Concerning the extent of Cuba, and of the coast along which he was sailing, Columbus could get little information. He was told that the coast extended westward for at least twenty days' journey, but whether it then ended, and how it ended, he could not learn. He therefore took one of the natives with him as a guide, and resumed his voyage. Almost immediately, however, he plunged into another archipelago, almost as dense and troublesome as that through which he had passed a few days before. Making his way through it with great difficulty, he reached the coast of Pinar del Rio, and effected a landing amid swamps and forests, only to find the region uninhabited, though frequent columns of smoke rising inland indicated to him the presence of a considerable population. For some time he made his way along that inhospitable coast, which trended steadily toward the southwest, a direction agreeing with his conceptions of the Asian coast as described by Marco Polo. Surely, he thought, he was on the coast of Indo-China, headed straight for the Golden Chersonesus. If he persisted, he would cross the Indian Ocean and reach the Red Sea, whence he could complete his journey to Europe overland by way of Palestine; or he could steer southward along the African coast and around that continent, and so reach home by circumnavigating the globe.
These fancies appear to have been shared by his companions, among whom were several accomplished navigators and geographers. The delusions were of course largely due to the erroneous estimate of the size of the globe, which made its circumference too little by some thousands of miles. But his companions could not be persuaded to approve his scheme of going on to circumnavigate the globe. The glamor of that vision did not blind their eyes to the worn and dilapidated condition of the ships, the lack of supplies, and the weariness of the crews. They were in no condition, they insisted, to proceed further through unknown regions. It was already satisfactorily demonstrated, they held, that they had reached the Asian coast. The part of prudence was to turn back to Isabella, if not to Spain, and refit their vessels for another and longer voyage.
These counsels finally prevailed upon Columbus himself, at the time when his flotilla lay at anchor in the Bay of Cortez, near the western extremity of Cuba. He was indeed so near that extremity that a day or two more of sailing would have brought him to Cape San Antonio and would have shown him that Cuba was an island. Or from the top of some tall tree, or even from the mast head, he might have looked across the lakes and lowlands of that region and seen the waters of Guadiana Bay, on the north side of the island. But this was not to be. Instead, he required every member of his company, from sailing master to cabin boy, to swear to and sign a formal declaration to the effect that the land which they had discovered and explored was a part of the Indies and of the Asian continent. Then, on June 13, he turned his course toward the southeast, only to enter another archipelago, the San Felipe and Indian keys. Beyond lay a large land, with mountains, to which he gave the name of Evangelista. It was, of course, the Isle of Pines, which he reached a little south of Point Barcos. Taking in a supply of water and wood, he skirted the coast southward, with the result that he ran into the land-locked recesses of the Bay of Sunianea. Finding no thoroughfare in that direction, he sailed back almost to the Bay of Cortez, and then made his way along the Cuban coast, through the archipelagoes, milky seas and what not which had given him so much trouble on his westward trip.
It was on July 7 that the next landing in Cuba was made, at a point on the southeastern coast of Camaguey, and at the mouth of a fine river which Columbus called the Rio de la Missa but the identity of which is now uncertain. It may have been the San Juan de Najasa or the Sevilla, or one of the several streams between those two. There, in a most genial and fruitful region, they spent some days and established friendly relations with the chief of a considerable community. In the presence of this chief and his retainers an altar was erected beneath a great tree, and mass was celebrated. An aged native, apparently a priest, watched this proceeding with much interest, and at its close approached Columbus and addressed him, saying:
"This which thou hast done is, I perceive, thy method of worshipping thy God; which is well. I am told that thou hast come hither with a strong force, and hast subdued many lands, filling the people with great fear. Be not, however, vainglorious. The souls of men after these bodies are dead have, according to our belief, one of two journeys to pursue. One is to a place that is dismal, foul and dark, which is prepared for those who have been cruel and unjust to their fellow men. The other is to a place of light and joy, prepared for those who have practised peace and justice. Therefore if thou art mortal, and must some time die, and dost expect that all men are to be rewarded according to the deeds done in their bodies, see that thou work justice and do no harm to those who have done no harm to thee."
In this address was revealed the most that we know of the religion of the Cuban aborigines. Columbus listened to it with surprise and gratification, not having supposed that any such faith or such knowledge of the future life existed among the natives of Cuba. He responded through his interpreter sympathetically, assuring the old man that he had been sent forth by his sovereigns to teach the true faith and to do good and no evil, and that all innocent and peaceable men might confidently look to him for friendship and protection. He also had his interpreter tell the people of the greatness, riches and splendor of Spain; to which they listened in credulous bewilderment. Then, on July 16, he sailed away from Cuba again, amid expressions of regret by the chief and his comrades; taking with him one of the young men whom he afterward sent to the Spanish court. But a storm struck his feeble vessels and nearly wrecked them. On July 18 they anchored near Cape Cruz for repairs, and were most hospitably received by the natives. At last, on July 22, they departed for Jamaica, whence they returned to Isabella. Never again did Columbus visit Cuba, though he approached its southern shore on his fourth voyage, on his way to the coast of Central America. To the end of his life, presumably, he believed Cuba to be a part of the Asian continent, continuous with Honduras and Veragua.
CHAPTER III
We have already quoted the enthusiastic encomium of Columbus upon Cuba at his first sight of and landing upon its shore. His diary and his narrative to the sovereigns of Leon and Castile on his return to Spain abound with similar expressions, as well as with informing bits of description of Cuba as they then found it. In the very first days of his first visit he found villages of houses "made like booths, very large, and looking like tents in a camp without regular streets but one here and another there. Within they were clean and well swept, with furniture well made. All were of palm branches, beautifully constructed. They found many images in the shape of women, and many heads like masks, very well carved. It was not known whether these were used as ornaments, or were to be worshipped."
The waters abounded in fish, and the people of the coast regions were apparently nearly all fishermen. The only domestic animals were the "dogs which never barked," and birds in cages. There were seen, however, skulls like those of cows, on which account Columbus assumed that inland there were herds of cattle. All night the air was vocal with the songs of birds and the chirping of crickets and other insects, which lulled the voyagers to rest. Along the shore and in the mouths of rivers were found large shells, unlike any that he had known in Spain, but no pearls were in them. The air was soft and salubrious, and the nights were neither hot nor cold. On the other islands which he had visited the heat was oppressive, a circumstance which he attributed to the flat and low-lying land; while Cuba was mountainous and therefore was blessed with cooling breezes.
At some point on the northeastern coast, probably in the neighborhood of Point Sama, a month after his first landing, he imagined that he had discovered deposits of gold. It was in the bed of a river, near its mouth, that he saw stones shining, as if with gold, and he had them gathered, to take home to Spain and to present to the sovereigns. At the same point some of the sailors called his attention to the pine trees on a neighboring hill. They were "so wonderfully large that he could not exaggerate their height and straightness, and he perceived that in them was material for great stores of planks and masts for the largest ships of Spain."