CHAPTER XVIII.
HIS LAST YEARS.
[Æt. 67; 1503]
The ships were now hopeless wrecks, and there was nothing more to be done with them except to abandon them to the underwriters and claim a total loss. The only chance that the Spaniards could avoid laying their bones in the bake-ovens of the Jamaican natives was in communicating with San Domingo, but in the absence of any efficient postal service this chance seemed very small. Diego Mendez, who was the captain of one of the vessels, and who had earned the confidence of Columbus by the skill with which he superintended the escape of the beleaguered colonists from Quibian’s hordes, volunteered to take a canoe and, with the help of Indian paddlers, make his way across the one hundred and twenty miles of sea which stretched between Jamaica and Hispaniola. He started on his voyage, and skirted the shore of Jamaica, so that he could land from time to time and take in provisions.
It struck the natives that they might as well improve the opportunity to lay in provisions for themselves, and accordingly they attacked Mendez with great energy and appetite, and made him and his Indian paddlers prisoners. There being in all seven prisoners, a dispute arose as to the fairest way of dividing them, and the savages agreed to settle it by a game of chance—which was probably “seven-up.” Mendez took advantage of the quarrelling to which the game gave rise, and ran away. At the end of a fortnight he appeared before the Admiral and announced that all was lost except honor and his canoe.
The bold Mendez was not disheartened, but volunteered to make a second attempt. This time he was joined by Fresco, the captain of the other wreck, together with twelve Spaniards and twenty Indians. The expedition started in two large canoes, and the Adelentado, with an armed force, marched along the shore as far as the extreme eastern point of the island to protect the canoes from any attack by the natives. Mendez and his companions suffered terribly from exposure and thirst, and many of the Indian paddlers died—a fact which shows either that the Spaniards could endure thirst better than the Indians, or that the latter had less water to drink than the former.
The expedition finally reached Hispaniola, having formed a very low opinion of canoeing as an athletic sport. According to the original plan, Mendez was to induce Ovando to send a ship to Columbus, and Fresco was to return with the news that Mendez was at San Domingo, hard at work inducing the Governor to send the ship; but as the surviving Indian paddlers said they were satiated with paddling and did not intend to return to Jamaica, Fresco was compelled to remain in Hispaniola.
Ovando, hearing that Columbus was in Jamaica, thought he had better stay there, and instead of sending a vessel to his relief, constantly promised to do so at the earliest possible moment, and constantly took good care that no such moment should arrive.
Meanwhile the shipwrecked men were becoming very discontented. When a man has nothing to do but to think of what he is to have for dinner, and then never has it, he is reasonably sure to exhibit a fretful spirit. This was the condition of the Spaniards at Port Santa Gloria. They were living on board the wrecked vessels because they did not care to tempt the appetites of the natives by living on shore; and as the Admiral was confined to his cabin with the gout, and could not overhear them, they naturally relieved their minds by constantly abusing him, one to another.
Francesco de Porras, who had been a captain of one of the ships—and it really seems as if there were as many captains in proportion to the size of the fleet as there are in the United States navy—thought this was a favorable time for mutiny, and accordingly proceeded to mutiny. He reminded the men that Columbus was unpopular in Spain, and was forbidden to land in San Domingo. This being true, why should he ever leave Jamaica, where he had nothing to do except to lie in his cabin and enjoy the pleasures of gout? He insisted that Mendez and Fresco would never return, and that they were either drowned or had gone to Spain. In short, by lucid arguments such as these he convinced the crews that Columbus intended to keep them in Jamaica for the rest of their lives.
Having thus induced the crews to mutiny, Porras went into the Admiral’s state-room and demanded that he should instantly lead the Spaniards back to Spain. Columbus took the ground that this was an unreasonable demand, since an ocean voyage could not be successfully made without vessels; but Porras, disgusted with such heartless quibbling, rushed on deck and called on his followers to embark in canoes and start for Cadiz without a moment’s delay. His proposal was enthusiastically received, and a tumult ensued which brought the crippled Admiral on deck on his hands and knees, in the vain hope of enforcing his authority.