But alas for the overweening confidence of a Peter or a Juan Sanchez! Fighting the elements at sea is a different thing from fighting Indians on land. Quite a different order of tactics is required; and the sailor's life is not the school in which to study the wiles of Indian strategy. In the one place the sailor is not more superior than is the savage in the other. The quibian, outwardly calm, inwardly is fiercely excited; and like the wild beast when hotly pursued, his instincts quicken with the occasion. He and his loved ones are prisoners, treacherously entrapped by a strange species of the human kind in return for fair words and generous hospitality. Their probable fate possesses all the horrors of uncertainty. Swiftly with the swift boat runs the time away; something must be done or all is lost. Narrowly, but cautiously, the chief surveys his keeper. It is pleasant to look upon the homely face of honest Juan Sanchez; not a lineament there but shines with God's best message to man, and in language which even dumb intelligence may read. Stern duty is largely diluted with humanity, integrity with charming simplicity; from which the wily quibian takes his cue, and thenceforth is master of the situation. With quiet dignity and cheerful resignation he sits among his people, hushing their lamentations and chiding their complaints. By words and little acts of consideration he lightens the labors of the boatmen, and studies for himself and people to give no unnecessary trouble. These conciliatory measures are not lost on the warm-hearted sailor, whose regard for his royal captive rises every moment. He is pronounced by all a well-mannered savage, a most courteous savage. And now the quibian modestly complains of the cords so tightly drawn by the too zealous Mendez. They do indeed cut into the flesh, and constrain him to a most uncomfortable position. And he such a gentleman-savage! Juan Sanchez is not the man to sit there and see a fellow-creature unnecessarily suffer; he cannot do it. The thongs which lacerate the prisoner's wrists are loosened, the cord which binds him to the seat is untied; but for security—for above all this great chief must be kept secure—one end of it the ever-watchful pilot twists round his hand. Night comes on. It is very dark, but the captives are quiet, and the boat glides noiselessly down the stream. Suddenly the light craft sways; a plunge is heard; the pilot feels his hand violently wrenched; he must loosen his hold or be drawn into the water. It is all as the flash of a pistol in point of time; the quibian's seat is empty; and honest Juan Sanchez is obliged to present his hanging front before his comrades, a Spaniard outwitted by a savage!
After scouring the country in several directions, the adelantado returned to the ships, bringing gold-plates, wristlets, and anklets to the value of three hundred ducats, which were divided, after deducting the king's fifth. Among the spoils taken from the quibian were two golden coronets, one of which was presented to Bartolomé by the admiral. Notwithstanding the escape of the chief, who, after all, was probably drowned, Columbus proceeded to execute his plans. There were the king's household and his chief men safely on board, and these should be sufficient to guarantee the tranquillity of the nations. So the arrangements for the comfort and security of the colony during the contemplated absence of the admiral were hastened to completion. The three vessels, after discharging part of their cargoes, were carried by the newly swollen stream over the bar, and reloaded. There they lay at anchor waiting a favorable wind.
THE COUNTRY ROUSED.
All this time, however, the Spaniards were reckoning without their host. The quibian was not dead. In spite of his bonds, he had made good his escape. After his bold plunge, finding himself free from the boat, he had extricated his wrists from the loosened cords, swam beneath the water to the bank, and had set out for his village, resolving vengeance. And now, hastily arming a thousand warriors, he attacked the Spaniards under cover of the dense vegetation, killing one and wounding eight, but was soon repulsed with heavy loss. Shortly afterward Diego Tristan, coming ashore from one of the vessels with eleven men, recklessly ascended the river a league for wood and water. All but one were killed.[IV-24]
The aspect of affairs was serious. It was now evident that no fear of what might befall his imprisoned household would deter the quibian from his bloody purpose. Alive or dead might be his brothers, wives, and children, he would rid his country of these perfidious strangers. To this end he secured the coöperation of the neighboring chieftains, and filled the forest with his warriors. Stealthily they lurked in the vicinity of the settlement, and watched every pathway, ready to cut off any who should venture abroad. Nowhere on the Islands had the Spaniards met such stubborn opposition, and serious misgivings filled their minds. Their own probable doom they saw foreshadowed in the mutilated bodies of Tristan and his men, which came floating past them down the stream, attended by ravenous fishes; and the requiems sung by quarrelling vultures over the remains when afterward they were thrown back by the waves upon the beach, tended in no wise to lessen their dismal forebodings. To heighten their misfortunes, a furious storm arose, which cut off all communication between the settlement and the ships. The adelantado endeavored in vain to quiet the fears of his people, who emboldened by despair would have seized the remaining caravel and put to sea had the weather permitted. Yet closer pressed upon them the enraged quibian, until dislodged they retreated to the river bank, before their caravel, and threw up earthworks, which they capped with the ship's boat, and behind which they planted their guns, and so kept the savages at bay.
On shipboard matters were no better. The continued absence of Tristan and his crew caused the admiral great anxiety. In such a heavy sea it was unsafe to remain near the shore; the parting of a cable would doom the clumsy craft to swift destruction. And as if this were not enough, the spirit of the quibian broke out among his encaged family. Preferring death to captivity they plotted escape. During the night the prisoners were confined in the forecastle, and on the covering slept a guard of soldiers. Collecting one night such articles as were within reach, stones used as ballast, boxes, and provision casks, they piled them up under the hatchway cover. Toward morning, when the guards were sleeping soundly, as many of the captives as were able mounted the heap, and placing their shoulders to the covering, by quick concerted action burst it open, throwing the sleeping sentinels in every direction, and springing out leaped into the sea. Those whose escape was prevented were found next morning dead, some hanging to the roof and sides of their prison, some strangled by means of strings round the neck drawn tight with the foot.
THE SETTLEMENT ABANDONED.
It was now of the utmost importance to communicate with the shore, as the admiral was convinced that the situation of the colonists was becoming perilous in the extreme. At least, all hope of settlement in that quarter must for the present be abandoned. The fate of the captives, when once it was known, would move the very rocks to revenge. But no boat could live in the surf intervening. Then stepped forward Pedro Ledesma, a Sevillian pilot, and offered if rowed to the breakers to attempt to gain the shore by swimming. The thing was done. Scarcely had Ledesma picked himself up from the spot where the waves threw him when he was surrounded by his forlorn countrymen, who informed him of the fate of Tristan, and of their determination to quit that accursed coast at any hazard. Ledesma returned and told the admiral, upon whose mind thereupon gloom settled in yet denser shades. Unrighteously deprived of his command at Santo Domingo, he had nourished the hope that this last and most important of his discoveries might prove the base of better fortune than was possible on the Spanish Isle. For had it not been revealed to him that this Veragua was the source whence Solomon drew the gold to build the temple? These lamentations continued during the remainder of the storm, which lasted nine days longer; after which preparations were made for the embarkation of the colonists, the admiral consoling himself with the promise of return under more favorable auspices.
Finally the caravel stationed in the river was dismantled, and out of the spars and some Indian canoes was made a raft, by means of which the colonists and their effects were in two days taken on board. The admiral then bore away eastward for Española. And it may have been the lingering hope of blind infatuation—so his followers thought it—that made him cling to the shore until the Darien country was passed, before striking out across the Caribbean Sea; others say it was to avoid contrary winds, while he affirms it was to deceive his pilots that they might not be able to find Veragua again without his charts. One worm-eaten caravel he was obliged to drop at Portobello. The other two held together until they reached Jamaica, where they were beached.
A new series of misfortunes here awaited the Great Unlucky One. From June 1503 to June 1504 he was doomed to remain on his wrecks, which now lay side by side, partially filled with water. Food became scarce, and the foraging expeditions met with constantly increasing difficulties in seeking the necessary supply. By desperate efforts Diego Mendez succeeded in reaching Española in a canoe; but when he had notified Ovando of the perilous situation of Columbus, the governor was in no haste to relieve his rival. Sickness next followed, and then mutiny. Francisco de Porras with forty-eight men threw off allegiance to the admiral, and taking ten canoes set out for Española. Twice thrown back upon Jamaica by adverse winds they abandoned the attempt, and gave themselves up to licentious roving about the island. A second mutiny was near its culmination when a small vessel appeared in the distance. Presently Diego de Escobar approached in a boat, and without leaving it, thrust in upon the admiral a letter, a side of bacon, and a barrel of wine, all from Ovando; then he disappeared as mysteriously as he had come. Following an attempted reconciliation with Porras was a fight between his gang and the Spaniards under Bartolomé, in which six were killed, among them our honest friend Juan Sanchez, who had cast his lot with Porras. The doughty Ledesma, also a rebel, though badly wounded, lived to be assassinated in Spain. Porras and several others were taken prisoners and confined on board the wreck. The remainder of the deserters then returned, penitent. Finally the admiral's agent at Santo Domingo, Diego de Salcedo, came to his relief with two ships.