Long even after the passing of the pioneer conquistadores the methods of the Spanish Court encouraged abuses of authority and many acts of tyranny. Officials, such as Governors and even Viceroys, were wont to pay certain sums down for the transference of the tenure of office, and it was then their task to wring as much from the governed territory as possible in order that they might retire from the New World to the Old the owners of vast fortunes.
To expect fair government under conditions such as these was to conceive human beings on a higher plane than that on which they are wont to be planned. Indeed, notwithstanding the atrocities and financial iniquities which were rife throughout Spanish and Portuguese Colonies, to imagine the various officials as necessarily inhuman and criminal is, of course, absurd. Many of these were men of talent, and of merciful and gentle disposition; but in many even of these cases the altogether extraordinary influence and atmosphere of the Southern Continent ended by driving them to acts from which in Europe they would have shrunk whole-heartedly. The dispositions of the men were not invariably at fault; but the system under which they worked was never anything else.
It is time, however, to forsake generalization, and to return to the Spanish pioneers who first colonized Haiti, and then set foot on the mainland itself. In the ill-fated island the drama, begun with the advent of the Spaniards, was being continued in deeper and bloodier shades. The royal edicts came pompously out from Spain, commanding that the welfare of the Indians should be the first consideration on the part of the Colonial Government; but the thunder of such edicts, worn out by the voyage, died away ere they reached the island. Ovando, it is true, made some endeavours to act up to the spirit of these enactments; but in view of the condition of the labour market and the clamourings of the settlers it was, humanly speaking, impossible to carry this out.
As time went on both settlers and Governors accustomed themselves to treat the aborigines rather as beasts of burden than as men, and they were hunted, slain, or driven to labour with as little compunction as if they had been pack-mules. The slightest sign of revolt was wont to be punished by an outlet of blood which left the unfortunate folk cowering in deeper terror and despair than before. The utter misery of the Indians may be imagined when the measures they took to free themselves are taken into consideration, for in the end they adopted the plan of committing suicide as the only means of cheating the rapacity of their white oppressors. Native families, and even entire villages, found gloomy consolation in a self-sought death. Even in this they were not invariably successful. Perhaps never has the irony of fate been more strongly illustrated than in the tale that is told of one large slave-owner and his human chattels.
These latter, having come to the end of their endurance, had determined to follow the example of so many in the neighbourhood, and to do away with themselves in a body. The Spaniard, however, received notice of the intention of these people in time. Hastening to the spot, he came upon them just as they were preparing to effect their end. He was undoubtedly a crafty being, this. Proceeding into the midst of the distraught folk, he called for a rope. This, he explained, was in order that he, too, might hang himself and thus accompany the Indians to the next world, where they would thus still remain his slaves. The ruse proved entirely successful. The credulous Indians became, as it were, horrified back to life at the idea; they abandoned the attempt upon their lives, and continued in sorrowful despair to serve their Spanish owner.
In 1509 Ovando sailed back to Spain, and some return was made to Columbus's family for the part he had played in the discovery of the new Colonies. His son, Diego, came out, having been endowed with the titles of Viceroy and Admiral. Thus the Court of Spain had at last conceded some of the privileges which had been so effectually won by his father. It is certain enough that the experiences of Diego's generation were very different from those of his father's. The new Commander took up his residence in state in Haiti, where he lived with great pomp and style. The Indians, however, it is said, suffered more under his Governorship than had been their lot under that of his predecessor.
The tide of conquest was flowing past the islands, and beginning to spend itself on the continent. In 1508 began the actual colonization of the Spanish Main. The first territories to which the Spaniards made their way were those which gave on the Gulf of Darien. Here a companion of Columbus in his second voyage, Alonso de Ojeda, was given the district extending from the Cape de la Vela to the Gulf of Uraba, and this territory was termed the Land of New Andalusia. Another adventurer, Nicuesa, came as his neighbour, holding the Governorship of the coast from the Gulf of Uraba to the Cape Gracias a Dios. These two conquistadores, although as jealous of each other as was usual with almost all these pioneer explorers, joined forces against the Indians, whom they attempted to subdue by means of an iron hand rather than by a silk glove. The Indians, however, proved themselves of a very warlike disposition, and the joint forces of the Spaniards were unable to crush the power of the aborigines. After a while the leaders were obliged to withdraw their forces from the district they had occupied.
Some while afterwards Nuñez de Balboa took charge of Uraba. On his arrival he found that matters on the Gulf of Darien had reached a desperate pitch. As the fortunes of the Spaniards had waned, the confidence of the Indians had increased. There is no doubt that the majority of men would have recoiled from the task which faced Balboa when he found himself at the head of a number of starving Spaniards, scarcely able to maintain their precarious foothold in a hostile country.
Balboa gathered together the despairing remnants, and contrived to put fresh heart into his men. He then turned to the Indians, and won their esteem by his considerate treatment. He proved himself, in fact, in every respect an able and successful leader. It was in 1512 that he set out on his famous expedition across the Isthmus, and won his way to the shores of the Pacific Ocean. It was certainly not the least dramatic moment in the history of early America when Balboa, in a frenzy of joy, seized the flag of Castile, and, holding it aloft, plunged his body into the waters of the ocean, claiming it for his King. As was the fate of so many able men of that period, it was not long before Balboa was superseded. The fine governmental structure he had built up was very soon wrecked by his successor and superior, Pedrarias. Friendly communication with the Indians was ruthlessly broken off. The natives were chased unmercifully by bloodhounds, and numbers slain.
Balboa, chafing beneath a situation which must have been keenly distressing to him, was suspected by Pedrarias, and arrested. The Bishop, Quevado, however, intervened in favour of the single-minded ex-Governor; a reconciliation of a kind was patched up, and, in order to strengthen this, Balboa was officially betrothed to the daughter of Pedrarias—a purely political move this, since Balboa was already united to the dusky daughter of Careta, an aboriginal chief. There is matter for the novelist here and to spare; few situations can be found which hold more possibilities. In this case they led to the death of Balboa, which would probably have happened irrespective of the strange situation in which he found himself. The cause, however, was merely renewed jealousy on the part of the Governor. Balboa had prepared a further expedition of discovery, so thoroughly, indeed, that the suspicions of Pedrarias were again needlessly aroused. A mock trial brought about a real catastrophe, which ended in the beheading of Balboa in 1547, at the age of forty-two.