Colorado-The Bright Romance of American History Part 1

Colorado--The Bright Romance of American History.

by F. C. Grable.

PREFACE.

It is Emerson's beautiful thought that all true history is biography, and that men are but the pages of history. In felicitous language the author has pictured a period that is indeed the bright romance of American history. It is the story of the discovery of a new Continent in the Western Seas; the story of a graceful and cultured people of a mighty world-power in the Fifteenth Century; the story of the dream of a great Western Empire to be founded in the New World, where would be revived all the pomps and chivalries of Castile's ancient court; the story of the fading of that dream in the splendor of the great world-idea of the self-government of man carried by the Pilgrim Fathers to Plymouth Rock in 1620; the story that in the great drama of life man is ever changing from the old into the new, and from the bad into the better in unceasing, unchanging, inevitable evolution; the story of early Colorado, whose ancient Capital, Santa Fe,--in the sense that Colorado is a part of the old Spanish country--was the first white settlement west of the Floridas upon all this Western Continent within the present domain of the United States.

But more than all, it is a story of the human touch of those still living and of great empire builders not long since pa.s.sed away, whose "hands bent the arch of the new heavens" over our beloved State of Colorado; whose eyes were filled with far-away visions and their hearts with sublime faith; pioneers and history makers of whom we would say as Cinneas said when asked by his master Pyrrhus after his return from his Emba.s.sy at Rome, "What did the Roman Senate look like?"

"An a.s.sembly of Kings!" replied Cinneas.

Wendell Phillips, in the greatest of all his lectures, pictures the "Muse of history dipping her pen in the sunlight and writing in the clear blue" above all other names the name of his hero "Toussaint l'Ouverture." The author in these pages which so graphically portray the early history of our State would not write the name of Colorado above any sister state; but we can catch between his lines the deep undertones of the music of the Union, which overmaster all sectional notes in the thought, that Colorado is a glorious part of it all.

And so it is enough that we read in the t.i.tle of this book these magic words, as if traced in the clear sunlight of our mountain skies, "Colorado--The Bright Romance of American History."

J. F. TUTTLE, JR.

COLORADO--THE BRIGHT ROMANCE OF AMERICAN HISTORY

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Ocean Explorer.]

CHAPTER I.

THE OLD, THE NEW, AND THE OCEAN BETWEEN.

[Sidenote: 1504]

The great Queen Isabella was dead. She had died amidst the splendor of the richest and most powerful Court on earth, beloved by some for her n.o.ble qualities, and execrated by others for her tyrannical laws, for the heartlessness and cruelty she had practiced, for the wars she had kindled, and for the lives she had sacrificed. Because of the turbulence of the elements, the superst.i.tious believed that her unconquerable spirit refused to be tranquilized even by death.

Darkness lay upon the world, and the slowly moving funeral cortege made its way the three hundred miles to Granada, menaced by the lightning's flash, and accompanied by the thunder's roar, the rain and the hurricane, and the floods which swept men and horses to their death. At last, after thirty years of a masterful and memorable reign, Isabella lay at rest in the marvelously beautiful Alhambra, the burial place of her choice which she had wrested from the Moorish Kings. And Ferdinand ruled in her stead.

[Sidenote: 1506]

Less than two years, and there was another notable death in Spain. The far-seeing eyes of a kingly man looked out upon the world for the last time. The active hands of a great navigator lay still, folded over the courageous heart that had long been broken; the heart that had been thrilled by the acclaim of the populace, and then chilled by the frowns of its sovereigns; the hands that had been bedecked with jewels by Ferdinand and Isabella, and later laden by them with chains.

Columbus, the admiral of the ocean, who had joined two worlds by his genius and accomplished an event whose magnitude and grandeur history can never equal, and who had filled the center of a stage, brilliant with the famous actors of his time, had died; died in poverty and neglect; instead of chimes chanting a requiem in his praise, there was the rattle of the chains his hands had worn, as they went down into his sepulchre for burial with him according to his wish. Even his grave remained unmarked for ten years, until public opinion forced Ferdinand to a tardy recognition of his duty in the erection of a monument in honor of one of the greatest men of any age; a man great in thought and great in action; a man with such a mighty faith that we stand appalled at its mightiness!

Isabella left a united country; a country at the pinnacle of greatness. She left a highly organized army; an army wrought out of a fragment of incompetency. She raised the standard of science and the arts, and advanced the cause of morality. But the greatest and most enduring monument she erected was the result of the slight encouragement and scant help that she gave to the enthusiastic Italian mendicant, who became the founder of a New World and whose fame will continue undimmed to the end of time.

[Sidenote: 1516]

"The King is dead" fell upon Ferdinand's unhearing ears. "Long live the King" greeted the advent of Charles, his successor. Charles, who was the son of the unfortunate Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella; Charles I, King of Spain; Charles V, Emperor of Germany; Ruler over the kingdom of Naples; Monarch of the New World. Power, such as the world has seldom seen, centered in this man; an empire so vast that it encircled the globe, and upon whose domain military activities never ceased. The cruelties of Spain are proverbial, and they reached their climax under the rule of Ferdinand, Isabella and Charles; and under them the decadence of their nation began, which in four hundred years has never ceased. Now, shorn of every dependency, its power forever destroyed, it lies crushed, humiliated and broken by the greatness of its fall.

And here this sketch leaves Old Spain and we sail away across the ocean five thousand miles, to the New Spain of that period, in a s.h.i.+p whose sails flap lazily in the breeze, taking more weeks then than days now by the modern methods of this enlightened age.

[Sidenote: 1519]

Hernando Cortez sprang from a n.o.ble but impoverished family. Educated for the law, he chose an adventurous life instead, and at the age of nineteen left Spain for San Domingo to try his fortunes in the New World, resulting in his brilliant conquest of Mexico; a country whose early history we can only imagine. The unknowable is there; for its secrets lie buried beneath the weight of centuries. Tragedy is there; for what derelict, never heard of more, dropped in from over the seas and cast its human wreckage on those unknown sh.o.r.es for the beginning of a nation? Who were those who may have been lost to home and friends and wandered in from Asia over that narrow strip of land long ago submerged? Whence they came, whatever their nation or color, they were human beings, with thoughts and affections like ours, whose beginnings we can never fathom. They grew in numbers, had flocks and herds, and gold and jewels. They had tribal governments, with differing customs and languages. They had the wandering habit. The streams, the mountains, and the plains beckoned them and they came and went, happy, care-free and prosperous. Some one among them said: "Let us all come together and unite as a people; establish a uniform government; build a city, and select some one of our number to rule over us." And it was done. Mexico City was built and became the Capital. Montezuma was made the ruler. They had laws and Courts of Justice; they had well-constructed and highly-decorated buildings, with architectural features the equal of some European structures prized for their beauty and durability. Their streets were laid out symmetrically, and their parks and landscape gardening added to the city's attractiveness. They had a system of ca.n.a.ls and well-developed agriculture; an organized army and thoroughly equipped s.h.i.+ps. Whence came this high civilization? We can never know. We only know that it existed. Two million people lived in and adjacent to Mexico City. They were rich, intelligent and contented, until the coming of Cortez; and when he reached the sh.o.r.es of Mexico in the Spring of 1519 it was a memorable day for them. He came in ten s.h.i.+ps with six hundred Spanish soldiers.

He disembarked, and when the last man was ash.o.r.e and all the ammunition and guns and supplies were landed, he performed a feat of courage bordering on the sublime. He set his s.h.i.+ps on fire, and he stood with his resolute men and saw them burn to the water's edge, knowing that the flame and smoke and destruction meant for each that he must conquer or die. And they marched away, a handful against a host, and they won!

But the fall of Mexico, like the fate of most nations, came from within and not from without. What could six hundred do against a united two million. That was where Cortez shone. To create discord, distrust and jealousy; to make them fight each other; to unite the disaffected under his own banner, was the work of a diplomat and general, and he was both. To their everlasting disgrace, the dissatisfied of the native race accomplished for Cortez the downfall of their own nation. And when, two years after he began his destructive warfare, the City of Mexico had been utterly destroyed; when a race had been subjugated; had been stripped of its vast treasure of gold and jewels for the greater glorification of the luxurious Court of Spain; had lost thousands by slaughter; then, and not till then, did the insurgents know that they had encompa.s.sed their own ruin. They were enslaved by the Spaniards. The last chapter in their national life was written. The Aztecs, as a people, were no more. They were given the name of Mexicans by the Spaniards, for "Mexitl" the national War G.o.d of the native race. Mexicans they have continued to this day, and Cortez as Captain General ruled over the Mexican Territory which he called "New Spain." He set four hundred thousand of the enslaved natives to rebuilding the City of Mexico, but their hearts were in the ruins of the old city, and not in the building of the new--for Cortez saw to it that there should be nothing in the new Spanish city that would remind them of the ancient grandeur of the old. Ten years after its completion there were not a thousand people in it. The old population was melting away, dying off from over-work in the mines to which they had been driven, and where they sickened from disease and hunger and heart yearning for the families from whom they had been forcibly separated, while nearly seven million dollars a year of their earnings were being sent to Spain, taken from the richest silver mines in all the world.

You were great Empire builders, oh Spain! But your wanton cruelty to mankind will forever cloud your glory as the eclipse darkens the sun!

You permitted the Inquisition! You pitted strength against helplessness, burned thousands alive, and confiscated their property!

You permitted the slaughter of twelve hundred thousand human beings in the West Indies, and never heard their pitiful cry, until the lack of earnings ceased to swell the income of the Crown, and then you carried captives from the mainland to take the place of the dead! You permitted the inst.i.tution of the American slave trade, which only ended at Appomattox, with the destruction of hundreds of thousands of American soldiers, and millions of money!

The power and fame of Cortez had grown beyond the limit set by the Crown of Spain. Every forceful and successful man in the Dominion of Spain was a marked man; not marked for preferment and encouragement, but marked for humiliation and disgrace. The battles that Cortez had won for the King were forgotten; the treasure he had sent home counted for naught; and for the territory he had subjugated, there was no appreciation. His authority was ended. An officer and soldiers came from Spain to take him back, not with honor, but in ignominy. He arrested the officer, and induced the soldiers to join his army. He was so powerful that he thought he could be King of the New World.

Finally, threats and promises secured his peaceable return to Spain, where all promises were broken, and his life was tempest-tossed until he died.

[Sidenote: 1528]

Then Nuno de Guzman was named Governor General of New Spain. He started out to duplicate the successes of Cortez, whose ability he lacked, as well as the opportunity. He hunted in vain for another Mexico City to conquer and despoil. He pushed Northward hunting for riches, slaughtering the natives, burning their villages, and laying waste their country. He conquered a great territory on the western coast of Upper Mexico, along the Gulf of California, which he called "New Gallicia." His rule was so ruthless, cruel and desolating, that even Spain, hardened as she was to suffering, was shocked with his barbarous persecution of the natives, and after seven years, a warrant was sent out from Spain for his arrest and trial, on charges of inhuman cruelty. He was deprived of his office, taken to Mexico City, held there a prisoner for several years, and was then returned to Spain.

[Sidenote: 1535]

Don Antonio de Mendoza, known as the "Good Viceroy," succeeded to the rule of Mexico, and put in practice a new policy, one not before tried in the New World, that of kindness. It had come too late for many, for the dead were everywhere, and the living had settled into a degree of hopelessness that a whole decade of kind treatment could do little toward counteracting. Three hundred and seventy-six years have pa.s.sed since that day, and the scars of those sixteen years of Spanish murder and plunder have not yet been removed.

With which our narrative ends as to the mis-rule of New Spain.

[Sidenote: 1536]

Pamfilo de Narvaez had been made Governor of Florida in 1527 by the Spanish Government, with a grant to explore and colonize a vast territory bordering on the Gulf of Mexico. He outfitted in Spain, sailed to Cuba where he repaired his vessels, thence into the Gulf of Mexico, meeting with storms that drove him out of his course, and so confused his mariners that they lost their reckoning. Consequently, he was left by his s.h.i.+ps with his three hundred men and horses on the coast of Florida, instead of on the coast of Texas, as he thought.

They rode away into the wilderness and nearly all to their death.

Their wanderings, hards.h.i.+ps and sufferings, the mind cannot conceive nor the pen describe. They worked to the West and North, crossing rivers and swamps, plains and mountains, through heat and cold, hungry and finally starving when their last horse had been used for food, mistreated by hostile Indians, lost and in despair. Beating their spurs into nails, they made boats, and using the hides from their horses for sails, they were borne down one of the Gulf Rivers, and out into the swift ocean current where they were carried to sea and drowned--all save four. Eight years after they had disembarked on the Florida Coast, these four were found by some slave catchers, away up on the Coast of California, whither they had wandered, and taken to Mexico City. Their sufferings had been so great, that when they reached civilization, they could no longer appreciate comforts. They continued to sleep on the ground, to eat unwholesome food, and to cling to the primitive habits they had formed. Slavery had in the meantime become so common, that Mendoza bought of the three Spaniards the negro, Estevanico, to act as guide to the far North, to which country Mendoza proposed to send an expedition.

[Sidenote: 1539]

Fray Marcos, a Priest from Italy, had been a partic.i.p.ant in the conquest of Peru, was a historian and theologian, picturesque in appearance and language, and was next to Mendoza in power. He was selected to go North on a visit preliminary to the proposed expedition, with the negro as guide. Rumors were in the air, and growing all the time, of wonderful cities and untold treasure in the North. Even the three returned Spaniards, rested from their wanderings, hinted at the fabulous wealth of which they persuaded themselves they had heard. The tales grew with the telling, so that Fray Marcos felt that he must be able to verify these reports, which he did, with the result that when the Coronado expedition found they did not exist, he had the great misfortune to ever after be called the "Lying Monk."

CHAPTER II.

CORONADO.

[Sidenote: 1540]

About four years after the death of Columbus at Valladolid, there was born at Salamanca, about sixty miles away, one who was to become an explorer in the world that Columbus had discovered. Francisco Vasquez de Coronado grew up to have ambitions of his own. He removed to New Spain, where he married Beatrice, the beautiful and accomplished daughter of King Charles' cousin. Her father, Alonzo Estranda, was the royal treasurer of the New Country. Even at that remote period those Spanish gentlemen had a way of coming across the seas and weighing their t.i.tles in the scales against the money, bonds and lands of the relatives of the prospective wife, in the process of which the wife did not apparently seem to be taken into account. Coronado received from the mother of Beatrice, a great landed estate that had come to her as a grant from the Crown. Then, too, they had a law in New Spain, that confiscated the property of a man if he failed to marry by a certain time. One who preferred poverty to matrimony, had his vast fortune taken from him, and given to Coronado, which was very bad for one, and very pleasant for the other. So Coronado started out on his career very rich. He was made an officer in the Spanish army, and almost immediately attracted attention to himself. The negroes in the mines at Ametepeque mutinied, and set up a king for themselves, in order that the wealth which they were producing might become the property of their own king and themselves, instead of being sent to the Court of Spain. The promptness with which Coronado shot many of them to death and took their king away, shows that he was neither lacking in decision nor initiative even at the very early age of twenty-seven. A year later, 1538, he received the appointment of Governor of New Gallicia, the country in the subjugation of which, Guzeman the Viceroy of New Spain, had accomplished his own undoing.