But the writer who has furnished the greatest supply of materials for the modern historian is Antonio de Herrera. He did not flourish, indeed, until near a century after the discovery of America; but the post which he occupied of historiographer of the Indies gave him free access to the most authentic and reserved sources of information. He has availed himself of these with great freedom; transferring whole chapters from the unpublished narratives of his predecessors, especially of the good bishop Las Casas, whose great work, "Crónica de las Indias Occidentales," contained too much that was offensive to national feeling to be allowed the honors of the press. The Apostle of the Indians, however, lives in the pages of Herrera, who, while he has omitted the tumid and overheated declamation of the original, is allowed by the Castilian critics to have retained whatever is of most value, and exhibited it in a dress far superior to that of his predecessor. It must not be omitted, however, that he is also accused of occasional inadvertence in stating as fact, what Las Casas only adduced as tradition or conjecture. His "Historia General de las Indias Occidentales," bringing down the narrative to 1554, was published in four volumes, at Madrid, in 1601. Herrera left several other histories of the different states of Europe, and closed his learned labors in 1625, at the age of sixty.
No Spanish historian had since arisen to contest the palm with Herrera on his own ground, until, at the close of the last century, Don Juan Bautista Muñoz was commissioned by the government to prepare a history of the New World. The talents and liberal acquisitions of this scholar, the free admission opened to him in every place of public and private deposit, and the immense mass of materials collected by his indefatigable researches, authorized the most favorable auguries of his success. These were justified by the character of the first volume, which brought the narrative of early discovery to the period of Bobadilla's mission, written in a perspicuous and agreeable style, with such a discriminating selection of incident and skilful arrangement, as convey the most distinct impression to the mind of the reader. Unfortunately, the untimely death of the author crushed his labors in the bud. Their fruits were not wholly lost, however. Señor Navarrete, availing himself of them, in connection with those derived from his own extensive investigations, is pursuing in part the plan of Muñoz, by the publication of original documents; and Mr. Irving has completed this design in regard to the early history of Spanish discovery, by the use which he has made of these materials in constructing out of them the noblest monument to the memory of Columbus.
FOOTNOTES
[1] See, in particular, a letter to Columbus, dated August, 1494; (apud Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages, tom. ii., Doc. Dipl., no. 79;) also an elaborate memorial presented by the admiral in the same year, setting forth the various necessities of the colony, every item of which is particularly answered by the sovereigns, in a manner showing how attentively they considered his suggestions.—Ibid., tom. i. pp. 226-241.
[2] Abundant evidence of this is furnished by the long enumeration of articles subjected to tithes, contained in an ordinance dated October 5th, 1501, showing with what indiscriminate severity this heavy burden was imposed from the first on the most important products of human industry. Recopilacion de Leyes de los Reynos de las Indias, (Madrid, 1774,) tom. i. lib. 1, tit. 16, ley 2.
[3] Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages, tom. ii., Doc. Dipl., no. 86, April 10th, 1495.—Nos. 103, 105-108, April 23d, 1497.—No. 110, May 6th, 1497. —No. 121, July 22d, 1497.—Herrera, Indias Occidentales, dec. 1, lib. 4, cap. 12.
[4] Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages, tom. ii., Doc. Dipl., nos. 86, 121.— Herrera, Indias Occidentales, lib. 3, cap. 2.—Muñoz, Hist. del Nuevo- Mundo, lib. 5, sec. 34.
The exclusion of foreigners, at least all but "Catholic Christians," is particularly recommended by Columbus in his first communication to the crown. Primer Viage de Colon.
[5] Among the foreign adventurers were the two Cabots, who sailed in the service of the English monarch, Henry VII., in 1497, and ran down the whole coast of North America, from Newfoundland to within a few degrees of Florida, thus encroaching, as it were, on the very field of discovery preoccupied by the Spaniards.
[6] Muñoz, Hist. del Nuevo-Mundo, lib. 5, sect. 32.—Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages, Doc. Dipl., no. 86.