gin, were invulnerable and incapable of death, deterred them for a while from resistance. A certain cacique, however, of an inquiring and analytic turn, resolved to institute experiments; and directed his people, who were charged to carry a young Spaniard across a stream, to hold their burden gently under water for a considerable time. Doubt being laid by the result, a general conspiracy was formed for the destruction of the Spaniards. The latter, taken by surprise, at first sustained a complete defeat. All their villages were destroyed, an hundred of their number were slain, and the remainder were compelled to take refuge in the fortress of Caparra. But Juan Ponce, receiving reinforcements from Hispaniola, renewed the war with such vigour and success, that the whole island was completely subdued, and the natives reduced, as in Hispaniola, to a state of complete slavery and to final extermination. The singular subsequent career of the conqueror, and his romantic search for the Fountain of Youth, are mentioned in the account of the invasion of Florida. "Jamaica," commences the grave historian of that island,* "had the honour of being discovered by Christopher Columbus, in his second expedition to the New World." Steering along the southern shore of Cuba, that commander, informed of a great island, lying in the south, turned his prows in that direction, and on the 5th of May, 1594, reached the shores of Jamaica. On the return from his last disastrous voyage, he was wrecked there, as we have mentioned, on the 24th of June, 1503, being compelled to run his sinking ships ashore, in a harbour still called, from the circumstance, Don Christopher's Cove. His miserable sojourn in this place, protracted for a year, and his final deliverance, have been already narrated. After the death of Columbus, his son Diego, unable to obtain justice from the crown, instituted his memorable suit before the council of the Indies for the restitution of his hereditary dignities and revenues. An illustrious marriage favoured his purpose, and that eminent body, after long and patient investigation, decided nearly every point in his favour. With this righteous decision Ferdinand only partially complied; but Diego, restored to the government of Hispaniola, proceeded thither, with a splendid retinue, in July, 1508, and entered on such of his rights as the injustice of the king had allowed. But finding that the island of Jamaica, manifestly within his own jurisdiction, had been granted by the crown * Bryan Edwards, Esq. to Ojeda and Nicuesa (then busied with their schemes for the settlement of the main land), he determined to anticipate their movements. Accordingly, in November, 1509, a force of seventy men was dispatched thither, under Juan de Esquivel, a gallant cavalier, and a man of humane and magnanimous temperament. To his eternal honour, the occupation of the island was disgraced by none of those atrocities which have left their indelible stain on the names of nearly all other early Spanish adventurers. Though the island produced no gold, a moderate and settled prosperity was the natural result. "The affairs of Jamaica," says a Spanish historian, "went on prosperously, because Juan de Esquivel having brought the natives to submission without any effusion of blood, they laboured in planting cotton, and raising other commodities which yielded great profit." This humane and honourable officer, however, having founded the town of New Seville, and established a flourishing colony, died within a few years of his appointment. The settlement appears to have increased with surprising rapidity, for, in 1523, only thirteen years after the arrival of Esquivel, Francis de Garay, then holding the command, fitted out an expedition of eight hundred and fifty men, many of whom were cavalry, for the conquest of Panuco, a territory on the Gulf, which, however, Cortes had already secured to the Spanish crown. The customary scenes of cruelty and massacre followed hard on the death of the first governor, and so rapidly did the work of extermination proceed, that in little more than half a century, it is said, nearly the whole native population, consisting of sixty thousand, had perished. Many caves in the mountains, still thickly covered with human bones, attest the miserable end of these unfortunates, who, fleeing from the sword or lash of the oppressors, died from hunger in those dismal recesses. Singular to state, the capital of New Seville, after attaining, in a few years, considerable size and importance, was abandoned-according to some accounts, by reason of a destructive attack of the natives, and to others, on account of the invasion of an innumerable swarm of ants. Neither of these legends are probable, but it is certain that the ruins of extensive buildings, some unfinished, yet remain, and that a new capital city, St. Jago de la Vega, or, as it is now called, Spanish Town, was founded at an early date in the history of the country. The subsequent annals of the island present comparatively little of interest until its capture by the English, under the active administration of Cromwell, in 1655-an act of hostility much decried by some writers, but which appears to have been only a reasonable and moderate reprisal for numerous massacres and atrocities committed by the Spaniards of the West Indies on the inhabitants of all neighbouring colonies. ACCOUNT OF AMERICUS VESPUCIUS. The renown of the discovery of the Western Continent, and the eternal perpetuation of that renown by the adoption of a name, were certainly due to Christopher Columbus, whose grand genius and indefatigable industry laid open the pathway to its shores. The next claim, in justice, would be that of its first actual discoverer, Sebastian Cabot, who, through a long life-time of enterprise and perseverance, proved himself not unworthy of the high honour which chance accorded to his youth. But, singular to state, a claim founded on the most glaring imposture, and unrelieved either by original genius or great achievement, has resulted in the eternal commemoration of a name otherwise long since lapsed into obscurity-the name of Amerigo Vespucci.* He was born at Florence on the 9th of March, 1451, of noble, though decayed parentage, and received a good education under the care of his uncle, an ecclesiastic. Renato, afterwards king of Sicily, was his fellow-pupil, and to their subsequent correspondence, or to a fabrication of a portion thereof, America is indebted for its present unsatisfactory name-a name representing no heroism of soul, no life-long devotedness to a great cause-but bearing in its every syllable the continual suggestion of fraud, usurpation and inaptitude. For many years Vespucci was engaged successfully in commerce in his native city, but finally, meeting with reverses, was compelled, in 1493, to accept an agency in Spain. At Seville he became ac quainted with Columbus, and was employed by the sovereigns in fitting out vessels for their exploring expeditions. He sailed with Alonzo de Ojeda in his voyage of 1499, infamous for treachery and cruelty committed on the Indians, and, with that daring but unprincipled commander, coasted along a great extent of the shores of South America. The appearance of this expedition on the coast of Hispaniola, and the uneasiness which it caused the admiral, have been mentioned. * Latinized into Americus Vespucius. In 1501, and again in 1503, the Florentine adventurer sailed to Brazil, in the Portuguese service; and from the interesting accounts which he gave of the new continent, it became fashionable to compliment him by giving it the title of America. In 1505, he returned to Spain, and we find him in friendly communication with Columbus, and offering to use his influence with the Spanish court in behalf of the rights of that injured commander-proof almost positive that no claim to the discovery of America had then been broached by him or by any one in his behalf. He received the office of Grand Pilot of Spain, which he held until his death in 1512. "By a most extraordinary piece of imposture, if committed by himself, or of forgery, if committed by another, the claims of Vespucius to the glory of the discovery of the New World have now, for centuries, been seriously discussed-though, at the present day, few, except his Florentine countrymen, will allow them even the merit of plausibility, on grounds só utterly untenable. In a letter which he is said to have written to King Renato, and which was published in 1507, (only a few months after the death of the great admiral) an account is given of a voyage which he claims to have made to the coast of South America in 1497-a year before the memorable expedition of Columbus. No assertion ever stood more entirely unsupported. By the unanimous testimony of a host of witnesses, it has been proved that, except in this letter, none of his contemporaries, or of those familiar with the Spanish marine, had ever heard of any such voyage. His own conduct and the tenor of his numerous remaining letters are all directly opposed to the reality of any such exploit; and at this distance of time we are unable to decide whether the account is a forgery of some other person, or whether, actuated by a miserable vanity, he thought it possible, at least with his correspondent, to arrogate to himself the discovery of the continent. It is certainly more agreeable to suppose the former, than to admit that a man of the real reputation of Vespucius, and to whose good character Columbus himself has borne testimony, should have been capable of such unblushing impudence and falsehood."* "Discoverers, &c., of America." THE SETTLEMENT OF THE ISTHMUS, AND DISCOVERY OF THE PACIFIC. CHAPTER I.. DISASTROUS ATTEMPTS TO FOUND A SETTLEMENT ON THE ISTHMUS. VASCO NUNEZ DE BALBOA.-THE SETTLEMENT OF DARIEN.DEALINGS WITH THE INDIANS. RUMOURS OF THE SOUTH SEA.-EXPEDITION OF BALBOA. THE first attempts of the Spaniards to plant their footsteps on the shores of the American mainland, were attended with grievous suf fering, loss and disappointment. A small settlement named San Sebastian was founded by Alonzo de Ojeda, in the year 1509, on the east side of the Gulf of Uraba; but, despite the impetuous bravery of the commander and the hardy endurance of his followers, the implacable enmity of the surrounding savages effected its destruction. Great numbers were slain, and the survivors were compelled to relinquish the undertaking. A similar attempt, under Diego de Nicuesa, at Nombre de Dios, resulted in equal suffering, mortality, and failure. Despite these misfortunes, or in ignorance of them, eager adventurers still turned their prows to a land which, more than any yet discovered, was supposed to teem with wealth of the precious metals. The name most memorable among these early settlers of the continent, both for brilliancy of discovery and natural high qualities, is that of Vasco Nunez de Balboa. His early life, in common with most of the Spanish pioneers, had been of a roving, unsettled, and perhaps profligate character. To avoid arrest from his creditors in Hispaniola, where he had been unsuccessfully engaged in planting, he contrived to be smuggled in a cask on board the vessel of Martin Enciso, who was sailing to the Isthmus in search of the colony of Ojeda. After experiencing some |