Chapter XXV: Prologue: Of the Bishop Don Fray Bartholomew De Las Casas or Casaus (3)

1. In the year 1526, by lying and deceiving and by making offers to the
King, as all the other tyrants have done till now to obtain offices
and positions, so as to rob, another unhappy man(95) was elected
governor of the kingdom of Yucatan.
2.2. This kingdom possessed a dense population, because the country is
very healthy and abounding much more than Mexico in provisions and
fruit: and honey was particularly abundant, more so than in any
other part of the Indies thus far discovered.
2.3. The said kingdom has a circumference of about three hundred leagues.
Its people were famous among all those of the Indies for prudence
and cleanliness, and for having fewer vices and sins than any other;
and they were very willing and worthy of being brought to the
knowledge of God. A great town might have been built there by the
Spaniards where they might have lived as in a terrestrial paradise
had they been worthy; but, on account of their great avarice,
stupidity and grave sins they were not; just as they have not been
worthy to possess the many other countries that God has disclosed to
them, in the Indies.
4.4. This tyrant, with three hundred men whom he brought with him, began
by making cruel war on those good and innocent people, who kept
within their houses without offending any one; and they killed and
destroyed countless people.
5.5. The country produces no gold, and if it had he would have used up
the people by working them in the mines; to coin gold therefore out
of the bodies and souls of those for whom Jesus Christ died, he made
slaves indifferently of all whom he did not kill; many ships were
attracted thither by the news that slaves were to be had, all of
which he sent back loaded with human beings whom he sold for wine,
oil, vinegar, pork, clothing, horses and whatever else he and his
men thought they needed.
6.6. He selected the most beautiful maid from fifty or a hundred, and
gave her to him who chose her, in exchange for an aroba of wine, or
oil, or for a pig: and similarly a handsome boy, chosen from among
two hundred or three hundred, for the same amount. One boy, who
seemed to be the son of a prince was given in exchange for a cheese;
and a hundred people for a horse.
7.7. He continued with these operations from the year 1526 to 1533 which
were seven years, ruining and depopulating those countries, and
killing those people without pity, till news of the riches of Peru
reached the place and the Spaniards left him, and that hell ceased
for some days.
8.8. Afterwards, however, his ministers returned to commit more great
evils, robbery, wickedness, and great offence against God: and
neither have they ceased at the present time. Thus have they almost
entirely depopulated all those three hundred leagues that were, as
has been said, so densely peopled.
9.9. No one could believe, neither could the particular cases of cruelty
that were done here, be related. I will only tell of two or three,
that I remember.
10.10. On one occasion these wretched Spaniards set out with fierce dogs
to hunt Indians, both women and men, and an Indian woman who was too
ill to escape, took a cord and, so that the dogs should not tear her
to pieces as they tore the others, she tied her little son of one
year to one foot, and then hanged herself on a beam; she was not
quick enough before the dogs came up and tore the child limb from
limb, although a friar baptised it before it expired.
11.11. When the Spaniards were leaving the kingdom, one of them asked the
son of a lord of a certain town or province to go with him; the
child answered, that he did not wish to leave his country: the
Spaniard replied, “come along with me, or I will cut off your ears”;
as the boy said that he would not, the man seized a dagger and cut
off one of his ears, and then the other; and on the boy still saying
that he would not leave his country, he slit his nostrils, laughing
as though he were only giving him a pinch.
12.12. This lost soul lauded himself, and shamelessly boasted before a
venerable monk that he tried his best to get many Indian women with
child, because when they were pregnant he got a better price on
selling them for slaves.
13.13. In this kingdom, or possibly in a province of New Spain, a Spaniard
went hunting game, or rabbits, with his dogs; one day, not finding
anything to hunt, it seemed to him that the dogs were hungry, so he
seized a little child from its mother and cut off its arms and legs
with a dagger, giving each dog its portion and when they had eaten
these pieces he threw that little body on the ground for all of them
together.
14.14. Consider only the inhumanity of the Spaniards in these parts and
how God has let them fall into reprobate appetite; consider of what
account they hold these people who are created in God’s image and
redeemed by His blood. But we shall see worse things below.
15.15. Leaving the infinite and unheard of cruelties perpetrated by those
who call themselves Christians, in this kingdom where there is no
justice worth speaking of, I will conclude with this only: that when
all the infernal tyrants had left, eager for and blinded by the
riches of Peru, Fray Jacomo proceeded, with four monks of his Order
of St. Francis, to that kingdom, to pacify it, and to preach and
bring to Jesus Christ the remnant of people left from the infernal
harvesting and the tyrannical massacres committed by the Spaniards
during seven years; and I think that these monks went there in the
year thirty-four.
16.16. They sent ahead certain Indians from the province of Mexico as
messengers, to inquire whether the natives were satisfied that the
said monks should enter their country, to bring them news of the one
only God, who is God and true Lord of all the world.
17.17. They [the Indians] assembled many times and consulted about the
thing, having first made many inquiries as to what sort of men these
were, who called themselves _fathers_ and _brothers_, and as to what
they laid claim; and in what they were different from the Christians
from whom they had suffered so many offences and such injustice.
18.18. They resolved at last to receive them, on the condition that they
came alone with no Spaniards. The monks promised this because the
Viceroy of New Spain had granted them this privilege and had given
orders that no more Spaniards except the monks were to be allowed to
enter the country, nor should the Indians suffer any harm from the
Christians.
19.19. The friars, as is their custom, preached to those people the gospel
of Christ, and the holy intentions of the king of Spain towards
them. With such love and pleasure did they receive the doctrine and
example of the monks, and so greatly did they rejoice over the news
of the kings of Castile, of whom in all the past seven years the
Spaniards had never given them information nor that there was any
king other than he, who tyrannised and destroyed here, that after
the monks had preached there forty days, the lords of the country
brought and consigned to them all their idols that they might burn
them.
20.20. And afterwards they gave them their own children, whom they love
more than the light of their eyes, that they might train them. And
they built them churches, monasteries and houses: and friars, were
invited to other provinces, to preach and bring the natives to the
knowledge of God and of him whom they called the great king of
Castile.
21.21. And, persuaded by the monks, the Indians did a thing never done
again up to the present day; and all that some of those Tyrants
pretend about those kingdoms being destroyed by the friars, is
falsehood and lies.
22.22. Twelve or fifteen lords, each ruling many vassals and large
territories, assembled their people and, after taking their votes
and consent, subjected themselves of their own will to the dominion
of the kings of Castile, receiving the Emperor, as King of Spain,
for their supreme and universal sovereign; and they made some sinas,
like signatures, which I have in my possession, together with the
attestations of the said friars.
23.23. Just when this growth of faith inspired the friars with great joy
and hope of drawing to Jesus Christ the still numerous people of
that kingdom who survived the murders and unjust wars, eighteen
Spanish tyrants on horse entered a certain part of the country with
twelve others on foot, which makes thirty, and they brought with
them many loads of idols taken from the Indians in other provinces.
24.24. And the captain of the said thirty summoned a lord of the country
where he had entered, and told him that he must take those loads of
idols and distribute them throughout his country, trading each idol
for an Indian man or woman, to make them slaves; he threatened to
make war on the chief if he refused.
25.25. Forced by fear, the said lord distributed the idols throughout all
this territory and commanded all his vassals that they should accept
and adore them, and give him Indian men and women as slaves for the
Spaniards. In alarm, the Indians who had two children gave one of
them, and those who had three gave two; and in this way they
concluded that sacrilegious commerce and the lord, or prince
satisfied the Spaniards.
26.26. One of these impious and infernal bandits, called Juan Garcia, when
ill and near death, had under his bed two loads of idols and he
commanded an Indian woman who served him, to be very careful not to
exchange those idols for fowls, but each one for a slave because
they were very valuable. And finally with this testament and
occupied with this thought the unhappy man died. And who doubts
that he is buried in hell?
27.27. Consider therefore of what profit are the religion and the examples
of Christianity of the Spaniards who go to the Indies; what honour
they procure for God; how they work that he may be known and adored
by those people; what care they take that His holy faith be sown,
grow and expand in those souls. And judge whether this be a less
sin than Jeroboam’s qui peccare fecit Israel by making two golden
calves, for the people to adore. Or whether it equals that of Judas
or causes more scandal.
28.28. These then are the deeds of the Spaniards who go to the Indies; in
their desire for gold they have numberless times sold, and do sell,
and have forsworn Jesus Christ.
29.29. When the Indians saw that the promise the monks made them that the
Spaniards should not enter those provinces did not come true, and
that the same Spaniards brought their idols from other countries to
sell, after they had given all their own gods to the monks to be
burned, so that they might adore the one true God, they became
tumultuous and the whole country was enraged with the friars, to
whom they said:
30.30. Why have you lied and deceived us saying that Christians could not
enter this country? And why have you burnt our gods when your
Christians bring gods from other provinces to sell to us? Were
perhaps our gods not better than those of other nations?
31.31. The friars having nothing to reply, calmed them as best they could.
They sought out the thirty Spaniards, telling them the harm they had
done and beseeching them to depart, but they would not go; on the
contrary they gave the Indians to understand, that it was the friars
themselves who had made them come there,—which was the height of all
malice.
32.32. At last the Indians determined to kill the friars; being warned by
some Indian, the latter escaped one night. And when the friars had
left, and the Indians perceived their innocence and virtue and the
malice of the Spaniards, they sent messengers a distance of fifty
leagues after them, praying them to return, and asking their pardon
for the anxiety they had caused them.
33.33. The friars, being servants of God and zealous for those souls, gave
them credence, and returned to the country where they were received
like angels, the Indians rendering them a thousand services; and
they stayed there four or five months longer.
34.34. As that country was so distant from New Spain, the Viceroy’s
efforts to expel those Christians from it were fruitless, and they
persisted in remaining there although he had them proclaimed
traitors; and because they never ceased their outrages and habitual
oppression of the Indians, it seemed to the monks that, sooner or
later the natives would become disgusted with such perverse works,
and that perhaps the evil consequences would fall on them,
especially as the evil deeds of the Spaniards constantly disturbed
the Indians and prevented them from preaching to them in tran‐
quillity. They therefore determined to abandon the kingdom.
35.35. Thus the country was left without the light and help of doctrine;
and those souls were abandoned to the obscurity of ignorance and
misery, in which they formerly were. The Indians were deprived,
till better times should come, of assistance and the diffusion of
the knowledge of God, which they had been already receiving with
eagerness; it was just as though we were to deprive plants of water
a few days after planting them: and this was brought about by the
inexpiable fault and consummate malice of those Spaniards.

The Province of Santa Maria

1. The province of Santa Marta was a country where the Indians had a
great deal of gold because both it and the places round about have
rich mines which were diligently worked. And for this reason, from
the year 1498 till the present 1542, numberless Spanish tyrants have
continually gone there with ships to ravage and kill those people
and to steal their gold. They afterwards returned in the ships with
which they made numerous expeditions, murdering and massacring, with
notorious cruelty; this commonly occurred along the seacoast and a
few leagues inland, till the year 1523.
2.2. In the year 1523 some Spanish tyrants went to take up their abode
here. And because the country, as has been said, was rich, divers
captains succeeded one another, each crueller than the other, so
that it seemed as though each had made a vow to practise more
exorbitant evils and cruelty than the other, in verification of the
rule we have given above.
3.3. In the year 1529 there arrived a great tyrant accompanied by many
men, devoid of any fear of God or any mercy on mankind; so great
were the massacres, slaughter and impiety he perpetrated, that he
surpassed all his predecessors. During the space of six, or seven
years that he lived, he and his men stole much treasure. (96)
4.4. He died without sacraments after also avoiding the commission of
investigation met on his account; and afterwards, other murderous
and thieving tyrants succeeded, who continued to destroy those
people who had survived the treatment and cruel swords of their
predecessors.
5.5. They marched far inland, ruining and exterminating large and
numerous provinces; killing, and making slaves of their people in
the ways above told of the others, putting lords and their vassals
to grievous tortures to force them to disclose the gold and the town
where it was to be had: as has been said they surpassed, both in
number and quality, the operations of all their predecessors so that
from the said year 1529, till to-day, they have devastated in those
parts more than four hundred leagues of country, which was as
densely peopled as the other.
6.6. I truthfully declare that if I had to relate singly the evil, the
massacres, the destruction, injustice, violence, slaughter, and the
great sins the Spaniards have committed in this Kingdom of Santa
Marta, against God, against the King, and against those innocent
nations, I would compose a very long history; I shall relate all
this however in due time, if God gives me life.
7.7. Here I wish only to quote some few of the words that the lord bishop
of that province now writes to the King: and the date of his letter
is the 20th of May, 1541, in which among other words he says thus:
8.8. “I assert, oh Sacred Cæsar, that the way to remedy the ills of this
country is for Your Majesty to now take it out of the hands of
step-fathers and to give it a husband, who will treat it justly, and
as it deserves; and this as soon as possible because otherwise I am
certain that the way these tyrants who now have the government,
crush and harass it, will very soon destroy it,” etc.
9.9. And further on he says: “therefore Your Majesty will clearly discern
that those who govern in these parts, deserve to be destroyed, to
relieve the republics. And if this is not done, their infirmities
are, in my opinion, without remedy. And Your Majesty will know in
like manner that in these parts there are no Christians but demons;
neither are there servants of God nor of the King, but traitors to
His law, and to the King.”
10.10. “Because in truth, the greatest obstacle I find to winning the
Indians from war to peace, and from peace to the knowledge of our
Holy Faith, is the harsh and cruel treatment that the peaceable ones
receive from the Christians.”
11.11. “They have on this account become so fierce and enraged, that
nothing is more hated or abhorred by them, than the name of
Christians, whom in all this country they call in their language
Yares, which means demons; and without doubt they are right, because
the deeds they do here are not those of Christians nor of reasonable
men, but of devils.”
12.12. “From which it arises, that the Indians, seeing these perverse
operations are general, and that both the commanders and the
subordinates are so devoid of mercy, think that such is the law of
the Christians, of which their God and their King are the authors.
And to try to persuade them to the contrary is like trying to dry up
the sea, and only makes them laugh and jeer at Jesus Christ and His
law.”
13.13. “And the Indian warriors, seeing the treatment shown the peaceable
people, count it better to die once, than many times in the power of
the Spaniards; I know this most invincible Caesar from experience”
etc.
14.14. And in a chapter further on he says: “Your Majesty has more
servants in these parts than is supposed; because there is not a
soldier among those here who, while he is assassinating, or robbing,
or destroying, or killing, or burning Your Majesty’s vassals to
force their gold from them, does not make bold to claim that he is
serving Your Majesty. It would therefore be well, Most Christian
Cæsar, that Your Majesty should make known by rigorously punishing
some of them, that such services as are contrary to the service of
God, are not accepted.”
15.15. All the above are formal words of the said Bishop of Santa Marta,
and from them it will be clearly seen what is done to-day in these
unfortunate countries, and to these innocent people.
16.16. By "Indian warriors" he means those who live in the mountains and
have been able to escape from massacres perpetrated by the unhappy
Spaniards. And he terms “peaceable” those Indians whom the
Spaniards, after having killed numberless people, condemn to the
aforesaid tyrannical and horrible slavery, in which they then finish
destroying and killing them, as appears from the quoted words of the
bishop: and in truth very little indeed does he express, of what
they suffer.
17.17. When the Spaniards make them labour, carrying loads over the
mountains, they kick and beat them, and knock out their teeth with
the handles of their swords, to force them to get up when they fall,
fainting from weakness, and to go on without taking breath; and the
Indians commonly exclaim; “go to, how wicked you are: I am worn out
so kill me here, for I would rather die now and here.” And they say
this with many sighs and gasps, showing great anguish and grief.
18.18. Oh! who could express the hundredth part of the affliction and
calamity that these innocent people suffer from the unhappy
Spaniards! May God make it known to those who can, and ought to
remedy it.

The Province of Cartagena

1. This province of Cartagena lies westward and fifty leagues below
that of Santa Marta, and bordering on that of Cenù as far as the
Gulf of Urabà: it comprises about a hundred leagues of seacoast and
a large territory inland towards the south.
2.2. These provinces have been as badly treated as those of Santa Marta,
distressed, killed, depopulated and devastated, from the year 1498
or 99 until to-day, and in them many notorious cruelties, murders,
and robberies have been committed by the Spaniards; but in order to
finish this brief compendium quickly and to recount the wickedness
done by them elsewhere, I will not describe the details.

The Pearl Coast

Paria, and the Island of Trinidad

1. Great and notorious have been the destruction that the Spaniards
have worked along the Coast of Paria, (97) extending for two hundred
leagues as far as the Gulf of Venezuela, assassinating the
inhabitants and capturing as many as they could alive, to sell them
as slaves.
2.2. They frequently took them by violating their pledged word and
friendship, the Spaniards failing to keep faith, while the Indians
received them in their houses, like fathers receive their children,
giving them all they possessed and serving them to the best of their
ability.
3.3. Certainly it would not be easy to relate, or describe minutely the
variety and number of the injustices, wrongs, oppressions, and
injury practised upon the people of this coast by the Spaniards from
the year 1510 up to the present day. I will relate but two or three
instances from which the villany and number of the others, worthy of
punishment by every torment and fire may be judged.
4.4. In the island of Trinidad which joins the continent at Paria, and is
much larger and more prosperous than Sicily, there are as good and
virtuous people as in all the Indies; an assassin going there in the
year 1516, with sixty or seventy other habitual robbers, gave the
Indians to understand that they had come to dwell and live in that
island along with them.
5.5. The Indians received them as though they were children of their own
flesh and blood, the lords and their subjects serving them with the
greatest affection and joy, bringing them every day double the
amount of food required; for it is the usual disposition and
liberality of all the Indians of this new world to give the
Spaniards in excess of all they need and as much as they themselves
possess.
6.6. In accordance with the Spaniards’ wish, they built one great house
of timber, where all might live: they needed no more than one in
order to carry out what they had in mind and afterwards
accomplished.
7.7. When they were putting the straw over the timbers and had covered
about the height of two paces so that those inside no longer saw
those without, the Spaniards, under pretence of hurrying on the
completion of the house, induced many people to go inside; meanwhile
they divided, some surrounding the house outside, with their weapons
ready for the Indians who should come out, and the others stationing
themselves inside the house. The latter drew their swords and
threatening the naked Indians with death if they moved, they began
to bind them, while some who ran out seeking to escape were cut to
pieces with swords.
8.8. Some who got out, wounded, and others sound, joined with one or two
hundred natives who had not entered the house, and arming themselves
with bows and arrows they retired to another house of the
community’s to defend themselves; while they defended the door
however, the Spaniards set fire to the house, and burnt them alive;
they then took the prey they had captured, amounting to perhaps a
hundred and eighty or two hundred men, and carried them bound to
their ship. Hoisting sail they departed for the island of San Juan,
where they sold one half as slaves, and afterwards to Hispaniola,
where they sold the remainder.
9.9. When I at the time reproved the captain in the same island of San
Juan for such infamous treachery and malice, he replied “Go to,
Senor, thus was I commanded, and instructions were given me by those
who sent me, that if I could not capture them in war, I should take
them under pretext of peace.”
10.10. And in truth he told me that in all his life he had found neither
father nor mother, if not in the island of Trinidad; such were the
good services the Indians had rendered him. This he said to his
greater shame and the aggravation of his sins.
11.11. Numberless times have they done these things on this continent,
capturing people and making them slaves under promise of safe
conduct. Let it be seen what sort of acts these are: and whether
those Indians taken in such a way, are justly made slaves.
12.12. Another time the friars of our Order of St. Dominic determined to
go and preach to those people and convert them, for they were
without the hope or the light of doctrine by which to save their
souls, as they still are to-day in the Indies; they sent a monk, who
was a theological scholar of great virtue and sanctity, accompanied
by a serving friar as his companion; his object was to see the
country, become intimate with the people, and seek convenient sites
to build monasteries.
13.13. When the monks arrived, the Indians received them as angels from
heaven, and listened with great affection, attention, and joy to
those words which they could make them understand more by signs than
speech, as they did not know the language.
14.14. It happened that after the departure of the vessel that had brought
the monks, another ship arrived there; the Spaniards on board of it
practising their infernal custom, deceitfully enticed the lord of
that land, named Don Alonso, on board without the monks perceiving
it; either the friars or some other Spaniards, had given him this
name, for the Indians like and desire Christian names and at once
ask to have them, even before they know enough to be baptised. So
they deceived the said Don Alonso, to make him come aboard their
ship, with his wife and certain other persons, by telling him they
would prepare a feast there for him.
15.15. At last seventeen persons went on board with the lord and his wife,
confident that as the monks were in the country, out of respect for
them, the Spaniards would not do anything wicked; because otherwise
they would not have trusted them. Once the Indians were on the
ship, the traitors set sail and were off to Hispaniola, where they
sold them for slaves.
16.16. On seeing their lord and his wife carried off, all the Indians came
to the friars intending to kill them. The friars were like to die
for sorrow on beholding such great villany, and it may be believed
they would have rather given their lives than that such injustice
should have been done; especially as it impeded those souls from
ever hearing or believing the word of God.
17.17. They called the Indians as best they could and told them that by
the first ship that passed there, they would write to Hispaniola and
bring about the restoration of their lord and of the others who were
with him. For the greater confirmation of the damnation of those who
were governing, God caused a ship to come at once to hand. The
monks wrote to their brethren in Hispaniola lamenting and protesting
repeatedly. The auditors never would do justice, because they
themselves had divided a share of the Indians so barbarously and
unjustly carried off by the tyrants.
18.18. The two monks who had promised the Indians that their lord, Don
Alonso, together with the others, should return in four months’
time, seeing that they did not come, neither in four, nor in eight
months prepared for death, and to give their lives to those to whom
they had consecrated them before they left. And so the Indians took
vengeance upon them, killing them justly, although they were
innocent: because it was believed that the monks had been the cause
of that treachery, and because they saw that what had been
faithfully promised them within four months was not fulfilled; and
also because up to that time and up to the present day they neither
knew, nor know, that there is a difference between the friars and
the Spanish tyrants, bandits, and assassins of all that country.
19.19. The blessed friars suffered unjustly, and by that injustice there
is no doubt that, according to our holy faith, they are true
martyrs, and reign blissfully to-day with God in the heavens; for
they were sent to that land under obedience, and their intention was
to preach and spread the holy faith, to save all those souls and to
suffer every kind of affliction and death that might be offered them
for Jesus Christ crucified.
20.20. Another time, through the great tyranny and execrable works of the
wicked Spaniards, the Indians killed two monks of St. Dominic and
one of St. Francis, of which I myself am a witness, for I escaped
the same death by divine miracle; so serious and horrible was the
case I might have much to say that would amaze mankind, but on
account of the length of the narration I will not relate it here nor
until the time comes. The last day will disclose all more clearly,
for God will then avenge such horrible and abominable outrages as
are done in the Indies by those who bear the name of Christians.
21.21. Another time there was a town in the provinces called Capo della
Codera, the lord of which was called Nigoroto; this is either a
personal name or else one common to all the lords of that country.
22.22. He was so kind and his people so virtuous, that when the Spanish
ships passed there the Spaniards found comforts, provisions, rest,
and every consolation and refreshment, and many did he deliver from
death, who, wasted with hunger, took refuge there from other
provinces where they had assassinated, and practised evil and
tyranny. He gave them food and sent them safe to the Pearl Island
[Cubagua], where some Christians dwelt, whom he could have slain,
without any one knowing it, and did not: all the Christians finally
called Nigoroto’s town the mansion and home of everybody.
23.23. An ill-starred tyrant deliberated within himself to attack this
place, as the people felt so safe: so he went there with a ship and
invited many people to come on board, as they were used to, trusting
the Spaniards. When many men, women, and children were gathered in
the ship, he set sail and came to the island of San Juan, where he
sold them all as slaves. And I arrived just then at the said island
and saw that tyrant and heard what he had done.
24.24. He left all that country ruined; and all those Spanish tyrants, who
robbed and assassinated along those coasts took it ill, and detested
so dreadful a deed because they lost the asylum and dwelling place
they had had there as though in their own houses.
25.25. To abbreviate, I omit the narration of the tremendous wickedness
and fearful deeds that have been committed, and are committed to-day
in these countries.
26.26. They have taken more than two million ruined souls from that
populous seacoast to the island of Hispaniola, and to that of San
Juan, where they have likewise caused their death in the mines and
other works, of which there were many, as has been said above. And
it excites great compassion and sorrow to see all that most
delightful coast deserted and depopulated.
27.27. It is certainly true, that never does a ship sail loaded with
kidnapped and ruined Indians (as I have told) without the third part
of those that embarked, being thrown dead into the sea, besides
those that they kill in effecting their capture.
28.28. The reason of this is, that as they need many men to accomplish
their aim of making more money from a greater number of slaves, they
carry but little food and water, so as to save expense to the
tyrants, who call themselves privateers; they have enough for only a
few more people than the Spaniards who man the ships to make the
raids; as these miserable Indians are in want and die of hunger and
thirst, the remedy is to throw them in the sea.
29.29. And in truth, one of them told me, that from the Lucayan Islands,
where very great havoc of this sort was made, to the Island of
Hispaniola, which is more than sixty or seventy leagues, a ship is
supposed to have gone without compass or nautical chart, finding its
course by the trail of dead Indians who had been thrown out of ships
and left in the sea.
30.30. When they are afterwards disembarked at the island where they are
taken to be sold, it is enough to break the heart of whomsoever has
some spark of compassion to see naked, starving children, old
people, men, and women falling, faint from hunger.
31.31. They then divide them like so many lambs, the fathers separated
from the children, and the wives from the husbands, making droves of
ten or twenty persons and casting lots for them, so that each of the
unhappy privateers who contributed to fit out a fleet of two or
three vessels, and the tyrant villains who go to capture and prey
upon the natives in their homes, receives his share.
32.32. And when the lot falls on a drove in which there is some old or ill
person, the tyrant who gets it, says: “Why in the devil do you give
this old man to me? That I shall bury him? Why should I take this
ill one? To nurse him?” It may be seen how the Spaniards despise
the Indians and whether they carry out the precept of divine love to
one’s neighbour, upon which rest the law and the prophets.
33.33. The tyranny exercised by the Spaniards upon the Indians in fishing
pearls, is as cruel, and reprehensible a thing as there can be in
the world. Upon the land there is no life so infernal and hopeless
as to be compared to it, although that of digging gold in the mines
is the hardest and worst.
34.34. They let them down into the sea three and four and five fathoms
deep, from the morning till sunset. They are always swimming under
water without respite, gathering the oysters, in which the pearls
grow.
35.35. They come up to breathe bringing little nets full of them; there is
a hangman Spaniard in a boat and if they linger resting, he beats
them with his fists, and, taking them by the hair, throws them in
the water to go on fishing.
36.36. Their food is fish and the fish that contain the pearls, and a
little cazabi or maize bread, which are the kinds of native bread:
the one gives very little sustenance and the other is very difficult
to make, so with such food they are never sufficiently nourished.
Instead of giving them beds at night, they put them in stocks on the
ground, to prevent them from escaping.
37.37. Many times the Indians throw themselves into the sea while fishing
or hunting pearls and never come up again, because dolphins and
sharks, which are two kinds of very cruel sea animals that swallow a
man whole, kill and eat them.
38.38. From this it may be seen, whether the Spaniards who thus seek
profit from the pearls, observe the divine precepts of love to God
and one’s neighbour; out of avarice, they put their fellow creatures
in danger of death to the body and also to the soul; because they
die without faith and without sacraments.
39.39. They lead the Indians such a wretched life that they ruin and waste
them in a few days; for it is impossible for men to live much under
water without respiration, especially because the cold of the water
penetrates their bodies and so they generally all die from
hæmorrhages, oppression of the chest caused by staying such long
stretches of time without breathing; and from dysentery caused by
the frigidity.
40.40. Their hair, which is by nature black, changes to an ashen colour
like the skin of seals, and nitre comes out from their shoulders so
that they resemble human monsters of some species.
41.41. With this insupportable toil, or rather, infernal trade, the
Spaniards completed the destruction of all the Indians of the
Lucayan Islands who were there when they set themselves to making
these gains; each one was worth fifty and a hundred crowns, and they
were sold publicly, although it had been prohibited by the
magistrates themselves; it was even more unjust elsewhere for the
Lucayans were great swimmers. They have caused the death of
numberless others here, from other provinces, and other regions.

The Yuyapari River

On a river called the Yuyapari, which flows for more than two hundred leagues through the province of Paria, a wretched tyrant(98) sailed a great distance in the year 1539, accompanied by four hundred or more men; and he did very great slaughter, burning alive and putting to the sword numberless innocent and inoffensive people who were in their towns or houses, unsuspicious of danger; and he left immense tracts of country burnt, terrorized, and the inhabitants scattered. He finally died a bad death and his fleet was dispersed. Other tyrants succeeded him and continued this wickedness and tyranny: and to-day they go through those regions destroying, killing, and sending to hell those souls that were redeemed by the son of God with His own blood.

The Kingdom of Venezuela

1. The Spaniards have always exercised diligent care to hide the truth
from our lord the King about injuries and losses to God, to human
souls, and to his State; and in the year 1526, he was deceived and
perniciously persuaded into giving and conceding to some German
merchants, the great kingdom of Venezuela which is much larger than
all Spain; the entire management of the government and all
jurisdiction were conceded under a certain agreement and compact, or
condition that was made with them. (99)
2.2. These men invaded these countries with a force of three hundred or
more and found the people the same gentle lambs, (and much more so),
as they usually find them everywhere in the Indies before the
Spaniards injure them.
3.3. More cruel beyond comparison than any of the other tyrants we have
told of, was their invasion; and more irrational and furious were
they than the cruellest tigers, or raging wolves and lions. Their
liberty of action was the greater because they held all the
jurisdiction of the country; with greater eagerness and blind
greediness of avarice, and with ways and arts for stealing and
accumulating gold and silver more exquisite than their predecessors,
they abandoned all fear of God and the King and all shame of men,
forgetting that they were mortal beings.
4.4. These devils incarnate have devastated, destroyed, and depopulated
more than four hundred leagues of most delightful country containing
large and marvellous provinces, valleys extending for forty leagues,
pleasant regions, very large towns, most rich in gold.
5.5. They have killed and entirely cut to pieces divers large nations and
destroyed many languages, so that not a person who speaks them
remains, except a few, who have hidden in caverns and in the bowels
of the earth to escape from the pestilential sword of the
foreigners.
66. They have killed, destroyed, and sent to hell, (according to my
belief), more than four or five millions of those innocent races by
means of various strange and new kinds of cruel iniquity and
impiety; nor do they, at the present day, cease sending them there.
7.7. I will relate no more than three or four instances of the endless
injustice, outrages, and slaughter they have done, and are doing
to-day; it may be imagined from these what they must have done to
accomplish the great destruction and depopulation we have described.
8.8. They took the supreme lord of all the province, putting him to
torture, for no other reason than to obtain his gold. He escaped
and fled to the mountains, where he remained in hiding amongst the
rocks, with his enraged and terrified people. The Spaniards
attacked them in their search for him; they recaptured him and,
after cruel slaughter, they sold at auction all whom they took
alive.
9.9. Before they captured that ruler, they had been received in many, nay
in all the provinces, wherever they went, with singing and dances
and many gifts of large quantities of gold; the payment they made
the Indians was to put them to the sword and cut them to pieces in
order to terrorise the whole country.
10.10. Once, when the inhabitants had come out to meet him in the
aforesaid way, the tyrant German captain put a great number of
people into a large straw louse and cut them to pieces. As the
house had some beams at the top and many climbed up to escape from
the bloody hands and swords of those men or pitiless beasts, this
infernal man caused fire to be set to the house; thus all who
remained were burnt alive. This action caused the depopulation of a
great number of towns as all the people fled to the mountains where
they hoped to be safe.
11.11. They came to another large province on the borders of the province
and kingdom of Santa Marta, where they found the Indians in their
towns and houses, peaceably occupied with their affairs. They
stayed with them a long time, eating their substance while the
Indians served them as though it were their duty to give them life
and succour; they bore with their continual oppressions and usual
exactions, which are intolerable, for one parasite Spaniard eats as
much in one day as would be sufficient for an Indian household of
ten persons for a month.
12.12. During this time, the Indians spontaneously gave them great
quantities of gold, besides the best of treatment. At last when the
tyrants wished to depart, they determined to repay their hospitality
in this following manner.
13.13. The German governor, who was a tyrant and, for what we know also a
heretic—for he never attends mass neither does he let many others
go, besides which, other signs mark him as a Lutheran,—ordered his
men to capture all the Indians they could, with their wives and
children, and to confine them in a large yard or wooden enclosure
prepared for the purpose; he then announced that whoever wished to
go out and be free, must ransom himself according to the will of the
iniquitous governor, giving so much gold for himself, so much for
his wife and for each of his children; and to force them the more,
he commanded that nothing whatever should be given them to eat,
until they brought him the gold he demanded as ransom.
14.14. Many who were able, sent to their houses for gold and redeemed
themselves. They were set free, and returned to their occupations
and to their houses to provide themselves with the necessaries of
life. The tyrant sent certain villainous Spanish thieves to
recapture these miserable Indians, who had once ransomed themselves;
they brought them back to the enclosure and tortured them with
hunger and thirst to make them ransom themselves again.
15.15. Many who were captured were ransomed two and three times. Others
who could not, because they had given all the gold they possessed
and had not enough left, he left languishing in the enclosure till
they died of hunger.
16.16. By this deed, he left ruined, desolate, and depopulated, a most
populous province most rich in gold, which has a valley of forty
leagues, where he burnt a town that had a thousand houses.
17.17. This infernal tyrant determined to go inland, as he eagerly desired
to discover the hell of Peru in those parts. To make this unhappy
journey, he, and the others brought numberless Indians, chained to
one another, carrying loads of sixty, and seventy pounds each.
18.18. If one tired, or fainted from hunger, fatigue, and weakness, they
at once cut off his head at the collar of the chain so as not to
stop to loosen the others in the line; and the head fell to one side
and the body to the other, and they distributed his load among the
other bearers.
1919. To tell of the provinces he destroyed, the towns, and places he
burnt (for all the houses are built of straw)—the people he killed,
the cruelty he displayed in the several massacres during this
journey, would make an incredible and terrifying story, but it would
be true, nevertheless.
20.20. These journeys were afterwards undertaken by other tyrants who
followed in the same Venezuela, and others from the province of
Santa Marta, animated by the same holy intention of discovering this
holy house of gold in Peru; and they found all the country for more
than two hundred leagues, so much burnt, depopulated, and deserted,
from formerly being most populous and prosperous, as has been said,
that though they themselves were cruel tyrants, they marvelled and
were horrified to behold the traces of such lamentable devastation.
21.21. Many witnesses have proved these things before the chancellor of
the exchequer of the India Council and the proofs are in the
possession of the same Council but they have never burnt alive any
of these nefarious tyrants.
22.22. But what has been proven is as nothing compared to the massacres
and great wickedness that have been committed, because all the
officers of justice in the Indies are so mortally blind that they do
not investigate the crimes, destruction, and slaughter that have
been, and are to-day wrought by all the tyrants of the Indies,
beyond declaring that as such and such a one has used cruelty
towards the Indians, the King’s revenue has lost so many thousand
crowns; they are satisfied with little proof, and that of a very
general and confused character.
23.23. And even this they do not verify, nor make it as clear as they
should; for if they did their duty to God and the king, they would
discover that the said German tyrants have robbed the king of more
than three million crowns’ worth of gold, because that province of
Venezuela, with the others they have ruined, devastated, and
depopulated for an extent of more than four hundred leagues, (as I
have said) was the most prosperous, the richest in gold, and the
most populous of the universe.
24.24. During the sixteen years those tyrants, enemies of God, devastated
it, they have wasted and caused the loss of more than two millions
of revenue that the king of Spain would have drawn from that
kingdom. Nor is there hope of repairing this damage between now and
the end of the world, unless God, through a miracle, should
resuscitate so many million persons.
25.25. These are the temporal injuries to the king. It would be well to
consider what, and how many are the injuries, the dishonour,
blasphemies, and insults to God and His law, and with what will be
requited so many numberless souls, burning in hell, because of the
avarice and cruelty of these tyrant animals or Germans. (100)
26.26. To sum up this wickedness and ferocity, I will only say that from
the day the Germans entered the country till the present time, that
is in these sixteen years, the Indians they have transported in
their ships amount to more than a million who were sold as slaves in
Santa Marta, Hispaniola, Jamaica, and the island of San Juan.
27.27. And even now, in the year 1542, the traffic continues, for the
royal Audiencia of Hispaniola dissembled—nay favoured this and all
the other numberless acts of tyranny and destruction done along all
that coast of the continent, which is more than four hundred leagues
from Venezuela to Santa Marta, and is under their jurisdiction,
though they could have prevented and corrected them.
28.28. There has been no other reason to make slaves of all these Indians
except the perverse, blind, obstinate will of these most avaricious
tyrants, and to satisfy their insatiable avarice for money; just as
all the others have always done everywhere in the Indies, taking
those lambs and sheep away from their houses, their wives, and their
children in the said cruel and wicked ways, marking them with the
king’s brand to sell them as slaves.

The Provinces of that Part of the Continent which is Called Florida