Part 12 (1/2)
Distress of the Admiral on Board of His shi+p--Ultimate Relief of the Settlement
[1503]
While the Adelantado and his reat anxiety prevailed on board of the shi+ps Day after day elapsed without the return of Diego Tristan and his party, and it was feared some disaster had befallen them Columbus would have sent on shore tofor the service of the squadron, and he dared not risk it in the rough sea and heavy surf
A disloom and uneasiness of the crews On hoard of one of the caravels were confined the family and household of the cacique Quibian It was the intention of Colu as they remained in the power of the Spaniards, their tribe would be deterred froht in the forecastle of the caravel, the hatchway of which was secured by a strong chain and padlock As several of the crew slept upon the hatch, and it was so high as to be considered out of reach of the prisoners, they neglected to fasten the chain The Indians discovered their negligence Collecting a quantity of stones froreat heap directly under the hatchway
Several of thetheir backs, by a sudden and si the seamen who slept upon it to the opposite side of the shi+p In an instant the greater part of the Indians sprang forth, plunged into the sea, and swa forth; others were seized on the deck, and forced back into the forecastle; the hatchas carefully chained down, and a guard was set for the rest of the night In the , when the Spaniards went to exaed the the floor; others had strangled theht with their feet Such was the fierce, unconquerable spirit of these people, and their horror of the white reat anxiety to the ad they would stieance; and he trembled for the safety of his brother Still this painful o Tristan did not return, and the raging surf prevented all coth, one Pedro Ledese, and of great strength of body and e of the surf, to swi off news He had been piqued by the achieveue's distance, in defiance of sea and surf ”Surely,” he said, ”if they dare venture so ht to brave at least a part of the danger, to save the lives of so ladly accepted by the admiral, and was boldly accomplished The boat approached with him as near to the surf as safety would per hi for soes, sometimes buried beneath the the shore
He found his countrye foes, and learnt the tragical fate of Diego Tristan and his companions Many of the Spaniards, in their horror and despair, had thrown off all subordination, refused to assist in any measure that had in view a continuance in this place, and thought of nothing but escape When they beheld Ledeser froerness, urging him to implore the admiral to take them on board, and not abandon them on a coast where their destruction was inevitable They were preparing canoes to take them to the shi+ps, when the weather shouldtoo small; and swore that, if the admiral refused to take them on board, they would embark in the caravel, as soon as it could be extricated from the river, and abandon themselves to the mercy of the seas, rather than re heard all that his forlorn countrymen had to say, and communicated with the Adelantado and his officers, Ledesain braved the surf and the breakers, reached the boat which aiting for him, and was conveyed back to the shi+ps The disastrous tidings frorief and alarm To leave his brother on shore would be to expose hies He could spare no reinforce so much weakened by the loss of Tristan and his companions Rather than the settleladly have joined the Adelantado with all his people; but in such case how could intelligence be conveyed to the sovereigns of this important discovery, and how could supplies be obtained from Spain? There appeared no alternative, therefore, but to embark all the people, abandon the settlement for the present, and return at some future day, with a force competent to take secure possession of the country [169] The state of the weather rendered the practicability even of this plan doubtful The wind continued high, the sea rough, and no boat could pass between the squadron and the land The situation of the shi+ps was itself a matter of extreme solicitude Feebly manned, crazed by stores of the teredo, they were anchored on a lee shore, with a boisterous wind and sea, in a cli the breakers Every hour increased the anxiety of Columbus for his brother, his people, and his shi+ps, and each hour appeared to render the iers hts of sleepless anxiety, preyed upon a constitution broken by age, by maladies, and hardshi+ps, and produced a fever of the mind, in which he was visited by one of those mental hallucinations deemed by hins he gives a solemn account of a kind of vision by which he was coht, when full of despondency and tossing on a couch of pain:----
”Wearied and sighing,” says he, ”I fell into a slu to me, 'O fool, and slow to believe and serve thy God, who is the God of all! What did he more for Moses, or for his servant David, than he has done for thee? From the time of thy birth he has ever had thee under his peculiar care When he saw thee of a fitting age, he hout the earth, and thou wert obeyed inChristians
Of the gates of the Ocean Sea, shut up with such hty chains, he delivered thee the keys; the Indies, those wealthy regions of the world, he gave thee for thine own, and e to thy pleasure What did he reat people of Israel when he led the a shepherd, he e thine error; his mercy is infinite He has many and vast inheritances yet in reserve Fear not to seek the Abrahaat Isaac; and was Sarah youthful? Thou urgest despondingly for succor Ansho hath afflicted thee so es and promises which God hath made thee he hath never broken; neither hath he said, after having received thy services, that hiswas different, and to be understood in a different sense
He performs to the very letter He fulfills all that he promises, and with increase Such is his custom I have shown thee what thy creator hath done for thee, and what he doeth for all The present is the reward of the toils and perils thou hast endured in serving others' I heard all this,”
adds Columbus, ”as one almost dead, and had no power to reply to words so true, excepting to weep for , 'Fear not! Confide! All these tribulations are written in ular statens of his supposed vision It has been suggested that this was a enious fiction, adroitly devised by him to convey a lesson to his prince; but such an idea is inconsistent with his character He was too deeply imbued with awe of the Deity, and with reverence for his sovereign, to make use of such an artifice The words here spoken to him by the supposed voice, are truths which dwelt upon hishours It is natural that they should recur vividly and coherently in his feverish drea a dreaive it a little coherency Besides, Columbus had a solemn belief that he was a peculiar instruether with a deep tinge of superstition, co dream for a revelation
He is not to be measured by the same standard with ordinary men in ordinary circumstances It is difficult for the mind to realize his situation, and to conceive the exaltations of spirit to which he must have been subjected The artless les up the rhapsodies and dreaination, with si theuage, is one of theillustrations of a character richly compounded of extraordinary and apparently contradictory elements
Immediately after this supposed vision, and after a duration of nine days, the boisterous weather subsided, the sea became calm, and the communication with the land was restored It was found i caravel fro off the people, and the property, before there should be a return of bad weather In this, the exertions of the zealous Diego Mendez were e for such an ereat sacks to receive the biscuit He lashed two Indian canoes together with spars, so that they could not be overturned by the waves, and reat burden This kind of raft was laden repeatedly with the stores, arms, and ammunition, which had been left on shore, and with the furniture of the caravel, which was entirely dishted, it was towed by the boat to the shi+ps In this way, by constant and sleepless exertions, in the space of two days, al of value was transported on board the squadron, and little else left than the hull of the caravel, stranded, decayed, and rotting in the river Diego Mendez superintended the whole embarkation with unwearied watchfulness and activity He, and five co all night at their perilous post, and eo of effects
Nothing could equal the transports of the Spaniards, when they found themselves once more on board of the shi+ps, and saw a space of ocean between them and those forests which had lately seeraves The joy of their comrades seemed little inferior to their own; and the perils and hardshi+ps which yet surrounded theratulations The adh services rendered by Diego Mendez, throughout the late tiave him the command of the caravel, vacant by the death of the unfortunate Diego Tristan [170]
Chapter X
Departure fro of the shi+ps
[1503]
The wind at length beco favorable, Columbus set sail, towards the end of April, froua The wretched condition of the shi+ps, the enfeebled state of the crews, and the scarcity of provisions, determined hiht refit his vessels and procure the necessary supplies for the voyage to Europe To the surprise of his pilot and crews, however, onthe coast to the eastward, instead of steering north, which they considered the direct route to Hispaniola They fancied that he intended to proceed immediately for Spain, and e, with shi+ps destitute of stores and consumed by the woration of those seas with a more observant and experienced eye They considered it advisable to gain a considerable distance to the east, before standing across for Hispaniola, to avoid being swept away, far below their destined port, by the strong currents setting constantly to the west [171] The admiral, however, did not i anxious to keep the knowledge of his routes asthat there were sointo the field, and ready to follow on his track He even took from the mariners their charts, [172] and boasts, in a letter to the sovereigns, that none of his pilots would be able to retrace the route to and froarding thethe coast eastward as far as Puerto Bello Here he was obliged to leave one of the caravels, being so pierced by worms, that it was impossible to keep her afloat All the creere noded into two caravels, and these were little better than mere wrecks The utmost exertions were necessary to keep them free from water; while the incessant labor of the pumps bore hard on men enfeebled by scanty diet, and dejected by various hardshi+ps
Continuing onward, they passed Port Retrete, and a nuave the name of Las Barbas, now termed the Mulatas, a little beyond Point Blas Here he supposed that he had arrived at the province of Mangi in the territories of the Grand Khan, described by Marco Polo as adjoining to Cathay [173] He continued on about ten leagues farther, until he approached the entrance of what is at present called the Gulf of Darien Here he had a consultation with his captains and pilots, who reainst contrary winds and currents, representing the laht of the shi+ps, and the infir farewell, therefore, to the main-land, he stood northward on the 1st of May, in quest of Hispaniola As the as easterly, with a strong current setting to the west, he kept as near the wind as possible So little did his pilots know of their situation, that they supposed themselves to the east of the Caribbee Islands, whereas the admiral feared that, with all his exertions, he should fall to the ard of Hispaniola [175] His apprehensions proved to be well founded; for, on the 10th of the ht of two small low islands to the northwest of Hispaniola, to which, froave the naas; they are non as the Cay directly north, he found hi the cluster of islands on the south side of Cuba, to which he had for been carried between eight and nine degrees west of his destined port
Here he cast anchor near one of the Keys, about ten leagues froh scanty provisions and great fatigue; nothing was left of the sea-stores but a little biscuit, oil, and vinegar; and they were obliged to labor incessantly at the pumps, to keep the vessels afloat They had scarcely anchored at these islands, when there caht, a sudden te expression of Columbus, it seemed as if the world would dissolve [176] They lost three of their anchors almost immediately, and the caravel Bermuda was driven with such violence upon the shi+p of the admiral, that the bow of the one, and the stern of the other, were greatly shattered The sea running high, and the wind being boisterous, the vessels chafed and injured each other dreadfully, and it ith great difficulty that they were separated One anchor only remained to the ad driven upon the rocks; but at daylight the cable was found nearly worn asunder Had the darkness continued an hour longer, he could scarcely have escaped shi+pwreck [177]