| 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,
[pg 375] 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 [pg 376]
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 [pg
378] 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
[pg 379] 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
[pg 381]
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 [pg 382] 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 [pg 383]
Lucayans were great swimmers. They have caused the death of
numberless others here, from other provinces, and other
regions. |