall pass to the colony, or inhabit ttlree.:
But whatever were the intentions of the kinpg, the adventurers kept. their
own object steadily in view.  Soon after their powers to establish a colony
were rendered complete by the royal charter [1629], they fitted out five
ships for New England; on board of which embarked upwards of three
hundred passengers, with a. view  of settling  there.  These were most
zealous puritans, whose chief inducement to relinquish their native land
was the hope of enjoying religious libexty in a country far removed from
the seat of government and the qppression of ecclesiastical courts.  Some
eminent nonconformist ministers accompanied them  as, their spiritual instructers.  On their arrival in New England, they found the wretched remainder of a small body of emigrants, who had left England [June 29],
the preceding year, under the conduct of Endicott, a deep enthusiast,
whom, prior to their incorporation by the royal charter, the associates had
appointed deputy governor.  They were settled at a place called by the
Indians Naunekeag, and to which Endicott, with the fond affectation of
fanatics of that age to employ the language and appellations of Scripture
in the affairs of common life, had given the name of Salem.
The emigrants under Endicott, and such as now joined them, coincided
perfectly  in religious principles.  They were puritans of the strictest
form; and to men of this character the institution of a church was naturally
of such interesting concern as to take place of every other object.  In this
first transaction, they displayed at once the extent of the reformation at
which they aimed.  Without regard to the sentiments of tnat monarch
under the sanction of whose authority they settled in America, and friom
whom they derived right to act as a body politics and in contempt of the
laws of England, with which the charter required that none of their acts
or ordinances should be inconsistent, they adopted in their infant church
that form of policy which has since been distinguished by the namle of
Independent.  They united together in religious society [Aug. 61, by a
solemn covenant with God and with one another, and in strict confrnlity,
as they imagined, to the rules of Scripture.  They elected a pastor, a
teacher, and an: elder, whom they set apart for their respective offices, by
imposition of the hands of the brethren.  All who were that day admitted
rrembers of the church signified their assent to a confession of faith drawn
up by their teacher, and gave an account of the foundation of their own
hopes as Christians; and it was declared that no person should hereafter
be received into comnmunion until he gave satisfaction to the church with
respect to his faith and sanctity.  The ftrm of public worship which they
instituted was without a liturgy, disencumbered of every superfluolus cereml1ony, and reduced to the low(est standard of Calvinistic simplicity.t
It was with: the utmost complacence that men passionately attach.ed to
their own notions, and who had long been restrained from  avowing them,
employed themselves in framing this model of a pure church.  But in the
first moment that they began to taste of Christian liberty themselves, they'
forgot that other men had an equal title to enjoy it.  Some of their number, retaining a high veneration for the ritual of the English church, were
so much offended at the total abolition of it, that they withdrew  from com* Hutchinson's Collect. of Orig. Papers, p. 18.-It is surprising that Mr. Neal, an industrious and
generally well informed writer, should affirm, that:' free liberty o(f conscience was gralted by this
charter, to all who should settle inl those parts, to worship God in their own wayv." Hist. of New
Engl. i. 121. This he repeats in his History of the Puritans, ii. 2J 1; and sullseqellnt historians have
copied lirmn implicitly. No-perinissionr of this kind, however, is contained in the charter; and such
an indulgence would have been inconsistent with all the maxims of Chlarge -and h;s ministers during
the course of his reign. At the timne when Charles issued the charter, the infir.ence of Lard over
his coullnsels was at its height, the puritans were prosecuted with the greatest severity, and the
kingdom was ruled entirely by prerogative. This is not an era in which one can expect to mrtte
with concessions in favour of nonconformists, from a prince of Clharl s's character and principla.
t Math. Malgnal, p. 18. Neal's Hist. of N. Engl. i. 1X26. Chalmers, J. 14:3.




436                    HISTORY  OF                      [BoocX.
muniop with the newly instituted church, and assembled separately for the
worship of God. With an inconsistency of which there are such flagrant
instances atmong Christians of every denomination that it cannot be imputed as a reproach peculiar to any sect, the very men who'had themselves
fled firom persecution became persecutors; and had recourse, in order to
enforce their own opinions, to the same unhallowed weapons, against the
employment of which they had lately remonstrated with so much violence.
Endicott called the two chief malecontents before him; and though they
were men of note, and among the number of original patentees, he expelle'd
them from the society, and sent them  home in the ships which were returning to England.*  The colonists were now united in sentiments; but,
on the approach of winter, they suffered so much from diseases, which
carried off almost one half of their number, that they made little progress
in occupying the country.
Meanwhile the directors of the company in England exerted their
utmost endeavours in order to reinforce the colony with a numerous body
of new settlers; and as the intolerant spirit ol Laud exacted conformity to
all the injunctions of the church with greater rigour than ever, the condition
of such as had any scruples with respect to this became so intolerable tnat
many accepted of their invitation to a secure retreat in New Enlamnd.
Several of these were persons of greater opulence and of better condition
than any who had hitherto migrated to that country. But as they intended
tO employ their fortunes, as well as to hazard their persons in establishing
a permanent colony there, and foresaw many inconveniences from their
subjection to laws made without their own consent, and framed by a
society which must always be imperfectly acquainted with their situation,
they insisted that the corporate powers of the company should be transferred from  England to America, and the government of the colony be
vested entirely in those who, by settling in the latter country, became
members of it.t The company had already expended considerable sums
in prosecuting the design of their institution, without having received
almost any return, and had no prospect of gain, or even of reimbursement,
but what was too remote and uncertain to be suitable to the ideas of merchants, the most numerous class of its members. They hesitated, however,
with respect to the legality of granting the demand of the intended emi..
grants. But such was their eagerness to be disengaged from an unpro.
mnising adventure, that, " by general consent it was determined, that the
charter should be transferred, and the government be settled in New
England."T  To the members of the corporation who chose to remain at
horme was reserved a share in the trading stock and profits of the company
during seven years.
In this singular transaction, to which there is nothing similar in the history
of English colonization, two circumstances merit particular attention: one
Is the power of the company to make this transference; the other is the
silent acquiescence with which the king permitted it to take place. If the
validity of this determination of the company be tried by the charter
which constituted it a body politic, and conveyed to it all the corporate
powers with which it was invested, it is evident that it could neither exercise those powers in any mode different from what the charter prescribed,
nor alienate them in such a manner as to convert the jurisdiction of a
trading corporation in England into a provincial government in America.
But from the first institution of the company of Massachusetts Bay, its
members seem to have been animated with a spirit of innovation in civil
policy, as well as in religion; and by the habit of rejecting established
usages in the one, they were prepared for deviating from theml in the other.
* Mather, p. 19. Neal, p. 129.  t Hutchinson's Coll. of Papers, p. 25.: Mather,
p. 20.  IIs:clhinson's liist. p. 12.  Chalmers, p. 150.




A MERI CA.                            437
They had applied for a royal charter, in order to g'ive legal effect to their
-operations ili England, as acts of a body politic; iut' the persons whom
they sent out to America, as soon as they landed there, considered themselves as individuals united together by voluntary association, possessing
the natural right of men who form a society, to adopt what mode of government, and to enact what laws they deemned most conducive to general
felicity.  Upon this principle of being entitled to judge and to decide for
themselves, they established their church in SaleTm, without regard to the
institutions of the church of England, of which the charter supposed them
to be members, and bound of consequence to conformity with its ritual.
Suitable to the same ideas, we shall observe them framing all their future
plans of civil and ecclesiastical policy.  The king, though abundanltly
vigilant in observing and checking slighter encroachments on his prerogative,
was either so much occupied at that time with other cares, occasioned by
his fatal breach with his parliament, that he could not attend to the proceedings of' the company; or he was so much pleased -with the prospect
of removing a body of turbulent subjects to a distant country, where they
might be tuiefull, and could not prove dangerous, that he was disposed to
connive at the irregularity of a measure which facilitated their departure.
Without interruption from the crown, the adventurers proceeded to carry
their scheme into execution.  In a general court, John W inthrop was
appointed governor, and Thomas Dudley deputy governor, and eighteen
assistants were chosen; in whom, together with the body of freemen who
should settle in New England, were vested all the corporate rights of the
company,  With such zeal and activity did they prepare for emigration,
that in the course of the ensuing year seventeen ships sailed for New
England, and aboard these above fifteen hundred persons,'among whom
were several of respectable families, and in easy circumstances. On their
arrival in New England, many were so ill satisfied with the situation of
Salem, that they explored the country in quest of some better station; and
settling in different places around the 1ay, according to their various'fancies, laid the foundations of Boston, Charles Town, Dorchester, Roxborough, and other towns, which have since become considerable in the
province. In' each of these a church was established on the same model
with that of Salem. This, together with the care of making provision for
their subsistence during winter, occupied them entirely during some months.
But in the first general court [Oct. 19], their disposition to consider themselves as members of an independent society, unconfined by the regulations
of their charter, began to appear.  The election of the governor and
deputy governor, the appointment of all otherkofficers, and even the power
of making laws, all which were granted by the charter to the freemen,
were taken from  them, and vested in the council of assistants. But the
aristocratical spirit of this resolution did not accord with the ideas of equality
prevalent among the people, who had been surprised into an approbation
of it. Next year [1631] the freemen, whose numbers had been greatly
augmented by the admission of new members, resumed their former rights
But, at the same time, they ventured to deviate from the charter in a
matter of greater moment, which deeply affected all the future operations
of the colony, and contributed greatly to form that peculiar character by
which the people of New England have been distinguished. A law was
passed, declaring that none shall hereafter be admitted freemen, or be
entitled to any share in the government,'or be capable of being chosen
magistrates, or even of serving as jurymen, but such as have been received
into the church as members.?  By this resolution, every person who did
not hold the favourite opinions concerning the doctrines of religion, the
discipline of the church, or the rites of worship, was at once cast out cf the
* Hutchinscn, p. W6. Chalners, p. 153




438                     HISTORY OF                      [BOOK X.
society, and stripped of all the privileges of a citizen. An uncontrolled
power of approving or rejecting the claims of those who applied for
admnission into communion with the church being vested in the ministers
and leading men of each congregation, the most valuable of all civil rights
was made to depend on their decision with respect to qualifications purely
ecclesiastical. As in examining intb these they proceeded not by any
k:nown or established rules, but exercised a discretionary judgment, the
clergy rose gradually to a degree of influence and authority, irom which
the levelling spirit of the independent church policy was calculated to
exclude them. As by their determination the political condition of every
citizen was fixed, all paid court to men possessed of such an important
power, byassuming those austere and sanctimonious manners which were
known to be the most certain recommendations to their favour. In consequence of this ascendant, which was acquired chiefly by the wildest
enthusiasts among the clergy, their notions became a standard to which all
studied to conform, and the singularities characteristic of the puritans in
that age increased, of which many remakable instances will occur in the
course of our narrative.
Though a considerable number of planters was cut off by the diseases
prevalent in a country so imperfectly cultivated by its original inhabitants
as to be still almost one continued forest, and several, discouraged by the
hardships to which they were exposed, returned to England, recruits sufficient to replace them arrived. At the same tine the small-pox, a dis.
temper fatal to the people of the New World, swept away such multitudes of the natives, that some whole tribes disappeared; and Heaven, by
thus evacuating a country in which the English might settle without
molestation, was supposed to declare its intention that they should
occupy it
As several of the vacant Indian stations were well chosen, such was the
eagerness of the English to take possession of them, that their settlements
became more numerous and more widely dispersed than suited the con.
dition of an infant colony. This led to an innovation which totally altered
the nature and constitution of the government. When a general court was
to he held in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-four, the freemen instead of atteiiding it in person, as the charter prescribed, elected
representatives in their different districts, authorizing them  to appear in
their name, with full power to deliberate and decide concerning every
point that fell under the cognizance of the general court. Whether this
measure was suggested by some designing leaders, or whether they found
it prudent to soothe the people by complying with their inclination, is
uncertain.  The representatives were admitted, and considered themselves,
in conjunction with the governor and assistants, as the supreme legislative
assembly of the colony. In assertion of their own rights, they enacted
that no law should be passed, no tax should be imposed, and no public
officer should be appointed, but in the general assembly.  The pretexts for
making this new arrangement were plausible. The number of freemen was
greatly increased; many resided at a distance from the places where the
supreme courts were held; personal attendance became inconvenient; the
form of government in their own country had rendered familiar the idea of
delegating their rights, and committing the guardianship of their liberties
to representatives of their own choice, and the experience of ages had
taught them that this important trust might with safety be lodged in their
hands. Thus did the company of Massachusetts Bay, in less than six
years from  its incorporation by the king, mature and perfect a scheme
which, I have already observed, some of its more artful and aspiring
leaders seem to have had in view, when the association for peopling New
England was first formed. The colony must henceforward be considered,
not as a corporation whose powers were defined, and its mode of




AMERICA.                             439
procedure regulated by its charter, but as a society, which, having acquired
or assumed political li}erty, had, by its own voluntary deed, adopted a
constitution or government framed on the model of that in England.
But however liberal their system oi civil policy might be, as their iellgious opinions were no longer under any restraint of authority, the spirit ot
fanaticism continued to spread, and became every day wilder and more
extravagant.  Williams, a minister of Salem, in high estimation, having
conceived an antipathy to the cross of St. George in the standard of England, declaimed against it with so much vehemence, as a relic of super
stition and idolatry which ought not to be retained among a people so pure
and sanctified, that Endicott, one of the members of the court of' assistants,
in a transport of zeal, publicly cut out the cross from the ensign displayed
before the governor's gate. This frivolous matter inteiested and divided
the colony. Some of the militia scrupled to follow colours in which there
was a cross, lest they should do honour to an idol; others refused to serve
under a mutilated banner, lest they should be suspected of having
renounced their aliegiance to the crown of England. After a longt controversy, carried on by both parties with that heat and zeal which in trivial
disputes supply the want of argument, the contest was terminated by a
conmpromise.  The cross was retained in the ensigns of forts and ships, but
erased from  the colours of the militia. Williams, on account of this, as
well as of some other doctrines deemed unsound, was banished out of the
colony.*
The prosperous state of New England was now so highly extolled, and
the simple frame of its ecclesiastic policy so much admired by all whose
affections were estranged from the church of England, that crowds of new
settlers flocked thither [1635]. Among these were two persons, whose
names have been rendered memorable by the appearance which they
afterwards made on a more conspicuous theatre; one was Hugh Peters, the
enthusiastic and intriguing chaplain of Oliver Cromwell: the other Mr.
Henry Vane, son of Sir Henry V'ane, a privy counsellor, high in office, and
of great credit with the king; a ybung man of a noble family, animated
with such zeal for pure religion and such love of liberty as induced him
to relinquish all his hopes in England, and to settle in a colony hitherto no
further advanced in improvement than barely to afford subsistence to its
members, was received with the fondest admiration.  His mortified
appearance, his demure look and rigid manners, carried even beyond the
standard of preciseness in that society which hejoined, seemed to indicate
a man of high spiritual attainments, while his abilities and address in business pointed him out as worthy of the highest station in the community.
With universal consent, and high expectations of advantage from his
administration, he was elected governor in the year subsequent to his
arrival [1636]. But as the affairs of an infant colony afforded not objects
adequate to the talents of Vane, his busy pragmatical spirit occupied itself
with theological subtilties and speculations unworthy of his attention.
These were excited by a woman, whose reveries produced such effects
both within the colony and beyond its precincts, that frivolous as they may
now appear, they must be mentioned as an occurrence of importance in its
history.
It was the custom at that time in New England, among the chief men
in every congregation, to meet once a week in order to repeat the sermons
which they had heard, and to hold religious conference with respect to the
doctrine contained in them. Mrs. Hutchinson, whose husband was among
the most respectable members of the colony, regretting that persons of her
sex were excluded from the benefit of those meetings, assembled statedly
in her house a numberof women, who employed themselves in pious exercise.
* Neal's Hist. of N Eng. p. 140, &c. Hutcinson, p. 37. Chalmers, p. i56.




440                     HISTORY OF                      [BooK X.
similar to those of the men. At first she satisfied herself with repeatling what
she could recollect of the discourses delivered by their teachers. Sne began
afterwards to add illustrations, and at length proceeded to censure some of
the clergy as unsound, and to vent opinions and fancies of her own. These
were all founded on the system which is denominated Antinomian by
divines, and tinged with the deepest enthusiasm. She taught, that sanctity
of life is no evidence of justification, or of a state of favour with God; and
that such as inculcated the necessity of manifesting the reality of our faith
by obedience preached only a covenant of works; she contended that the
Spirit of God dwelt personally in good men, and by inward revelations and
impressions they received the fullest discoveries of the divine will. The
fluency and confidence with which she delivered these notions gained
her many admirers and proselytes, not only among the vulgar but among
the principal inhabitants. The whole colony was interested and agitated.
Vane, whose sagacity and acuteness seemed to forsake him whenever they
were turned towards religion, espoused and defended her wildest tenets.
Many conferences were held, days of fasting and humiliation were
appointed, a general synod was called; and, after dissensions so violent as
threatened the dissolution of the colony, Mrs. Hutchinson's opinions were
condemned as erroneous, and she herself banished [1637]. Several ot her
disciples withdrew from the province of their own accord. Vane quitted
America in disgust, unlamented even by those who had lately admired
him; some of whom now regarded him as a mere visionary, and others as
one of those dark turbulent spirits doomed to embroil every society into
which they enter.*
However much these theological contests might disquiet the colony of
Massachusetts Bay, they contributed to the more speedy population of
America. When Williams was banished from  Salem in the year one
thousand six hundred and thirty-four, such was the attachment of his hearers to a pastor whose piety they revered, that a good number of them voluntarily accompanied him in his exile. They directed their march towards
the south; and having purchased from the natives a considerable tract of
land, to which Williams gave the name of Providence, they settled there.
They were joined soon after by some of those to whom the proceedings
against Mrs. Hutchinson gave disgust; and by a transaction with the
Indians they obtained a right to a fertile island in Narraganset Bay, which
acquired the name of Rhode Island.  Williams- remained among them
upwards of forty years, respected as the father and the guideof the colony
which he had planted. His spirit differed from that of the puritans in
Massachusetts; it was mild and tolerating; and having ventured himself
to reject established opinions. he endeavoured to secure the same liberty
to other men, by maintaining that the exercise of private judgment was a
natural and sacred right; that the civil magistrate has no compulsive jurisdiction in the concerns of religion; that the punishment of any person on
account of his opinions was an encroachment on conscience, and an act of
persecution.  These humane principles he instilled into his followers;
and all who felt or dreaded oppression in other settlements resorted to a
commnunity in which universal toleration was known to be a fundamental
maxim. In the plantations of Providence and Rhode Island, political union
was established by voluntary association, and the equality of condition
among, the members, as well as their religious opinions; their form of
government was purely democratical, the supreme power being lodged i
the freemen personally assembled. In this state they remained until they
were incorporated by charter.$
* lather, book vii. C. 3. Hutchinson, p. 53. 74. Neal, p. 1. 144. 165, &c. Chalmers, p. 163.
t Neal's Hist. of N. Eng. p. 141.. Hutchinson, p. 38. Neal, ii. 112. Dougl. Sum. ii.  -76,
&c. Chalmers, cir. ii.




AMIERICA.                            441
To similar causes the colony of Connecticut is indebted for its origin.
The rivalship between Mr. C(otton and Mr. Hooker, two favourite millisters in the settlement of Massachusetts Bay, disposed the latter, who was
feast successful in this contest for fame and power, to wish for some settlement at a distance from a competitor by whom his reputation was eclipsed.
A good number of those who had imbibed Mrs. Hutchinson's notions, and
were offended at such as combated them, offered to accompany him.
Having employed proper persons to explore the country, they pitched upon
the west side of the great rinver Connecticut as the most inviting station;
and in the year one thousand six hundred and thirty-six, about a hundred
persons, with their wives and families, after a fatiguing march of many
days through woods and swamps, arrived there, and laid the foundation of
the towns of Hartford, Springfield, and Weathersfield. This settlement
was attended with peculiar irregularities. Part of the district now occu
pied lay beyond the limits of the territory granted to the colony of Mas
sachusetts Bay, and yet the emigrants took a commission from the governor
and court of assistants, empowering them to exercise jurisdiction in that
country. The Dutch from Manhados or New York, having discovered
the river Connecticut, and established some trading houses upon it, had
acquired all the right that prior possession confers. Lord Say and Sele
and Lord Brook, the heads of two illustrious families, were so much
alarmed at the arbitrary measures of Charles I., both in his civil and ecclesiastical administration, that they took a resolution, not unbecoming young
men of noble birth and liberal sentiments, of retiring to the New World,
in order to enjoy such a form of religion as they approved of, and those
liberties which they deemed essential to the well being of society. They,
too, fixed on the banks of the Connecticut as their place of settlement, and
had taken possession, by building a fort at the mouth of the river, which
from their united names was called Say Brook. The emigrants from Massachusetts, without regarding either the defects in their own right or the
pretensions of other claimants, kept possession, and proceeded with vigour
to clear and cultivate the country. By degrees they got rid of every competitor. The Dutch, recently settled in America, and too feeble to engage
in a war, peaceably withdrew from Connecticut. Lord Say and Sele and
Lord Brook made over to the colony whatever title they might haVe to:any lands in that region. Society was established by a voluntary compact
of the freemen; and though they soon disclaimed all dependence on the
colony of Massachusetts Bay, they retained such veneration for its legislative wisdom as to adopt a form of government nearly resembling its institutions, with respect both to civil and ecclesiastical policy. At a subsequent period, the colony of Connecticut was likewise incorporated by
royal charter.A'
The history of the first attempts to people the- provinces of New Hamp
shire and Mlaine, which form the fourth and most extensive division in New
England, is ob'scured and perplexed, by the interfering claims of various
proprietors. The company of Plymouth had inconsiderately parce.lled
out the northern-part of the territory contained in its grant among different
persons: of these only Sir Ferdinando Gorges and Captain Mason seem to
have had any serious intention to occupy the lands allotted to them. Their
efforts to accomplish this were meritorious and persevering, but unsuccessiiIl. The expense of settling colonies in an uncultivated country must
necessarily be great and immediate; the prospect of a return is often uncertain, and always remote. The funds of two private adventurers were
not adequate to such an undertaking. Nor did the planters whom they
sent out possess that principle of enthusiasm, which animated their neighbours of Massachusetts with vigour to struggle through all the hardships and
* Hutchlinson, p. 44, &c Neal, i. 147. Douglas, ii. 158, &c. ChJmers's Annals, ch. xil.
VOL. I.-56




442                     HISTORY OF                      [Boox X.
dangers to which society in its infancy is exposed in a savage land.
Gorges and Mason, it is probable, must have abandoned their design, if,
froIn the saine motives that settlements had been made in Rhode Island and
Connecticut, colonists had not unexpectedly migrated into New Hampshire and Maine. Mr. Wheelwright, a minister of some note, nearly related
to Mrs. Hutchinson, and one of her most fervent admirers and partisans,
had on this account been banished from the province of Massachusetts Bay.*
In quest of a new station, he took a course opposite to the other exiles,
and advancing towards the north,: founded the town of Exeter on a small
river flowing into Piscataqua Bay. His tollowers, few in number, but
firmly united, were of such rigid principles, that even the churches of
Massachusetts did not appear to them sufficiently pure. From time to time
they received some recruits, whom love of novelty, or dissatisfaction with
the ecclesiastical institutions of the other colonies prompted to join them.
Their plant.ations were widely dispersed, but the country was thinly peopled, and its political state extremely unsettled. The colony of Massa
chusetts Bay claimed jurisdiction over them, as occupying lands situated
within the limits of their grant. Gorges and Mason asserted the rights
conveyed to them as proprietors by their charter. In several districts the
planters, without regarding the pretensions of -either party, governed themselves by maxims and laws copied from those of their'brethren in the adjacent colonies.t  The first reduction of the political constitution in the provinces of New Hampshire and Maine into a regular and permanent form,
was subsequent to the Revolution.
By extending their settlements, the'English became exposed to new
danger. The tribes of Indians around Massachusetts Bay were feeble and
unwarlike; yet frorn regard to justice, as well as motives of prudence, the
first colonists were studious to obtain the consent of the natives before they
ventured to occupy any of their lands; and though in such transactions the
consideration given was often very inadequate to the value of the territory
acquired, it was sufficient to satisfy the demands of the proprietors. The
English took quiet possession of the lands thus conveyed to them, and no
open hostility broke out between them and the ancient possessors. But
the colonies of Providence and Connecticut soon foulpd that they were surrounded by more powerful and martial nations. Among these the most
considerable were the Narragansets and Pequods; the former seated on the
bay which bears their name, and the latter occupying the territory which
stretches from the river Pequods along the banks of the Connecticut. The
Pequods were a formidable people, who could bring into the field a thousand warriors not inferior in courage to any in the New World. They
foresaw, not only that the extermination of the Indian race must be the
consequence of permitting the English to spread over the continent'of
America,' but that, if measures were not speedily concerted to prevent it,
the calamity would be unavoidable. With this view they applied to the
Narragansets, requesting them to forget ancient animosities for a moment,
and to co-operate with them in expelling a common enemy who threatened
both with destruction. They representidd that, when those strangers first
landed, the object of their visit was -not suspected, and no proper precautions were taken to check their progress-; that now, by sending out colonies in one year towards three different tquarters, their intentions were
manifest, and the people of America must abandon their native seats to
make way for unjust intruders.
But the Narragansets and Pequods, like most of the contiguous tribes in
America, were rivals, and there subsisted between theln an hereditary and
implacable enmity. Revenge is the darling passion of savages; in order
* Hutchinson, p. 70. t Ibid. p. 103, &c. 176. Douglas's Sum. ii. 22, &c. Chalmers's Annals,
eh. xvii.




AMERICA.                              443
to secure tne indulgence of which there is no present advantage that they
wvill not sacrifice, and no futlre -consequence which they do not totally
disregard.  The Narragansets, instead of closing with the prudent proposal
of their neighbours, discovered their hostile intentions to the governor of
Massachusetts Bay: and, eager to lay hold on such a favourable opportunity of wreaking their vengeance on their ancient foes, entered into an
alliance with the English against them. The Pequods, more exasperated
than discouraged by the imprudence and treachery of their countrymen,
took the field, and carried on the war in the usual- mode of' Americans.
They surprised stragglers, and scalped them; they plundered and burnt
remote settlements; they attacked Fort Say Brook without success, though
garrisoned only by twenty men; and when the English began *to act
)ffensively, they retired to fastnesses which they deemed inaccessible.
The different colonies had agreed to unite against the common enemy,
each furnishing a quota of men in proportion to its numbers. The troops
of Connecticut, which lay most exposed to danger, were soon assembled.
The march of those from Mussachusetts, which formed the most considerable body, was retarded by the most singular cause that ever influenced
the operations of a military force. When they were mustered previous to
their departure, it was found that some of the officers, as well as of the
private soldiers, were still under a covenant of works; and that the
blessing of GOD could not be implored or expected to crown the arms of
such unhallnwed men with success. The alarm was general, and many
arrang'ements necessary in order to cast out the unclean, and to render this
little band sufficiently pure to fight the battles of a people who entertained
high ideas of their own sanctity.-'
Meanwhile the Connecticut troops, reinforced by a small detachment
fromn Say Brook, found it necessary-to advance towards the enemy. They
were posted on a rising ground, in the middle of a swamp towards the
head of the river Mistick, which they had surrounded with palisadoes,
the best defence that their slender skill in the art of fortification had discovered.  Thr)ugh they knew that the English were in motion, yet, with
the usual improvidence and security of savages, they took no measures
either to observe their progress, or to guard against being surprised themselves. The enemy, unperceived, reached the palisadoes [May 20]; and
if a dog had not given the alarm by barking, the Indians must have been
massacred without resistance. In a moment, however, they started to
arms, and, raising the war cry, prepared to repel the assailants. But at
that early period of their intercourse with the Europeans, the Americans
were little acquainted with the use of gunpowder, and dreaded its effects
extremely.  While some of the English galled them with an incessant fire
through the intervals between the palisadoes, others forced their way by
the entries into the fort, filled only with branches of trees; and setting fire
to the huts which were covered with reeds, the confusion and terror quickly
became general.  Many of the women and children perished in the
flames; and the warriors, in endeavouring to escape, were either slain by
the English, or, falling into the hands of their Indian allies, who surrounded
the fort at a distance, were reserved for a more cruel fate. After the junction of the troops from Massachusetts, the English resolved to pursue their
victory; and hunting the Indians from  one place of retreat to another
some subsequent encounters were hardly less fatal to them than the action
on the Mistick. In less than three months the tribe of Pequods were extirpated: a few miserable fugitives, who took refiuge among the neighbouring Indians, being incorporated by them, lost their name as a distinct
people. In this first essay of their arms, the colonists of New England
seem to have been conducted by skilful and enterprising officers, and disNeal, i. 168.




t44                       HISTORY OF                        [Booi X
played both coU-eia1g' and perseverance as soldiers.  But they stained their
laurels by the use which they made of victory.  Instead of treating the
Pequods as an independent people, who made a gallant eflbrt to defend
the property, the rights, and the freedom of their nation, they retaliated
upon them  all the barbarities of American war.  Some they massacred in
cold blood, others they gave up to be tortured by their Indian allies, a considerable number they sold as slaves in Bermudas, the rest were reduced
to servitude among themselves.'
But reprehensible as this conduct of the English must be deenied, their
vigorous efforts in this decisive campaign filled all the surrounding tribes
of Indians with such a high opinion of their valour as secured a long tranquillity to all their settlements.  At the same time the violence of administration in England continued to increase their population and strength, by
forcing many respectable subjects to tear themselves from all the tender
connections that bind men to their native country, and to fly for refuge to a
region of the New World, which hitherto presented to thein nothing that
could allure them thither but exemption from oppression.  The number of
those emigrants drew the attention of government, and appeared so formidable that a proclamation was issued, prohibiting masters of ships from
carrying. passengers to New  England without special permission.  On
many occasions this injunction was eluded or disregarded.  Fatally for the
king, it operated with full effect in one instance.  Sir Arthur Haslerig,
John Hampden, Oliver Cromwell, and some other persons whose principles
and views coincided with theirs, inpatient to enjoy those civil and religious liberties which they struggled in vain to obtain in Great Britain,
hired some ships to carry them and their attendants to New England.  By
order of council, an embargo was -laid on these when on, the point of
sailing; and Charles, far from suspecting that the future revolutions in his
kingdoms were to be excited and directed by persons in such an humble
sphere of life, forcibly detained the men destined to overturn his throne,
and to terminate his days by a violent deatht
But, in spite of' all the efforts of government to check this spirit of
migration, the measures of the king and his ministers were considered by
a great body of the people as so hostile to those rights which they deemed
most valuable, that in the course of the year one thousand six hundred and
thirty-eight, about three thousand persons embarked for New  England,,choosing rather to expose themselves to all the consequences of disregarding the royal proclamation than to remain longer under oppression.
Exasperated at this contempt of his authority, Charles had recourse to a
violent but effectual mode of accomplishing what he had in view. A
writ of ugo warranto was issued against the corporation of Massachusetts
Bay.  The colonists had conformed so little to the terms of their charter
that judgment was given against them  without difficulty.  They were
found to have forfeited all their rights as a corporation, which of cclrse
returned to the crown, and:Charles began to take measures for new modelling the political frame of the colony, and vesting the administration of its
affairs in other hands. But his plans were never-carried into execution.
In every corner of' his dominions the storm now began to gather, which
soon burst, out with such fatal violence, that Charles, during the remainder
of his unfortunate reign, occupied with domestic and more interesting cares,
had not leisure to bestow any attention upon a remote and inconsiderable
province.$
On the meeting of the Long Parliament, such a revolution took place
in England that all the motives for migrating to the New World ceased.
+ Hutchinson, p. 58. 76, &c. Mather, Magnalia, b. vii. ch. 6. Hubbard's State of N. Eng. p. 5.
116, &c.   t Matler, Magnalia, b. i. oh. 5. p.'23. Ncal's fIist. of N. Eng. i. 151. Chalmers'
Annals, i. 155. 160, &c.. Hutchinson, p. 86. 502, &c. Chalmers's Annals, i. 161.




AMERICA.                             445
The maxims of the puritans with respect to the government both of church
and state became predominant in the nation, and were enforced by the
hand of power. Their oppressors were humbled; that perfect system
of reformed polity, which had long been the objiect of their admiration
and desire, was established by law; and amidst the intrigues and conflicts
of an obstinate civil war, turbulent and aspiring spirits found such full occupation that they had no inducement to quit a busy theatre, on which they
had risen to act a most conspicuous part. From the year one thousand sis
hundred and twenty, when the first feeble colony was conducted to New
England by the Brownists, to the year one thousand six hundred and forty,
it has been computed that twenty-one thousand two hundred British
subjects had settled there. The money expended by various adventurers
during that period, in fitting out ships, in purchasing stock, and transporting
settlers, amounted on a moderate calculation, nearly to two hundred thousand pounds:* a vast sum in that age, and which no principles, inferior in
force to those wherewith the puritans were animated, could have persuaded
men to lay out on the uncertain prospect of obtaining an establishment in
a remote uncultivated region. which, from its situation and climate, could
allure them with no hope but that of finding subsistence and enjoying
freedom. For some years, even subsistence was procured with difficulty;.and it was towards the close of the period to which our narrrative is arrived,
before the product of the settlement yielded the planters any return for
their stock. About that time they began to export corn in small quantities
to the West Indies, and made some feeble attempts to extend the fishery,
and to open the trade in lumber, which have since proved the staple
articles of commerce in the colony.t  Since the year one thousand six
hundred and forty, the number of people with which New England has
recruited the population of the parent state, is supposed at least to equal
what may have been drained from it by occasional migrations thither.
But though the sudden change of system  in Great Britain stopped
entirely the influx of settlers into New England, the principles of the
colonists coincided so perfectly with those of the popular leaders in parliament that they were soon distinguished by peculiar marks of their
brotherly affection. By a vote of the House of Commons in the year one
thousand six hundred and forty-two, the people in all the different planta-.
tions of New England were exempted froum payment of any duties, either
upon goods exported thither, or upon those which they imported into the
mother country, until the House shall take further order to the contrary.
This was afterwards confirmed [1646] by the authority of both Houses.
Encouraged by such an extraordinary privilege, industry made rapid progress in all the districts of New England, and population increased along
with it. In return for those favours, the colonists applauded the measures
of parliament, celebrated its generous efforts to vindicate the rights and
liberties of the nation, prayed for the success of its arms, and framed regulations in order to prevent any exertion in favour of the king on the other
side of the Atlantic.:
Relying on the indulgent partiality with which all their proceedings
were viewed by men thus closely united with them in sentiment and
wishes, the people of New England ventured on a measure which not
only increased their security and power, but may be regarded as a considerable step towards independence. Under the impression or pretext of
the danger to which they were exposed from the surrounding tribes of
Indians, the four colonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and
New Haven, entered into a league of perpetual confederacy, offensive and
defensive ([May 19, 1643]; an idea familiar to several leading men in the
* Mather, b. i ch 4. p. 17. ch. 5. p. 23. IHutchinson, p. 193. Chalmers's Annals. p. t65.
t HutchlI) in, p. 91, 92.  t lbid. p 114. App. 517. Chalmers's Annals, i. 174. 176.




416                     HISTORY OF                       [BooI K;
colonies, as it was framed in imitation of the famous bond of union among
the Dutch provinces, in whose dominions the Brownists had long resided.
It was stipulated that the confederates should henceforth be distinguished
by the name of the United Colonies of New England; that each colony
should remain separate and distinct, and have exclusive jurisdiction within
its own territory; and that in every war, offensive or defensive, each of
the confederates shall furnish his quota of men, provisions, and money,
at a rate to he fixed from  time to time, in proportion to the number of
people in each settlement; that an assembly composed of two conlmissioners from each colony shall be held annually, with power to deliberate
and decide in all points of common concern to the confederacy; and every
determination, in which six of their number concur, shall be binding on
the whole.?  In this transaction the Colonies of New England seem to
have considered themselves as independent societies, possessing all the
rights of sovereignty, and free from the control of any superior power.
The governing party in England, occupied with affairs of more urgent
concern, and nowvise disposed to observe the conduct of their brethren in
America with any jealous attention, suffered the measure to pass without
animadversion.
Emboldened by this connivance, the spirit of independence gathered
strength, and soon displayed itself more openly; some persons of note in
the colony of Massachusetts, averse to the system of ecclesiastical polity
established there, and preferring to it the government. and discipline of the
churches of England or Scotland, having remonstrated to the general court
against the injustice of depriving them of their rights as freemen, and of
their privileges as Christians [1646], because they could not join as members with any of the congregational churches, petitioned that they might
no longer be bound to obey laws to which they hadpnot assented, nor be
subjected to taxes imposed by an assembly in which they were not represented. Their demands were not only rejected, but they were imtprisoned
and fined as disturbers of the public peace; and when they arpp inrted
some of their number to lay their grievances before parliament, the annual
court, in order to prevent this appeal to the supreme power, atteinpted
first to seize their papers, and to obstruct their embarkation for England.
But though neither of these could be accomlplished, such was the address
and influence of the Colony's agents in England, that no inquiry seems to
have been made into this transaction.t  This was followed by art indica
tion, still less ambiguous, of the aspiring spirit prevalent among the people
of Massachusetts. Under every form of government the right of' coining
money has been considered as a prerogative peculiar to sovereignty, and
which no subordinate member in any state is entitled to claim. Regardless
of this established maxim, the general court ordered a coinage of silver
money at Boston [l652], stamped with the name of the colony, and a tree
as an apt sym~bol of its progressive vigour.$  Even this usurpation escaped
without notice. The Independents, having now humbled all rival sects,
engrossed the whole direction of affairs inG reat Britain, and long accustomed
to admire the government of New England, framed agreeably to those
principles which they had adopted as the most perfect model of civil and
ecclesiastical polity, they were'unwilling to stain its reputation by censuring
any part of its conduct.
When Cromwell usurped the supreme power, the colonies of New
England continued to stand as high in his estimation. As he had deeply
imbibed all the fanatical notions of the Independents, and was perpetually
surrounded by the most eminent and artful teachers of that sect, he kept
a constant correspondence with the leading men in the American settle.
* Neal's fist. of N. Eng. i. 202, &c.. Hutchinson p. 12-. Chalmers's Annals, p. 177. t Neal's
Hist. of N. Eng. i. 121. Hutchinson's Hist. 145, &t  Collect. 188, &c. Chalm. Anmn. 179, Mather.
Magnal. b. iii. ch. i. p 30.  + Hutchilson's Hist. 177, 178. Chalmers's Annals, p. 181




A ME RI C A.                           447
ments, who seem to have looked up to him as a zealous patron.' I He in
return considered them as his most devoted adherents, attached to him no
less by affection than by principle. He soon gave a striking- proof of this.
On the conquest of Jamaica, he formed a scheme for the security and
inmprovement of the acquisition made by his victorious arms, suited to the
ardour of an impetuous spirit that delighted in accomplishing its ends by
extraordinary means.  He proposed to transport the people of New
Engl.ld to that island, and employed every argument calculated to make
impression upon them, in order to obtain their consent. He endeavoured
to rouse their religious zeal by representing what a fatal blow it would be
to the man of sin, if a colony of the faithful were settled in the midst of
his territories in the New World. He allured them with prospects of
ir"rnense wealth in a fertile region, which would reward the industry of
those who cultivated it with all the precious productions of the torrid zone,
and expressed his fervent wish that they might take possession of it, in
order to fulfil God's promise of making his people the head and not the
tail  He assured theam of being supported by the whole force of his
authority, and of vesting all the powers of government entirely in their
hands.  But by this time the colonists were attached to a country in which
they had resided for many years, and where, though they did not attain
opulence, they enjoyed the comforts of life in great abundance; and they
dreaded so much the noxious climate of the West Indies, which had proved
fatal to a great number of the English who first settled in Jamaica, that
they declined, though in the most respectful terms, closing with tilhe Proector's propositiona.
Hutcninson, App. 520, &c. Collect. p. 233    f Hutchinson, p. 190, &c. Cha!mers, p 108




1 44; 1
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
NOTE [1]. PAGE 10.
TYRE was situated at such a distance from the Arabian Gulf, or Red Sea, as
made it impracticable to convey commodities from thence to that city by land
carriage. This induced the Phoenicians to render themselves masters of Rhinocrura or Rhinocolura, the nearest port ill the Mediterranean to the Red Sea.
They landed the cargoes which they purchased in Arabia, Ethiopia, and India,
at Elath, the safest harbour in the Red Sea towards the North. Thence they
were carried by land to Rhinocolura, the distance not being very, considerable;
and, being re-shipped in that port were transported to Tyre, and distributed over
the world. Strabon. Geogr. edit. Casaub. lib. xvi. p. 1128. Diodor. Sicul.
Biblioth. Histor. edit. Wesselingii, lib. i. p. 70.
NOTE [2]. PAGE 21.
THE Periplus Hannonis is the only authentic monument of the Carthaginian
skill in naval affairs, and one of the most curious fragments transmitted to us
by antiquity. The learned and industrious Mr. Dodwell, in a dissertation
prefixed to the Periplus of Hanno, in the edition of the Minor Geographers
published at Oxford, endeavours to prove that this is a spurious work, the
composition of some Greek, who assumed Hanno's name. But M. de Montesquieu, in his l'Esprit des Loix, lib. xxi. c. 8. and M. de Bougainville, in a dis.
sertation published tom. xxvi. of the M6moires de l'Acaddmie des Inscriptions,
&c. have established its authenticity by arguments which to me appear unanswerable. Ramusio has accompanied his translation of this curious voyage
with a dissertation tending to illustrate it. Racolte de Viaggi, vol. i. p. 112.
M. do Bougainville has, with great learning and ability, treated the same subject.
It appears that Hanno, according to the mode of ancient navigation, undertook
this voyage in small vessels so constructed that he could keep close in with the
coast. He sailed from Gedes to the island of Cerne in twelve days. This is
probably what is known to the moderns by the name of the Isle of AIguim.
It became the chief station of the Carthaginians on that coast; and M. de
Bougainville contends, that the cisterns found there are monuments of the Carthaginian power and ingenuity. Proceeding from Cerne, and still following
the winding of the coast,-he arrived in seventeen days, at a promontory which
he called The West Horn, probably Cape Palmas. From this he advanced to
another promontory, which he named The South Horn, and which is manifestly
Cape de Tres Puntas, about five degrees north of the line. All the circumstances
contained in the short abstract of his journal, which is handed down Lo us, concerning the appearance and state of the countries on the coast of Africa, are
confirmed and illustrated by a comparison with the accounts of modern navigators. Even those circumstances which, from their seeming improbability, have
been produced to invalidate the credibility of his relation, tend to confirm it.
He observes, that in the country to the south of Cerne, a profoune silence
reigned through the day; but during the night innumerable fires were kindled
along the banks of tLe rivers, and the air resounded with the noise cf pipes




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             449
and drums and cries of joy. The same thing, as Ramusio observes, still takes
place. The excessive heat obliges the Negroes to take shelter in the woods, or
in their houses, during the day. As soon as the sun sets, they sally out, and by
torchlight enjoy the pleasure of music and dancing, in which they spend the
night. Ramus. i. 113. F. In another place, he mentions the sea as burning
with torrents of fire. What occurred to M. Adanson, on the same coast, may
explain this: " As soon," says he, " as the sun dipped beneath the horizon, and
night overspread the earth with darkness, the sea lent us its friendly light.
While the prow of our vessel ploughed the foaming surges, it seemed to set them
all on fire. Thus we sailed in a luminous inclosure, which surrounded us like
a large circle of -rays, from whence darted in the wake of the ship a long stream
of a light." Voy. to Senegal, p. 176. This appearance of the sea, observed by
Hunter, has been mentioned as an argument against the authenticity of the
Periplus. It is, however, a phenomenon very common in warm climates. Captain Cook's second voyage, vol. i. p. 15. The Periplus of Hanno has been
translated, and every point with respect to it has been illustrated with much
learning and ingenuity, in a work published by Don Pedr. Rodrig. Campomanes,
entitled, Antiguedad maritima de Cartago, con el Periplo de su General Hannon
traducido e illustrado. Mad. 1756. 4to.
NOTE [3]. PAGE 21
LoNG after the navigation of the Phoenicians and of Eudoxus round Africa,
Polybius, the most intelligent and best informed historian of antiquity, and particularly distinguished by his attention to geographical researches, affirms, that
it was not known,in his time, whether Africa was a continued continent stretching
to the south, or whether it was encompassed by the sea. Polybii Hist. lib. iii.
Pliny the naturalist asserts, that there can be no communication between the
soathern and northern temperate zones. Plinii Hist. Natur. edit. in usum.
Delph. 4to. lib. ii. c. 68. If they had given full credit to the accounts of those
voyages, the former could not have entertained such a doubt, the latter could
not have delivered such an opinion. Strabo mentions the voyage of Eudoxus,
but treats it as a fabulous tale, lib. ii. p. 155; and, according to his account of
it, no other judgment can be formed with respect to it. Strabo seems not to
have known any thing with certainty concerning the form and state of the
southern parts of Africa. Geogr. lib. xvii. p. 1180. Ptolemy, the most inquisitive and learned of all the ancient geographers, was equally unacquainted with
any parts of Africa situated a few degrees beyond the equinoctial line; for he
supposes that this great continent was not surrounded by the sea, but that it
stretched, without interruption, towards the south pole; and he so far mistakes
its true figure that he describes the continent as becoming broader and broader
as it advanced towards the-south. Ptolemai Geogr.lib.iv.c. 9. Brietli Parallela
Geogr. veteris et novae, p. 86.
NOTE [4]. PAGE 24.
A FACT recorded by Strabo affords a very strong and singular proof of the
ignorance of the ancients with respect to the situation of the various parts of
the earth. When Alexander marched along the banks of the Hydaspes and
Acesine, two of the rivers which fall into the Indus, he observed that there were
many crocodiles in those rivers, and that the country produced beans of the
same species with those which were common in Egypt. From these circumstances he concluded that he had discovered the source of the Nile, and prepared
a fleet to sail down the Hydaspes to Egypt. Strab. Geogr. lib. xv. p. 1020.
This amazing error did not arise from any ignorance of geography peculiar to
that monarch; for we are informed by Strabo, that Alexander applied with
particular attention in order to acquire the knowledge of this science, and had
accurate maps or descriptions of the countries through which he marched. Lib.
ii. p. 120. But in his age the knowledge of the Greeks did not extend beyond
the limits of the Mediterranean.
VOL. I. —-57
-21




450            NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
NOTE [5]. PAGE 24.
As the flux and reflux of the sea is remarkably great at the mouth of tihe
river Indus, this would render the phenomenon more formidable to the Greeks.
Varen Geogr. vol. i. p. 251.
NOTE [6]. PAGE 25
IT is probable that the ancients were seldom induced to advance so far as the
mouth of the Ganges, either by motives of curiosity or views of commercia
advantage. In consequence of this, their idea concerning the position of that
great river vwas very erroneous. Ptolemy places that branch of the Ganges,
which he distinguishes by the name of the Great Mouth, in the hundred and
forty-sixth degree of longitude from his first meridian in the Fortunate Islands.
But its true longitude, computed from that meridian, is now determined, by
astronomical observations, to be only a hundred and five degrees. A geographer
so eminent must have been betrayed into an error of this magnitude by the
imperfection of the information which he had received concerning those distant
regions; and this affords a striking proof of the intercourse with them being
extremely rare. With respect to the countries of India beyond the Ganges,
his intelligence was still more defective, and his errors more enormous. I shall
have occasion to observe, in another place, that he has placed the country of
the Seres, or China, no less than:sixty degrees further east than its true position.
M. d'Anville, one of the most learned and intelligent of the modern geographers,
has set this matter in a clear light, in two dissertations published in Mem. do
1'Acad6m. des Inscript. &c. tom. xxxii. p. 573. 604.
NOTE [7]. PAcE 25.
IT is remarkable, that the discoveries of the ancients were made chiefly by
land; those of the moderns are carried on chiefly by sea. The progress ot
conquest led to the former, that of commerce to the 1hattcr. It is a judicious
observation of Strabo, that the conquests of Alexander the Great made kn6lwn
the East, those of the Romans opened the West, and those of Mithrmdates Iing
of Pontus the North. Lib. i. p. 26. When discovery is carried on by land
alone, its progress must be slow and its operations confined. Whenr it is carried
on only by sea, its sphere may be more extensive, and its advances more rapid;
but it labours under peculiar defects. Though it may make known the position
of different countries, and' ascertain their boundaries as far as these are determined by the ocean, it leaves us in ignorance with respect to their interior state.
Above two centuries and a half have elapsed since the Europeans sailed round
the southern promontory of Africa, and have traded in most of its ports; but,
in a considerable part of that great continent, they have done little more than
survey its coasts, and mark its capes and harbours. Its interior regions are in a
great measure unknown. The ancients, wv'ho had a very imperfect knowledge
of its coasts, except where they are washed by the Mediterranean or Red Sea,
were accustomed to penetrate into its inland provinces, and, if we may rely on
the testimony of Herodotus and Diodoris Siculus, had explored many parts of
it now altogether unknown. Unless both modes of discovery be united, the
geographical knowledge of the earth must remain incomplete and inaccurate.
NOTE [8]. PAGE 27.
THE notion of the ancients concerning such an excessive degree of heat in
the torrid zone as rendered it uninhabitable, and their persisting in this error
long after they began to have some commercial intercourse with several parts
of India lying within the tropics, must appear so singular and absurd, that it
may not be unacceptable to some of my readers to produce evidence of their
holdiing this opinion, and to account for the apparent inconsistence of their theory
with their experience. Cicero, who had bestowed attention upon every part
of philosophy known to the ancients, seems to have believed that the torrid zone
was uninhabitable, and, of consequence, that there could be no intercourso




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                               451
between tlhe northern and southern temperate zones. He introduces Africanus
thus addressing the younger Scipio: " You see this earth cncompasscd, and as
it were bound ill by certain zones, of which two, at the greatest distance from
each other, and sustaining the oppGsite poles of heaven, are frozen with perpetual
cold; the middle one, and the largest of all, is burnt with the heat of the sun;
two are habitable; the people in the southern one are antipodes to us, with
whom we have no connection."  Somnium Scipionis, c. 6. Geminus, a Greek
philosopher, contemporary with Cicero, delivers the salne doctrine, not in a
popular work, but in his EX-~N  e,; } ala auvcky   a treatise purely scientific. "W hen
we speak," says he, "of the southern temperate zone and its inhabitants, and
concerning those who are called antipodes, it must be always understood, that
we have no certain knowledge or information concerning the southern temperate
zone, whether it be inhabited or not. But from the spherical figure of the earth,
and the course which the sun holds between the tropics, we conclude that there
is another zone situated to the south, which enjoys the same degree of teinperature with the northern one which we inhabit."  Cap. xiii. p. 31. ap. Petavii
Opus de Doctr. Tempor. in quo Uranologium  sivc Systemata var. Auctorum.
Amst. 1705. vol. 3. The opinion of Pliny the naturalist, with respect to both
these points, was the same: "There are five divisions of the earth, which are
zalled zones. All that portion which lies near to the two opposite poles is
oppressed with vehement cold and eternal frost.  There, unblessed with
tile aspect of milder stars, perpetual darkness reigns, or at the utmost, a
feeble light reflected from surrounding snows. The middle of the earth, in
which is the orbit of the sun, is scorched and burnt up with flames and fiery
vapour. Between these torrid and frozen districts lie two other portions of
the earth, which are temperate; but, on account of the burning region interposed, there can be no communication between them. Thus Heaven has deprived us of three parts of the earth." Lib. ii. c. 68. Strabo delivers his opinion
to the same effect, in terms no less explicit: "The portion of the earth which
lies near the equator, in the torrid zone, is rendered uninhabitable by heat."
Lib. ii. p. 154. To these I might add the authority of many other respectable
philosophers and historians of antiquity.
In order to explain the sense in which this doctrine was generally received, we
may observe, that Parmenides, as we are informed by Strabo, was the first who
divided the earth into five zones, and extended the limits of the zone whieh he
supposed to be uninhabitable on account of heat beyond the tropics. Aristotle,
as we learn likewise from Strabo, fixed the boundaries of the different zones in
the same manner as they are defined by modern geographers. But the progress
of discovery having gradually demonstrated that several regions of the earth
which lay within the tropics were not only habitable, but populous and fertile,
this induced later geographers to circumscribe the limits of the torrid zone. It
is not easy to ascertain with precision the boundaries which they allotted it.
From a passage in Strabo, who, as far as I know, is the only author of antiquity
from whom we receive any hint concerning this subject, I should conjecture,
that those who calculated according to the measurement of the earth by Eratosthenes, supposed the torrid zone to comprehend near sixteen degrees, about
eight on each side of the equator; whereas such as followed the computation
of Posidonius allotted about twenty-four degrees, or somewhat more than
twelve degrees on each side of the equator to the torrid zone. Strabo, lib. ii. p,
151. According to the former opinion, about two-thirds of that portion of the
earth which lies between the tropics was considered as habitable; according to
the latter, about one-half of it. With this restriction, the doctrine of the
ancients concerning the torrid zone appears less absurd; and we can conceive
the reason of' their asserting this zone to be uninhabitable, even after they had
opened a communication with several places within the tropics. When men
of science spoke of the torrid zone, they considered it as it was limited by the
definition of geographers to sixteen, or at the utmost to twenty-four degrees;
and as they knew almost nothing of the countries nearer to the equator, they
might still suppose them to be uninhabitable. In loose and popular discourse,
the namne of the torrid zone continued to be given to all that portion of the
earth which lies within the tropics. Cicero seems to have been unacquainted
with those ideas of the later geogranhers; and, adhering to the division of




-452         1NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
Parmenides, describes the torrid zone as the largest of the five. Some of the
ancients rejected the notion concerning the intolerable heat of the torrid zone
as a popular error. This we are told by Plutarch was the sentiment of Pythagoras; and we learn from Strabo, that Eratosthenes and Polybius had adopted
the same opinion, lib. ii. p. 154. Ptolemy seems to have paid no regard to the
ancient doctrine and opinions concerning the torrid zone.
NOTE [9]. PAGE 35.
THE court of Inquisition, which effectually checks a spirit of liberal inquiry,
and of literary improvement, wherever it is established, was unknown in Portugal in the fifteenth century, when the people of that kingdom began their
voyages of discovery. More than a century elapsed before it was introduced
by John IlI., whose reign commenced A. D. 1521.
NOTE [10]. PAGE 38.
AN instance of this is related by Hakluyt, upon the authority of the Portu.
guese historian Garcia de Resende. Some English merchants having resolved
to open a, trade with the coast of Guinea, John II. of Portugal despatched
ambassadors to Edward IV., in order to lay before him the right which he had
acquired by the Pope's bull to the dominion of that country, and to request of
him to prohibit his subjects to prosecute their intended voyage. Edward was
so much satisfied with the exclusive title of the Portuguese, that he issued his
orders in the terms which they desired. Hakluyt, Navigations, Voyages, and
Traffics of the English, vol. ii. part ii. p. 2.
NOTE [11]. PAGE 42.
THE time of Columbus's death may be nearly ascertained by the following
circumstances. It appears from the firagment of a letter addressed by him to
Ferdinand and Isabella, A. D. 1501, that he had at that time been engaged forty
years in a seafaring life. In another letter he informs them that he went to
sea at the age of fourteen: from those facts it follows, that he was born A. D.
1447. Life of Christa. Columbus, by his son Don Ferdinand. Churchill's
Collection of Voyages, vol. ii. p. 484, 485.
NOTE [12]. PAGE 44.
THE spherical figure of the earth was known to the ancient geographers.
They invented the method, still in use, of computing the longitude and latitude
of different places. According to their doctrine, the equator, or imaginary line
which encompasses the earth, contained three hundred and sixty degrees; these
they divided into twenty-four parts, or hours, each equal to fifteen degrees.
The country of the Seres or Singe, being the furthest part of India known to
the ancients, was supposed by Marinus Tyrius, the most eminent of the ancient
geographers before Ptolemy, to be fifteen hours, or two hundred and twentyfive degrees to the cast of the first meridian, passing through the Fortunate
Islands. Ptolemnei Geogr. lib. i. c. 11. If this supposition was well founded,
the country of the Seres, or China, was only nine hours, or one hundred and
thirty-five degrees west from the Fortunate or Canary Islands; and the navigation in that direction was much shorter than by the course which the Portuguese were pursuing. Marco Polo, in his travels, had described countries,
particularly the island of- Cipango or Zipangri, supposed to be Japan, considerably to the east of any part of Asia known to the ancients. Marcus Paulus
de Region. Oriental. lib. ii. c. 70. lib. iii. c. 2. Of course, this country, as it
extended further to the east, was still nearer to the Canary Islands. The conclusions of Columbus, though drawn from inaccurate observations, were. just.
If the suppositions of Marinus had been well founded, and if the countries
which Marco Polo visited, had been situated to the east of those whose longitude
Marinus had ascertained, the proper and nearest course to the East Indies must
have been to steer directly west. HIerrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 2. A more extensive




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                              453
anowledge of the g?'be has now discovered the great error of Marinus, in
supposing China to be fifteen hours, or two hundred and twenty-five degrees
east from the Canary Islands; and that even Ptolemy was mistaken, when he
reduced the longitude of China to twelve hours, or one hundred and eighty degrees.
The longitude of the western frontier of that vast empire is seven hours, or one
hundred and fifteen degrees froim the meridian of {he Canary Islands. But
Columbus followed the light which his age afforded, and relied upon the
authority of writers, who were at that time regarded as the instructers and
guides of: mankind in the science of geography.
NOTE [13]. PAGE 53.
As the Portuguese, in making their discoveries, did not depart far from the.
coast of Africa, they concluded that birds, whose flight they observed with
great attention, did not venture to any considerable distance from land. In
the infancy of navigation it was not known that birds often stretched their flight
to an immense distance from any shore. In sailing towards the West Indian
Islands, birds are often sevn at t!ie distance of iiwo hundred leagues fiom the
nearest coast. Sloane's Nat. iist. of Jamaica, vol. i. p. 30. Catesby saw an
owl at sea when the ship was six hundred leagues distant from land. Nat.
Hist. of Carolina, pref. p. 7. Hist. Naturelle de M. Buffon, tom. xvi. p. 32.
From which it appears, that this indication of land, on which Columbus seems
to have relied with some confidence, was extremely uncertain. This observation is confirmed by Capt. Cook, the most extensive and experienced navigator
of any age or nation. "No one yet knows (says he) to what distance any of
the oceanic birds go to sea; for my own part, I do not believe that there is one
in the whole tribe that can be relied on in poitting out the vicinity of land"
Voyage towards the South Pole, vol. i. p. 275.
NOTE [14]. PAGE 58.
IN a letter of the Admiral's to Ferdinand and Isabella, he describes one of
the harbours in Cuba with all the enthusiastic admiration of a discoverer.-"I
discovered a river which a galley might easily enter: the beauty of it induced
me to sound, and I found from five to eight fathoms of water. Having proceeded a considerable way up the river, every thing invited me to settle there.
The beauty of the river, the clearness of the water through which I could see
the sandy bottom, the multitude of palm trees of different kifids, the tallest
and finest I had seen, and an infinite number of other arge and flourishing trees,
the birds, and the verdure of the plains are so wonderfully beautiful, that this
country excels all others as far as the day surpasses the night in brightness and
splendour, so that I often said, that it would be in vain for me to attempt to
give your ilighnesses a full account of it, for neither my tongue nor my pen
could coine up to the truth; and indeed I am so much amazed at the sight of
such beauty, that I know not how to describe it."  Life of Columb. c. 30
NOTE [15]. PAGE 59.
TIIE account which Columbus gives of the humanity and orderly behaviour
of the natives on this occasion is very striking. " The king (says he in a letter
to Ferdinand and Isabella) having been informed of our misfortune, expressed
great grief for our loss, and immediately sent aboard all the people in the place
in many large canoes; we soon unloaded the ship of every thing that was upon
deck, as the king gave us great assistance: hre himself, with his brothers and
relations, took all possible care that every thing should be properly done, both
aboard and on shore. And, from time to time, he sent some of his relations
weeping, to beg of me not to be dejected, for he would give me all that he had.
I can assure your Highnesses, that so much care could not have been taken in
securing our effects in any part of Spain, as all our property was put together
in one place near his palace, until the houses which he wanted to prepare for
the custody of it were emptied. He immediately placed a guard of armed men,
rwho watched during the whole night, and those on shore lamented as if they




454           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
had been much interested inourloss. The people are so affectionate, sotractabilo,
and so peaceable, that I swear to your Highnesses, that there is not a better race
of men, nor a better country in the world. They love their neighbour as themselves; their conversation is the sweetest and mildest in the world, cheerful and
always accompanied with a smile. And although it is true that they go naked,
yet your Highnesses may be assured that they have many very commendable
customs; the king is served with great state, and his behaviour is so decent that
it is pleasant to see him, as it is likewise to observe the wonderful memory
which these people have, and their desire of knowing every thing, which lead.
them to inquire into its causes and effects." Life of Columbus, c. 32. It is
probable that the Spaniards were indebted for this officious attention to the
opinion which the Indians entertained of them as a superior order of beings.
NOTE [16]. PAGE 62.
EVERY monument of such a man as Columbus is valuable. A letter whlch
he wrote to Ferdinand and Isabella, describing what passed on this occasion,
exhibits a most striking picture of his intrepidity, his humanity, his prudence,
his public spirit, and courtly address. " I would have been less concerned for
this misfortune had I alone been in danger, both because my life is a debt that
I owe to the Supreme Creator, and because I have at other times been exposed
to the most imminent hazard.'But what gave me infinite grief and vexation
was, that after it had pleased our Lord to give me faith to undertake this enterprise, in which I had now been so successful, that my opponents would have
been convinced, and the glory of your Highnesses, and the extent of your territory, increased by me; it should please the Divine Majesty to stop all by my
death. All this would have been more tolerable had it not been attended wit}h
the loss-of those men whom I had carried with me, upon promise of the greatest
prosperity, who, seeing themselves in such distress, cursed not only their
coming along with me, but that fear and awe of me which prevented them
from returning, as they often had resolved to have done. But besides all this,
my sorrow was greatly increased by recollecting that I had left my two sons at
school at Cordova, destitute of fiicnds, in a foreign country, when it could not
in all probability be known that I had done such services as might induce Your
Highnesses to remember them. And though I comforted myself with the faith
that our Lord would not permit that which tended so much to the glory of his
Church, and which I had brought- about with so much trouble, to remain imperfect, yet I considered, that, on account of my sins, it was his will to deprive
me of that glory which I might have attained in this  world. While in this
confused state, I thought on the good fortune which accompanies Your Highnesses, and imagined that although I should perish, and the vessel be lost, it
was possible that you might somehow come to the knowledge of my voyage,
and the success with which it was attended. For that reason I wrote upoln
parchment with the brevity which the situation required, that I had discovered
the lands which I promised, in how many days I had done it, and what course
I had followed. I mentioned the goodness of the country, the character of the
inhabitants, and that Your Highnesses' subjects were left in possession of' all
that I had discovered. Having sealed this writing, I addressed it to Your
Highoesses, and promised a thousand ducats to any person who should deliver
it sealed, so that if any foreigner found it, the promised reward might prevail
on them not to give the information to another. I then caused a great cask to
be brought to me, and wrapping up the parchment in an oiled cloth, and afterwards in a cake of Wax, I put it into the cask, and having stopped it well, I
cast it into the sea. All the men believed that it was some act of devotion.
Imagining that this might.l!ever chance to be taken up, as the ships approached
nearer to Spain, I made another packet like the first, and placed it at the top
of the poop, so that, if the ship sunk, the cask remaining above water might
be committed to the guidance of fortune."
NOTE [17]. PAGE 64.
SO.ME Spanish authors, with the meanness of national jealousy, have endeavoured to detract from the glory of Columbus, by insinuating that he was led




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                               455
to the discovery of the New WVorld, not by his own inventive or enterprising
genius, but by information which he had received. According to their account a vessel having been driven from its course by easterly winds, was
carried before them far to the west, and landed on the coast of an unknown
country, frolm which it returned with difficulty; the pilot and three sailors
being the only persons who survived the distresses which the crew suffered
from want of provisions and fatigue in this long voyage. In a few days after
their arrival, all the four died; but the pilot having been received into the house
of Columbus, his intimate friend disclosed to him before his death, the secret
of the discovery which he had accidentally made, and left him his papers colltaining a journal of the voyage, which served as a guide to Columbus in his
undertaking.  Gomara, as far as I-know, is the first author who published this
story. Hist. c. 13. Every circumstance is destitute of evidence to support it.
Neither the name of the vessel nor its destination is known. Some pretend
that it belonged to one of the seaport towns in Andalusia, and was sailing
either to the Canaries or to Madeira; others, that it was a Biscayner in its way
to England; others, a Portuguese ship trading on the coast of Guinea. The
name of the pilot is alike unknown, as well as that of the port in which he
landed on his return. According to some, it was in Portugal; according to
others, in Madeira, or the Azores. The year in which this voyage was made is
no less uncertain. Monson's Navy. Tracts. Churchill, iii. 371. No mention is
made of this pilot, or his discoveries, by And. Bernaldes, or Pet. Martyr, the
contemporaries of Columbus. Herrera, with his usual judgment, passes over
it in silence. Oviedo takes notice of this report, but considers it as a tale fit
only to amuse the vulgar. Hist. lib. ii. c. 2. As Columbus held his course
directly west from the Canaries, and never varied it, some later authors have
supposed that this uniformity is a proof of his being guided by some previous
information. But they do not recollect the principles on wLich he founded all
his hopes of success, that by holding a westerly course he mast certainly arrive
at those regions of the east described by the ancients. His fim-rn belief of his
own system led him to take that course, and to pursue it without deviation.
The Spaniards are not the only people who have called in question Columbus's
claim to the honour of having discovered America. Some German authors
ascribed this honour to Martin Behaim their countryman. He was of the noble
family of the Behaims of Schwartzbach, citizens of the first rank in the Imperial
town of Nuremberg. Having studied under the celebrated John Muller, better
known by the name of Regiomontanus, he acquired such knowledge of cosmography as excited a desire of exploring those regions, the situation and
qualities of which he had been accustomed, under that able master, to investigate and describe. Under the patronage of the Dutchess of Burgundy he repaired to Lisbon, whither the fame of the Portuguese discoveries invited all
the adventurous spirits of the age. There, as we learn from Herman Schedel,
of whose Chronicon.Vundi, a German translation was printed at Nuremberg,
A. D. 1493, his merit as a cosmographer raised him, in conjunction with
Diego Cane, to the command of a squadron fitted out for discovery in the year
1483. In that voyage he is said to have discovered the kingdom of Congo.
He settled in the island of Fayal, one of the Azores, and was a particular friend
of Columbus. HIerrera, dec. 1. lib. i. c. 2. Magellan had a terrestrial globe
made by Behaim, on which he demonstrated the course that he proposed to
hold in search of the communication with the South Sea, which he afterwards
discovered. Gomara Hist. c. 19. Herrera, dec. 11. lib. ii. c. 19. In the year
1492, Behaim visited his'relations in Nuremberg, and'left with them a map
drawn with his own hand, which is still preserved among the archives of the
family. Thus far the story of Martin Behaim seems to be well authenticated;
but the account of his having discovered any part of the New World appears
to be merely conjectural.
In the first edition, as I had at that time hardly any knowledge of Behain
but what I derived from a frivolous dissertation' De vero Novi Orbis Inventore,' published at Frankfort, A. D. 1714, by Jo. Frid. Stuvenius, I was induced,
by the authority of Herrera, to suppose that Behaim was not a native of Germany; but from more full and accurate information, communicated to me by
the learned Dr. John Reinhold Forster. I am now satisfied that I was mistaken.




466            NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
Dr. Forster has been likewise so good as to favour me with a copy of Behalm's
map, as published by Doppelmayer in his account of' the Mathematicians and
Artists of Nuremberg. From this map the imperfection of cosmographical
knowledge at that period is manifest.. Hardly one place is laid down in its
true situation. Nor can I discover from it any reason to suppose that Behaim
had the least knowledge of any region in America. He delineates, indeed, an
island to which he gives the. name of St. Brandon. This, it is imagined, may
be some part of Guiana, supposed at first to be an island. He places it in the
same latitude with the Cape Verd isles, and I suspect it to be an imaginary
island which has been admitted into some ancient maps on no better authority
than the legend of the Irish St. Brandon or Brendan, whose story is so childishly
fabulous as to be unworthy of any notice. Girald. Cambrensis ap. Missingham
Florilegium Sanctorum, p. 427.
The pretensions of the Welsh to the discovery of America seem not to rest
on a foundation much more solid. in the twelfth century, according to Powell,
a dispute having arisen among the sons of Owen Guyneth, King of North
Wales, concerning the succession to his crown, Madoc, one of their number,
weary of this contention, betook himself to sea in q nest of a more quiet settlement. He steered due west, leaving Ireland to the north, and arrived in an
unknown country, which appeared to him so desirable, that he returned to
Wales and carried thither several of his adherents and companions. This is
said to have happened about the year 1170, and after that, he and his. colonywere heard of no more. But it is to be observed, that Powell, on whose testimony the authenticity of this story rests, published his history above four
centuries from the date of the event which he relates. Among a people as
rude and as illiterate as the Welsh at that period, the memory of a transaction
so remote must have been very imperfectly preserved, and would require to be
confirmed by some author 6f greater credit, and nearer to the era of Madoc:s
voyage than Powell. Later antiquaries have indeed appealed to the testimony
of Meredith ap Rees, a Welsh bard, who died A. D. 1477. But he too lived: at
such a distance of time from the event, that he cannot be considered as a witness of much more credit than Powell. Besides,hisverses,published by Hakluyt,
vol. iii. p. 1., convey no information, but that Madoc, dissatisfied with his
domestic situation, employed himself in searching the ocean for new possessions.
But even if we admit the authenticity of Powell's story, it does not follow that
the unknown country which Madoc discovered by steering west, in such a
course as to leave Ireland to the north, was any part of America. The naval
skill of the Welsh in the twelfth century was hardly equal to such a voyage.
If he made any discovery at all, it is more probable that it was Madeira, or
some other of the western isles. The affinity of the Welsh language with some
dialects spoken in America,has been mentioned as a circumstance which confirms
the truth of Madoc's voyage. But that affinity has been observed in so few instances, and in some of these is so obscure, or so fanciful, that no conclusion
can be drawn from the casual resemblance of a small ntumber of words. There
is a bird, which, as far as is yet known, is found only on the coasts of South
America, from Port Desire to the Straits of Magellan. It is distinguished
by the name of Penguin. This word in the Welsh language signifies Whitehead. Almost all the authors who favour the pretensions of the Welsh to the
discovery of America, mention this as an irrefragable proof of the affinity of
the Welsh language with that spoken in this region or America. But Mr,
Pennant, who has given a scientific description of the Penguin, observes that
all the birds of this genus have black heads, " so that we must resign every
hope (adds he) founded on this hypothesis of retrieving the Cambrian race in
the New World."  Philos. Transact. vol. lviii. p. 91, &ec. Besides this, if the
Welsh, towards the close of the twelfth century, had settled in any part o'
America, some remains of the Christian doctrine and rites must have been.
found among their descendants, when they were discovered about three hundred
years posterior to their migration; a period so short that, in the course of it,
we cannot well suppose that all European ideas and arts would be totally forgotten. Lord Lyttleton, in his notes to the fifth book of his History of Henry
II., p. 371, has examined what Powell relates concerning the discoveries made by
Madoc, and invalidates the truth of his story by other arguments of great weight




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             451
The pretensions of the Norwegians to the discovery of America seem to be
better ouiloded than those of the Germans or Welsh.'heil h l-,ilants of
Scandinavia were remarkable in the middle ages for the boldness and extent
of their maritime excursions. In 874, the Norwegians discovered and planted
a colony in Iceland. In 982, they discovered Greenland, and established settlements there. From  that, some of their navigators proceeded towards the
west, and discovered a country more inviting than those- horrid regions with
which they were acquainted. According to their representation, this country
was sandy on the coasts, but in the interior parts level and covered with wood,
on which account they gave it the name of Helle-land, and JMark-land, and
having afterwards found some plants of the vine which bore grapes, they called
it Wtin-land. The credit of this story rests, as far as I know, on the authority
of the saga, or chronicle of King Olaus, composed by Snorro Sturlonides, or
Sturlusons, published by Perinskiold, at Stockholm, A. D. 1697. As Snorro
was born in the year 1179, his chronicle might be compiled about two centuries
after the event which he relates. His account of the navigation and discoveries
of Biorn, and his companion Lief, is a very rude confused tale, p. 104. 110.
326. It is impossible to discover from him what part of America it was in
which the Norwegians landed. According to his account of the length of the
days and nights, it must have been as far north as the fifty-eighth degree of
latitude, on some part of the coast of Labradore, approaching near to the entry
of Hudson's Straits. Grapes certainly are not the production of that country.
Torfeus supposes that there is an error in the text; by rectifying.of which the
place where the Norwegians landed may be supposed to be situated in latitude
490~  But neither is that the region of the vine in America. From perusing
Snorro's tale, I should think that the situation of Newfoundland corresponds
best with that of the country discovered by the Norwegians. Grapes, however,
are not the production of that barren island. Other conjectures are mentioned
by M. Mallet, Introd.  1l'Hist. de Dannem. 175, &c. I am not sufficiently acquainted with the literature of the north to examine them. It seems manifest,
that if the Norwegians did discover any part of America at that period, their
attempt to plant colonies proved unsuccessful, and all knowledge of it was
soon lost.
NOTE [18]. PAGE 64.
PETER MARTYR, ab Angleria, a Milanese gentleman, residing at that time m
the court of Spain, whose letters contain an account of the transactions of
that period, in the order wherein they occurred, describes the sentiments with
which he himself and his learned correspondents were affected in very striking
terms. 1" Prwm latitia prosiluisse to, vixque a lachrymis pro gaudio temperasse,
quando literas adspexisti meas quibus, de antipodum  orbe latenti hactenus, to
certiorem feci, mi suavissime Pomponi, insinuasti. Ex tuis ipso literis colligo,
quid senseris. Sensisti autem, tantique rem fecisti, quanti virum summa doetrina insignitum decuit. Quis namque cibus sublimibus praestari potest ingeniis,
isto suavior? quod condimentum gratius?  A me facio conjecturam. Beati
sentio spiritus meos, quando accitos alloquor prudentes aliquos ex his qui ab ea
redeunt provincia.  Implicent animos pecuniarum cumulis augendis miseri
avari, libidinibus obseceni; nostras nos mentes, postquam Deo pleni aliquando
fuerimus, contemplando, hujuscemodi rerum notitia demulciamus." Epist. 15e2,
Pomponio Leato.
NOTE [19]. PAGE 69.
So firmly were men of science, in that age, persuaded that the countries
which Columbus had discovered were connected with the East Indies, that Benaldes, the Cura de los Palacios, who seems to have been no inconsiderable
proficient in the knowledge of cosmography, contends that Cuba was not an
Island, lut a part of the continent, and united to the dominions of the Great
Khan. This he delivered as his opinion to Columbus himself, who was his
guest for some time on his return from his second voyage; and he supports it
by several arguments, mostly founded on the authority of Sir John Mandeville.
VOL. 1.-58




458           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
MS. penes me. Antonio Gallo, who was secretary to the magistracy of G(enoa
towards the close of the fifteenth century, published a short account of the
navigations and discoveries of his countryman Columbus, annexed to his
Opuscula Historica de Rebus Populi Genuensis: in which he informs us, from
letters of Columbus which he himself had seen, that it was his opinion, founded
upon nautical observations, that one of the islands he had discovered was distant only two hours or thirty degrees from Cattigara, which, in the charts of the
geographers of that age, was laid down, upon the authority of Ptolemy, lib.
vii. c. 3, as the most easterly place in Asia. From this he concluded, that if
some unknown continent did not obstruct the navigation, there must be a short
and easy access, by holding a westerly course, to this extreme region of the
East. Muratori Scriptores Rer. Italicarum, vol. xxiii. p. 304.
NOTE [201. PAGE 71.
BERNALDES, the Cura or Rector de los Palacios, a contemporary writer, says,
that five hundred of these captives were sent to Spain, and sold publicly in
Seville as slaves; but that, by the change of climate and their inability to
bear the fatigue of labour, they all died in a short time. MS. penes me.
NOTE [21]. PAGE 76.
Columbus seems to have formed some very singular opinions concerning tne
countries which he had now discovered. The violent swell and agitation of
the waters on the coast of Trinidad led him to conclude this to be the highest
part of the terraqueous globe, and he imagined that various circumstances
concurred in proving that the sea was here visibly elevated. Having adopted
this erroneous principle, the apparent beauty of the country induced him to
fall in with a notion of Sir John Mandeville, c. 102, that the terrestrial paradise
was the highest land in the earth; and he believed that he had been so fortunate
as to discover this happy abode. Nor ought we to think it strange that a person
of so much sagacity should be influenced by the opinion or reports of such a
fabulous author as Mandeville. Columbus and the other discoverers were
obliged to follow such guides as they could find; and it appears from several
passages in the manuscript of Andr. Bernaldes, the friend of Columbus, that
no inconsiderable degree of credit was given to the testimony of Mandeville in
that age. Bernaldes frequently quotes him, and always with respect.
NOTE [22]. PAGE 81.
IT is remarkable that neither Gomara nor Oviedo, the most ancient Spanish
historians of America, nor Herrera, consider Ojeda, or his companion Vespucci,
as the first discoverers of the continent of America. They uniformly ascribe
this honour to Columbus. Some have supposed that national resentment
against Vespucci, for deserting the service of Spain, and entering into that of
Portugal, may have prompted these writers to conceal the actions which he
performed. But Martyr and Benzoni, both Italians, could not be warped by
the same prejudice. Martyr was a contemporary author; he resided in the
court of Spain, and had the best opportunity to be exactly informed with respect
to all public transactions; and yet neither in his Decads, the first general history
published of the New World, nor in his Epistles, which contain an account of
all the remarkable events of his time, does he ascribe to Vespucci the honour
of having first discovered the continent. Benzoni went as an adventurer to
America in the year 15,41, and resided there a considerable time. He appears
to have been animated with a warm zeal for the honour of Italy, his native
country, and yet does not mention the exploits and discoveries of Vespucci.
Herrera, who compiled his general history of America from the most authentic
records, not only follows those early writers, but accuses Vespucci of falsifying
the dates of both the voyages which he made to the New World, and of confounding the one with the other, in order that he might arrogate to himself the
glory of having discovered the continent. Her. dec. 1. lib. iv. c. 2. IIe asserts,
that in a judicial inquiry into this matter by the royal fiscal, it was proved by




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS                              459
the testimony of Ojeda himself, that he touched at Hispaniola when returning
to Spain from his first voyage; whereas Vespucci gave out that they returned
directly to Cadiz from the coast of Paria, and touched at Hispaniola only in
their second voyage; and that he had finished the voyage in five months;
whereas, according to Vespucci's account, he had employed seventeen months
in performing it. Viaggio primo de Am. Vespucci, p. 36. Viag. secundo, p. 45
Herrera gives a more full account of this inquest in another pa't of his Decads,
and to the same effect. Her. dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 5. Columbus was in Hispaniola
when Ojeda arrived there, and had by that time come to an agreement with
Roldan, who opposed Ojeda's attempt to excite a new insurrection, and, of
consequence, his voyage must have been posterior to that of the admiral.
Life of Columbus, c. 84. According to Vespucci's account, he set out on his
first voyage May 10th, 1497. Viag. primo, p. 6. At that time Columbus
was in the court of Spain preparing for his voyage, and seems to have enjoyed a considerable degree of favour. The affairs of the New World were
at this juncture under the direction of Antonio Torres, a friend of Columbus.
It iS not probable that, at that period, a commission would be granted to another
person to anticipate the admiral by undertaking a voyage which he himself
intended to perform. Fonseca, who patronized Ojeda, and granted the license
for his voyage, was not recalled to court, and reinstated in the direction of
Indian affairs, until the death of Prince John, which happened September, 1497,'P. Martyr, Ep. 18,2,) several months posterior to the time at which Vespucci
pretends to have set out upon his voyage. A life of Vespucci was published
at Florence by the Abate Bandini, A. D. 1745, 4to. It is a work of no merit,
written with little judgment, and less candour. He contends for his countryman's title to the discovery of' the continent with all the blind zeal of national
partiality, but produces no newr evidence to support it. We learn from him
that Vespucci's account of his voyage was published as early as the year 1510,
and probably sooner. Vita di Am. Vesp. p. 52. At what time the name o.
AMERICA came to be first given to the New World is not certain.
NOTE [231. PAGE 99.
THE form employed on this occasion served as a model to the Spaniards in
all their subsequent conquests in America. It is so extraordinary in its natlre, and
gives us such an idea of the proceedings of the Spaniards, and the principles upon
which they founded their right to the extensive dominions which they acquired
in the New World, that it well merits the attention of the reader. " I Alonso de
Ojeda, servant of the most high and powerful kings of Castile and Leon, the
conquerors of barbarous nations, their messenger and captain, notify to you, and
declare in as ample form as I am capable, that God our Lord, who is one and
eternal, created the heaven and the earth, and one man and one woman, of
whom you and we, and all the men who have been or shall be in the world:
are descended. But as it has come to pass through the number of generations
during more than five thousand years, that they have been dispersed'into
different parts of the world, and are divided into various kingdoms and pro
vinces, because one country was not able to contain them, nor could they have
found in one the means of subsistence and preservation: therefore God our
Lord gave the charge of all those people to one man named St. Peter, whom
he constituted the lord and head of all the human race, that all men, in whatever place they are born, or in whatever faith or place they are educated, might
yield obedience unto him. He hath subjected the whole world to his jurisdiction, and conmmanded him to establish his residence in Rome, as the most
proper place for the government of the world. He likewise promised and gave
him power to establish his authority in every other part of the world, anrid to
judge and govern all Christians, Moors, Jews, Gentiles, and all other people
of whatever sect or faith they may be. To him is given the name of Pope,
which. signifies admirable, great father and guardian, because he is the father
and governor of all men. 7Those who lived in the time of this holy father
obeyed and acknowledged him as their Lord and King, and the superior of the
universe. The same has been observed with respect to them who, since his




460           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATION-S.
time, have been chosen to the pontificate. Thus it now coi:,stlnuv  and will
continue to the end of the world.'One of these Pontiffs, as lord of the world, hath made a grant of these
islands, and of the Tierra Firma of the ocean sea, to the Catholic Kings of
Castile, Don Ferdinand and Donna Isabella, of glorious memory, and their
successors, our sovereigns, with all they contain, as is more fully expressed in
certain deeds passed upon that occasion, which you may see if you desire it.
Thus His Majesty is King and lord of these islands, and of the continent, in
virtue of this donation; and, as King and lord aforesaid, most of the islands
to which his title hath been notified, have recognised His Majesty, and now
yield obedience and subjection to him as their lord, voluntarily and without
resistance; and instantly, as soon as they received information, they obeyed
the religious men sent by the King to preach to them, and to instruct them in
our holy faith; and all these, of their own free will, without any recompense
or gratuity, became Christians, and continue to be so; and His Majesty having
received them graciously under His protection, has commanded that they should
be treated in the same manner as his other subjects and vassals.' You are
bound and obliged to act in the same manner. Therefore I now entreat and
require you to consider attentively what I have declared to yo u; and that you
may more perfectly comprehend it, that you take such time as is reasonable in
order that you may acknowledge the Church as the superior and guide of the
universe,' and likewise the holy father called the Pope, in his own right, and
his Majesty, by his appointment, as King and sovereign lord of these Islands,
and of the Tierra Firm8; and that you consent that the aforesaid holy fathers
shall declare and preach to you the doctrines above mentioned. If you do this,
you act well, and perform that to which you are bound and obliged; and His
Majesty, and I in his name, will receive you with love and kindness, and will
leave you, your wives and children, free and exempt from servitude, and in
the enjoyment of all you possess, in the same manner as the inhabitants of
the islands. Besides this, His Majesty will bestow upon you many privileges,
exemptions, and rewards. But if you will not comply, or maliciously delay to
obey my injunction, then, with the help of God, I will enter your country by
force, I will carry on war against you with the utmost violence, I will subject
you to the yoke of obedience to the Church and King, I will take your wives
and children, and will make them slaves, and sell or dispose of them according
to His Majesty's pleasure; I will seize your goods, and do you all the mischief
in my power, as rebellious subjects, who will not acknowledge or submit to
their lawful sovereign. And I protest, that alH the bloodshed and calamities
which shall follow are to be imputed to you, and not to His Majesty, or to me,
or the gentlemen who serve under me; and as I have now made this declaration and requisition unto you, I require the notairy here present to grant me a
certificate of this, subscribed in proper form.'." Herrera, dec. 1. lib. vii. c. 14.
NOTE [24]. PAGE 105.
BALBOA, in his letter to the king, observes that of the hundred and ninety
men whom he took with him, there were never above eighty fit for service at
one time. So much did they suffer from hunger, fatigue, and sickness.; Herrera, dec. 1. lib. x. c. 16. P. Mart. decad. 226.
NOTE [25]. PAGE 110.
FONSECA, Bishop of Palencia, the principal director of American Affairs, had
eight hundred Indians in property;- the commendator Lope de Conchillos, his
chief associate in that department, eleven hundred; and other favourites had
considerable numbers. They sent overseers to the islands, and hired: out thosao
slaves to the planters. Herrera, dec. 1. lib. ix. c. 14. p. 325.
NOTE [26]. PAGE 119.
Tirouaer America is more plentifully supplied with water than the other
regions of the globe, there is no river or stream of water in Yucatan. This




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             461
peninsula projects from the continent a hundred leagues, but, where broadest,
does not extend above twenty-five leagues. It is an extensive plain, not only
without mountains, but almost without any inequality of ground. The. ihnhabitants are supplied, with water from pits, and, wherever they dig them, find
it in abundance. It is probable, from all those circlumstances, that this country
was formerly covered by the sea. Herrerae Descriptio Indim Occidentalis, p.
14. Histoire Naturelle, par M. de Buffon, tom. i. p. 593.
NOTE [27]. PAGE 120.
M. CLAVIGERO censures me for having represented the Spaniards who sailed
with Cordova and Grijalva, as fancying in the warmth of their imagination,
that they saw cities on the coast of Yucatan adorned with towers and cupolas.
I know not what translation of my history he has consulted (for, his quotation
from it is not taken from the original), but I never imagined that any building
erected by Americans could suggest the.idea of a cupola or dome, a structure
which their utmost skill in architecture was incapable of rearing. My words
are, that they fancied the villages which they saw from their ships "to be
cities adorned with towers and pinnacles." By pinnacles I meant some elevation above the rest of the building; and the passage is translated almost
literally from Herrera, dec. 2. lib. iii. c. 1. In almost all the accounts of new
countries given by the Spanish discoverers in that age, this warmth of admiration is conspicuous; and led them to describe these new objects in the most
splendid terms. When Cordova and his companions first beheld an Indian
village of greater magnitude than any they had beheld in the islands, they dignified it by the name of Grand Cairo. B. Diaz, c. 2. From the same cause
Grijalva and his associates thought the country, along the coast of which they
held their course, entitled to the name of New Spain.
NOTE [28]. PAGE 123.
THE height of the most elevated point in the Pyrenees is, according to M.
Cassini, six thousand six hundred and forty-six feet. The height of the mountain Gemmi, in the canton of Berne, is ten thousand one hundred and ten feet.
The height of the Peak of Teneriffe, according to the measurement of P.
Feuill1, is thirteen thousand one hundred and seventy-eight feet. The height
of Chimborazo, the most elevated point of the Andes, is twenty thousand
two hundred and eighty feet; no less than seven thousand one hundred and
two feet above the highest mountain in the ancient continent. Voyage de D.
Juan Ulloa, Observations Astron. et Physiq. tom. ii. p. 114. The line of congelation on Chimborazo, or that part of the mountain which is covered perpetually with snow, is no less than two thousand four hundred feet from its
summit. Prevot HIist. Gdn6r. des Voyages, vol. xiii. p. 636.
NOTE [29]. PAGE 123.
As a particular description makes a stronger impression than general assertions, I shall give one of Rio de la Plata by an eye-witness, P. Cattanco, a
Modenese Jesuit, who landed at Buenos Ayres in 1749, and thus represents
what he felt when such new objects were first presented to his view. " While
I resided in Europe, and read in books of history or geography, that the mouth
of the river de la Plata was a hundred and fifty miles in breadth, I considered
it as an exaggeration, because in this hemisphere we have no example of such
vast rivers. When I approached its mouth, I had the most vehement desire to
ascertain the truth with my own eyes; and J found the matter to be exactly as
it was represented. This I deduce particularly from one circumstance: When
we took our departure from Monte Video, a fort situated more than a hundred
miles from the mouth of the river, and where its breadth is considerably diminished, we sailed a complete day before we discovered the land on the op
posite bank of the river; and when we were in the middle of the channel, we
could not discern land on either side, and saw nothing but the sky and water as
if we had been in some great ocean. Indeed we should have taken it to be sea,




45,,2             ZGNOTES AND ILILUSTRATIONS.
if tle fresh water of the river, which was turbid like the Po, had not satisfied
us that it was a river. Moreover, at Buenos Ayres, another hundred miles
up the river, and where it is still much narrower, it is not only impossible to
discern the opposite coast, which is indeed very low, but perceix e the houses
or the tops of the steeples in the Portuguese settlement at Colonia on the other
side of the river." Lettera prima, published by Muratori, 11 Christianesimo
Felice, &c. i. p. 257.
NOTE [30]. PAGE 124.
NEWFOUNDLAND, part of Nova Scotia, and Canada, are the countries -which
lie in the same parallel of latitude with the Kingdom of France; and inll every
part of these the water of the rivers is frozen during winter to the thickness of several feet; the earth is covered with snow as deep; almost all the
birds fly during that season from a climate where they could not live.  The
country of the Eskimaux, part of Labrador, and the countries on the south
of Hudson's Bay, are in the same parallel with Great Britain; and yet in all
these the cold is so intense that even the industry of Europeans has not attempted cultivation.
NOTE [31]. PAGE 125.
ACOSTA is the first philosopher, as far as I know, who endeavoured to ac
count for the different degrees of heat in the old and new continents, by the
agency of the winds which blow in each. Histoire Moral. c&c. lib. ii. and iii.
M. de Buffon adopts this theory, and has not only improved it by new observations, but has emplcyed his amazing powers of descriptive eloquence in embellishing and placing it in the most striking light. Some remarks may be
added, which tend to illustrate more fully a doctrine of much importance in
every inquiry concerning the temperature of various climates.
When a cold wind blows over land, it must in its passage rob the surface of
some of its heat. By means of this the coldness of the wind is abated. But
if it continue to blow in the same direction, it will come, by derrees, to pass
over a surface already cooled, and will suffer no longer any abatement of its
own keenness. Thus, as it advances over a large truct of land, it brings on all
the severity of intense frost.
Let the sanie wind blow over an extensive and deep sea; the superficial
water must be immediately cooled to a certain degree, and the wind proportionally warmned.  But the superficial and colder water, becoming specifically
heavier than the warmer water below it, descends; what is warmer supplies
its place, which, as it comes to be cooled in itsturn, continues to warm the air
which passes over it, or to diminish its cold. This change of the superficial
water and successive ascent of that which is warmer, and the consequent successive abatement of coldness in the air, is aided by the agitation caused in the
sea by the mechanical action of the wind, and also by the motion of the tides.
This will go on, and the rigour of the wind will continue to diminish until the
whole water is so far cooled, that the water on the surface is no longer removed
from the action of'~the wind fast enough to hinder it from being arrested by
frost. Whenever the surface freezes, the wind is no longer warned by the
water from below, and it goes on with undiminished cold.
From those principles may be explained the severity of winter frosts in extensive continents; their mildness in small islands; and the superior rigour of
winter in those parts of North America with which we are best acquainted.
In the north-west parts of Europe, the severity of winter is mitigated by the
west winds, which usually blow in the months of November, December, and
part )f January.
On the other hand, when a warm wind blows over land, it heats the surface,
which must therefore cease to abate the fbrvour of the wind. But the same
wind blowing over water, agitates it, brings up tile colder water from below,
and thus is continually losing somewhat of its own heat.
But the great power of the sea to mitigate the heat of the wind or air passing
over it, proceeds from the following circumstance:-that on account of the




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                               463
transparency of the sea, its surface cannot be heated to a great degree by the
sun's rays; whereas the ground, subjected to their influence, very soon acquires
great heat. When, therefore, the wind blows over a torrid continent, it is
soon raised to a heat alnost intolerable; but during its passage over an extensive ocean, it is gradually cooled; so that on its arrival at the furthest shore
it is again fit for respiration.
Those principles will account for the sultry heats of large coniinents in the
torrid zone: for the mild climate of islands in the same latitude; and for the
superior warmth in summer which large continents, situated in the temperate
or colder zones of the earth, enjoy when compared with that of islands. The
heat of a climate depends not only upon the immediate effect of the sun's
rays, but on their continued operation, on the effect which they have formerly
produced, and which remains for some time in the ground. This is the reason
why the day is warmest about two in the afternoon, the summer warmest about
the middle of July, and the winter coldest about the middle of January.
The forests which cover America, and hinder the sunbaems from heating the
ground, are a great cause of the temperate climate in the equatorial parts. The
ground, not being heated, cannot heat the air; and the leaves, which receive
the rays intercepted from the ground, have not a mass of matter sufficient to
absorb heat enough for this purpose. Besides, it is a known fact, that the vegetative power of a plant occasions a perspiration from the leaves in proportion
to the heat to which they are exposed: and, from the nature of evaporation,
this perspiration produces a cold in the leaf proportional to the perspiration.
Thus the effect of the leaf in heating the air in contact with it is prodigiously
diminished. For those observations, which throw much additional light on
this curious subject, I am indebted to my ingenious friend, Mr. Robison, professor of natural philosophy in the university of Edinburgh.
NOTE [32]. PAGE 125.
THE climate of Brazil has been described by two eminent naturalists, Piso
and Margrave, who observed it with a philosophical accuracy for which we
search in vain in the accounts of many other provinces in America. Both
represent it as temperate and mild when compared with the climate of Africa.
They ascribe this chiefly to the refreshing wind which blows continually from
the sea. The air is not only cool, but chilly through the night, insomuch that
the natives kindle fires every evening in their huts. Piso de Medicina Brasiliensi,
lib. i. p. 1, &c. Margravius Histor. Rerum Natural. Brasilim, lib. viii. c. 3. p.
264. Niouhoff. who resided long in Brazil,confirms their description. Churchill's
Collection, vol. ii. p. 26. Gumilla, who was a missionary many years among
the Indians upon the river Oronoco, gives a similar description of the temperature of the climate there. Hist. de l'Oronoque, tom. i. p. 26. P. Acugna felt
a very considerable degree of cold in the countries on the banks of the river
Amazons. Relat. vol. ii. p. 56. M. Biet, who lived a considerable time in
Cayenne, gives a similar account of the temperature of that climate, and
ascribes it to the same cause. Voyage de la France, Equinox, p. 330. Nothing
can be more different from these descriptions than that of the burning heat oQ
the African coast given by M. Adanson. Voyage to Senegal, passim.
NOTE [33]. PAGE 126.
Two French frigates were sent upon a voyage of discovery jn the year 1739.
In latitude 440 south, they began to feel a considerable degree of cold. In
latitude 480, they met with Islands of floating ice. Histoire des Navigations
aux Terres Australes, tom. ii. p. 256, &c. Dr. Halley fell in with ice in latitude
90o. Id. tom. i. p. 47. Commodore Byron, when on the coast of Patagonia,
latitude' 50~ 33' south, on the fifteenth of December, which is midsummer in
that part of the globe, the twenty-first of December being the longest day
there, compares the climate to that of England in the middle of winter.
Voyages by Hawkesworth, i. 25. Mr. Banks having landed on Terra del
Fuego, in the Bay of Good Success, latitude 550, on the sixteenth of January,
which corresponds to the month of July in our hemisphere. two of his attend



464          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
snts died in one night of extreme cold, and all the party were in the most
imminent danger of perishing. Id. ii. 51, 52. By the fourteenth of March,
corresponding to September in our hemisphere, winter was set in with rigour,
and the mountains were covered with snow. Ibid. 72. Captain Cook, in his
voyage towards the South Pole, furnishes new and striking instances of the
extraordinary predominance of cold in this region of the globe. "Who would
have thought (says he) that an island of no greater extent than seventy leagues
in circuit, situated between the latitude of 540 and 55~, should in the very
height of summer be, in a manner, wholly covered, many fathoms deep, with
frozen snow; out more especially the S. W. coast?  The very summits of the
lofty mountains were cased with snow and ice; but the quantity that lay in
the valleys is incredible; and at the bottom of the bays, the coast was terminated by a wall of ice of considerable height." Vol. ii. p. 217.
In some places of the ancient continent, an extraordinary degree of cold
prevails in very low latitudes. Mr. Bogle, in his embassy to the court of the
Delai Lama, passed the winter of the year 1774, at Chamnanning, in latitude
310 39' N. He often found the thermometer in his room twenty-nine degrees
under the freezing point by Fahrenheit's scale: and in the middle of April the
standing waters were all frozen, and heavy showers of snow frequently fell.
The extraordinary elevation of the country seems to be the cause of this ex.
cessive cold. In travelling from Indostan to Thibet, the ascent to the summit of the Boutan Mountains is very great, but the descent on the other side
is not in equal proportion. The kingdom of Thibet is an elevated region, extremely bare and desolate. Account of Thibet, by Mr. Stewart, read in the
Royal Society, p. 7. The extraordinary cold in low latitudes in America cannot
be accounted for by the same cause. Those regions are not remarkable for
elevation. Some of them are countries depressed and level.
The most obvious and probable cause of the superior degree of cold towards
the southern extremity of America, seems to be the form of the continent there.
Its breadth gradually decreases as it stretches from St. Antonio southwards,
and from the bay of St. Julian to the Straits of Magellan its dimensions are
much contracted. On the east and west sides it is washed by the Atlantic and
Pacific Oceans. From its southern point it'is probable that a great extent of
sea, without any considerable tract of land, reaches to the Antarctic pole,
In whichever of these directions the wind blows, it is cooled before it approaches
the Magellanic regions, by passing over a vast body of water:; nor is thle land
there of such extent, that it can recover any considerable degree of heat in its
progress over it. These circumstances concur in rendering the temperature of
the air in this district of America more similar to that of an insular, than to
that of a continental climate, and hinder it from acquiring the same degree of
summer heat with places in Europe and Asia in a correspondent northern latitude. The north wind is the only one that reaches this part of America, after
blowing over a great continent. But from an attentive survey of its position,
this will be found to have a tendency rather to diminish than augment the
degree of heat. The southern extremity of America is properly the termination of the immense ridge of the Andes, which stretches nearly in a direct line.
from north to south, through the whole extent of the continent. The most
sultry regions in South America, Guiana, Brazil, Paraguay, and Tucuman, lie
many degrees to the east of the Magellanic regions. The level country of
Peru, which enjoys the tropical heats, is situated considerably to the west of
them. The north wind then, though it blows over land, does not bring to the
southern extremity of America an increase of heat collected in its passage
over torrid:regions; but before it arrives there, it must have swept along the
summits of the Andes, and becomes impregnated with the cold of that frozen
region.
Though it be now demonstrated that there is no solthern continent in that
region of the globe which it was supposed to occupy, it appears to be certain
from Captain Cook's discoveries, that there is a large tract of land near the
south pole, which is the source -of most-of the ice spread over the vast southern
ocean.. Vol. ii. p. 230. 239._&c. Whether the influence of this remote frozen
continent may reach the southern extremity of America, and affect its climate,
is an inquiry not unworthy of attention.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                              465
NOTE L34]. PAGE 127.
M. CONDAMINE is one of the latest and most accurate observers of the interior state of South America. 6" After descending from the Andes (says he,)
one beholds a vast and uniform prospect of water and verdure, and nothing
more. One treads upon the earth, but does'not see it; as it is so entirely
covered with luxuriant plants, weeds, and shrubs, that it would require a considerable degree -of labour to clear it for the space of a foot."  Relation abrdgee d'un Voyage, &c. p. 48. One of the singularities in the forests is a sort of
osiers, or withes, called bejucos by the Spaniards, lianes by the French, and nibbes
by the Indians, which are usually employed as ropes in America. This is one
of the parasitical plants, which twists about the trees it meets with, and rinsng
above their highest branches, its tendrils descend perpendicularly, strike into
the ground, take root, rise up around another tree, and thus mount and descend
alternately. Other tendrils are carried obliquely by the wind, or somle accident,.
and form a confuision of interwoven cordage, which resembles the rigging of a
ship. Bancroft, Nat. Hist. of Guiana, 99. These withes are often as thick as
the arm of a man. Id. p. 75. M. Boguer's -account of the forests in Peru
perfectly resembles this description. Voyages au Peru, p. 16. Oviedo gives a
similar description of the forests in other parts of America. Hist. lib. ix. p.
144. D. The country of the Moxos is so much overflowed, that they are
obliged to reside on the summit of some rising ground during some part of the
year, and have no communication with their countrymen at any distance.
Lettres Edifiantes, tom. x. p. 187. Garcia gives a full and just description of
the rivers, lakes, woods, and marshes in those countries of America which lie
between the tropics. Origen de los Indios, lib. ii. c. 5. ~ 4, 5. The incredible
hardships to which Gonzalez Pizarro was exposed in attempting to march into
the country to the east of the Andes, convey a very striking idea of that part
of America in its original uncultivated state. Garcil. de la Vega, Roval Com.
ment. of Peru, part ii. book iii. c. 2-5.
NOTE [35]. PAGE 128.
THz animals of America seem not to have been always of a size inferior to
those in other quarters of the globe. From antlers of the moose-deer which
have been found in America, it appears to have been an animal of great size.
Near the banks of the Ohio, a considerable number of bones of an immense
magnitude have been found. The place where this discovery has been,made
lies about one hundred and ninety miles below the junction of the river Scioto,
with the Ohio. It is about four miles distant from the banks of the latter, on
the side of the marsh called the Salt lick. The bones lie in vast quantities,
about five or six feet under ground, and the stratum is visible in the bank on
the edge of the Lick. Journal of Colonel George Croglan, JlS. penes me.
This spot seems to be accurately laid down by Evans in his map. These bones:
must have belonged to animals of enormous bulk; but naturalists being acquainted with no living creature of such size, were at first inclined to think
that they were mineral substances. Upon receiving a greater number of specimnens, and after inspecting them more narrowly, they are now allowed to be
the bones of an animal. As the elephant is the largest known quadruped, and
the tusks wnich were found, nearly resembled, both in form and quality, the,
tusks of an elephant, it was concluded that the carcasses deposited on the
Ohio were of that species. But Dr. Hunter, one of the pemsons of our ago
best qualified to decide with respect to this point, having accurately examined
Feveral parcels of tusks, and grinders, and jaw-bones, sent from the Ohio to
1London, gives it as his opinion that they did not belong to an elephant, but to
somen huge carnivorous animal of an unknown species. Phil. Transact. vol..
Iviii. p. 34. Bones of the same kind, and'as remarkable for their size, have'
Oce,n found near the mouths of the great rivers Oby, Jeniseia, and Lena in
iPi"vria. Strahlenberg, Descript. of SNorth and East Parts of Europe and.sia,
p. 4012, rc.. The elephant seems to be confined in his range to the torrid zone,
Vi':L. I.-59




466           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
and never multiplies beyond it. In such cold regions as those bordering on the
frozen sea, he could not live. The existence of such large animals in America
might open a wide field for conjecture. The more we contemplate the face of
nature, and consider the variety of her productions, the more we must be satisfied
that astonishing changes have been made in the terraqueous globe by convulsions and revolutions, of which no account is preserved in history.
NOTE [36]. PAGE 128.
THIS degeneracy of the domestic European animals in America may be imputed to some of these causes. In the Spanish settlements, which are situated
either within the torrid zone, or in countries bordering upon it, the increase of
heat and diversity of food prevent sheep and horned cattle from attaining the'same size as in Europe. They seldom become so fat, and their flesh is not so
juicy, or of such delicate flavour. In North America, where the climate is
more favourable, and similar to that of Europe, the quality of the grasses
which spring up naturally in their pasture grounds is not good. Mitchell, p.
151. Agriculture is still so much in its infancy, that artificial food for cattle is
not raised in any quantity. During a winter, long in many provinces, and rigorous in all, no proper care is taken of their cattle. The general treatment of
-their horses and horned cattle is injudicious and harsh in all the English colonies.'These circumstances contribute more, perhaps, than any thing peculiar in the,quality of the climate, to the degeneracy of breed in the horses, cows, and
xsheep of many of the North American provinces.
TE [37]. PAGE 128.
IN the year 1518, the island of Hispaniola was afflicted with a dreadful visita-'tion of those destructive insects, the particulars of which Herrera describes,
and mentions a singular instance of the superstition of the Spanish planters.
After trying various methods of exterminating the ants, they resolved to im.
plore protection of the saints; but as the calamity was new, they were at a loss
-to find out the saint who could give them the most effectual aid. They cast
lots in order to discover the patron whom they should invoke. The lots decided in favour of St. Saturninus. They celebrated his festival with great'solemnity, and immediately, adds the historian, the calamity began to abate.
HIerrera, dec. 2. lib. iii. c. 15. p. 107.
NOTE [38]. PAGE 129.
THE author of Recherches Philosophiques sur les Americains supposes this'difference in heat to be equal to twelve degrees, and that a place thirty degrees
-from the equator in the old continent is as warm as one situated eighteen degrees
from it in America, tom. i. p. 11. Dr. Mitchell, after observations, carried on:during thirty years, contends that the difference is equal to fourteen or fifteen
degrees of latitude. Present State, &c. p. 257.
NOTE [39]. PAGE 129.
JANUARY 3d, 1765, Mr. Bertram, near the head of St. John's river, in East
Florida, observed a frost so intense that in one night the ground was frozen an
*inch thick upon the banks of the river. The limes, citrons, and banana trees,
*at St. Augustin, were destroyed. Bertram's Journal, p. 20. Other instances
of the extraordinary operations of cold in the southern provinces of North
America are collected by Dr. Mitchell. Present State, p. 206, &c. February'7th, 1747, the frost at Charleston was so intense, that a person having carried
two quart bottles of hot water to bed, in the morning they were split to pieces,
and the water converted into solid lumps of ice. In a kitchen where there was
a fire, the water in a jar in which there was a live large eel, was frozen to the
bottom. Almost all the orange and olive trees were destroyed. Description of
South Carolina, 8vo. Lond. 1761.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             467
NOTE [40]. PAGE 129.
A REMARKABLE instance of this occurs in Dutch Guiana, a country every
where level, and so low, that during the rainy seasons it is usually c overed with'
water near two feet in height. This renders the soil so rich, that on the surface,
for twelve inches in depth, it is a stratum of perfect manure, and as such has
been transported to Barbadoes. On the banks of the Essequibo, thirty crops of
ratan canes have been raised successively; whereas in the West Indian islands
not more than two is ever expected from the richest land. The expedients by
which the planters endeavour to diminish this excessive fertility of soil are various. Bancroft, Nat. Hist. of Guiana, p. 10, &c.
NOTE [41]. PAGE 134.
MULLER seems to have believed, without sufficient evidence, that the CapJ
had been doubled, tom. i. p. 11, &c.; and the imperial academy of St. Petersburgh give some countenance to it by the manner in which Tschuklcotskoi-noss
is laid down in their charts. But I am assured, from undoubted authority, that
no Russian vessel has ever sailed round that cape; and as the country of'shutkt
is not subject to the Russian empire, it is very imperfectly known,
NOTE [42]. PAGE 135.
WERE this the place for entering into a long and intricate geographical dig
quisition, many curious observations might arise from comparing the accounts of
the two Russian voyages and the charts of their respective navigations. One
remark is applicable to both. We cannot rely with absolute certainty on the
position which they assign to several of the places which they visited. The
weather was so extremely foggy, that they seldom saw the sun or stars; and
the position of the islands and supposed continents was commonly determined
by reckoning, not by observation. Behring and Tschirikow proceeded much
further towards the east than Krenitzin. The land discovered by Behring, which
he imagined to be part of the American continent, is in the 236th degree of
longitude from the first meridian in the isle of Ferro, and in 580 28' of latitude.
Tschirikow came upon the same coast in longitude 241~, latitude 560. Muller,
i. 243, 249. The former must have advanced 60 degrees from the port of
Petropawlowski, from which he took his departure, and the latter 65 degrees.
But from the chart of Krenitzen's voyage, it appears that he did not sail further
towards the east than to the 208th degree, and only 32 degrees from Petropawlowski. In 1741, Behring and Tschirikow, both in going and returning, held a
course which was mostly to' the south of that chain of islands, which they discovered; and observing the mountainous and rugged aspect of the headlands
which they descried towards the north, they supposed them to be promontories
belonging to some part of the American continent, which, as they fancied,
stretched as far south as the latitude 56. In this manner they are laid down
in the chart published by Muller, and likewise in a manuscript chart drawn by
a mate of Behring's ship, communicated to me by Mr. Professor Robison.
But in 1769, Krenitzin, after wintering in the island Alaxa, stood so far towards
the north in his return, that his course lay through the middle of what Behring
and Tschirikow had supposed to be a continent, which he found tobe an open sea,
and that they had mistaken rocky isles for the headlands of a continent. It is
probable, that the countries discovered in 1741, towards the east, do not belong
to the American continent, but are only a continuation of the chain of islands.
The number of volcanos in this region of the globe is remarkable. There are
several in Kamtchatka, and not one of the islands, great or small, as far as the
Russian navigation extends, is without them. Many are actually purning, and
the mountains in all bear marks of having been once in a state of eruptiol.
Were I disposed to admit such conjectures as have found place in other inquiried
concerning the peopling of America, I might suppose that this part of the
earth, having manifestly suffered violent convulsions from earthquakes an




.4c68       NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
volcanos, an isthmus, which may have formerly united Asia to America, has
been broken, and formed into a cluster of islands by the shock.
It is singular, that at the very time the Russian navigators were attempting
to make discoveries in the north-west of America, the Spaniards were prosecuting the same design from another quarter. In 1769, two small vessels
sailed from Loretto in California to explore the coasts of the country to the
north of that peninsula. They advanced no further than the port of MonteRey, in latitude 36. But, in several successive expeditions fitted out from the
port of St. 3las in New Galicia, the Spaniards have advanced as far as the
latitude 58. Gazeta de JMadrid, March 19, and May 14, 1776. But as the
journals of those voyages have not yet been published, I iannot compare their
progress with that of the Russians, or show how near the navigators of the
two nations have approached to each other. It is to be hoped that the enlightoned minister who has now the direction of American affairs in Spain, will not
withhold this information from the public.
NOTE [43]. PAGE 136.
OUR knowledge of the vicinity of the two continents of Asia and America,
which was very imperfect when I published the History of America in the year
1777, is now complete. Mr. Coxe's account of the Russian Disccoveries between
Asia and America, printed in the year 1780, contains many curious and important facts with respect to the various attempts of the Russians to open a communication with the New World. The history of the great voyage of Discovery,
begun by Captain Cook in 1776, and completed by Captains Clerk and Gore,
published in the year 1780, communicates all the information that the curiosity
of mankind could desire with regard to this subject.
At my request, my friend, Mr. Playfair, Professor of Mathematics in the
University of Edinburgh, has compared the narrative and charts of those illustrious navigators with the more imperfect relations and maps of the Russians.
The result of this comparison I communicate in his own words, with much
greater confidence in his scientific accuracy, than I could have ventured to
place in any observations which I myself might have made upon the subject.
" The discoveries of Captain Cook in his last voyage have confirmed the
conclusions which Dr. Robertson had drawn, and have connected together the
facts from which they were deduced. They have now rendered it certain that
Behring and Tschirikow touched on the coast of America in 1741. The former
discovered land in latitude 580, 28', and about 236~ east from Ferro. He has
given such a description of the Bay in which he anchored, and the high mountain to the westward of it Lwhich he calls St. Elias, that though the account of
his voyage is much abridged in the English translation, Captain Cook recognised
the place as he sailed along the western coast of America in the year 1778.
The isle of St. Hermogenes, near the mouth of Cook's river, Schumagins isles
on the coast of Alashka, and Foggy Isle, retain in Captain Cook's chart the
names which they had received from the Russian navigator. Cook's Voy. vol.
ii. p. 347.
" Tschirikow came upon the same coast about 20 30' farther south than Behring, near the Mount Edgecumbe of Captain Cook.
"' With regard to Krenitzin, we learn from Coxe's Account of the Russian
Discoveries, that he sailed from the mouth of the Kamtchatka river with twe
ships in the year 1768. With his own ship he reached the island of Oonolashka,
in which there had been a Russian settlement since the year 1762, where no
wintered probably in the same harbour or bay where Captain Cook afterwards
anchored. The other ship wintered at Alashka, which was supposed to be an
island, though it be in fact a part of the American continent. Krenitzin
accordhingiy returned without knowing that either of his ships had been on the
coast of America; and this is the more surprising, because Captain Cook has
informed us that Alashka is understood to be a great continent, both by the
Russians and the natives at Oonolashka.
"According to Krenitzin, the ship which had wintered at Alashka had har-dly
sailed 30~ to the eastward of the harbour of St. Peter and St. Paul in Karnt.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             469
ehatka; out, according to the more accurate charts of Captain Cook, it had
sailed no less than 370 17' to the eastward of that harbour. There is nearly
the same mistake of 50 in the longitude which Krenitzin assigns to Oonolashka.
It is remarkable enough, that in the chart of those seas, put into the hand of
Captain Cook by the Russians on that island, there was an error of the same
kind, and very nearly of the same extent.
" But what is of most consequence to be remarked on the subject is, that
the discoveries of Captain Cook have fully verified Dr. Robertson's conjecture'that it is probable that future navigators in those seas, by steering farther
to the north than Behring and Tschirikow or Krenitzin had done, may find
that the continent of America approaches still nearer to that of Asia.? See p.
134. It has accordingly been found that these two continents, which, in the
parallel of 55~, or that of the southern extremity of Alashka, are about fobr
hundred leagues asunder, approach continually to one another as they stretch
together toward the north, until, within less than a degree from the polar cirnebu,
they are terminated by two capes only thirteen leagues distant. The east cai?.
of Asia is in latitude 660 6' and in longitude 1900 22' east from Greenwich; th}~
western extremity of America, or Prince'of Wales' Cape, is in latitude 650 46',
and in longitude 1910 45'. Nearly in the middle of the narrow strait (Behring s
Strait) which separates these capes, are the two islands of St. Diomede, fromr
which both continents may be seen. Captain King informs us, that as ihe
was sailing through this strait, July 5, 1779, the fog having cleared away, he
enjoyed the pleasure of seeing from the ship the continents of Asia and
America at the same moment, together with the islands of St. Diomede lying
between them. Cook's Voy. vol. iii. p. 244.
"Beyond this point the strait opens towards the Arctic Sea,, and the coasts
of Asia and America diverge so fast from one another, that in the parallel of
690 they are more than one hundred leagues asunder. Ib. p. 277. To the
south of the strait there are a number of islands, Clerk's, King's, Anderson's,'
&c., which, as well as those of St. Diomede, may have facilitated the migra
tions of the natives from the one continent to the other. Captain Cook,
however, on the authority of the Russians at Oonolashka, and for other good
reasons, has diminished the number of islands which had been inserted in
former charts of the northern Archipelago. He has also placed Alashka, or
the promontory which stretches from the continent of America S. VW. towards
Kamtchatka, at the distance of five degrees of longitude farther from the coast
of Asia than it was reckoned by the Russian navigators.
"' The geography of the Old and New World is therefore equally indebted to
the discoveries made in this memorable voyage; and as many errors have been
corrected, and many deficiencies supplied, by means of these discoveries, so the
accuracy of some former observations has been established. The basis of the
map of the Russian empire, as far as regarded Kamtchatka, and the country of
the Tschutzki, was the position of four places, Yakutsh, Ochotz, Bolcheresk, and
Petropawlowski, which had been determined by the astronomer Krassilnicow in
the year 1744. Nov. Comment. Petrop. vol. iii. p. 465, &c. But the accuracy of
his observations was contested by M. Engel, and M. Robert de Vaugondy; Coxe,
Append. i. No. 2. p. 267. 272. and the former of these geographers ventured to take
away no less than 28 degrees from the longitude, which, on the faith of Krassilnicow's observations, was assigned to the eastern boundary of the Russian
empire. With how little reason this was done, will appear from considering
that our British navigators, having determined the position of Petropawlowski
by a great number of very accurate observations, found the longitude of that
port 158~ 43' E. from Greenwich, and its latitude 530 1'; agreeing, the first to
less than seven minutes, and the second to less than half a minute, with the,
calculations of the Russian astronomer: a coincidence which, in the situation
of so remote a place, does not leave an uncertainty of more than four English
miles, and which, for the credit of science, deserves to be particularly remarked.
The chief error in the Russian maps has been in not extending the boundaries
of that empire sufficiently towards the east. For as there was nothing to connect the land of the Tschutzki and the north-east point of Asia with those
places whereof the position had been carefully ascertained, except the imperfect
accounts of Behsing's and Synd's voyages, considerable errors could not fail ta




470   ~NOTES AND ILLUSTkATIONS.
be introduced, and that point was laid down as not more than 230 2' east of
the meridian of Petropawlowski. Coxe, App. i. No. 2. By the observations
of Captain King, the difference of longitude between Petropawlowski and the
East Cape is 310 9'; that is 8~ 7' greater than it was supposed to be by the
Russian geographers.". -It appears from Cook's and King's Voy. iii. p. 272,
that the continents of Asia and America are usually joined together by ice
during winter. Mr. Samwell confirms this account of his superior officer.
" At this place, viz. near the latitude of 66~ N. the two coasts are only thirteen
leagues asunder, and about midway between them lie two islands, the distance
from each to either shore is short of twenty miles. At this place the natives
of Asia could find no difficulty in passing over to the opposite coast, which
is in sight of their own. That in a course of years such an event would happen
either through design or accident, cannot admit of a doubt. The canoes which
we saw among the Tschutzki were capable of performing a much longer voyage
and, however rude they may have been at some distant period, we can scarcely
suppose them  unequal to a passage of six or seven leagues. People might
have been carried over by accident on floating pieces of ice. They might
also have travelled across on sledges or on foot; *for we have reason to believe
that the strait is entirely frozen over in the winter; so that, during that season,
the continents, with respect to the communication between them, may be considered as one land."  Letter from Mr. Samwell, Scot's Magazine for 1788, p.
604. It is probable that this interesting portion of geographical knowledge
will, in the course of a few years, receive farther improvement. Soon after
the publication of Captain Cook's last voyage, the great and enlightened
Sovereign of Russia, attentive to every thing that may contribute to extend
the bounds of science, or to render it more accurate, formed the plan of a new
voyage of discovery, in order to explore those parts of the ocean lying between
Asia and America, which Captain Cook did not visit, to examine more accu.
rately the islands which stretch from one continent almost to the other, to survey the north-east coast of the Russian empire, from the mouth of the Kovyma,
or Kolyma, to the North Cape, and to settle, by astronomical observations, the
position of each place worth notice. The conduct of this important enterprise
is committed to Captain Billings, an English officer in the Russian service, of
whose abilities for that station it will be deemed the best evidence, that he
accompanied Captain Cook in his last voyage. To render the expedition more
extensively useful, an eminent naturalist is appointed to attend Captain Billings.
Six years will be requisite for accomplishing the purposes of the voyage.
Coxe's Supplement to Russian Discoveries, p. 27, &c.
NOTE [44]. PAGE 141.
-FEW travellers have had such opportunity of observing the natives of Ame
rica, in its various districts, as Don Antonio Ulloa. In a work lately published
by him, he thus describes the characteristical features of the race: "A very
small forehead, covered with hair towards its extremities, as far as the middle
of the eye-brows; little eyes; a thin nose, small and bending towards the
upper lip; the countenance broad; the ears large; the hair very black, lank,
and coarse; the limbs well turned, the feet small, the body of just proportion;
and altogether smooth and free from hair, until old age, when they acquire
some beard, but never on the cheeks." Noticias Americanas, &c. p. 307. M.
le Chevalier de Pinto, who resided several years in a part of America which
Ulloa never visited, gives a sketch of the general aspect of the Indians there.
" They are all of copper colour with some diversity of shade, not in proportion
to their distance from the equator, but according to the degree of elevation of
the territory which they inhabit. Those who live in a high country are fairer
than those in the marshy low lands, on the coast. Their face is round, further
removed, perhaps, than that of any people from an oval shape. Their forehead
is small, the extremity of their ears far from the face, their lips tbick, their nose
flat, their eyes black, or of a chesnut colour, small, but capable of discerning
objects at a great distance. Their hair is always thick and sleek, and without
any tendency to curl. They have no hair on any part of their body but the
head. At the first aspect a southern American appears to be mild and innocent.




NO TES  AND  ILLUSTaiATIONS.                        47t
but on a more attentive view, one discovers in his countenance something wild,
distrustful, and sullen." MS. penes me. The two portraits drawn by hands
very different from those of common travellers, have a near resemblance.
NOTE [45]. PAGE 141.
AMAZING accounts are given of the persevering speed of the Americans,
Adair relates the adventures of a Chikkasah warrior, who ran through woods
and over mountains, three hundred computed miles, in a day and a half and
two nights. Hist. of Amer. Ind. 396.
NOTE [46]. PAGE 143
M. GODIN LE JEUNE, who resided fifteen years among the Indians of 1'eru
and Quito, and twenty years in the French colony of Cayenne, in which there
is a constant intercourse with the Galibis and other tribes on the Oronoco, observes, that the vigour of constitution among the Americans is exactly in proportion to their habits of labour. The Indians in warm climates, such as those
on the coasts of the South Sea, on the river of Amazons, and the river Orinoco,
are not to be compared for strength with those in-cold countries; and yet, says
he, boats daily set out from Para, a Portuguese settlement on the river of Amazons, to ascend that river against the rapidity of the stream, and with the same
crew they proceed to San Pablo, which is eight hundred leagues distant. No
crew of white people, or even of Negroes, would be found equal to a task of
such persevering fatigue, as the Portuguese have experienced; and yet the
Indians being accustomed to this labour from their infancy, perform it. MS.
*enes me.
NOTE L47]. PAGE 145.
DON ANTONIA ULLOA, who visited a great part of Peru and Chili, the king.
dom of New Granada, and several of the provinces bordering on the Mexican
Gulf, while employed in the same service with the French Mathematicians
during the space of ten years, and who afterwards had an opportunity of
viewing the North Americans, asserts " that if we have seen one American,
we may be said to have seen them all, their colour and make are so nearly the
same." Notic. Americanas, p. 323. A more early observer, Pedro de Cieca
de Leon, one of the conquerors of Peru, who had likewise traversed many
provinces of America, affirms that the people, men and women, although there
is such a multitude of tribes or nations as to be almost innumerable, and such
diversity of climates, appear nevertheless like the children of one father and
mother. Chronica del' Peru, parte i. c. 19. There is, no doubt, a certain combination of features, and peculiarity of aspect, which forms what may be called
a European or Asiatic countenance. There must likewise be one that may be
denominated American, common to the whole race. This may be supposed to
strike the traveller at first sight, while not only the various shades, which distinguish people of different regions, but the peculiar features which discriminate
individuals, escape the notice of a transient observer. But when persons who
had resided so long among the Americans concur in bearing testimony to the
similarity of their appearance in every climate, we may conclude that it is
more remarkable than that of any other race. See likewise Garcia Origen do
los Indies, p. 54. 242. Torquemada Monarch. Indiana, ii. 571.
NOTE [48]. PAGE 146.
M. LE CHEVALIER DE PINTO observes, that in the interior parts of Brazil, he
had been informed that some persons resembling the white people of Darien
had been found; but that the breed did not continue, and their children became
like other Americans. This race, however, is very imperfectly known. MS
penes me.




472           NOTES AND ILUSTRATIONS.
NOTE [49]. PAGE 147.
TRE testimonies of different travellers, concerning the Patagonians, have
been collected and stated with a considerable degree of accuracy by the author
of Recherches Philosophiques, &c. tom. i. 281, &c. iii. 181, &c. Since the
publication of his work, several navigators have visited the Magellanic regions,
and like their predecessors, differ very widely in their accounts of its inhabitants.
By Commodore Byron and his crew, who sailed through the Straits in i764,
the common size of the Patagonians was estimated to be eight feet, and many
of them much taller. Phil. Transact. vol. lvii. p. 78. By Captains Wallis and
Carteret, who actually measured them in 1766, they were found to be from six
feet to six feet five and seven inches in height. Phil. Trans. vol. Ix. p. 22.
These, however, seem to have been the very people whose size had been rated
so high in the year 1764; for several of them had beads and red baize of the
same kind with what had been put on board Captain Wallis's ship, and he
naturally concluded that they had got these from Mr. Byron. hlawkesw. i.
In 1767 they were again measured by M. Bougainville, whose account differs
little from that of Captain Wallis. Voy. 129. To these I shall add a testimony of great weight. In the year 1762, Don Bernardo Ibegnez de Echavarri
accompanied the Marquis de Valdelirios to Buenos Ayres, and resided there
several years. He is a very intelligent author, and his reputation for veracity
unimpeached among his countrymen. In speaking of the country towards the
southern extremity of America, "' By what Indians," says he, " is it possessed?
Not certainly by the fabulous Patagonians who are supposed to occupy this
district. I have from many eye-witnesses, who have lived among those Indians,
and traded much with them, a true and accurate description of their persons.
They are of the same stature with the Spaniards. I never saw one who rose
in height two varas and two or three inches," i. e. about 80 or 81'332 inches
English, if Echavarri makes his computation according to the vara of Madrid.
This agrees nearly with the measurement of Captain Wallis. Reyno Jesuitico,
238. Mr. Falkner, who resided as a missionary forty years in the soutlern
parts of America, says that "' the Patagonians, or Puelches, are a large bodied
people; but I never heard of that gigantic race which others have mentioned,
though I have seen persons of all the different tribes of southern Indians."
Introd. p. 26. M. Dobrizhoffer, a Jesuit, who resided eighteen years in Paraguay, and who had seen great numbers of the various tribes which inhabit the
countries situated upon the Straits of Magellan, confirms, in every point, the
testimony of his brother missionary Falkner. Dobrizhoffer enters into some
detail with respect to the opinions of several authors concerning the stature of
the Patagonians. Having mentioned the reports of some early travellers with::egard to the extraordinary size of some bones found on that coast which were
supposed to be human; and having endeavoured to show that these bones
belonged to some large marine or land animal, he concludes, "de hisce ossibus
arede quicquid libuerit, dummodo, me suasore, Patagones pro gigantibus desinas
habere." Hist. de Abissonibus, vol. ii. p. 19, &c.
NOTE [50]. PAGE 149
ANTONIO SANCHES RIBEIRO, a learned and ingenious physician, published a
dissertation in the year 1765, in which he endeavours to prove that this disease
was not introduced from America, but took its rise in Europe, and was brought
on by an epidemical and malignant disorder. Did I choose to enter into a disquisition on this subject, which I should not have mentioned if it had not been
intimately connected with this part of my inquiries, it would not be difficult to
point out some mistakes with respect to the facts upon which he founds, as
well as some errors in the consequences which he draws from them. The rapid
communication of this disease from Spain over Europe, seems however to
resemble the progress of an epidemic, rather than that of a disease transmitted
by infection. The first mention of it is in the year 1493, and before the year
1497, it had made its appearance in most countries of Europe,with such alarming




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             473
symptoms as rendered it necessary for the civil magistrate to interpose, in order
to check its career.-Since the publication of this work, a second edition of
Dr. Sanchez's Dissertation has been communicated to me. It contains several
additional facts in confirmation of his opinion, which is supported with such
plausible arguments, as render it a subject of inquiry well deserving the atten
tion of learned physicians.
NOTE [51]. PAGE 150.
THE people of Otaheite have no denomination for any number above two
hundred, which is sufficient for their transactions. Voyages by Hawkesworth,
ii. 228.
NOTE [52]. PAGE 152.
As the view which I have given of rude nations is extremely different from
that exhibited by very respectable authors, it may be proper to produce some of
the many authorities on which I found my description. Th6 manners of the
savage tribes in America have never been viewed by persons more capable of
observing them with discernment, than the philosophers employed by France
and Spain, in the year 1735, to determine the figure of the earth. M. Bouguer,
D. Antonio d Ulloas and D. Jorge Juan, resided long among the natives of the
least civilized provinces in Peru. M. de la Condamine had not only the same
advantages with them for observation, but, in his voyage down the Maragnon,
he had an opportunity of inspecting the state of the various nations seated on
its banks, in its vast course across the continent of South America. There is a
wonderful resemblance in their representation of the character of the Americans. " They are all extremely indolent," says M  Bouguer, " they are stupid;
they pass whole days sitting in the same place, without moving, or speaking a
single word. It is not easy to describe the degree of their indifference for
wealth, and all its advantages. One does not well know what motive to propose to them, when one would persuade them to perform any service. It is
vain to offer them money; they answer, that they are not hungry."  Voyage
au Perou, p. 102. " If one considers them  as men, the narrowness of their
understanding seems to be incompatible with the excellence of the soul. Their
imbecility is so visible that one can hardly form an idea of them different from
what one has of the brutes. Nothing disturbs the tranquillity of their souls,
equally insensible to disasters and to prosperity. Though half naked, they
are as contented as a monarch in his most splendid array. Riches do not
attract them in the smallest degree, and the authority of dignities to which
they may aspire are so little the objects of their ambition, that an Indian will
receive with the same indifference the office of a judge (Alcade) or that of a
hangman, if deprived of the former and appointed to the latter. Nothing can
move or change them. Interest has no power over them, and they often refuse
to perform a small service, though certain of a great recompense. Fear makes
no impression upon them, and respect as little. Their disposition is so singular
that there is no method of influencing them, no means of rousing them from
that indifference which is proof against all the endeavours of the wisest persons;
no expedient which can induce them to abandon that gross ignorance, or lay
aside that careless negligence which disconcert the prudence and disappoint
the care of such as are attentive to their welfare." Voyage d'Ulloa, tom. i.
335. 356. Of those singular qualities he produces many extraordinary instances,
p. 336-347. "Insensibility," says M. de la Condamine, "is the basis of the
American character. I leave others to determine, whether this should be dignified with the name of apathy, or disgraced with that of stupidity. It arises,
without doubt, from the small number of their ideas, which do not extend
beyond their wants. Gluttons even to voracity, when they have wherewithal
to satisfy their appetite. Temperate, when necessity obliges them, to such a
degree, that they can endure want without seeming to desire any thing. Pusillanimous and cowardly to excess, unless when they are rendered desperate by
drunkenness. Averse to libour, indifferent to every motive of glory, honour,
or gratitude; occupied entirely by the object that is present. and always do
VOL. I. —60                     22




474         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
ternlined by it alone, without any solicitude about futurity; incapable of fore..
sight or of reflection; abandoning themselves when under no restraint, to a
puerile joy, which they express by frisking about and immoderate fits of laugh.
ter; without object or design, they pass their life without thinking, and grow
old without advancing beyond childhood, of which they retain all the defects.
If this description were applicable only to the Indians in some provinces of
Peru, who are slaves in every respect but the name, one might believe, that this
degree of degeneracy was occasioned by the servile dependence to which they
are reduced; the example of the modern Greeks being procf how far servitude
may degrade the human species. But the Indians in the missions of the Jesuits,
and the savages who still enjoy unimpaired liberty, being as limited in their
faculties, not to say as stupid, as the other, one cannot observe without humiliation, that man, when abandoned to simple nature, and deprived of the advantages resulting from education and society, differs but little from the brute
creation." Voyage de la Riv. de Amaz. 52, 53. M. de Chanvalon, an intelligent and philosophical observer, who visited Martinico in 1751, and resided
there six years, gives the following description of the Caraibs: "It is not the
ed colour of their complexion, it is not the singularity of their features, which
constitutes the chief difference between them and us. It is their excessive simplicity: it is the limited degree of their faculties. Their reason is not more
enlightened or more provident than the instinct of brutes. The reason of the
most gross peasants, that of the negroes brought up in the parts of Africa,most remote from intercourse with Europeans, is such, that we discover ap.
pearances of intelligence, which, though imperfect, is capable of increase. But
of this the understanding of the Caraibs seems to be nardly susceptible. If
sound philosophy and religion did not afford us their light, if we were to decide
according to the first impression which the view of that people makes upon
the mind, we should be disposed to believe that they do not belong to the same
species with us. Their stupid eyes are the true mirror of their souls; it appears
to be without functions. Their indolence is extreme; they have never the
least solicitude about the moment which is to succeed that which is present."
Voyage k la Martinique, p. 44, 45. 51. M. de la Borde, Tertre, and Rochefort,
confirm this description. " The characteristics of the Californians," says P.
Venegas, " as well as of all other Indians, are stupidity and insensibility; want
of knowledge and reflection; inconstancy, impetuosity, and blindness of appetite; an excessive sloth, and abhorrence of all labour and fatigue; an excessive
love of pleasure and amusement of every kind, however trifling or brutal;
pusillanimity; and, in fine, a most wretched want of every thing which con.
stitutes the real man, and renders him rational, inventive, tractable, and useful
to himself and society. It is not easy for Europeans, who never were out of
their own country, to conceive an adequate idea of those people; for, even in
the least frequented corners of the globe, there is not a nation so stupid, ot
such contracted i leas, and so weak both in body and mind, as the unhappy
Californians. Their understanding comprehends little more than what they
see; abstract ideas, and much less a chain of reasoning, being far beyond their
power; so that they scarce ever improve their first ideas, and these are in
general false, or at least inadequate. It is in vain to represent to them any
future advantages which will result to them from doing or abstaining from
this or that particular immediately present; the relation of means and ends
being beyond the stretch of their faculties. Nor have they the least notion of
pursuing such intentions as will procure themselves some future good, or guard
them against future evils. Their will is proportional to their faculties, and all
their passions move in a very narrow sphere.  Ambition they have none, and
are more desirous of being accounted strong than valiant. The objects of
ambition with us, honour, fame, reputation, titles, posts, and distinctions of
superiority, are unknown among them; so that this powerful spring of action,
the cause of so much seeming good and real evil in the world, has no power
here. This disposition of mind, as it gives them up to an amazing languor and
lassitude, their lives fleeting away in a perpetual inactivity and detestation of
labour, so it likewise induces them to be attracted by the first object which their
own fancy, or the persuasion of another, places before theln; and at the same
time renders Ltem as prone to alter their resolutions with the same facility.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             475
They lo;k with indifference upon any kindness done them; nor is even the
bare remembrance of it to be expected from them. In a word, the unhappy
mortals may be compared to children, in whom the developement of reason is
not completed. They may indeed be called a nation who never arrive at manhood."  Hist. of California, English Transl. i. 64. 67. Mr. Ellis gives a similar
account of the want of foresight and inconsiderate disposition of th~ people
adjacent to Hudson's Bay. Voyage, p. 194,195.
The incapacity of the Americans is so remarkable, that negroes frcy all the
different provinces of Africa are observed to be more capable of imp' oving by
instruction. They acquire the knowledge of several particulars  (hich the
Americans cannot comprehend. HRence the negroes, though slaves, vw tue themselves as a superior order of beings, and look down upon the Amer: cans with
contempt, as void of capacity and of rational discernment. Ul.aa Notic.
Americ. 322, 323.
NOTE [53]. PAGE 155.
DOBRIZHOFFER, the last traveller I know who has resided among any tribe of
the ruder Americans, has explained so fully the various reasons which have
induced their women to suckle their children long, and never to undertake
rearing such as were feeble or distorted, and even to destroy a considerable
number of their offspring, as to throw great light on the observations I have
made, p. 144. 154. Hist. de Abissonibus, vol. ii. p. 107. 221. So deeply were
these ideas imprinted in the minds of the Americans, that the Peruvians, a
civilized people when compared with the barbarous tribes whose manners I am
describing, retained them; and even their intercourse with the Spaniards has
not been able to root them out. When twins are born in any farnmily, it is still
considered as an ominous event, and the parents have recourse to rigorous acts
of mortification, in order to avert the calamities with which they are threatened.
When a child is born with any deformity, they will not, if they can possibly
avoid it, bring it to be' baptised, and it is with difficulty they can be brought to
rear it. Arriaga Extirpac. de la Idolat. del Peru, p. 32, 33.
NOTE [54]. PAGE 156.
THE number of the fish in the rivers of South America is so extraordinary
as to merit particular notice. "In the Maragnon (says P. Acugna,) fish are
so plentiful, that, without any art, they may take them with the hands." p. 138.
"In the Orinoco (says P. Gumilla,) besides an infinite variety of other fish,
tortoise or turtle abound in such numbers, that I cannot find words to express
it. I doubt not but that such as read my account will accuse me of exaggeration: but I can affirm that it is as difficult to count them as to count the sands
on the banks of that river. One may judge of their number by the amazing
consumption of them; for all the nations contiguous to the river, and even
many who are at a distance, flock thither at the season of breeding, and not
only find sustenance during that time, but carry off great numbers both of the
turtles and of their eggs," &c. Hist. de l'Orenoque, ii. c. 22. p. 59. M. de la
Condamine confirms their accounts, p. 159.
NOTE [55]. PAGE 156.
PIso describes two of these plants, the Cururuape and the Guajana-Timbo.
it is remarkable, that though they have this fatal effect upon fishes, they are
so far from being.noxious to the human species, that they are used in medicine
with success. Piso, lib. iv. c. 88. Bancroft mentions another, the Iliarree, a
small quantity of which is sufficient to inebriate all the fish to a considerable
distance, so that in a few minutes they float motionless on the surface of the
water, and are taken with ease. Nat. Hist. of Guiana, p. 106.
NOTE [56]. PAGE 157.
RgEnARTABLE instances occur of the calamities which rude nations suffer by
famine. Alvar Nugnez Cabeca de Vaca, one of the most gallant and virtuous




476          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
of the Spanish adventurers, resided almost nine years among the savages of
Florida. They were unacquainted with every species of agriculture. Their
subsistence was poor and precarious. "They live chiefly (says he) upon roots
of different plants, which they procure with great difficulty, wandering fiom
place to place in search of them. Sometimes they kill game, sometimes they
catch fish, but in such small quantities, that their hunger is so extreme as compels them to eat spiders, the eggs of ants, worms, lizards, serpents, a kind of
unctuous earth, and, I am persuaded, that if in this country there were stones,
they would swallow these. They preserve the bones of fishes and serpents,
which they grind into powder and eat. The only season when they do noL
suffer much from famine, is. when a certain fruit, which he calls Tunas, is ripe.
This is the same with the Opuntia, or prickly pear, of a reddish and yellow
colour, with a sweet insipid taste. They are sometimes obliged to travel faT
from their usual place of residence in order to find them. Naufragios, c. xviii.
p. 20, 21, 22. In another place he observes, that they are frequently reduced
to pass two or three days without food, c. xxiv. p. 27.
NOTE [57]. PAGE 158.
M. FERMIrN has given an accurate description of the two species of'manioe
with an account of its culture, to which he has added some experiments, in
order to ascertain the poisonous qualities of the juice extracted from that
species which he calls the bitter cassava. Among the Spaniards it is known
by the name of Yuca brava. Descr. de Surin. tom. i. p. 66.
NOTE [58]. PAGE 158.
THE plantain is found in Asia and Africa, as well as in America. Oviedocontends, that it is not an indigenous plant of. the New World, but was introduced into the Island of Uispaniola, in the year 1516, by Father Thomas de
Berlanga, and that he transplanted it from  the Canary Islands, whither the
original slips had been brought from the East Indies. Oviedo, lib. viii. c. 1.
But the opinion of Acosta and other naturalists, who reckon it an American
plant, seems to be better founded. Acosta Hist. Nat. lib. iv. 21. It was cultivated by rude tribes in America, who had little intercourse with the Spaniards,
and who were destitute of that ingenuity which disposes men to borrow what
is useful from foreign nations. Gumil. iii. 186. Wafer's Voyage, p. 87.
NOTE [59]. PAGE 159.
IT is remarkable that Acosta, one of the most accurate and best informed
writers concerning the West Indies, affirmls that maize, though cultivated in the
continent, was not known in the islands, the inhabitants of which had none
but cassada bread. Hist. Nat. lib. iv. c. 16. But P. Martyr, in the first book ox
hisfirst Decad, which was written in the year 1493, upon the return of Columbus
from his first voyage, expressly mentions maize as a plant which the islanders
cultivated, and of which they made bread, p. 7. Gomara likewise asserts that
they were acquainted with the culture of maize. Histor. Gener. cap. 28.
Oviedo describes maize without any intimation of its being a plant that was
not natural to Hispaniola. Lib. vii. c. 1.
NOTE [60]. PAGE 161.
NEW Holland, a country which formerly was only known, has lately been
visited by intelligent observers. It lies in a region of the globe where it must
enjoy a very favourable climate, as it stretches from the 10th to the 38th degree
of southern latitude. It is of great extent, and from its square form must be
much more than equal to all Europe. The people who inhabit the various
parts of it appear to be of one race. They are evidently ruder than most of
the Americans, and have made still less progress in improvement and the arts
of life. There is not the least appearance of cultivation in any part of this
vast region. The inhabitants are extremely few, so that the country appears




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             477
almost desolate.  Their tribes are still more inconsiderable than those of
America. They depend for subsistence almost entirely on fishing. They do
not settle in one place, but roam about in quest of food. Both sexes go stark
naked. Their habitations, utensils, &c. are more simple and rude than those
of the Americans. Voyages, by Hawkesworth, iii. 622, &c. This, perhaps,
is the country where man has been discovered in the earliest stage of his progress, and exhibits a miserable specimen of his condition and powers in that
uncultivated state. If this country shall be more fully explored by future
navigators, the comparison of the manners of its inhabitants with those of Ihe
Americans will prove an instructive article in the history of the lurman species.
NOTE [61]. PAGE 161.
P. GABRIEL MAREST. who travelled from his station among the Illinois to
Michilimackinac, thus describes the face of the country:-" We have marched
twelve days without meeting a single human creature. Sometimes we found
ourselves in vast meadows, of which we could not see the boundaries, through
which there flowed many brooks and rivers, but without any path to conduct
us. Sometimes we were obliged to open a passage across thick forests, through
bushes, and underwood filled with briars and thorns. Sometimes we had to
pass through deep marshes, in which we sunk up to the middle. After being
fatigued through the day, we had the earth for our bed, or a few leaves, exposed to the wind, the rain, and all the injuries of the air." Lettr. Edifiantes,
ii. 360. Dr. Bicknell, in an excursion from North Carolina towards the moun
tains, A. D. 1730, travelled fifteen days without meeting with a human creature.
Nat. Hist. of North Carolina, 389. Diego de Ordas, in attempting to make a
settlement in South America, A. D. 1532, marched fifty days through a country
without one inhabitant. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. i. c. 11.
NOTE [62]. PAGE 162.
I STRONGLY suspect that a community of goods, and an undivided store, are
known only among the rudest tribes of hunters; and that as soon as any species of agriculture or regular industry is known, the idea of an exclusive right
of property to the fruits of them is introduced. I am confirmed in this opinion by accounts which I have received concerning the state of property among
the Indians in very different regions of America. " The idea of the natives of
Brazil concerning property is, that if any person cultivate a field, he alone
ought to enjoy the produce of it, and no other has a title to pretend to it. If
an individual or family go a hunting or fishing, what is caught belongs to the
individual or to the family, and they communicate no part of it to any but to
their cazique, or to such of their kindred as happen to be indisposed. If any
person in the village come to their hut, he may sit down freely, and eat without
asking liberty. But this is the consequence of their general principle of hospitality; for I never observed any partition of the increase of their fields, or
the produce of the chase, which I could consider as the result of any idea concerning a community of goods. On the contrary, they are so much attached
to what they deem to be their property, that it would be extremely dangerous
to encroach upon it. As far as I can see or can learn, there is not one tribe of
Indians in South America among whom the community of goods which has
been so highly extolled is known. The circumstance in the government of the
Jesuits, most irksome to the Indians of Paraguay, was the community of goods
which those fathers introduced. This was repugnant to the original ideas of
the Indians. They were acquainted with the rights of private exclusive property, and they submitted with impatience to regulations which destroyed
them."  M. le Cheval, de Pinto, MS. penes me. "Actual possession (says a
missionary who resided several years among the Indians of the five nations)
gives a right to the soil; but, whenever a possessor sees fit to quit it, another
has as good right to take it as he who left it. This law, or custom, respects
not only the particular spot on which he erects his house, but also his plantingground. If a man has prepared a particular spot of ground on which he
designs in future to build or plant, no man has a right to incommode him,




478         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
much less to the fruit of his labours, until it appears that he voluntarily gives
up his views. But I never heard of any formal conveyance from one Indian
to another in their natural state. The limit of every canton is circumscribed;
that is, they are allowed to hunt as far as such a river on this hand, and such a
mountain on th3 other. This area is occupied and iniproired by individuals and
their families: individuals, not the community, have the use and profit of their
ow n labours, or success in hunting." MS. of Mr. Gideon Hawley, penes me.
NOTE [63]. PAGE 162.
THIS difference of temper between the Americans and Negroes is so remarkable, that it is a proverbial saying in the French islands, " Regarder un sanvage
de travers, c'est le battre; le battre, c'est le tuer; battre un Negre, c'est le
nourrir." Tertre, ii. 490.
NOTE [64]. PAGE 163.
THE description of the political state of the people of Cinaloa perfectly
resembles that of the inhabitants of North America. " They have neither
laws nor kings (says a missionary who resided long among them) to punish any
crime. Nor is there among them any species of authority, or political government, to restrain them in any part of their conduct. It is true that they acknowledge certain caziques, who are heads of their families or villages; but
their authority appears chiefly in war, and the expeditions against their enemies.
This authority the caziques obtain not by hereditary right, but by their valour
in war, or by the power and number of their families and relations. Sometimes
they owe their pre-eminence to their eloquence in displaying their own exploits." Ribas Histor. de las Triumph, &c. p. 11. The state of the Chiquitos
in South America is nearly the same. " They have no regular form of government or civil life, but in matters of public concern they listen to the advice of
their old men, and usually follow it. The dignity of Cazique is not hereditary,
but conferred according to merit, as the reward of valour in war. The union
among them is imperfect. Their society resembles a republic without any
head, in which every man is master of himself, and, upon the least disgust,
separates from those with whom he seemed to be connected."  Relacion Historical de las Missiones de los Chiquitos, por P. Juan, Patr. Fernandezo p. 32, 33.
Thus, under very different climates, when nations are in a similar state of
society, their institutions and civil government assume the same form.
NOTE [65]. PAGE 168.
"I HAVE known the Indians (says a person well acquainted with their mode
of life) to go a thousand miles for the purpose of revenge, in pathless woods,
over hills and mountains, through huge cane swamps, exposed to the extremities of heat and cold, the vicissitude of seasons, to hunger and thirst. Such is
their overboiling revengeful temper, that they utterly contemn all those things
as imaginary trifles, if they are so happy as to get the scalp of the murderer,
or enemy, to satisfy the craving ghosts of their deceased relations."  Adair's
Hist. of Amer. Indians, p. 150.
NOTE [66]. PAGE 168.
IN the account of the great war between the Algonquins and Iroquois, the
achievements of Piskaret, a famous chief of the Algonquins, performed mostly
by himself alone, or with one or two companions, make a capital figure. De
la Potherie, i. 297, &c. Colden's Hist. of Five Nations, 125, &c.
NOTE [67]. PAGE 169.
THE life of an unfortunate leader is often in danger, and he is always degraded from the rank which he had acquired by his former exploits. Adair,. 388.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             479
NOTE [68]. PAGE 169.
As the ideas of the North Americans, with respect to the mode of carrying
on war, are generally known, I have founded my observations chiefly upon the
testimony of the authors who describe them. But the same maxims took
place among other nations in the New World. A judicious missionary has
given a view of the military operations of the people in Gran Chaco, in South
America, perfectly similar to those of the Iroquois. " They are much addicted
to war (says he), which they carry on frequently among themselves, but perpetually against the Spaniards. But they may rather be called thieves than
soldiers, for they never make head against the Spaniards, unless when they can
assault them by stealth, or have guarded against any mischance by spies, who
may be called indefatigable; they will watch the settlements of the Spaniards
for one, two, or three years, observing by night every thing that passes with the
utmost solicitude, whether they may expect resistance or not, and until they
are perfectly secure of the event, they will not venture upon an attack; so
that, when they do give the assault, they are certain of success, and free from
all danger. These spies, in order that they may not be observed, will creep on
all four like cats in.the night; but if they are discovered, make their escape
with much dexterity. But, although they never choose to face the Spaniards,
if they be surrounded in any place whence they cannot escape, they will fight
with desperate valour, and sell their lives very dear." Lozano Descript. del
Gran Chaco, p. 78.
NOTE [69]. PAGE 170.
LERY, who was an eye-witness of the proceedings of the Toupinambos, a
B3asilian tribe, in a war against a powerful nation of their enemies, describes
their courage and ferocity in very striking terms. Ego cum Gallo altero. paulo
curiosius, magno nostro periculo (si enim ab hostibus capti aut lesi fuissemus,
devorationi fuissemus devoti), barbaros nostros in militiam ountes comitari
volui. Hi, numero 4000 capita, cum hostibus ad littus decerthrunt, tanta ferocitate, ut vel rabidos et furiosos quosque superarent. Cum  primum  hostes
conspexere, in magnos atque editos ululatus perruperunt. Haec gens adeo fera
est et truculenta, ut tantisper dum viriuri vel tantillum restat, continuo dimicent, fugamque nunquam capessant. Quod a natura illis inditum esse reor.
Testor interea me, qui non semel, turn peditum turn equitum copias ingentes,
in aciem instructas hie conspexi, tanta nunquam voluptate videndis peditum
legionibus armis fulgentibus, quanta tum pugnantibus istis percussum fuisse.
Lery Hist. Navigat. in Brasil. ap. de Bry, iii. 207, 208, 209.
NOTE [70]. PAGE 170.
IT was originally the practice of the Americans, as well as of other savage
nations, to cut off the heads of the enemies whom they slew, and to carry them
away as trophies. But, as they found these cumbersome in their retreat, which
they always make very rapidly, and often through a vast extent of country,
they became satisfied with tearing off their scalps. This custom, though most
prevalent in North America, was not unknown among the Southern tribes
XLozano, p. 79.
NOTE [71]. PAGE 172.
THE terms of the war song seem to be dictated by the same fierce spirit of
revenge. "' I go to war to revenge the death of my brothers; I shall kill; I
shall exterminate; I shall burn my enemies; I shall bring away slaves; I shall
devour their heart, dry their flesh, drink their blood; I shall tear off their
scalps, and make cups of their skulls." Bossu's Travels through Louisiana,
vol. i. p. 102. I am informed, by persons on whose testimony I can rely, that
as the number of people in the Indian tribes has decreased so much, almost
none of their prisoners are now put to death. It is considered as better policy




,480           NO T E S A ND  LL U S T RAT IONS.
to spare and to adopt them. Those dreadful scenes which I have described
occur now so rarely, that missionaries and traders who have resided long
among the Indians, never were witnesses to them.
NOTE r72]. PAGE 172.
ALL the travellers who have visited the most uncivilized of the American
tribes, agree in this. It is confirmed by two remarkable circumstances, which
occurred in the conquest of different provinces. In the expedition of Narvaez
into Florida in the year 1528, the Spaniards were reduced to such extreme distress by famine, that, in order to preserve their own lives, they ate such of their
companions as happened to die. This appeared so shocking to the natives, who
were accustomed to devour none but prisoners, that it filled them with horror
and indignation against the Spaniards. Torquemnada Monarch. Ind. ii. p. 584.
Naufragios de Alv. Nugnes Cabeca de Vaca, c. xiv. p. 15. During the siege
of Mexico, though the Mexicans devoured with greediness the Spaniards and
Tlascalans whom they took prisoners, the utmost rigour of the famine which
they suffered could not induce them to touch the dead bodies of their own
countrymen. Bern. Diaz del Castillo Conquist. de la N. Espagna, p. 156.
NOTE [73]. PAGE 172.
MANY singular circumstances concerning the treatment of prisoners among
the people of Brasil, are contained in the narrative of Stadius, a German officer
in the service of the Portuguese, published in the year 1556. He was taken
prisoner by the Toupinambos, and remained in captivity nine years. He was
often present at those horrid festivals which he describes, and was destined him.
self to the same cruel fate with other prisoners. But he saved his life by his
extraordinary efforts of courage and address. De Bry, iii. p. 34, &c. M. de
Lery, who accompanied M. de Villagagnon in his expedition to Brasil in the
year 1556, and who resided some time in that country, agrees with Stadius in
every circumstance of importance. He was fiequently an eye-witness of the
manner in which the Brasilians treated their prisoners.  De Bry, iii. 210.
Several striking particulars omitted by them, are mentioned by a Portuguese
author. Purch. Pilgr. iv. 1294, &c.
NOTE [74]. PAGE 174.
THouOH I have followed that opinion concerning the apathy of the Americans, which appeared to me most rational, and supported by the authority of
the most respectable authors, other theories have been formed with regard to
it, by writers of great eminence. D. Ant. Ulloa, in a late work, contends that
the texture of the skin and bodily habit of the Americans is such, that they
are less sensible of pain than the rest of mankind. He produces several proofs
of this, from the manner in which they endure the most cruel chirurgical operations, &c. Noticias Americanas, p. 313, 314. The same observation has been
made by surgeons in Brasil. An Indian, they say, never complains under pain,
and will bear the amputation of a leg or an arm without uttering a single
groan. MS. penes me.
NOTE [75]. PAGE 174.
raIs is an idea natural to all rude nations. Among the Romans, in the
early periods of their commonwealth, it was a maxim that -a prisoner " turn
decessisse videtur cum captus est." Digest. lib. xlix. tit. 15. c. 18. And afterwards, when the, progress of refinement rendered them more indulgent with
respect to this article, they were obliged to employ two fictions of law to secure
the property, and permit the return of a captive; the one by the Lex Cornelia,
and the other by the Jus Postliminii. Heinec. Elem. Jur. Civ. sec. ord. Pand.
ii. p. 294. Among the Negroes the same ideas prevail. No ransom was ever
accepted for a prisoner  As soon as one is taken in war, he is reputed to be




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             481
dead; and he is so in effect to his country and his family. Voy. du Cheval. des
Marchais, i. p. 369.
NOTE [76]. PAGE 175.
THE people of Chili, the most gallant and high-spirited of all the Americans,
are the only exception to this observation. They attack their enemies in the
open field; their troops are ranged in regular order; their battalions advance
to the charge not only with courage, but with discipline. The North Americans, though many of them have substituted the European fire-arms in place of
their own bows and arrows, still adhere to their ancient maxims of war, and
carry it on according to their own peculiar system. But the Chilese nearly
resemble the warlike nations of Europe and Asia in their military operations.
Ovalle's Relation of Chili. Church. Coell. iii. p. 71. Lozano's Hist. Parag. i.
144, 145.
NOTE [77]. PAGE 176.
HERRERA gives a remarkable proof of this. In Yucatan, the men are so so.
licitous about their dress, that they carry about with them mirrors, probably
made of stone, like those of the Mexicans, Dec. iv. lib. iii. c. 8, in'which they
delight to view themselves; but the women never use them. Dec. iv. lib. x. c.
3. He takes notice that among the fierce tribe of the Panches, in the new
kingdom of Granada, none but distinguished warriors were permitted either to
pierce their lips and to wear green stones in them, or to adorn their heads with
plumes of feathers. Dec. vii. lib. ix. c. 4. In some provinces of Peru, though
that empire had made considerable progress in civilization, the state of women,was little improved. All the toil of cultivation and domestic work was devolved
upon them, and they were not permitted to wear bracelets, or other ornaments,
with which the men were fond of decking themselves. Zarate Hist. de Peru,
i p. 15, 16.
NOTE [78]. PAGE 176.
I HAVE ventured to call this mode of anointing and painting their bodies, the
dress of the Americans. This is agreeable to their own idiom. As they never
stir abroad if they are not completely anointed; they excuse themselves when
in this situation, by saying that they cannot appear because they are naked
Gumilla, Hist. de l'Orenoque, i. 191.
NOTE [79]. PAGE 177.
SOME tribes in the province of Cinaloa, on the gulf of California, seem to be
among the rudest people of America united in the social state. They neither
cultivate nor sow; they have no houses in which they reside. Those in the
inland country subsist by hunting; those on the seacoast chiefly by fishing.
Both depend upon the spontaneous productions of the earth, fruits, plants, and
roots of various kinds. In the rainy season, as they have no habitations to
afford them shelter, they gather bundles of reeds, or strong grass; and binding
them together at one end, they open thenm at the other, and fitting them tc
their heads, they are covered as with a large cap, which, like a penthouse
throws off the rain, and will keep them dry for several hours. During th.
warm season, they form a shed with the branches of trees, which protects them
from the sultry rays of the sun. When exposed to cold they make large fires,
round which they sleep in the open air. Historia de los Triomphos de Nuestra
Santa Fe entre Gentres las mas Barbaras, &c. por P. And. Perez de Ribas,
p. 7, &c.
NOTE [80]. PAGE 177.
TaEsE houses resemble barns. "We have measured some which were a
hundred and fifty paces tong, and twenty paces broad. Above a hundred perVOL. I.-61




482,         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATION S,
sons resided in some of them."  Wilson's Account of Guiana. Purch. Pilgr.
tol. iv. p. 1263. Ibid. 1291. " The Indian houses," says Mr. Barrere, "have
a most wretched appearance, and are a striking image of the rudeness of early
times. Their huts are commonly built on some rising ground, or on the banks
of a river, huddled sometimes together, sometimes straggling, and always without any order. Their aspect is melancholy and disagreeable. One sees nothing*
but what is hideous and savage. The uncultivated fields have no gayety.
The silence which reigns. there, unless-when interrupted by the disagreeable
notes of birds, or cries of wild beasts, is extremely dismal."  Relat. de la
France Equin. p. 146.
NOTE [81]. PAIGE 178."SOME tribes in South America can send their arrows to a great -distance, and
with considerable force, without the aid of the bow. They make use of a
hollow reed, about nine feet long-and an inch thick, which is called a Sarbacane.
In it they lodge a small arrow, with some unspun cotton wound about its great
end; this confines the air, so that they can blow it with astonishing rapidity,
and a sure aim, to the distance of above a hundred paces. These small arrows
are always poisoned. Fermin. Descr. de Surin. i. 55. Bancroft's Hist, of
Guiana, p. 281, &c. r The- Sarbacane is much used in some parts of the East 
Indies.
NOTE [82]. PAGE 178.
I MIGHT produce many instances of this, but shall satisfy myself with one
taken from the Eskimaux. "Their greatest ingenuity (says Mr. Ellis) is
shown in the structure of their. bows, made commonly of three pieces of wood,
each mnaking part of the same arch, very nicely and exactly joined together.
They are commonly of fir or larch; and as this wants strength and elasticity,
they supply both by bracing the back of the bow with a kind of thread, or line,
made of the sinews of their deer, and the bowstring of the same materials.
To make them draw more stiffly, they dip them into water, which causes both
the back of the bow and the string to contract, and consequently gives it the
greater force; and as they practise from their youth, they shoot with very
great dexterity." Voyage to Hudson's Bay, p. 138.
NOTE [83]. PAGE 178.
NECESSITY is the great prompter and guide of mankind in their inventions.
There is, however, such inequality in some parts of their progress, and some
nations get so far the start of others in circumstances nearly similar, that we
must ascribe this to some events in their story, or to some peculiarity in their
situation, with which we are unacquainted. The people in the island of Otaheite, lately discovered in the South Sea, far excel most of the Americans in
the knowledge and practice of the arts of ingenuity, and:yet they had not invented any method of boiling water; and having no vessel that could bear the
fire, they had no more idea that water could be made hot, than that it could be
made solid. Voyages by Hawkesworth, i. 466. 484.
NOTE [84]. PAGE 178.
ONE of these boats, which could carry nine men, weighed only, sixty pounds.
Gosnol. Relat. des Voy. a lt Virgin. Rec. de Voy. au Nord, tom. v. p. 403.
NOTE [85]. PAGE 179.
A REMA1RKABLE proof of this is produced by Ulloa. In weaving hammocks,
coverlets, and other coarse cloths which they are accustomed to manufacture,
their industry has discovered no more expeditious method than to take up
thread after thread, and, after counting and sorting them each time, to pass
the woof between them, so that in finishing a small piece of those stuffs they




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             483
frequently spend more than two years. Voyage, i. 336. Bancroft gives the
same description of the Indians of Guiana, p. 255. According to Adair, the'
ingenuity antd despatch of the North American Indians are not greater, p. 422.
From one of the engravings of the Mexican paintings in Purchas, vol. iii. p.
1106, I think it probable that the people of Mexico were unacquainted with
any better or more expeditious mode of weaving. A: loom was an invention
beyond:the ingenuity of the most improved Americans. In all their works they
advance so slowly, that one of their artists is two months at a tobacco-pipe
with his knife before he finishes it. Adair, p. 423.
NOTE [86]. PAGE 180.
THE trticle of religion-in P. Lafitau's Mceurs des Sauvages extends to 347
tedious pages in-quarto.
NOTE [87]. PAGE 181.
I HAVE referred the reader to several of the authors who describe:the most
uncivilized nations in America. Their testimony is uniform. That of P.
Ribas concerning the people of Cinaloa coincides with the rest. "I was extremely attentive (says he), during the years I resided among them, to ascertain
whether they were to be considered as idolaters'; and it may be affirmed with
the most perfect exactness, that though among some of them there may be
traces of idolatry, yet others have not the least knowledge of God, or even-of
any false deity, nor pay any formal adoration to the Supreme Being who exercises dominion over the world; nor have they any conception of the providence
of a Creator, or Governor, from whom they expect in the- next-life the reward
of their good or the punishment of their evil deeds. Neither do they publiclyjoirn in any- act of divine worship."  Ribas Triumphos, &c. p. 16.
NOTE [88]. PAGE 181.
THE people of Brasil were so much affrighted by thunder, which is frequent
and awful in their country, as well as in other parts of the torrid zone, that it
was not only the object of religious reverence, but the most expressive name
in their language for the Deity was Toupan, the same by which they distin-l
guished thunder. Piso de Medec. Brasil, p.8. Nieuhoff. Church. Coll. ii. p. 132
NOTE [89]. PAGE 184.
By the account which M. Dumont, an eye-witness, gives of tile funeral of
the great chief of the Natchez, it appears that the feelings of the persons who
suffered on that occasion were very different. Some solicited the honour with
eagerness; others laboured to avoid their doom, and several saved their lives
by' flying to the woods. As the Indian Brahmins give an intoxicating draught
to the:women who are to be burned together with the bodies of their husbands,
which renders them insensible of their approaching fate, the Natchez  obliged
their victims to swallow several large pills of tobacco, which produces a similar
effect. MWm de Louis. i. 227.
NOTE [90]. PAGE 187.
ON some occasions, particularly in dances instituted for the recovery of
ersons who are indisposed, they are extremely licentious and indecent. De
la Potherie'-Hist. &c. ii. p. 42. Charlev. N. Fr. iii. p. 319. But tie nature of
their dances is commonly such as I have described.
NOTE [91]. PAGE 187.
THE Oth6macoas, a tribe seated on the 5Iinks of the Orinoco, employ for the
same purpose a composition which they call Yupa. Is is formed of the seeds'
of an unknown plant reduced to powder, and certain she'lls burned and pual




484           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
verized. The effects of this when drawn up into the nostrils are so vYolent
that they resemble madness rather than intoxication. Gumilla, i. 286.
NOTE [92]. PAGE 188.
THOUGH this observation holds true among the greater part of the southern
tribes, there are some in which the intemperance of the women is as excessive
as that of the men. Bancroft's Nat. Hist. of Guiana, p. 275.
NOTE [93]. PAGE 190.
EVEN in the most intelligent writers concerning the manners of the Ameri
cans, one meets with inconsistent and inexplicable circumstances. The Jesuit
Charlevoix, who, in consequence of the controversy between his order and that
of the Franciscans, with respect to the talents and abilities of the North Americans, is disposed to represent their intellectual as well as moral qualities in the
most favourable light, asserts, that they are engaged in continual negotiations
with their neighbours, and conduct these with the most refined address. At the
same time he adds, " that it behooves their envoys or plenipotentiaries to exert
their abilities and eloquence,.for, if the terms which they offer are not accepted,
they had need to stand on their guard. It frequently happens, that a blow
with the hatchet is the only return given to their -propositions. The envoy is
not out of danger, even if he is so fortunate as to avoid the stroke; he may
expect to be pursued, and, if taken, to be burnt."  Hist. N. Fr. iii. 251. What
occurs, p. 147, concerning the manner in which the Tlascalans treated the ambassadors from Zempoalla, corresponds with the fact related by Charlevoix.
Men capable of such acts of violence seem to be unacquainted with the first
principles upon which the intercourse between nations is founded; and instead
of the perpetual negotiations which Charlevoix mentions, it seems almost im-possible that there should be any correspondence whatever among them.
NOTE [94]. PAGE 191.
IT is a remark of Tacitus concerning the Germans, " Gaudent muneribus,
sed nec data imputant, nec acceptis obligantur."  C. 21. An author who had
a good opportunity of observing the principle which leads savages neither to
express gratitude for favours which they had received, nor to expect any return
for such as they bestowed, thus explains their ideas: " If (say they) you give
me this, it is because you have no need of it yourself; and as for me, I never
part with that which I think necessary to me." Mdmoire sur le Galibis; Hist.
des Plantes de la Guiane Frangoise par M. Aublet, tom ii. p. 110.
NOTE [95]. PAGE 196.
AND Bernaldes, the contemporary and friend of Columbus, has preserved
some circumstances concerning the bravery of the Caribbees, which are not
mentioned by Don Ferdinand Columbus, or the other historians of that period
whose works have been published. A Caribbean canoe, with four men, two
women, and a boy, fell in unexpectedly with the fleet of Columbus in his second
voyage, as it was steering through their islands. At first they were struck
almost stupid with astonishment at such a strange spectacle, and hardly moved
from the spot for above an hour. A Spanish bark, with twenty-five men, ad..
vanced towards them, and the fleet gradually surrounded them, so as to cut
off their communication with the shore. " When they saw that it was impossible to escape (says the historian), they seized their arms with undaunted
resolution, and began the attack. I use the expression with undaunted resolution,
fbr they were'few, and beheld a vast number ready to assault them. They
wounded several of the Spaniards, although they had targets, as well as other
defensive armour; and even after their canoe was overset, it was with no little
difficulty and danger that part of thei were taken, as they continued to defend
themselves, and to use their bows with great dexterity while swimming in the
sea." Hist. de.D. Fern. y Ysab. MS. c. 119.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             485
NOTE [96]. PAGE 196.
A PROBABLE conjecture may be formed with respect to the cause of the distlnction in character between the Caribbees and the inhabitants of the larger
islands. The former appear manifestly to be a separate race. Their language
is totally different from that of their neighbours in the large islands. They
themselves have a tradition, that their ancestors came originally from some
part of the continent, and, having conquered and exterminated the ancient
inhabitants, took possession of' their lands, and of their women. Rochefort,
384. Tertre, 360. Hence they call themselves Banaree, which signifies a man
come from beyond sea.- Labat, vi. 131. Accordingly, the Caribbees still use
two distinct languages, one peculiar to the men, and the other to the women.
Tertre, 361. The language of the men has nothing common with that spoken
in the large islands. The dialect of the women considerably resembles it,
Labat, 129. This strongly confirms the tradition which I have mentioned.
The Caribbees themselves imagine that they were a colony from the Galabis,
a powerful nation of Guiana in South Ameriqa. Tertre; 361. Rochefort, 348.
But as their fierce manners approach nearer to those of the people in the
northern continent, than to those of the natives -of South America; and as
their language has likewise some affinity to that spoken in Florida, their origin
should be deduced rather from the former than from the latter. Labat, 128,
&c. Herrera, dec. i. lib. ix. c. 4. In their wars, they still observe their ancient
practice of destroying all the males, and preserving the women either for servitude or for breeding.
NOTE [97]. PAGE 197.
OUR. knowledge of the events which happened in the conquest of New Spain,
is derived from sources of irnformation more original and authentic than that
of any transaction in the history of America. The letters of Cortes to the
Emperor Charles V. are an historical monument, not only first in order of
time, but of the greatest authenticity and value. As Cortes early assumed a
command independent of Velasquez, it became necessary to convey such an
account of his operations to Madrid, as might procure him the approbation of
his sovereign.
The first of his despatches has never been made public. It was sent from
Vera Cruz, July 16th, 1519. As I imagined that it might not reach the Emperor
until he arrived in Germany, for which he set out early in the year 1520, in
order to receive the Imperial crown; I made diligent search for -a copy of this
despatch, both in Spain and in Germany, but without success. This, however,
is of less consequence, as itl could not contain any thihig:very material, being
written so soon after Cortes arrived in New Spain. But,:in searching for the
letter from Cortes, a copy of one from the colony of Vera Cruz to the Emperor
has been discovered in the Imperial library at Vienna. Of this I have given
some account in its proper place, see p. 210. The second despatch, dated October 30th, 1520, was published at Seville A. D. 1522, and the third and fourth
soon after they -were received. A Latin translation of- them appeared in Germany A. D. 1532. Ramusio soon after made them more generally known, by
inserting them in his valuable collection. They contain a regular and minute
history of the expedition, with many curious particulars concerning the policy
and manners of the Mexicans. The work does honour to Cortes'; the style is
simple and perspicuous; but as it was manifestly his interest to represent his
own actions in the fairest light, his victories are probably exaggerated, his
losses diminished, and his acts of rigour and violence softened.
The next in order is the Chronica de la Nueva Espagna, by Francisco Lopez
de Gomara, published A. D. 1554. Gomara's historical merit is considerable.
His mode of narration is clear, flowing, always agreeable, and sometimes
elegant. But he is frequently inaccurate and credulous; and as he was the domestic chaplain of Cortes after his return from New Spain, and probably composed his work at his desire, it is manifest that he'abours to magnify the merit
of his hero, and to conceal or extenuate such transactions as were unfavourable




486            NOTES.AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
to his character. Of this, Herrera accuses him in one instance, Dec. ii. lib. in.
c. 2, and it is not once only that this is conspicuous. Ho writes, however, with
so much freedom concerning several measures of the Spanish Court, that the
copies both of his Historia de las Indias, and of his Chronica, were called in
by a decree of the Council of the Indies, and they were long considered as pro.
hibited books in Spain; it is only of late that license to print them has been
granted. Pinelo Biblioth. 589.
The Chronicle of Gomara induced Bernal Diaz del Castillo to compose his
Historia Verdadera de la Conquista de la Nueva Espagna. He had been an
adventurer in each of the expeditions to New Spain, and was the companion
of Cortes in all his battles and perils. When he found that neither he himself,
nor many of his fellow-soldiers, were once mentioned by Gomara, but that the
fame of all their exploits was ascribed to Cortes, the gallant veteran laid hold
of his pen with indignation, and composed his true history. It contains a prolix,
minute, confused narrative of all Cortes's operations, in such a rude vulgar
style as might be expected from an illiterate soldier. But as he relates transactions of which he was witness, and in which he performed a considerable
part, his account bears all the marks of authenticity, and is accompanied with
such a pleasant navYete, with such interesting details, with such amusing vanity,
and yet so pardonable in an old soldier who had been (as he boasts) in a hundred and nineteen battles, as renders his book one of the most singular that
is to be found in any language.
Pet. Martyr ab Angleria, in a treatise De Insulis nuper inventis, added to
his Decades de Rebus Oceanicis et Novo Orbe, gives some account of Cortes's
expedition. But he proceeds no further than to relate what happened after
his first landing. This work, which is brief and slight, seems to contain the
information transmitted by Cortes in his first despatches, embellished with
several particulars communicated to the author by the officers who brought the
letters from Cortes.
But the book to which the greater part of modern historians have had recourse for information concerning the conquest of New Spain, is Historia do
la Conquista de Mexico, por D. Antonio de Solis, first published A D. 1684.
I know no author in any language whose literary fame has risen so far beyond
his real merit. De Solis is reckoned by his countrymen one of the purest
writers in the Castilian tongue; and if a foreigner may venture to give his
opinion concerning a matter of which Spaniards alone are qualified to judge,
he is entitled to that praise. But though his language be correct, his taste in
composition is far from being just., His periods are so:much laboured as to be
often stiff, and sometimes tumid; the figures which he employs by way of
ornament are frequently trite or improper, and his observations superficial.
These blemishes, however, might easily be overlooked, if he were not defective
with respect to all the great qualities of an historian. Destitute of that
patient industry in research which conducts to the knowledge of truth; a
stranger to that impartiality which weighs evidence with cool attention; and
ever eager to establish his favourite system of exalting the character of Cortes
into that of a perfect hero, exempt from error, and adorned with every virtue;
he is less solicitous to discover what was true than to relate what might appear
splendid. When he attempts any critical discussion, his reasonings are fal.
lacious, and founded upon an imperfect view of facts. Though he sometimes
quotes the despatches of Cortes, he seems not to have consulted them; and
though he sets out with some censure on Gomara, he frequently prefers his
authority, the most doubtful of any, to that of the other contemporary historians.
But of all the Spanish writers, Herrera furnishes the fullest and most accurate information concerning the conquest of Mexico, as well as every other
transaction of America. The industry and attention with which he consulted
not only the books, but the original papers and public records, which tended to
throw any light upon the subject of his inquiries, were so great, and he usually
jhudges of. the evidence before him with so much impartiality and candour, that
his Decads may be ranked among the most judicious and useful historical collections. If, by attempting to relate the various occurrences in the New World
in a strict chronological order, the arrangement of events in his work had not




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             487
been rendered so perplexed, disconnected, and obscure, that it is an unpleasant
task to collect from different parts of his book, and piece together the detached
shreds of a story, he might justly have been ranked among the most eminent
historians of his country. He gives an account of the materials from which
he composed his work, Dec. vi. lib. iii. c. 19.
NOTE [98]. PAGE 198.
CoRTES purposed to have gone in the train of Ovando when he set out for
his government in the year 1502- but was detained by an accident. As he was
attempting in a* dark night* to scramble up to the window of a lady's bedchamber, with whom he carried on an intrigue, an old wall, on the top of
which he had mounted, gave way, and he was so much bruised by the,fall as
to be unfit for the voyage. Gomara,:Cronica de la Nueva Espagna, cap. 1
NOTE [99]. PAGE 198.
CORTES had two thousand pesos in the hands of Andrew Duero, and he bor
rowed four thousand. Those sums are about equal in value to fifteen hundred
pounds sterling; but as the price of every thing was extremely high in America,
they made but a scanty stock when applied towards the equipment of a military
expedition. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. iii.c. 2. B. Diaz, c. 20.
-  NOTEo [100]. PAGE 200.
THE: names of those gallant officers, which will often occur in the subsequent
story, were Juan Velasquez de Leon, Alonso Hernandez Portocarrero, Francisco
do Montejo, Christoval de Olid, Juan de Escalante, Francisco de Morla, Pedro
de Alvarado, Francisco de Salceda, Juan de Escobar, Gines de Nortes. Cortes
himself commanded the Capitana, or Admiral. Francisco de Orozco, an officer
formed in the wars of Italy, had the command of the artillery. The experienced Alaminos acted as chief pilot.
NOTE [101]. PaGE 201.
IN those different conflicts, the Spaniards lost only two men, but had a con,
siderable number wounded. Though there be no occasion for recourse to any
supernatural cause to account either for the greatness of their victories, or the
smallness of their loss, the Spanish historians fail not to ascribe both to the
patronage of St. Jago, the tutelar saint of their country, who, as they relate,
fought at the head of their countrymen, and by his prowess gave a turn to the
fate of the battle. Gomara is the first who mentions this apparition of St.
James. It is amusing to observe the ermbarrassment of B. Diaz del Castillo,
occasioned by the struggle between his superstition and his veracity. The
former disposed him to believe this miracle, the latter restrained him from
attesting it. " I acknowledge," says he, 1" that all our exploits and victories
are owing to our Lord Jesus Christ, and that in this battle there was such a
number of Indians to every one of us, that if each had thrown a handful of
earth they might:have buried us, if by the great mercy of God we had not
been protected. It may be that the person whom Gomara mentions as having
appeared on a mottled gray horse, was the glorious apostle Signor San Jago
or Signor San Pedro, and that I, as being a sinner, was not worthy to seehim.
This I know, that I saw Francisco de Morla, on such a horse, but as an unworthy transgressor, did not deserve to see any of the holy apostles. It may
have been the will of God, that it was so as Gomara relates, but until I read
his Chronicle I never heard among any of the conquerors that such a.hing
had happened." Cap. 34.
NOTE [1021. P.AGE 203.
SEVERAL Spanish historians relate this occurrence in such terms as if they
wished it should be believed, that the Indians, loaded with the presents, had




488         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
carried them from the capital, in the same short space of time that the couriers
performed that. journey. This is incredible, and Gomara mentions a circumstance which shows that nothing extraordinary happened on this occasion.
This rich present had been prepared for Grijalva, when he touched at the same
place some months before, and was now ready to be delivered, as soon as
Montezuma sent orders for that purpose. Gomara Cron. c. xxvii. p. 28.
According to B. Diaz del Castillo, the value of the silver plate representing
the moon was alone above twenty thousand pesos, above five thousand pounds
sterling.
NOTE [103]. PAGE 206.
THIS private traffic was directly contrary to the instructions of Velasquez,
who enjoined, that whatever was acquired by trade should be thrown into the
common stock. But it appears that the soldiers had each a private assortment
of toys and other goods proper for the Indian trade, and Cortes gained their
ikvour by encouraging this underhand barter. B. Diaz, c. 41.
NOTE [104]. PAGE 211.
GomAiRA has published a catalogue of the various articles of which this pre
sent consisted. Cron. c. 49. P. Martyr ab Angleria, who saw them after they
were brought to Spain, and who seems to have examined them with great attention, gives a description of each, which is curious, as it conveys some idea
of the progress which the Mexicans had made in several arts of elegance. De
Insulis nuper inventis Liber, p. 354, &c.
NOTE [1051. PAGE 213.
THERE is no circumstance in the history of the conquest of America which
is more questionable than the account of the numerous armies brought into
the field against the Spaniards. As the war with the republic of Tlascala,
though of short duration, was one of the most considerable which the Spaniards
waged in America, the account given of the Tlascalan armies merits some attention. The only authentic information concerning this is derived from three
authors. Cortes in his second despatch to the Emperor. dated at Segura de la
Frontera, Oct. 30, 1520, thus estimates the number of their troops; in the first
battle 6000; in the second battle 100,000; in the third battle 150,000. Relat.
ap. Ramus. iii. 228. Bernal Diaz del Castillo,, who was an eye witness, and
engaged in all the actions of this war, thus reckons their numbers: in the first
battle, 3000, p. 43;- in the second battle 6000, ibid.; in the third battle 50,000,
p. 45. Gomara, who was Cortes's chaplain after his return to Spain, and
published his Cronica in 1552, follows the computation of Cortes, except in the
second battle, where he reckons the Tlascalans, at 80,000, p. 49. It was manifestly the interest of Cortes to magnify his own dangers and exploits. For it
was only by the merit of extraordinary services that he could hope to atone for
his irregular conduct in assuming an independent command. Bern. Diaz,
though abundantly disposed to place his own prowess, and that of his fellowconquerors, in the most advantageous point of light, had not the same temptation to exaggerate; and it is probable that his account of the numbers approaches, nearer to the truth. The assembling of an army of 150,000 men
requires many previous arrangements, and such provisions for their subsistence
as seems to be beyond the foresight of Ameribans. The degree of cultivation
in Tlascala does not seem to have been so great as to have furnished such
a vast army with provisions.  Though this province was so much better
cultivated than other regions of New Spain that it was called the country of
bread; yet the Spaniards in their march suffered such want, that they were
ebliged to subsist upon Tunas, a species of fruit which grows wild in the fields.
Herrera, dec. ii. lib. vi. c. 5. p. 182.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIO.NS.49
NOTE [106]. PAGE 215
THESE unhappy victims are said to be persons of distinction. It seems improbable that so great a number as fifty should be employed as spies. So many
prisoners had been taken and dismissed, and the Tlascalans had sent so many
messages to the Spanish quarters, that there appears to be no reason for
hazarding'the lives of so many considerable people in order to procure'information about the position and state of their camp. The barbarous manner in
which Cortes treated a people unacquainted with the laws of war established
among polished nations, appears so shocking to the later Spanish writers, that
they diminish the number of those whom he punished so cruelly. Herrera
says, that he cut 6ff the hands of seven, and the thumbs of some more.'Dec.
ii. lib. ii. c. 8. De Solis relates, that the hands of fourteen or fifteen were cut
off, and the thumbs of all the rest. Lib. ii. c. 20. But Cortes himself, Relat.
p. 228. b. and after him Gomara, c. 48, affirm, that the hands of all the fifty
were cut off.
NOTE [107]. PAGE 216.
THE horses were objects of the greatest astonishment to. all the people of
New Spain. At first they imagined the horse and his rider, like the Centaurs
of the ancients, to be some monstrous animal of a terrible form; and supposing
that their food was the same as that of men, brought flesh and bread to nourish
them. Even after they discovered their mistake, they believed the horses de
voured men in battle, and when they neighed, thought that they were demanding
their prey. It was not the interest of the Spaniards to undeceive them"
Herrera, dec. ii. lib. vi. c. 11.
NOTE [108]. PACE 218.
ACCORDINa to Bart. de las Casas, there was no reason for this massacre, and
it was an act of wanton cruelty, perpetrated merely to strike terror into the
people of New Spain. Relac. de la Destruyc. p. 17, &c. But the zeal of Las
Casas often leads him to exaggerate. In opposition to him, Bern. Diaz, c. 83,
asserts, that the first missionaries sent into New Spain by the Emperor made a
judicial inquiry into this transaction; and having examinedtlie priests and elders
of Cholula, found that there was a real conspiracy to cut off the Spaniards,
and that the account given by Cortes was exactly true. As it was the object
of Cortes at that time, and manifestly his interest, to gain the good will of
Montezuma, it is improbable that he should have taken a step which tended
so visibly to alienate him from the Spaniards, if he had not believed it to be
necessary for his own preservation. At the same time the Spaniards who
served in America had such contempt for the natives, and thought them so
little entitled to the common rights of men, that Cortes might hold the Cholulans to be guilty upon slight and imperfect evidence. The severity of the
punishment was certainly excessive and atrocious.
NOTE [109]. PAGE 218.
THIS description is taken almost literally from Bernal Diaz del Castillo, who
was so unacquainted with the art of composition as to be incapable of embellishing his narrative. He relates in a simple and rude style what passed in
his own mind and that of his'fellow-soldiers on that occasion:'and let it not
be thought strange," says he, " that I should write in this manner of what then
happened, for it ought to be considered, that it is one thing to relate, another
to have beheld things that were never before seen, or heard, or spoken of
among men."  Cap. 86. p. 64. b.
NOTE [110]. PAGE 223.
B. DIAZ DEL CASTILLO gives us some idea of the fatigue and hardships they
underwent in performing this and other parts of df"t- During the nine months
VYoL. I.-62




09(0           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
that they remained in Mexico, every man, without any distinction betweeix
officers and soldiers, slept on his arms in his quilted jacket and gorget. They
Jay on mats, or straw spread on the floor, and each was obliged to hold himsed
as alert as if he had been on guard. " This," adds he, "became so habitual to
me, that even now, in my advanced age, I always sleep in my clothes,and never
in any bed. When I visit my Encomienda, I reckon it suitable to my rank to
have a bed carried along with my other baggage, but I never go into it; but
according to custom, I lie in my clothes, and walk frequently during the
night into the open air to view the stars, as I was wont when in service."
Cap. 108.
NOTE [1111. PAGE 224.
CoRTEs himself, in his second despatch to the Emperor, does not explain the
motives which induced him either to condemn Qualpopoca to the flames,.or
to put Montezuma in irons. Ramus. iii. 236. B.-Diaz is silent with respect to
his reasons for the former; and the only cause he assigns for the latter was,
that he might meet with no interruption in executing the sentence pronounced
against Qualpopoca, c. xcv. p. 75. But as Montezuma was his prisoner, and
absolutely in his power, he had no reason to dread him, and the insult offered
to-that monarch could have no effect but:to irritate him unnecessarily. Gomara
supposes that Cortes had no other object than to occupy Montezuma with his
own distress and sufferings,:that:he might give less attention to what befell
Qualpopoca. Cron. c. 89.:Herrera adopts the same -opinion. Dec. ii. lib.
Viii. c. 9. But it seems an odd expedient, in order to make a person bear one:injury, to load him with another that is greater.:De Solis imagines, that Cortes
had nothing else in view than to:intimidate Montezuma, so that he might make
no attempt to rescue the victims from their fate; but.the spirit of that monarch
was so submissive, and he had so tamely given up the prisoners to the disposal
of Cortes, that he had no cause to apprehend any opposition from him. If the
explanation which I have attempted to give of Cortes's proceedings on this occasion be not admitted, it appears to me, that they must be reckoned among
the wanton and barbarous acts of oppression which occur too often in the history of the conquest of America.
NOTE [112]. PAGE 226.
DE SOLIS asserts, lib. iv. c. 3, that the proposition of doing homage to the King
of Spain came from Montezuma himself, and was made in order to induce the
Spaniards to depart out of his dominions. He describes his conduct on this
occasion as if it had been founded upon a scheme of profound policy, and
executed with such a refined address as to deceive Cortes himself. But there
is no hint or circumstance in the contemporary historians, Cortes, Diaz, or
Gomara, to justify this theory. Montezuma, on other occasions, discovered
no such extent of art and abilities. The anguish which he felt in performing
this humbling ceremony is natural, if we suppose it to have been involuntary.
But, according to the theory of De Solis, which supposes that Montezuma was
executing what he himself had proposed, to have assumed an appearance of
sorrow would have been preposterous, and inconsistent with his own design of
deceiving the Spaniards.
NOTE [4113]. PAGE 227.
IN several of the provinces, the Spaniards, with all their industry and influence, could collect no gold. In others, they procured only a few trinkets of
small value. Montezuma assured Cortes, that the present which he offered to
the king of Castile, after doing homage, consisted of all the treasure amassed
by his father: and told him, that he had already distributed the rest of his
gold and jewels among the Spaniards. B. Diaz. c. 104. Gomara relates, that
all the silver collected amounted to 500 marks. Cron. c. 93. This agrees with
the account given by Cortes, that the royal fifth of silver was 100 marks.
-Relat. 239. B. So that the sum total of silver was only 4000 ounces, at th;




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             491
rate of eight ounces a mark, which -demonstrates the proportion of silver to
gold to have been exceedingly small.
NOTE [114]. PAGE 227
DE SOLIS, lib. iv. c. 1. calls in question the truth-of this transaction, from no
better reason than that it was inconsistent with that prudence which distinguishes the character of Cortes. But he ought to have recollected the impetu.
osity of his zeal at Tlascala, which was no less imprudent. He asserts, that
the evidence for it rests upon the testimony of B. Diaz del Castillo, of Gomara,
and of Herrera. They all concur, indeed, in mentioning this inconsiderate
step which Cortes took; and they had good reason to do so, for Cortes himself relates this exploit in his second despatch to the Emperor, and seems to
glory in it. Cort. Relat. Ramus. iii. 140. D. This is one instance, among
many, of De Solis's having consulted with little attention the letters of Cortes
to Charles V. from which the most authentic information with respect to his
operations must be derived.
NOTE [115]. PAGE 229.
HERRaEA and-De Solis suppose that Velasques was encouraged to equip this
armament against Cortes by the account which he received from Spain concerning the reception of the agents sent by the colony of Vera Cruz, and the
warmth with which Fonseca Bishop of Burgos had espoused his interest, and
condemned the proceedings of Cortes. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. ix. c. 18. De
Solis, lib. iv. c. 5. But the chronological order of events refutes this supposition. Portocarrero and Montejo sailed from Vera Cruz, July 26, 1519. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. v. c. 4. They landed at St. Lucar in October, according to
Herrera, ibid. -But P. Martyr, who attended the court at that time, and communicated every occurrence of moment to his correspondents day by day,
mentions the arrival of these agents for the first time in December, and speaks
of it as a recent event. Epist. 650. All the historians agree that the agents
of Cortes had their first audience of the Emperor at Tordesillas, when he went
to that town to visit his mother in his way to St. Jago de Comnpostella. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. v. c. 4. De Solis, lib. iv. c. 5. But the Emperor set out,from
Valladolid for Tordesillas on the 11th of March, 1520; and P. Martyr mentions
his having seen at that time the presents made to-Charles. Epist. 1665. The
armament under Narvaez sailed from Cuba in April 1520. It is manifest then
tlhat Velasquez could not receive any account of what passed in this interview
at Tordesillas previous to his hostile preparations against Cortes. His real
-motives seem to be those which I have mentioned. The patent appointing him
Adelantado of New Spain, with such extensive powers, bears date November
13, 1519. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. iii. c. 11. He might receive it about the
beginning of January. Gomara takes notice, that as soon as this patent was
delivered to him, he began to equip a fleet and levy forces. Cron. c. 96.
NOTE [116]. PAGE 230..DE SOLIS contends, that as Narvaez had no interpreters, he could hold no
intercourse with the people of the provinces, nor converse with them in any
way but by signs, that it was equally impossible for him to carry on any communication with Montezuma. Liv. iv..c. 7. But it is upon the authority of
Cortes himself that I relate all the particulars of Narvaez's correspondence both
with Montezuma and with his subjects in the maritime provinces. Relat.
Ramus. iii. 244. A. C. Cortes affirms that there was a mode of intercourse
between Narvaez and the Mexicans, but does not explain how it was carried on.
Bernal Diaz supplies this defect, and informs us that the three deserters who
joined Narvaez acted as interpreters, having acquired a competent knowledge
of the language, c. 110. With his usual minuteness, he mentions their names
and characters, and relates, in chapter 122, how they were punished for their
perfidy.'The Spaniards had now resided above a year among the Mexicans;
and it is not surprising that several among them should have made some pro




492          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
ficiency m speaking their language. This seems to have been the case. Her.
rera, dec. 2. lib. x. c. 1. Both B. Diaz, who was present, and Herrera, the most
accurate and best informed of all the Spanish writers, agree with Cortes in his
account of the secret correspondence carried on with Montezuma. Dec. 2. lib.
x. c, 18, 19. De Solis' seems to consider it as a discredit to Cortes, his hero,
that Montezuma should have been ready to engage in a correspondence with
Narvaez. He supposes that monarch to have contracted such a wonderful
affection for the Spaniards, that he was not solicitous to be delivered from
them. After the indignity with which he had been treated, such an affection
is incredible; and even De Solis is obliged to acknowledge, that it must be
looked upon as one of the miracles which God had wrought to facilitate the
conquest, lib. iv. c. 7. The truth is, Montezuma, however much overawed by
his dread of the Spaniards, was extremely impatient to recover his liberty.
NOTE [117]. PAGE 236.
These words I have borrowed from the anonymous Account of the European
Settlements in America, published by Dodsley, in two volumes 8vo.; a work
of so much merit, that I should think there is hardly any writer in the age who
ought to be ashamed of acknowledging himself to be the author of it.
-NOTE [118]. PAGE 238.
The contemporary historians differ considerably with respect to the loss of
the Spaniards on this occasion. Cortes in his second despatch to the Emperor,
makes the number only 150. Relat. ap. Ramus. iii. p. 249. A. But it was
manifestly his interest, at that juncture, to conceal from the court of Spain the
full extent of the loss which he had sustained. De Solis, always studious to
diminish every misfortune that befell his countrymen, rates their loss at about
ewo hundred men. Lib. iv. c. 19. B. Diaz affirms that they lost 870 men,
and that only 440 escaped from Mexico, c. 128. p. 108. B. Palafox, Bishop of
Los Angeles, who seems to have inquired into the early transactions of his
countrymen in New Spain with great attention, confirms the account of B.
Diaz with respect to the extent of their loss. Virtudes del Indio, p. 22. Gomara
states their loss at 450 men. Cron. c. 109. Some months afterwards, when
Cortes had received several reinforcements, he mustered his troops, and found
them to be only 590. Relat. ap. Ramus. iii. p. 255. E. Now, as Narvaez
brought 880 men into New Spairn, and about 400 of Cortes's soldiers were then
alive, it is evident that his loss, in the retreat from Mexico, must have been
much more considerable than what he mentions., B. Diaz, solicitous to magnify
the dangers and sufferings to which he and his fellow-conquerors were exposed,
may have exaggerated their loss; but,in my opinion,it cannot well be estimated
at less than 600 men.
NOTE [1191. PAGE 246.
SOME remains of this great work are still visible, and the spot where the
brigantines were built and launched is still pointed out to strangers. Torquo.
mada viewed them. Monarq. Indiana, vol. i. p. 531.
NOTE [120]. PAGE 249.
THE station of Alvarado on the causeway of Tacuba was the nearest to the
city. Cortes* observes, that there they could distinctly observe what passed
when their countrymen were sacrificed. Relat. ap. Ramus. iii. -p. 273. E. B.
Diaz, who belonged to Alvarado's division, relates what he beheld with his
own eyes. C. 151. p. 148. b. 149. a. Like a man whose courage was so clear
as to be above suspicion, he describes with his usual simplicity the impression
which this spectacle made upon him. " Before (says he) I saw the breasts of
my companions opened, their hearts yet fluttering, offered to an accursed idol,
and their flesh devoured by their exulting enemies; I was accustomed to enter
a battle not only without fear, but with high spirit. But from that time I nevea




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             493
advanced to fight with the Mexicans without a secret horror and anxiety; my
heart trembled at the thoughts of the death which I had seen them suffer."
He takes care to add, that as soon as the combat began, his terror went off;
and indeed, his adventurous bravery on every occasion is full evidence of this
B. Diaz, c. 156. P. 157. a.
NOTE [121]. PAGE 252.
ONE circumstance in this siege merits particular notice. The account which
the Spanish writers give of the numerous armies employed in the attack or
defence of Mexico seems to be incredible. According to Cortes himself, he
had at one time 150,000 auxiliary Indians in his service. Relat. Ramus. iii.
275. E. Goinara asserts that they were, above 200,000. Cron. c. 136. Her.
rera, an author of higher authority, says they were about 200,000. Dec. iii.
lib. i. c. 19. None of the contemporary writers ascertain explicitly the number
of persons in Mexico during the siege. But Cortes on several occasions mentions the number of Mexicans who were slain, or who perished for want of
food; and, if we may rely on those circumstances, it is probable that above
two hundred thousand must have been shut' up in the town. But the quantity
of provisions necessary for the subsistence of such vast multitudes assembled
in one place, during three months, is so great, that it requires so much foresight
and arrangement to collect these, and lay them up in magazines, so as to be
certain of a regular supply, that one can hardly believe that this could be accomplished in a country where agriculture was so imperfect as in the Mexican
empire, where there were no tame animals, and by a people naturally so improvident, and so incapable of executing a complicated plan, as the most
improved Americans. The Spaniards, with all their care and attention, fared
very poorly, and were often reduced to extreme distress for want of provisions.
B. Diaz; p. 142. Cortes Relat. 271. D. Cortes on one occasion mentions
slightly the subsistence of his army; and, after acknowledging that they were
often in great want, adds, that they received supplies from the people of the
country, of fish, and of some fruit, which he calls the cherries of the country.
Ibid. B. Diaz says that they had cakes of maize, and serasas de la tierra; and
when the season of these was over, another fruit, which he calls Tunas; but
their most comfortable subsistence was a root which the Indians use as food, to
which he gives the name of Quilites, p. 142. The Indian auxiliaries had one
means of subsistence more than the Spaniards. They fed upon the bodies of
the Mexicans whom they killed in battle. Cortes Relat. 176. C. B. Diaz con
firms his relation, and adds, that when the Indians returned from Mexico to
their own country, they carried with them large quantities of flesh of the
Mexicans salted or dried, as a most acceptable present to their friends, that they
might have the pleasure of feeding upon the bodies of their enemies in their
festivals, p. 157. De Solis, who seems to consider it as an imputation of discredit to his countrymen, that they should act in concert with auxiliaries who
fed upon human flesh, is solicitous to prove that the Spaniards ondeavoured to
prevent their associates from eating the bodies of the Mexicans, lib. v. c. 24.
But he has no authority for this from the original historians. Neither Cortes
himself nor B. Diaz seems to have had any such scruple; and on many occasions they mention the Indian repasts, which were become familiar to them,
without any mark of abhorrence. Even with this additional stock of food for
the Indians, it was hardly possible to procure subsistence for armies amounting
to such numbers as we find in the Spanish writers. Perhaps the best solution
of the difficulty is, to adopt the opinion of B. Diaz del Castilqlo, the most artless
of all the Historiadores primitivs. " When Gomara (says he) on some occasions relates, that there were so many thousand Indians our auxiliaries, and on
others, that there were so many thousand houses in this or that towyn, no regard
is to be paid to his enumeration, as he has no authority for it, the numbers not
being in reality the fifth of what he relates. If we add together the different
numbers which he mentions, that country would contain more millions than
there are in Castile."  C. 129. But though some considerable deduction should
certainly be made from the Spanish accounts of the Mexican forces, they must
have been very numerous; for nothing but an immense superiority in number




494            NOTES AND ILLUSTR ATION S.
could have enabled them to withstand a body of nine-hundred Spaniards, conducted by a leader of such abilities as Cortes.
NOTE [122]. PAGE 257.
IN relating the oppressive and cruel proceedings of the conquerors of New
Spain, I have not followed B. de las Casas as my guide. His account of them,
Relat. de la Dcstruyc. p. 18, &c. is manifestly exaggerated. It is from the
testimony of Cortes himself, and of Gomara who wrote under his- eye, that'I
have taken my account of the punishment of the Panucans, and they relate it
without any disapprobation. B. Diaz, contrary to his usual custom, mentions
it only in general terms, c. 162. Herrera, solicitous to extenuate this barbarous
action of his countrymen, though he mentions 63- caziques, and 400 men of
note, as being condemned to the flames, asserts that 30' only were burnt, and
the rest pardoned. Dec. 3. lib. v. c. 7. But this is contrary to-the testimonyof the original historians, particularly of Gomara, whom' it appears he had
consulted, as he adopts several of his expressions in this passage. The punishment of Guatimozin is related by the most authentic of the Spanish writers.
Torquemada has extracted from a history of Tezeuco, composed in the Mexi.
can tongue, an account of this transaction, more favourable to Guatimozin'
than that of the Spanish authors. Mon. Indiana, i. 575. According to the
Mexican account, Cortes had scarcely a shadow of evidence to justify such' a
wanton act of cruelty. B. Diaz affirms, that Guatimozin' and his fellow.
sufferers asserted their innocence with their last breath, and that many of the
Spanish soldiers condemned this action of Cortes'as- equally unnecessary and
unjust, p. 200. b. 201. a.
NOTE [123]. PAGE 259.
THE motive for undertaking this expedition was, to Punish Christoval de
Olid, one of his officers' who had revolted against him, and- aimed at establishing
an independent jurisdiction.  Cortes regarded this insurrection as of such
dangerous example, and dreaded so. much the abilities and popularity of its
author, that in person-he led the body of troops destined to suppress it. He
marched, according to Gomara, three thousand- miles, throu:gh a country
abounding with thick forests, rugged mountains, deep rivers, thinly inhabited.
and cultivated only in a few places. What he suffered-'from famine, from the
hostilityv of the natives, from the climate, and from hardships of every species,
has nothing in history parallel to it, but what occurs in the adventures of- the
other discoverers and conquerors of: the New World-. Cortes was employed
in this dreadful service above two years; and-'though it'was not distinguished
by any splendid event, he exhibited, during the course of' it, greater personal
courage, more fortitude of mind, more' perseverance and patience than in any
other period or scene in his life. Herrera, dec. 3.' lib. vi. vii. viii. ix. Gomara,
Cron. c. 163-177. B. Diaz, 174-190.  Cortes, MS. penes me. Were one to
write a life of Cortes, the account of this expedition should occupy a splendid
place in it. In a general history of America, as the expedition was productive
of no great event, the mention of it is sufficient.
NOTE [124]. PAGE 259.
AccoRDING to Herrera, the treasure which Cortes-brought with him, consisted
of fifteen hundred marks of wrought plate, tvwo hundred thousand pesos of
Sine gold, and ten thousand of inferior' standard, manv- rich jewels, one in par.
ticular worth forty thousand pesos, and several trinkets and ornaments of
value. Dec. 4. lib. iii. c. 8. lib. iv. c. 1. He afterwards'engaged to give a por.
tion with his daughter of a hundred thousand-pesos. Gomara Cron. c. 237.
The fortune which he left his sons was very considerable. But, as we have
before related, the sum divided among the conquerors, on the' first reduction
of Mexico, was very small. There appears, then, to be some reasonwfor'sus.
pecting that the accusations of Cortes's enemies were not altogether destitute
of foundation. They charged him with having applied to his own use a dis.




NOTES, AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            495.
proportionate share of the Mexican spoils; with having concealed the royal
treasures of Montezuma and Guatimozin; with defrauding the king of his
fifth; and robbing his followers of what was due to them. Herrera, dec. 3. lib.
viii. c. 15. dec. 4. lib. iii. c. 8. Some of the conquerors themselves entertained
suspicions of the same kind: with respect to this part of his conduct.  B.
Diaz, c. 157.
NOTE [125]. PAGE 261.
IS tracing the progress-of the Spanish arms in New Spain, we have followed
Cortes himself as our most certain guide. His despatches to the Emperor contain a minute account of his operations. But the unlettered conqueror of
Peru was incapable of relating his own exploits. Our information with respect
to them, and other transactions in Peru, is derived, however, from contemporary
and respectable authors.
The most early account of Pizarro's- transactions in Peru was published by
Francisco de Xerez, his secretary. It is a simple, unadorned narrative, carried
down no further than the death of Atahualpa, in 1533; for-the author returned
to Spain in 1534, and, soon after he landed, printed at Seville his short History
of the'Conquest of Peru, addressed to the Emperor.
Don Pedro Sancho, an officer who served under Pizarro, drew up an account
of his expedition, which was translated into Italian-by Ramusio, and inserted
in his valuable collection, but has never been published in its original language.
Sancho returned to Spain at the same time with Xerez. Great credit is due
to what both these authors relate concerning the progress and operations of
Pizarro; but the residence of the Spaniards in Peru had been so short, at the
time when they left it, and their intercourse with the natives are so slender,
that their knowledge of the Peruvian manners and customs is very imperfect.
The nextcontemporary historian is Pedro Cieza de Leon, who published his
Cronica del Peru at Seville in 1553. If hle had finished all that he purposes in
the general division of his work, it would have been the most complete history
which had been published of any region in the New World. He was well
qualified to execute it, having served' during seventeen years in America, and
having visited in person most of the provinces concerning which he had occasion to write. But only the first part of his chronicle has been printed. It
contains a description of Peru, and several of the- adjacent provinces, with an
account of the institutions and customs of the natives, and is written with so
little art, and such an apparent regard for truth, that one must regret the loss
of the other parts of his work.
This loss is amply supplied by Don Augustine Zarate, who published, in
1555, his Historia del Descubrimiento y Conquesta de la Provincia del Peru.
Zarate -was a man of rank and education, and employed in Peru as comptrollergeneral: of the public revenue.  His history, whether  we attend to its matter
or composition, is a book of considerable merit: as he had an opportunity to
be well informed, and seems to have been inquisitive with respect to -the manners and transactions of the Peruvians, great credit is due to his testimony.
Don Diego Fernandez published his Historia del Peru in 1571. His sole
object is to relate the dissensions and civil, wars of the Spaniards in that empire. As he served in a public station in Peru, and was well acquainted both
with the country and:with the principal-actors in those singular scenes which
he describes, as he possessed sound - understanding and great impartiality, his
worklmay be ranked among those of the historians: most distinguished for their
industry in research, or their capacity in judging with respect to the events
which they relate.
The last author who can be reckoned among the contemporary historians of
the conquest of Peru is Garcilasso de la Vega, Inca. For though the first part
of his work, entitled Commentarios Reales del Origin de los Incas Reies del Peru,
was not published sooner than the year 1609, seventy-six years after the death
of Atahualpa the last Emperor, yetas -he was born in Peru, and was the son of
an officer of distinction among the Spanish conquerors, by a Coya, or lady of
the royal race, on account of which he always took the name of Inca; as he
was master of -the language spoken by the Incas, and acquainted with the tra



496         NOt'IES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
ditions of his countrymen, his authority is rated very high, and often placed
above that of all the other historians. His work, however, is little more than
a commentary upon the Spanish writers of the Peruvian story, and composed
of quotations taken from the authors whom I have mentioned. This is the
idea which he himself gives of it, lib. i. c. 10. Nor is it in the account of
facts only that he follows them servilely. Even in explaining the institutions
and rites of his ancestors, his information seems not to be more perfect than
theirs. His explanation of the Quipos is almost the same with that of Acosta.
He produces no specimen of Peruvian poetry, but that wretched one which he
borrows from Blas Valera, an early missionary, whose memoirs have never been
published. Lib. ii. c. 15. As for composition, arrangement, or a capacity of
distinguishing between what is fabulous, what is probable, and what is true,
one searches for theni in vain in the commentaries of the Inca. His work,
however, notwithstanding its great defects, is not altogether destitute of use.
Some traditions which he received from his countrymen are preserved in it.
His knowledge of the Peruvian language has enabled him to correct some errors
of the Spanish writers, and he has inserted in it some curious facts taken from
authors whose works were never published, and are now lost.
NOTE [126]. PAGE 263.
ONE may form an idea both of the hardships which they endured, and of
the unhealthy climate in the regions which they visited, from the extraordinary
mortality that prevailed among them. Pizarro carried out 112 men, Almagro
70. In less than nine.months 130 of these died. Few fell by the sword; most
of them were cut off by diseases. Xeres, p. 180.
NOTE [127]. PAGE 264.
THIS island, says Herrera, is rendered so uncomfortable by the unwholesomeness of its climate, its impenetrable woods, its rugged mountains, and the multitude of insects and reptiles, that it is seldom any softer epithet than that of
infernal is employed in describing it. The sun is almost never seen there, and
throughout the year it hardly ever ceases to rain. Dec. iii. lib. x. c. 3. Dampier touched at this island in the year 1685; and his account of the climate is
not more favourable. Vol. i. p. 172. He, during his cruise on the coast, visited
most of the places where Pizarro landed, and his description of them throws
light on the narrations of the early Spanish historians.
NOTE [128]. PAGE 270.
BY this time horses had multiplied greatly in the Spanish settlements on the
continent. When Cortes began his expedition in the year 1518, though his
armament was more considerable than that of Pizarro, and composed of persons
superior in rank to those who invaded Peru, he could procure no more than
sixteen horses.
NOTE [129]. PAGE 271.
IN the year 1740, D. Ant. Ulloa and D. George Juan. travelled from Guag
aquil to Motupe by the same route which Pizarro took.- From the description
of their journey, one may form an ideaof the difficulty of his march. The
sandy plains between St. Michael de Pieura and Motupe extend 90 miles, without water, without a tree, a plant, or any green thing, on a dreary stretch of
burning sand. Voyage, tom. i. p. 399, &c.
NOTE [130]. PAGE 273.
THIS extravagant and unseasonable discourse of Valverde has been censured
by all historians, and with justice. But though he seems to have been an
illiterate and bigotted monk, nowise resembling the good Olmedo, who accompanied Cortes; the absurdity of his address to Atahualpa must not be charged




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            497
wholly upon him. His harangue is evidently a translation or paraphrase of
that form, concerted by a junto of Spanish divines and lawyers in the year
1509, for explaining theeright of their king to the sovereignty of the New World,
and for directing the officers employed in America how they should take possession of any new country. See Note 23. The sentiments contained in Valverde's harangue must not then be imputed to the bigotted imbecility of a
particular man, but to that of the age. But Gomara and Benzoni relate one
circumstance concerning Valverde, which, if authentic, renders him an object
not of contempt only but of horror. They assert, that during the whole action
Valverde continued to excite the soldiers to slaughter, calling to them to strike
the enemy not with the edge but with the points of their swords. Gom. Cron.
c. 113. Benz. Histor. Nov. Orbis, lib. iii. c. 3. Such behaviour was very diX.
ferent from that of the Roman Catholic clergy in other parts of America.
where they uniformly exerted their influence to protect the Indians, and to
moderate the ferocity of their countrymen.
NOTE [131]. PAGE 273.
Two different systems have been formed concerning the conduct of Atahualpa. The Spanish writers, in order to justify the violence of their countrymen,
contend that all the Inca's professions of friendship were feigned; and that Iis
intention in agreeing to an interview with Pizarro at Caxamalca, was to cut
off him and his followers at one blow; that for this purpose he advanced with
such a numerous body of attendants, who had arms concealed under their garments to execute this scheme. This is the account given by Xeres and Zarate,
and adopted by Herrera. But if it had been the plan of the Inca to destroy
the Spaniards, one can hardly imagine that he would have permitted themto
march through the desert of Motupe, or have neglected to defend the pas"s&
in the mountains, where they might have been attacked with so much advan
tage. If the Peruvians marched to Caxamalca with an intention to fall upon
the Spaniards, it is inconceivable that of so great a body of men, prepared foraction, not one should attempt to make resistance, but all tamely suffer themselves to be butchered by an enemy whom they were armed to attack. Ata.
hualpa's mode of advancing to the interview has the aspect of a peaceable
procession, not of a military enterprise. He himself and his followers were in
their habits of ceremony, preceded, as on days of solemnity, by unarmed harbingers.  Though rude nations are frequently cunning and false; yet if a
scheme of deception and treachery must be imputed either to a monarch that
had no great reason to be alarmed at a visit from strangers who solicited admission into his presence as friends, or to an adventurer so daring and so little
scrupulous as Pizarro, one cannot hesitate in determining where to fix the presumption of guilt. Even amidst the endeavours of the Spanish writers to
palliate the proceedings of Pizarro, one plainly perceives that it was his intention, as well as his interest, to seize the Inca, and that he had taken measures
for that purpose previous to any suspicion of that monarch's designs.
Garcilasso de la Vega, extremely solicitous to vindicate his countrymen, the
Peruvians, from the crime of having concerted the destruction of Pizarro and
his followers, and no less afraid to charge the Spaniards with improper conduct
towards the Inca, has framed another system. He relates, that a man of maiestic form, with a long beard, and garments reaching to the ground, having appeared in a vision to Viracocha, tho eighth Inca, and declared that he was a
child of the Sun, that monarch built a temple in honour of this person, and
erected an image of him, resembling as nearly as possible the singular form in
which he had exhibited himself to his view. In this temple divine honours
were paid to him, by the name of Viracocha. P. i. lib. iv. c. 21. lib. v. c. 22.
When the Spaniards first appeared in Peru, the length of their beards, and the
dress they wore, struck every person so much with their likeness to the image
of Viracocha, that they supposed them to be children of the Sun, who had
descended from heaven to earth. All concluded that the fatal period of the
Peruvian empire was now approaching, and that the throne would be occupied
by new possessors. Atahualpa himself considering the Spaniards as messengers from heaven, was so far from entertaining any thoughts of resisting theln,
VOL. I.-63                     23




408           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
that he determined to yield implicit obedience to their commands. From these
sentiments flowed his professions of love and respect. To those were owing
the cordial reception of Soto and Ferdinand Pizarro in his camp, and the sub
missive reverence with which he himself advanced to visit the Spanish general
in his quarters; but from the gross ignorance of Philipillo, the interpreter, the
declaration of the Spaniards, and his answer to it, were so ill explained, that.
by their mutual inability to comprehend each other's intentions, the fatal rencantre at Caxamalca, with all its dreadful consequences, was occasioned.
It is remarkable, that no traces of this superstitious venerati on of the Peru.
vians for the Spaniards are to be found either in Xeres, or Sancho, or Zarate,
previous to the interview at Caxamalca; and yet the two former served undeo
Pizarro at that time, and the latter visited Peru soon after the conquest. If
either the Inca himself, or his messengers, had addressed the Spaniards in the
words which Garcilasso puts in their mouths, they must have been struck with
such submissive declarations; and they would certainly have availed themselves
of them  to accomplish their own designs with greater facility. Garcilasso
himself, though his narrative of the intercourse between the Inca and Spaniards,
preceding the rencontre at Caxamnalca, is founded on the supposition of his
believing them to be Viracochas, or divine beings, P. ii. lib. i. c. 17, &c., yet,
with his:isual inattention and inaccuracy, he admits in another place that the
Peruvians did not recollect the resemblance between them and the god Viracocha, untIil the fatal disasters subsequent to the defeat at Caxamalca, and then
only began to call them Viracochas. P. i. lib. v. c. 21. This is confirmed by
Herrera, dec. v. lib. ii. c. 12. In many different parts of America, if we may
believe the Spanish writers, their countrymen were considered as divine beings
who had descended from heaven. But in this instance, as in many which occur
in the intercourse between nations whose progress in refinement is very unfqual,
the ideas of those who used the expression were different from the ideas of
those who heard it. For such is the idiom of the Indian languages, or such is
the simplicity of those who speak them, that when they see any thing with
which they were formerly unacquainted, and of which they do not know the
origin, they say that it came down from heaven. Nugnez. Ram. iii. 327. C.
The account which I have given of the sentiments and proceedings of the
Peruvians, appears to be more natural and consistent than either of the two
preceding, and is better supported by the facts related by the contemporary
historians.
According to Xeres, p. 200, two thousand Peruvians were killed. Sancho
makes the number of the slain six or seven thousand. Ram. iii. 274. D. By
Garcilasso's account, five thousand were massacred. P. ii. lib. i. c. 25. The
number which I have mentioned, being the medium between the extremes, may
probably be nearest the truth.
NOTE [132]. PAGE 274.
NOTHING can be a more striking proof of this, than that three Spaniards
travelled from Caxamalca to Cuzco. The distance between them is six hundred
miles. In every place throughout this great extent of county, they were
treated with all the honours which the Peruvians paid to their sovereigns, and
even to their divinities. Under pretext of amassing what was wanting for the
ransom of the Inca, they demanded the plates of gold with which the walls of
tie Temple of the Sun in Cuzco were adorned; and though the priests were
unwilling to alienate those sacred ornaments, and the people refused to violate
tle shrine of their God, the three Spaniards, with their own hands, robbed the
Temple of part of this valuable treasure; and such was the reverence of the
natives for their persons, that though they beheld this act of sacrilege with
astonishment, they did not attempt to prevent or disturb the commission of it
Zarate, lib. ii. c. 6. Sancho ap. Ramus. iii. 375. D.
NOTE [133]. PAGE 278.
ACCORDING to Herrera, the spoil of Cuzco, after setting apart the King's
Jifth, was divided among 480 persons. Each received 4000 pesos. This




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            499
amounts to 1,920,000 pesos. Dec. v. lib. vi. c. 3. But as the general and other
officers were entitled to a share far greater than that of the private men, the
sum total must have risen much beyond what I have mentioned. Gomara, c.
123, and Zarate, lib. ii. c. 8, satisfy themselves with asserting in general, that
the plunder of Cuzco was of greater value than the ransom of Atahualpa.
NOTE [134]. PAGE 279.
No expedition in the New World was conducted with more persevering
cou:age than that of Alvarado, and in none were greater hardships endured.
Many of the persons engaged in it were, like their leader, veterans who had
served under Cortes, inured to all the rigour of American war. Such of my
readers as have not an opportunity of perusing the striking description of their
sufferings by Zarate, or Herrera, may form some idea of the nature of their
march from the sea-coast to Quito, by consulting the account which D. Ant.
Ulloa gives of his own journey in 1736, nearly in the same route. Voy. tom.
i. p. 178, &c., or that of M. Bouguer, who proceeded from Puerto Viejo to Quito
by the same road which Alvarado took. He compares his own journey with
that of the Spanish leader, and by the comparison gives a most striking idea of
the boldness and patience of Alvarado in forcing his way through so many
obstacles. Voyage de Perou, p. 28, &c.
NOTE [135]. PAGE 279.
AccoRDING to Herrera, there was entered on account of the king in gold
155,300 pesos, and 5,400 marks (each 8 ounces) of silver, besides several vessels
and ornaments, some of gold, and others of silver; on account of private persons, in gold 499,000 pesos, and 54,000 marks of silver. Dec. 5. lib. vi. c. 13.
NOTE [136]. PAGE 283.
THE Peruvians not only, imitated the military arts of the Spaniards, but had
recourse to devices of their own. As the cavalry were the chief objects olt
their terror, they endeavoured to render them incapable of acting by means of
a long thong with a stone fastened to each end. This, when thrown by a
skilful hand, twisted about the horse and its rider, and entangled them so as to
obstruct their motions. Herrera mentions this as an invention of their own.
Dec. 5. lib. viii. c. 4. But as I have observed, p. 178, this weapon is common
among several barbarous tribes towards the extremity of South America; and
it is more probable that the Peruvians had observed the dexterity with which
they used it in hunting, and on this occasion adopted it themselves. The Spaniards were considerably annoyed by it. Herrera, ibid. Another instance of
the ingenuity of the Peruvians deserves mention. By turning a river out of
its channel, they overflowed a valley, in which a body of the enemy was
posted, so suddenly, that it was with the utmost difficulty the Spaniards madle
their escape. Herrera, dec. 5. lib. viii. c. 5.
NOTE [137]. PAGE 290.
HERRERA'S account of Orellana's voyage is the most minute and apparently
the most accurate. It was probably taken from the journal of Orellana himself. But the dates are not distinctly marked. His navigation down the Coca,
or Napo, began early in February, 1541; and he arrived at the mouth of the
river on the 26th of August, having spent near seven months in the voyage..
M. de la Condamine, in the year 1743, sailed from Cuenca to Pars, a settlelnent
of the Portuguese at the mouth of the river, a navigation much longer than
that of Orellana, in less than four months. Voyage, p. 179. But the two
adventurers were very differently provided for the voyage. This hazardous
undertaking to which ambition prompted Orellana, and to which the love of science led M. de la Condamine, was undertaken in the year 1769, by Madame
Godin des Odonais from conjugal affection. The narrative of the hardships
Which she suffered, of the dangers to which she was exposed, and of the dlis



500            NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS
asters which befell her, is one of the most singular and affecting stories in any
language, exhibiting in her conduct a striking picture of the fortitude which
distinguishes the one sex, mingled with the sensibility and tenderness peculiar
to the other. Lettre de M. Godin a M. de la Condamine.
NOTE [138]. PAGE 291.
HIERRERA gives a striking picture of their indigence. Twelve gentlemen,
who had been officers of distinction under Almagro, lodged in the same house,
and having but one cloak among them, it was worn alternately by him wn~
had occasion to appear in public, while the rest, from the want of a decent
dress, were obliged to keep within doors. Their former friends and companions were so much afraid of giving offence to Pizarro, that they durst not
entertain or even converse with them. One may conceive what was the condition, and what the indignation of men once accustomed to power and opulence, when they felt themselves poor and despised, without a roof under
which to shelter their heads, while they beheld others, whose merits and services
were not equal to theirs, living in splendour in sumptuous edifices. Dec. 6
lib viii. c. 6.
NOTE [139]. PAGE 296.
HERRERA, whose accuracy entitles him to great credit, asserts, that Gonzalo
Pizarro possessed domains in the neighbourhood of Chuquesaca de la Plata,
which yielded him an annual revenue greater than that of the Archbishop of
Toledo, the best endowed see in Europe. Dec, 7. lib. vi. c. 3.
NOTE [140]. PAGE 301.
ALL the Spanish writers describe his march, and the distresses of both parties, very minutely. Zarate observes, that hardly any parallel to it occurs in
history, either with respect to the length of the retreat, or the ardour of the
pursuit. Pizarro, according to his computation, followed the viceroy upwards
of three thousand miles. Lib. v. c. 16. 26.
NOTE [141]. PAGE 307.
IT amounted, according to Fernandez, the best informed historian of that
period, to one million four hundred thousand pesos. Lib. ii. c. 79.
NOTE [142]. PAGE 308.
CARvAJAL, from the beginning, had been an advocate for an accommodation
with Gasca. Finding Pizarro incapable of holding that bold course which he
originally suggested, he recommended to him a timely submission to his sovereign as the safest measure. When the president's offers were first communicated to Carvajal, "By our Lady (says he in that strain of buffoonery which
was familiar to him), the priest issues gracious bulls. He gives them both
good and cheap; let us not only accept them, but wear them as reliques about
otur necks." Fernandez, lib. ii. c. 63.
NOTE [143]. PAGE 310.
DURING the rebellion of Gonzalo Pizarro, seven hundred men were killed in
battle, and three hundred and eighty were hanged or beheaded. Herrera, dec.
B. lib. iv. c. 4. Above three hundred of these were cut off by Carvajal. Fornandez, lib. ii. c. 91. Zarate makes the number of those put to a violent death
five hundred. Lib. vii. c. 1.
NOTE [144]. PAGE 313n
IN my inquiries concerning the manners and policy of the Mexicans, I have
received much information from a large manuscript of Don Alonso de Corita




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                              501
one of the judges in the Court of Audience at Mexico. In the year 155X3,
Philip II., in order to discover the mode of levying tribute from his Indian subjects, that -would be most beneficial to the crown, and least oppressive to them,
addressed a mandate to all the Courts of Audience in America, enjoining them
to answer certain queries which he proposed to them concerning the ancient
form of government established among the various nations of Indians, and the
mode in which they had been accustomed to pay taxes to their kings or chiefs.
In obedience to this mandate, Corita, who had resided nineteen years in America,
fourteen of which he passed in New Spain, composed the work of which I have
a copy. He acquaints his sovereign, that he had made it an object, during his
residence in America, and in all its provinces which he had visited, to inquire
diligently into the manners and customs of the natives; that he had conversed
for this purpose with many aged and intelligent Indians, and consulted several
of the Spanish Ecclesiastics, who understood the Indian language most perfectly, particularly some of those who landed in New Spain soon after the conquest. Corita appears to be a man of some learning, and to have carried on
his inquiries with the diligence and accuracy to which he pretends. Greater
credit is due to his testimony from one circumstance. His work was not composed with a view to publication, or in support of any particular theory, but
contains simple though full answers to queries proposed to him officially.
Though Herrera does not mention him among the authors whom he had
followed as guides in his history, I should suppose, from several facts of which
he takes notice, as well as from several expressions which he uses, that this
memorial of Corita was not unknown to him.
NOTE [145]. PAGE 317.
THE early Spanish writers were so hasty and inaccurate in estimating the
numbers of people in the provinces and towns in America, that it is impossible
to ascertain that of Mexico itself with any degree of precision.  Cortes
describes the extent and populousness of Mexico in general terms, which imply
that it was not inferior to the greatest cities in Europe. Gomara is more
explicit, and affirms, that there were 60,000 houses or families in'Mexico. Cron.
c. 78. Herrera adopts his opinion, Dec. 2. lib. vii. c. 13.; and the generality of
writers follow them implicitly without inquiry or scruple. According to this
account, the inhabitants of Mexico must have been about 300,000. Torquemada, with his usual propensity to the marvellous, asserts, that there were
120,000 houses or families in Mexico, and consequently about 600,000 inhabitants. Lib. iii. c. 23. But in a very judicious account of the Mexican cmpire,
by one of Cortes's officers, the population is fixed at 60,000 people. Ramusip,
iii. 309. A. Even by this account, which probably is much nearer the truth
than any of the foregoing, Mexico was a great city.
NOTE [146]. PAGE 318.
IT is to P. Torribio de Benavente that I am indebted for this curious observa
tion. Palafox, Bishop of Ciudad de la Puebla Los Angeles, confirms and illustrates it more fully. The Mexican (says he) is the only language in which a
termination indicating respect, silavas reverentiales y de cortesia, may be affixed
to every word. By adding the final syllable zin or azin to any word, it becomes a proper expression of veneration in the mouth of an inferior. If, in
speaking to an equal, the word Father is to be used, it is Tatl, but an inferior
says Tatzin. One priest speaking to another, calls him Teopixque; a person
of inferior rank calls him Teopixcatzin. The name of the emperor who reigned
when Cortes invaded Mexico, was.Montezuma;  but his vassals, from reverence
pronounced it Jiontezumazin. Torribio, MS. Palaf. Virtudes del Indlo, p. 65.
The Mexicans had not only reverential nouns, but reverential verbs. The
manner in which these are formed from the verbs in common use is explained
by D. Jos. Aug. Aldama y Guevara in his Mexican Grammar, No. 188.




s02          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
NOTE [147]. PAGE 320.
FROM comparing several passages in Corita and Herrera, we may collect
with some degree of accuracy, the various modes in which the Mexicans con
tributed towards the support of government. Some persons of the first order
seem to have been exempted from the payment of any tribute, and as their
only duty to the public, were bound to personal service in war, and to follow
the banner of their sovereign with their vassals. 2. The immediate vassals of
the crown were bound not only to personal military service,-but paid a certain
proportion of the produce, of their lands in kind. 3. Those who held offices
of honour or trust paid a certain share of what they received in consequence
of holding these. 4. Each Capullce, or association, cultivated some part of the
common field allotted to it, for the behoof of the crown, and deposited the
produce in the royal granaries. 5. Some part of whatever was brought to the
public markets, whether fruits of the earth, or the various productions of their
artists and manufacturers, was demanded for the public use, and the merchants
who paid this were exempted from every other tax. 6. The Mayeques, or adscripli
glebc, were bound to cultivate certain districts in every province, which may
be considered as crown lands, and brought the increase into public storehouses.
Thus the sovereign received some part of whatever was useful or valuable in
the country, whether it was the natural production of the soil, or acquired by
the industry of the people. What each contributed towards the support of
government seems to have been inconsiderable. Corita, in answer to one of
the queries put to the Audience of Mexico by Philip II., endeavours to estimate
iii money the value of what each citizen might be supposed to pay, and does
not reckon it at more than three or four reals, about eighteen pence or two
shillings a head.
NOTE [148]. PAGE 321.
CORTES, who seems to have been as much astonished with this, as with any
instance of Mexican ingenuity, gives a particular description of it. Along
one of the causeways, says he, by which they enter the city, are conducted two
conduits, composed of clay tempered with mortar, about two paces in breadth,
and raised about six feet, In one of them is conveyed a stream of excellent
water, as large as the body of a man, into the centre of the city, and supplies
all the inhabitants plentifully. The other is empty, that when it is necessary
to clean or repair the former, the stream of water may be turned into it. As
this conduit passes along two of the bridges, where there are breaches in the
causeway, through which the salt water of the lake flows, it is conveyed over
tfem in pipes as large as the body of an ox, then carried from the conduit to
the remote quarters of the city in canoes, and sold to the inhabitants. Relat
ap. Ramus. 241. A.
NOTE [149]. PAGE 32
IN the armoury of the royal palace of Madrid are shown suits of armour,
which are called Montezuma's. They are composed of thin lacquered copperplates. In the opinion of very intelligent judges, they are evidently eastern.
The forms of the silver ornaments upon them, representing dragons, &c. may
be considered a confirmation of this. They are infinitely superior, in point of
workmanship, to any effort of American art. The Spaniards probably received
them from the Philippine islands. The only unquestionable specimen of
Mexican art, that I know of in Great Britain, is a cup of very fine gold, which
is said to have belonged to Montezuma. It weighs 5oz. 12dwt. Three drawihgs of it were exhibited to the Society of Antiquaries, June 10, 1765. A
man's head is represented on this cup. On one side the full face. on the other
the profile, on the third the back parts of the head. The relievo is said to have
been produced by punching the inside of the cup, so as to make the representation of a face on the outside. The features are gross, but represented with
some degree of art, and certainly too rude for Spanish workmanship. This




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            503
cup was purchased by Edward Earl of Orford, while he lay in the harbour of
Cadiz with the fleet under his command, and is now in the possession of his
grandson, Lord Archer. I am indebted for this information to my respectable
and ingenious friend Mr. Barrington. In the sixth volume of the Archweologia,
p. 107, is published an account of some masks of Terra Cotta, brought from a
burying-ground on the American continent, about seventy miles from the
British settlement on the Mosquito shore. They are said to be likenesses of
chiefs, or other eminent persons. From the descriptions and engravings of
them, we have an additional proof of the imperfect state of arts among the
Americans.
NOTE [150]. PAGE 323
THe learned reader wilt perceive how much I have been indebted, in this
part of my work, to the guidance of the Bishop of Gloucester, who has traced
the successive steps by which the human mind advanced in this line of its progress, with much erudition, and greater ingenuity. He is the first, as far as I
know, who formed a rational and consistent theory concerning the various
modes of writing practised by nations, according to- the various degrees of
their improvement. Div. Legation of Moses, iii. 69, &c. Some important
observations have been added by M. le President de Brosses, the learned and
intelligent author of the Traite de la Formation Mecanique des Langues, tom.
i. 295, &c.
As the Mexican paintings are the most curious monuments extant of the
earliest mode of writing, it will not be improper to give some account of the
means by which they were preserved from the general wreck of every work of
art in America, and communicated to the public. For the most early and complete collection of these published by Purchas, we are indebted to the attention
of that curious inquirer, Hakluyt. Don Antonio Mendoza, viceroy of New
Spain, having deemed those paintings a proper present for Charles V., the ship
in which they were sent to Spain was taken by a French cruiser, and they came
into the possession of Thevet, the King's geographer, who, having travelled
him-self into the New World, and described one of its provinces, was a curious
observer of whatever tended to illustrate the manners of the Americans. On
his death, they were purchased by Hakluyt, at that time chaplain of the
English ambassador to the French court; and, being left by him to Purchas,
were published at the desire of the learned antiquary, Sir Henry Spelman.
Purchas, iii. 1065. They were translated from English into French' by Melchizedeck Thevenot, and published in his collection of voyages, A. D. 1683.
The second specimen of Mexican picture-writing was published by Dr. Francis Gemelli Carreri, in two copper-plates. The first is a map, or representation
of the progress of the ancient Mexicans on their first arrival in the country,
and of the various stations in which they settled, before they founded the
capital of their empire in the lake of Mexico. The second is a Chronological
Wheel, or Circle, representing the manner in which they computed and marked
their cycle of fifty-two years. He received both from Don Carlos de Siguenza
y Congorra, a diligent collector of ancient Mexican Documents. But as it
seems now to be a received opinion (founded, as far as I know, on no good
evidence), that Carreri was never out of Italy, and that his famlous Giro del
Mundo is an account of a fictitious voyage, I have not mentioned these paintings
in the text. They have, however, manifestly the appearance of being Mexican
productions, and are allowed to be so by Boturini, who was well qualified to determine whether they were genuine or supposititious. M. Clavigero likewise
admits them to be genuine paintings of the ancient Mexicans. To me they
always appeared to be so, though from my desire to rest no part of my narra
tive upon questionable authority, I did not refer to them. The style of painting
in the former is considerably more perfect than any other specimen of Mexican
design; but as the original is said to have been much defaced by time, I suspect
that it has been improved by some touches from the hand of a European artist.
Carreri, Churchill, iv. p. 487. The Chronological Wheel is a just delineation
of the Mexican mode of computing time, as described by Acosta, lib. vi. c. 2.
Iti seems to resemble one which that learned Jesuit had seen; and if it be ad.




504         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
mitted as a genuine monument, it proves that the Mexicans had artificial or
arbitrary characters, which represented several things besides numbers. Each
month is there represented by a symbol expressive of some work or rite peculiar to it.
The third specimen of Mexican painting was discovered by another Italian.
In 1736, Lorenzo Boturini Benaduci set out for New Spain, and was led by
several incidents to study the language of the Mexicans, and to collect the remains of their historical monuments. He persisted nine years in his researches,
with the enthusiasm of a projector, and the patience of an antiquary  In
1746, he published at Madrid, Idea de una Xueva Hiistoria General de la dimerica
Septentrional, containing an account of the result of his inquiries; and he added
to it a catalogue of his American Historical Museum, arranged under thirty-six
different heads. His idea of a New History appears to me the work of a whimsical credulous man. But his catalogue of Mexican maps, paintings, tributerolls, calendars, >Sc. is much larger than one could have expected. Unfortunately a ship, in which he had sent a considerable part of them to Europe, was
taken by an English privateer during the war between Great Britain and Spain,
which commenced in the year 1739; and it is probable that they perished by
falling into the hands of ignorant captors. Boturini himself incurred the displeasure of the Spanish court, and died in an hospital at Madrid. The history
of which the Idea, &c. was only a prospectus, was never published. The remainder of his Museum seems to have been dispersed. Some part of it came
infto the possession of the present Archbishop of Toledo, when he was primate
of New Spain: and he published from it that curious tribute-roll which I have
mentioned.
The only other collection of Mexican paintings, as far as I can learn, is in
the Imperial Library at Vienna. By order of their Imperial Majestics I have
obtained such a specimen of these as I desired, in eight paintings made with
so much fidelity, that I am informed the copies could hardly be distinguished
from the originals. According to a note in this Codex.Tlexicanus, it appears
to have been a present from Emmanuel, King of Portugal, to Pope Clement
VII. who died A. D. 1533. After passing through the hands of several illustrious proprietors, it fell into those of the Cardinal of Saxe-Eisenach, who
presented it to the Emperor Leopold. These paintings are manifestly Mexican,
but they are in a style very different from any of the former. An engraving
has been made of one of them, in order to gratify such of my readers as may
deem this an object worthy of their attention. Were it an object of sufficient
importance, it might perhaps be possible, by recourse to the plates of Purchas,
and the Archbishop of Toledo, as a key, to form plausible conjectures concerning
the meaning of this picture. Many of the figures are evidently similar. A. A.
are targets and darts, almost in the same form with those published by Purchas,
p. 1070, 1071, &c. B. B. are figures of temples, nearly resembling those in
Purchas, p. 1109 and 1113, and in Lorenzana. PlateII. C. is a bale of mantles,
or cotton cloths, the figure of which occurs in almost every plate of Purchas
and Lorenzana. E. E. E. seem to be Mexican captains in their war dress,
the fantastic ornaments of which resemble the figures in Purchas, p. 1110,
-1111. 2113. I should suppose this picture to be a tribute-roll, as their mode of
noting numbers occurs frequently. D. D. D., &c. According to Boturini, the
mode of computation by the number of knots was known to the Mexicans as
well as to the Peruvians, p. 85, and the manner in which the number of units
ie represented in the Mexican paintings in my possession seems to confirm this
opinion. They plainly resemble a string of knots on a cord or slender rope.
Since I published the former edition, Mr. Waddilove, who is still pleased to
continue his friendly attention to procure me information, has discovered, in
the Library of the Escurial, a volume in folio, consisting of forty sheets of a
kind of pasteboard, each the size of a common sheet of writing paper, with
great variety of uncouth and whimsical figures of Mexican painting, in very
fiesh colours, and with an explanation in Spanish to most of them. The first
twenty-two sheets are the signs of the months, days, &c. About the middle
of each sheet are two or more large figures for the month, surrounded by the
signs of the days. The last eighteen sheets are not so filled with figures.
They seem ta be signs of Deities, and images of various objects. According




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            50Q
to this Calendar in the Escurial, the Mexican year contained 286 days, divided
into 22 months of 13 days. Each day is represented by a different sign, taken
from some natural object, a serpent, a dog, a lizard, a reed, a house, &c. The
signs of days in the Calendar of the Escurial are precisely the same with those
mentioned by Boturini, Idea, &Sc. p. 45. But, if we may give credit to that
author, the Mexican year contained 360 days, divided into 18 months of 20
days. The order of days in every month was computed, according to him,
first by what he calls a tridecennary progression of days from one to thirteen,
in the same manner as in the Calendar of the Escurial, and then by a septenary
progression of days from one to seven, making in all twenty. In this Calendar
not only the signs which distinguish each day, but the qualities supposed to
be peculiar to each month are marked. There are certain weaknesses which
seem to accompany the human mind through every stage of its progress in
observation and science. Slender as was the knowledge of the Mexicans in
astronomy, it appears to have been already connected with judicial astrology.
The fortune and character of persons born in each month are supposed to be
decided by some superior influence predominant at the time of nativity.
Hence it is foretold in the Calendar, that all who are born in one month will
be rich, in another warlike, in a third luxurious, &c. The pasteboard, or whatever substance it may be on which the Calendar in the Escurial is painted,
seems, by Mr. Waddilove's description of it, to resemble nearly that in the
Imperial Library at Vienna. In several particulars the figures bear some likeness to those in the plate which I have published. The figures marked. D,
which induced me to conjecture that this painting might be a tribute-roll similar to those published by Purchas and the Archbishop of Toledo, Mr. Waddi.
love supposes to be signs of days: and I have such confidence in the accuracy
of his observations, as to conclude his opinion to be well founded. It appears,
from the characters in which the explanations of the figures are written, that
this curious monument of Mexican art has been obtained soon after the conquest
of the Empire. It is singular that it should never have been mentioned by any
Spanish author.
NOTEr [L51]. PAGE 324.
THE first was called the Prince of the Deathful Lance; the second the Divider of Men; the third the Shedder of Blood; the fourth the Lord of thb
Dark-house. Acosta, lib. vi. c. 25.
NOTE [152]. PAGE 327.
THE temple of Cholula, which was deemed more holy than any in New
Spain, was likewise the most considerable. But it was nothing more than a
mount of solid earth. According to Torquemada, it was above a quarter of a
league in circuit at the base, and rose to the height of forty fathoms. Mon.
Ind. lib. iii. c. 19. Even M. Clavigero acknowledges that all the Mexican
temples were solid structures, or earthen mounts, and of consequence cannot
be considered as any evidence of their having made any considerable progress
in the art of building. Clavig. ii. 207.
From inspecting various figures of temples in the paintings engraved by
Purchas, there seems to be some reason for suspecting that all their temples
were constructed in the same manner. See vol. iii. p. 1109, 1110, 1113.
NOTE [153]. PAGE 327.
NOT only in Tlascala and Tepeaca, but even in Mexico itself, the houses of
the people were mere huts built with turf or mud, or the branches of trees.
They were extremely low and slight, and without any furniture but a few
earthen vessels. Like the rudest Indians, several families resided under the
same roof, without having any separate apartments. Herrera, dec. 2 ib. vii.
c. 13. lib. x. c. 22. dec. 3. lib. iv. c. 17. Torquem. lib. iii. c. 23.
VOL. I. —6




500i6         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
NOTE [154]. PAGE 327.
I AM informed by a person who resided long in New Spain, and visited almost
every province of it, that there is not, in all the extent of that vast empire, any
monument or vestige of any building more ancient than the conquest, nor of
any bridge or highway, except some remains of the causeway from Guadaloupe
to that gate of Mexico by which Cortes entered the city. MS. penes me. The
author of another account in manuscript observes, "' That at this day there
does not remain even the smallest vestige of the existence of any ancient
Indian building, public or private, either in Mexico or in any province of New
Spain. I have travelled, says he, through all the countries adjacent to them,
viz. New Galicia, New Biscay, New Mexico, Sonora, Cinaloa, the New Kingdom of Leon, and New Santandero, without having observed any monument
worth notice, except some ruins near an ancient village in the valley de Casas
Grandes, in lat. N. 3o. 46'. long. 2580. 24'. from the island of Teneriffe, or 460
leagues N. N. W. from Mexico.", He describes these ruins minutely, and they
appear to be the remains of a paltry building of turf and stone, plastered over
with white earth or lime. A missionary informed that gentleman, that he had
discovered the ruins of another edifice similar to the former, about a hundred
leagues towards N. W. on the banks of the river St. Pedro. MS. penes me.
These testimonies derive great credit from one circumstance, that they were
not given in support of any particular system or theory, but as simple answers
to queries which I had proposed. It is probable, however, that when these
gentlemen assert that no ruins or monuments of any ancient work whatever
are now to be discovered in the Mexican empire, they meant that there were
no such ruins or monuments as conveyed any idea of grandeur or magnificence
in the works of its ancient inhabitants. For it appears from the testimony of
several Spanish authors, that in Otumba, Tlascala, Cholula, &c. some vestiges
of ancient buildings are still visible. Villa Segnor Theatro Amer. p. 143. 308.
353. D. Fran. Ant. Lorenzana, formerly Archbishop of Mexico, and now of
Toledo, in his introduction to that edition of the Cartas de Relacion of Cortes,
which he published at Mexico, mentions some ruins which are still visible in
several of the towns through which Cortes passed in his way to the capital, p.
4, &c. But neither of these authors gives any description of them, and they
seem to be so very inconsiderable, as to show only that some buildings had once
been there. The large mount of earth at Cholula, which the Spaniards dignified with the name of temple, still remains, but without any steps by which
to ascend, or any facing of stone. It appears now like a natural mount, covered
with grass and shrubs, and possibly it was never any thing more. Torquem.
lib. iii. c. 19. I have received a minute description of the remains of a temple
near Cuernavaca, on the road from Mexico to Acapulco. It is composed of
large stones, fitted to each other as nicely as those in the buildings of the Peruvians, which are hereafter mentioned. At the foundation it forms a square
of twenty-five yards; but as it rises in height it diminishes in extent, not
gradually, but by being contracted suddenly at regular distances, so that it
must have resembled the figure- B. in the plate. It terminated, it is said, in
a spire.
NOTE [155]. PAGE 329.
THE exaggeration of the Spanish historians, with respect to the number of
human victims sacrificed in Mexico, appears to be very great. According to
Gomara, there was no year in which twenty thousand human victims were not
offered to the Mexican Divinities, and in some years they amounted to fifty
thousand. Cron. c. 229. The skulls of those unhappy persons were ranged
in, order in a building erected for that purpose, and two of Cortes's officers,
who had counted them, informed Gomara that their number was a hundred
and thirty-six thousand. Ibid. c. 82. Herrera's account is still more incredible,
that the number of victims was so great, that five thousand have been sacrificed
in one day, nay, on some occasions, no less than twenty thousand. Dec. iii. lib.
ii. c. 16. Torquemada goes beyond both in extravagance; for he asserts that




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             b07R
twenty thousand children, exclusive of other victims, were siaughtemrd annually. Mon. Ind. lib. vii. c. 21. The most respectable authority in favour of
such high numbers is that of Zumurraga, the first Bishop of Mexico, who, in
a letter to the chapter-general of his order, A. D. 1631, asserts, that the Mexicans sacrificed annually twenty thousand victims. Davila. Teatro Eccles. 126.
In opposition to all these accounts, B. de las Casas observes, that if there had
been such an annual waste of the human species, the country could never have
arrived at that degree of populousness for which it was remarkable when the
Spaniards first landed there. This reasoning is just. If the number of victims
in all the provinces of New Spain had been so great, not only must population
have been prevented from increasing, but the human race must have been exterminated in a short time. For besides the waste of the species by such
numerous sacrifices, it is observable that wherever the fate of captives taken
in war is either certain death or perpetual slavery, as men can gain nothing by
submitting speedily to an enemy, they always resist to the uttermost, and war
becomes bloody and destructive to the last degree. Las Casas positively asserts, that the Mexicans never sacrificed more than fifty or a hundred persons
in a year. See his dispute with Sepulveda, subjoined to his Brevissima Rela
cion, p. 105. Cortes does not specify what number of victims was sacrificed
annually; but B. Diaz del Castillo relates that, an inquiry having been made
with respect to this by the Franciscan monks who were sent into New Spain
immediately after the conquest, it was found that about two thousand five
hundred were sacrificed every year in Mexico. C. 207.
NOTE [156]. PAGE 330.
IT is hardly necessary to observe, that the Peruvian Chronology is not only
obscure, but repugnant to conclusions deduced from the most accurate and
extensive observations, concerning the time that elapses during each reign, in
any given succession of Princes. The medium has been found not to exceed
twenty years. According to Acosta and Garcilasso de la Vega, Huana Capac,
who died about the year 1527, was the twelfth Inca. According to this rule
of computing, the duration of the Peruvian monarchy ought not to have been
reckoned above two hundred and forty years; but they affirm that it had subsisted four hundred years. Acosta, lib. vi. c. 19. Vega, lib. i. c. 9. By this
account each reign is extended at a medium to thirty-three years, instead of
twenty, the number ascertained by Sir Isaac Newton's observations; but so
imperfect were the Peruvian traditions, that though the total is boldly marked,
the number of years in each reign is unknown.
NOTE [157]. PAGE 332.
lMANY of the earliest Spanish writers assert that the Peruvians offered human
sacrifices. Xeres, p. 190. Zarate, lib. i. c. 11. Acosta, lib. v. c. 19. But Garcilasso de la Vega contends, that though this barbarous practice prevailed
among their uncivilized ancestors, it was totally abolished by the Incas, and
that no human victim was ever offered in any temple of the Sun. This assertion, and the plausible reasons with which he confirms it, are sufficient to refute
the Spanish writers, whose accounts seem to be founded entirely upon report,
not upon what they themselves had observed. Vega, lib. ii. c. 4. In one of
their festivals, the Peruvians offered cakes of bread moistened with blood
drawn from the arms, the eyebrows, and noses of their children. Id. lib. vii.
c. 6. This rite may have been derived from their ancient practice, in their uncivilized state, of sacrificing human victims.
NOTE L158]. PAGE 334.
THE Spaniards have adopted both those eustoms of the ancient Peruvians.
They have preserved some of the aqueducts or canals, made in the days of
the Incas, and have made new ones, by which they water every field thrat they
cultivate, Ulloa Voyage, tom. i. 422. 477. They likewise continue to use




508            N NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
guano, or the dung of sea-fowls, as manure. Ulloa gives a description of the
almost incredible quantity of it in the small islands near the coast. Ibid. 481.
NOTE [159]. PAGE 335.
THE temple of Cayambo, the palace of the Inca at C(allo in the plain of
Lacatunga, and that of Atun-Cannar, are described by Ulloa, tom. i. 286, &c.
who inspected them with great care. M. de Condamine published a curious
memoir concerning the ruins of. Atun-Cannar. M6m. de l'Academie de Berlin,
A. D. 1746, p. 435. Acosta describes the ruins of Cuzco, which he had examined. Lib. vi. c. 14. Garcilasso, in his usual style, gives pompous and
confused descriptions of several temples and other public edifices. Lib. iii. c.
1. c. 21. lib. vi. c. 4. Don. -    Zapata, in a large treatise concerning Peru,
which has not hitherto been published, communicates. some information with
respect to several monuments of the ancient Peruvians, which have not been
mentioned by other authors. MS. penes me, Articulo xx. Ulloa describes some
of the ancient Peruvian fortifications, which were likewise works of great extent and solidity. Tom. i. 391. Three circumstances struck all those observers: the vast size of the stones which the Peruvians employed in some of their
buildings. Acosta measured one, which was thirty feet long, eighteen broad,
and six in thickness; and yet, he adds, that in the fortress at Cuzco there were
stones considerably larger. It is difficult to conceive how- the Peruvians could
move these, and raise them to the height even of twelve feet. The second
circumstance is, the imperfection of the Peruvian art, when applied to working
in timber. By the patience and perseverance natural to Americans, stones may
be formed into any shape, merely by rubbing one against another, or by the
use of hatchets or other instruments made of stone; but with such rude tools
little progress can be made in carpentry. The Peruvians could not mortise
two beams together, or give any degree of union or stability to any work composed of timber. As they could not form a centre, they were totally unacquainted with the use of arches in building; nor can the Spanish authors conceive how they were able to frame a roof for those ample structures which
they raised.
The third circumstance is a striking proof, which all the monuments of the
Peruvians furnish, of their want of ingenuity and invention, accompanied with
patience no less astonishing. None of the stones employed in those works
were formed into any particular or uniform shape, which could render them
fit for being compacted together in building. The Indians took them as they
fell from the mountains, or were raised out of the quarries. Some were
square, some triangular, some convex, some concave. Their art and industry
were employed in joining them together, by forming such hollows in the one
as perfectly corresponded to the projections or risings in the other. This
tedious operation, which might have been so easily abridged by adapting the
surface of the stones to each other, either by rubbing, or by their hatchets of
copper, would be deemed incredible, if it were not put beyond doubt by inspecting the remains of those buildings. It gives them a very singular appearance to a European eye. There is no regular layer or stratum of building,
and no one stone resembles another in dimensions or form. At the same time,
by the persevering but ill-directed industry of the Indians, they are all joined
with that minute nicety which I have mentioned. Ulloa made this observation
concerning the form of the stones in the fortress of Atun-Cannar. Voy. i. p.
387. Penito gives a similar description of the fortress of Cuzco, the most perfect of all the Peruvian works. Zapata MS. penes me. According to M. de
Condamine, there were regular strata of building in some parts of AtunCannar, which he remarks as singular, and as a proof of some progress in
improvement.
NOTE [160]. PAGE 337.
THE appearance of those bridges which bend with their own weight, wave
with the wind, and are considerably agitated by the motion of every person




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                           509
who passes along them, is very frightful at first. But the Spaniards have
found them to be the easiest mode of passing the torrents in Peru, over which
it would be difficult to throw more solid structures either of stone or timber.
They form those hanging bridges so strong and broad, that loaded mules pass
along them. All the trade of Cuzco is carried on by means of such a bridge
aver the river Apurimac. Ulloa, tom. i. p. 358. A more simple contrivance
was employed in passing smaller streams: A basket, in which the traveller
was placed, being suspended from a strong rope stretched across the strearr,
it was pushed or drawn from one side to the other. Ibid.
NOTE [1611. PAGE 341.
MY information with respect to those events is taken from TVNoticia breve de
la expedicion militar de Sinora y Cinaloa, su exito feliz, y vantojoso estado, en
que por consecuentia de ello, se han puesto ambas provincias, published at
Mexico, June 17th, 1771, in order to satisfy the curiosity of the merchants,
who had furnished the viceroy with money for defraying the expense of the
armament. The copies of this NJVoticia are very rare in Madrid; but I have
obtained one, which has enabled me to communicate these curious facts to the
public. According to this account, there was found in the mine Yecorato in
Cinaloa a grain of gold of twenty-two carats, which weighed sixteen marks
four ounces four ochavas; this was sent to Spain as a present fit for the king,
and is now deposited in the royal cabinet at Madrid.
NOTE [162]. PAGE 341.
THE uncertainty of geographers with respect to this point is remarkable, for
Cortes seems to have surveyed its coasts with great accuracy. The Archbishop
of Toledo has published, from the original in the possession of the Marquis
del Valle, the descendant of Cortes, a map drawn in 1541, by the pilot Domingo
Castillo, in which California is laid down as a peninsula, stretching out nearly
in the same direction which is nowgiven to it int the best maps; and the point
where Rio Colorada enters the gulf is marked with precision. Hist. de Nueva
Espagna, 327.
NOTE [163]. PAGE 342.
I AM indebted for this fact to M. L'Abbd Raynal, tom. iii. 103; and upon
consulting an intelligent person, long settled on the Mosquito shore, and who
has been engaged in the logwood trade, I find that ingenious author has been
well informed. The logwood cut near the town of St. Francis of Campeachy
is of much better quality than that on the other side of Yucatan: and the
English trade in the Bay of Honduras is almost at an end.
NOTE [164]. PAGE 348.
P. TORRIBIO DE BENEVENTE, or Motolinea, has enumerated ten causes of
the rapid depopulation of Mexico, to which he gives the name of the Ten
Plagues. Many of these are not peculiar to that province. 1. The introduction of the small pox. This disease was first brought into New Spain in the
year 1520, by a Negro-slave, who attended Narvaez in his expedition against
Cortes. Torribio affirms, that one half of the people in the provinces visited
with this distemper died. To this mortality, occasioned by the small pox,
Torquemada adds the destructive effects of two contagious distempers which
raged in the year 1545 and 1576. In the former 800,000, in the latter above
two millions perished, according to an exact account taken by order of the
viceroys. Mon. Ind. i. 642. The small pox was not introduced into Peru for
several years after the invasion of the Spaniards; but there, too, that distemper proved very fatal to the natives. Garcia Origin, p. 88. 2. The numbers
who were killed or died of famine in their war with the Spaniards, particularly
during the siege of Mexico. 3. The great famine that followed after the reduction of Mexico, as all the people engaged, either on one side or other, had




510          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
neglected the cultivation of their lands. Something similar to this lappened
in all the other countries conquered by the Spaniards. 4. The grievous tasks
imposed by the Spaniards upon the people belonging to their Repartimientos.
5. The oppressive burden of taxes which they were unable to pay, and from
which they could hope for no exemption. 6. The numbers employed in collecting the gold carried down by the torrents from the mountains, who were
forced from their own habitations, without any provision made for their subsistence, and subjected to all the rigour of cold in those elevated regions. F.
The immense labour of rebuilding Mexico, which Cortes urged on with such
precipitate ardour as destroyed an incredible number of people. 8. The number of people condemned to servitude, under various pretexts, and employed
in working the silver mines. These, marked by each proprietor with a hot
iron, like his cattle, were driven in herds to the mountains. 9. The nature of
the labour to which they were subjected there, the noxious vapours of the mines,
the coldness of the climate, and scarcity were so fatal, that Torribio affirms
the country round several of those mines, particularly near Guaxago, was
covered with dead bodies, the air corrupted with their stench, and so many vultures and other voracious birds hovered about for their prey,,that the sun was
darkened with their flight. 10. The Spaniards, in the different expeditions
which they undertook, and by the civil wars which they carried on, destroyed
many of the natives whom they compelled to serve them as Tamemes, or carriers of burdens. This last mode of oppression was particularly ruinous to
the Peruvians. From the number of Indians who perished in Gonzalo Pizarro's
expedition into the countries to the east of the Andes, one may form some
idea of what they suffered in similar services, and how fast they were wasted
by them. Torribio, MS. Corita, in his Breve y Summaria Relacion, illustrates and confirms several of Torribio's observations, to which he refers. MS.
penes me.
NOTE [165]. PAGE 348.
EVEN Montesquieu has adopted this idea, -lib. viii. c. 18. But the passion of
that great man for system sometimes rendered him inattentive to research;
and from his capacity to refine, he was apt, in some instances, to overlook
obvious and just causes.
NOTE [166]. PACE 349.
A STRONG proof of this occurs in the testament of Isabella, where she aiscovers the most tender concern for the humane and mild usage of the Indians.
Those laudable sentiments of the queen have been adopted in the public law
of Spain, and serve as the introduction to the regulations contained under the
title Of the good treatment of the Indians. Recopil. lib. vi. tit. x.
NOTE [167]. PAGE 350.
IN the seventh Title of the first book of the Recopilacion, which contains the
laws concerning the powers and functions of archbishops and bishops, almost
a third part of them relates to what is incumbent upon them as guardians of
the Indians, and points out the various methods in which it is their duty to
interpose, in order to defend them from oppression either with respect to their
persons or property. Not only do the laws commit to them this honourable
and humane office, but the ecclesiastics of America actually exercise it.
Innumerable proofs of this might be produced from Spanish authors. But I
rather refer to Gage, as he was not disposed to ascribe any merit to the popish
clergy to which they were not fully entitled. Survey, p. 142. 192, &c. Henry
Hawks, an English Merchant, who resided five years in New Spain previous
to the year 1572, gives the same favourable account of the popish clergy.
Hakluyt, iii. 466. By a law of Charles V. not only bishops, but other eccle.
siastics, are empowered to inform and admonish the civil magistrates, if any
Indian is deprived of his-just liberty and rights; Recopiiac. lib. vi. tit. vi. ley
14: and thus were constituted legal protectors of the Indians. Some of the




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                            511
Spanish ecclesiastics refused to grant absolution to such of their countrymen
as possessed Encomiendas, and considered the Indians as slaves, or employed
them in working their mines. Gonz. Davil. Teatro Eccles. i. 157.
NOTE [168]. PAGE 350.
ACCORDING to Gage, Chiapa dos Indos contains 4000 families; and he men.
tions it only as one of the largest Indian towns in America, p. 104.
NOTE [169]. PAGE 350.
IT is very difficult to obtain an accurate account of the state of population
in those kingdoms of Europe where the police is most perfect, and where science has made the greatest progress. In Spanish America, where knowledge
is still in its infancy, and few men have leisure to engage in researches merely
speculative, little attention has been paid to this curious inquiry. But in the
year 1741, Philip V. enjoined the viceroys and governors of the several provinces in America, to make an actual survey of the people under their jurisdiction, and to transmit a report concerning their number and occupations. In
consequence of this order, the Conde de Fuen-Clara, Viceroy of New Spain,
appointed D. Jos. Antonio de Villa Segnor y Sanchez to execute that commission in New Spain. From the reports of the magistrates in the several districts, as well as from his own observations and long acquaintance with most
of the provinces, Villa Segnor published the result of his inquiries in his Teatro
dmericano. His report, however, is imperfect. Of the nine diocesses, into
which the Mexican empire has been divided, he has published an account of
five only, viz. the archbishopric of Mexico, the bishoprics of Pueblo de los
Angeles, Mechoacan, Oaxaca, and Nova Galicia. The bishoprics of Yucatan,
Verapaz, Chiapa, and Guatimala, are entirely omitted, though the two latter
comprehend countries in which the Indian race is more numerous than in any
part of New Spain. In his survey of the extensive diocess of Nova Galicia,
the situation of the different Indian villages is described, but he specifies the
number of people only in a small part of it. The Indians of that extensive
province, in which the Spanish dominion is imperfectly established, are not
registered with the same accuracy as in other parts of New Spain. According
to Villa Segnor, the actual state of population in the five diocesses above mentioned is of Spaniards, negroes, mulattoes, and mestizos, in the diocesses of
Families.
Mexico. —-105,202Los Angeles                  -. - -.                        30,600
Mechoacan --— 30,840
Oaxaca -  -  -   - -. 7,296
Nova Galicia  - 1                                              16,770
190,708
At the rate of five to a family, the total number is  -   -   - 953,540
Indian families in the diocess of Mexico                      119,511
Los Angeles -                        - - -                     88,240
Mechoacan -. 36,196
Oaxaca... -44,222
Nova Galicia  -   6,222
294,391
At the rate of five to a family, the total number is 1,471,955. We may rely
with great certainty on this computation of the number of Indians, as it is
taken from the MJkatricula, or register, according to which the tribute paid by
them is collected. As four diocesses of nine are totally omitted, and in that




512        NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS..of Nova Galicia the numbers are imperfectly recorded, we may conclude that
the number of Indians in the Mexican empire exceeds two millions.
The account of the number of Spaniards, &c. seems not to be equally complete. Of many places, Villa Segnor observes in general terms, that several
Spaniards, negroes, and people of mixed race, reside there, without specifying
their number. If, therefore, we make allowance for these, and for all who reside in the four diocesses omitted, the number of Spaniards, and of those of a
mixed race, may probably amount to a million and a half. In some places
Villa Segnor distinguishes between Spaniards and the three inferior races of
negroes, mulattoes, and mestizos, and marks their number separately. But he
generally blends them together. But from the proportion observable in those
places, where the number of each is marked, as well as from the account of
the state of population in New Spain by other authors, it is manifest that the
number of negroes and persons of a mixed race far exceeds that of Spaniards.
Perhaps the latter ought not to be reckoned above 500,000 to a million of the
former.
Defective as this account may be, I have not been able to procure such in.
telligence concerning the number of people in Peru, as might enable me to form
any conjecture equally satisfying with respect to the degree of its population.
I have been informed that in the year 1761, the protector of the Indians in the
viceroyalty of Peru computed that 612,780 paid tribute to the king. As all
females, and persons under age, are exempted from this tax in Peru, the total
number of Indians ought by that account to be 2,449,120. MS. penes me.
I shall mention another mode by which one may compute, or at least form a
guess concerning the state of population in New Spain and Peru. According
to an account which I have reason to consider as accurate, the number of
copies of the bull of Cruzada exported to Peru on each new publication, is,
1171,953; to New Spain, 2,649,326. I am informed that but few Indians
purchase bulls, and that they are sold chiefly to the Spanish inhabitants, and
those of mixed race; so that the number of Spaniards, and people of a mixed
race, will amount, by this mode of computation, to at least three millions.
The number of inhabitants in many of the towns in Spanish America may
give us some idea of the extent of population, and correct the inaccurate but
popular notion entertained in Great Britain concerning the weak and desolate
state of their colonies. The city of Mexico contains at least 150,000 people.
It is remarkable that Torquemada, who wrote his JMonarquia Indiana about
the year 1612, reckons the inhabitants of Mexico at that time to be only 7000
Spaniards and 8000 Indians. Lib. iii. c. 26. Puebla de los Angelescontains
above 60,000 Spaniards, and people of a mixed race. Villa Segnor, p. 247
Guadalaxara contains above 30,000 exclusive of Indians. Ibid. ii. 206. Lima
contains 54,000. De Cosme Bueno Descr. de Peru, 1764. Carthagena con.
tains 25,000. Potosi contains 25,000. Bueno, 1767. Popayan contains abovw
20,000. Ulloa, i. 287. Towns of a second class are still more numerous.
The cities in the most thriving settlements of other European nations in Am6
rica cannot be compared with these.
Such are the detached accounts of the number of people in several towns,
which I found scattered in authors whom I thought worthy of credit. But 1
have obtained an enumeration of the inhabitants of the towns in the province
of Quito, on the accuracy of which I can rely; and I communicate it to the
public, both to gratify curiosity, and to rectify the mistaken notion which I
have mentioned. St. Francisco de Quito contains between 50 and 60,000
people of all the different races. Besides the city, there are in the Corregimzento twenty-nine curas or parishes established in the principal villages, each of
which has smaller hamlets depending upon it. The inhabitants of these are
mostly Indians and mestizos. St. Juan de Pasto has between 6 and 8000 inhabitants, besides twenty-seven dependent villages. St. Miguel de Iba:~a,
7000 citizens, and ten villages. The district of Havalla, between 18 and 20,000
people. The district of Tacuna, between 10 and 12,000. The district of
Ambato, between 8 and 10,000, besides sixteen depending villages. The city
of Riobamba, between 16 and 20,000 inhabitants, and nine depending villages.
The district of Chimbo, between 6 and 8000. The city of Guayaquil, from 16




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             51i3
to 20,000 inhabitants, and fourteen depending villages. The district of Atuasi,
betivween 5 and 6000 inhabitants, and four depending villages. The city of
Cuenza, between 25 and 30,000 inhabitants, and nine populous depending
villages. The town of Laxa, from 8 to 10,000 inhabitants, and fourteen depending villages. This degree of population, though slender if we consider
the vast extent of the country, is far beyond what is commonly supposed. I
have omitted to mention, in its proper place, that Quito is the only provincein
Spanish America that can be denominated a manufacturing country; hats,
cotton stuffs, and coarse woollen cloths are made there in such quantities as to
be sufficient not only for the consumption of the province, but to furnish:a considerable article for exportation into other parts of Spanish America. I know
not whether the uncommon industry of this province should be considered as
the cause or the effect of its populousness. But among the ostentatinus inhabitants of the New World, the passion for every thing that comes from
Europe is so violent, that I am informed the manufactures of Quito are so
much undervalued as to be on the decline.
NOTE [170]. PAGE 352.
THESE are established at the following places: —St. Domingo in the island
of Hispaniola, Mexico in New Spain, Lima in Peru, Panama in Tierra Firme,
Santiago in Guatimala, Guadalaxara in New Galicia, Santa Fe in the New
Kingdom of Granada, La Plata in the country of Los Charcas, St. Francisco
de Quito, St. Jago de Chili, Buenos Ayres. To each of these are subjected
several large provinces, and some so far removed from the cities where the
courts are fixed, that they can derive little benefit from their jurisdiction. The
Spanish writers commonly reckon up twelve Courts cf Audience, but they inclide that of Manilla, in the Philippine islands.
NOTE [171]. PAGE 354.
ON account of the distance of Peru and Chili from Spain, and the difficulty
of carrying commodities of such bulk as wine and oil across the isthmus of
Panama, the Spaniards in those provinces have been permitted to plant vines
and olives: but they are strictly prohibited from exporting wine or oil to any
of the provinces on the Pacific Ocean, which are in such a situation as to receive them from Spain. Recop. lib. i. tit. xvii. 1. 15-18.
NOTE [172]. PAGE 355.
THIS computation was made by Benzoni, A. D. 1550, fifty-eight years after
the discovery of America. Hist. Novi Orbis, lib. iii. c. 21. But as Benzoni
wrote with the spirit of a malecontent, disposed to detract from the Spaniards
in every particular, it is probable that his calculation is considerably too low.
NOTE [173]. PAGE 355.
MY information with respect to the division apd transmission of property in
the: Spanish colonies is imperfect. The Spanish authors do not explain this
fully, and have not perhaps attended sufficiently to the effects of their own institutions and laws. Solorzano de Jure Ind. (vol. ii. lib. ii. 1. 16.) explains
in some measure the introduction of the tenure of JTfayorasgo, and mentions
some of its effects. Villa Segnor takes notice of a singular consequence of it.
He observes, that in some of the best situations in the city of Mexico, a good
deal of ground is unoccupied, or covered only with the ruins of the houses
once erected upon it; and adds, that as this ground is held by right of Matyo
rago, and cannot be alienated, that desolation and those ruins become perpetual.
Teatr. Amer. vol. i. p. 34.
NOTE [174]. PAGE 356.
TyrERE is no law that excludes Creoles from offices either civil or ecclesiastic.
On the contrary, there are many Cedulaz, which recommend the conferring
VOL. I.-65




514           ]NOTES AN D ILLUSTRATIONS.
places of trust indiscriminately on the natives of Spain and America. Betan
court y Figueroa Derecho, &c. p. 5, 6. But, notwithstanding such repeated
recommendations, preferment in almost every line is conferred on native
Spaniards. A remarkable proof of this is produced by the author last quoted.
From the discovery of, America to the year 1637, three hundred and sixty-nine
bishops, or archbishops, have been appointed to the different diocesses in that
country,. and of all that number only twelve were Creoles, p. 40. This predilection for Europeans seems still to continue. By a royal mandate, issued in
1776, the chapter of the cathedral of Mexico is directed to nominate European
ecclesi-itics of known merit and abilities, that the King may appoint them to
supply vacant benefices. MS. penes me.
NOTE [175]. PAGE 358.
MODEtATE as this tribute may appear, such is the extreme poverty of the
Indians in many provinces of America, that the exacting of it is intolerably
oppressive. Pegna Itiner. par Paroches de Indios, p. 192.
NOTE [176]. PAGE 358.
IN New Spain, on account of the extraordinary merit and services of the first
conquerors, as well as the small revenue arising from the country previous to
the discovery of the mines of Sacatecas, the encomiendas were granted for
three, and sometimes for four lives. Recopil. lib. vi. tit. ii. c. 14, &c.
NOTE [177]. PAGE 359.
D. ANT. ULLOA contends, that working in mines is not noxious, and as a
proof of this informs us, that many Mestizos and Indians, who do not belong to
any Repartimiento, voluntarily hire themselves as miners; and several of the
Indians, when the legal term of their service expires, continue to work in the
mines of choice. Entreten. p. 265. But his opinion concerning the wholesomeness of this occupation is contrary to the experience of all ages; and
wherever men are allured by high wages, they will engage in any species of
labour, however fatiguing or pernicious it mayibe. D. Hern. Carillo Altamirano
relates a curious fact incompatible with this'opinion. Wherever mines are
wrought, says he, the number of Indians decreases; but in the province of
Canmpeachy, where there are no mines, the number of Indians has increased
more than a third since the conquest of America, though neither the soil nor
climate be so favourable as in Peru or Mexico. Colbert Collect. In another
memorial presented to Philip III. in the year 1609, Captain Juan Gonzales de
Azevedo asserts, that in every district of Peru where the Indians are compelled
to labour in the mines, their numbers were reduced to the half, and in some
places to the third, of what it was under the viceroyalty of Don Fran. Toledo
in 1581. Colb. Collect.
NOTE [178]. PAGE 359.
As labour of this kind cannot be prescribed with legal accuracy, the tasks
seem to be in a great measure arbitrary, and, like the services exacted by feudal
superiors in vinea prato, aut messe, from  their vassals, are extremely burdensome, and often wantonly oppressive. Pegna Itiner. par Paroches de Indios
NOTE [179]. PAGE 359.
THE turn of service known in Peru by the name of.Jita is called Tanda in
New Spain. There it continues no longer than a week at a time. No person
is called to serve at a greater distance from his habitation than 24 miles. This
arrangement is less oppressive to the Indians than that established in Peru.
Memorial of Hern. Carillo Altamirano. Colbert Collect.




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                             515
NOTE [180]. PAGE 360.
TrE strongest proof of tlhis may be deduced from the laws themselves. By
the multitude and variety of regulations to prevent abuses, we may form an
idea of the number of abuses that prevail. Though the laws have wisely provided that no Indian shall be obliged to serve in any mine at a greater distance
from his place of residence than thirty miles; we are informed, in a memorial
of D. Hernan Carillo Altamirano presented to the king, that the Indians of
Peru are often compelled to serve in mines at the distance of a hundred, a
hundred and fifty, and even two hundred leagues from their habitation. Colbert Collect. Many mines are situated in parts of the country so barren and
so distant from the ordinary habitations of the Indians, that the necessity of
procuring labourers to work there has obliged the Spanish monarchs to dispense with their own regulations in several instances, and to permit the viceroys to compel the people of more remote provinces to resort to those mines.
Escalona Gazophyl. Perub. lib. i. c. 16. But, in justice to them, it shoald be
observed that they have been studious to alleviate this oppression as much as
possible, by enjoining the viceroys to employ every method in order to induce
the Indians to settle in some part of the country adjacent to the mines. Id. ibid.
NOTE [181]. PAGE 362.
ToRQ.UEMADA, after a long enumeration which has the appearance of accuracy, concludes the number of monasteries in New Spain to be four hundred.
Mon. Ind. lib. xix. c. 32. The number of Monasteries in the city of Mexico
alone was, in the year 1745, fifty-five. Villa Segnor Theat. Amer. i. 34. Ulloa
reckons up forty convents in Lima; and mentioning those for nuns, he says
that a small town might be peopled out of them, the number of persons shut
up there is so great. Voy. i. 429. Philip III., in a letter to the Viceroy of
Peru, A. D. 1620, observes, that the number of convents in Lima was so great,
that they covered more ground than all the rest of the city. Solorz. lib. iii. c.
23. n. 57. Lib. iii. c. 16. Torquem. lib. xv. c. 3. The first monastery in
New Spain was founded A. D. 1525, four years only after the conquest. Torq.
lib. xv. c. 16.
According to Gil Gonzalez Davila, the complete establishment of the
American-church in all the Spanish settlements was, in the year 1649, 1 patriarch, 6 archbishops, 32 bishops, 346 prebends, 2 abbots, 5 royal chaplains, 840
convents. Teatro Ecclesiastico de las Ind. Occident. Vol. i. Pref. When
the order of Jesuits was expelled from all the Spanish dominions, the colleges,
professed houses, and residences which it possessed in the province of New
Spain were thirty, in Quito sixteen, in the New Kingdom of Granada thirteen,
in Peru seventeen, in Chili eighteen, in Paraguay eighteen; in all, a hundred
and twelve. Collection General de Providencias hasta aqui tomadas sobre
estranamente, &c. de la Compagnia, part i. p. 19. The number of Jesuits,
priests, and novices in all these amounted to 2245. MS. penes me.
In the year 1644 the city of Mexico presented a petition to the king, praying
that no new monastery might be founded, and that the revenues of those
already established might be circumscribed, otherwise the religious houses
would soon acquire the property of the whole country. The petitioners request
likewise, that the bishops might be laid under restrictions in conferring holy
orders, as there were at that time in New Spain above six thousand clergymen
without any living. Ibid. p. 16. These abuses must have been enormous indeed, when the superstition of American Spaniards was shocked, and induced
to remonstrate against them.
NOTE [182]. PAGE 363.
TIns description of the manners of the Spanish clergy I should not have
ventured to give upon the testimony of Protestant authors alone, as they may
be suspected of prejudice or exaggeration. Gage, in particular, who had a
better opportunity than any Protestant to view the interior state of Spanish




516          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONiNS.
America, describes the corruption of the church which he had forsaken with
so much of the acrimony of a new convert, that I should have distrusted his
evidence, though it communicates some very curious and striking facts. But
Benzoni mentions the profligacy of ecclesiastics in America at a very carly
period after their settlement there. Hist. lib. ii. c. 19, 20. M. Frezier, an intelligent observer, and zealous for his own religion, paints the dissolute mannersof the Spanish ecclesiastics in Peru, particularly the regulars, in- stronger
colours than I have employed. Voy. p. 51. 215, &c. M. Gentil confirms this
account. Voy. i. 34. Correal concurs with both, and adds many remarkable
circu.nstances. Voy. i. 61. 155. 161. I have good reason to believe that the
manners of the regular clergy, particularly in Peru, are still extremely indecent.
Acosta himself acknowledges that great corruption of manners had been the
consequence of permitting monks to forsake the retirement and discipline of
the cloister, and to mingle again with the world, by undertaking the charge of
the Indian parishes. De Procur. Ind. Salute, lib. iv. c. 13, &c. He mentions
particularly those vices of which I have taken notice, and considers the temptations to them as so formidable, that he leans to the opinion of those who
hold that the regular clergy should not be employed as parish priests. Lib. v.
c. 20. Even the advocates of the -regulars admit, that many and great enormities abounded among the monks of different orders, when set free from the
restraint of monastic discipline; and from the tone of their defence, one may
conclude that the charge brought against them was not destitute of truth. In
the French colonies the state of the regular clergy is nearly the same as in the
Spanish settlements, and. the same consequences have followed. M. Biet,
superior of the secular priests in Cayenne, inquires, with no less.-appearance
of piety than of candour, into the causes of this corruption, and. imputes it
chiefly to the exemption of regulars from the jurisdiction and censures of their
diocessans; to the temptations to which they are exposed; and to their engaging in commerce. Voy. p. 320.. It is remarkable, that all the authors who
censure the licentiousness of the. Spanish regulars: with the greatest severity,
concur in vindicating the conduct of the Jesuits. Formed under a discipline
more perfect than that. of the other monastic orders, or animated by that concern for the honour. of the society which takes such full possession of every
member of the order, the Jesuits, both in Mexico and Peru, it is allowed, maintain a most irreproachable decency of manners. Frezier,. 223.  Gentil. i..34.
The. same praise is likewise due to the bishops and most.of the dignified clergy.
Frez. Ibid.
A volume of the Gazette.de Mexico for- the years 1728, 1729,.1730, having
been. communicated to me, I find there a striking, confirmation of what I have
advanced concerning the. spirit-of low illiberal superstition prevalent in Spanish
America. From- the newspapers of any nation one may learn what are the
objects which chiefly engross its attention, and which appear to it most interesting. The Gazette of Mexico is filled almost-entirely with accounts of religious functions, with descriptions of processions, consecrations of churches,
beatifications of saints, festivals, autos de fe, &c. Civil or commercial affairs,
and even the transactions of Europe, occupy but a small corner in this magazine of monthly intelligence. From the titles of new books, which are regularly
inserted in this Gazette, it appears that two-thirds of them are treatises of
scholastic theology, or of monkish devotion.
NOTE [183]. PAGE 363.
SOLORZANO, after: mentioning the corrupt morals of some of the regular
clergy, with that cautious reserve which became a Spanish layman in touching
on a subject so delicate, gives his opinion very explicitly, and -with much firmness, against committing parochial charges to monks. He produces the testiinony of several respectable authors of his country, both divines and lawyers,
in confirmation of his opinion. De Jure Ind. ii. lib. iii. c. 16. A striking proof
of the alarm, excited by the attempt of the Prince d'Esquilache to exclude the
regulars from parochial cures, is contained in the Colbert collection of papers.
Several memorials were presented to the king by the procurators for the mo
nastic orders, and replies were made to these in name of the secular clergy




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                               517
An eager and even rancorous spirit is manifest on both sides in the conduct of
this -dispute.
NOTE [184]. PAGE 365.
NOT only the native Indians, but the Slestizos, or children of a Spaniard
and Indian, were originally excluded from the priesthood, and refused admission into any religious order. But by a law issued Sept. 28th, 1588, Philip 1
required the prelates of America to ordain such mestizos -born: in lawful wed
lock, as they should find to be properly qualified, and to permit them to take
the vows in any monastery where they had gone; through a regular noviciate.
Recopil. lib. i. tit. vii. 1. 7. Some regard seems to have been paid to this law
in New Spain; but none in Peru. Upon a representation of this to'Charles
II. in the year 1697, he issued a new edict, enforcing the observation of it, and
professing his desire to have all his subjects, Indians and mestizos as well sa
Spaniards, admitted to the enjoyment of the same privileges. Such, how
ever, was the aversion of the Spaniards in America to the Indians and their
race, that this seems to have produced little effect; for in the year 1725 Philip
V. was obliged to renew the injunction in a more peremptory tone. But so
unsurmountable are hatred and contempt of the Indians among the Peruvian
Spaniards, that the present king has been constrained to enforce the former
edicts anew, by a law published September 11, 1774. Real Cedula, MS.
pezes me.
M. Clavigero has contradicted what I have related concerning -the ecclesiastical state of the Indians, particularly their exclusion from the sacrament o
the eucharist, and from holy orders, either as seculars or regulars, in such a
manner as cannot fail to make a deep impression. He, from his own knowledge, asserts, "that in New Spain not only are Indians permitted to partake of
the sacrament of the altar, but that Indian priests are- so numerous that they:may be counted by hundreds; and among these have, been many hundreds o'
rectors, canons, and doctors, and, as report goes, even a-very learned bishop
At present there are many priests, and not a few rectors, among whom there
have been three or four our own pupils."  Vol. II. 348, &c. I owe it, therefore,
as a duty to the public as well as to myself, to consider each of these points
with care, and to explain the reasons which induced me to adopt the opinion
which I have published.
I knew that in the Christian church there is- no distinction of persons, but
that men of every nation, who embrace the religion of Jesus, are -equally entitled to every Christian privilege which they are qualified to receive. I knew
likewise that an opinion prevailed, not only among most of the:Spanish laity
settled ia America, but among " many ecclesiastics (I use the words of Herrera,
dec. ii. lib. ii. c. 15), that the Indians were not perfect or rational men, and
were not possessed of such capacity as qualified them to partake of the sacrament of the altar, or of any other benefit of our religion."  It was against
this opinion that Las Casas contended with the laudable:zeal which I have
described in Books III. and VI. But as the Bishop:of Darien, doctor Sepulvida, and other respectable ecclesiastics, vigorously supported the common
opinion concerning the incapacity of the Indians, it became necessary, in order
to determine thepoint, that the authority of the-Holy See should be interposed;:and accordingly Paul III. issued a bull, A. D. 1537, in which, after condemning
the opinion of those Who held that the Indians, as being- on a level with brute
beasts, -should be reduced to servitude, he declares that they -were:really men,
and as such were capable of embracing the Christian religion, and participating
of all its blessings. My account of this bull, notwithstanding the cavils of ML
Clavigero, must appear just to every person who takes the trouble of perusing
-it; -and my account is the same with- that adopted by Torquemada, lib. xvi. c.
25, aa.d by Garcia, Orig. p. 311. But even after this decision, so low did the
Spaniards residing in America rate the capacity of the natives, that the first
council of Lima (I call it by that name on the authority of the best Spanish
authors) discountenanced the admission of Indians to the holy communion.
Torquem. lib. xvi. c. 20. In New Spain the exclusion of Indians from the
sacrament was still more explicit. Ibid. After two centuries have elapsed, and




518           NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
notwithstanding all the improvement that the Indians may be supposed to have
derived from their intercourse with the Spaniards during that period, we are
informed by D. Ant. Ulloa, that in Peru, where, as will appear in the sequel
of this note, they are supposed to be better instructed than in New Spain,
their ignorance is so prodigious that very few are permitted to communicate, as
being altogether destitute of the requisite capacity. Voy. i. 341, &c. Solorzo
Polit. Ind. i. 203.
With respect to the exclusion of Indians from the priesthood, either as seculars or regulars, we may observe that while it continued to be the common
opinion that the natives of America, onl account of their incapacity, should
not be permitted to partake of the holy sacrament, we cannot suppose that
they would be clothed with that sacred character which entitled them to consecrate and to dispense it. When Torquemada composed his Jelonarquia Indiana it was almost a century after the conquest of New Spain; and yet in his
time it was still the general practice to exclude Indians from holy orders. Of
this we have the most satisfying evidence. Torquemada having celebrated
the virtues and graces of the Indians at great length, and with all the comrplacency of a missionary, he starts as an objection to what he had asserted,
"If the Indians really possess all the excellent qualities which you have described, why are they not permitted to assume the religious habit? Why are
they not ordained priests and bishops, as the Jewish and Gentile converts were
in the primitive church, especially as they might be employed with such superior advantage to other persons in the instruction of their countrymen?"
Lib. xvii. c. 13.
In answer to this objection, which establishes, in the most unequivocal man
ner, what was the general practice at that period, Torquemada observes, that
although by their natual dispositions the Indians are well fitted for a subordinate situation, they are destitute of all the qualities requisite in any station of
dignity and authority; and that they are in general so addicted to drunkenness, that upon the slightest temptation one cannot promise on their behaving
with the decency suitable to the clerical character. The propriety of excluding
them from it, on these accounts, was, he observed, so well justified by experience, that when a foreigner of great erudition, who came from  Spain, condemned the practice of the Mexican church, he was convinced of his mistake in a public disputation with the learned and most religious Father D. Juan
de Gaona, and his retraction is still extant. Torquemada indeed acknowledges,
as M. Clavigero observes with a degree of exultation, that in his name some
Indians had been admitted into monasteries; but, with the art of a disputant,
he forgets to mention that Torquemada specifies only two examples of this,
and takes notice that in both instances those Indians had been admitted by
mistake. Relying upon the authority of Torquemada with regard to New
Spain, and of Ulloa with regard to Peru, and considering the humiliating depression of the Indians in all the Spanish settlements, I concluded that they
were not admitted into the ecclesiastical order, which is held in the highest
veneration all over the New World.
But when M. Clavigero, upon his own knowledge asserted facts so repugnant
to the conclusion I had formed, I began to distrust it, and to wish for further
information. In order to obtain this, I applied to a Spanish nobleman, high in
office, and eminent for his abilities, who, on different occasions, has permitted
me to have the honour and benefit of corresponding with him. I have been
favo'ured with the following answer: "What you have written concerning the
admission of Indians into holy orders, or into monasteries, in Book VIII.,
especially as it is -explained and limited in Note LXXXVIII. of the quarto edition, is in general accurate, and conformable to the authorities which you quote.
And although the congregation of the council resolved and declared, Feb. 13,
A. D. 1682, that the circumstance of being an Indian, or mulatto, or mestizo,
did not disqualify any person from being admitted into holy orders, if he was
possessed of what is required by the canons to entitle him to that privilege;
this only proves such ordinations to be legal and valid (of which Solorzano and
the Spanish lawyers and historians quoted by him, Pol. Ind. lib. ii. c. 29, were
persuaded), but it neither proves the propriety of admitting Indians into holy
orders, nor what was then the common practice with respect to this; but, on




NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.                               519
tihe contrary, it shows that there was some doubt concerning the ordaining of
Indians, and some repugnance to it.
" Since that time there have been some examples of admitting Indians into
holy orders. We have now'at Madrid an aged priest, a native of Tlascala.
His name is D. Juan Cerilo de Castilla Aquihual Catehuttle, descended of a
cazique converted to Christianity soon after the conquest. He studied the
ecclesiastical sciences in a seminary of Puebla de los Angeles. He was a candidate, nevertheless, for ten years, and it required much interest before Bishop
Abren would consent to ordain him. This ecclesiastic was a man of unexceptionable character, modest, self-denied, and with a competent knowledge of
what relates to his clerical functions. He came to Madrid. above thirty-four
years ago with the sole view of soliciting admission for the Indians into the
colleges and seminaries.in New Spain, that if, after being well instructed and
tried, they should find an inclination to enter into the ecclesiastical state, they
might embrace it, and perform its functions with the greatest benefit to their
countrymen, whom they could address in their native tongue. He has obtained various regulations favourable to his scheme, particularly that the first
college which became vacant in consequence of the exclusion of the Jesuits
should be set apart for this purpose. But neither these regulations, nor any
similar ones inserted in the laws of the Indies, have produced any effect, on
account of objections and representations from the greater part of persons of
chief consideration employed in New Spain. Whether their opposition be well
founded or not is a problem difficult to resolve, and towards the solution of
which several distinctions and modifications are requisite.
" According to the accounts of this ecclesiastic, and the information of other
persons who have resided in the Spanish dominions in America, you may rest
assured, that in the kingdom of Tierra Firme no such thing is known as either
an Indian secular priest or monk; and that in New Spain there are very few
ecclesiastics of Indian race. In Peru, perhaps, the number may be greater, as
in that country there are more Indians who possess the means of acquiring
such a learned education as is necessary for persons who aspire to the clerical
character."
NOTE [185]. PACGE 366.
UZTARIZ, an accurate and cautious calculator, seems to admait, that the
quantity of silver which does not pay duty, may be stated thus high. According
to Herrera there was not above a third of what was extracted from Potosi that
paid the king's fifth. Dec. 8. lib. ii. c. 15. Solorzano asserts likewise, that the
quantity of silver which is fraudulently circulated, is far greater than that
which is regularly stamped, after paying the fifth. De Ind. Jure, vol. ii. lib
v. p. 846.
NOTE [186]. PAGE 368.
When the mines of Potosi were discovered in the year 1545, the veins wereo
so near the surface, that the ore was easily extracted, and so rich that it was
refined with little trouble and at a small expense, merely by the action of fire.
The simple mode of refining by fusion alone continued until the year 1574,
when the use of mercury in refining silver, as well as gold, was discovered'
Those mlines having been wrought without interruption for two centuries, the
veins are now sunk so deep, that the expense of extracting the ore is greatly
increased. Besides this, the richness of the ore, contrary to what happens in
most other mines, has become less as the vein continued to dip. The vein
has likewise diminished to such a degree, that one is amazed that the Spaniards
should persist in working it. Other rich mines have been successively discovered; but in general the value of the ores has decreased so much, while the expense of extracting them has augmented, that the court of Spain in the year
1736 reduced the duty payable to the king from afifth to a tenth. All the quicksilver used in Peru is extracted from the famous mine of Guancabelica, disnovered in the year 1563. The crown has reserved the property of this mine
to itself; and the persons who purchase the qu.clksilver pay not only the price




520         NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
of it, but likewise affth, as a duty to the king. But in the year 1761 this duty
on quicksilver was abolished, on account of the increase of expense in working
mines. Ulloa, Entretenimientos, xii-xv. Voyage, i. p. 505. 523. In consequence of this abolition of theJfifth, and some subsequent abatements of price,
which became necessary on account of the increasing expense of working mines,
quicksilver, which was formerly sold at eighty pesos the quintal, is now delivered by the king at the rate of sixty pesos. Campomanes, Educ. Popul. ii,
132, note. The duty on gold is reducedto a twentieth, or five per cent. Any
of my readers who are desirous of being acquainted with the mode in which
the Spaniards conduct the working of their mines, and the refinement of the
ore, will find an accurate description of the ancient method by Acosta, lib. iv.
vc 1-13, and of.their more recent improvements in the metallurgic art, by
Gamboa Comment. a las ordenanz. de Minas, c. 22.
NOTE [187]. PAGE 369.
MANY remarkable proofs occur of the advanced state of industry in Spain
at the beginning of the sixteenth century. The number of cities in Spain was
considerable, and they were peopled far beyond the proportion that was common in other parts of Europe. The causes of this I have explained. Hist.
of Cha. V. p. 68.  Wherever cities are populous, that species of industry
which is peculiar to them  increases: artificers and manufacturers abound.
The effect of the American trade in giving activity to these is manifest from a
singular fact. In the year 1545, while Spain continued to depend on its own
industry for the supply of its colonies, so much work was bespoke from the
manufacturers, that it was supposed they could hardly finish it in less than six
years. Campom. i. 406. Such a demand must have put much industry in
motion, and have excited extraordinary efforts. Accordingly, we are informed,
that in the beginning of Philip II.'s reign, the city of Seville alone, where the'
trade with America centred, gave. employment to no fewer than 16,000 looms
in silk or woollen work, and that above 130,000 persons had occupation in carrying on these manufactures. Campom. ii. 472. But so rapid and pernicious
was the operation of the causes which I shall enumerate, that before Philip III.
ended his reign the looms in Seville were reduced to 400. Uztariz, c. 7.
Since the publication of the first edition, I have the satisfaction to find my
ideas concerning the early commercial intercourse between Spain and her colonies confirmed and illustrated by D. Bernardo Ward, of the Junto de Comercio at Madrid, in his Proyicto Economico, part ii. c. i. "Under the reigns
of Charles V. and Philip. II." says he, "the manufactures of Spain and of
the Low-Countries subject to her dominion were in a most flourishing state.
Those of France.and England were in their infancy. The republic of the
United Provinces did not then exist. No European power but Spain hadc.olonies of any value in the New World. Spain could supply her settlements
there with the productions of her own soil, the fabrics wrought by the hands
of her own artisans, and all she received in return for these belonged to herself
alone. Then.tthe exclusion of foreign manufactures was proper, because it
might be rendered.effectual. Then Spain might lay heavy duties upon goods
exported to America, or imported from it, and might impose what restraints
she deemed'proper upon a commerce entirely in her own hands. But when
time and successive revolutions had occasioned an alteration in all those cirCumstances, when the manufactures of Spain began to decline, and the de
mands of America were supplied by foreign fabrics, the original maxims and
regulations of Spain should have been accommodated to the change in her
situation. The policy that was wise at one period became absurd in the
other."
NOTE [188]. PAGE 372.
No bale of goods is ever opened, no chest of treasure is examined. Both
are received on the credit of the persons to whom they belong; and only one
instance -of fraud is recorded, during the long period in which trade was carried
On with this liberal confidence. All the coined silver that was brought from




NO-TES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.  s!21
Peru to -:Porto-bello in the year 1654 was found to be adulterated, apnd to be.mingled with a: fifth part of base metal.:The Spanish merchants, with. senti-.ments suitable.to their usual integrity, sustained the whole loss, and indemni-'fied-the foreigners by whom they were.employed. The fraud was,detected,
and the, treasurer of. the:revenue in Peru, the author of. it, was publicly burnt,.B. Ulloa.:Retablis. de Manuf.,: &c.:liv. ii..p. 102.
NOTE [189]. PAGE 374.
MIANY: striking proofs occur of the scarcity of money in Spain. -:Of -all-the
smmense. sums which have been imported from America,: the amount -of. which
I shall afterwards have occasion to mention,. Moncada asserts, that - there did
not remain. in Spain, in 1619, above two hundred; millions of pesos, one -half in
coined money, the other in. plate and. jewels. Restaur. de Espagna, disc. ii. c.
1. Uztariz, who published. his valuable work: in 1724, contenlds, that in money,
plate, and jewels, there. did not remain a; hundred million. Theor.,, &c. c. 3.
Campomanes, on the authority of. a remonstance from the community of merchants in,Toledo to Philip- III., relates, as, a certain proof how scarce cash had
become, that, persons.who lent money received a third of the, sum which they
advanced.as interest and:.premium.'Educ.: Popul. i..,417.
NOTE' [190]." PAGE 375.
W.THEH account of. the mode in which the, factors of the. South Sea- company
conducted the trade in the fair of Porto-bello, which, was opened to them by
the:Assiento, I have taken from Don'Dion.,Alcedo y Herrera, president of the
Court of Audience in. Quito, and governor.of that  province..Don Dionysio
was a person of such respectable character for probity and discernment, that
his testimony in any point would be of much weight; but greater credit is
due to it in this case, as he was an eye-witness of the transactions which he
relates, and was often employed in'detecting and authenticating the frauds
which he describes. It is probable, how'ever, that his -representation, being
composed at the commencement of the -war..which broke out between Great
Britain and Spain,. in the year 17-39, may, in some instances, discover a portion
of'.the acrimonious.spirit natural at that juncture. His detail of facts is
curious; and. even English authors confirm it in some degree, by.admitting
both that.various frauds. were practised in theitransactions-of the annual ship,
and that the. contraband trade from Jamaica, and. other British colonies, was
become enormously great.:But for the credit: of the English nation it may be
observed, that those fraudulent operations. are not to be considered as deeds of
the company,:but as the dishonourable arts of their factorsand agents. The
company itself sustained. a considerable loss by the Assiento trade. Many of
its servants acquired immense fortunes. Anderson Chronol. deduct. ii. 388.
NOTE' [191]. PAGE 377.
SEVERAL facts with. respect to the institution, the progress, and the effects of
this company, are curious, and but little known to English readers. Though
the province of Venezuela, or Caraccas, extends four-hundred miles along the
coast, and is one of the most fertile in America, it was so much neglected by
the:Spaniards, that during the twenty years prior to the establishment of the
company, only:-ve ships.sailed:from.Spain-to that.province; and, during sixteen years,'from 170.6 to- 1722, not a Single, ship.arrived from  the Caraccas in.:Spain.'Noticias.de',Real Campania de Caraccas, p.' 28. During -this period
Spain must have' been. supplied almost. entirely with a large quantity of cacao,
w.hich it. consumes, by foreigners. Before-the erection of the company, neither
tobacco nor hides were-imported from Caraccas'into:Spain. Ibid. p. 1.17.
Since the. commercial operations. of- the company, begun in the year.1731 i the
importation of cacao into Spain has.increased amazingly. During thirty
years subsequent to 1701, the number- offanegas. of cacao -(each a hundred and
ten pounds) imported from Caraccas w.as-643,215.:During eighteen years subsequent to 1731, the number offanegas imported was 869,247; and if we.supVOL. I.-6b'6                    24




522            NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
pose the importation to be' continued in the same proportion during the remainder of thirty years, it will amount to 1,448,746fanegas, which is an increase
of 805,531fanegas. Id. p. 148. During eight years subsequent to 1756, there
have been imported into Spain by the company 88,482 arrobas (each twentyfive pounds) of tobacco; and hides to the number of 177,354. Id. 161. Since
the publication of the Noticias de Campania, in 1765, its trade seems to be on
the increase. During five years subsequent to 1769, it has imported 179,156
fanegas of cacao into Spain, 36,208 arrobas of tobacco, 75,496 hides, and 221,432
pesos in specie. Campomanes, ii. 162. The last article is a proof of the growing wealth of the colony. It receives cash from Mexico in return for the cacao,
with which it supplies that province, and this it remits to Spain, or lays out in
purchasing European goods. But, besides this, the most explicit evidence is
produced, that the quantity of Cacao raised in the province is double to what
it yielded in 1731; the number of its live stock is more than treble, and its inhabitants much augmented. The revenue of the bishop, which arises wholly
from tithes, has increased from eight to twenty thousand pesos. Notic. p. 69.
In consequence of the augmentation of the quantity of cacao imported into
Spain, its price has decreased from eighty pesos for the fanega to forty. Ibid.
61. Since the publication of the first edition. I have learned that Guyana,
including all the extensive provinces situated on the banks of the Orinoco, the
islands of Trinidad and Margarita are added to the countries with which the
company of Caraccas had liberty of trade by their former charters. Real Cedula, Nov. 19, 1776. But I have likewise been informed, that the institution of
this company has not been attended with all the beneficial effects which I have
ascribed to it. In many of its operations the illiberal and oppressive spirit of
monopoly is still conspicuous. But in order to explain this, it would be necessary to enter into minute details, which are not suited to the nature of this
work.
NOTE [192]. PAGE 380.
THIS first experiment made by Spain of opening a free trade with any o.
her colonies, has produced effects so remarkable, as to merit some further illustration. The towns to which this liberty has been granted, are Cadiz and
Seville, for the provinne of Andalusia: Alicant and Carthagena, for Valencia
and Murcia; Barcelona, for Catalonia and Aragon; Santander, for Castile;
Corugna, for Galicia; and Gijon, for Asturias. Append. ii. a la Educ. Popul.
p. 41. These are either the ports of chief trade in their respective districts, or
those most conveniently situated for the exportation of their respective productions. The following facts give a view of the increase of trade in the settlements to which the new regulations extend. Prior to the allowance of free
trade, the duties collected in the custom house at the Havanna were computed
to be 104,208 pesos annually. During the five years preceding 1774, they rose
at a medium to 308,000 pesos a year. In Yucatan the duties have arisen from
8000 to 15,000. In Hispaniola, from 2500 to 5600. In Porto Rico, from 1200
to 7000. The total value of goods imported from Cuba into Spain was
reckoned, in 1774, to be 1,500,000 pesos. Educ. Popul. i. 450, &c.
NOTE [193]. PAGE 382.
THE two treatises of Don Pedro Rodriguez Campomanes, Fiscal del real Consejo y Supremo (an officer in rank and power nearly similar to that of AttorneyGeneral in England), and Director of the Royal Academy of History, the one
entitled Discurso sobre el Fomento de la Industria Popular; the other, Discurso. sobre la Education Popular de los Artesanos y su Fomento; the former
published in 1774, and the latter in 1775, afford a striking proof of this.
Almost every point of importance with respect to interior police, taxation,
agriculture, manufactures, and trade, domestic as well as foreign, is examined
in the course of these works; and there are not many authors, even in the
nations most eminent for commercial knowledge, who have carried on their
inquiries with a more thorough knowledge of those various subjects, and
a more perfect freedom from vulgar and national prejudices, or who have




NOTES AND ILLUSTRA IONS.                             523
united more happily the calm researches of philosophy with the ardent zeal of
a public spirited citizen. These books are in high estimation among the
Spaniards; and it is a decisive evidence of the progress of their own ideas,
that they are capable of relishing an author whose sentiments are so liberal.
NOTE [194]. PAGE 384.
THE galeon employed in that trade, instead of the six hundred tons to which
it is limited by law, Recop. lib. xlv. 1. 15, is commonly from twelve hundred to
two thousand tons burden. The ship from Acapulco, taken by Lord Anson,
inrstead of the 500,000 pesos permitted by law, had on board 1,313,843 pesos,
besides uncoined silver equal in value to 43,611 pesos more. Anson's Voy. 384
NOTE [195]. PAGE 384.
THE price paid for the bull varies according to the rank of different persons.
Those in the lowest order who are servants or slaves, pay two reals of plate,
or one shilling; other Spaniards pay eight reals, and those in public office, or
who hold encomiendas, sixteen reals. Solorz. de Jure Ind. vol. ii. lib. iii. c. 25.
According to Chilton, an English merchant who resided long in the Spanish
settlements, the bull of Cruzado bore a higher price in the year 1570, being
then sold for four reals at the lowest. Hakluyt, iii. 461. The price seems to
have varied at different periods. That exacted for the bulls issued in the last
Predicacion will appear from the ensuing table, which will give some idea of
the proportional numbers of the different classes of citizens in New Spain and
Peru.
There were issued for New Spain-Bulls at 10 pesos each -. ~                       4
at 2 pesos each.                      22,601
at 1 peso each  -                                          164,220
at 2 reals each -                                      -2,462,500:2,649,325
For Peruat 16 pesos 41 reals each'..  -                3
at 3 pesos 3 reals each                                     14,202
at 1 peso 5j reals each                               -    78,822
at 4 reals each -.  - - -  410,325
at 3 reals each -...   668,601
1,171,953
NOTE [196]. PAGE 385.
As Villa Segnor, to whom we are indebted for this information contained in
his Theatro Americano, published in Mexico A. D. 1746, was accomptant-general in one of the most considerable departments of the royal revenue, and by that
means had access to proper information, his testimony with respect to this point
merits great credit. No such accurate detail of the Spanish revenues in any
part of America has hitherto been published in the English language; and the
particulars of it may appear curious and interesting to some of my readers.
From the bull of Cruzado, published every two years, there arises
an annual revenue in pesos                                    150,000
From the duty on silver.                     700,000
850,000




~524          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
Broughtforuward   850,000
From the duty on gold                                          60,000
From tax on cards -                                            70,000
From tax on pulque, a drink used by the Indians.161,000
From tax on stamped paper --                   -         -    41,000
From ditto on ice -                                            15,522
From ditto on leather    -                                      2,500
From ditto on gunpowder --                                     71,550
From ditto on-salt -    -              ---.  32,000
Frolm ditto on copper of Mechoachan -                           1,000
From ditto on alum                                 -   -        -6,500
From ditto on Juego de los gallos --             -21,100
From the half of ecclesiastical annats -                       49,000
From royal ninths of bishoprics, &c. &  -    -                 68,800
From the tribute of Indians -                                 650,000
From Alcavala, or duty on sale of goods                       721,875
From the Almajorifasgo, custom house -                        373,333
From the mint       -                                         357,500.3,552,680
This sum amounts to 819,161 sterlingl.; and if we add to it the profit accruing from the sale of 5000 quintals of quicksilver, imported from the:mines
of Almaden, in Spain, on the King's account, and what accrues from the dveria,
and some other taxes which Villa Segnor does not estimate, the public revenue
in new Spain may well be reckoned above a million pounds sterling money.
Theat. Mex. vol. i. p. 38, &c. According to Villa Segnor, the total produce of
the Mexican mines amounts at a medium to eight millions of Pesos in silver
annually, and to 5912 marks of gold. Ibid. p. 44. Several branches of the
revenue have been explained in the course of the history; some of which
there was no occasion of mentioning, require a particular illustration. The
right to the tithes in the New World is vested in the crown of Spain, by a bull
of Alexander VI. Charles V. appointed them to be applied in the following
manner: One fourth is allotted to the bishop of the diocess, another fourth to
the dean and chapter, and other officers of the cathedral. The remaining half
is divided into nine equal parts. Two of these, under the denomination of
los dos J\'ovenos reales, are paid to the crown, and constitute a branch of the
royal revenue. The other seven parts are applied to the maintenance of the,
parochial clergy, the building and support of churches, and other pious uses.
Recopil. lib. i. tit. xvi. Ley, 23, &c. Avendano Thesaur. Indic. vol. i. p. 184.
The Ailcavala is a duty levied by an excise on the sale of goods. In Spain
it amounts to ten per cent. In America to four per cent. -Solorzano, Polit.
Indiana, lib. vi. c. 8. Avendano, vol. i. 186.
The Almajorifasco, or custom paid in America on goods imported and exported, may amount on an average to fifteen per cent. Recopil. lib. viii. tit.
xiv. Ley, i. Avendano, vol. i. p. 188.
The Averia, or tax paid on account of convoys to guard the ships sailing to
and from America, was first imposed when Sir Francis Drake filled the New
World with terror by his expedition-to the South Sea. It amounts to-two-per
cent. on the value of goods. Avendano,:vol. i. -p. 189.:Recopil.:lib. ix. tit. ix.
Ley, 43, 44.
I have not been able to procure any -accurate:detail of- the several-branches
of revenue in Pcru later than the year 1614. From a curious manuscript containing a state of that viceroyalty inall its departments, presented to-the Mar
quis of Montes-Claros by-Fran. Lopez Caravantes, accomptant-general in the
tribunal of Lima, it appears that the public revenue,, as nearly as I can compute the value of the money in which Caravantes states his-accounts, amounted
in ducats at 4s. lid. to  2-372,768
Expenses of government  --                                1,242,992
Net free revenue  1,129,776...... *.




N:OTES'AND-' ILLUS T:RAT I ON:S.                   528
Thietotal in sterling money:.583,303
E]xpenses-.of government-  -    -3055608
Net free revenue   277,735
But several articles appear to be omitted in this computation, such as the
duty on stamped-:paper: leather: ecclesiastical annats,- &c. so- that -the revenue
of- Peru may be- well supposed -equal to that of Mexico,
In: computing- the expense of government in'New Spain, I may take theat of
Peru as:a standard. There the annual establishment for defraying the-charge
of adminstration exceeds one half of- the -revenue- collected; and there is:no
reason for supposing it to be less in New Spain.
I have obtained a calculation of the total amount of the public revenue of
Spain from America and the Philippines, which, as the reader will perceive
from the two last articles, is more recent than any of the former.
Alcavalas (Excise) and Aduanas (Customs), &c. in pesos fuertes - 2,500,000
Duties on Gold and silver  -3,000,000
Bull of Cruzado                     - -1,000,000
Tribute of the Indians                                       2,000,000
By sale of quicksilver                                         300,000
Paper exported on the king's account, and sold in the royal warehouses -                       --                            300,000
Stamped paper, tobacco, and other small duties    -   -   -   1,000,000
Duty on coinage of, at the rate of one real de la Plata for each mark   300,000
From the trade of Acapulco, and the coasting trade from province
to province                                                  500,000
Assiento of Negroes                                            200,000
From the trade of Jtathe, or herb of Paraguay,-formerly monopolized
by the Jesuits -                                             500,000
From other revenues formerly belonging to that order -   -   -   400,000
Total 12,000,000
Total in sterling money ~2,700,000
Deduct half, as the expense of administration, and there remains
net free revenue                                          ~1,350,000
NOTE [197]. PAGE 385.
AN author long conversant in commercial speculation has computed, that
from the mines of New Spain alone the king receives annually, as his fifth, the
sum of two millions of our money. Harris, Collect. of Voy. ii. p. 164. According to this calculation, the total produce of the mines must be ten millions
sterling; a sum so exorbitant, and so little corresponding with all accounts ot
the annual importation from America, that the information on which it is
founded must evidently be erroneous. According to Campomanes, the total
product of the American mines may be computed at thirty millions of pesos,
which, at four shillings and sixpence a peso, amounts to 7,425,0001. sterling, the
king's fifth of which (if that were regularly paid) would be 1,485,0001. But
from this sum must be deducted what is lost by a fraudulent withholding of the
fifth due to the crown, as well as the sum necessary for defraying the expense
of administration. Educ. Popular. vol. ii. p. 131. note. Both these sums are
considerable.
NOTE [198]. PAGE 385.
ACCOnDING to Bern. de Ulloa, all foreign goods exported from Spain to
America pay duties of various kinds, amounting in all to more than 25 per
cent. As most of the goods with which Spain supplies her colonies are foreign,
such a tax upon a trade so extensive must yield a considerable revenue




526          NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.
Retablis. de Manuf. et du Commerce d'Esp. p. 150. He computes the value
of goods exported annually from Spain to America to be about two millions
and a half sterling. p. 97.
NOTE [199]. PAGE 386.
THE Marquis de Serralvo, according to Gage, by a monopoly of salt, and by
embarking deeply in the Manilla trade, as well as in that to Spain, gained
annually a million of ducats. In one year he remitted a million of ducats to
Spain, in order to purchase from the Conde Olivares, and his creatures, a pro.
longation of his government, p. 61. He was successful in his suit, and continued in office from 1624 to 1635, double the usual time.




IND E X.
ABR ySSrflqx, an embassy sent to that country  Alvaerado, Alonzo, is sent from Lima by Franc s
by John It. king of Portugal, 41.             Pizarro with a body of Spaniards to relieve
Acapulco, the nature of the trade carried on from    his brothers at Cuzco, 284. Is taken prisoner
thence to MAanilla, 383. Amount of the trea-   by Almagro, ib. His escape, 285.
sure on board the ship taken by Lord Anson, --, Pedro de, is left by Cortes to command
523.  at Mexico, while he marched against Narvaez
Acosta, his method of accounting for the differ-   231.  He is besieged by the Mexicans, 233.
ent degrees of heat in the old and new conti-   His imprudent conduct, 234. His expedition
nents, 462.                                  to Quito in Peru, 279.
Adair, his account of the revengeful temper of Amazons, a community of, said to exist in South
the native Americans, 478.                    America, by Francis Orellana, 290.
Adanson, his justification of Hanno's account of America, the continent of, discovered by Christhe African seas, 449.                        topher Columbus, 76. How it obtained this
Africa, the western coast of, first explored by   name, 81.  Ferdinand of Castile nominates
order of John I. king of Portugal, 34. Is dis-  two governments in, 98. The propositions
covered from Cape Non to Bojador, 35. Cape   offered to the natives, 99.  III reception of
Bojador doubled, 36. The countries south-   Ojeda and Nicuessa among them, ib.  The
ward of the river Senegal discovered, 39. Cape   South Sea discovered by Balboa, 104. Rio de
of Good Hope seen by Bartholomew Dias, 40.   Plata discovered, 108. The natives of, injuCauses of the extreme heat of the climate   riously treated by the Spaniards, 117. The
there, 125. Ignorance of the ancient astrono-   vast extent of, 123. The grand objects it premers concerning, 449  Expedition to the coast   sented to view, lb.  The circumstances of,
of, 394.                                      favourable for commerce and civilization, ib
Agriculture, the state of, among the native Ame-   The climates of, 124. Various causes of the
ricans, 158. Two principal causes of the de-  -peculiarity of its climates, 125. Its rude and
fects of, 161.                                uncultivated state when first discovered, 126.
Aguado, is sent to Hispaniola, as a commissioner   Its animals, 127. Its insects and reptiles, 128.
to inspect the conduct of Columbus, 72.       Birds, ib.  General account of its soil, 129.
AJguilar, Jerom de, is relieved from a long capti-  Inquiry into the first population of, lb. Could
vity among the Indians at Cozumel by Per-   not be peopled by civilized nations, 132. The
nando Cortes, 201.                            northern extrenmity of, contiguous to Asia, 133.
fAlbuquerque, Rodrigo, his barbarous treatment   Probably peopled by Asiatics, 137. Condition
of the Indians of Hispaniola, 108.            and character of the native inhabitants inARlceavala, in the Spanish Customs, the terms ex-   quired into, ib. Were more rude than the
plained, 524.                                 natives of any other known parts of the earth,
Alezander the Great, his political character, 23.  lb.  The Peruvians and Mexicans excepted,
His motive in founding the city of Alexandria,   138. The first discoverers incapable of a judiib. His discoveries in India, ib.             cious speculative examination, ib. Thevarious
Alexander, VI. Pope, grants to Ferdinand and   systems of philosophers respecting the natives,
Isabella of Castile the right of all their western   139. Method observed in the present review
discoveries, 65. Sends missionaries with Co-   of their bodily constitution and circumstances,
lumbus on his second voyage, ib.              140. The venereal disease derived from this
Almagro, Diego de, his birth and character, 262.   part of the world, 148. Why so thinly inhaAssociates with Pizarro and De Luque in a   bited, 161. The country depopulated by convoyage of discovery, ib.  His unsuccessful   tinual wars, 174. Causes of the depopulation
attempts, 283. Is neglected by Pizarro in his   of, traced, 347. This depopulation not the
Spanish negotiation, 265. Is reconciled to him,   result of any intentional system of policy, 348.
266. Brings reinforcements to Pizarro at Peru,   Nor the result of religion, 349. Number ot
274. Beginning of dissensions between him   Indian natives still remaining in Mexico and
and Pizarro, 280.  Invades Chili, 281.  Is   Peru, 350. All the Spanish dominions there
created governor of Chili, and marches to   subjected to two viceroys, 351. Its third viceCuzco, 283. Seizes Cuzco out of the hands of   royalty lately established, lb.  Cause of the
Pizarro, 284.  Defeats Alvarado, and takes   extreme coldness toward the southern extrehim prisoner, lb. Is-deceived by the artful   mity of, 464. The natural uncultivated state
negotiations of Francis Pizarro, 285. Is de-   of the country described, 465. Bones of large
feated by the Pizarros, 286. Is taken prisoner,   extinct species of animals discovered under
287  Is tried and condemned, ib. Is put to   ground near the banks of the Ohio, ib. Why
death, ib.                                    European animals degenerate there, 466. Sup., the son, affords refuge to his father's   posed to have undergone a convulsive separafollowers at Lima, 291.  His character, ib.   tion frot i Asia, 467. The vicinity of the two
Heads a conspiracy against Francis Pizarro,   continem.ts of Asia and America clearly ascer292.  Pizarro assassinated, ib. Is acknow-   tained, 468,469,470. See Mexico, Peru, Cortcs,
ledged as his successor,' ib. His precarious   Pizarro, Cabot, &c.
situation, 293. Is defeated by Vaca de Castro, —, North, project of settling there, 396.
294. Is betrayed and executed, ib.            First expedition to, fails, 397. A second expe~Almajorifasgo, in the Spanish American Cus-   dition to, ends disastrously, lb. Plan of settling
toms, the amount of, 524.                     there resumed without effect, ib. The coast




528                                     INDEX.
of, divided into two parts, 402.  Charters   ib. How taxed,ib. Stated services demande4
granted to two companies for settling colonies   from them, lb.  Mode of exacting these serin, ib.  Emigrations from  England to, 436.   vices, 359. How  governed, lb. Protector of
See Colonies,.New-England, Virginia, &c.       the Indians, his function, ib. Reasons why
d.mericans, native, in Spanish America, their   so small a progress is made in their conversion,
bodily constitution and complexion, 140, 141.   364. Their characteristic features described,
Their strength and abilities, 141, 142. Their   470   Instances of their persevering speed,
insensibility with regard to their women, 142.   471.
No deformities in their frame, 144. This cir-.Amerigo, Vespucci, publishes the first written
cumstance accounted for, ib. Uniformity'of   account of the New World, and hence gave
their colour, 145. A peculiar race of, described,   name to America, 81. His claim  as a disco.
146. The Esquimaux, ib. Patagonians, 147.   verer examined, 458.
The existence of Patagonian giants yet remain-.tnacoana, a female cazique of Hispaniola, her
ing to be decided, ib. Their diseases, 148. The    base and cruel usage by the Sl;aniards, 93, 94.
venereal disease peculiarly theirs, ib.  The j.9sdes, stupendous height and extent of that
powers and qualities of their minds, 149. Are   range of mountains, 123. Their height comonly solicitous to supply immediate wants, lb.   pared with other mountains, 461   Gonzalo
The art of computation scarcely known' to   Pizarro's remarkable expedition over, 289.'
them, 150.  Have no abstract ideas, lb.' The  dnimals, large, very few found in America at its
North Americans much more intelligent than: first discovery, 128.
those of the South, 151.  Their aversion to  2/rcients, cau'se of the imperfection of the art of
labour, 152. Their social state, ib. DOmestic   navigation among them,'18. Their geograiphiunion -153.' The wonen, lb. Their women. cal knowledge extremely confined,' 449.
not prolific, 154. Their parental affectioh and  A.rabians, peculiarly attached to the'' study of
filial duty, 155. Their modes of subsistence,   Geography, 28
156. Fishing,i b. Hunting, 157. Agriculture,.drgonauts, the expedition of, why so faiotm'
158. The-various objects:of their culture, ib.   among the Greeks, 21
Two principal causes' of the defects of their  odsithmetic- or computation, the art.of, hardly 
agriculture, 159. Their want of tame animals,   known to the native Americans, 150':- 
ib. Their want of useful metals, ii6.   Their.sceolino, Father, his extraordinary mission to
political instituttions,161. Were divided into    the Princex of the Tartars, 30.
small independent communities, ilb.  Unac-  dsiatic discoveries made by the Russians, 135 i
quainted withtheidea of property, 162.   Their.lssiento trade, the'nature of, explained, 374.
high sense of equality and independence, ib.   The frauds in, and how put an end to,'375.
Their-ideas of subordination imperfect, lb. To  jAtahualpa, is left by his father Huascar his sucwhat tribes these. descriptionrs apply, 163.   cessor in the'kingdoin of Quito,'269. Defeats
Some' exceptions, 164.'  Florida, ib.  The    his brother Huascar, and usurps'thle empiie' of
Natchez, lb;. The islands, 165. In Bogota, ib.   Peru, ib. Sends presents toPizarrod,270.' Visits
Inquiry into the causes of these irregularities,   Pizarro 272.  Is perfidiously seized by him,
lb. Their art of war, 167. Their motives to   273.  Agrees with Pizarro on a ransom, ib
hostility, ib'.  Causes of their' ferocity, ib    Is refused hisliberty 275. Hisbehaviour'durPerpetuity of their' animosities, 168.  Their   ing his confinement  276. A form~i' of trial bemodes of conductingwar, lb. Are not destitute   stowedon him, lb. Is put to death, 277. Comof courage and fortitude, 169.  Incapable of: parison of authorities relating'to his'transacmilitary'discipline, 170.' Their treatment of   tions with, and treatment by Pizarro,497.
prisoners; lb. Their fortitude under torture, Audience of'New Spain, board of, established by
171. - Never eat human:flesh but'to gratify re-   the Emperor Charles V., 259. Courts of, their
venge, 172. How'the Shuth Americans'treated   jurisdiction, 352. 
their prisoners, lb. Their military education,.'veria, a Spanish' tax for Convoy to and'from
173.  Strange method of choosing'a- captain    America, when first imposed,'524. Its-rate, ib.
among the Indians on the banks of the Orinoco,.zores, those islands discovered by the Por'tuib. Their numbers wasted by continual wars: guese,' 38.
174. Their tribes'now recruit their numbers
by adopting prisoners, ib. Are never formida- Bacon, Nathaniel, heads an insurrection in Virble in war to more polished nations, 175. Their   ginia, 424. Forces' the governor'and council
arts, dress, and ornaments, lb.' Their habita-   there to fly, lb.'They apply' Lo England for
tions, 176. Their arms, 178. Their' domestic   succour, 425. His death terminates the rebelutensils, ib. Construction of their canoes, lb.   lion, ib.
The listlessness with whichl they apply to la- Balboa, Vasco'Nugnez de, settles a colony at
bhour, 179.  Their religion, lb.  Soine tribes   Santa Maria,in the Gulf of Darien, 100. Realtogether: destitute of any, 180'.' Remark0able   ceives intelligence of the.rich country of Peru,
diversity in their religious notions, 181. Their   102. His character, 103  Marches across the
ideas of the immortalityof the soul, 183. Their   isthmus, 104. Discovers the Southern'Ocean,
modes: of burial, 184.' Why their. physicians   lb. Returns, 105. Is superseded in his compretend to be conjurors; lb.  Their love'of   mand by the appointment ofPedrarias Davila,
dancing, 185. Their immoderate passion for   lb. Is fined by Pedraiias for'former transacgamifig, 187. Areextremely addicted to drunk.tions, 106.' Is appointed lieutefainitgovernor
enness, ib.  Put' their aged and' incurable to    of the couiitries-on the South Sea, and marries
death, 189. General-estimate of their chliarac    Pedrarias's daughter, 106,'107. Is arrested and
ter, lbb.' Their intellectual powers, ib. Their   put to death'by Pedrarias, 107.'
political talents, 190. Powers of. affection 191. Bark, Jesuits', a production peculiar to Peru: 368
Hiardness of heart ib.;.Their insensibility, ib, Barrere, his description of the construction os
Tacituriiity, 192. Their' cunning, lb. Their  Indian houses, 482.
virtues, 193. Their spirit of independence, lb. Behaim, Martin, the honour of having discovered
Fortitude, lb.  Attachment to their commu-  America falsely ascribed to him by sonle Ger
nity, ib.' Their' satisfaction with their own    man' authors, 455. Account of him and his
condition, 194. General caution  with respect   family, lb.
to this inquiry, ib. Twodistinguishable classes, Behi isng' and Tschirikow, Russian navigators,
195.  Exceptions as to their character, 196,.  thought to have:discovered  the north-west
An, antipathy industriously'encouraged be-   extremity of America from the eastward, 135
tweeni them and:the Negroes in America, by' Uncertainty of their accounts, 467.
the Spaniards,-358. Their present condition, Benalcazar, governor of St. Michael, reduces




INDEX.                                       529
the kingdom of Quito, 278, 279. Is deprived Caraccas, establishment of'the company trading
of his command by Pizarro, 289.            to that coast, 377. Growth of the trade, 521.
Benjamin, the Jew of Tudela, his extraordinary  Caribbee islands, discovered by Columbus in his
travels, 30.                                second voyage, 66.
Bernaldes, instance of the-bravery of the Carib- Caribbees, their spirit peculiarly fierce, 196.
bees mentioned by him, 484.                 Their character, by 84. de Chanvalon, 474.
Bethencourt, John de, a Norman baron, conquers   Probable conjecture as to the distinction in
and possesses the Canary islands, 33.       character between them and the natives of
Birds, an account of those natural to America,  the larger islands, 485.
128. The flighit of, often stretch to an immense Carpini, his extraordinary mission to the Prince
distance from land, 453.                    of the Tartars, 30.
Bogota, in America, some account of the inha- Carthagena, the harbour of, the safest and best
bitants of, 165. Causes of their tame submis-  lortified of any in all the Spanish American
sion to the Spaniards, 166. Their religious   dominions, 345
doctrines and rites, 183.                 Carthaginians, state of commerce and navigation
Bojador, Cape, the first discovery of, 35. Is   among, 20. The famous voyages of Hanno
doubled by the Portuguese discoverers, 36.  and Himlico, ib.
Bossu, his account of the American war song, Carvajal, Francisco de, contributes to Vaca de
479.                                        Castro's victory over young Almagro, 294.
Bovadilla, Francis de, is sent to Hispaniola to   Encourages Gonzalo Pizarro to assume the
inquire into the conduct of Columbus, 83.   government of Peru, 300  Advises Pizarro to
Sends Columbus home in irons, 83, 84. Is de-   assume the sovereignty of the country, 302.
graded, 85.                                 Is seized by Gasca, and executed, 308.
Bougainville, his defence of the Periplus of Castillo, Bernal Diaz del, character of his HisHanno, 448.                                 toria Verdadera de la Conquista de la Nueva
Bouguer, MA., his character of the native Peru-   Espagna, 486.
vians, 473.                               Centeno, Diego, revolts from Gonzalo Pizarro to
Brasil, the coast of, discovered by Alvarez Ca-   the viceroy of Peru, 301. Is defeated by Carbral, 82. Remarks on the climate of, 463.   vajal, and secretes himself in a cave, 302.
Bridges, Peruvian, described, 508.            Sallies out, and seizes Cuzco, 306, 307.  Is
Buenros.Iyres, in South America, some account   reduced by Pizarro, 307.  Is employed by
of that province, 344.                      Gasca to make discoveries in the regions about
Bulls, papal, of no force in Spanish America,  the river Plata, 310.
before examined and approved by the royal Chancelour, Richard, sails in search of a northcouncil of the Indies, 361. See Crusado.    west passage, 393. The fleet is scattered in a
Burial of the dead, American mode of, 184.    storm, ib. He enters the White Sea, and winters at Archangel, ib. Visits Moscow, a disCabot, Giovanni, is appointed to command the   tance of 1200 miles, and delivers a letter to the
first expedition to explore unknown countries,   czar, lb. Is the means of opening a trade
390. Embarks with his son at Bristol, ib.   with Russia, ib.  Is empowered by Queen
Discovers Newfoundland, ib. Returns to Eng-   Elizabeth to negotiate with the czar in her
land, ib. No advantage is derived from his   name, ib.
discoveries, ib.  The scheme is abandoned, Chanvalon, M. de, his character of the native
391. He is appointed governor of a company   Caribbees, 474.
of merchant adventurers, for whom he obtains Chapetones, in the Spanish American colonies,
a charter, 393.                             who thus distinguished, 356.
---, Sebastian, sails on an expedition to South Charles III., king of Spain, establishes packet
America, 392. Visits Brasil, and touches at   boats between Spain and the colonies, 378.
Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, ib. His voyage   Allows free trade to-the Windward islands, ib.
extends the sphere of English navigation, and   Grants the colonies a free trade with each
proves the means of opening an intercourse   other, 380.'
with the Archipelago, and some towns on the -:V., Emperor, sends Roderigo de Figueroa
coast of Syria, ib.                         to Hispaniola, as Chief Judge, to regulate the
Cabral, Alvarez, a Portuguese commander, dis-  treatment of the Indians, 113. Causes this
coveys the coast of Brasil, 82.             subject to be debated before him, 115. Equips
Cacao, the best in quality, produced in the Spanish   a squadron at the solicitation of Ferdinand
American colonies, 368. The preparation of   Magellan, 253. Resigns his claim on the Mochocolate from, derived from the Mexicans,  luccas to the Portuguese, 255. Appoints Cortes
376.                                        governor of New Spain, 256. Rewards him
Cadiz, the galeons and flota removed thither from    on coming home, 259.  Establishes a board
Seville, 372.                               called the Audience of New Spain, lb. His
California, the peninsula of, discovered by Fer-   consultations on American affairs, 294. Estanando Cortes, 260. The true state of this   blishes new regulations, 296.
country long unknown, 341. Why depreciated  Chesapeak. See Virginia.
by the Jesuits, lb.  Favourable account of, Chili, is invaded by Almagro, 281. fIow sfib
given by Don Joseph Galvez, ib.    I        jected by the Spaniards, 342. Excellence ot
Californians, the character of, by P. Venegas,  its climate and soil, lb. Cause of its being
474.                                        neglected, 3-13. Prospect of its improvement,
Campeachky, discovered by Cordova, who is re-  ib.
pulsed by the natives, 119                Chiquitos, political state of that people, from
Campomanes, Don Pedro Rodriguez, character of   Fernandez, 478.
his political and commercial writings, 522.: Chocolate, the use of, derived from the Mexicans
His account of the produce of the Spanish   376.
American mines, 525.                      Cholula, in Mexico, arrival of Cortes there, with
ananry islands, erected into a kingdom by Pope   some account of the town, 217. A conspiracy
Clement VI., 33. Are conquered by John de   against Cortes discovered, and the inhabitants
Bethencourt, lb.                            destroyed, ilb.
Cannibals, no people ever found to eat human  Church government, sentiments respecting, at
flesh for subsistence, though often for revenge,  the Reformation, 427. Religious persecution
172. 480.                                   in the reigns of Queen Mary and Queen Eliza.
Canoes, American the construction of, described,   beth, 428.  Intolerant spirit of the church, 429.
178.s                                       Separation of the Puritan, from the church,
VoL. I.  67




530                                    INDEX
lb.  They are reduced into an ecclesiastical   tlements, 414. A bloody war is commenced
system by Robert Brown, a popular declaimer,   with the Indians, and neither old nor young
and adopt the name of Brownists, 430. Take    are spared, ib. The settlements extend, and
refuge in Holland, 431. Remove thence to   industry revives, 415. Defects in the first conAmerica, 432.  Church government is esta-   stitution of the colonies, 417. King Charles's
blished irn Massachusetts Bay, 435. Its intole-   arbitrary government of them, 418. He grants
rance, ib. The intolerance of Laud increases   them new privileges, 419. They flourish under
the emigrations from England, 436.            the new government, 420. The colonists reCtcero, instance of his ignorance in geography,   main attached to the royal cause, and parlia450.                                          ment makes war on Virginia, which is obliged
Cinaloa, political state of the people there, 478.   to acknowledge the Commonwealth, 420, 421.
Their mode of living, 481. Are destitute of   Restraints are laid on the trade of the colonies,
all religion, 483. Extraordinary large grain of   421. The colonists are dissatisfied with these.gold found there, 509.                       restraints, ib.  Are the first to acknowledge
Csneguilla, in the province of Sonora, late dis-   Charles II., but their loyalty is ill rewarded, ib.
coveries of rich mines made there by the Spa-   Restraints on their commerce further extended
niards, 340.  Probable effects of these disco-   by the navigation act, 42-2. Efiects of the act,
veries, 341.                                  423. Colonists remonstrate against it, ib. The
Clasvigeo, M., several of his objections answered,   colony of Virginia is attacked by the Indians
518, 519.                                     lb. Discontents are produced by the grants of
Clement VI., Pope, erects the Canary islands into   land by the crown, lb. A colony is established
a kingdons, 33.                               at New Plymouth in New England, 432. Plan
Climates, influenced by a variety of causes,   of its government, ib. A grand council is ap124. Their operation on mankind, 195. In-   pointed, 433. A new colony is projected, ib.
quiry into the cause of the different degrees of   Settles at Massachusetts Bay, 434. The char
neat in, 462.                                 ter of the company in England being transCochlirneal, an important production, almost pe-   ferred to the colonies, they extend in consecufliar to New Spain, 368.                    quence of it, 436. The colonists increase, 437.
Cold, extraordinary predominance of, in the cli-   New settlers arrive, 439. Sectaries settle in
mate of Amllerica, 124. Causes of this peru-   Providence and Rhode Island, 440. Theologiliarity, 125.                                 cal contests give rise to a colony at Connecticut,
Colonies, English American, project of settling   441. Emigrants from Massachusetts Bay settle
them, 396. Two expeditions fail, 397. The   there, ib. Settlements are formed in the profirst colony established in Virginia, 398. In    vinces of New-Hampshire and Maine, ib.
danger of perishing by famine: it returns to   State of the colonies at the Revolution, 444.
England, 399.  A second attempt made to    Are exempted from certain duties, 445. Enter
settle there, but the colony perishes by famine,   into a league of confederacy, lb. Assume the
400. The scheme of. settling there is aban-   rightof coining, 446. Are patronized by Cromdoned, ib. Circumstances in the reign of-Eli-   well, who proposes to transport them to Jazabeth unfavourable to colonization, 401. The   maica, lb. They decline his offer, 447. See
reign of James favourable to the establishment   JN'ew-England, Viginiazn, &c.
of colonies, ib.  James divides the coast of Colonies, Spanish American, view of the policy
America into two parts; the one called the first   and trade of, 347. Depopulation the first effect
or south colony of Virginia, the other the   of them, ib. Causes of this depopulation, lb.
second or north colony, 402. He grants char-   The small-pox very fatal to, 348. General idea
ters to two companies for the government of   of the Spanish policy in, lb. Early interposithem, lb. Tenor and defects of those charters,   ticon of the regal authority in, 349. An exclu
403. Under these charters the settlements of   sive trade the first object in, 353. Compared
the English in Virginia and New England were    with those of ancient Greece and Rome, 354.
established, lb.  Capt. Newport sails from    The great restrictions they are subject to, lb.
England for Virginia, and discovers the Chesa-   Slow progress of their population from Europe,
peak, 404. Sails up James river, and founds   355. Are discouraged by the state of property
a settlement in Jamestown, lb. Its bad ad-   there, ib.; and by the nature of their ecclesi
ministration, ib. It is annoyed by the Indians,   astical policy, 356. The various classes of
and sufelrs from scarcity and the unhealthiness   people in, lb.  Ecclesiastical constitution of,
of the climate, 405. Seasonable succours are   360.  Form and endowments of the church
sent from  England, 406.  A survey of the   there, 361. Pernicious effects of monastic incountry is undertaken, ib. The colony depends   stitutions there, lb.  Character of. the ecerilefor subsistence chiefly on supplies from the   siastics there, 362. Productions of, 365. The
natives, 407. A change is made in the consti-   mines, 366. Those of Potosi and Sacotecas,
tution of the company, and a new charter is  ib. The spirit with which they are worked,
granted with more ample privileges, lb. Lord   lb. Fatal effects of this ardour, 367. Other
Delaware is appointed governor of the colony,   commodities that compose the commerce of;
lb. Anarchy prevails there, 408. It is almost   368. Amazing increase of horned cattle there,
reduced by famlie, lb. Lord Delaware arrives,  lb.  Advantages which Spain formerly derived
and by his wise administration restores order   from them, 369. Why the same advantages
and discipline, 409. His health obliges him to   are not still received, lb. Guarda costas emn
return to Enlgland, and he is superseded by Sir   ployed to check the contraband trade in, 375.
Thomas Dale, who establishes martial law,   The use of register ships introduced, 376; and
lb. A new charter is issued to the colony, and   galeons laid aside, lb. Company of the Canew privileges are granted, 410. Cultivation    raccasinstituted, 377. Establishment of regulal
of the land is promoted, and a treaty entered   packet boats to, 378. Free trade permitted he.
into with the natives, lb. The land in Virginia   tween them, lb. New  regulations in. the gobecomes property, 411. The culture of tobacco    vernmnent of, 380. Reformation of the courts
is introduced, and its pernicious cmonsequences,   of justice, lb.  New distribution of governlb.  The company in England send out a   ments, lb. A fourth viceroyalty established,
number of young women to induce the colo-   lb. Attempts to reform domestic policy, 381.
nists to form more extensive plans of industry,   Their trade with the Philippine islands, 383.
411.  Negroes are first introduced, lb.  A    Revenue derived from, by Spain, 384. Expense
new constitution is given to the colony, lb. A    of administration there, 385. State of popugeneral massacre of the Er.glish is planned by   lation in, 512.  The number of monasteries
the Indians, and executed in most of the set-  there, 515. See,Mexico Peru, &c.




I NDEX.                                        531
Columbus. Bartholomew, is sent by his brother   the eastern empire after the subversion of the
Christopher to negotiate with Henry VII. king   western, 28. Revival of, in Europe, 31.
of England, 46. The misfortunes of his voy- Compass, mariner's, navigation extended more
age, 48.  Follows his brother to Ilispaniola,   by the invention of, than by all the efforts ot
69, 70. Is vested with the administration of   preceding ages, 32. By whom invented, ib.
affairs there by his brother on liis return to  Condamine,: M., his account of the country at
Spain, 73. Founds the town of St. Domingo,   the foot of the Andes, in South America, 465.
W7.',   His remarks on the character of the native
c~ — -—,  Christopher, birth and education of,   Americans, 473.
42. His early voyages, ib. Marries and settles Congo, the kingdom of, discovered by the Portuat Lisbon, ib  His geographical reflections, 43.   guese, 39.
Conceives the idea of making, discoveries to  Constantinople, the consequence of removing
the westward 44. Offers his services to the   the seat of the Roman Empire to, 27. ContiGenoese senate, 45. Cause of his overtures   nued a commercial pity after the extinction of
being rejected in Portugal, 46.: Applies to the   the western empire, 28.  Became the chief
courts of Castile and England, ib. His propo-   mart of Italy, 29.
sal, how treated by' the Spanish geographers, Cordova, Francisco Hernandez, discovers Yuca
47.  Is patronized by Juan Perez, 48.  His  tan, 119. Is repulsed at Campeachy, alid re
proposals again rejected, 49.  Is invited by   turns to Cuba, ib.
Isabella, and engaged in the Spanish service, Corita, Alonzo, his observations on the contra50.  Preparations for his voyage, 51.  The   band trade of the Spanish colonies, 382, 383.'amount of his equipment, lb.  Sails from    Character of his American memoirs, 500, 501.'Spain, 52. His vigilant attention to all cir- Cortes, Fernando, his birth, education, and cha
cumstances during his voyage, lb. Apprehen-   racter, 197. Is by Velasquez appointed coin
sions of his crew, lb. His address in quieting   mander of the armament fitted out by him
their cabals, ib. Indications of their approach-   against New Spain, 198. Velasquez becomes
ing land, 54. An island discovered, 55. He   jealousof him, 199. Velasquez sends an order
lands, 56. His interview with the natives, lb.   to deprive him of his commission, and lay him
Names the island San Salvadore, ib. Prose-   under an arrest, 199.  Is protected by his
cutes his discoveries southward, 57. Discovers   troops, lb.  The amount of'his forces, 200.
and lands on the island of Cuba,'ibh. Discovers   Reduces the Indians at Tabasco, 201. Arrives
Hispaniola'58. Suffers shipwreck, but is saved   at Et. Juan de Ulua, lb. His interview with
by the Indians, 59. Builds a fort, 60. Returns   two Mexican commanders, ib. Sends presents
to Europe, 61. His expedient to preserve the   to Montezuma, 203.'' Receives others ill return,
memory of his discoveries during a storm, 62.  ilb.' His schemes,' 205.' Establishes a form of
Arrives at the Azores, lb. Arrives at Lisbon,   civil. government, 207.'Resigns his cornmis
ib. His reception in Spain, 63. His audience   sion under Velasquez, and assumes the comwith Ferdinand and Isabella, lb. His equip-   mand in the king's name, 207,208. His firiendment for a second voyage, 65. Discovers the   ship courted by the Zempoallans, 208. Builds
Carribbee islands, 66.  Finds his colony on    a fort, 209. Concludes a fornial alliance with
Hispaniola destroyed, ib. Builds a city, which   several caziques, 210. Discovers a conspiracy
he calls Isabella, 67. Visits the interior parts   among his men, and destroys his ships, 211.
of the country, lb. His men discontented and' Advances into the country, 212. Is opposed
factious, 68. Discovers the island of Jamaica,   by the Tlascalans, 213. Concludes a peace
69. 3Meets his brother Bartholomew at Isa-   with them, 215. His rash zeal, 216. Proceeds
Della, 70. The natives ill.used by his men,   to Cholula, 217.  Discovers' a' conbspiracy
and begin to be alarmed, ib.' He defeats the   against him there, and destroys the inhabitants,
Indians, 71., Exacts tribute from them, ib.   lb.' Approaches in sight of the capital city of
Returns to Spain to justify his conduct, 73. Is   Mexico, lb. His first interview with Montefurnished with a more regular plan for colonl-   zuma, 218. His anxiety at his situation in the
zation, 74. His third voyage, 75. Discovers   city of Mexico, 221. Seizes Montezuma, 223.
the island of Trinidad, 76. Discovers the con-   Orders him to be fettered, 224. Reasons for
tinent of America, lb. State of Hispaniola on    his conduct, ib. Prevals on Mo0ntezuma to
his arrival, lb. Composes the-mutiny ofR61ldan    own himself a vassal to the Spanish crown,
and his adherents, 78.  Is distressed by the   225. Amount' and division'of his treasure,
factious behaviour of his men, 82. Complaints   226. Enrages the Mexicans by his imprudent
carried to Spain against him, ib. Is sent home   zeal, 227.  An armament sent by Velasquiez
in irons, 84. Clears his conduct, but is not.to supersede him, 228. His deliberations on
restored to his authority, lb. His solicitations   this event, 230. Advances to meet Narvaez
neglected, 86. Forms new schemes of disco-   231. Defeats Narvaez, and talkes him  privery, ib.  Engages in a fourth voyage, 87.   soner, 233. Gains over the Spanish soldiers to
His treatment at Hispaniola, lb.. Searches   his interest, ib. Returns to Mexico, 234. His
after a passage to the Indian ocean, 88. Is   improper conduct on his arrival. ib. Is'esoshipwrecked on the coast of Jamaica, 89. His  lutely attacked bythe Mexicans, 235. Attacks
artifice to secure the friendship of the Indians,   them in return without success? lb. Death of
90. Is delivered, and arrives at Hispaniola,   Montezuma, 236.  His extraordinary escape
91. Returns to Spain, lb. His death, 92. His  from death, 237. Abandons the city of Mexright to the original discovery of America de-   ico, lb. Is attacked by the' Mexicans, ib. His
fended, 298. The' spirit of adventure raised   great losseg in the encounter, 238. Difficulties
in England by his discoveries, 389. Is checked   of his retreat, lb., Battle, of Otumba, 239.
by the want of skill in- navigation, ib. His   Defeats the Mexicans, 240.  Mutinous spirit
system of opening a passage to India by steer-   of his troops, 241. R' educes the Tepeacans,
ing a western course is adopted by Cabot, 390.   242. Is strengthened by several reinforcements,, Don Diego, sues out his claim to his'  ib. Returns towards Mexico, 243. Establishes
father's privileges, 97. Marries, and goes over   his head-quarters at Tezeico,' 244. Reduces
to Hispaniola, lb. Establishes a pearl-fishery   or conciliates the surrounding country, ib.
atCubagu'a, 98. Projectsthe conquestofCuba,   Cabals among his troops, 245.' His prudence
100. His measures thwarted by Ferdinand,   in suppressing them, ilb. Builds and launches
108. Returns to Spain, lb.                    a fleet of brigantines on the lake, 246. BeCommerce, the era from which its commencement   siege s   ca  grand' assault to
is to he dated, 17. Motives to an intercourse   take the city by storm, but is repulseil, 24&
among distant nations, 18. Still flourished in' Evades the Mexican prophecy, 250.  Takes




532                                  IN) EX.
Guatimozin prisoner, 251. Gains possession El Dorado, wonderful repork of a  untry so
of the city, lb.; and of the whole empire, 252.   called, made by Francis O ellan, 290.
Defeats another attempt to supersede him in Elephant, that animal peculiar to the torrid zone,
his comtland, 256. Is appointed governor of   465.
New Spain, ib. His schemes and arrange- Elizabeth, the reign of, ausiclous to discovery,
ments, 256, 257. Cruel treatment of the na-   394. She encourages commerce, and secures
tives, 257. His conduct subjected to inquiry,   the trade to Russia, 395.  Circumstances in
258.' Returns to Spain to justify himself, 259.   her reign unfavourable to colonization, 401.
Is rewarded by the emperor Charles V., ib.   Her high idea of,her superior skill'in theology,
Goes back to Mexico with limited powers, ib.   428, note.
Discovers California, 260. Returns to Spain, Escurial, curious calendar discovered in the
and dies, lb. Inquiry into the nature of.4his  library there by Mr. Waddilove, 501. Descripletters to the emperor CharlesV., 485. Authors  tion of; that valuable monument of Mexican
who wrote of his conquest of New Spain, ib.   art, ib.
Council of the Indies, its power, 353.      Esquimaux Indians, resemblance between them
QOeoles in the Spanish American colonies, cha-   and their neighbours the Greenlanders, 136.
racter of, 356.                             Some account of, 482.
Croglan, Colonel George, his account of the dis- Eugene IV., Pope, grants to the Portuguese an
covery of the bones of a large extinct species   exclusive right to all the countries they should
of animals in North America, 465.           discover,:from Cape Non to the continent of
Crusades to the Holy Land, the great political   India, 38.
advantages derived from, by the European na- Europe, how affected by the dismemberment of
tions, 29.                                  the Roman empire by the barbarous nations,
Crusado, bulls of, published regularly every two   27. Revival of commerce and navigation, 28.
years in the Spanish colonies, 384. Prices of,   Political advantages derived from  the cruand amount of the sale at the last publication,   sades, 29.
523.
Cuba, the island of, discovered by Christopher Ferdinand, king of Castile-see Cotumbus and
Columbus, 57. Is sailed round by Ocampo, 97.   Isabella-turns his attention at length to the
The conquest of, undertaken by Diego Velas-   regulationof Americanaffairs,95. DonDiego
quez, 101.  Cruel treatment of the cazique   de Columbus sues out his father's claims
Hatuey, and his repartee to a friar, lb. Co-   against him, 97. Erects two governments on
lumbus's enthusiastic description of a harbour   the continent of America, 98. Sends a fleet
in, 453. The tobacco produced there the finest  to Darien, and supersedes Balboa, 105. Ap.
in all America, 368.                        points Balboa lieutenant-governor of the coun
Cubagua, a pearl fishery established there, 98.    tries on the South Sea, 106. Sends Dias de
Cumana, the natives of, revenge their ill treat-   Solis to discover a western passage to the Moment by the Spaniards, 118. The country de-  luccas, 108. Thwarts the measures of Diego
solated by Diego Ocampo, ib.                Columlibus, lb.  His decree concerning the
Cuzco, the capital of thePeruvian empire, founded   treatment of the Indians, 109.
by Manco Capac, 268. Is seized by Pizarro, Fernandez, Don Diego, character of his Historia'278. Is besieged by the Peruvians, 282. Is   del Peru, 495.
surprised by Almagro, 283. Is recovered and  --, P., his description of the political
pillaged by the Pizarros, 286, 287. Was thb   state of the Chiquitos, 478.
only city in all Peru, 338.               Figue'oa, Roderigo de, is appointed chief-judge
of Hispaniola, with a commission to examine
Dancing, the love of, a favourite passion among   into the treatment of the Indian natives, 113.
the Americans, 185.                         Makes an experiment to determine the capacity
Darien, the isthmus of, described, 103. The in-   of the Indians, 117.
zrease of. settlement there obstructed by the Florida, discovered by Juan Ponce de Leon, 101.
noxiousness of the climate, 345.            The chiefs there hereditary, 164. Account of,
Delaware, Lord, is appointed governor of Virgi-  fron Alvara Nugnez Cabeca de Veca, 475. -
nia, 407. His wise administration there, 409. Flota, Spanish, some account of, 372.
Is obliged to return to England on account of Fonseca, bishop of Badajos, minister for Indian
his health, lb.                             affairs, obstructs the plans of colonization and
De Solis, his unfortunate expedition up the river   discovery formed by Columbus, 72. 75. PaPlata, 108.                                 tronizes the expedition of Alonzo de Ojeda, 80...-, Antonio, character of his Historia de Friobisher, Martin, makes three unsuccessful
la Conquista de Mexico, 486.:    attempts to discover a north-east passage to
D'Esquilache, Prince, viceroy of Peru, his vi-  India, 395.
gorous measures for restraining the excesses of
the regular clergy there, 363. Rendered inef- Galeons, Spanish, the nature and purpose of
fectual, lb.                                these vessels, 372. Arrangement of their vo7Diaz, Bartholomew, discovers the Cape of Good   age, ib.
Hope, 40.                                 Galvez, Don Joseph, sent to discover the true
Discoveries, the difference between those made   state of California, 341.
by land and those by sea stated, 450.     Gama, Vasco de, his voyage for discovery, 79.
Dodswell, his objections to the Periplus of IHanno   Doubles the Cape of Good Hope, ib. Anchors
exploded, 448.                              before the city of Melinda, ib. Arrives at CaleDomingo, St., on the island of Hispaniola, found-   cut, in Malabar, lb.
ed by Bartholomew Columbus, 76, 77.       Gaming, strange propensity of the Americans
Dominicans, those in Hispaniola publicly remon    to, 187.
strate against the cruel treatment of the Indians, Ganges, erroneous ideas of the ancients as to the
109. See Las Casas.                         position of that river, 450.
Drake, Sir Francis, sails round the world, 395.  Gasca, Pedro de la, sent to Peru as president of
Dru7tkenness, strong propensity of the Americans   the Court of Audience in Lima, 304. His
to indulge in, 187.                         character and moderation, ib. The powers he
was vested with, lb. Arrives at Panama, 305
Earth, the globe of, how divided into zones by   Acqupires possession of Panama with the fleet
the ancients, 26.                           and forces there, 306.  Advances towards
Egyptians, ancient, state of commerce and na-   CutCed 307. Pizarro's troops desert to him,
vigation among them, 19.                    308.  His moderate use of the victory lb




INDEX.                                       533
Devises employment for his soldiers, 310. His Henry, prince of Portugal, his character and
division of the country among his followers,  studies, 35. Expeditions formed by his order,
311. The discontents it occasions, ib.  Re-   36. Applies for a papal grant of his new die
stores order and government, ib. His reception   coveries, 37. His death, 38.
at his return to Spain, 311, 312.         Herrada, Juan de, assassinates Francis Pizarro,
Geminus, instance of his ignorance in geogra-   292. Dies, 293.
phy, 451.                                 Herrera, the best historian of the conquest of
Geography the knowledge of, extremely confined   New Spain, 486. His account of Orellana's
among the ancients, 26. Became a favourite   voyage, 499.
study among the Arabians, 28.             Hispaniola, the island of, discovered by ChristoGiants, the accounts of, in our early travellers,   pher Columbus, 58. fIis transactions with the
unconfirmed by recent discoveries, 32. 472.  natives, ib. A colony left there by Columbus,
Glbert, Sir Humphrey, conducts the first colony   61.  The colony destroyed, 66.  Columbus
to North America, 396. A charter is granted   builds a city called Isabella, 67.'The natives
to him and his heirs, ib. Conducts another ex-  ill used, and begin to be alarmed, 70. Are depedition, which ends disastrously, and in which   feated by the Spaniards, 71. Tribute exacted
he perishes, 397.                           from them, ib. They siheme to starve the
Gioia, Flavio, the inventor of the mariner's comn-   Spaniards, 72. St. Domingo:founded by Barpass, 32                                    tholomew Columbus, 77. Columbus sent home
Globe, its division into zones by the ancients, 26.  in irons by Bovadilla, 84. Nicholas de Ovando
Gold, why the first metal with which man was   appointed governor, 85.  Summary view of
acquainted, 160. Extraordinary large grain of,  the conduct of the Spaniards towards the nafound in the mines at Cinaloa, 509.         tives of, 92. Unhappy fate of Anacoana, 94.
Gomara, character of his Cronica de la Nueva   Great produce from the mines there, ib. The
Espagna, 485.                               inhabitants diminish, 96. The Spaniards reGood Holpe, Cape of, discovered by Bartholomew-   cruit them by trepanning the natives of the
Diaz, 40.                                   Lucayos, ib. Arrival of Don Diego de ColumGosnold, Bartholomew, is the first who attempts   bus, 97, 98. The natives of, almost extirpated
to steer a direct course from England to North   by slavery, 100. 108. Controversy concerning
America, 401. Descries Massachusetts Bay,  the treatment of them, 109. Cotumbus's acandretuns toEngland,ihb. Theconsequences   count of the humane treatment he received
of his voyage, ib.                          from the natives of, 453. Curious instance of
Government, no visible form of, among the native   superstition in the Spanish planters there, 466.
Americans, 163. Exceptions, 164.          Holguin, Pedro Alvarez, erects the royal standard
aran Chsaco, account of the method of making   in Peru, in opposition to the younger Almagro,
war among the natives of, from Lozano, 479.    293. Vaca de Castro arrives, and assumes the
Graada, new kingdom of, in America, by whom    commland, 294.
reduced to the Spanish dominion, 346. Its cli- Homer, his account of the navigation of the anmate and produce, ib. A viceroy lately esta-   cient Greeks, 21, 22.
blished there, 351.                       Honduras, the value of that country, owing to
Greeks, ancient, progress of navigation and dis-  its production of the logwood tree, 341.
covery among them, 21. Their commnercial Horned cattle, amazing increase of them in Spaintercoulrse with other nations very limited, 34.   nish America, 368.
Greenland, its vicinity to North America, 136.   Horses, astonishment and mistakes of the MexiGreenville, Sir Richard, establishes a colony in   cans at the first sight of them, 489. Expedient
Virginia, which, being in danger of perishing   of the Peruvians to render them incapable of
by famine, is obliged to return to England, 398.   action, 499.
Appears off the coast-soon after the departure Huana Capac, inca of Peru, his character and
of the colony, and lands fifteen of his crew to   family, 269.
keep possession of the island, who are destroyed Huascar Capac, inca of Peru, disputes his broby the savages, 399.                        ther Atahualpa's succession to Quito, 269. Is
Gresialva, Julan de, sets out from Cuba on a voy-   defeated and taken prisoner by Atahualpa, ib.
age of discovery, 120. Discovers and gives   Solicits the assistance of Pizarro against his
name to New Spain, ib. His reasons for not   brother, q70. Is put to death by order of Ataplanting a colony in his newly discovered   hualpa, 274.
lands, 121.                               Huitchinson, Mrs., heads a sect of religious woGuarda Costas, employed by Spain to check illi-   men in New-EnglIand, who are denominated
cit trade in the American colonies, 375.    Antinomians, 439.  Her doctrines are con
Guatimala, the indigo there superior to any in   demned by a general synod there, 440.
America, 368.
Guatimozin, nephew and son-in-law of Monte- Incas of Peru, received origin of their empirezuma, succeeds -Quetlavaca in the kingdom of   268. Their empire founded' both in religionMexico, 223. Repulses the attacks of the Spa-   and policy, 331. See Peru..
niards in storming the city of Mexico, 249. Is India, the motives of Alexander the Great in his
taken prisoner by Cortes, 251. Is tortured to   expedition to,- 23. The commerce with, how
discover his treasure, 252. Is hanged, 257.  carried on in ancient times, 25; and when arts
Guiana, Dutch, cause of the excessive fertility   began to revive in Europe, 28. The first voyof the soil there, 467.                     age made round thie Cape of Good Hope, 79.
Attempts to discover a north-west passage to,
Hakluzyt, improves the naval and commercial   unsuccessful, 392. 395. An attempt made by
skill of the age in which he lived, 402. Is em-   the north-east to, 394. A company of mer
powered to settle any part of the south colony   chants in England is incorporated to prosecute
of Virginia, ib.                            discoveries in, 393. A communication witlh,
Rinno, his Periplus defended, with an account   attempted by land, 394. The design is encouof his voyage, 448..                 raged by Queen Elizabeth, 395.
Hatuey, a cazique of Cuba, his cruel treatment, Indians in Spanish America. See.imericans.
and memorable  epartee to a Franciscan friar, Indies, West, why Columbus's discoveries were
101.                                        so named, 64.
Hawkleswortlh's voyages, account of New Hol- Innocent IV., Pope, his extraordinary mission to
land, and the inhabitants from, 476.        the Prince of the Tartars, 30.
Heat, the different degrees of, in the old and new  Inquisition, court of, when and by whom first
continents accounted for, 462. Estimated, 466.  introduced into Portugal 452.




534                                    INDEX.
Insects and reptiles, why so numerous and nox-.lagellan, Ferdinand, his account of the gigantic
ious in America, 128.                         size of the Patagonians, 147. The existence
Iron, the reason why savage nations were unac-   of this gigaitic race yet to be decided, ib. Hlis
quainted with this metal, 160.                introduction to the court of Castile, 253. Is
Isabella, queen of Castile, is applied to by Juan    equipped with a squadron for a voyage of disPerez in behalf of Christopher Columbus, 48.   covery, ib. ~ Sails through the famous strait
Is again applied to by Quintanilla and Santan-   that bears his name, 254. Discovers the La
gel,-ib. Is prevailed on to equip him, 50. Dies,   drone and Philippine islands, ib. Is killed; ib.
91. Her real motives for encouraging discove- JMagnet, its property of attracting iron known to
ries in America, 349.                         the ancients, but not its polar inclination,' 18.
-,,the  city. of, in Hispaniola, built by   Extraordinary advantages resulting from this
Christopher Columbus, 67.                     discovery, 32.
Italy, the first country in Europe where civiliza- Malo, St.,' account of its commerce with SpanisL
tion and arts revived after -the overthrow of   America, 374.
the Roman empire, 29. The commercial spirit JManco Capac, founder of the Peruvian empire,
of, active and enterprising, ib.              account of, 268.,JMandeville' Sir John, his eastern travels, with e
Jamaica, discoveredby Christopher Columbus,69.   character of his writings, 31.
Jerome, St.'; three monks of that order sent by JManila,'the colony of, established by Philip II.
Cardinal Ximenes'to Hispaniola, to regulate   of Spain, 383.  Trade between, and South
the treatment of the Indians, 111. Their con-   America, lb.
duct under this commission, lb.; are recalled,.Mankinsd, their disposition and manners formed
113.                                          by their situlation, 131..: Hence resemblances to
Jesuits, acquire an absolute dominion over Cali-   be traced in very distant places without comfornia, 341. Their motives for depreciating the   munichtion, ib. Have'uniformly attained the
country, ib.                                  greatest perfection of their nature in temperate
Jews, ancient state of commerce and navigation    regions,'195.
among them, 20.                             JMausco Polo, the Venetian, his extraordinary tra
John I.', king of Portugal, the first who sent ships   vels in the East, 31.
to explore the western coast of Africa, 34. His.Mlarest, Gabriel, his account of the country beson, Prince Henry; engages in these attempts,   tween the Illinois and Michilimackinac, 477.
36..-Jlarina, Donna, a Mexican slave, her history
-- II, king of Portugal, patronises all attempts   201.
towards discoveries, 39. Sends an embassy to JMarinus, Tyrius, his erroneous position of China
Abyssinia, 41. His ungenerous treatment of   452.
Columbus, 46.                               JMartyr, Peter, his sentiments on the first discovery of America, 457.
Ladrone islands, discovered by Ferdinand Ma- JMaryland, See Virginia.
gellan, 254..Massachusetts Bay. See Jimeica,.JNVew-Eng-r
Lakes, amazing size of those in North America,   land, &c.
123.                                        JMerchants, English, the right of property in the
Las Casas, Bartholomew, returns from Hispa-   North American colonies vested in a company
niola to solicit the cause of the enslaved Indians   of, resident in London, 400.  Charters are
at the court of Spain, 110. Is sent back with   granted to two companies of, to make settle
jpowers by Cardinal Ximenes, 111. Returns   ments in America, 402. Tenor and defects of,dissatisfied, 112. Procures a new commission   these charters, 403. A new charter. is granted
to be sent over on this subject, 113. Recom-    to them, with, more ample''privileges, 407.
mends the scheme of supplying the colonies   They are divided by factions, 41.5. An inquiry
with Negroes, lb. Undertakes a new colony,   is instituted into their conduct, 416. They are
114.. His conference with the bishop of Darien   required to surrender their charter, which they
before the emperor Charles V., 115,116. Goes   refuse;'b. A writ of quo warranto is issued
to America to carry his schemes into execution,   out against them, 417. They are tried in the
116. Circumstances unfavourable to him, 117.   cotrt of King's Bench, and thecompany is
His final miscarriage, 118. Revives his repre-   dissolved, lb. Their charter is transferred to
sentations in'favour of the Indians at the de-   the colonies, 418.
sire of the emperor, 295. Composes a treatise MJestizos, in the Spanish American colonies, dison the destruction of America, 296.           tinction between them and mulattoes, 357.
Leon, Pedro Cieza de, character of his Cronica JMetals, useful, the original natives of America
del Peru, 495.                                totally unacquainted with, 160.
Lery, his description of the courage and ferocity JMezicans, their account of their own origin,
of the Toupinambos, 479.                      compared with later discoveries, 137. Their
Lima, the city of, in Peru, founded by Pizarro,   paintings few in number, and of ambiguous
281.                                          meaning, 314. Two collections of them disListon, Mr., the British minister at Madrid, his   covered, lb., note. Their language furnished
answer to several interesting inquiries relating   with respectful terminations for all its words,
to the admission of Indians into holy orders,   501. How they contributed to the support of
518.                                          government, 502. Descriptions of their histoLogwood, the commodity that gives importance   rical pictures, ib. Various exaggerated accounts
-to the provinces of, Honduras and Yucatan,   of the number of human victims sacrificed by
341. Policy of the Spaniards to defeat the   them, 506.
English trade in, 342.                      JMexico. arrival of Fernando Cortes on the coast
Louis, St., king of France, his embassy to the   of, 201.;  His interview with two Mexican offiChan of the Tartars, 31.                      cers, 202.  Information sent to Montezuma,
Lozaino, his account of the method of making   with some Spanish presonts, 203. Montezuma
war among the natives of Gran Chaco, 479.     sends presents to Cortes, with orders not to apLuque, Hernando de, a priest, associates with   proach his capital, lb. State of the empire at
Pizarro in his Peruvian expedition, 262.      that time, 204. The Zempoallans court the
friendship of Cortes, 208.  Several caziques
Jfadeilra, the island of, first discovered, 36.  enter into alliance with Cortes, 209. Character
Jladoc, prince of North Wales, story of his voy-   of the natives of Tlrscala, 21.2. -The TIascaage and discovery of North America examined,   lans reduced to sue for peace, 215. Arrival
456                                           of Cortes at the capital -,ity 218. The city




INDEX.                                         535
described, 220.  Montezuma acknowledges   Remains inflexible with legard to religion, 227.
himself a vassal to the Spanish crown, 225.   Circumstances of his death, 236. Account of
Amount of the treasure collected by Cortes, ib.   a gold cup of his in England, 502,
Reasons of gold being found in such small JMulattoes, in the Spanish American colonies
quantities, 227. The Mexicans enraged at the   explanation of this distinction, 357
imprudent zeal of Cortes, ihb.; attack Alvarado
during the absence of Cortes, 233. Their reso-.Narvaez, Pamphilo, is sent by Velasquez with
lute attack on Cortes when he returned, 235.   an armament to Mexico, to supersede Cortes.
Death of Montezuma, 236. The city aban-   229. Takes possession of Zempoalla. 231. Is
doned by Cortes, ib. Battle of Oturnba, 240.   defeated and taken prisoner by Cortes, 233.
The Tepeacans reduced, 242. Preparations of   Ilow he. carried on his correspondence with
the Mexicans against the return of Cortes, 243.   Montezuma, 491.
Cortes besieges the city with a fleet on the.Natchez, an American nation, their political in
lake, 247. The Spaniards repulsed in storming   stitutions, 164. Causes of their tame submisthe city, 249. Guatimozin taken prisoner, 251.   sion to the Spaniards, 166.  Their religious
Cortes appointed governor, 256. His, schemes   doctrines, ib.
and arrangements, 257. Inhuman treatment JNavigation, the arts of, very slowly improved
of the natives, ib.  Reception of the new    by mankind, 17. The knowledge of, prior to
regulations there, 258. List and character of   commercial intercourse, ib. Imperfections of,
those authors who wrote accounts of the con-   among the ancients, 18.  More improved by
quest of, 485. A retrospect into the form of   the invention of the mariner's compass thant
government, policy, and arts in, 313. Our in-   by all the efforts of preceding ages, 32. The
formation concerning, very imperfect, 314.   first naval discoveries undertaken by Portugal,
Origin of the monarchy, 315. Number and    33.
greatness of the cities, 316. Mechanical pro- JNegroes, their peculiar situation under the Spafes3ions there distinguished from each other,   nish dominion in America, 357. Are first in
317. Distinction of ranks, ib. Political insti-   troduced into Virginia, 412
tutions, 319. Power and solendour of their MJews England, first attempts to settle in, unsuc
monarchs, 320.  Order of government, ib.   cessfu], 426. Religious disputes give rise to
Provision for the support of it, lb. Police of,  the colony there, 427. A settlement is formed
ib.  Their arts, 321.  Their paintings, ib.   at New Plymouth in Massachusetts Bay, 432.
Their method of computing time, 323. Their   Plan of its government, ib. All property is
wars continual and ferocious, 324. Their fu-   thrown into a. common stock, 433. - A grand
neral rites, ib. Imperfection of their agricul-   council is appointed, lb. A new colony is proture, lb. Doubts concerning the extent of the   jected at Massachusetts Bay, and a charter
empire, 325.  Little intercourse among its   granted for its establishment, 434. Its settleseveral provinces, ib. Ignorance of money,   ment there, 435. A new church is instituted
326. State of their cities, ib. Temples and   there, ib. Its intolerance,436. Charterofthe
other public buildings, lb. Religion of, 329.   English company of merchants in L( ndon is
Causes of tile depopulation of this country,   transferred to the colonies, ib.  The colony
347.  The small-pox very fatal there, 348.   at Massachusetts Bay extends, 437. None but
Number of Indian natives remaining there,   members of the church are admitted as free350. Description of the aqueduct for the sup-   men there, lb. Bad consequences of this regu
ply of the capital city, 502. See Colonies.  lation, 438. The settlement increases, and the
Michael, St., the gulf of, in the South Sea, dis-   assembly is restricted to the representatives of
covered and named by Balboa, 104.  The   freemen, lb.  Extent of political liberty ascolony of, established by Pizarro, 268.       sumed by the assembly, lb. Spirit of fanatiAkigs'ations of mankind, why first made by land,   cism spreads in the colony, 439. New settlers
17.                                           arrive, and the doctrines of the Antinomians
Jtind, human, the efforts of it proportioned to   are condemned by a general synod, 440. Sectathe wants of the body, 151.                   ries settle in Providence and Rhode Island, lb.
Jines of South America, the great inducement   Theological contests give rise to the colony of
to population, 340.  Some account of, 366.   Connecticut, 441. Emigrants from Massachu
Their produce, lb. The spirit with which they   setts Bay settle in Connecticut, ib. The Dutch,
are worked, 367. Fatal effects of this ardour,   who had established a few trading towns on
ib. Evidence of the pernicious effects of la-   the river there, peaceably withdraw, lb. Setbouring in them, 514. Of Mexico, total pro-   tl6ments are formed in the provinces of New
duce of, to the Spanish revenue, 523, 524.    Hampshire and Maine, 442. Further encroach-.l~olucca islands, the Spanish claims on, sold by   ments of the English are resisted by the natives,
the emperor Charles V. to the Portuguese, 255.   lb. War with thePequod tribes is commenced,.Monastic institutions, the pernicious effects of,   443. Purification of the army, lb. The Inin the Spanish American colonies, 361. Num-   dians are defeated, lb.  Cruelties exercised
ber of convents there, 515.                   against them, 444. Emigrations from England.Monsoons, the periodical course of, when disco-   to the colonies are prohibited by proclamation,
vered by navigators, 25.                      lb. Colony of Massachusetts Bay is sued at,Monetesiswo, a Dominican preacher at St. Domingo,   law. and found to have forfeited its rights, lb.
publicly remonstrates against the cruel treat-   Confederacy of the States in, 445. See Coloment of the Indians, 109.                     nies.
A.Iontezuma, the first intelligence received by the.Newofoundland, its situation described, 462. Dise
Spaniards of this prince, 121. Receives intel-   covery of, by Cabot, 390.
ligence of the arrival of Fernando Cortes in lNewe Holland, some account of the country and
his dominions, 203. His presents to Cortes, lb.   inhabitants, 476.
Forbids him to approach his capital, lb. State.New Plymouth, settlement at, 432. See Coloof his empire at this time, 204. His character,   12ies, N.ew England.
lb. His perplexity at the arrival of the Spa-.JNew Spaisn, discovered and named by Juan de
niards, lb. His timid negotiations with Cortes,   Grijalva, 120. See JIcxico.
206. His scheme for destroying Cortes at Cho- Nigno, Alonso, his voyage to America, 81.
lula discovered, 217. His irresolute conduct,.Nezoregians, might in ancient times have mil
218. His first interview with Cortes, 219. Is   grated to and colonized America, 136.
seized by Cortes, and confined to the Spanish.JNulinez Vela, Blasco, appointed viceroy of Peru,
quarters, 223. Is fettered, 224. Acknowledges   to enforce the new regulations, 297. His cha.
himself a vassal to the Spanish crown,.225    racter, 299. CommitsVaca de Castro to prison,




536                                    IN DEX.
ib. Dissensions between him and the Court of   kingdom divided between Huascar and Ata
Audience, 300. Is confined, ib. Recovers his   hualpa, 269.'Atahualpa usurps the govern.
liberty, 301. Resumes his command, ib. Is   ment, ib.  Huascar solicits assistance from
pursued by Gonzalo Pizarro, ib. Is defeated   Pizarro, 270. Atahualpa visits Pizarro, 272.
and killed by Pizarro, 302.                   Is seized by Pizarro, 273. Agreement for his
ransom,-ib. Is refused his liberty, 275. Is
Ocampo,. Diego, sent with a squadron from His-   cruelly put to death, 277. Confusion of the
paniola to desolate the country of Cumana,   empire on this event, ib. Quito reduced by
117.                                          Benalcazar, 278, 279.  The city of Lima
--. —, Sebastian de, first sails round Cuba,   founded by Pizarro, 281.  Chili invaded -by
and discovers it to be an island, 97.         Almagro, ib. Insurrection of the Peruvians,
Ocean, though adapted to facilitate the inter-   282. Almagro put to death by Pizarro, 287.
course between distant countries, continued   Pizarro divides the country among his follow
long a formidable barrier, 17.  See Compass   ers, 288. Progress of the Spanish arms there,
and N'avigation.                              289. Francis Pizarro assassinated, 292. ReOjeda, Alonzo de, his private expedition to the   ception of the new regulations there, 297, 298.
West Indies) 83. His second voyage, 85. Ob-   The viceroy confined by the court of audience.
tains a government on the continent, 98, 99.  300. The viceroy defeated and killed by Gon
Olrmedo, Father Bartholomew  de, checks the   zalo Pizarro, 302.  Arrival of Pedro de la
rash zeal of Cortes at Tlascala in Mexico, 216.   Gasca, 306. Reduction and death of Gonzalo
Is sent by Cortes to negotiate with Narvaez,   Pizarro, 308. The civil wars there not carried
23M                                           on with mercenary soldiers, 309. But neverrellana, Prancis, is appointed to the command   theless gratified with immense rewards, lb.
of a bark built by Gonzalo Pizarro, and deserts   Their profusion and luxury, lb. Ferocity of
him, 290. Sails down the Maragnon, ib. Re-   their contests, 310. Their want of faith, lb.
turns to Spain with a report of wonderful dis-   Instances, ib. Division of, by Gasca, among
coveries, ib. Herrera's account of his voyage,   his followers, 311. Writers who gave accounts
499.                                          of the conquest of, 493. A retrospect into the
Orgognez, commands Almagro's party against   original government, arts, and manners of the
the Pizarros, and is defeated and: killed by   natives, 313. The high antiquity they pretend
them, 286.                                    to, 329. Their records, 330. Origin of their
Orisnoco, the great river of, discovered by Chris-   civil policy, ib. This founded in religion, 331
topher Columbus, 76.  Strange method of   The authority of the incas absolute and un
choosing a captain among the Indian tribes on   limited, ib.  All crimes:were punished capi
the banks of, 173. T'he amazing plenty of fish   tally, 332.  Mild genius of their religion, ib.
in, 475.                                      Its influence on their civil policy, ib.; and on
Otaheite, the inhabitants of, ignorant of the art  their military system, 333. Peculiar state of
of boiling water, 482.                        property there, lb. Distinction of ranks, 334.
Otumba, battle of, between Cortes and the Mexi-   State of arts, ib. Improved state of agriculcans, 239, 240.  ture, lib. Their buildings, 335. Their public
Ovando, Nicholas de, is sent governor to Hispa-   roads, ib. Their bridges, 336. Their mode of
niola, 85. His prudent regulations, lb. Re-   refining silver ore, 337. Works of elegance,
fuses admission to Columbus, on his fourth   ib.  Their civilization, nevertheless, but imvoyage, 87. His ungenerous behaviour to Co-   perfect, 338. Cuzco the only place that had'umbus on his shipwreck, 89, 90. Receives   the appearance of a city, ib. No perfect sepaaim at length, and sends him home, 91. En-   ration of professions, ib. Little commercial
gages in a war with the Indians, 93. His cruel   intercourse, ib.  Their unwarlike spirit, ib.
treatment of them, ib. Encourages cultivation   Eat their flesh and fish raw, 339. Brief acand'r tr:f factltres, 95. His method of trepan-   count of other provinces under the viceroy of
ning the natives of the Lucayos, 96. Is re-   New Spain, lb. Causes of the depopulation
called, 97.                                   of this country, 347. The small-pox very fatal
there, 348.  Their method of building, 508.
Pacific Ocean, why and by whom so named, 254.   State of the revenue derived from, by the
Packet boats, first esta...lient of, between    crown of Spain, 520. See Colonies.
Spain and her American tc.t.ineeo, 378.     Peter I., czar of Russia, his extensive views in
Panama, is settled by Pedrarias Davila, 107.    prosecuting Asiatic discoveries, 133.
Parmenides, the first who divided the earth by Philip It. of Spain, his turbulent disposition aided
zones, 451.                                   by his American treasures, 369. Establishes
Patagonians, some account of, 147. The reality   the colony of -Manila, 383.'of their gigantic size yet to be decided, 472.    Philip III., exhausts his country by inconsiderate
Pedrarias Davila, is sent with a fleet to super-   bigotry, 370.
sede Balboa in his government of Santa Maria Philippine Islands, discovered by Ferdinand Maon the isthmus of Darien, 105. Treats Balboa   gellan, 254.  A colony established there by
il, 106. Rapacious conduct of his men, lb.   Philip II. of Spain, 383. Trade between, and
Is reconciled to Balboa, and gives him  his   America, ib.
daughter, 107. Puts Balboa to death, ib. Re- Phanicians, ancient state of commerce and na
moves his settlement from Santa Maria to Pa-   vigation among them, 19. Their trade, how
nama, lb.                                     conducted, 448.
Penguin, the name of that bird not derived from  Physic, the art of, in America, why connected
the Welsh language, 456.                      with divination, 184.
Perez, Juan, patronizes Columbus at the court Pinto, Chevalier, his description of the charac.
of Castile, 48. His solemn invocation for the   teristic features of the native Americans, 470.
success of Columbus's voyage, 52.           Pinzon, Vincent Yanez, commands a vesse
Periplus of Hanno, the authenticity of that work   under Columbus in his first voyage of disco
justified, 448.                               very, 51. Sails to America on a private ad
Peru, the first intelligence concerning this country   venture with four ships, 81. Discovers Yuca
received by Vasco Nugnez de Balboa, 104.   tan, 97.
The coast of, first discovered by Pizarro, 264. Pizarro, Ferdinand, is besieged in Cuzco by the
Pizarro's second arrival, 267. His hostile pro-   Peruvians, 282. Is surprised there by Almagro,
ceedings against the natives, ib. The colony   283. Escapes with Alvarado 285.  Defends
of St. Michael established, 268. State of the   his brother at the court of Spain, 2838  Is
empire at the time of this invasion, ib. The   committed to prison, lb.




INDEX.                                         537
Pizarro, Francisco, attends Balboa in his settle- Portuguese, a view of the circumstances that
ment on the isthmus of Darien, 100. Marches'  induced them  to undertake the discovery of
under him across the.isthmus, where they dis-   unknown countries, 33. First African discocover the South Sea, 103. His birth, education,   veries of, 34.' Madeira discovered, 36. They
and character, 261. Associates with Alnagro   double Cape Bojador, ib. Obtain a papal grant
and De Luque in a voyage of discovery. 262.   of all the countries they should discover, 38.
His ill success, ib. Is recalled, and deserted by   Cape Verd islands and the Azores discovered,
most of his followers,'263, 264. Remains on   ib.  Voyage to the East Indies by Vasco de
the island-of Gorgona for supplies, 264. Dis-   Gama, 79.
covers the coast of Peru, ib. Returns to Pa- Potosi, the rich silver mines there, how disconama, 265. Goes to Spain to solicit reinforce-   vered, 366. The mines. of, greatly exhausted,
ments, lb.  Procures the supreme command   and scarcely worth working, 519.
for himself, 266.  Is assisted with money by Prisoners- of war, how treated by the: native
Cortes, lb.  Lands again in Peru, 267. His   Americans, 170.
hostile proceediings against the natives, lb. Property, the idea of, unknown to the native
Establishes the colony of St. Michael, 268.   Americans, 161.  Notions of the Brasilians
State of the Peruvian empire' at this'time, lb.   concerning, 477.
Cause of his easy penetration into the country, Protector of the Indians in Spanish. America, his
270. Is applied to by Huascar for assistance   function, 359.
against his victorious brother Atahualpa, lb. Ptolemjy, the philosopher, his geographical deState of his forces, ib. Arrives at Caxamalca,   scriptions more ample and exact than those of
271. Is visited by the inca, 272. His perti-   his predecessors, 27. HisGeography translated
dious seizure of him, 273. Agrees to Atahu-   by the Arabians, 28. His erroneous position
alpa's offer for his ransom, ib. Division of   of the Ganges, 449.
their plunder, 274.   Refuses Atahualpa his
liberty, 275. His ignorance exposed to Atahu-  Quetlavaca, brother: of Montezuma, succeeds
alpa, 276. Bestows a form of trial on the inca,   him as king of Mexico, 243. Conducts in perib.  Puts him  to death, 277.  Advances to   son the fierce attacks which oblige Cortes to
Cuzco, 278. Honours conferred on him by the   abandon his capital, lb. Dies ofe the smallSpanish court, 280. Beginning of dissensions    pox, ib.
between him and Almagro, ib. His civil regu- Quevedo, bishop of Darien, his conference with
lations, ib.  Founds the city of Lima, 281.   Las Casas on the treatment of the Indians, in
Insurrection of the Peruvians 282; 283. Cuzco   the presence of the emperor Charles V., 115.
seized by Almnagro, 284. Deiudes Almagro by  Qicksilver, the property of the famous mines of,
negotiations, 285. Defeats Almagro, and takes   at Guanacabelica, reserved by the crown of
him: prisoner, 286. Puts Almagro to death,   Spain, 519.' The price of, why reduced, 520.
287. Divides the country among his followers, Quinquina, or Jesuits' Bark, a production petu288, 289. -The impolitic partiality of his allot-  liar to Peru, 368.
ments, ib. Makes his brother Gonzalo governor Quipos, or historic cords of the Peruvians, some.
of Quito, 289.  Is assassihated'-by Juan de   account of, 330.
Herreda, 292.''                   Quito, the kingdom  of,- conquered by Huana: —, Gonzalo, is nIadoe govermor of Quito    Capac, inca of. Peru, 269. Is left to his son
by his brother Francis, 289. Ilis expedition    Atahualpa, ib.  Atahuialpa's general revolts
over the Andes, ib' Is deserted by Orellana,   after his' death, 278. Is - reduced by the Spar
290. His distress on this event, lb. His disas-   niards under Benalcazar, 278, 279. Benalcazar
trous return to Quito, 291. Is encouraged by   deposed, and Gonzalo Pizarro made governor
the people to oppose Nugnez Vela, the new    289,                        o  a   gvro
viceroy, 299.  Assumes the government of
Peru, 301. Marches'against the viceroy, 302. Raleigh, resumes the plan of settling colonies.in
Defeats and kills him, lb. Is advised by Car-   North America, 397.'DespatchesAmadas and
vajal to asure n'  e sovereignty of the country,    Barlow to examine the intended settlements,
ib.  Chooses Lo negotiate with the court of   who discoverVirginia, and retuirntoEngland,
Spain, 303. Consultations of the court on his   397, 398.  Establishes a colony in Virginia,
conduct, lb.  His violent resolutions on the: which, on account of famine, is obliged to rearrival of Pedro de la Gasca, 305. Resolves   turn to England, 398, 399.  Makes, a.second
to oppose him by violence, 306. Marches to   attempt to settle a colony there, which perishes
reduce Centeno at Cuzco, 307. Defeats him,   by famine, 400. Abandons. the design, lb.
ib.  Is deserted by his'troops on the approach  Ramusio, his defence of Hanno's account.of the
of Gasca, 308. Surrenders,'and is executed,   coast' of Africa, 448.
ib  His adherents men of no principle, 309.    Register ships, for what purpose. introduced in
Plata, Rio de, discovered by Dias de Soils, 108.   the trade'between Spain and her colonies, 376.
Its amazing width, 461.                       Supersede the' use of the galeons, lb.
Playfair, Mr., professor of mathematics in Edin-:Religion of the native Amnericans an inquiry
burgh, the result of his comparison  of. the nar-  into,'179..       l
rative and charts given in'Captain Cook's:Ribas, his. account of the political state of the
voyages, published in 1780, and Mr. Coxes   people of Cinaloa, 481. Of their want of reltaccount of the Russian discoveries, printed in   gion, 483.
the same year, in which the vicinity of the two Rio de la Plata and Tucuman, account of those
continents of Asia and America is clearly as-   provinces, 343.
certained, 468, 469.'     Rivers, the amazing size of those in America, 123.
Pliny, the naturalist, instance of his ignorance in  Robinson, Professor, his remarks on the temperageography, 451.                               ture of various climates, 462.
Pance de'Leon, Juan, discovers. Florida, 101. Roldan, Francis, is left chief.justice in.Hispaniola
Romantic motive of his voyage, lb.''by Christopher Columbus, 73.. Becomes. the
Population of. the earth, slow progress of, 17.  ringleader of a mutiny, 77. Submits, 78.
Poeto' Bello, discovered and named by Christo- Romans, their progress in navigation and. disco-'pher Columbus, 88.                            very, 24.'Their military spirit averse-to mePorto Rico, is settled and subjected by. Juan    chanical arts and.commerce, lb.'Navigation
Ponce de Leon, 97...            1  and trade favoured in the provinces under their
Porto Santo, the first discovery of, 36.        government, 24 25. Their extensive discovePortugal, when and by whom the court of In-   ries by land, 27. Their empire and the sciences
quisition was first introduced into, 452.     destroyed together, ib.
VoL. I.-68




5638                                   INDEX.
Rubruquis, Father, his embassy from France to  Toupinambos, accountof their ferocious courage,
the Chan of the Tartars. 31.                  from Lery, 479.
Russia, a trade to, opened by the English, 393. Trade, no efforts made in England to extend it
Restricted to a company of British merchants,   in the reign of Henry VII. or his immediate
ib. The connection with the Russian empire   successors, 391. To what causes that neglect
encouraged by Queen Elizabeth, 395.           was owing, lb,
Russians, Asiatic discoveries made by them, 134. -, free, opened between Spain and her coloUncertainty of, 467.                          nies, 378. Increase of the Spanish customs
from this measure, 522.
Sacotecas, the rich silver mines there, when dis-   winds, the periodical course of, when diecovered, 366.                                 covered by navigators, 25.
San Salvador, discovered and named by Chris- Travellers, ancient, character of their writings
topher Columbusi 56.                          31 32,
Sancho, Don Pedro, account of his history of the  Trinidad, the island of, discovered by Christopher
conquest of Peru, 495.                        Columbus on his third voyage, 76.
Sandoval, the shocking barbarities executed by, Tucuman and Rio de la Plata, account of those
in Mexico, 257.                               provinces, 343..-...-  -—, Francisco Tello de, is sent by the  Tyre, the commerce of that city, how conducted,
emperor Charles V. to Mexico, as visitador of   448.
America, 297. His moderation and prudence,
ib.                                         Ulloa, Don Antonio de, his description of the
Savage life, a general estimate of, 189.        characteristic features of the native AmeriScalps, motive of the native Americans for taking   cans, 479. His reason for the Americans not
them from their enemies, 479.                 being so sensible of pain as the rest of manSerralvo, Marquis de, h.s extraordinary gains   kind, 480. His account of the goods exported
during his viceroyalty in Ameri, 526.         from Spain to America, with the duty on them,
Seville, extraordinary increase:of its manufac-   525.
tures by the)'Amnerican trade, 520. Its trade
greatly reduced, lb. The American trade re- Vaca de Castro, Christoval, is sent from Spain
moved to Cadiz, 371.                          to regulate the government of Peru, 288. ATSilver ore, method of retfning it practised by the   rives at Quito, 293.  Assumes the supreme
native Peruvians, 337.                        authority, ib.'Defeats young Almagro, 294.
Small-pox, Indian territories depopulated by; 438.   The severity of his proceedings, ib.: Prevents
Sonora, late discoveries of rich mines made there   an insurrection concerted to oppose the' new
by the Spaniards, 340.                        regulations, 298. Is imprisoned by the new
Soul, American ideas of the immortality of,   viceroy, 299.
183.                                        Valver-de, Father Vincent, his curious harangue
South Sea, first discovered by Vasco Nugnez de   to Atahualpa, inca of Peru, 272. Gives his
Balboa, 104.                                  sanction to the trial and condemnation of AtaSpain, general idea of the policy of, with regard   hualpa, 277.
to the American colonies, 350. Early interpo- Vega, Garcilasso de in, character of his comsition of the regal authority in the colonies, ib.   mentary on the0 Spanish writers concerning
All the American dominions of, subjected to   Peru, 495.
two viceroys, 352. A third viceroyalty lately  Vegetables, their natural tendency to fertilize the
established, lb.  The colonies of, compared   soil where they grow, 129.
with those of Greece and Rome, 354. Advan-  Velasquez, Diego de, conquers the island of Cuba,
tages she derived from her colonies, 369. Why    100. 118. His preparations for invading New
she does not still derive the same, lb. Rapid   Spain, 197. His difficulty in choosing a comdecline of trade, 370. This decline increased   mander for the expedition, lb. -Appoints Ferby the mode of regulating the intercourse with   nando Cortes, 198. His motives to this choice,
America, lb. Employs gularda costas to check   lb. Becomes suspicious of Cortes, 199.'Orders
illicit trade, 375. The use of register ships in-   Cortes to be deprived of his commission, and
troduced, 376. Establishment of the company   arrested, lb. Sends an armament to Mexico
of Caraccas, 377. Enlargement of commercial   after Cortes, 228.
ideas there, ib.'Free trade permitted to several Venegas, P., his character of the native Califorprovinces, 378. Revenue derived from Ame-   nians, 474.
rica, 384. Specification, 523.              Venereal disease, originally brought from AmeSpaniards, their curious form of taking posses-   rica, 148.  Appears to be wearing out, 149.
sion of newly discovered countries, 459.      Its first rapid progress, 472.
Strabo, a citation from, proving the great geo- Venszuela, history of that settlement, 345.
graphical ignorance of the ancients, 449. His Venice, its origin as a maritime state, 29. Travels
own want of geographical knowledge, 451.      of Marco Polo, 31.
Superstition always connected with a desire of Verd Islands, discovered by the Portuguese, 38.
penetrating into the secrets of futurity, 184.    Viceroys, all the Spanish dominions in America
subjected to two, 351.  A third lately estaTapia, Christoval de, is sent from Spain to Mex-   blished, lb. Their powers, lb. A fourth estaico, to supersede Cortes in his command, but   blished, 380.
fails in the attempt, 256.                  Villa, Segnor, his account of the state of popuTartars, the possibility of their migrating to   lation in New Spain, 511. His detail of the
America, 1.35.                                Spanish American revenue, 523.
Tithes of Spanish America, how applied by the  Villefagna, Antonio, one of Cortes's soldiers,
court of Spain, 524.                          foments a mutiny among his troops, 245. Is
Tlascala, in Mexico, character of the natives of,   discovered by Cortes and hanged, lb.
213. Oppose the passage of the Spaniards, lb. Virsginia, first discovery of, 398.  Attempt to
Are reduced to sue for neace, 214, 215.       settle there unsuccessful, 398, 399. A second
Tobacco, that of Cuba the best flavoured of any    attempt to settle there, when the colony perin all America, 368. The use of, first intro-   ishes by famnine, 400. The scheme of settling
duced into England, 399. Culture of, in Vir-  there abandoned, lb. Is divided into two cologinia, and its consequences, 411. Its exporta    nie.-, 402. Charters are granted to two corn
tion thence is annually increased, 412. Trade   panies to make settlements in, lb.  Captair
for, opened with Holland, 413. Grahts and   Newport sails from England to, and discovers
monopoly of, 418, 419.                        the Chesapeak, 404. He proceeds up Jamet




INDEX                                        539
river, and founds a colony in Jamestown, ib.   John Harvey, the governor, and send him pri
Its bad administration, ib. Captain Smith is  soner to England, 419. He is released by the
excluded from his seat at the council board,   king, and reinstated in his government, lb. Is
405. The colony is annoyed by the Indians,  succeeded by Sir John Berkeley, whose wise
and suffers from scarcity and the unhealthiness'administration is productive of the best effects,
of the climate, ib. Smith:is recalled, and the   ib. New privileges are granted to the colony,
prosperity of the colony restored, ib. He is   which flourishes under the new government,
taken prisoner by the Indians, his life spared,   420. It is attacked by the Indians, 423. Dis
and his liberty obtained through the interces-   contents are produced by grants of land from
sion of'the favourite daughter of an Indian   the crown, ib. An insurrection breaks out,
chief, 405, 406. Returns to Jamestown, and   and the governor and council are forced to fly,
finds the colony in distress, 406. The colonists  424. They apply to England for succour, 425.
are deceived by the,appearance of gold, ib. A    The rebellion is terminated by the death of
survey of the country is undertaken by Smith;   Nathaniel Bacon, ib. The governor is reinib. The company obtains a new charter with   stated, and an assembly called, ib. The momore ample privileges, 407. The jurisdiction   deration of its proceedings, ib. General state
of the council in, is abolished, and the govern-   of the colony till the year 1688, 426.  See
ment vested in a council resident in London,   Colonies.
ib. Lord Delaware is appointed governor and Volcanos, remarkable number of, in the northern
captain-general of the colony, and Sir Thomas   parts of the globe, discovered by the Russians
Gates and Sir George Summers are vested with   467.
the command till his arrival, ib. The vessel
in which they embark is stranded on the coast Wafer, Lionel, his account of a peculiar race of
of Bermudas, ib. Smnith returns to England,   diminutive Americans, 146. Compared with
and anarchy prevails in the colony, 408. The   similar productions in Africa, ib.
Indians withhold supplies, and the colony is War song of the native Americans, the sentireduced by famine, ib. Gates and Summers   ments and terms of, 479.
arrive from Bermudas, and find the colony in  WPilloughby, Sir Hugh, sails in search of a north
a desperate situation, ib. They are about to   east passage to India, 393. Steers along the
return to England, when Lord Delaware ar-   coast of Norway, and doubles the North Cape,
rives, 409. He reconciles all differences, and   ib. His squadron is separated in a storm, and
perfectly restores subordination, ib. Is obliged   his ship driven into an obscure harbour in Rusto resign the government, and return to Eng-   sian Lapland, where he and all his companions
land on account of his health, lb. Is super-   are frozen to death, ib.
seded by Sir Thomas Dale, who establishes  Women, the condition of, among the nativeAmemartial law, ib. Another charter is granted   ricans, 153, 154. Are not prolific, 154. Are
to the colony, with new privileges, 410. The   not permitted to join in their drunken feasts,
land is cultivated, and a treaty concluded with   188. Nor to wear ornaments, 481.
the Indians, ib. Rolfe, a man of rank in the
colony, marries the daughter of an Indian Xerez, Francisco de, secretary to Pizarro, the
chief, ib. The land first becomes property,   earliest writer on his Peruvian expedition, 495
411. The culture of tobacco is introduced, lb. Ximenes, Cardinal, his regulations for the treatThe quantity exported increases every year,   ment of the Indians in the Spanish colonies,
412. Negroes are first introduced, lb. A geo   111.  Patronizes the attempt of Ferdinand
neral assembly of representatives is formed,   Magellan, 253.
ib. A new constitution is given to the colony,
and a trade for tobacco opened with Holland, Yucatan, the province of, discovered by Pinzon
413. Thenecessary precautions for the defence   and Dias de Solis, 97.  Described, 460, -161.
of the colony being neglected, a general mas-   From whence that province derives its value,
sacre of the English is planned by the Indians,   342. Policy of the court of Spain with respect
and executed in most of the settlements, 413,  to, lb.
414. A bloody war is commenced with the
Indians, 414. Their plantations are attacked, Zarate, Don Augustine, character of his History
and the owners murdered, 415. A few escape   of the Conquest of Peru, 495.
to the woods, where they perish with hunger, Zones, the earth how divided into; by the geolb. The settlements extend, and industry re-   graphy of the ancients, 26. By whom first so
vives, ib. The strength of the colony is consi-  divided, 451.
derably weakened, 418. A temporary council Zummaraga, Juan de, first bishop of Mexico,
bi appointed for its government, ib. The arbi-  the destroyer of all the ancient records of the
trary government of the colonies on the acces-   Mexican empire, 314.
sioi of Charles I., ib. The colonists seize Sir








QUESTIONS
FOR THE
EXAMINATION OF STUDENTS.
BY JOHN FROST, A.DL








QUESTIONS
FOR
EXAMINATION OF STUDENTS
IN
ROBERTSON'S HISTORY OF AMERICA..B. —Thefigures prefxed to each paragraph refer to the pages of Harper's stereotype
edition oJ Robertson's History of America.
B OOK  I.                   leaders? —Describe the voyage of Hanno. —
Page 17..                 Of Himlico.
Was the earth rapidly peopled 7 —what 9c-                 Page 21.
casioned the first dispersion of the human    Describe the voyage  said to have been ac..
race?-How were the early migrations made' complished by a Phoenician fleet fitted out by
-Were navigation and slhip-building rapidly  Necho. —Who else is said to have accom
perfected?-How is their early imperfection  plished the same? —Are these accounts well
proved?-From  what era must we date the authenticated? —Why did the Phoenician and
origin of commerce?                         Carthaginian voyagers conceal their disco.
veries? —When did the memorials of their
Page 18.                  naval skill perish?-Did the Greeks and RoWhat is the first species of commerce r- mans learn navigation and commerce from the
Give some account of its progress.-What Phoenicians and Carthaginians?-What was
besides conquest became a motive for longa the first object among the early Grecian voyavoyages?-Of what did trade become a great gers?-What was the extent of the famous
source?-Did navigation advance as rapidly  expedition of the Argonauts1-What is the
as commerce?-Before the discovery of the modern name of the Euxine Sea?-Had navimariner's compass how far were voyages ex- gation advanced much in Homer's time?
tended? —Were voyages longer than at present — At what season were they undertaken?                 Page 22?
Describe the ships of the early Greeks.-To
Page 19.                  what rank among maritime nations did th
Where did the Egyptians open a commerce? ancient Greeks afterward arrive?-What sort
-What seas were crossed in these voyages I-  of vessels were used in the Persian war?By what route were their commodities brought How far did the ancient Grecian commerce
froi India to Egypt?-What change took extend?-With whom was their chief inter
place' in the character of the Egyptians? — course?-What places did they occasionally
Where is Egypt?-What other ancient nation visit?-Which way from Greece is Asia Mino
was devoted to commerce?-Where was an- or Lesser Asia?-Italy? —Sicily?-The Euxcient Phcenicia? —What were its commercial ine?-The Hellespont?-What example of the
cities?-Which way is it from Tyre to Egypt? ignorance of the' Greeks is quoted? —Iow far
-At what did the Phcenicians aim. —What did the geographical knowledge of the Greeks
places did their ships visit?-Where are tie extend?-Of what facts were they ignoranit
Straitsbf Gades?-What is the modern name?
-Did the Phoenicians plant colonies!-Where                 Page 23.
did they acquire commodious harbours?-With    What expedition enlarged the geographical
what countries did they establish a regular in- knowledge of the Greeks?-What commercial
tercourse? —Under what lkings did the Jews republic was among the conquests of Alex
direct their attention to commerce? —How did ander?-After reducing Tyre and Egypt what
they obtain a share of the Phoenician com- plan did he form?-What city did he found
mnerce                                     -Where?-With what design?-What was
the consequence of its situation?-Whither
Page 20.                  did he conduct his army by land?-How far
Where is Idumea? —Where is Palestinel- into India did he advance?-What did he re.
Which way from Phcenicia?-Which way are solve to examine?-By what communication
Tyre and Sidon from Jerusalem?-Whither did he design to furnish his Asiatic dominions
did Solomon send fleets?-Where were prob- with the commodities of the East?-How did
ably the places called Ophir and Tarshish? he design to distribute them to the rest of thE
-Did the Jews long continue commerce 7- world?-Whom did he send to survey the Per.
Did they improve navigation or extend dis- sian Gulf? —Was this justly considered a grea
covery?-Who were the descendants of the undertaking.
Phoenicians?-Where was ancient Carthage?
-Did the Carthaginians inherit the commer-                  Page 24.
cial spirit?-What countries did their voyagers   In executing it, what surprising discovery
visit in the north-west?-What countries in was made?-How was it regarded? —HoW
the south? —How far south did they sail?-  long did the voyage last 1-Was the navigation
What islands did they discover 1-Did they  to Undia by this course continued! —Who were
undertake voyages of discovery?-Under what A wched afterward by the Indian trade of




544                                QU ESTIONS.
Alexandria?-What progress did the Romans                   Page 31.
make in navigation and discovery? —Why was   What induced St. Louis to send a mission
this?-What made them first aim at maritime to Tartary?-Who were sent?-What was
power?-For what purpose was this power the result? —Who was Marco Polo?-When
used?-Did the Romans ever become a com- did he flourish?-Under whose protection did
mercial people? —In whose hands did their he travel?-How long? —What countries becommerce remain? —Was it well protected  fore unknown did he visit?-What Englishand profitable? —What improved under it?    man visited the same countries' —When?Page 25.                  Where is Pekin?-Japan?
What fact was observed in the Indian                      Page 32.
ocean?-What use was made of this obser-   What was the character of the narratives
vation? —What was the utmost limit of the of these travellers?-oWhat was their effect
Roman navigation? —How  far did travellers on the public?-What important discovery
probably penetrate by land?-What amount was made at this time?-What use did naviof money was drawn annually from Rome by gators make of it?-Who was the author of
the Indian trade?-What number of ships an- the discovery?-What injustice did he suffer?
nually sailed from the Arabian Gulf to India? -Why was not the discovery immediately
— How was the knowledge of remote countries used for the purpose of malking distant disobtained in ancient times?-What countries of coveries.
Europe were conquered by the Romans I
Page 26.                                   Page 33.
In Africa?-In Asia?-Of what countries i    How long time elapsed before it was used
Europe were the ancient Romans ignorant?- for discovery?-For what purposes did the
In Africa? —In Asia!3-What did the ancients Spaniards first visit the Canaries3 —Where
believe concerning the Zones?-By what class are they?-To whom did Clement VI. give
of people was this theory held?-What conse- them?-By  what right 3-Who   conquered
fuences follow from this theory?       them.-How far had navigation advanced at
the begiining of the fifteenth century?-What
Page 27.                  kingdom first roused that spirit of curiosity
What other extravagant theory did the an- and enterprise which led to the discovery of
cients believe?-What does this theory prove? the New World?-Who was trained in this
-Who brought geography to its highest point school?
among the ancients?-When did he flourish,                  Page 34.
and what did he publish 3?-Did geographical
knowledge decline after Ptolemy's time?-    What had raised the military spirit 
What city became first in point of commerc   terprie of the Portuguese  -When did John
-What was the consequence of the fall of the   become k    f Portugal I-What was his
eharacter?-For what did he equip a fleet and
Roman empire?-What was the first effect of caracter-For what did he equip a fleet and
the settlement of the barbarous nations in the-Whither did he send ships for
south of Europe?                           discovering new  regions?-What may we
date from this? —What had been the former
Page 28.                  boundary of the Portuguese voyagers-2
Did geographical science nearly perish in
the wreck of the Roman empire?-Did com-                    Page 35.
merce?-What prevented commerce from    What was the literary character of the Por
ceasing altogether?-How far did the trade of tuuese in the fifteenth century?-How far did
Constantinople extend? —After the conquest their discoverers go in the firstvoyage!-What
of Egypt by the Arabians, how were commodi- was the character of Henry duke of -Viseo?ties conveyed from India to Constantinople?  Where. did he fix his residence?-For what
-How did the Arabians acquire a fondness purpose?-To what sources of iliformation
for geographical science?-Did they advance did he apply?-Whom  did he engage in his
the science? —Where is Arabia?-Which way  service 3
from Egypt?                                                Pae 36.
Page 29.                    Describe his first effort?-What island did
What country first began to recover from  Zarco and Vaz discover? —What was done
the desolation and barbarism occasioned by  next year?-Describe the settlement of MIthe fall of the Roman empire!-What hap- deira and its consequences?-Who first doupened to the Italian cities!-What was the bled Cape Bojador? —When I
consequence?-What foreign city became the                  P
chief mart of the Italians? —At what other
cities did they purchase the commodities of   What further discoveries'did the Portuguese
the East?-Where is Alepo? —Tripoli i    make towards the south of Africa! —Where is
Syria?-IHow were the goods conveyed from  the river Senegal? —In what latitude3 —Tn
India to these ports?-To what port of Egypt what latitude is Cape Blanco?-Cape Verd?did the Italian merehants resort?-What were  What sort of inhabitants did the Portuguese
the chief commercial cities of Italy? —To what find south of the Senegal?-What objections
countries beyond the Mediterranean did their were made to prince Henry's schemes?-Was
merchants resort?-What event gave a new  he deterred by them? —Who supported him in
impulse to commerce?-Who furnished trans- his designs?-What did he request' of the
ports and provisions to the crusaders?-Were  pope 3
the Italians enriched by the crusades?                     Page 38.
Page 30.                    What grant was obtained from the pope t —
What advantage arose from it? —What was,
Did the other countries of Europe partici-               ro
pate in the benefits of the crusades -Givurope partn icithe effect of the Portuguese discoveries on the
public mind?-What new adventurers entered
account of the travels of Benjamin of Tudela  their service-hat new.discveries were
-Give an account of the mission of Carpini          them 3-Wheare  thcAzores -The
nd  coino.  Cape Verd Isles?-What does the discovery of




QUESTIONS.                                    b4y
these clusters prove?-When did prince Henry What was the first step towards prosecuting
die?-How far south had the Portuguese dis- this design X-To whom did he first submit his
coveries then extended — What extent of the project?-How was it received?-To whom
west coast ot Africa was explored?        next?
Page 39.                                  Page 46.
What prevented Alphonso king of Portugal   How did the king receive the proposal?-To
from prosecuting the African discoveries with whom did he refer it?-What was the result?
ardour?-To whom did he commit them?- -To whom did Columbus next apply?-When
What was the consequence?-When did the did he land in Spain?3-To whom did he send
Portuguese cross the equinoctial?-What then his brother?-What circuimstances were unsurprised them?-When did John II. succeed favourable to Columbus's success in Spain --
A.lphonso — WVhat did, his voyagers find to be How was his character suited to please the
the character of the country north of the Sene- Spanish 3
gal?-What, south?-What ensued?-When
did king John fit out a new fleet? —What                   Page 47.
kingdoms were discovered?-Where did he   What did he gain by it?-To whom did Ferbuild forts and settle colonies?-Where is dinand and Isabella remit the consideration of
Benin? —Congo? —Gttinea?                  Columbus's project? —Vhat remarks did the
Spanish philosophers make on Columbus's
project?-How long did Columbus urge his
WVhat country did the Portuguese expect to project before obtaining a report from Tala
arrive at by going round Africa to the south? vera? —What was the answer of Ferdinand
-To whom did the king of Portugal send an and Isabella fbaunded on this report? —To what
embassy?-Was Prester John a real person- Spanish subjects did Columbus next apply?age? —What was the origin of his name?- With what success?
Who were the ambassadors sent in quest of
Prester John's dominions by the king of Por-               Page 48.
tural? —What other expedition did king John   What had befallen B3artholomew Columbus t
project?-Towhom-wasitintrusted?-When?  -Who  prevented Columbus from  leaving
-What was the length of the voyage?-What Spain, and going to England?-What was the
discoveries did he make?                  character of Perez?-To whom did Perez apPage 41.                  ply on behalf of Columbus? —What did Isabella do?-What was the first effect of the
What cape was the limit of his voyage?-  interview?-What new friends did Columbus
Why was it so called?-How far did Covillam  acquire 3-How did Ferdinand regard Colum
and Payva travel together? —W'hat countries bus's plot?
did they respectively visit after separating? —
What important conclusion was conveyed in                  Page 49.
Covillam's despatches?-What design did the   What demands did Columbus make? —How
king of Portugal now entertain -Who-were  did the commissioners proceed — What was
alarmed at it?-Why? —What news was re- the result of' the negotiation? —What did Co.
ceived before the expedition sailed?      lumbus then do?-What great event happened,about this time?-What advantage did QuinB OOK  II                 tanilla and Santalngel take of it I-What arguments did they offer to the queen?
Page 42.
Page 50.
Of what country was Christopher Columbus   What was the effect?-What generous offer
a subject?-3-How was he educated3-WVhen  did Isabella make?-How did Santangel redid he first i go  to sea?-Wvhat places did he ceive it 3 —When was the treaty of negotiation
visit in 1467? —Whose service did he next en- signed?-Wat was tefirst article-Th
ter?-Relate an adventure of his off the coast snd?-What was the first article-Theowdid
second?-Third?-Fourth?-Fifth?-How did
of Portugal.-Whither did he go?-What hap- Ferdinatd behave 2
pened to him there'! 
Page-~~~~ 43                   ~~Page 51.
Page 43.
Who defrayed the expense?-What precauWho was his wife?-What effect did the tion was taken with respect to the Portuguese?
perusal of Perestrello's papers have on Colum- -Where was the expedition fitted?-Where
bus?-With what places did he trade? —What is Palos?-Who assisted and accompanied Codid he acquire by these voyages?-What was lumbus?-Of what did the armament consist?
the great object of voyagers at this time?-  -'Who were the several commanders, and
Why?-What was the only route to India what were their vessels' names?-What was
which had ever be'en thought of before Colurn- the number of men -What was the whole
bus's time?-What route did he propose to sum employed in fitting out the squadron?take?                                    What circumstances rendered the undertaking
Page - 44.                a very bold one?
On what arguments, drawn from the figure                 Page 52.
and structure of the earth, did Columbus found   What religious act preceded the embarkahis belief of a continent in the west? —What tion? —When did the squadron sail?-Where
facts led to the same conclusion?-What led did they arrive August 13th?-Where are these
Columbus to believe that this western conti- islands?-What accident happened to the Pinnent was connected with India?-Did Colum- ta?-Whence and when did Columbus next
bus suppose that the western continent was take his departure?-What disposition did the
near the Western Isles?                  sailors manifest?-How were the effects of it
prevented? —What character and qualifications
-   Page 45.        -    did Columbus now exhibit 3
To whom did Columbus communicate his
opinions?-Did Paul encourage him 1 —Towhat                Page 53.
design did Columbus's opinions lead him?-    What did he endeavour to conceal?? —Wiat
VOL. I.-69.          25




546'                            QUESTIONS.
new  phenomenon respecting the compass                   Page 60.
alarmed them?-How did Columbus dissipate   Did Columbus determine to return to Spain?
he fears occasioned by this appearance?- -What means did he adopt of prosecuting
What wind did he fall in with?-What new  discoveries in Hayti?-HIow was an opportuappearance alarmed the sailors 400 leagues nity presented of colonizing the country?west of the Canaries?-How did Columbus Did the cazique accept his offer? —Give an acreconcile them to this? —How far had they count of the settlement.-Hovw did Columbus.
advanced, October 1st?-How far did Colurn- strike terror into the natives'
bus pretend that they had advanced?
Page 61.
Page 54.
What was the effect of firing the cannon?What did the sailors now resolve to do?-  How many men did Cnlumbus leave? —Under
How did Columbus prevent them from open whom? —What advice did he give? —When
mutiny?-By what did he next steer his did he sail?-Whom did be overtake?-Did he
course? —Did he make the land in this direc- excuse Pinzon?-What had Pinzon done in
tion?-What was the consequence          I his absence?-W~hat did Columrbus now dePage 55.                 termine to do?-What preparations did he
By what meas did he overme  this new  make? —How far and how long did he sail
By what means did he over(ome this new  prosperousl?
difficulty?-What signs of land appeared?- 
What orders did Columbus give?-What did                  Page 62.
Colurnbus discover at 10 o'clock, P. M.? —From   What now befell Col umbus?-How were the
which ship was the cry of land first heard?- sailors affected?-What did Columbus do to
What was discovered in the morning? —What preserve a record of his voyage? —What land
religious act was performed?-How  did the was discovered on the 15th?-Where are the
crews behave towards Columbus?-What was Azores?-What disquieted Columbus here?done at sunrise? —What was discovered on Whither was he driven by a second storm?shore?                                    How was he treated there?
Page 56.                                 Page 63.
How did the voyagers behave on landing    What satisfaction did Columbus enjoy??
-For whom did they take possession of the How long did he remain in Lisbon?-When
country?-How did the natives regard the did he arrive in Palos — After how long a voySpaniards and- their ships?-Of this newly age?-How was he received?-When did the
discovered island, what was the appearance of Pinta arrive?-Where were the sovereigns?the soil?-Climate?-Trees?-Inhabitants? — What did they order?-Describe Columbus's
WVhat sort of trade was carried on between journey.-His entrance into the city. —How
the Spaniards and natives?-What were the was he received by Ferdinand and Isabella I
boats of the natives called?-What title and hIow was he honoured?
authority did Columbus assume?-What did
he call the island?-Where is it? —Was it as              Page 64.
rich as had been expected?                How rewarded?-What was he commanded
Page 57.                 to do? -How was Columbus's discovery reg  arded in Europe?-To what opinion did CoWhat induced Columbus to sail towards the lumbus adhere?-By what was it confirmed?
south?-Whom did lie take. along with him? -Was Columbus's opinion generally adopted?
-To what other islands did he give names?- -What name was given to the country disWhat did he next discover? —Whom did he covered by Columbus?-After the country
send into the interior?-Give the particulars was foundnot to be India, what was it called?
of their discoveries in the interior.-What is -What were the natives called?
maize?-Does it appear by the narrative that
this is an original production of Cuba.?-                Page 65.
Where did the inatives tell Columbus that they   What number of ships were provided for
found their gold?-What did he infer from  the second expedition?-Of men?-What did
this?-What part of the coast of Cuba did he they carry with them?-Did Ferdinand enter
explore?-Where is Porto delPrincipe  into the spirit of his subjects?-Who was
pope at this time? —What grant did he make
Page 58.                 to Ferdinand and Isabella?-Where was the
To what island did the natives direct Colum- celebrated line drawn which was to separate
bus in quest of gold?-Where is Hayti?-  the Spanish from the Portuguese possessions?
What captain deserted the squadron?-Whel — What preparations were made for convertdid Columbus reach Hayti? —What did he call ing the Indians?
the port?-The country?-What port did he
next visit?-How did he here contrive to open            Page 66.
a communication with the natives? —How did   When did Columbus sail on his second voythey behave?-Did they possess more gold than age?-Where did he touch? —How did he vary
the natives of Cuba?-By whom was Colum- his course?-When -did he make the land?bus here visited?-How did this person be- What did he call it?-What islands did he afhave?-What led Columbus to suppose that terward visit?-Where is Dominica? 7-Marhe had arrived at Japan?                titlica?- Marigalante 3- Guadaloupe't-Antigua? —Porto Rico?-What people inhabited
these islands?-Were they cannibals?-When
Whither did he now direct his course?- did he arrive at Navidad?-What had hapWhat harbour did he put into? —What cazique pened there? —What account did the cazique's
governed the district?-What present did he brother give of the colony?
make to Columbus?-When did Columbus set
sail to visit Guacanahari? —Give an account              Page 67.
of his shipwreck.-How did the natives- be-   What colony did Columbus now found.have?-How did Guacanahari?-What were What was the character of Columbus's colotow Columbus's circumstances?           nists?-Were they suitable persons for coloe



QUESTIONS.                                    547
nizing a new country?-To what did their                    Page 76.
discontent lead?-How did Columbus treat   HIow did he alter his course?-What island
those who conspired against him? —How many was discovered, August 1st?-Where is it?ships were sent-hime?-What did he request Near what river?-Describe the river.-HIow
from Spain?                               was Columnbus's squadron endangered by it?
Page 68.             -W-hat did he call it? —What inference did
he draw from its size and violence?-Was it
Wuiom did Columbus send to explore Cibao. confirmed?-What part of the conlinent of
— How did he proceed?-What were the In- America did Columbus first visit? —What sort
dian opinions concerning the horses? —How  of people did he there find?-What animals?
did they find the gold?-Why did Columbus -What did the admiral imagine concerning
call the port St. Thomas? —What distresses it 3-What compelled him to go to Hayti?came upon the colonists? —Did these lead to What islands did he discover on his way?discontents?                               What did they become remarkable for?-What
Page 69.                  was Columbus's condition on his arrival?What happened in his absence
Who joined in them?-Was their discontent
removed?-Whom  did Columbus leave to                       Page 77.
govern the colony while he should make fur-   What city had the adelantado Bartholomew
ther discoveries?-What island did he dis-he
cover? —What happened to him on the south there employ the Spaniards?-Who rebelled
coast of Cuba?-Whom did he meet on his agaist Bartholomew?-Who saved the fort
return to Hispaniola? —Give an account of at St. Domingo fromthe mutleersa   Whither
did they retire?-What did they do?-What
Page 70.                  had befallen the ships sent by Columbus from
What had been the conduct of the soldiers the Canaries 3-Who had gained a large part
Wunder  hdargaritenh-Wlat were the habits of  ft  r    f these ships — What was their
the Indians with respect to food — What did  character 3
they resolve to do?                                       Page 78.
Page 71.                    When did these ships arrive at St. Domingo?-Why was Columbus reluctant to fight
What did Columbus determine to do? —What the rebels -How did he recover them to obewas the number of the Indians?-What king  dience?-How did he gain Roldan?-Did these
remained faithful to the Spaniards?-How was negotiations occupy much time?-What new
the attack managed?-What was the result? regulation concerning the Indians wvas intro— Iow did Columbus then employ himself?-  duced?-What did this regulation introduce?
What tax did lie impose?-Why did Columbus — What were the repartirnientos — VWhat eftax the Indians  feet did they have?-What prevented ColumPage 72.                  bus from prosecuting his discoveries?-What
did he send to Spain?-What complaints did
Who was Columbus's enemy at court?-  Roldan make?-What did Columbus?
What was his only means of counteracting
the machinations of his enemies at court?-   -              Page 79.
Why was the tribute peculiarly oppressive to   Which gained most credit?-For what purthe Indians?-What expedient did they devise pose did Emanuelof Portugal send out a fleet?
for freeing themselves? —What was its effect -To whom did he give the command?-What
on the Spaniards? —On the Indians?-What was his character?-Whence did he sail -
proportion of the inhabitants of Hayti perish- How long was he in passing the Cape of Good
ed?-What complaints were made of Colum- Hope?-Why?-Which way did he steer?bus?-What was the consequence?-What Where did he anchor? —What sort of people
person was appointed a commissioner to ex- had he found on the east coast of Africa?amine into Columbus's conduct.            How did they change as he advanced north?Page 73.                  Whither did he go from Melinda?-Where is
Melinda?-Calecut? —What sort of country
How did Acguado behave in his new office?-  and people did he find I-What is observed of
What resolution did Columbus take?-To  the voyage?
whom did he commit the administration of                             <
affairs? —What was he called?-Who was                     Page 80.
appointed chief justice?-What mistake did   When did he land at Lisbon, and after how
Columbus make in directing his course home? long a voyage?-Give a summary of the dis-What was the consequence?-How did he coveries of the fifteenth century.-What pribehave in this extremity?-Eow was he re- vate adventurer set out for the new world?ceived at court?                           With how many ships?-How did Fonseca,
Page 74.                  bishop of Badajos, assist him?-Give an account of his voyage.
What had he done for Spain?-What did he count of his voyage.
promise 1 —What was the effect on the king                 Page 81.
and queen? —What plan was now formed?-    Who accompanied him?-What was the
What sort of labourers were to go out?-How  consequence of Amerigo's account of the voywere they to be supported? —What improper age?-Wliat other private adventurers went
persons did Columbus propose to take out?   to the new world?-Describe the voyage.Describe Pinzon's voyage.-What did the king
Page 75.                of Portugal undertake?-To whom did he give
What hindrances to Columbus's enterprise the command of the expedition?
existed?-How long was he delayed by them?
— How many ships were prepared?-What                       Page82.
course did lie resolve to steer?-When did he   Which way did Cabral steer, in order to
sail?-Where did he touch?-From  the Cana- avoid the coast of Africa? —What country did
ries, how many ships were sent to Hispaniola? he accidentally discover?-For whom did he:
What befell him near the equinoctial 3?  take possession of it? —Where is Brazilt —




548                              IQUESTIONS.
lDes it appear by this that America would him?-Did Columbus go to the west?-What
have been discovered without Columbus's voy- kingdom would he have bound there?-Which
age t-What was the state of things in His- way did he go?-WihaL did he discover? —lepaniola? —What was taking place in Spain to scribe the situation of these coutlries on the,
Columbus's disadvantage I                   map.-Wlhere is Cape Gracias a Dios 1-Porto
Bello? —Where didl he attempt to fixa colony 1
Page 83.                   -What was the result?
What was the effect of the accusations on
the minds of the sovereigns?-What persone 89.
was sent out to try and to supersede Colum-   What misfortunes now befell Colunbus.
bus?-How did he proceed on his arrival?-  Where was he wrecked?-When?-VVho ultWhat did Columbusdo? —Howwashetreated? dertook to carry intelligence of his situation
— How did he bear it?                      to Hispaniola?-In what sort of vessel t —Describe the voyage.-How were they treated on
Page 84.                   their, arrival?-How long did ttey solicit as
How did Bovadilla render himself popular sistance?-In the mean time, what happened
and Columbus ilipopular?-How did he accu- to Gclumbus and his cornpanions in Jamaica?
mulate charges against Columbus?-How did — What did the seamen do i
the captain treat Columbus?-What was Columbus's answver ro the caotain's offer to take               Page
off his chains? —How were Ferdinand and   How did the natives behave?-Relate CoIsabella affected on hearing of Columbus's ar. lumbus's expedient for strilkingg awe into the
rival in chains? —What orders did they give? minds of the Indians! —hat was the effect?
-How did he behave at the interview with the -Meantime whlat had the mutineers done?sovereigns? —Did they degrade Bovadilla?-  How did Ovenlod, the governor of Hispaniola,
Why did they not restore Columbus?         insult Columbus?
Page 85.                                    Page 91.
Whom did they appoint governor of His-   How did Columbus explain this cruel propaniolal —How  did Columbus manifest his ceeding to his followers?-How did the nutifeelings at this hidignity?-What private ad- neers proceed?-Who marched against them?
venturers fitted out two ships for America in -Describe the battle and its results.-What
Jan aary, 1501?-What coast did they discover? happened after tranquillity was restored?-What is that country now called?-What How long had they reltaitned on the island!other adventurers visited the same coast?-  What island was it?-Which way is it from
For what was a fleet equipped at the public Hispaniola?-How  far distant?-How  did
expense?-How was Bovadilla proceeding in Ovalndo treat Columbus on his arrival at St.
Hislaniola? —How did lie govern the lSpanish  Domingno?-How  did he treat the captain of
colonists t-How did lhe treat the Indians?    the nmutileers?-How the flaithful men who
had adhered t,, Columbus?-When did he sail
Page 86.                  for Spain?-What befell him on his voyage?What was the effect of this oppression on Where did he arrive?-Where is St. Lucar.
the Indians 1-How many ships were there in -What event did he hear of on his arrival 
Ovande's armament?-How  many settlers? -Why was this news afflictive to him? 
— How did the new governor, on his arrival,
treat Bovadilla?-R-oldan?-The Indians?-                      Pag e 92.
The Spaniards? —Who was Bovadilla?-Rol-   What did Columbus demand of Ferdinand
dan?-What regulation was introduced re- -How were his claims treated?-What was
specting the gold l —What did, Columbus de- the result?-Whllen and where did he die?mand of the sovereigns!-Why was it not How 
gratnted? —low long was he nrging his claim
at court? —VWhat opinion did Columbus adopt               B OK  III.
concerning a passage to the East Indies?
Page 87.                 What was the effect of Isabella's regulations
in favour of the Indians of Hispaniola?What did he ask of the sovereigns?-For
what rdid ht e 1-Weas  os of the soeregns-For What was the effect of tihe king's claiming
what purpose?-What reasons disposed them  half the gold? —How did Ovando modify these
to granthis request? —What had been the re-reg gl          ationse
suit of the Portuguese voyages to the East
Indies? —What sort of fleet was allowed Co-                   Page 93.
lumbts to find his passage to the East Indies?   Were these acts of Ovanldo approved?— Who  accompanied him?-When  did he What was the effect of this new oppression of
sail?-Where did he touch?-What occasioned  the ITndians?-How did the Spaniards regard
his going to Hlispaniola? —What found he the Indians? —Iow did they treat them?there?-W'liat request did he make of' Ovan- What occasioned the war against the cazique
do?-Who was Ovandn? —What. advice did' of Higuey — How was it terminated?-Who
Columbus give him? —How were Columbus's was cazique of Xaragua 1-How  had shs
request and his counsel treated?-What was treated the Spaniards?
the consequence?-Did Columbus suffer by.the storm?                                                  Page 94.
Page 88.                     What exasperated thle adherents of Roldan
againist her? —Of what did they accuse her?'How many ships of Ovando's fleet were lost? -With what force did Ovando march into her
— What men perished? — What amount of country? —lilder what pretence 1-Relate the
money was lost 1-Wet e Colurmrbus's effects matnner in which he betrayed her and her peosaved? —What is remarked concerning this 0le.-What was her fate?-What was the
event by historians? —What construction did effect of this cruel treatnent on the Indianst
the people of that age put upon it?-When did -How was Isabella's death a misfortune to
Columbus leave Hispaniola!-rWhat island  the Indians?-1ow v mntch ofthe revenues of
did he discover? -What sort of inhabitants the New World belonged to Ferdinand?-To
did he find 1-What information did they give whom did he confer grants 1-How  did the




QUESTIONS..549
courtiers profit by these grants 7-What was remnant settle?-IUnder whom? —What two
the effect in Tlispaniola?                 other great Spanish leadlers were originally
engaged in this expedition? —Wily did Coites
Page 95.                   stay at IIispaetiola? -What roused the spirit
What amount of money was annually re- of adventure among the Spaniards?-a-What
ceived frorn ITispanio(,la?-How  did Ovando  made them  leave Elispaniola?-What island
govern the Spaniards.-What new source of did Don Diego Columbus propose to conquer?
wealth did lie open. —What was the effect'! -When?-Who was sent fobr that purpose'.l
-Wiho seconded Ovaido in pronoting the -With how many men?-Whal is the length
welfare of the colony?-What court did he  of Cuba?
erectl-Where did it asseilhble -Where is
Seville? —How did he regulate the ecclesiasti-              Page 101.'al governmenlt of Amrerica?-'What did he   What was the character of the people of
jhibit?                                  Cuba?-Did they prepare for defenice?-Who
opposed the Spaniards?-HIow was he treatedl
Pagre O9.                -Give an account of his conference with the
How many inhabitants were there in His- Franciscan friar.-What was the effect of Vepaniola when Colautbus discovered it?-To  lasquez's cruelty to Hatuey?-How  many
what number were they reduced in fifteen  ships did Juan Ponlce de Leon fit out. —Toyears?-'ro   what causes does the historian  wards what islands did he sail?-Where did he
attribute this waste of human life?-What touch?-What country did he discover?-Why
was its effect on the Spanish improvements? did he call it Florida?-Wlere is it?-To
-What remedy did Ovatdo propose?-Under whom does it now belong?-How did tie nawhat pretence were the inhabitants of the tives behave?-Through what channel did he
Lucayo islands removed to Hispaniola? —How  return to Porto Rico?-What curious tradition
many were removed. —What urged the Span- led Poence de Leon to the Lucayos?
lards to new discoveries?
Page 102.
Page 097                     How is the Spanish belief of this tradition
Who was Juan Ponce de Leon?-What accounted for?-Where was Balboa's colony?
island didt he settle?-Which way is it from  -How did he try to gain fronl the crown a
Hispaniola?-Is it larger or smaller than  confirmation of his election as governor?Hispaniola? —What became of the original in- Relate the incident which happened in one of
habitants of that island?-What two adven- his excursions.-To what country did the
turers made a voyage to the continent?-What cazique refer in this conversation?-What did
country did they discover? —How is it situ- Balboa suppose?
ated I-Between what bays I-W-hat important
discovery did Sebastian de Ocampo make'? —                   Page 103.
What claim did Don Diego Columbus prefer   What preparations did Balboa make for his
against king Ferdinanld?-How much time did expedition? —Describe the isthmus of Darien
he waste in fituitless irrportunity — Before -Was it easy to cross it?-What was Balwhat council did he then bring his celebrated  boa's character? —What was the number of
lawsuit with the king?-What was the deci- his men?-Of Indians who accompanied him i
sion? —How did t)on Diego strengthen his in- -For what purpose did he take dogs with
fluence at court?-At the instance of the duke him?-What difficulties did he encounter?of Alv-a and lis family, what did king Ferdinand then do?                                                Page 104.
Page 98.                    How did he reassure his men?-How was
he opposed?-What ensued?-low  many
Who accomptanied tihe new  governor to  days had they spent?-Relate the manner of
Hispaniola?H-Iow did he there live?7-Who  Balboa's discovering the Pacific Ocean.-In
are descended lrom the persons who accorn- what manter did he take possession of it 7panieod Don Diego Colum1)us!'?-Howx  were the What part of the Pacific did lie discover?Indians treated by Dolt Diego?-For what pur- Where is it?-What wealth did -he obtain?pose was CllbaEua settled 7-Who were em- How?-What information did he receive conployed to dive for pealrls?7-What was the cerning Peru?-What country did he suppose
effect — How far south did Solis arnd Pinzon  it to be near 
go in their second voyage? —Did they leave a
colony?-What adventurers wvent out to colo-                  Page 105.
nize the north coast of South America? —   What did Balboa determine to do?-To
Under whose patronage 7-What part of the  what place did he return?-After how long an
coast did Ferdinand give to Ojeda?-What absence?-What officer distinguished himself
part to Nicuessa?-Point these out on the in this expedition — What was Balboa's first
map, and showv to wvhat,ovenrments they now  care? —What was the effect of this intellibelong.                                     gence?-Who was Balboa's enemy at court?
Page 99.                   — Who was appointed governor of Darien instead of Balboa-I-How  many vessels and
Describe the manner in which the Spanish  soldiers were sent out 7-IHow many people
lawyers and priests directed these adveiturers  embarked in the fleet?-How  did he find
to take plossession of South America.-Did  Balboa engaged?-How was he received b
the natives assent to the doctrines?-What did  hinr          H
Ojeda and Nicuessa then do?-What was the
character of the natives?-I-ow  were they                    Page 106.
armed? —What was the consequence?-What   How did Balboa behave?-How  was he
other disasters befell the Spaniards?      treated?-What misfortunes befell the colony!
-How (lid the forces of Pedrarias~treat the sur
X Page 1()0.               rounding Indians?-What counmtry was deso
How many reinforcements did the colony  lated by him?-What is this country now
receive from  HIispaniola? —What befell the  called?-What accounts were sent to Spain
greatest part of the colony — Where did the by Balboa?-By Pedrarias?-What tlid king




550                              QUESTIONS.
Ferdinand do?-What did he order Pedrarias did they give the credit of the whole?-Giv
to do?                                    an account of Las Casas's behaviour. —Where
did he take shelter?-With what determination
Page 107.                 did he set sail for Europe?-In what state did
How did Pedrarias treat Balboa?-Who ef- he find Cardinal Ximenes? -Who took the
fected a reconciliation between them?-What government?-Who were Charles's counselWas the consequence of it?-What was the lors 1
first effect of their concord?-For what did he
begin to prepare?-With what number of                     Page 113.
ships and men did he furnish himself? —How    How did Las Casas ingratiate himself with
did Pedrarias regard this?-What did he order Charles's Flemish ministers?-What scheme
Balboa to do? —Relate the manner of his ar- did he censure?-Who joined in his censures?
rest, trial, and death.-Why did not the king -Who  were recalled?-Who superseded
punish Pedrarias for this arbitrary act? — them?-What was he instructed to dol-What
Whither did he remove the colony? —Of what was the objection to treating the Indians as
use was this removal? —Where is Santa Ma- free subjects?-What remedy did Las Casas
ria?-On what ocean Panama.                propose for this?-Had this trade been abolished?-When had slaves been imported into
Page 108.                 America?-By whose permission?-For what
For what purpose did king Ferdinand fit out reasons were they preferred to the Indians?-'wo ships?-Under whose command did he Had Cardinal Ximenes encouraged this traf
place them?-What river did he enter Janu- fiec i-Why did Las Casas "
ary 1st, 1516?-Where is Rio de Janeiro?What mistake did he make concerning the                   Page 114.
Rio de la Plata? —What put a stop to their   Was his plan adopted? —What patent did
discoveries and sent the ships home i-How  Charles grant?-To whom?-To whom did
did the Spaniards still regard Hispaniola?-  he sell it?-vVhat did they do 7-What limited
How did king Ferdinand retrench the author- the effects of their trade 1-What other expeity of Don Diego Colu-mbus in Hispaniola --  dient did Las Casas have recourse to?-Who
What did Don Diego do?-Who was appointed defeated it'?-What did he next attempt?-O0
to the office of distributing the Indians!-How  what country did he solicit a grant?-How,
did he execute it?-How many Indians did he and with what sort of people did he proposeto
find of the 60,000 who had escaped their former colonize it?
oppressions?-What was the effect of his
causing them to be sold at auction?                       Page 115.
109  What objections did the bishop of Burgos
Page 109.               and the Council of the Indies make to this
What was the occasion of a controversy be- scheme?-To whom  did he then have retween the Dominican and Franciscan friars? course?-To whom did Charles refer his pe
-Which party befriended the Indians7 —To  tition? —What country did they grant Las
whom did they apply to decide the dispute?- Casas?-Who censured this determination?To whom did Ferdinand refer it? —What was What was the effect?-For what did the emthe decision?-Did it abolish the repartimien- peror Charles V. himself discover an inclinatos? —What did the Dominicans then do?-  tion?-How was an opportunity afforded?What -was the substance of the decree by Where was the court then held?-Where is
which Ferdinand silenced them?             Barcelona?-For what purpose did Charles resolve to confront Las Casas and the bishop of
Darien? —Where was the solemn audience
What grants did Ferdinand make? —What held'?
edict did he publish?-How did the Domini-                 P     116
cans then proceed?-What new advocate for
the Indians did the oppression of Albuquerque   Who attended?-What observations did the
call forth?-What was his history and chrar- bishop of Darien make?-What reply did Las
acter?-How did he now attempt to serve the Casas make?-What patent did Charles grant?
cause of the Indians?-How was he received -What hindered Las Casas from procuring
by the king?-What did Ferdinand promise?  settlers?-How many did he obtain?-Did he
set sail with these?-Where did he touch?Page 111.                 What news did he hear there?-Owing to the
What prevented him from fulfiiling hisprom- high price of negroes, whither had the Span-,se?-Who succeeded him?-How was Las iards lately resorted for slaves?
Casas- prevented from visiting Charles in the
Low Countries?-How did Cardinal Ximenes                   Page 117.
settle the affair?-Why did he confide the   How did they obtain them?-How were the
office of superintendents to monks of St. Je- Indians of Cumana affected by these atrocirome?-What lawyer was joined with them? ties?-Whom did they murder?-How did the
-What title did he give to Las Casas?-Who people of Hispaniola resolve to revenge this?opposed this measure of Ximenes? —How did Whfat number of ships and men were placed
he treat them?-Did they issue the necessary under the command of Ocampo? —For what
despatches?-How did these new-made offi- purpose?-Where did Las Casas meet this arcers proceed on their arrival in Hispaniola?-  mament?-What did he perceive to be theeffeet
What was the effect on the colonists?-What of this movement?-Whither did he go?conclusion did the fathers of St. Jerome after- How was he received there?-What had ren
ward arrive at?                           dered him unpopular there?-What experi
ment had Figueroa there made?-What inference was drawn from the result of this experiWhat were the habits of the Indians?-  ment'1-What did Las Casas obtain in His.
What did the superintendents find necessary? paniola?
-What did they endeavour to secure?-How?
-What did Zuazo do? -Who was Zuazot-                       Page 118
How were the Spanish settlers pleased with   What did he find on returning to Ports
Zuazo and the superintendents? —To whlom  Rico 1-What,did he do witl the remnaa ol




QUESTIONS.                                  551
his colonists?-What rendered their situation  narrative with a disquisition concerning the
dangerous?-What did he call the place where aborigines of America, which may be consider
he established his colony?-Did the troops re- ed as superseded by the works of writers of later
main with him?-Whither did he go in search i date and better means of information on that
of protection for his colonyl?-What happened to I particular subject.
them in his absence? —Whither did he retreat
after the complete failure of all his schemes  i         BOOK   V.
-What comment does the historian make on
Las Casas's system?-When did Diego Ve-                   Page 197.
lasquez conquer Cuba 7-What had been the I
state of the island under his administration. What did Grijalva find on his return to
-How is Cuba situated — Had the sea west Cuba 1-Whowas the author of this expediof it been explored? —Was this sea considered tion?-Did he defray a considerable part of
the est field for discoveries f           the expense. —What sort of commander did
Velasquez seek?-Could he find one couragePage 119.                ous and servile too?-Who was recommended
What officers were desirous to attempt dis- to him  by Lares and Ducro?-Where and
coveries in that quarter? —Whom  did they when was Cortes born?-Where is Estremapersuade to join them?-Who approved and dura?-To what university was Cortes sent? 
assisted inl the design?-.How many men em- -Did he finish his studies there!-Why did
barked?-Wlhen'?-From what port. —Where his father send him abroad?
is this port situated?-Who was pilot?-Why               Page 198.
did they sail due wsest?-When did they make
land?-What did it prove to be?-Where is   What were then the two great fields of millthis cape?-Where  is Xucatan?-How  were tary enterprise for the Spanish youth?-What
they received?-By what sort of people?-On prevented Cortes from going to Italy?-Under
landing, what-befell them?-Which way did whose patronage did he seek his fortune in
he sail when he left this place?-What place America?-How was he employed in Hispandid he come to next?-Where is this place?- iota?-With whom  did he go to Cuba?Which  way from Cape Catouche?1-What When?-How did Velasquez reward his sersurprised the Spaniards?-Where did they find vices there?-What was now his character?a river?-Which way is this place from Cam- What did Velasquez expect from him?-How
peachy?-What befell the watering party  did he proceed on receiving his commission.I
which Cordova landed -What befell the Span-   How were his zeal and activity misrepreiards on their way back to Cuba?          sented to Velasquez 
Page 120.                                 Page 199.
Wthat befell Cordova on his return?-Did    Was Velasquez suspicious of him? —Why
the result of this expedition damp the ardour was his departure hastened?-When did he
of discovery?-Why did Velasquez encourage sail?-From what port — Where did he touch
a new expedition 1-How maity embarked in  for stores and recruits? —What did Velasquez
the snew enterprise?-Under whose command? do after his departure?-Whom did he em
-Whence and when did it sail?-Who was power to deprive Cortes of his commission?pilot?-What was the first land they made?-  I-ow did Cortes prevent this?-For what port
Where is this island?-Why did they not stay  did Cortes next sail? —What did Velasquez
there?-Where did they next land?-What then do? —How did Cortes hear of Velasquez's
transpired, there?-Which way did they sail intentions?
from Potonclhan?-What did they observe on                Page 200.
the coast? -What country did one of the sol-  Iiow did Cortes remove Dieeo de Ordazldiers say it resembled —What name did Grijalva, in consequence, give the country? —Wds Why?-tWh      at information did  Cortes then
give his troops? —What request did they make!
this name retained — Where did they next — What ensued —Were great efforts made in
land?-Wkhere is the river Tabasco?       fitting out this expedition? -What was the
Page 121.                 number and size of the vessels?-Of' men?How lwere they here received?-At what How were the soldiers divided and complace did they next touch?-Where is the manded 1 —Hom  v many of  them had musketsr
province of Guaxaca?-How were the Span- -How many were crossbow-men-How were
iards there received?-What amount of goldthe rest armed?-What sort of defensive armour did they wear?-How many horses, fielddid they obtain for their toys in trade with the otir did they wear?-How many horses, fieldnatives?-Who did the natives say was their pieces, and  falconets had they -Whept  did
king? —Where did Grijalva behold the horrid they sail?-What sin and superscription was
effects of the Indian superstitions?-Whom on their banners 
did he despatch to Valasquez -With what                   Page 201.
information? —From  what place?-To what   Were they confident of success?-Where
river did he then proceed? —What did Grijal- did Cortes first touch?-What important acva's officers wish him t) do? —Why did he not quisition did he make there?-Where did he
comply with'heir wisles?-To what port of next touch?-How was the disposition of the
Cuba did he return? —When? —Afterhow long Indians here altered since Grijalva's visit?a voyage-?-What had the Spaniards disco- Did Cortes make war oil them?-With what
vered in this imoraant voyage?            success?-Where did Cortes next land? —How
Page 122.                 was he here received?-What embarrassed
him in his intercourse with these Indians 
In what direction had they pursued their -How was he relieved?-Give an account of
course?-How far?-For what purposes did Donna Marina.
Velasquez send a confidential messenger to
Spain?-What preparations did he make be-                 Page 202.
fore Grijalva's returns?                   Who had sent two persons to Cortes?-For
what purpose had they been sent?-What an
Note.-The editor has omitted the Fourth swer did he give?-What did he do next morn
Book in his set of Questions.as it interrupts the ing?-Who entered the camp next morning!




6552                              QUESTIONS.
-How did Cortes receive them?-What did offices was he then elected?-Who ratified the
he tell them?-How did they receive the in- choice?-On accepting his new commission,
formation?-How did they attempt to concili- how did Cortes proceed? —What did the adhe
ate him?-Of what did this present consist t-  rents of Velasquez do?-Who of them were
WVhat was its effect?-On what did Cortes in- arrested by Cortes?-How were they treated'
sist?-During the interview, how were some -What was the effect on their dependants 1of the Mexican attendants employed?-How  How did Cortes conciliate these three leaders?
did, Cortes take advantage of this        — Did they always afterward remain faithful
to him? —What was the chief instrument
Page 203.                 of Cortes's intrigue? —What caziques offered
What exhibitions of power and skill did he fiiendship to Cortes?-Why?-What did Cormake?-How were the Indians affected by it? tes infer firom this offer?
-What information and presents were now
sent to Montez.uma?-What refinement in po-                  Page 209.
lice had the Mexican monarchs introduced? —   How  did he receive the Zempoallans -
How far was the capital from St. Juan de What place had been fixed on for a settlement.
Ulua?-How soon were the presents trans- -How far from Vera Cruz?-Which way?ported and the answer returned?-How  did In marching thither whom did Cortes visit?the Mexican ambassadors renew the negotia- What did he learn from the cazique?-To what
tion?-Of what did these presents consist?-  place did Cortes continue his march?-Relate
How did Cortes receive them?-With what the manner of building and fortifying this
message were they accompanied?            town.-Who assisted the Spaniards in their
labours?-How  did Cortes gain the caziques
Page 204.                of Zempoalla and Quiabislan to his interest
What reply did Cortes make?-What did while the town was built?-What insult did
the astonished Mexicans prevail on him to do? they offer to the Mexican power?
-What was the state of the Mexican empire
at this time?-How long had it existed?-What               Page 210.
was its length and breadth — The character   Who saved the deputies of Montezuma front
of the people?-The situation of the monarch? being sacrificed?-How did the two caziques
-What would have been the result, if Monte- now complete their union with the Spaniards?
zuma had brought his forces at once to act -What did they offer?-HIow long had Cor
against the Spanish intruders?-What was tes been in Mexico 1-What had he reason t3
Montezuma's general character?-What symffp- apprehend?-Why?- Before he began his
toms had he discovered since the appearance march towards the capital of Mexico, what
of the Spaniards?-What-seems to have been did he persuade the magistrates of Vera Cruz
the remote source of his indecision and fear?  to do?-In this letter, what did they say concerning Velasquez? —Concerning Cortes and
Page 205.                  his officers?-What request did they make?Does this tradition account in part for the What did they say concerning the country? —
alarmn of Montezuma and his subjects?-What Did Cortes write?
was the effect on Montezuma of Cortes's refusal to depart?-What did his counsellors                  Page 211.
advise?-With what was their positive in-   What did he prevail on his soldiers to do._
junction to Cortes to depart accompauied?-  Who were sent with the letters and present 
What two parties existed in the Spanish camp? -With what instructions?-What alarming
-Had Cortes become popular anlong the sol- event occurred while the vessel was preparing
diers?                                      for their departure?-How was the conspiracy
Pige 206.             betrayed?-What appearances did Cortes now
observe in his army? —What did he appreDuring the intrigues in the camp, who ar- bhend?-What did he resolve to do?-How did
rived from the Mexican court?-With what? he prevail on his soldiers to destroy the ships?
-When Cortes refused to depart, how, did -How was the project executed?-What reTeutile behave?-WAhat happened next morn- mark does the historian make on this transacing?-How  did the adherents of Velasquez tion?
take advantage of this?-Whom did they send
to remonstrate with Cortes?-What request                    Page 212.
did they make through Ordaz?-What orders   What act of Cortes at this time gave great
did Cortes then issue?-What ensued?-Had offence to the Zempoallans? —How were the
Cortes foreseen this?-Did he affect surprise consequences ofitfavoided.-When did Cortes
at it q —What did he declare?-What did he march from Zemnpoalla?-With what forces
say had been his own private opinion?     and equiplnents? —-Where and with whom did
he leave a garrison?-With what did the caPage 207.               zique of Zempoalla supply him?-Where is
What did heofferto do?-How wasthe offer Flascala? —Which way from Vera Cruz?received?-Were the malecontents obliged to What was the character of the people of Flasjoin in the enthusiastic applause expressed by cala?-How did Cortes hope to gain their allithe other soldiers.-What did Cortes set ance?
about?-What officers of the colony were.
elected by his contrivance?-What sort of per-              Page 213.
sons were chosen?-Did they acknowledge de-   Whom did Cortes send to the Flascalans?pendence on Velasquez?-What name did they How were they treated?-Why?-When did
give the settlement?-What is this in Span- CortesadvanceintotheFlascalalnterritories?ish?-What is the place now called?-How  What loss did he sustain in the first battle with
is St. Juan de Ulua situated with respect to the Flascalans?-What precaution did he then
Vera Cruz?-What did Cortes do at the first take 1-How long did he suffer assaults from
meeting of the council?-WVhat was the sub- them? —Did they make any impression on the
stance of his harangue?-What did he do after Spaniards?-What peculiar practice was a
having finished his discourse?            hindrance to them?
Page 208.                                  Page 214.
Was his resignation accepted — To what   WVhat were their weapons 1-Were they of




QUESTIONS.                                     553
much use against the Spaniards?-What ex- What happened next morning? —How were
amples of generosity did the Flascalans ex- the three succeeding days employed?-AHow is
hibit? —When repulsed, to whom  did they Mexico situated?-How  watered?-What is
have recourse?-What answer did the priests the size of the two largest lakes?-On what is
give? —What did they do in consequence of the city of Mexico built.-By what was the
the priests' opinion?-Did their night-attack access to the city?-What was the length of
succeed?-To what did they then incline 3    these causeways 3 —How were they construct
ed?-Describe the buildings.-How largew
Page 215.                the great square for the market?
What made the Flascalans suppose the
Spaniards to be benevolent?-What circum-                    Page 221.
stance favoured the opposite opinion?-What   What was now the situation of the Spancurious address did their deputies make?-On  lards?-What circumstances rendered it very
what terms was peace concluded 3-What suf- perilous?.-What had Cortes heard before
feriugs had the Spaniards endured?-What leaving Cholula?-Of what did he become sencaused them to forget these sufferings? —How  sible on his arrival in the city of Mexico?-Olong did Cortes remain at Flascala?-For what what did his success depend?
purpose? —What information did he there acquire?                                                    Page 222.
What bold resolution did he form? —IHo
Page 216.                 did his officers at first receive it?-Did they
How did the Flascalans regard the Span- afterward accede to it?-How did he prepare
iards?-What did they offer?-How did the to execute it?-Who accompanied him?-How
Spaniards all consider themselves?-I-id Cor- was Cortes received?-How did he address
tes attempt to convert the Flascalans to  Montezumal-How  did Montezuma behave?
Christianity?- Did they acknowledge the — What orders did he give?-What reason did
truth of what he taught? —What did they  Cortes then offer for Montezuma's repairing
claim of him and the other Europeans?-What to his quarters?-What did he promise?did Cortes demand!-When refused,whatwas How was the proposition received?-What
he about to do?-Who prevented hlim?-By  was the reply?- How long did the interview
what arguments?                           last?
Page 217.                                   Page 223.
When leaving the Flascalans in the exer-   What exclamation did Velasquez de Leon
cise of their own rites, what did Cortes re- utter?-What was the effect?-How were the
quire i-What warning did the Flascalans officers and people of Montezuma affected by
give Cortes on his leaving the country for his surrender?-IIow did Montezumahush the
Mexico?-How many Flascalans accompanied  tumult?-What remark is made concerning
him?-Towards what place did they march? this transaction?-How was Montezuma re-Where is Cholula?-Had Montezuma con- ceived and treated in the Spanish quarters?sented to their going thither? —How was the Who were brought prisoners to Mexico? —By
place considered by the Mexicans? —What whose order?-For what act? —How were they
offerings were there made?-Why did Monte- tried?-What was their sentence?-What
zusma invite the Spaniards thither!-What part had these men acted? —Of what was the
signs of treachery did two Flascalans disco- pile composed on which they suffered death I
ver?-What. information did Marina obtain                        224
How did Cortes prepare to revenge this treachery?-Describe the massacre.                 How was Montezuma treated?-How did
this treatment affect him and his attendants!
Page 218.                  -What happened on the return of Cortes fromn
How long did it last?-How many Cholu- the execution?-What motive of policy seems
lans fell?-How many Spatliards?-What did  to have actuated Cartes in these atrocious acts
Cortes then order? —Was he obeyed? —To- of cruelty to the officers, and contumely towards what city did Cortes next advance?-, wards the sovereign?-Did they produce the
Which way is Mexico from Cholula?-In his  desired effect? —Iiow long did Montezuma remarch, what dispositions did he observe among  main tranquilly in the Spanish quarters?the Mexicans towards Montezuma's govern- How were the affairs of the empire conducted
ment?-Where did the Spaniards first behold
the plain of Mexico?-Describe the appear-                  Page 225.
ltnce of the plain.-The situation of the city of   How was Montezuma guarded when huntMexico.-What messages did Cortes receive ing beyond the lake?-Is this management of
from Montezuma?-What persuasion seems Cortes considered an extraordinary refinement
to have preserved the Spaniards from any at- in policy?-For what purpose did he send
tack 7                                     Spaniards into the interior?-While they were
thus employed, what did Cortes do — What
Page 219.                  was still wanting to complete his security?Over what did they continue their march?-  How was this attained?-What did he new
Who met them as they drew near the city?-  urge Montezuma to do?-Did he comply?
Whose approach did they announce? —Who
preceded Montezuma?-How was he attend-                     Page 226.
ed?-Describe the pageant.-How did Cortes   In what manner was Montezuma affected on
receive him? —Describe the ceremonial. —What making his submission to the Spanish governdid the Spaniards hear among the crowd of ment?-How did his princes receive the proMexicans?-What did Montezuma say at part- posal?-How did Cortes reconcile thenr to it?
ing?-Describe the place allotted for the Span- -With what was Montezuma's submission
iards.-How did Cortes strengthen it?-What accompaitied?-To what did the amount of
happened ir the evening?                  treasure received from the Mexicans amount?
— How much was set apart fbr the king?Page 220.                  For Cortes?-How  was the rest divided?What tradition did Montezuma communicate How much did each soldier's share amountto 
o Cortes?-What reply did Cortes make?-   -Were they satisfied l
VOL. I.-70




554                              QUESTIONS.
Page 227.                 quished patty treated?-What was the effect
Why was the amountof gold collected in so  of this treatment?  How many soldiers had
rich a country so small?-Did the Mexicans Cortes now?-To what should these events be
use it-as money? —For what purposes did they  ascribed?- -What news came from Mexico?
-use it?-Did they work the mines of their                  Page 234
country? —HIow did they obtain gold?-On
what point was Montezuma inflexible?-What   What had occasioned the revolt in the city
was the effect of his firmness on Cortes?-  of Mexico?-What was its extent?-What did
How was Cortes deterred from throwing down Cortes do on hearing the news of this revolt!
all the idols? —With what did he content him- -What number of Flascalans joined him?
self?-What did the Mexicans now resolve? What did he learn on entering the Mexican
-How  did they propose to effect it?-What territories?-What precautions did the Mexidid Montezuma observe to Cortes 7          cans neglect to take?-What was the consequence — When did Cortes enter the city?Page 228.                 How  did Alvarado and his soldiers receive
What threat did he add to this declaration? him? — Of what imprudence was Cortes
-What answer did Cortes give?-What pre- guilty?
parations did he make3? —How long had his                  Page 235.
messengers to Spain been gone? -What was   Who reported the contemptuous expressions
his situation — What news was brought by-a of Cortes -What was their effect?-Where
Mexican courier?7-What  by Satidoval's cou- was the first attack made? —What discovery
rier?-How had Velasquez learned the situa- was made by the Mexicans on this occasion 
tion of Cortes?-How was he affected by the -What happened next day?-What was the
intelligence?                              effect of this determined attack on Cortes?Page 229.                 How did it affect the soldiers who had come
HIow had Velasquez's messenger been re- with Narvaez? —What was the cause of the
ceived at the Spanish court? —What appoint- Mexicans ceasing from hostilities at night?ment had Velasquez received?-What did he Whatdid Cortes do next day?-WVhat animated
determine to do? -What number of ships, the courage of the Mexicans?-Wlhat enabled
men, and cannon composed his armament?-  the Spaniards to cut through the Mexicans
Under what commander?-What were his in- wherever they met?-What disadvantages did
structions?-Whien and where did he laild? — they suffer from fighting among houses?
How did he obtain interpreters and informa-                P         236.
tion of Cortes's movements? —How did these
soldiers misrepresent Cortes's situation?-   Did the Spaniards effect any thing decisive
What message did he send to Sandoval, the on the second day of battle3-What loss did
governor of Vera Cruz? —How were his oes- they suffer?-What happened to Cortes in the
senger and suite treatedby Sandoval?3-How  next sally? —What expedient was now reby Cortes -Wlhat was the benefit which Cor- sorted to 37-What was the effect of Montezutes derived from this?-What information did ma's appearance?-What did he advise?they give concerning Narvaez?             IHow was his harangue received? -When
Montezuma fell, how did his subjects behave?
Page 230.                 — How did Montezuma treat Cortes's attempt
What representations had Narvaez secretly  to console him?-In what manner did he die I
conveyed to Montezuma? —What was their -For what did Cortes now prepare? —What
effect on the Mtexicans?-On Montezuma?-  new motion of the Mexicans engaged him in
What did Cortes resolve to do?-Whom did  new conflicts?-Who was commissioned to
he send to Narvaez? —How did he receive 01- dislodge them from the tower?-How often
medo — How was Ollmedo received by Nar- was he repulsed?
vaez's men X-What was the effect of Cortes's               Page 237.
presents on Narvaez's soldiers?              What did Cortes then do?-What extraorPage 231.                  dinary instance of self-devotion in two MexiWhat course did Narvaez take?-What did cals is recorded?-When possessed of the
Cortes determine to aido t-Whom  did he leave tower, how did the Spaniards dispose of it?in charge of Montezuma  and the capitale -- What rendered a retreat absolutely necessary?
With howe many men za-When reinforced by — How did the Spaniards attempt to effect their
Sandoval, what was his force? —How did he escape?-Who commanded the van?-The
arm his soldiers against Narvaez's cavalry -  rear?-The centre?-WWhat relations of Mhon
Towards what place did he advance?-What
prevented an accommodation between Cortes Mexicans interrupt their retreat?-Describe
and Narvaez'-How did Cortes take advan-the attack.
tage of the intercourse between the two ar-                Page 238.
mies?-How were nearly allNarvaez's officers   What happened when the Spaniards began
and men inclined?-What was the effect of to give way?-Which general first passed the
this on Narvaez?                           causeway, and reached the mainland?-With
Page 232.                 how many men? —What did they hear?Which leader offered battle?-Was the offer Where did those who escaped from the city to
accepted?-What compelled Narvaez's soldiers the mainland assemble?-What number?to retreat to Zempoa!lla?-What did Cortes What trait of feeling was observed in Cortes?
now resolve?-What part of the undertaking -What distinguished officer fell in the action l
did he intrust to Sandoval?- To Olid?-  -What supplies were lost?-What number
What did he reserve for himself? —Describe  of Flascalans?-What injury was occasioned
the action.                                by the gold in possession of the Spaniardst
Page 233.                                  Page 239.
What befell Narvaez? — hat was the re-   Where did the Spaniards take shelter?sult of the action?-What was the loss of Which side of the lake were they on?-OU
Cortes?-Of Narvaez — How were the van — which side was Flasoala?-Which end of the




QUESTIONS.                                    555
lake were they obliged to go round?-Under heavy articles?-How far did the company ex
whose guidance?-To what distresses were  tend when most scattered?-Did they arrive
they exposed in their retreat towards Flas- safe at Tezeuco?-What number of men,
cala?-What circumstance animated them?-  horses, an-d cannon arrived at Vera Cruz from
Where did they arrive on the sixth day?-What Hispaniola?-How long was the canal through,
exclamation did they hear from the Mexicans which the brigantines were conveyed from the
as they approached towards it?-How was its building-place to the lake?-Whe'n were they
meaning explained?-What was the effect of launched?-With what ceremonies?
this sight on the Spaniards?-What did Cortes
Page 247.
do?
How did Cortes determine to attack the
Page 240.                 city?-To what officers did he assign the three
How did Cortes effect the dispersion of this points of attack?-What d;d he reserve for
great army?-What treasure did he get?-  himself7 —How  did Alvarado and Olid dis
Where did they arrive next day?-How were tress the inhabitants of the city?-In what
they received by the Flascalans?-What losses condition did they find the towns which they
did Cortes now hear of? —Was he discouraged  were sent to occupy on the borders of the
from his undertaking by this intelligence.    lake!-How did Guatimozin attempt to de.
stroy the Spanish brigantines?-Describe the
Page 241.                 attack, and its result. —Of what advantage did
What colony of the Spaniards in New Spain  Cortes find the possession of the lake?-Did
remained unmolested?-How did Cortes se- Cortes conduct the siege in a regular manner?
cure the Flascalan chiefs?-What did he bring -What was done each morning?
from Vera Cruz? —For what did he send to
HIispaniola and Jamaica?-What did he pre-                     248.
pare to build? —Whatportion of his army was   What rendered this mode of warfare neces
discontented 1-What was the effect of their sary?-How  long did Cortes adhere to it?discontent?1-What was the utmost which  How did he then attempt to take the city?Cortes could effect with them. -What expedi- What officer was charged to secure a retreat?
tion did he employ them in?              — How?-How did he discharge the duty?How did Guatimozin take advantage of his
Page 242.                 neglect?
What was its success? —IIow did he afterward employ his troops?-How did Cortes                    Page 249.
gain the soldiers sent by Velasquez to reinforce   How did he inspirit his men?-Describe the
Narvaez?-What other reinforcement did Cor- consequences of this movement of Guatimo
tes receive 7-What occasioned their joining  zin.-How many Spaniards were lost'i-What
him?-What reinforcement did he receive from  did the Spaniards observe in the city at night?
Spain?-What was now the amount of his -How  did Cortes bear his misfortune?army t                                    What proclamation did the Mexicans send into
Page 243.                the country t
Whom  did Cortes now dismiss?-What                      Page250.
number of soldiers and guns did he then mus-   How did Cortes defeat this stratagem?ter?-Of Flasealans and other friendly In- When the eight days expired, how did the Indians?-When did he begin his march towards dians proceed? —How many of them joined
Mexico  -Wbo had succeeded Montezuma? —  Cortes?IHow did Cortes now pioceed in the
How had he shown his courage and capacity? siege?-What weapons did his men use?-What preparations had he made for resisting  How did Cortes deprive the besieged Mexicans
the renewed attack of the Spaniards?-H-ad of supplies? —What were the consequences?
he succeeded in gaining the Flascalans? —'How did Guatimozin behave?
What happened in the midst of his prepara-                Page 251
tions?-Who succeeded Quetlavaca?
How much of the city was laid in ruins?Page 244.                 What did the Mexicans now design?-How
Of what city did Cortes take possession?-  did they endeavour to conceal this design?Where was it situated?-How did Cortes se- Who was ordered to watch their movements
cire his possession of this place?-Was he on the lake?-Relate the capture of Guatimo
ready to attack the city 1?How did he employ  zin.-What was his address to Cortes?-What
his troops?-What was the condition of most was the effect of his capture?- How long had
of the cities adjacent to the city of Mexico?-  the siege lasted?-By whose aid did Cortes
How did Cortes prevail on several of them to  effect the reduction of Mexico?
acknowledge the king of Castile as their sovereign?-Did Guatimozin attempt to preventPage 252.
this?.                                      In what were the Spaniards disappointed?
P-What had Guatimozin done with his treasures? —By what deed did Cortes sully the
What soldiers formed a conspiracy in the glory of his conquest? —Relate the behaviour
Spanish camp?-Who headed it?-How far of Guatimozin under the torture.-What was
had it proceeded?-How was it betrayed?-  the consequence of the fate of the capital?How suppressed?-By what stroke of policy  How far did the Spaniards penetrate?-What
did Cortes retain the allegiance of all the sur- new discovery did Cortes now meditate?
viving conspirators?
Page 253.
Who was Ferdinand Magellan?-Where had
Whom did Cortes send to bring down the he served?-Whither did he go, on quitting
materials for the brigantines to the lake?- the service under Albuquerque?-What offer
With what force?-,What did these materials did he make to the king of Portugal?-Why
consist of?-In what manner were. they con- was his suit refused?-How  did Magellan
veyed? —By how many Tamenes?-What manifest his indignation at this treatment?were the Tamenes?-How did they carry these  Where did he next offer his project? —T  wbha/




565                              GQuESTIONS,
minister did he apply?-Wllat monarch or- commissioners?-What representations did
dered an expedition to be equipped under Ma- they make concerning Cortes?-What effect
gellan?-What titles were given him?-When  did these have on the ministers?
did he sail? —Fromn what port?-With how
many ships and men?                                         Page 259.
Did they infuse the same suspicions into
Page 254.                  Charles's mind? —What did he order? —What
Where did he search for a passage to India? prevented the execution of Ponce de Leon's
-What river did he reach January 12th, 1520  commission?-What was its effect on the mind
-What led him to suppose that this was the of Cortes?-Were his actions still misreprelong-sought passage? —What made him  re- sented to his sovereign?-What was the connounce the idea?-Where did he winter?-In sequence?-What did the followers of Cortes
what latitude?-What events transpired there? advise?-What did Cortes do?-How did he
-In what latitude did he discover the strait? appear in Spain?-What did he take with himn?
-How long was he, in passing through it to -Who attended him?-How was he received?
the great Southern Ocean — What name did he -What honours and rewards did he receive 1
give to the strait?-How long did he sail north- - HTow was he treated by the emperor him
west without discovering land? —What did the self?-Was he reinstated in his office?-What
crews suffer?-Why did they call the ocean  department was committed to him?
Pacific?-What islands did he discover March
6th?-What others? -— What happened at one                 Page 260.
if them? —At what place did the expedition   To whom was the supreme direction of civil
arrive November 8th?                      affairs in Mexico given'-Who was afterward
made viceroy?-What effect did this arrangePage 255.                  ment have on Cortes? —What did he now enWhat surprised the Portuguese there?-  gage in?-What befell the squadrons sent out
What sort of cargo was put on board the Vic- by him to make discoveries?-What did he
tory?-Under whose command did the expedi- then do?-What country did he discover?lion return to Spain?-By what route?-After When did he return once more to Spain?3how long a voyage i —VWas this the first voy- What sort of reception did he meet with?age round the world?-.To whom belongs the  How did the emperor treat him? —How was
honour of these great discoveries?-What the rest of his lilb passed?-When did he die?
merit now belonged to Spain?-For what did -In what particulars did his fate resemble that
their metn of science contend?-In what trade of all the other persons who had distinguished
did their merchants engage?-For what sum  themselves in the discovery or conquest of the
did Charles V. give up the rich commerce of New World?
the Spice Islands to the Portuguese? —Was it
ever recovered by Spain?-What important                   BOOIi VI.
commercial effects resulted to Spain from the
voyage of Magellan?                                        Page 261.
PaWe 256ho discovered the Pacific Ocean?-What
Page 256.
was the effect. of this discovery on the advenWhile effecting the conquest of Mexico, turers of the 16th century 3? —For what purof what was Cbrtes destitute?-Who was pose were several armaments fitted out?sent to supersede himr?-By whose influence,? Under what sort of leaders?-What opinion
-When and where did Tapia land?-What resulted from their failure? —What three perwas his character?-HIow did Cortes prevail sons resolved to execute Balboa's scheme?upon him  to abandon'the province?-With  Who was Pizarro?-What was his character? 
what did he send deputies to Spain?-What -Where did he first serve?-Where afterrequest were they ordered to urge?-At what ward? —With what success?
juncture did they arrive in Spain?-HRw was
their account received? —What appointment                   Page 262.
did the emperor give to Cortes?-What au-   Who was Almagro — What was his characthority had Cortes already exercised?      ter?-Who was Luque?-Who  authorized
their confederacy?-What did Pizarro engage
Page 257.                to do?-What did Almnagro?-Luque?-How
Where did he determine to establish the was the confederacy confirmed — Whence did
seat of government?-Did he attend to the Pizarro sail?-With what ftrce?-What re.
mines and to the agricultural interests of the tarded his progress?-Where did he touch 7country?-What did he grant his officers?-  What difficulties did he encounter?
Did the Mexicans submit to their conquerors
without resistance?-How did the several re-Page 263
bellions end?-How were the common people   Whither did he retire?-Describe Almagro's
treated? —The chiefs -How many were burnt adventures.-What wound did he receive?at once in Panuco? —By whose command?- After joining Pizarro, whither did he repair?With the advice of Cortes? -What circum- For what purpose1-How many men did he
stance heightened the cruelty of the scene?-  raise?-What bay did he and Pizarro reach?
What other horrible example of severity was -Where is it?-What sort of country did they
Cortes guilty of? —What was the effect of these find?-What prevented their invading it?examples on the inferior Spanish officers?  Whither did Pizarro retire?-Whither did Almagro go?-For what purpose?-What prePag~e 258.               vented his succeeding? —What did the govWho distinguished himself by acts of ctu- ernor of Panama do?-What advice did AleIty — What circumstance probably saved the magro and Luque send to Pizarro?
Mexicans from extermination? —When were
the rich mines of Mexico discovered? —What                 Page 264.
was then the state of the colony?-Were the   What was Pizarro's resol ution?-How many
conquerors of Mexicoenabled to live in ease and of his men adhered to him — Where did they
splendour?-What arrangement did Charles stay? —How long was it before the governor
V. make?-What was the character of these sent a vessel to their relief? —What did Pizarrs




QUESTIONS.                                     557
iduce the crew of the vessel and his followers he divide his empire?-What did Huascar reo  do?-What coast did they discover?- quire his brother to do?-fHow did Atahualpa
Where did they land?-Where is Tumbez 1-  proceed?-Which brother conquered? —What
What did they find there?-What chiefly at- use did he make of his victory — Why did he
tracted their notice 1                     spare Huascar I
Page 265.                                  Page 270.
After exploring the country, what did Pizarro   What was the state of the empire when Ptake with him?-Whither did he then sail?-  zarro visited Peru the second time?-Wnat
After how long an absence?.-What is ob- prevented the Peruvians from resisting his
served of Pizarro — Did the governor of Pa- encroachments?-VWho sent to solicit his aid?
lama still discourage Pizarro's scheme?-  -lWhat did lie determine to do? —Where did
Why?-To whom did the three associates now  he leave a garrison?-With what force did he
esolve to apply?-What stations did they re- march?-Towards what place?-Who was
pectively resolve to apply for -- Who went there? —Who met him on his march?-What
o Spain to urge their suit?-How did Pizarro assurances did Pizarro send to Atahualpa?
~onduct at court?-How was his scheme re-                   Page 271.
garded by the emperor Charles V. and his min-   What opinions did the Pe
isters?-What did he obtain for Luque?-For   What opinions did the Peruvians form con
~~~~Almag ~~ro?cerning the Spaniards 1-What sort of reception did the inca resolve to give them?-Did
Page 266.'                 he, in consequence of this resolution, neglect
What did Pizarro secure to himself?-What good opportunities to cut them off?-Where
was the extent of his territory?-Of his power did Pizarro take his station on entering Caxawith respect to his appointments1-Was he malca?-Who asid he send to Atalualpa 1to be independent of the governor of Panama? For what purpose'? —How were they received?
-What did he engage to do in return for these -What did they observe?-On their return,
concessions?-From what port did he sail -  what did Pizarro resolve to do 5
In what manner?-Why secretly?-Who sup-                     Page 272.
plied him with motney?-Where did he land I
-Whither did he march?-What were the   How did he prepare for seizing the inca?names of the four brothers who accompanied  In what style did the inca appear when he
him?-What was their character? —Why was came to Pizarro's quartera?-What part did
Almagro offended with Pizarro' -How was Father Valverde perform in this transaction'.he pacified: —On what terms was the confede- Describe his proceedings. —What did he reracy renewed?-What was their force? —Wlen quire of Atahualpa?-Was his harangue undid Pizarro sail 7                         derstood l —What was the inca's reply?
Page 267.                                  Page 273.
For what purpose was Almagro left at Pa-   How did he exasperate the priest?-What
nama? —Iow long was the voyage?-Where  did the priest say?-What did Pizarro do?did Pizarro land his troops?-Which way did Describe the massacre of the people and the
they miarch — What difficulties did they en- capture of the inca.-How many Peruvians
counter?-W'at amount of booty did they gain fell? —How many Spaniards? —low were the
in Coaque?-What was the effect of this suc- Spaniards affected by their victory? —How was
cess 7-Whither did Pizarro despatch ships?-  the inca affected by his misfortune?-Did PiDid he use force, or did he use policy in re- zarro attempt to console him?-What discoducing the natives — How long was he occu- very did the inca make 1-What offer?-Was
pied in subjecting Ptina?-Where  is this itaccepted?
island? —How long was he detained at Tum-                  Page 274.
bez?-B-y what cause? —What reinforcements   How was the gold collected, the inca being
did he receive?-Under what commanders?-  a prisoner? —Why was not his rescue attemptWhere did he establish the first Spanish colony ed?-Did all the Spaniards remain at Caxain Peru?-Under what name?                malca?-What news did Pizarro hear?-What
Page 268.                 number of soldiers did Almagro bring?-Itow
was the inca affected with the intelligence of
What was the extent of Peru at the time of this reinforcement?-What news did he hear
the Spanish invasion?-What was the char- frorn his brother?-Why did this alarmt himt?
acter of its early inhabitants — Who, accord- -How did he dispose of Huascar?-Did the
ing to their tradition, appeared on the banks of Spaniards wait for the reception of all the
the Titiaca lake? —From whom did they claim  promised treasure before dividing it? —tow
descent?-For what did they say they had been much was set apart for the crown of Spain 1
sent? —What city did they found?-What were _ How  much for Almagro's men?-How
their names?-W-hat did Manco Capac teach? much remained for Pizarro and his men?
-What did Mama Ocollo?-What did Manco
Capac introduce, after teaching the arts of                 Page 275.
civilized life? —What was thus founded?-    With what ceremonies was it divided?What was at first the extent of the empire  -- How much did each soldier receive?-Is there
What was the nature of' Manco's authority?   any parallel for this in history?-Why did PiPage 269.                  zarro allow sixty of his followers to go to
Spain?-Did he now  grant Atahualpa his
How were the incas regarded?-Were the liberty?-What is observed of this transacroyal tamily forbidden to ally themselves with tion?-Was the possession of Atahualpa's
their subjects' —Was their despotic power person of as great advantage to Pizarro as
abused? —What was the character of twelve MIontezuma's capture was to Cortes? -Why
of their monarchs in succession — Who was not?-What part of Pizarro's army was dis
their monarch when the Spaniards first visited satisfied?-Why 
Peru? —WV hat was his character?-What kingdom did be subject?-How did he violate the                Page 276.
ancient laws? —When did he din?-How did   What did they insist on? —What alarmed




QUESTIONS.
Pizarro?-Who increased his apprehensions? the Peruvians invest?-Wbhat did the men of
-Who was this miscreant?-Why did he these besieged cities suppose concerning each
wish to cut off Atahllualpa?-How did Atahu- other?-How long was Cuzco invested2?alpa hasten his own fate?-How did Pizarro  Who commanded there?
seek to cover the guilt of Atahualpa's murder?
-Who were his judges?-What crimes wasate 283
he charged with?                             How did the Peruvians imitate the Span
iards?-How much of the city did they rePage 277.                 cover from the Spaniards?-What officer fell
How did Philippillo conduct during the trial? in the siege?.-What Spaniard appeared in the
— What was Atahualpa's sentence? —How  neighbourhood of Cuzco? —What had he rewas he affected by it.-What did Valverde ceived from Spain?-How did he interpret it 
offer him for embracing the Christian faith?- -What was his object in coming to Cuzco'How was he put to death?-Whom did Pi- -Who endeavoured to gain his friendship?
zarro now invest with the ensigns of royalty?
— Vhom did the people of Cuzco acknowledge                      284.
as inca? —What was the state of the country?   Failing of this, how did the inca proceed? -
Did he gain his object?-How did Almagro
Page 278.                 gain possession of the city?-Was his jurisHow did, the people behave after Atahualpa's diction over Cuzco acknowledged? —Whom
death?-How did the general who commanded did Francisco Pizarro send to Cuzco to relieve
for Atahualpa in Quito behave?-Were the his brothers?-With how many men?-On
Spaniards pleased with these appearances?-  what river were they opposed by Almagro?Towards what city did Pizarro march?- What How did Almagro attempt to gain these men
had been the effect of the return of some of and their leader?-When he did not succeed
his followers with their gold to Panama?-  in this, how did he contrive to surprise AlvaHow many men had lie now?-W-Vas he op- rado's camp and take him? —What advice did
posed?-What was the result?-Dd he take Orgognez give Almagro? —What prevented
Cuzco?-What treasures were found there?- his taking his advice?
When did Atahualpa's son die?-Who was
then acknowledged as inca?-What general                   Page 285.
set out to reduce Quito?                    What did Almagro do?-Was Pizarro ac
qutain ted with the late events at Cuzco?-What
Page 279.                events did -he hear of at one time? —What was
What difficulties did he encounter?-Did he his situation? —How did he contrive to gain
take the city? —What disappointment did he time — Who escaped from Almagro?-With
meet there?-What other general advanced to how many men?-What proposal did Pizarro
attachkQuito? —With how many men i-Where then make to Almagro?-Did Altmagro accede
did he land?-What route did lhe take?-What to it?-When Ferdinand Pizarro was released,
hardships did he suffer?-How many men did  how did Francisco proceed?-What city did
he lose?-On arriving at the plain of Quito, he design to attack?-How many men did he
whom did he find opposed to hinm?-On what muster?-Who had command of them?
terms did Alvarado agree to return to Guatimala?-What did most of his followers do?-                 Page 286.
When did Ferdinand Pizarro land in Spain?-    By what route did they approach Cuzco?What was the effect of his wealth?-How  Why did not Almagro cut them off in the dewas he received by the emperor?            files of the Andes?-On what plain did the
two factions meet? —Who were assembled to
Page 280.                 witness the battle?-Who led Almagro's arHow were his brother's services recom- my?-Why did not he lead it himself —WVhat
pensed?-How  was Almagro rewarded?- is observed of the respective forces?-Of the
How was Ferdinand?-Did he set out again  battleh?-What forces decided the fate of the
for Peru?-When Almagro heard of his pro- day?-Who was dangerously wounded?motion, what did he do?-Who opposed him? Who were massacred?-How many men fell  /
What was the effect of Francis Pizarro's arrival'-What were the terms of their recon-                Page 287.
ciliation? —To what part of the country did   What befell Almagro?-How did thelndians
Pizarro now march?-How  did he employ  behave?-.What city was pillaged? —By whom?
himself!                                   -Was much plunder obtained?-Were the
new adventurers of Ferdinand Pizarro's army
Page 281.                 satisfied with this plunder 7-How did he emWhere did lhe establish the capital of the ploy them  — For what did the conquerors imempire?-Where is Lima?-Cuzco? —Quito? peach and try Almagro?-What was his sen-Callao?-Whither did Almagro march?-  tence? —Did he attempt to avert his fate.?With what force?-What route did he take? How? —How did he die?-At what age?-How
-What was the consequence?-What sort of many children did he leave?
people did they find in Chili?-Were the Spaniards completely victorious and successful in              Page 288.
Chili?                                      Who first carried the news of the dissensions in Peru to Spain?-Who arrived ill Spain
Page 282.                 afterward?-What did he endeavour to do?What recalled them from Chili to Peru?-  Who was sent out to settle the disputes of the
How did Pizarro find occupation for the nu- Spaniards in Peru?-What were his instrucmerous adventurers who flocked to Peru?-  tions?-LTow was Ferdinand Pizarro treated?
How did Manco Capac take advantage of their -How was Francisco Pizarro proceeding in
dispersion into different parts of the empire? Peru? —How did he proceed in parcelling out
— How did he contrive to raise troops while the territory?
he was himself a prisoner?-How did he make
his escape?-How many men did he raise?-                   Page 289.
What city did he attack?-Who defended it?   To whom did he assign the best portions of
-With how many men?-What othercity did the country?-What was the effect of this




QUESTIONS.                                    559
partiality?-How did Pizarro's officers employ paid by the Spanish crown?-By whom then?
themselves?-Who invaded Chili -What city -How long were the Spaniards occupied in
did ha found?-Who succeeded to the govern- acquiring their possessions in Amnerica?ment of Quito? — In whose stead?-What was Was the crown entitled to claim much from
Gonzalo instru.:ted to attempt — Why?-With  the conquerors? —Why not? —What was rehow many soldiers did he set out from Quito? served for the crown? —What was the great
-How many Indians?-What did they suffer? object of the conquerors?-H-ad they ally thing
Page 290.                 like well-regulated government? —What evil
in particular required a remedy?-Were the
What river did they reach I-Into what does emperor Charles V. and his ministers anxious
it empty?-Where is the Maragnon?-Into what to prevent the extinction of the Indian race
does it empty?-What ocean borders on Peru? -Who was at Madrid then?
-What did they construct on their arrival at
the banks of the Napo?-Who took command                   Page 290.
of it?-With how many men?-What scheme   What representations did he make to the
did Orellana now form?-What is said of it?-  emperor?-What treatise did he compose?How far had he to sail?-By what-rivers did he 1How was Charles affected?-Were his views
reach the ocean?-How did he obtain provi- confined merely to the relief of the Indians?
sions on his way?-To what island did he at -How did he regard the conquerors of Peru?
last arrive?-Whither did he then go?-Wlat -What did he prepare? —What provisions of
marvellous stories did he tell there?-What his code of laws were approved l-What rewas the fabulous region described by him  gulations were disapproved?
called? —Iave reason and observation at last
exploded Orellana's fables? —Ofwhat extensive             Page 297.
countries was he the first discoverer? —How    Who remonstrated against these regula
was Gonzalo Pizarro affected on not finding tions? —What did they say?-Did Charles
Orellana at the junction of the Napo and Ma- persist?-Whom  did he send to -Mexico?-In
ragnon?                                  what capacity?-To Peru?-With what title?
Page 291.                 -How was the entry of Sandoval into Mexico
viewed?-Did the inhabitants submit to the
How far did he advance on the Maragnon innew laws?-Why I-Did Mendoza and Sandosearch of him?-How did he hear of Orellana's
val agree to remonstrate against the new
treachery? —What was the effect of this news laws?-Did  Charles relax the rigour of the
oneahisnen I,-,DidPizarroconsetlt to return? laws?-Did Charles relax the rigour of the
on his men? —Did Pizarro consent to return?
laws?
-How far were they from Quito?-To what
extremities of famine were they reduced onl                Page 298.
their return?-How many Spaniards and In-   Were the laws as well received in Peru
dians perished in this expedition? —How many Why not?-W-1Ahat did the colonists say con
returned to Quito?-In what condition?-Who  cerning the new laws? —For what were they
composed the discontented party in Peru?-  ready?-How were they diverted from their
Who headed them — What washis character? design?-What had now become necessary 
-What did they plot? —Was Pizarro warned
of it I-Did he regard the warning?                        Page 299.
Page 292;                   What was the character of the viceroy?-.How did he proceed on landing at Tumbez?Who was Almagro's tutor?-What part did  How  as he receed  i-What did  he declare
Who                       How was he received I-What did lie declare
he takel-Relate the story of Pizarro's assas- on entering Lima?-How did he behave there 
sination.-Atter the assassination, how many  -How did he treat the persons of rank in
conspirators joined the nineteen assassins?-  Lima?-How Vaca de Castro?-To whom did
Whom  did                 the                 colonists look for relief? —What was his
dwellings were pillaged.                  character? —What considerations prompted
Page 293.                 him to rebel?-,What restrained him I-What
induced him to repair to Cuzco?
How many men did Almagro muster          nducedhimtorepairtoCu
Whom did he appoint to act as general?-      -             Page 300.
Why?-Did all the Spanish officers join Al-   How was he received?-To what office did
magro,?-Why note-At what city was the the people elect him — What did they emroyal standard erected? —While this opposition  power him to do?-What measures did he take
to Almagro was acquiring vigour, who arrived  under the sanction of this nomination?-Who
in Popayan 1-To what city did he march? — resorted to his standard?-Who deserted from
On learning Pizarro's death, what did he do? the viceroy to him?-What had happened at
-What two commanders acknowledged his Lima?-Who had quarrelled with the viceroy?
jurisdiction?-What talents did Vaca de Cas- -Which prevailed -Wtat did they do with
tro discover?-How did he gain followers?-the viceroy? —What did the judges then do?For what place did Almagro set outWho  With what intention?-Who corresponded
commanded there?-Whom did he lose on the with  izarro  -What adviser had Pizarro?march? 1What did he wish Pizarro to aim at?-What
Page 294.                 did Pizarro demand?
Did Holguin escape from Almagro?-Whom                   Page 301.
did he join?-Who entered their camp and took
the supreme command?-By- what right?_-   When the judges hesitated to comply with
Where did lie meet the followers of Almagro?his command, what did Carvajal do I-What
-fIow far from Cuzco I-What distinguished did the court of audience do next morning?-_
veteran fought on Vaca de Castro's side?-Was Pizarro's government firmly and quietly
Which side prevailed?-How many fought on settled?-Relate the circumstances of Nugnez
both sides?-How many fell?-What did Vaca Velat s embarkation, sailing for Spain, and rede Castro do after the battle?-What was Al- turn to Tumbez.-What did he do on landing
magro's fate?                            at Tumbez?-Who joined kim?-Who put the
Page 295.                 lieutenant-governor of Charcas to death, and
adeclared for the viceroy?-Against whom did
Was the expense of the expeditions to Peru Pizarro march 7-Whither did Vela retreat? —




560                               QUESTIONS.
Who pursued him?-Whither did he fly from  happened on the march?-How many soldiers
Quito? —Who now pursued him?-To what had he on arriving in sight of Iluarina? —
place did Pizarro return?                 Where is Iuarina?-Where is the lake of Ti
tiaca?-What was the character of Pizarro's
remaining troops?-When did he attack Cen
Whither did he send Carvajal?-HIow many  teno? —What was Centeno's force? —What
men did the viceroy raise in Popayan?-By  was the result of the battle?-What counter
whose assistance?-Whither did he march?-  balanced this vrictory?-Who took possession
When did he and Pizarro rneet? —What was of Lima?-Who landed at Tumbez? —Witl
the result of the battle-?-Who fell?-What how many men?-What territory was now ir,
city did Pizarro enter in triumph?-Who de- Pizarro's possession?-What was in Gasca's?
feated Centeno?-Where did Centeno conceal -Which way did Gasca march?-How did he
himself?-What was now the extent of Pizar- behave 3-Where did he stop?-For what purro's command?-Where did he place a garri- pose?
son?-Where is Nontbre de Dios?- How did
Pizarro's followers behave? —What was the                   Page 308.
substance of Carvajal's letter to Pizarro?  How many men had Pizarro?-Did he listen
to Gasca's offers of pardon?-Who advised him
Page 303.                 to do so? -Towards what city did Gases
Who seconded these exhortations?-What march? —With how many men?-Why did
did he attempt to demonstrate?-To what did not Pizarro advance to meet him?-How near
Pizarro confine his views?-For what did he did Gasca approach to Cuzco?-When Pizarro
send a person to Spain — How was Charles V. had marched out to meet him, who chose the
occupied during these troubles in Peru?-To  ground? —What was there unusual in the ap
whom did he leave the care of providing a pearance of Pizarro's army?-Of Gasca's -
remedy for tthem?-What were the chief ob- Who deserted Pizarro when both armies were
stacles to the employment of force in quelling  ready to engage?-What was the effect of this
the rebels in Peru.                        defection?-Wllat did Pizarro and Carvajal
do? —How soon was their army dispersed?Page 304.               What did Pizarro say to his officers?-What
What were the different routes for arriving  answer did they make?-What did he do?at Peru?-Wcre thIey practicable at that time What befell Carvajal? —How  did Gasea use
for an army?-What remained fbr the minis- his victory?-When was Pizarro beheaded?ters to do — Whom  did the ministers choose HIow did he die?-How did Carvajal die l
for an envoy to Peru.-What was his character? -What did the emperor do?-Did GascaPage 309.
accept the appointment? —What did he refuse?   What befell Cepeda?-Were the adventurers
-What title did he accept? —What instances to Peru hired soldiers? —What did each of
ofself-denrial did hlie exhibit?-What sort of au- them expect to do for himself'?-Were the
thority did he require to be invested with?  troops raised at a great expense? —Did the
chicts make expensive presents to their offiPage 305.                  cers? -Wihat did Gonzalo Pizarro expend in
Enumerate some of the powers which he raising a thousand soldiers?-What did Gasesa
demanded for hitmself —Who refused thetm  expend in raising his army?-What did Cepeda
-Who granted them?-,in what style did he receive?-For what?-What did HIinojosa reset out for the purpose of quelling a rebellion? ceive?-For what 7-What was the effect of
-Who received him at Nombre de Dios -  this wealth on the soldiers?'
How? -Why?-Who received him at Panama?-Iow?-What did he declare in both
places?-Who were gained over to his inter-   What was the character of the conquerors
est?-What exasperated Pizarro?-What did of Peru?-What was their leading passion?re resolve to do? —For what purpose did he Give examples of their rapacity.-Of their
send a deputation to Spain? —What did these  treachery and inconstancy.-Whllat was the
persons require of' Gasca e                 effect of Pizarrogs death?-What two objects
now occupied tihe president's attention — How
Page 306.                  was theformer of these accomplished?
What instructions did they carry to Hinojosa?-What circumstances pushed Pizarro to                 Page 311.
these wild measures?-To what did he trust   What was the amount of repartimientos to
for continuance in power?-Was he aware of be distributed in consequence of Pizarro's
the disaffection spreading among his follow- death' —Did Gasca reserve any of it for himers? —What lid Hinoljosa and his officers do? self?-Whither did he retire to make the dis— What did the deputies?-What news did  triburion?-With whom? —How did he avoid
Pizarro hbar? —For what did he prepare?-For the effects of his impartiality in the distribuwhat did he order Gasca to be tried?-Who  tion? —What was the effect of publishing the
acted as judge and condemned hiim?-Wlhat decree of partition?-Of what was Gasca acwas the object and effect of this proceeding?  cused — Ittow was this mutinous spirit check-Iad Pizarro the powver of executing the sea- ed?-low did Gasca labour to sooth the maletence at this tirme?-Why not?-IIow many  contents?-How did he endeavour to strengthmen did he raise l-From  what places did. en tilhe hands of his successors?-What imGasca raise troops?-When did he detach a provetnents did he make? —To whom did he
squadron of his fleet to the coast of Peru?-'  commit the government of Peru?-When did
Did they land?-I-ow did they do more effect- he sail for Spain? —How much of the public
ual service'-What was the effect of the offers money did he carry with him 1
of pardon 7
Page 312.
Page 307.                 (f-How was he received in Spain? —Give a
Who emerged from his cave, and took -Cuzco  summary accomunt of his services. —How did
with a flw men?-What was the number of the emperor receive him? —To what office was
soldiers there?-What did mnost of them do  he promoted?-HIow did he pass the remainder
- -Whom did Pizarro set out to oppose?-What of his days?-Did tranquillity continue long




- QUESTIONS.                                 561
2n. Peru after Gasca's departure?-What deso- of homage did the nobles pay the king?-What
lated the country for several years?-What is observedof the Mexican tongue 1?-Have the
were the ultimate effects of these commotions? Spaniards described the Mexican government
-To what state was Peru finally brought 1- and laws accurately 1-What inconsistency
Where is Peru?-How is it bounded?-What appears in their accounts?
are its chief cities?-Ports?-Mountains 1Does it now belong to Spain 1                            Page 319.
From what has it arisen?-What was Mon
BOOI V IL                  tezuma's object?-How did he pursue it?How was Cortes benefited by these proceedPage 313.                ings of Montezuma?-Where can we discover
the original form and genius of the Mexican
How did Mexico and Peru differ from the policy — Who composed the most respectable
other parts of the New World?-How did order of the state?-Were they all of equal -
they compare with Europe?-Were the people rank?-How many inhabitants were there in
of these countries acquainted with the useful the territories of each of the first thirty no
metals?-What,animals had the Mexicans bles?1-How many inferior nobles were there?
reared?-What had the Peruvians tamed?-  -What nobles levied taxes from their vassals?
For what were the lamas useful?-What are -Did they all pay military service and tribute
considered very important steps in the progress to the emperor 1-What policy is round in this
of civilization 1                        view of the Mexican state? —What are the
Page 314.                three distinguishing features of the' frudal
system?-Did the. system  operate hlere as in
What effect had the ignorance of these on Europe? —ho possessed the real and effectthe Mexicans and Peruvians?-Which empire ive power in Mexico?-What constitutional
was first subjected to the Spanish crown?-   restraints had the nobles imposed on the emWere Cortes and his followers well qualified peror?-inow  was the  crown disposed o Mpeor 1?-How was the crown disposed of?to examine the government and policy of Mex- Who at first were electors 1-Who afterward?
ico 1 -Why not.?-How was the memory of -Where did the choice generally fall?
past events preserved?-Why did the early
missionaries destroy these records? —What                Page 320.
was the effect of this piece of fanaticism? —  What was the character of the Mexican
Can tradition be depended upon for a history princes?-At what particular appearances in
of past events?-On what writers must we Montezuma's court were the Spaniards surdepend for the particulars of the Mexican his- prised?-How was justice administered in
tory?                                    the different parts of the empire 1 —How was
Page 315.                the government supported? —How were the
Was the Mexican empire of long duration? taxes paid?-Where was the produce of' the
-How was their country originally peopled? taxes collected?-What use was made of
-When did certain tribes from the north and them?-How did people of inferior condition
north-west enter New Spain?-When did the and without property pay their taxes?-What
Mexicans take possession of the plain of Mex- evidence of civilization is found in the Mexiico?-What town did they found fifty years can police and public works?
afterward 1-1How were they for a long time               P    321
governed?-How afterward?-Who was their
ninth monarch?-According to this account,   What improvements of polished life existed
what was the age of the Mexican nation?- in the city of Mexico?-What is considered as
Of the monarchy?'  the most decisive proof of Mexican refineOment?1-Give examples.-Are the Spanish ac
Page 316.                counts of these manufactures probably exagWas the right of private property understood  gerated?-Are they contradicted by the existin Mexico?-Was the distinction between real ing remains of Mexican art?
and personal estate established -Did any                 Page 322.
part of the citizens hold land so as to transmit it to their heirs?-What was the second   In what view are these rude pictures immode of tenure?-To what classes of citizensportant and interesting 7-For what were the
did these modes of tenure appertaisl?-How  first essays of this art probably first used 1was land divided among the great body of the What is this sort of record called?-Where
people?-What other  striking circumstance do we find traces of it?-For what did the Indian
distinguishes Mexico from other nations in chefs use t  Are the  Mexican pictures suAmerica I                                perior to these Indian records — What could
the Mexicans represent in their pictures?Page 317.                Who has published the best series of them,?Which were the principal cities?-Did Cor- What does the first part contain?-The seetes and his followers exaggerate the import- ond?-The third — Who has publishedanother
ance of these cities?-How many inhabitants specimen!
had the city of Mexico?-What is the nextmentioned symptom of improvement?-Does
it exist among savages? —Did it exist to any   What do these pictures represent? —Do they
considerable extent in Mexico?-What is the address the eye or the understanding?-What
next circumstance that merits attention -  may they be considered I-Are they very deWere the savage tribes of America distin- fective records?-To what might the Mexicans
guished by this characteristic?          have eventually arrived? —By what steps?Were they approaching towards writing?Page 318                 How did they indicate a town?-How did they
Did it exist in Mexico?-Who were the distinguish one town from another?-Did they
Mayeques? —Describe their situation.-How  sometimes indicate a particular town by the
were the freemen treated?-How were the no- emblem without the house?-How did they
blesdivided?-Were their titles andlands here- represent a king who had made conquests?ditary — Whatmark ofdistinction between the In what notation did they attempt to exhibit
nobles and the people existed?-What marks ideas without any corporeal form? —How di
VOL. 1.-71




562                               QUESTIONS
they represent a: unit!.-HTow: small numbers:? far did -Mancos successors extend their doe
-How large numbers?-To what amount — minion t-On.what was the whole system of
What prevented a further improvement-?-  policy -in Peru founded?-How were the. chil
Are their records-any thing:more than, picture- dren of the sun. regarded? —Was it. a partof
writing?-How did the Mexicans divide their the people's religion to reverence- the royal
year? —How did they make out the complete  family?-1-Wiat consequences resulted from
year?-What did they call these, five days..   these ideas 1-What. was the badge of an ex.
Page. 324  ecutive officer of the emperor 2
Page: 324.a
How did they employ them-? —Were the                     Page 332.
Mexicans awarlike people?-What was usu-   How were all crimes punished in Peru?ally their object in war?-How were- their Why?-Did these seyere laws render.crimes
captives treated?'-How-waa- the emperor's rare,-What were the principal objects of
funeral celebrated?-Were the Mexicans a worship among the Peruvians?-Is this sort
hardy, laborious people?-To -what was. their of' superstltion milder than the. worship, of
weakness attributed?':            imaginary divinities?-Where have we examples of the two.kindsl?-What were offered to
Page 32,5:                 the sun..-Did. the incas offer. human, sacriDid Montezuma rule over the, whole of:what fices — What. was. the national character of
is now called Mexico. —Who possessed the the Peruvians compared with that of, the Mlex
provinces towards the north" and; west?- eians?
What other provinces.were independent; of:the
emperor?-Was there much, intercourse be-                  Page 333.
tween the different parts of the: empire?-    Was the mixture of religion in the Peruvian
What proofs of this are givet'?            system of policy. favourable to the character
of both kings and people. —Were rebellious
Page 32..                 subjects- and tyrannical rulers equally, rare?Had the Mexicans. any money — Is this a For what did the incas conquer?-How were
strong proof of barbarism? —W.as. mnoney,.an  prisoners. treated?-How were the, lands. di?
early invention in the Old World? —How  videdin Peru?-How. was,.the product of the
was commercial intercourse carried on in  first share employedl —The second?-The
Mexico? —W-hat sort, of nuts. had acquired' a third?-How often was. the.' land divided.? —
standard value like that of. money?-Whatis. How was it cultivated?-What was.the effect
said of the. Mexican cities?-How' is Tlascala  of this arrangement on the. character of she
described? -What sort of a structure was.the,'people?
great temple.of Mexico?,age.334
Page. 327.;                 Was- the distinction of ranks establishtd in
Did the other temples- resemble this? —Do,t Peru?-Who w.ere the Yna~coneasi? - Were
the Spaniards describhe the. emperor's- housea they numerous.? —Who were the next class.anid those of the nobility as being magnificent   — Who. were the Orejones?-W-ho were the
-What reason is there to doubt. their state- head of. all?-To what was -this form of sociments?-From this enumeration of facts,what.  ety favourable? —Were theartsmore advanced
is evident 1?-What is no less manifest?   in, Per.u than. in Mexico?-What. is:observed
of agriculture in Peru?-How-. did. the -PeruP,... ag,328.,.  viansaprovide for times, of scarcity?-Is Pera
Are.- the Spanish, accounts. of the. -Mexican. well watered?-How did the Peruv ianswateer
government and: policy to be. considerd: su- their fields 
stantially true —If Cortes, had made. false,
statemenlts to the emperor, would his.enemies.:           Page, 335:
have contradicted them,-. hat institutionof;  Did they use, the plough? —How- did they
the Mexicans is mentioned which had no, par. turn up the earth? —How were the, houses
allel in Europe at that time? 2            built on the.coast 1-In the mountainous regions. —Do.any of'.their. buildings remains?Page 329. *What is observed.of their temples and' pal
In what respect were. the: Mexicans repre- aces.?-What was the. extent of the temple,
sonted as more. barbarous thanl. they really, of Pachacamac? —Describe. it.-What-wasthe
were?-What: w tas the charac.terof the Mexi-  greatest. work of the.incas?
can religion?-V. hat- were the ornaments, of,
their temples 1-What.means-were. em pioyed'            Page 336.
to. appease the wrath. of their gods?-What,   What was the extent of these roads.. —De'
sacrifices were deemed most-, acceptable?- scribe their construction.-Did the Spaniards
WVhat was, the. effect, of thislreligion on, the keep this work in repair?-In what respect
feelings and character of the,peoplea —How  did:the:Peruvian policy resemble;the Roman?
long had. Peru subsisted as. an empire before -Wre   the. roads of the incas superior to anythe conquest i-Under how many monarchs 1 7work. of publicutility then existing. in Europe.t
qPager330w.'  j —Describe the, rope,.bridges of the Peruvian&s
What.. were the. quipos.? -For: w.bgt wore               Page 337.
they.used? —Were, they stil.more imperfect.  What, advances had the Peruvians made. in;
records than; the Mexican pictures:-, Howi navigatio?-How, did. t, Peruvians obtai
were most of them lost, 1-Who.attempted to] gold:l.How didthey obtain silver?-How,did
throw.light onmthe P.eruvsian history by meansi they Supply the aant of bellows: What is
of. the quipos?-Did he, succeed:? —Is, much  said of their vessels and trinkets i-What
credit due to. the-traditional stQiresif theearly, iwere the geuacas 1- *What articles were found
Peruvian. monarchs?.                 i-.tiihem.-DiCd-4aey muse copper:   -
Page 331.  Page 338;
Is'there any satisfactory statement concern-   What wa L he oniy city, properly so calledi
ipg Ithe real origin.o~fManco, Cape,and Mgmai of ancient Peru — Are, cities neessary toithe
Ollo.?,-, Who did the.prtend  to be -How  pr.ogressof refinement in.artsand manner.t?




QUESTIONS.                                    663
Was the separation "'professions, so compete' regioi''divided?-Wiat  cotitry is north o
an Peru as in Mexico?-What was the only Rio de la Plata?
separate order of artists?-What other consequence followed fromn' tie want of cities in               Page 344.
Peru'? —Explain- the connexion between corn-   Where. are' Tucuman and Buenho Ayres,. —
merceahfd agricuiture.-What was the differ- What is the chief settlement?-What is the
ence between Mexico and Peru with respect most remarkable: feature'of the province'of
to commerce?-What was the most fatal de- Tucuman?-By what European animals' have
fect4in. tlie Peruvian character? -        these plains' been filled'?-What article odf
commerce' do' they furnish'?-What sdrt: of
Page 339.                  trade was carried on through the Rio de' la.
HOW' did they differ from the other'Areri- Plata and Brazil' with Peru? —'here is Terra
cans in this respect — Does the same pacific Firma' —What is it now called?-Where is
character still appear in the native Peruvians? New Granada? -What lies'east of Veragua?'
-What cruel custom existed in Peru?-What
was' their reason for it?-IIow'nmany werePage 34r.
sacdrified on the' dath' of HuIana Capa? -Iir    What are its harbours?-Which is on the
what particular weie the Peruvians more bar- east side? —What were they called?-Was
barous than the most rude tribes? —VWere Peri anotier communication to the Pacific opened
and Mexico the only possessionsof Spainin the afterward?-Where are Carthagena and St.
New'World?-lien were the" others con- Martha?-Who conquered these provinces?quered? —By whom?-Whatprovinces of NewV When?-What does the country produce 7Spai: fawe' never sulject to the'dominion of What is the chief port? —What enriched:this'
the Mexicans 1                             place?-What Spaniard first visited Santa
Martia?-Why was Venezuela so calld 7.?Page, 3406                 Upon whom did Charles V. bestow the' prov
What is said of their soil and productiorist? —  ince of Venezuela?-For what.
What: circumstance. is favoUirable to the in-               Pag 346
cerease of their population?-What happened
inithe provin'ces of: Cinaloa and, Sonora in'  On what condition-To whom  did' they
1t7657?-T'o whom did the Spanish'inhabitants- commit the execution of their plan?-How
spply for aid?-Why was he at first unable'to  did they proceed?-What was the consegive it? —How  did he' raise' money for the quence? —To whom did the province revert 7wair -How long did it last?-How'did it ter- What were theother Spanish provinces on the
minate?-What discoveries uere made during  north coast of South America! —Where are
thie~ war 7 —Wha~t wasB discovered" at" Cine: they'situated?-Who conquered New Granaguilla:                                    da?-When?-What rendered its conquest
difficult?-What: renders the climate of New
Page 341.                  Granada temperate?-How  is gold obtained'
Who discovered California? —-When? —  there?-Who are employed in finding it?Where, is it situated?-What religious-order Why are the negroes' nunfit for mining?
acquired dominion over it-?-Why- did they                   Pge 347
fepresent it as barre anid.unwholesome:?-One 
the expulsion of the Jesuits from the Spanish   What- facts are mentioned illustrating the
dominionS, who' was sent to California? — wsealt-h'of New-Granada?-To what country
What' discoveries -did he make?-What proe-  does New'Granada. now belong?-Is it now a
inices are' east' of Mexico?-Whatis' their ex- Spanisl province.:
tent?-What do they produce in abundance'?
-After conquiering Jamaica, what was, the-               BOO K  V III.
first objett of the English l
Pae 342To'hatobjects does'the historian now'di
Page 342,             rect our attention 7 —What was the first conseWhere did they make their first attempt? — quence of the establishment of the Spaniards
Whereo did they afterward establish their prin- in America?-What was the first cause of
cipal station?-How did the Spaniards endea- depopulation?-Where was it' first' experi.:
s'iour to stop this encroachment on their terri- enced -.'-What wa'there besides war to caus'
tories'l-Have they been compelled to consent the depopulation of these countries' — How
to it.?-What method did they devise' for'en- were many of the natives- destroyed'in' Mexidering'It of little consequence?-Where are co t —In Peru 7
Costai Rica- and Veragud?-What is said f'of    *
them?-Where is Chili?-Who' attempted' its                 Page'348.
conquest?-DidAlmagro sueceed 7-Whatwas   What-wiis more destructive than Warto the
the fate of Valdivia -!-Who' saved tlie remnant' natives-'of Mexico and Perul —What was the'
of his army?-What part of Chili Wuas con-' chief object' of the conquerors'of these counquered: by the Spaniards?-What part is pos- tries?-'For' this,' what did they' neglect? —sessed by the Indians?-What is the extent of' Whiere'werei the mines'situated?-Who we'e
Chili?-What is observed of its soil and cli- ei'ployed:to'work them?-From whence'vWere'
mate?                                      they'br6ught?-What"was the conssequeice?'
— What disease increased the evil -What:
Page 343.                - false charge is brought against the Spaniards?
What is said of its atirimals?'L-Itsi'iiies   - -Is such a design' necessary to account for
Was it neglected by the Spaniards? —Through the deppulation  of Spanish America?
what' pots was s was its commerce Ionii carrierd oil
with Spain:?-Has a'-direct intercourse' been                Page 349.
since-opened?-What-are'now the'chie-f ports   Did the Spaiish' government'try to preven':
of-Chili?-Is it a Spanish province at thie pres- the destruction of lives'among the Indians'?-'
ent' time? —What provinces are-eaSt'of Chili-? Why could it not be prevented by the'governi
-Whiat mountains se'parate theiri from6  Chili'?  ment 7' —To whom should the desolation'of the
-On what viceroyalty were they formerly de- New W'orld be' attributed?-To what: othel
Vendent -?f-What is their extent? —iHoW'is this cause's the depopulatiori of Spanish AAmietrca'




b64                              QUESTIONS.
finjustly attributed?-What reasons are op- gos? —How did they descend? —Were the evi
posed to this?                            effects of these extensive entails severely
felt.
Page 350.                 felt
Whom  did the Indians consider as their                 Page 356.
natural guardians and protectors?-Are many   What other severe burthen did the Span
of the Indians still left in Mexico and Peru?-  ish colonies bear?-What articles paid tithes?
In what other provinces are they numerous? — -Were the colonists liberal towards the
How  many were there in New Spain in churches?-Who were the chapetones?Robertson's time?-What nations were most What offices were confined to them?-What
easily civilized?-Were the Spaniards suc- was meant by old Christians?-What was the
cessful in civilizing the most savage tribes --  character of the chapetones?-Who were the
What was the condition of the government of creoles?-What was their character inRobertSpain when Spanish America was settled?- son's time,?
What peculiarity distinguishes the Spanish                 P     357.
from other European colonies?age.
Who conducted the internal commerce of
Page 351.                 the colonies?-With what were the creoles
What was the fundamental maxim of the satisfied? —How did the chapetones and creSpanish colonial policy?-What was their oles regard each other 7-Did the Spanish court
great charter?-Was the power of the Spanish encourage this hostility?-Why?-Were the
crown over the colonies absolute?-How was mestizos and mulattoes numerous?-What
Spanish America at first divided?-How far were carried on by them?-How were the neodid the jurisdiction of the first division extend? groes mostly employed? —Were they favour
-The second?-What inconveniences at- ites of the Spaniards?
tended this arrangement?-Where was a third
viceroyalty established?-How far did its jurisdiction extend?-What power did the vice-   Whom did they hate? —Why did the Span
roys possess -What pomp of state did they lards encourage this hostility? —Which was,exhibit.                  the most depressed order of men in the Span
ish colonies?-Who freed them from slavery?
Pag~e 352.                -When?-What tax was imposed on them?
-In whom was the administration of justice -Of whom  was every Indian in Spanish
-In Spanish America vested?-What is the America a vassal?2-To whom  was three-,characteristic of the most despotic govern- fourths of the tax paid? —To whom was the.xnents?-How' were the Spanish viceroys re- country parcelled out when first conquered?~strained from interineddling with the adminis- For how long a time?-To whom did the grant,tration of justice?-On whom did the govern- then revert?-Was this a constant source of.nment devolve in case of the viceroy's death?   patronage and powerto the crown?
Page 353.                                 Page 359.
What was vested in the, council of the In-   Were the Indians compelled to work ---
dies?-What laws originate in this council?-  Were they paid?-In what different occupaWhat offices are conferred by it 7-Who were tions were they required to work?-What
accountable to it?-What has been the object were the mitas?-What portion of the people,of the Spanish monarchs?-Where did the of a district might be called out at once in,council meet?-For what was the Casa de la Peru?-In New Spain, how many could be
Contratacion instituted —Where and when? called out in a district?-How long was each
-What commerce was at first confined to mita keptin amine in Peru?-At what wages?,Seville? - On what river is Seville? -What -How  were the Indians in the principa.:are the powers of the house of trade?-What towns governed?-How in their own villages?
-was the first object of the Spanish monarchs? -Was the office of cazique hereditary?-What
was the duty of the officer called protector of
Page 354.                 the Indians?
Why did they dread the intrusion of strangers?-What two kinds of colonies existed in               Page 360.,ancient times?-Give examples of each.-   How was the tribute raised from the Indians
Which kind speedily became independent?- applied?-Have the laws enacted by the counWhat did the Spanish monarchs do in Ameri- cil of the Indies proved effectual remedies of
-ea?-How did they secure the dependence of the evils they were intended to prevent?. —'the colonies on the parent state?-What were Why have they not?-What wrongs did the
the colonies principally employed about? —  Indians suffer in defiance of these laws?Whence were they suppliedwith manufactured Where did these wrongs most abound?-For
-articles and a part of their provisions?-What what did Ferdinand solicit Alexander VI.?was severely prohibited in the Spanish colo- On what condition did he obtain it?-What
nies?-Why?-What did the colonies give in did Julius II. confer on the kings of Spain?exchange for clothes, furniture, luxuries, &c.
imported from Spain 2?-What vessels monopo-                Page 361.
lized all the commerce between Spain and her   What was the consequence of these grants?,colonies?                                -In what did all authority in Spanish America
centre?-What council must approve of all
Page 355.                 papal bulls relating to Spanish America?2What restrictions were laid respecting all What was the effect of this limitation of the
-foreigners?-What was the effect of this policy papal power in Spanish America?-Were there.on the colonies? —Was the progress of the archbishops, bishops, &c. in Spanish Ameritolonies slow?-How many Spaniards were ca?-How  were the inferior clergy divided?
there in all the provinces sixty years after their -What were the curas?-The doctrineros t
settlement?-What is necessary in order to -The missionerov?-Are the revenues of the
Promote a rapid increase of people in any new  church large?-How  is the wealth of the
settlement?-Did the Spaniards regard this?- church displayed?-Have the effects of the
What were the encomiendas?-The mayoras- monasteries been favourable to the country 1




QUESTIONS.                                   565
Page 362.                                Page 371.
Are the ecclesiastics of Spanish America   To what expedient was Philip 1II. driven! 
distinguished for their literary attainments?-  -Has the possession of her colonies proved a
Whom did the popes permit to assume paro- source of wealth to Spain in the same prochial charges in America?-Did this increase portion as the colonies of other countries? —
the number of missionaries?-What honours Was Spain anxious to monopolize the trade
did many of them gain?                   of her colonies?-How have the Dutch, English, French, and Danes monopolized the
Page 363.                trade of their East Indian colonies? —What
What useful history was written by the Je- prevented Spain from adopting this policy I
luit Acosta. —Were many of the missionaries
from the European convents to America of a
bad character 1-What prince opposed the   What regulation was adopted? —WVhat was
regulars?-Did he succeed — What edict did the consequence? —What were the fleets to
Ferdinand VI. issue?                    America called?-Whence did they sail at'first?-Whence after 1720? —What countries
Page 364.                 did the galeons supply?-Where did they
Have the priests been successful in convert- touch?-Who went to Santa Martha to trade
ing the Indians?-What imprudent course did with them?-Of what kingdoms was Porto
the first missionaries take?-How many Mexi- Bello the mart?-Describe the fairs of Porto
cans did one clergyman baptize in a day?- Bello.-To what port did the flota go?-What
How many Mexicans were baptized in a few  province did it supply?-Where did the fleets
years — What was the effect of this mea- rendezvous? —Whence did they proceed from
sure?-What is the greatest obstacle to the Havana?-Where is Santa Martha?-Carthaprogress of Christianity among the Indians?   gena? —Vera Cruz?-Havana? -Was the
whole commerce of Spain with her colonies
Page 365.                 confined to these two fleets 1-What was the
What did the early missionaries say con- effect of this absurd arrangement?-What
cerning the Indians?-What did the council of profits did the monopolists of Seville and CaLima decree? —Why had the inquisition no diz charge on their goods I
jurisdiction over the Indians?-WVere the                  Page 373.
Spanish colonies too large for Spain to people?
Is it always the interest of a monopolist to
Page 366.                 check commerce?-Why?-What was the
What was the chief object of the Spanish amount of tonnage of the two fleets?-What
colonists?-Why did they abandon many of violent punishments for smuggling were protheir islands?-To what countries did they posed — Was any remedy applied to the evils
crowd? —When were the mines of Potosi dis- under which the commerce of Spain la
covered?-In what other provinces were rich bouredl
mines discovered?-What amount of gold and                Page 374.
silver was annually brought to Spain from her   What roused the energies of Spain 1-What
own amine?-On what condition?  fleets, and treasure to Spain? —What was the
own a mine   nhatcoditoconsequence? —Who gained quiet possession
Page 367.                 of the throne of Spain? —What privilege did
Who were the searchers.?-How did they Philip V. grant to the French merchants?proceed?-What was the effect of the rage for How did they use it?-To what provinces
mining on commerce and agriculture?-What were they limited?-Did their commodities
ought to have been the policy of the Spanish  find their way to all the other provinces?government  What would have been the consequence if
this had continued?-Was it prohibited, and
Page 368.                 the French' merchants again excluded from all
Are the countries colonized by Spain in Spanish America? —What grants did Philip
America rich in other productions besides gold V. make to Great Britain 
and silver?-Where is cochineal produced?-               Page 375.
What is it?-Where is the jesuits' bark found?
-Indipgo 1 —Cacao 1-The best tobacco?-Su-   Where were British factories established 1
gar? —Hides!                             -What did their agents learn?-How did the
English merchants profit by this?-How did
Page 369.                 they abuse the grant concerning the ship of
Under what sovereigns was Spain an indus- 500 tons?-By whom was nearly all the corm
trious country? —What manufactures did the merce of South America engrossed? —Iow
Spaniards engage in?-What market had they did this affect the galeons?-How did Spain
for them?-How many merchant-ships had attempt to check this illicit commerce? —What'
Spain at the beginning of the sixteenth cen- led to a war with England?-What was the
tury?1-Was the sudden increase of wealth consequence?-What did the smuggling of
unfavourable to the Spanish character?-What the English teach the Spaniards 1
was its effect on Philip II.?-What nations
did he annoy with hostile operations?                    Page 3.
What inconveniences attended the use of the
Page 370.                 galeons and/lota for supplying the Spanish colWhat was the effect of his wars?-In what onies?-How did Spain remedy these inconvemanner did Philip III. weaken his empire?-  niences?-What was the effect of this arrangeDescribe the state of Spain in the 17th cen- ment?-When were the galeons laid aside?itury.-What occasioned a still further drain How was the commerce with Peru anld Chili
of population from Spain?-Could Spain sup- then carried on?-What course did the single
ply her colonies with articles of necessary ships take 1 —Was this favourable to Peru and
consumption?-From  what countries were Chili? —What ports declined in consequence
they smuggled?-Where did the wealth of the of it?-To what port did all the register sh' p
New World then go?                      return?-How is chocolate made!




66                                 QUESTIONS
Page 377.                                  Page 385..Is it gn article of much commercial import-   What was the amount of annual revenue
4nce!-Where is the cacao raised? —What of Spain raised in America? —What domestic
o/tion engrossed much of thetrade in it?- sources of revenue on exports, &c. are to'bo
Did ithey  supply Spain with it?-IIow  did added to this?-Was the government of the
PhilipVY. remedythis?-Who.havepr0fited by  Spanish colonies expensive -How  did tcl
this institution l-Wle re   were the register viceroys augment it?.What  was ihe salarY
ships of' this company obliged to deliver their of the viceroy of Peru!
Page 386.
Page 378.                    Of Mexico 1 —-Tp what were they raiaed.!Who exposed the defects of the Spanish co- How did the viceroys add to their income?-.
Ionial system? —What was the effect of their What amount did aviceroy sometimes receive
writings?-How did Charles II. open a regu-in presents on nmame-day??-What officer adlar communication between Sp.aip aild the ministeredhis government without corruptiQnt
Colonies?-What places did the packet-boats -What is observed of him?
isit? -— Wh.at cargo were they,allowed Ato
carry?.-What did Charles I..dop in 1765?1                B OOK  IX.
Page 379.                                   Page 389.
What were the effects of. this measure-    -Whose dominions in America were next;in
How much did it increase the trade of Cuba  extent to those of Spain?-: What was the. effect
-Did its benefits extend to' Spain? —What of Columbus's discoveries on the English1-7 —
was its effect on the sugar trade?-What regu- Under what king was a voyage to America
lation existed with respect to the intercourse  first proposed?-Were the English qualified. to
of the colonies with each other — Was this undertake it?-Why not? —What was then
good policy?                               their commercial character 
Page 380.                                   Page 390.
What were its effects.?-How  was this   When did the English first trade with Spat!
grievance redressed?-By whom?-What re- and Portugal?-When did they enter the Mediforms did Don Joseph Galvez effect?-What terranean?-To whom did Henry VII. cominconveniences resulted from the great extent mit the command of their first voyage of disofthe three Spanlish viceroyalties? —Where did  covery?-With  what powers?-When? —
Galvez establish a fourth. —What did it in- When did Cabot embarkl —With how many:elude?-,What two advantages resuitefd from  ships and barks?-V-What country did they exthis?                                       pect to reach?-What island was their first
discovery? —What did they bring a-way —.
Page 381.                  What partof the coast.did.llhe pass-? —Did.he
Who was the fourth viceroy?-What part return without landing on the continent.-..
of the former territories of Peru-were under What advantages did England gain by.this
his urisdiction?-What change was made in  voyage?
eW  Spain. -Who.was intrusteds with the'          Page 391.
psew governmenti!-What was the oh`bjct of
theB  irbnin   pain?-Howdid they attempt iWhat circumstances prevented Henry VII.
to effecntthis?  -'-   -'.,.  A            from prosecuting his scheme?-What service
did Cabot enter?-What laws unfriendly to
Page 383.                  commerce existed in England?-What.preDid the Spanish people learn the defects of vented Henry VI.I.from prosecuting discoyve
their own commercial policy — What did their rics in America?
writers notice 1-What has been the effbct of                Page 392.
the rigid commercial regulations of Spain?-    What prevented Mary?-How long was the
What conduct of the revenue.offiqer is.no- scheme neglected?-Who now employed Caticed 1-To what extent was the king de- bet?-What places did he visit?-With what
frauded?                                   places in the east was a trade opened by EngPage 383.                  lish merchaebts.?-,What was the favourite
project of the nationu-What attempts were
Where is Manil~la 1-Which way from Aca- made' in it? —With what success a-What
pulco? —What ocean lies between them? —  fishery became an object of attention in the
When did Philip II. establish a colony at Ma- reign of Edward VI.?-What did Cabot proqilla?-With whom did this colony commence  pose 
an intercourse?-With what country did this
colony afterward open a trade?-To what                      Page 393.
port?-To what port was it afterward re-   What company was formed?-For what
moved 1 —What amount of money did the.ships purpose?-Who was made governor of it?take out to Manilla?-What did.they take back  What did he fit out?-,Who took the command
to Acapulco? —How was Peru allowed to par- of the fleet I-What befell Willoughby?_
ticipate in the traffic?-Were the Peruvians  Who escaped the storm, and arrived at Archafterward excluded from  it?-Describe the angel?-Where is Archangel?-How does one
effects of this trade.                     sail from  England thither?-Relate Chancelour's adventures in RIissia.-What did he
Page 38f.                  receive from the czar?-Who was queen when
Is this trade inconsistent with the usual he returned to En'gland.?-To whom did she,plicy or Spain? —What was the first kind of write?-What did she empower Chancelour
taxes paid by the Spanish colonies to the gov- to do?-To whom did she grant the exclusive'rinment of Spain 1-What was meant by  right of trade?-Whither did they push their
right of sigeiory?-What by d7uty of Vassal- discoveries-?'ge?-What does.the second brarich of taxes
coimprehendri -The thi'tlWhat was meant                    Page 3
by bull of cruzado f                         By what other channel did they attempt Au




QUESTIOuNS.                                      67
open a communication with the east?-How  state of things?-Who was Gosnold?-What
far did their factors go — Where'is Choras-' places did he discover and name.l-How-long
san? —What part of Africa did the English- was his voyage?! —What were its effects?-.
visit?-WVhat (lid they trade in?-With what Where is Elizabeth Island — Nantucket?countries did the English open a trade in the -Martha's Vineyard?-Cape Codl:.
reigns of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Mary.                    42
-:Who slcceeded Mary? —Did she.encourage                    age
commerce i-The navy                          Who sent out a small vessel? —For what
purpose?-What account did their messenP.Iie 39k..                o gers bring hack -Who was Richard HalWith what sovereign did. she eultivate-com- luyt?-What did he publish? —What were the
mercial relations? —,What company did she effects of his efforts?-How -did James I. di
encourage?-What empire did their agents vide -the country 7 —For what reason?-What
visit?. —What did they effect? —What scheme grant did he make to Gates, Summers, and
did.the earl of Warwick set on foot-?-Who  Hakluyt -L-To whom did he.giVe the south
-took command of tilhe expedition?-What coast colony-l
did he explore? —What did Sir Francis Drake
-undertake:?.rWhat coast did he explore? —                      403.
-What did he expect to find there? —,Was'he   What sort of government did he establish
the first Englishman who sailed round the for the colony?-What privileges with respect
-world? t''''to duties and trade did he grant the colonists 
-What articles of this charter were incon-, Page1316. ~sistent with freedom? -What articles were
Had the English hitherto attenpted to settle contrary to the usual colonial policy of all
a colony — tWhat. circumstances directed their nations?.-Which were the two original parent
attention to the formation of colonies — Who  colonies of North America?
was conductor of the -first English colony to
America l-.,Under whose auspic.es -What                    Page 44.
were tlhe terms of.his chalrter'        Who sailed for Virginia, December 19thI?With how many vessels and men? —What
P'ojoined agert 3-9-Wht.    ~ he persons of distinction were with him?-,What
Who joined Gilhert I-Yhat was the fate land did he first discover7 — What hay did he
c  fhs expeditins?-. Of.himself.-. V h a islnd  enter  What river?-How far'? —What town!id.he.talte possession of? —For who.m 7-.Did did the colonists fbund?-What is said of it:
this.failure discourage Raleigh?-W hen did  -What troubles ensued?
he procure a patent?- Whom did he Fend out X
-What course did they take'-IX  wha part                   Page 405.
of the country did they make researches 7'   What cat of injustice was done 7-Who:an
noyoed the colonyr —What other circumstance
distressed thema — Who was chosen their
What island did they take?-Where isit 7-  leader?-What measures did he take?-WYihat
With whom did they trade? -— What accounts was theireffect.?-What befell him —Whither
did they give on their return 7 —Whatdid Eliz- was he carried?-What was his sentence -- 
abeth:call the counitry.-VWhom-did Raleigh By whom was it pronounced?
next selnd outt? -Wilh how,many ships?W hither did he go?-Where did he make ex-                  Pag, 406.
cu.rsions? —-Where did he establish a colony?   Who saved his life?-How? —What did she
-Was it a suitabb!e place a — How  many men afterward do 7 -How many colonists did Smith
were there in the colony. —Underwhose corn- find on his return to Jamestown? —What un
mand 7?-Who was Hariot 7-What did he lucky incident now happened -— What was it
effect?-What was the object of the colonists? effect?T-,What remedy did Smith propose.?:F-H:ow did.the Indians deceive them -- ow  How was it exeocutedI-What discoveries did
were they pulished 7-Whjat did the colony he make? —HoW far did he sail in his boatl
oW U~ff~er! t   Page 39p,.                                  Page 407.
-WhYo geievd them, and took them home to   What is said of his account and map of the
England?-What sort of account did Hariot country?- On what did the colony depend for
give of the country? —What fashion did Lane subsistence?-What changes did King James
and his people learn of the indi ans?.Who  make ithe governmentofthe colony?-What
adopted it in England?-What has been the was the consequence?,-o was made gov,
consequence -What happened a few days ernor of Virginia? —What was his character 
after Drake's departure? —Who  came with -Who was sent out from Ellgland — With
three ships, and left another colony a.t Roan- what offices -,-What befell them — Who ayt,ke? —What was its fate?                   rived at Jamestown?
Page 400.                                  Page 408.
What person did Raleigh send out next   What was now the state of affairs in the
year?-With how many ships?-For what colony?-What had disabled Smith?-Whither
purpose did White return?, —What prevented  did he go. —What ensued? — hat did the
his success? —What  was the fate of the col- colony suffer from the Indians 7? —To what ex,
ny;?-What diverted Raleigh's attention from  tremities weretheyreduced by famine?.- What
Virginia?-To whom did he assign the coun- loss of lives ensued? —Y-What were the circun
try and his patent?-Did they settle the coun- stances ofGates and Summers's shipwreck on
try?-When did.Queen Elizabeth ie? —W.Were Bermudas! -How did they proceed?-Where
there any English colonies in Am,erica then?- did they land May 23d?-What did they there
Ho.w long was this after Cabot's discovery of find?
No rth A merica I-,Was Elizabeth favourable 
to Cqlonization I-Why not?  Page 409.
For what place did they set sail??,,Page 401.
prevented their voyage to Newfogndland?-:,
WWho succeeded her? 7-Wat  Wls now the Iid they return with Lord Delawapre —..qw




668                              QUESTIONS.
did Lord Delaware proceed on his arrival at nists? —What did the king requibe to i a sur
Jamestown?-What were the effects of his rendered?
administration?-What caused his return to
England 1-Who succeeded him — Who su-                      Page 417.
perseded Mr. Percy?-What sort of law did   Did the company submit to these orders T!he introduce?                             What was done in general court, October
20th?-What did James then direct?-Whom
Page 410.                 did he send to Virginia?-For what purpose?
How did he exercise his power?-What new  -How was the lawsuit decided?-What does
privileges were granted in the new charter of Stith say concerning this measure?
16121-What territories were added to Virginia?-How was the expense defrayed?-                      Page 418.
Was the lottery afterward abolished?-By    How much had been expended on the Vir
whose interference?-What was the effect of ginia colony?-What were the annual receipts
martial law in Dale's hands?-With whom did from  it? —How  many of the colonists surhe make a treaty?-To whom was Pocahuntas vived?-Who resolved to encourage the colomarried — Whither did they go?            ny?-To whom did James coinmit the governPa ge, 41 1.          ment of the colony? —What prevented his
making a new set of regulations?-Who sucWhere did she die?-Who are descended  ceeded James I.?-What did he declare?from her — Was Rolfe's example generally  Whom did he appoint governor? —What did he
followed?-What had been the state of landed intend?-How was Virginia governed during
property in Virginia — What was the effect of most of Charles's reign?-What proclamation
this 7-How did Dale remedy it — What en- was issued 1-What was the effect of this?
sued? —What did the Virginians now begin to
cultivate?-Was it profitable?-To what ex-                  Page 419.
tent was it cultivated I                     How was the value of land diminished'
Page 412.                  -Who succeeded Yardely? —What was his
character?-HIow did he behave -How was
What evil effect resulted from this?-What he treated?-How were the deputies of the
was now the state of the colony? —What cir- /colon;es treated by Charles?-Whom did he.
cumstance attached the colonists more firmly to appoint to succeed Harvey?-What was Berkethe country?-What incident furnished them  ley's character?-How long was he governor?
with a new kind of workmen?-Who called -What were the effects of his administrathe first general assembly that ever was held  tion?-For what was the colony indebted to
in Virginia? —When 1-How  many corpora- the king — What directions did he give Berke
tions were represented in it l-What powers ley 
did they assum,?-What made it acceptable'
to the people?-What was issued by the com-                Page 420.
pany, July 24th? —Where was the supreme   What reasons are assigned for Charles's
legislative power in Virginia vested?     liberal treatnment of the Virginia colony?-For
what was he solicitous 1-What instructions
Page 413.                 did he give Berkeley for this purpose — To
Howwere questions determined?-Bywhom  what number did the colonists increase?could laws be negatived?-By whom were What instances of attachment to the king were
they ratified?-How were the members of the given by the Virginia colonists?-What ordicolony after this time considered?-What was nance did the parliament issue? —What meathe effect of this change?-With whom' was a sure was taken to enforce obedience z
trade in tobacco opened?-To what did this
leadl-What did the parent state require?-                 Page 421.
What did the colony claim?-To what rivers   What colonies did they compel to submit?
did the settlements extendl?-What conspiracy -Whither did the squadron then go?-Who
was now formed'!t                         opposed them? —What terms were gained in
consequence of his resistance?-How  did
Page 414.                 Berkeley then behave?-What two laws did
Who was the Indian leader?-What was the parliament make? —What did they prohis character?-What tribes united?-What hibit in England?-How long did the colony
day was fixed for the maisacre — How did the remain quiet under Cromwell's governors?Indians proceed?-How many English were What persons came out from England — What
cut off in one hour?-What saved Jamestown  was the consequence?-What was done after
and the adjacent settlements?-Where did the Governor Matthews's decease?-What boast
colonists assemble?-What now occupied their did the Virginians make? —How-was the news
thoughts?                                  of the restoration of Charles II. received in
Virginia'.
Page 415.
How did they execute their purposes?-                    Page 422.
What was the effect. of this war on the In-   How did Charles II. treat the Virginians?dians?a-On the colony?-What disturbed the What did the acts of navigation provide?general courts of the company?-What were What did a subsequent law provide?-What
discussed in the general courts?-How  did tax was laid?
James I. regard these proceedings?-What did
his ministers attempt?-Did they succeed                   Page 423.?
How were these statutes regarded in EngPage 416.                 land?-How in Virginia?-Did the colonists
What did James now design?-What pre- remnonstrate against them? —Were they suetexts had he for dissolving the company'-  cessful? —What measures were taken to enWhat sort of commission did he issue?-What force obedience!-Did the Virginians elidq.
did he order?-What sort of report did the the laws?-With whom did they trade?-What
commissioners make to the king?-What in- design did some old soldiers of Cromwell
tention did he signify, 8th October? —What  b'orm 1:-Who disconcerted their project?was declared, to quiet the'minds of the colo- What was the cause of the reduction in the




QUESTIONS.                                 569
value ot tobacco?-What was its effect?-  the advocates of a further reformation relinWho annoyed the remote settlements?-What quish their design?-What did they do? —
act of Charles caused discontent 1-What was What name did they acquire?-Did they acthe effect of all these grievances on the colo- quire influence among the people?-What do
nists I                                  you understand by conformists. and nonconPage 424.                formists?-Was toleration understood at this
Who was Nathaniel Bacon?-What was his period of history 
character?-How did he behave?-To  what                Page 430.
office was he chosen?-Who refused him a   How were the puritan clergy treated by the
commission — What proclamation did Berke- queen?-What new court was established?ley issue?-To what place did Bacon march? Who attempted to check the arbitrary proceed-What did he demand' -Was it granted?- ings of the queen? —Did she silence them!What did the council prevail on Berkeley to To what oppressive act did she compel them
do?-1-ow did they proceed when Bacon had to assent?-What was its effect on the puriretired?-Whither did Bacon march on hear- tans? —Ifow did they retaliate the wrongs they
ing of the proceedings of the council — Whi- suffered from the queen?-Did the people
ther did Berkeley flee?-Whither the council! follow them?-To what form of church gov-Who now had supreme power.             ernment did the more learned and sober puritans incline.?-Who was Robert Brown?~Page 425.  ~      What did he teach 1
How did he endeavour to confirm it? —-How 
did Berkeley proceed?-What town was burnt
in the contest — To whom had Berkeley ap-   What sort of government does the historian
plied for aid 1-What aid did Charles send?- call that of Brown?-What were his followWVhat did Bacon and his party resolve to do? ers called?-How were they treated?-How
-What event now happened?-What was did he end his career — Did his sect become
the consequence?-What is this insurrection extinct?-Whither did a body of them fly —
called?-HIow long did it last? —Whom did Who was their pastor? —What directed their
Berkeley call together? —How did they pro- attention towards America as an asylum?ceed I                                   For what did they apply to the king.
Page 426.                                Page 432.
Who succeeded Berkeley?-To what time is   From whom did the Brownists obtain a
the history brought down?-With whom was grant of land?-How many of them  sailed
peace concluded?-In what spirit was the from England?-When?-Where did they degovernment administered? —What oppressive sign to land?-How did their captain deceive
law was enacted?-Did the colony still in- them?-What land did they first make?. —
crease?-What diffused wealth among the When?l-What did they suffer on the voyage?
colonists?-What was the number of the colo- -Where did they settle? —At what season 1nists at the period when the Revolution in  How many died before spring?-Who attacked
England took place in 1688  them?-Were they repulsed 1-What consolation had they?-What church government had
BOOK  X.                  they? —What system of civil government --
On what did they attempt to found their sysIn what ports of England did James 1. estab- tem of civil government chiefly?
lish two trading companies?-For what purpose?-Which was the more flourishing?-                  Page 433.
What gentlemen belonged to the Plymouth   In what did they imitate the primitive Chriscompany?-Where was a settlement made in tians 1-What was the effect of this?-Was it
16071                                    relinquished?-To what number did they inPage 427.                crease in ten years?-What did they obtain in
1630?-How must this colony be considered?Was it continued?-Who went out on a To what was it afterward united?-To whom
tradikng voyage!-How did he employ a part did James I, grant a new charter in 1620?of his time?-To whom did,he communicate  With what powers?-What was this society
his discoveries? —What did Prince Charles called?-Wasitsuccessfulincolonization1call the country?-What cause now began to What was the situation of the puritans in Engoperate in favour of emigration?-What was land 1-Whither did they wish to emigrate?the consequence of the Reformation?-Of what Who formed an association of puritanical genwas -!Calvin an advocate?-What did he ex- tlemen 
hibit?-Where was it copied?
Page 434.
Page 428.                  What did they purchase? —When?-Where
What prevented the English from adopting did they seek and find new copartners?-Did
it?-Did the English articles of religion con- these new proprietors consider the grant which
form to Calvin's doctrines?-In what respects had been obtained from the council of Plydid the English church differ from Calvin?- mouth a sufficient basis for the government of
Was the church and the state policy connected a colony?-To whom did they apply for full
in England?-What rites of the Catholic powers of government? —id they succeed?ehurch did the English church retain?-How  To what was this charter similar?-Who
did Queen Mary treat her Protestant subjects? named the first governor?-Who had the right
-What was the effect of her persecution?- of electing his successors?-Who had the exWhere did those who fled from it take refuge? ecutive power?-Who the legislative!-What
-When did they return?-With what feel- exemption did they obtain?-What was the
ings?-To what mode of worship were they object of the charter?-Did Charles see the
attached? —What did they endeavour to re- real motives of the puritans?
form I-Who were disposed to co-operate with                  435.hem?-Who opposed them?-Why                           Page
What did he expressly provide for?-How
Page 429.                many ships and men were sent out to New
What act of parliament was passed — Did England? —Who accompanied them as spiritual
VOL. I-72




teachtersf1-that did they dind on their arri- next considered? —What two gentemen weir
val I-WVho was Ehndicott?-Where were -he the first settlers of these provinces'
andi his followers settled?-What form  of                Pa  442.
policy did the new colony adopt?-What did       W          gethey elect?-Who seceded from them?         Who was Mr. Wheelwright?-Where did
he found a town? -What was it called?Page 436.                What colony claimed jurisdiction over them 2
What inconsistency were the puritans now  -What new danger attended the colonists-? —
guilty,: of? I-What, did Endicott do? —What How did the people of Massachusetts acquire.
part of theh colonists died in-the winter?-Who  their lands I-What warlike tribes surrounded,
were. now compelled by Laud's persecutions t& the settlers-of Providence' and Connecticut -'
migrate to. New-EnglandI? —On what. did these: What did the: Pequods: ask, of the Narragannew; emigrants insist?-Did: they gain their setsI
point?-Does the historian-think that the com-            Page 443
pany had any right to transfer the governm Antg
of the colony from England-to A-merica?     What- prevented their uniting against the
common enemy3?-What did the NarragansetsPage 437.                 do?-How did the Pequods proceed I-Where
W'hat does he suppose to have been the were they repulsed?-What colony first mus
king's motive for permitting: this transfer i- tered troops?-What hindered the advance of
Who were appointed governor and deputy- the Massachusetts people? —What troops adgovernor — IIow many ships and people sailed vanced to attack- the Indians I-Where were
froni:. England for New-England.?-In what the Indians posted? —What prevented their
places: did: they settle?-What disposition ap- being:completely surprised and massacredlpeared.- in, their first general court?-What What gave the English a great advantage? —
rights did- theyl take- from the, freemen,?-In-  Describe the action.-W-rhat was its result?whiom'were they-vested?-.Whien did tle free- What was done after the arrival of the troops
ten resume their-rights A7-Whatsinglarlaw-  from Massachusetts?-In how long a -time
wase passed?                             were the Pequods extirpated?-W-hat was thecharacter of the English officers in this first
Page 438.                 New-England war?
What were its effects? —What destroyed
many of the Indians?-How was this event                  Page
regarded by the colonists?-What innovation   What was the truer character' of the- war!
ais - intrbduced  in consequence' of the great What was its effect on the other tribes?Spread. andi increase- of: the: colony:? —What What-was the effect of the persecution in Eng-'
were the pretexts fori t?-HIow must the-colony land?-What was done to prevent emigratioun'heneforward;be- considkered?-. -What indivcdtials, ere- prevented fromt emn;;
barking: for New;Englarid?-What- reniark: its
Page 439.-                made on this important event?-How-many:
Who was Williams?-What did:he raise; a persons embarked in 1638 7- How did Charles
controversy about t-HoW -was-he punished.! resent this contempt of his proclamation?-"Wfho now enigrated to New-Eigland? —   What prevented Charles from punishing the
Whatwas,Vane'os  character? —o' what office, colonists?-What happened on the meeting of
was he elected'I-To what did he direct his, the Long Parliament 
attention?-For. what purpose were religious              P    44
meetings held?-Who was Mrs. Hutchinson?
— Whatdid she-establish-?                   How mary.persons had gone froih Englaid
to New-England between. 1620 and 16401 -
Page 440.                 How much money had been expended on the.
What -did  she teach?-Who embraced her colony?-What beginnings of commerce ap
opinions?-Whtiat was, the consequences?-  peared about the latter part of this period?How was;Mrs. Hutchinson treated I-Whither Who distinguished the colony with peculiar
did Vane go? —What was the effeCt -of these- Mtarks of favtour -What vote'did' the house
dissensions?-Where- did Williams settle?-I  of commrons- pass?-What' was its effect?What- island did his followers buy of the-Tn- What rdturn did the colonists make'for these
dians?-What did Williams teach?-'What favours?-What step did the colonies-take towas a-fundamental maxim ofhiscommniunity?  Wards independt uce?
-Wihatwas the form of government      -                   Page 446.'Page 441.                  What stipulations did the contract contain t
What caused Mr. Hooker to emigrate from  -Was this measure censured in England?_Massachusetts?-How  many persons went Why not? —What: act of intolerance and op.
with- him I —When?-What towns did- they pression was perpetrated by the general court
found? —On which side of Connecticut river of Massachusetts! —What otheract of usurpaare Hartford and Weathersfield?-On which  tion did they commit?-Did the-English govw
side is Springfield? —Inl what state are Hart- ernment censure these proceedings? —Why:
ford- and' Weathersfield?-In what, state is; notI.-Did Oliver Cromwell favour the coloSpringfield —Where had the Dutch formed -a  nies -of New-England.?
settlement-?-Where -had Lord Say and Sele
and Lord: Brook-formed a settlement?-Where -   -        Page 447.
is Saybrook?-Did the emigrants from Massa-   What striking- proof of his attachment did,
chusettsget rid of all these'competitors 1-Did he give!-What -reasons. did he- offer in supthey beconie-independent of Massachusetts and port -of his scheme?-Why did —the colonists
gain a royal charter?.-What provinces, ate decline to comply-with his wishes?