Christopher Columbus and How He Received and Imparted the Spirit of Discovery Part 48

[Sidenote: This Cantino coast a duplicated Cuba.]

The Stevens theory is that this seeming Florida arose from a Portuguese misconception of the first two voyages of Columbus, by which two regions were thought to have been coasted instead of different sides of the same, and that what others consider an early premonition of Florida and the upper coasts was simply a duplicated Cuba, to make good the Portuguese conception. It is not explained how so strange a misconception of very palpable truths could have arisen, or how a coast trending north and south so far could have been confounded with one stretching at right angles to such a course for so short a distance.

Stevens traces the influence of his "bogus Cuba" in a long series of maps based on Portuguese notions, in which he names those of Waldseemuller (1513), Stobnicza (1512), Schoner (1515, 1520), Reisch (1515), Bordone (1528), Solinus (1520), Friess (1522), and Grynaeus (1532--made probably earlier), as opposed to the Spanish and more truthful view, which is expressed by Ruysch (1507-8) and Peter Martyr, (1511).

It is a proposition not to be dismissed lightly nor accepted triumphantly on our present knowledge. We must wait for further developments.

The fancy that this coast was Asia and that Cuba was Asia might, indeed, have led to the transfer to it at one time of the names which Columbus had placed along the north coast of his supposed peninsular Cuba; but that proves a misplacement of the names, and not a creation of the coast. For a while this continental land was backed up on the maps against a meridian scale, which hid the secret of its western limits, and left it a possible segment of Asia. Then it stood out alone with a north and southwestern line, but with Asia beyond, just as if it were no part of it, and this delineation was common even while there was a division of geographical belief as to North America and Asia being one.

[Sidenote: Cuba an island.]

The fact that Cuba, in the drafting of the La Cosa and Cantino maps, is represented as an island has at times been held to signify that the views of Columbus respecting its peninsular rather than its insular character were not wholly shared by his contemporaries. That foolish act by which, under penalty, the Admiral forced his crew to swear that it was a part of the main might well imply that he expected his a.s.sertions would be far from acceptable to other cosmographers. If Varnhagen's opinion as to the track of Vespucius in his voyage of 1497, following the contour of the Gulf of Mexico, be accepted as knowledge of the time, the insularity of Cuba was necessarily proved even at that early day; but it is the opinion of Henry Stevens, as has been already shown, that the green outline of the western parts of Cuba in La Cosa's chart was only the conventional way of expressing an uncertain coast. Consequently it did not imply insularity. If it is to be supposed that the Portuguese had a similar method of expressing uncertainties of coast, they did not employ it in the Cantino map, and Cuba in 1502 is unmistakably an island. It is, moreover, sufficiently like the Cuba of La Cosa to show it was drawn from one and the same prototype. If the maker of the Cantino map followed La Cosa, or a copy of La Cosa, or the material from which La Cosa worked, there is no proof that he ever suspected the peninsularity of Cuba.

[Sidenote: Columbus looking on at other explorations.]

Columbus, in his hours of neglect, and amid his unheeded pleas for recognition, during these two grewsome years in Spain, may never have comprehended in their full significance these active efforts of the Portuguese to antic.i.p.ate his own hopes of a western pa.s.sage beyond the Golden Chersonesus; but the doings of Mendoza, Cristobal Guerra, and other fellow-subjects of Spain were not wholly unknown to him.

[Sidenote: 1500. October. Bastidas's expedition.]

In October, 1500, and before Columbus knew just what his reception in Spain was going to be, Rodrigo de Bastidas, accompanied by La Cosa and Vasco Nunez Balboa, sailed from Cadiz on an expedition that had for its object to secure to the Crown one quarter of the profits, and to make an examination of the coast line beyond the bay of Venezuela, in order that it might be made sure that no channel to an open sea lay beyond. The two caravels followed the sh.o.r.e to Nombre de Dios, and at the narrowest part of the isthmus, without suspecting their nearness to the longed-for sea, the navigators turned back. Finding their vessels unseaworthy, for the worms had riddled their bottoms, they sought a harbor in Espanola, near which their vessels foundered after they had saved a part of their lading. A little later, this gave Bobadilla a chance to arrest the commander for illicit trade with the natives. This transaction was nothing more, apparently, than the barter of trinkets for provisions, as he was leading his men across the island to the settlements.

[Sidenote: Portuguese and English in these regions.]

It was while with Bastidas, in 1501-2, that La Cosa reports seeing the Portuguese prowling about the Caribbean and Mexican waters, seeking for a pa.s.sage to Calicut. It was while on a mission of remonstrance to Lisbon that La Cosa was later arrested and imprisoned, and remained till August, 1504, a prisoner in Portugal.

[Sidenote: 1502. January. Ojeda's voyage.]

We have seen that in 1499 Ojeda had met or heard of English vessels on the coast of Terra Firma, or professed that he had. The Spanish government, suspecting they were but precursors of others who might attempt to occupy the coast, determined on thwarting such purposes, if possible, by antic.i.p.ating occupation. Ojeda was given the power to lead thither a colony, if he could do it without cost to the Crown, which reserved a due share of his profits. He obtained the a.s.sistance of Juan de Vegara and Garcia de Ocampo, and with this backing he sailed with four s.h.i.+ps from Cadiz in January, 1502, while Columbus was preparing his own little fleet for his last voyage. It was a venture, however, that came to naught. The natives, under ample provocation, proved hostile, food was lacking, the leaders quarreled, and the partners of Ojeda, combining, overpowered (May, 1502) their leader, and sent him a prisoner to Espanola, where he arrived in September, 1502.

[Sidenote: English in the West Indies.]

There has never been any clear definition as to who these Englishmen were, or what was their project, during these earliest years of the sixteenth century. There is evidence that Henry VII. about this time authorized some ventures in which his countrymen were joint sharers with the Portuguese, but we know nothing further of the regions visited than that the Privy Purse expenses show how some Bristol men received a gratuity for having been at the "Newefounde Launde." There is also a vague notion to be formed from an old entry that Sebastian Cabot himself again visited this region in 1503, and brought home three of the natives,--to say nothing of additional even vaguer suspicions of other ventures of the English at this time.

In enumerating the ocean movements that were now going on, some intimation has been given of the tiresome expectancy of something better which was intermittently beguiling the spirits of Columbus during the eighteen months that he remained in Spain. It is necessary to trace his unhappy life in some detail, though the particulars are not abundant.

[Sidenote: Columbus's life in Spain. 1500-1502.]

Ferdinand had not been un.o.bservant of all these expeditionary movements, and they were quite as threatening to the Spanish supremacy in the New World as his own personal defection was to the dejected Admiral. It had become very clear that by tying his own hands, as he had in the compact which Columbus was urging to have observed, the King had allowed opportunities to pa.s.s by which he could profit through the newly aroused enthusiasm of the seaports.

[Sidenote: Ferdinand allows other expeditions.]

We have seen that he had, nevertheless, through Fonseca sanctioned the expeditions of Ojeda, Pinzon, and others, and had notably in that of Nino got large profits for the exchequer. He had done this in defiance of the vested rights of Columbus, and there is little doubt that to bring Columbus into disgrace by the loss of his Admiral's power served in part to open the field of discovery more as Ferdinand wished. With the Viceroy dethroned and become a waiting suitor, there was little to stay Ferdinand's ambition in sending out other explorers. His experience had taught him to allow no stipulations on which explorers could found exorbitant demands upon the booty and profit of the ventures. Anybody could sail westward now, and there was no longer the courage of conviction required to face an unknown sea and find an opposite sh.o.r.e.

Columbus, who had shown the way, was now easily cast off as a useless pilot.

It was not difficult for the King to frame excuses when Columbus urged his reinstatement. There was no use in sending back an unpopular viceroy before the people of the colony had been quieted. Give them time. It might be seasonable enough to send to them their old master when they had forgotten their misfortunes under him. Perhaps a better man than Bobadilla could be found to still the commotions, and if so he might be sent. In the face of all this and the King's determination, Columbus could do nothing but acquiesce, and so he gradually made up his mind to bide his time once more. It was not a new discipline for him.

[Sidenote: Bobadilla's rule in Espanola.]

It was clear from the intelligence which was reaching Spain that Bobadilla would have to be superseded. Freed from the restraints which had created so much complaint during the rule of Columbus, and even courted with offers of indulgence, the miserable colony at Espanola readily degenerated from bad to worse. The new governor had hoped to find that a lack of constraint would do for the people what an excess of it had failed to do. He erred in his judgment, and let the colony slip beyond his control. Licentiousness was everywhere. The only exaction he required was the tribute of gold. He reduced the proportion which must be surrendered to the Crown from a third to an eleventh, but he so apportioned the labor of the natives to the colonists that the yield of gold grew rapidly, and became more with the tax an eleventh than it had been when it was a third. This inhuman degradation of the poor natives had become an organized misery when, a little later, Las Casas arrived in the colony, and he depicts the baleful contrasts of the Indians and their attractive island. Gold was potent, but it was not potent enough to keep Bobadilla in his place. The representations of the agony of life among the natives were so harrowing that it was decided to send a new governor at once.

[Sidenote: Ovando sent to Espanola.]

The person selected was Nicholas de Ovando, a man of whom Las Casas, who went out with him, gives a high character for justice, sobriety, and graciousness. Perhaps he deserved it. The sympathizers with Columbus find it hard to believe such praise. Ovando was commissioned as governor over all the continental and insular domains, then acquired or thereafter to be added to the Crown in the New World. He was to have his capital at Santo Domingo. He was deputed, with about as much authority as Bobadilla had had, to correct abuses and punish delinquents, and was to take one third of all gold so far stored up, and one half of what was yet to be gathered. He was to monopolize all trade for the Crown. He was to segregate the colonists as much as possible in settlements. No supplies were to be allowed to the people unless they got them through the royal factor. New efforts were to be made through some Franciscans, who accompanied Ovando, to convert the Indians. The natives were to be made to work in the mines as hired servants, paid by the Crown.

[Sidenote: Negro slaves to be introduced.]

It had already become evident that such labor as the mining of gold required was too exhausting for the natives, and the death-rate among them was such that eyes were already opened to the danger of extermination. By a sophistry which suited a sixteenth-century Christian, the existence of this poor race was to be prolonged by introducing the negro race from Africa, to take the heavier burden of the toil, because it was believed they would die more slowly under the trial. So it was royally ordered that slaves, born of Africans, in Spain, might be carried to Espanola. The promise of Columbus's letter to Sanchez was beginning to prove delusive. It was going to require the degradation of two races instead of one. That was all!

[Sidenote: 1501. Columbus's property restored.]

[Sidenote: His factor.]

To a.s.suage the smart of all this forcible deprivation of his power, Columbus was apprised that under a royal order of September 27, 1501, Ovando would see to the rest.i.tution of any property of his which Bobadilla had appropriated, and that the Admiral was to be allowed to send a factor in the fleet to look after his interests under the articles which divided the gold and treasure between him and the Crown.

To this office of factor Columbus appointed Alonso Sanchez de Carvajal.

[Sidenote: Ovando's fleet.]

[Sidenote: 1502. February 3. It sails.]

The pomp and circ.u.mstance of the fleet were like a biting sarcasm to the poor Admiral. One might expect he could have no high opinions of its pilots, for we find him writing to the sovereigns, on February 6, a letter laying before them certain observations on the art of navigation, in which he says: "There will be many who will desire to sail to the discovered islands; and if the way is known those who have had experience of it may safest traverse it." Perhaps he meant to imply that better pilots were more important than much parade. He in his most favored time had never been fitted out with a fleet of thirty sail, so many of them large s.h.i.+ps. He had never carried out so many cavaliers, nor so large a proportion of such persons of rank, as made a s.h.i.+ning part of the 2,500 souls now embarked. He could contrast his Franciscan gown and girdle of rope with Ovando's brilliant silks and brocades which the sovereigns authorized him to wear. There was more state in the new governor's bodyguard of twenty-two esquires, mounted and foot, than Columbus had ever dreamed of in Santo Domingo. Instead of vile convicts there were respectable married men with their families, the guaranty of honorable living. So that when the fleet went to sea, February 13, 1502, there were hopes that a right method of founding a colony on family life had at last found favor.

[Sidenote: 1502. April. Reaches Santo Domingo.]

The vessels very soon encountered a gale, in which one s.h.i.+p foundered, and from the deck-loads which were thrown over from the rest and floated to the sh.o.r.e it was for a long time apprehended that the fleet had suffered much more severely. A single s.h.i.+p was all that failed finally to reach Santo Domingo about the middle of April, 1502.

Let us turn now to Columbus himself. He had not failed, as we have said, to reach something like mental quiet in the conviction that he could expect nothing but neglect for the present. So his active mind engaged in those visionary and speculative trains of thought wherein, when his body was weary and his spirits harried, he was p.r.o.ne to find relief.

[Sidenote: Columbus's _Libros de las proficias_.]

He set himself to the composition of a maundering and erratic paper, which, under the t.i.tle of _Libros de las proficias_, is preserved in the Biblioteca Colombina at Seville. The ma.n.u.script, however, is not in the handwriting of Columbus, and no one has thought it worth while to print the whole of it.

[Sidenote: Isaiah's prophecy.]

[Sidenote: Conquest of the Holy Land.]

In it there is evidence of his study, with the a.s.sistance of a Carthusian friar, of the Bible and of the early fathers of the Church, and it shows, as his letter to Juan's nurse had shown, how he had at last worked himself into the belief that all his early arguments for the westward pa.s.sage were vain; that he had simply been impelled by something that he had not then suspected; and that his was but a predestined mission to make good what he imagined was the prophecy of Isaiah in the Apocalypse. This having been done, there was something yet left to be accomplished before the antic.i.p.ated eclipse of all earthly things came on, and that was the conquest of the Holy Land, for which he was the appointed leader. He addressed this driveling exposition, together with an urgent appeal for the undertaking of the crusade, to Ferdinand and Isabella, but without convincing them that such a self-appointed instrument of G.o.d was quite worthy of their employment.

[Sidenote: End of the world.]

The great catastrophe of the world's end was, as Columbus calculated, about 155 years away. He based his estimate upon an opinion of St.

Augustine that the world would endure for 7,000 years; and upon King Alfonso's reckoning that nearly 5,344 years had pa.s.sed when Christ appeared. The 1,501 years since made the sum 6,845, leaving out of the 7,000 the 155 years of his belief.

[Sidenote: Defeated by Satan.]