land of Asia. Proceeding westward, he pushed his way, with much danger and difficulty, through the intricate navigation of that beautiful archipelago, which he named the Queen's Garden, and which he supposed to be the same as that described by his favourite author. Finally, gaining the open sea, he again landed, on the 3d of June, and held intercourse with the natives. Their reports confirmed his error, and even inspired his mind with hopes that he was in the neighbourhood of that fabulous potentate, the renowned Prester John, with whom it had been the fruitless aim of so many sovereigns to communicate. With sanguine hopes, he pressed on, meeting the kindest reception from the inhabitants of the coast, who thronged with delight about his vessel. He supposed that by keeping along the shore, he should, ere long, arrive at the Gulf of the Ganges and the Arabian Sea, and thence pass to the straits of Babelmandel. He even conceived the daring project, with his little fleet of open vessels, of coasting around Africa, triumphing over the rival Portuguese, and enrolling his name as the first circumnavigator of the globe.

But this splendid design, had his theory been correct, must have fallen through from the inefficient state of his command. The caravels were wretchedly leaky and sea-worn. His provisions had

nearly given out. The navigation had again become perilous, and intricate in the extreme, the coast consisting of low swamps and vast thickets of mangroves, and being covered, far and near, with shoals and archipelagos of innumerable islands. The crews, worn out by toil and exposure, earnestly remonstrated against proceeding further. Columbus reluctantly admitted the necessity of return; but to authenticate his supposed ascertainment of the locality, took a singular precaution. Being, it is supposed, somewhere near the Bay of Philippina, all hands were solemnly questioned, before a notary public, as to their opinion of the coast they had surveyed. Prompted by a desire for return, and probably placing implicit faith in the judg ment of their commander, the whole command, including several experienced geographers and navigators, unanimously concluded, that the land they had so long followed was no other than the coast of Asia; and the notary proclaimed grievous penalties against any who should afterwards recant his opinion.

At the time of this extraordinary process, Columbus was so near the western extremity of the island, that two or three days' sail would have brought him to the Gulf of Mexico. To the day of his death, he firmly

believed that Cuba was the eastern projection of the continent of Asia On the 13th of June, he turned his prow to the eastward, and ere long discovered the Isle of Pines, which he named Evangelista. The return voyage, retarded by storms and contrary winds, occupied three months, during which much friendly intercourse was held with the natives of Cuba and Jamaica. It was not until the last of Septem ber that the squadron regained Isabella; Columbus, exhausted by five months of continual anxiety, watching and exposure, being carried ashore completely insensible, and apparently at the point of death.

CHAPTER VI.

MISCONDUCT OF THE SPANIARDS IN HAYTI.-HOSTILITIES OF THE INDIANS. -THEIR DEFEAT AND ENSLAVEMENT.

-INJURIOUS TREATMENT OF COLUMBUS.- -APPOINT-
MENT OF AGUADO.—THEIR RETURN TO SPAIN.

DURING the protracted absence of their commander, the mutinous colonists, relieved from the weight of his personal authority, had fallen into much license and anarchy. Margarite, instead of fulfilling the duties of his important mission, by visiting the caciques, conciliating the doubtful and overawing the inimical, had only sought the gratification of his own self-importance and licentiousness. His people were not slow to follow his example; and the natives, with alarm and disgust, beheld their provisions, their little stock of gold, and their women, forcibly wrested from them by those whom, so little. time before, they had welcomed as visitors from the celestial regions. Diego Columbus, wanting sufficient energy, had been unable to repress these disorders; and finally Margarite and Father Boyl, having plunged the whole colony into trouble, seized certain of the ships, and, with their faction, dreading the return of the admiral, left hastily for Spain. The army, abandoned by its leader, roved through the country, committing all manner of outrages on the Indians, ana exciting their implacable enmity against the Europeans.

The island of Hayti, at this time, was divided into five native principalities or kingdoms, each ruled by a separate cacique, to whom all inferior chieftains in his district paid submission. That of Marien,

in the northern part of the island, and surrounding the settlement of Isabella, was held by Guacanagari, the former friend of Columbus. Over the beautiful Vega Real, or Royal Plain, the richest portion of the island, ruled a powerful chief called Guarionex. The province of Xaragua, including the lake of that name, in the west, was governed by Behechio. Cotubanama held sway over the territory of Higuey, in the east, and the dreaded Caonabo ruled over Maguana, including the golden mountains of Cibao. The population of the island is said, perhaps with exaggeration, to have amounted to a million of souls.

Those people, though, for the most part, placable and unwarlike, now, offended by repeated injuries, had commenced reprisals; and though not venturiug on any open attack, had cut off stragglers, in one instance to the number of ten, and otherwise harassed the intruders. Caonabo alone, deeming the time propitious, and remembering his triumph at La Navidad, ventured on overt warfare. He marched, with a great force, against the fortress of St. Thomas, where Ojeda was stationed with only fifty Spaniards; but the latter, strongly fortified, made a gallant defence, and after a siege lasting thirty days, the Indians, weary of the attempt, at last broke up and dispersed to their homes. Their indomitable cacique, still bent on the destruction of the invaders, now applied all his energies to form a general confederacy against the common enemy. All the caciques returned favourable answers, except Guacanagari, who remained faithful to his white allies, and who, in consequence, was exposed to fresh attack and depredation from the neighbouring powers.

Such was the condition of affairs, distracted by domestic sedition and menaced by native hostility, when Columbus, prostrated by dangerous illness, was borne into the harbour of Isabella. The worst consequences might have ensued, but for the circumstance that his brother Bartholomew, a man of stern and energetic character, for many years the sharer of his hopes and disappointments, during his absence, had arrived at the port, in command of a small squadron freighted with supplies. Incapacitated by illness from directing the affairs of the colony, Columbus conferred on this brother the office of Adelantado or lieutenant-governor-an office for which he was eminently qualified, and his appointment to which was clearly within the scope of the admiral's authority-but a measure regarded with deep distrust by the jealous Ferdinand, and doubtless injurious to his interests at the court of Spain.

The new deputy took vigorous measures for the defence of the colony and its restoration to order. A hostile force of the Indians was defeated, with much loss, and a new fortress was erected in the Vega. Caonabo, the inveterate enemy of the whites, was secured by an extraordinary piece of craft and audacity practised by Ojeđa. That redoubted cavalier, with only ten companions, marching for sixty leagues through the forests, suddenly presented himself at the court of the savage chieftain. The latter, charmed with his boldness, received him well, and even agreed to accompany him to the settlement. They set forth, accordingly, with a large force of warriors, and on the way, the wily Spaniard, under pretence of ornament, contrived to fasten on the wrists of his companion a pair of brilliant steel shackles. Having induced the fettered cacique to mount behind him, he gave spurs to his horse, and after a difficult march, succeeded in bringing his prize safely to the settlement. The fierce captive, undaunted by his misfortune, maintained a bold and haughty demeanour, even to the admiral, and boasted of the destruction of La Navidad. Ojeda, indeed, he treated with high respect, admiring, with true savage appreciation, the audacious trick by which he had been entrapped. One of his brothers, a brave and able warrior, resolved to effect his release, raised a force of several thousand men, with which he marched against the Spanish settlement; but these unclad and feebly-armed numbers were unable to withstand the unwonted terrors of cavalry and musketry, and were defeated, with much slaughter, by Ojeda.

In the autumn (1494), much to the relief of the colony, four vessels arrived from Spain, bringing supplies, and also a considerable number of mechanics and husbandmen. On their return, Columbus sent home a considerable quantity of gold, and, in accordance with the barbarous usage of the day, by which all infidels and pagans were held as proper' subjects for oppression, five hundred Indian captives, for sale in the slave-market of Seville. To the honour of Isabella, on their arrival, she countermanded the order for their sale, and directed that they should be returned to their homes-dispatching at the same time, unhappily with little effect, strict orders for kind and conciliatory treatment toward the natives in general.

Indignant at the captivity of their fellow-sovereign, all the caciques, except Guacanagari, entered into a fresh and formidable confederacy against the Spaniards. In March, 1495, a great force, sufficient, it was thought, to overwhelm the feeble settlements of the whites,

mustered not far from Isabella. Columbus, now recovered from his illness, with Bartholomew, at the head of only two hundred men, the whole available force of the colony, marched forth to give them battle. The disparity of force was less than might be supposed, for his men were armed to the teeth, after the European fashion, and were provided with horses and bloodhounds—both objects of especial terror to the Indians. He fell in with the ill-arrayed and undisciplined masses of the enemy, near the site of the town of St. Jago; and by a skilful manoeuvre, at once succeeded in throwing them into confusion. A charge of cavalry had its usual effect; and the ferocious bloodhounds, the disgrace of Spanish warfare, springing in their midst, and tearing their half-clad bodies, completed the defeat. Many were slain, and many more made prisoners; and the Indian army, seized with a panic, broke up, and took refuge in the mountains. The power of the confederacy was completely overthrown. Guacanagari, who had taken part with the Spaniards, unable to endure the general hatred of his countrymen, betook himself to a solitary place, where he perished of mortification and remorse.

Nearly the whole island, after this decisive action, submitted to the victors; and Columbus, marching through the country, dictated conditions of peace to the vanquished caciques, severe in the extreme. Fortresses were erected in their several provinces; and to supply the heavy tribute demanded by the conqueror, their people, in effect, were reduced to complete slavery. Each native over the age of fourteen, was compelled to furnish, every three months, a hawk'sbell filled with gold dust-these tinkling toys, which, so little before, had charmed them as the gifts of heaven, being, by a pitiful coincidence, selected as the measure of their toil and enslavement. The admiration which we feel for the genius and the virtues of Columbus is most unpleasantly checked by the remembrance of his severities toward those who had welcomed him with such kindness to their shores, and whose feeble enmity had been excited only by repeated wrong and outrage. He was a man, undoubtedly, in advance of his time in liberality and humanity; but, desirous to substantiate the importance of his discoveries, and to keep up his credit with the court by the transmission of treasure, charged his conscience with the enslavement of a whole people-a light charge, he may have thought, in that day of intolerance and cruelty, when unbelievers were held to have no rights at all, or, if any, only to the dry exchange of their corporal services for the priceless opportunity of conversion.