ble distress ensued, and Bartholemew, on his return, divided the malcontents among a chain of military posts which he had established, and also removed a considerable number to St. Domingo. Fresh difficulties were soon occasioned by the bigoted cruelty of the priests, who, to avenge the destruction of some images, in a chapel of the virgin, burned alive, after the merciless custom of their age and order, certain of the subjects of Guarionex. That powerful cacique, indig nant at this atrocity, set on foot a fresh conspiracy. A general massacre of the Spaniards, to be effected on the day of tribute, was planned, and the Indians of the Vaga, to the number of several thousands, assembled in that beautiful plain. But the adelantado, advised of their scheme, marching by stealth, fell on their quarters in the dead of night, and carried off fourteen of the principal caciques. Two of these were executed, and the Indians, fearing for the others, hastened to submit. Guarionex, in consideration of the great inju ries which he had received, was, with politic clemency, pardoned by the victor, and peace, for a time, was restored to the island. It was much easier, indeed, for the shrewd and vigorous deputy to overawe and conciliate the natives than to maintain authority over the mutinous colonists, by whom he was envied as a foreigner and to whom the wholesome strictness of his rule had rendered him doubly odious. One Francisco Roldan, a man whom, from the post of a menial in his kitchen, Columbus, discerning his abilities, had raised to the office of alcalde or judge of the island, was the chief mover of sedition. By promises and indulgence, he conciliated a large band of idlers and desperadoes, backed by whom, he set at nought the amiable but feeble rule of Diego, now governor of Isabella. Finally, these reprobates, having broken open the public warehouses of that city, and supplied themselves from the contents, took up their march for Xaragua, where, says an author of the day, with fitting indignation, "this filthy sinke of rebels liued in all kinde of mischiefe, robbing the people, spoyling the countrey, and rauishing both wyves and virgins." The adelantado, having vainly attempted to negotiate with the insurgents, proclaimed them traitors and rebels; but from the inefficiency of the force at his command, was unable to suppress the revolt. A fresh conspiracy among the Indians, excited by these wretches, soon occupied his attention, and aroused all his energies. Guarionex, his plans disconcerted, took refuge with Mayonabex, chief of the Ciguayans, who joined him in carrying on a harassing and desultory warfare against the whites. The indefatigable Bartholemew, with a small force, made his way into their almost inaccessible mountain fastnesses, defeating a large body of Indians, who opposed him at the passage of a ford, and who, what with paint and the war-whoop, seemed, says the chronicler, "so many deuills incarnat newly broke out of hell." Despite this misfortune, the highland cacique refused to surrender his guest, and when threatened with all the terrors of fire and sword, in event of his obstinacy, replied to the messenger, "Tell the Spaniards that they are bad men, cruel and tyrannical; usurpers of the territory of others, and shedders of innocent blood; I have no desire of the friendship of such men. Guarionex is a good man, he is my friend, he is my guest, he has fled to me for refuge, I have promised to protect him, and I will keep my word." But after a long and harassing warfare, the unfortunate caciques, their villages destroyed by fire, were compelled to take refuge among the cliffs and caves, where, worn out with fatigue and hunger, they were finally captured. Their lives were spared, and the adelantado returned to St. Domingo. There, after an absence of two years and a half, Columbus, wearied by toil and exhausted by illness, had just arrived. An infinitude. of troubles immediately beset him. The vessels, which he had dispatched from the Canaries, touching at Xaragua, had afforded the rebels, by means of artifice, a large supply of arms and munitions, and many of the convicts had joined them. Anxious, at all events, to relieve the settlement of this crew of desperadoes, he offered a free passage to Spain to all who desired it, and invited Roldan, assuring him of safety, to a personal interview. But the latter dispatched an insolent answer; and so widely had disaffection spread, that the gov ernor, on mustering his forces, found but a mere handful of men under his flag. He was therefore compelled to send off his ships without them, but wrote to the court, detailing his discoveries, sending specimens of gold and pearls, and entreating assistance and countenance. The rebels also forwarded a statement of their own, which, backed by men of influence, was highly injurious to his interests at court. CHAPTER VIII. TRIUMPH OF THE REBELS.-COLUMBUS RUINED AT COURT.- PREJUDICED by the representations of his enemies, the sovereigns hesitated to confirm the authority of their governor against the insurgent faction; and he was accordingly compelled to make peace with the rebels on terms dishonourable to his office and to the crown which he represented. Roldan was reinstated in his post of alcalde, and he and his followers, to quiet their rapacity, received large grants of land, of Indian slaves, and other property and privileges. Columbus would now have returned to Spain, to plead in person his rights and interests, but for a vexatious incident arising from their fresh infringement. Alonzo de Ojeda, his former follower, inflamed by the accounts of his late voyage, had been allowed, by the favour of Fonseca, to fit out an expedition in the same direction. With him went Amerigo Vespucci, who by a fraudulent claim (made by himself or others in his name) afterwards succeeded in wresting from the true discoverer the glory of conferring a name on the western continent. This expedition, which sailed in May, 1499, guided by the charts of Columbus, had coasted along the shores of South America, and had discovered the Gulf of Venezuela. Touching at various islands, the rapacious commander had kidnapped a store of slaves, and finally, landing in Hispaniola, continued there the same atrocious pursuit. The craft and audacity of Roldan, whom the governor dispatched against the intruder, compelled him to quit the coast, and, turning his prows to the unprotected islands of the archipelago, he made up his living freight, and carried it to the slavemarket of Cadiz. Hardly was this vexatious affair disposed of, when a new conspir acy of the colonists, headed by one Adrian de Moxica, broke out. Columbus, with a few attendants, hastened to the scene, and, coming on the insurgents by night, seized the persons of the ringleaders. Moxica was ordered to be hanged on the summit of Fort Concepcion. Hoping, perhaps, to save his own life, he accused some innocent persons; on which the governor, in one of his rare but uncontrollable fits of anger, commanded him to be flung headlong from the battlements. The whole revolt was repressed with the utmost sternness and promptitude, and Columbus, a part of the insurgents crushed, and the rest conciliated, began to hope for an opportunity to establish the government on a more stable footing. But numerous and powerful enemies, possessing the ear of the court, were continually undermining his reputation; and troops of discontented vagabonds, shipped from the colony, surrounded the palace, and annoyed its inmates by their clamours for pay, for redress, or for charity. By his pertinacity in enforcing the serfdom of the natives, he had alienated the favour of Isabella, who now ceased to protect his interests; and the jealous Ferdinand, long anxious for a pretext to resume the high dignities which he had unwarily granted, soon found the means to effect his purposes. Columbus had requested that a judge and an umpire, learned in the law, for the purpose of settling disputes, might be sent to the island; and the king, taking advantage of this suggestion, appointed one Francisco Bobadilla, a man of a passionate and vainglorious temper, to this office, provid ing him with a secret letter, to be produced if the culpability of Columbus should be proved, and conferring on him the supreme authority in the island. On the 23d of August, 1500, he arrived at the port of St. Dimingo, where, to his horror and indignation, he beheld the body of a Spaniard hanging to a gibbet on either bank of the river, being those of certain insurgents, executed by order of the governor. Many others were in prison, and on his entrance into the town, he demanded of Diego Columbus, then in command, that they should be delivered over to himself. The latter refusing, he proceeded to church, where, with prodigious pomposity, he read the secret missive of the sover eigns, and then, with a huge array of malcontents and loiterers, proceeded to the prison. Though no opposition was made, the doughty knight, provided with scaling-ladders and battering implements, made a ridiculous show of taking it by storm, and made seizure of the prisoners with great assumption of importance. He then took possession of the house of the absent governor, and seized cu all his property; "and, in short, conducted himself with all the insolence and rapacity which might be expected from a man of his character, whose elevation to office was dependent on his assertion of the guilt of his predecessor." Columbus, on hearing of the arrival of Bobadilla, and of certain rash edicts, which, to secure popularity, the latter had issued, wrote a letter of caution to him, supposing that he was imprudently exceeding his powers. The intruder, in reply, asserted the authority he had received, and peremptorily ordered the deposed governor to appear before him. Travelling in a lonely manner, stung to the heart by the ingratitude of his patrons, the injured admiral obeyed; and on his arrival, the vile usurper of his rights, mindless of his age, his dignity, and his great name, ordered him to be ironed like a common felon. This outrage he endured with the calmness of a mind steeled by interior grief against any mere external manifestation of wrong. No word of impatience or resentment escaped him. "Columbus," says his biographer, "could not stoop to deprecate the arrogance of a weak and violent man like Bobadilla. He looked beyond this shallow agent and all his petty tyranny to the sovereigns who employed him. It was their injustice and their ingratitude alone that could wound his spirit; and he felt assured that when the truth came to be known, they would blush to find how greatly they had wronged him." His brothers were also arrested, and all were separately confined on board of different vessels, ignorant of the charges against them, while every species of slanderous complaint and corrupt evidence, afforded by such as had felt the strictness of his rule, was greedily received by the new governor. In October, 1500, manacled like the vilest of culprits, the most faithful and eminent servant of the Spanish crown was sent home from the island which he had discovered and the city he had founded. The vessel once out at sea, the commander, a man of honour and feeling, would have taken off his irons; but the admiral refused to allow him. "Their majesties," he said, with sternness and gravity, "commanded me by letter to submit to whatever Bobadilla should order in their name; by their authority he has put upon me these chains; I will wear them until they shall order them to be taken off, and I will preserve them afterwards as relics and memorials of the reward of my services." It is said that afterwards they were always |