he who bestow'd such a quantity of Money gratis was the Master of vast Treasure their sole Aim and Design and the Solace of their Labours whereupon they conterfeit a pretended Departure but returning about the Fourth Night-Watch and entring the City privily upon a surprize which they thought was sufficiently secur'd consecrated it with many Citizens to the Flames and robb'd them of Fifty or Sixty Thousand Crowns The Dynast or Prince escaped with Life and gathering together as great a Number of Men as he could possibly at that instant of time and Three or Four Days being elapsed pursued the Spaniards who had depriv'd him also by Violence and Rapine of a Hundred and Thirty or Forty Thousand Crowns and pouring in upon them recover'd all his Gold with the destruction of Fifty Spaniards but the remainder of them having receiv'd many Wounds in that Rencounter betook them to their Heels and sav'd themselves by flight but in few days after the Spaniards return and fall upon the said Cacic well-arm'd and overthrow him and all his Forces and they who out-liv'd the Combat to their great Misfortune were expos'd to the usual and frequently mention'd Bondage Of the Province of NICARAQUA THE said Tyrant An. Dom. 1522. proceeded farther very unfortunately to the Subjugation or Conquest of this Province In truth no Person can satisfactorily or sufficiently express the Fertility Temperateness of the Climate or the Multitude of the Inhabitants of Nicaraqua which was almost infinite and admirable for this Region contain'd some Cities that were Four Miles long and the abundance of Fruits of the Earth which was the cause of such a Concourse of People was highly commendable The People of this place because the Country was Level and plain destitute of Mountains so very delightful and pleasant that they could not leave it without great grief and much dissatisfaction they were therefore tormented with the greater Vexations and Persecutions and forced to bear the Spanish Tyranny and Servitude with as much Patience as they were Masters of Add farther that they were peaceable and meek-spirited This Tyrant with these Complices of his Cruelty did afflict this Nation whose advice he made use of in destroying the other Kingdoms with such and so many great Dammages Slaughters Injustice Slavery and Barbarisme that a Tongue though of Iron could not express them all fully He sent into this Province which is larger than the County of Ruscinia Fifty Horse-Men who put all the People to the Edge of the Sword sparing neither Age nor Sex upon the most trivial and inconsiderable occasion As for Example if they did not come to them with all possible speed when called and bring the imposed burthen of Mahid which signifies Corn in their Dialect or if they did not bring the Number of Indians required to his own and the Service or rather Servitude of his Associates And the Country being all Campaign or Level no Person was able to withstand the Hellish Fury of their Horses He commanded the Spaniards to make Excursions that is to rob other Provinces permitting and granting these Thieving Rogues leave to take away by force as many of these peaceable People as they could who being iron'd that they might not sink under the Burthen of Sixty or Eighty Pound weight it frequently hapned that of Four Thousand Indians Six only returned home and so they dyed by the way but if any of them chanced to faint being tired with over-weighty Burthens or through great Hunger and Thirst should be siezed with a Distemper or too much Debility and Weakness that they might not spend time in taking off their Fetters they beheaded them so the Head fell one way and the Body another The Indians when they spied the Spaniards making preparations for such Journeys knowing very well that few or none returned home alive just upon their setting out with Sighs and Tears burst out into these or the like Expressions Those were Journeys which we travelled frequently in the service of Christians and in some tract of time we return'd to our Habitations Wives and Children But now there being no hope of a return we are for ever depriv'd of their Sight and Conversation It hapned also that the said President would dissipate or disperse the Indians de novo at his own pleasure to the end as it was reported he might violently force the Indians away from such as did infest or molest him and dispose of them to others upon which it fell out that for the space of a Year complete there was no sowing or planting And when they wanted Bread the Spaniards did by force plunder the Indians of the whole stock of Corn that they had laid up for the support of their Families and by these indirect Courses above Thirty Thousand perished with Hunger Nay it fortun'd at one time that a Woman opprest with insufferable Hunger depriv'd her own Son of his Life to preserve her own In this Province also they brought many to an untimely End loading their Shoulders with heavy planks and pieces of Timber which they were compell'd to carry to a Haven Forty Miles distant in order to their building of Ships sending them likewise unto the Mountains to find out Hony and Wax where they were devour'd by Tygers nay they loaded Women impregnated with Carriage and Burthens fit for beasts But no greater pest was there that could unpeople this Province than the License granted the Spaniards by this Governour to demand Captives from the Cacics and Potentates of this Region for at the Expiration of Four or Five Months or as often as they obtain'd leave of the Governour to demand them they deliver'd them up Fifty Servants and the Spaniards terrified them with Menaces that if they did not obey them in answering their unreasonable Demands they should be burnt alive or baited to Death by Dogs Now the Indians are but slenderly stor'd with Servants for it is much if a Cacic hath Three or Four in his Retinue therefore they have recourse to the Subjects and when they had in the first place seized the Orphans they required earnestly and instantly one Son of the Parent who had but Two and Two of him that had but Three and so the Lord of the place satisfied the desires of the Tyrant not without the Effusion of Tears and Groans of the People who as it seems were very careful of their Children And this being frequently repeated in the space between the Year 1523 and 1533 the Kingdom lost all their Inhabitants for in Six or Seven Years time there were constantly Five or Six Ships made ready to be fraighted with Indians that were sold in the Regions of Panania and Perusium where they all dyed for it is by dayly Experience prov'd and known that the Indians when Transported out of their Native Country into any other soon dye because they are shortned in their allowance of Food and the Task impos'd on them no ways diminished they being only bought for Labour And by this
of it they replied but sufficiently satisfied that they are cruelly and wickedly inclined Then thus said he it is they adore a certain Covetous Deity whose cravings are not to be satisfyed by a few moderate offerings but they may answer his Adoration and Worship demand many unreasonable things of us and use their utmost endeavours to subjugate and after that murder us Then taking up a Cask or Cabinet near at hand full of Gold and Gems he proceeded in this manner This is the Spaniard's God and in honour of him if you think well of it let us celebrate our Arcytos which are certain kinds of Dances and caprings used among them and by this means his Deity being appeas'd he will impose his Commands on the Spaniards that they shall not for the future molest or injure us who all unanimously with one consent in a loud tone made this reply Well said Well said and thus they continued skipping and dancing before this Cabinet without the least intermission till they were quite tired and grown weary Then the Noble Hathney re-assuming his discourse said if we Worship this Deity till ye be ravished from us we shall be destroyed therefore I judge it convenient upon mature deliberation that we cast it into the River which advice was approved of by all without opposition and the Cabinet thrown into the next River When the Spaniards first touched on this Island this Cacic who was thoroughly acquainted with them did avoid and shun them as much as in him lay and defended himself by force of Arms wherever he met with them but at length being taken he was burnt alive for flying from so unjust and cruel a Nation and endeavouring to secure his Life against them who only thirsted after the blood of himself and his own People Now being bound to the post in order to his Execution a certain Holy Monk of the Franciscan Order discours'd with him concerning God and the Articles of our Faith which he never heard of before and which might be satisfactory and advantagious to him considering the small time allow'd him by the Executioner promising him Eternal Glory and Repose if he truly believ'd them or otherwise Everlasting Torments After that 〈◊〉 had been silently pensive sometime he askt the Monk 〈…〉 Spaniards also were admitted into Heaven and he answâ—â—â—◠〈…〉 the Gates of Heaven were open to all that were Good 〈…〉 the Cacic replyed without farther Consideration that he would rather go to Hell than Heaven for fear he should cohabit in the same Mansion with so Saguinary and Bloody a Nation And thus God and the Holy Catholick Faith are Praised and Reverenced by the Practices of the Spaniards in America Once it so hapned that the Citizens of a Famous City distant Ten Miles from the place where we then resided came to meet us with a splendid Retinue to render their Visit more Honourable bringing with them delicious Viands and such kind of Dainties with as great a quantity of Fish as they could possibly procure and distributing them among us but behold on a sudden some wicked Devil possessing the Minds of the Spaniards agitated them with so great fury that I being present and without the least Pretence or Occasion offered they cut off in cold Blood above Three Thousand Men Women and Children promiscuously such Inhumanities and Barbarisms were committed in my sight as no Age can parallel Some time after I dispatch Messengers to all the Rulers of the Province of Havana that they would by no means be terrified or seek their refuge by absence and flight but to meet us and that I would engage for they understood my Authority that they should not receive the least of Injuries for the whole Country was extremely afflicted at the Evils and Mischiefs already perpetrated and this I did with the advice of their Captain As soon as we approacht the Province Two and Twenty of their Noblemen came forth to meet us whom the Captain contrary to his Faith given would have expos'd to the Flames alledging that it was expedient they should be put to Death who were at any time capacitated to use any Stratagem against us but with great difficulty and much adoe I snatcht them out of the fire These Islanders of Cuba being reduc'd to the same Vassalage and Misery as the Inhabitants of Hispaniola seeing themselves perish and dy without any redress fled to the Mountains for shelter but other Desperado's put a period to their days with a Halter and the Husband together with his Wife and Children hanging himself put an end to these Calamities By the ferocity of one Spanish Tyrant whom I knew above Two Hundred Indians hang'd themselves of their own accord and a multitude of People perished by this kind of Death A certain Person here in the same Isle constituted to exercise a kind of Royal Power hapned to have Three Hundred Indians fall to his share of which in Three Months through excessive labour One Hundred and Sixty were destroy'd insomuch that in a short space there remained but a tenth part alive namely Thirty but when the Number was doubled they all perisht at the same rate and all that were bestow'd upon him lost their lives till at length he paid his last Debt to Nature and the Devil In Three or Four Months time I being there present Six Thousand Children and upward were murder'd because they had lost their Parents who labour'd in the Mines nay I was a Witness of many other stupendous Villanies But afterward they consulted how to persecute those that lay hid in Mountains who were miserably massacred and consequently this Isle made de solate which I saw not long after and certainly it is a dreadful and deplorable sight to behold it thus unpeopled and laid waste like a Desert Of the CONTINENT IN the Year 1514 a certain unhappy Governour Landed on the firm Land or Continent a most bloody Tyrant destitute of all Mercy and Prudence the Instrument of God's Wrath with a Resolution to people these parts with Spaniards and although some Tyrants had touched here before him and Cruelty hurried them into the other World by several wayes of Slaughter yet they came no farther than to the Sea Coast where they committed prodigious Thefts and Robberies but this Person exceeded all that ever dwelt in other Islands though execrable and profligate Villains for he did not only ravage and depopulate the Sea-Coast but buried the largest Regions and most ample Kingdoms in their own Ruins sending Thousands to Hell by his Butcheries He made Incursions for many Miles continuance that is to say in those Countries that are included in the Territories of Darien and the Provinces of Nicaraqua which are near Five Hundred Miles of the most Fertil Land in the World very well peopled abounding with Villages Cities and Towns and the most opulent for Gold of all the Regions hitherto discover'd And although Spain has bin sufficiently furnished with the purest God yet it was dig'd
means there have been taken out of this Province Five Hundred Thousand Inhabitants and upward who before were Freemen and made Slaves and in the Wars made on them and the horrid Bondage they were reduc'd unto Fifty or Sixty Thousand more have perished and to this day very many still are destroy'd Now all these Slaughters have been committed within the space of Fourteen years inclusively possibly in this Province of Nicaraqua there remains Four or Five Thousand Men who are put to Death by ordinary and personal Oppressions whereas according to what is said already it did exceed the other Countries of the World in multitude of People Of New SPAIN NEW Spain was discovered Anno Dom. 1517. and in the detection there was no first or second Attempt but all were exposed to slaughter The year ensuing those Spaniards who style themselves Christians came thither to rob kill and slay though they pretend they undertook this Voyage to people the Countrey From this year to the present viz. 1542. the Injustice Violence and Tyranny of the Spaniards came to the highest degree of extremity for they had shook hands with and bid adieu to all fear of God and the King unmindful of themselves in this sad and deplorable condition for the Destructions Cruelties Butcheries Devastations the Demolishing of Cities Depredations c. which they perpetrated in so many and such ample Kingdoms are such and so great and strike the minds of Men with so great horror that all we have related before are inconsiderable comparatively to those which have been acted from the year 1518 to 1542 and to this very month of September that we now live to see the most heavy grievous and detestable things are committed that the Rule we laid down before as a Maxim might be indisputably verified to wit that from the beginning they ran headlong from bad to worse and were overcome in their Diabolical acts and wickedness only by themselves Thus from the first entrance of the Spaniards into New Spain which hapned on the 18th day of April in the said month of the year 1518 to 1530 the space of ten whole years there was no end or period put to the Destruction and Slaughters committed by ther merciless hands of the Sanguinary and Blood-thirsty Spaniard in the Continent or space of 450 Miles round about Mexico and the adjacent or neighbouring parts which might contain four or five spatious Kingdoms that neither for magnitude or fertility would give Spain her self the pre-eminence This intire Region was more populous then Toledo Sevil Valedolid Saragoza and Faventia and there is not at this day in all of them so many people nor when they flourisht in their greatest height and splendor was there such a number as inhabited that Region which embraceth in its Circumference four hundred and eighty Miles Within these twelve years the Spaniards have destroyed in the said Continent by Spears Fire and Sword computing Men Women Youth and Children above four Millions of people in these their Acquests or Conquests for under that word they mask their Cruel Actions or rather those of the Turk himself which are reported of them tending to the ruin of the Catholick Cause together with their Invasions and Unjust Wars contrary to and condemned by Divine as well as Human Laws nor are they reckoned in this number who perished by their more then Egyptian Bondage and usual Oppressions There is no Tongue Art or Human knowledge can recite the horrid Impieties which these Capital Enemies to Government and all Mankind have been guilty of at several times and in several Nations nor can the circumstantial Aggravations of some of their wicked Acts be unfolded or display'd by any manner of Industry time or writing but yet I will say somewhat of every individual particular thing with this protestation and Oath that I conceive I am not able to comprehend one of a Thousand Of New Spain in Particular AMong other Slaughters this also they perpetrated in the most spatious City of Cholula which consisted of Thirty Thousand Families all the Chief Rulers of that Region and Neighbouring places but first the Priests with their High Priest going to meet the Spaniards in Pomp and State and to the end they might give them a more reverential and honourable reception appointed them to be in the middle of the Solemnity that so being entertained in the Appartments of the most powerful and principal Noblemen they might be lodged in the City The Spaniards presently consult about their slaughter or castigation as they term it that they might fill every corner of this Region by their Cruelties and wicked Deeds with terror and consternation for in all the Countries that they came they took this course that immediately at their first arrival they committed some notorious â—utcheries which made those Innocent Sheep tremble for fear To this purpose therefore they sent to the Governours and Nobles of the Cities and all Places subject unto them together with their supream Lord that they should appear before them and no sooner did they attend in expectation of some Capitulation or discourse with the Spanish Commander but they were presently seized upon and detained Prisoners before any one could advertise or give them notice of their Captivity They demanded of them six thousand Indians to drudge for them in the carriage of their bag and baggage and as soon as they came the Spaniards clapt them into the Yards belonging to their Houses and there inclosed them all It was a thing worthy of pity and compassion to behold this wretched people in what a condition they were when they prepared themselves to receive the burthens laid on them by the Spaniards They came to them naked their Privities only vail'd their Shoulders loaden with food only covered with a Net they laid themselves quietly on the ground and shrinking in their Bodies like poor Wretches exposed themselves to their Swords Thus being all gathered together in their Yards some of the Spaniards Armed held the doors to drive them away if attempting to approach and others with Lances and Swords Butcher these Innocents so that not one of them escaped but two or three days after some of them who hid themselves among the dead bodies being all over besprinkled with blood and gore presented themselves to the Spaniards imploring their mercy and the prolongation of their Lives with tears in their Eyes and all imaginable submission yet they not in the least moved with pity or compassion tore them impieces but all the Chief Governours who were above one hundred in number were kept bound whom the Captain commanded to be affixed to posts and burnt yet the King of the whole Countrey escaped and betook himself with a Train of thirty or forty Gentlemen to a Temple called in their Tongue Quu which he made use of as a Castle or Place of Defence and there defended himself a great part of the day but the Spaniards who suffer none to escape out of
their clutches especially Souldiers setting fire to the Temple burnt all those that were there inclosed who brake out into these dying words and exclamations O profligate Men what injury have we done you to occasion our death Go go to Mexico where our supream Lord Montencuma will revenge our cause upon your persons And 't is reported while the Spaniards were engaged in this Tragedy destroying six or seven thousand Men that their Commander with great rejoycing sang this following Ayre Mira Nero de Tarpeia Roma como se ardia Gritos de Ninos y Vieyot y el de nadase dolia From the Tarpeian still Nero espies Rome all in Flames with unrelenting Eyes And hears of young and old the dreadful Cries They also committed a very great Butchery in the City Tepeara which was larger and better stored with Houses then the former and here they Massacred an incredible number with the point of the Sword Setting sail from Cholula they steer'd their course to Mexico whose King sent his Nobles and Peers with abundance of Presents to meet them by the way testifying by divers sorts of Recreations how grateful their arrival was and acceptable to him but when they came to a steep Hill his brother went forward to meet them accompanied with many Noblemen who brought them many gifts in Gold Silver and Robes Embroidered with Gold and at their entrance into the City the King himself carried in a golden Litter together with the whole Court attended them to the Palace prepared for their reception and that very day as I was informed by some persons then and there present by a grand piece of Treachery they took the great King Motencuma never so much as dreaming of any such surprize and put him into the custody of eighty Soldiers and afterward loaded his Legs with irons but all these things being passed over with a light pencil of which much might be said one thing I will discover acted by them that may merit your observation When the Captain arrived at the Haven to fight with a Spanish Officer who made War against him and left another with an hundred Soldiers more or less as a Guard to King Motencuma it came into their heads that to act somewhat worth remembrance that the dread of their Cruelty might be more and more apprehended and greatly increased In the interim all the Nobility and Commonalty of the City thought of nothing else but how to exhilarate the Spirit of their Captive King and solace him during his Confinement with variety of diversions and Recreations and among the rest this was one viz. Revellings and Dances which they celebrated in all Streets and Highways by night and they in their Idiom term Mirotes as the Islanders do Arcytos to these Masques and nocturnal Jigs they usually go with all their Riches Costly Vestments and Robes together with any thing that is pretious and glorious being wholly addicted to this humor nor is there any greater token among them then this of their extraordinary exultation and rejoycing The Nobles in like manner and Princes of the Blood Royal every one according to his degree exercise these Masques and Dances in some place adjoyning to the House where their King and Lord is detained Prisoner Now there were not far from the Palace about 2000 Young Noblemen who were the issue of the greatest Potentates of the Kingdom and indeed the flower of the whole Nobility of King Motencuma and a Spanish Captain went to visit them with some Soldiers and sent others to the rest of the places in the City where these Revellings were kept under pretence only of being spectators of the solemnity Now the Captain had commanded that at a certain hour appointed they should fall upon these Revellers and he himself approaching the Indians very busie at their Dancing said San Jago that is St. James it seems that was the Word Let us rush in upon them which was no sooner heard but they all began with their naked Swords in hand to pierce their tender and naked Bodies and spil their generous and Noble blood till not one of them was left alive on the place and the rest following his example in other parts to their inexpressible stupefaction and grief seized on all these Provinces Nor will the Inhabitants till the General conflagration ever discontinue the Celebration of these Festivals and the Lamentation and Singing with certain kind of Rhythmes in their Arcytos the doleful ditty of the Calamity and Ruin of this Seminary of the antient Nobility of the whole Kingdom which was their frequent Pride and Glory The Indians seeing this not to be exampled cruelty and iniquity executed against such a number of guiltless persons and also bearing with incredible patience the unjust Imprisonment of their King from whom they had an absolute Command not to take up Arms against the Spaniard the whole City was suddenly up in Arms fell on the Spaniards and wounded many of them the rest hardly escaping but they presenting the point of a Sword to the Kings Breast threatned him with death unless he out of the Window commanded them to desist but the Indians for the present disobeying the Kings Mandate proceeded to the Election of a Generalissimo or Commander in Chief over all their Forces and because that the Captain who went to the Port returned Victor and brought away a far greater number of Spaniards then he took along with him there was a Cessation of Arms for three or four days till he re-entred the City and then the Indians having gathered together and made up a great Army fought so long and so strenuously that the Spaniards despairing of their safety called a Council of War and therein resolv'd to retreat in the dead time of night and so draw off their Forces from the City which coming to the knowledge of the Indians they destroyed a great number Retreating on the Bridges made over their Lakes in this just and Holy War for the causes above-mentioned deserving the approbation of every upright Judge But afterward the Spaniards having recruited and got together in a Body they resolved to take the City and carried it at last wherein most detestable Butcheries were acted a vast number of the people slain and their Rulers perished in the Flames All these horrid Murders being commited in Mexico and other Cities ten fifteen and twenty miles distant This same Tyranny and Plague in the abstract proceeded to infest and lay desolate Panuco A Region abounding with Inhabitants even to admiration nor were the slaughters therein perpetrated less stupendious and wonderful In the same manner they utterly laid waste the Provinces of Futepeca Ipilcingonium and Columa every one of them being as large as the Kingdoms of Leon and Castile It would be very difficult or rather impossible to relate the Cruelties and Destruction there made and committed and prove very nauseous and offensive to the Reader 'T is observable that they entred upon these Dominions and laid waste the
Indian Territories so populous that it would have rejoyced the hearts of all true Christians to see their number upon no other title or pretence but only to enslave them for at their first arrival they compel'd them to swear the Oath of Obedience and Fealty to the King of Spain and if they did not condescend to it they menaced them with death and Vassalage and they who did not forthwith appear to satisfie the unequitable Mandates and submit to the will and pleasure of such unjust and Cruel Men were declared Rebels and accus'd of that Crime before our Lord the King the blindness or ignorance of those who were set over the Indians as Rulers did so darken their understanding that they did not apprehend that known and incontrovertible Maxim in Law That no Man can be called a Rebel who is not first proved to be a subject I omit the injuries and prejudice they do to the King himself when they spoil and ravage his Kingdoms and as much as in them lies diminish and impair all his Right and Title to the Indies nay in plain English invalidate and make it null and void And these are the worthy Services which the Spaniards do for our Kings in those Countries by the injust and colourable pretences aforesaid This Tyrant upon the same pretext sent two other Captains who exceeded him in impiety and cruelty if possible to the most flourishing and Fertil in Fruits and Men Kingdoms of Guatimala Situate toward the South who had also received Orders to go to the Kingdoms of Naco Honderae and Guaymura verging upon the North and are Borderers on Mexico three hundred miles together The one was sent by Land the other by Sea and both well furnished with Horse and Foot. This I declare for a Truth that the outrages committed by these two particularly by him that went to Guatimala for the other not long after his departure died a violent Death would afford matter sufficient for an entire Volume and when completed be so crouded with slaughters injuries butcheries and inhuman Desolations so horrid and detestable as would Ague-shake the present as well as future ages with terror He that put out to Sea vexed all the Maritime Coasts with his cruel Incursions now some Inhabitants of the Kingdom of Jucatan which is seated in the way to the Kingdoms of Naco and Naymura to which places he steered his course came to meet him with burthens of Presents and Gifts and as soon as he approacht them sent his Captians with a party of Soldiers to depopulate their Land who committed great spoils and made cruel slaughters among them and in particular a Seditious and Rebellious Officer who with three hundred Soldiers entred a Neighbouring Country to Guatimala and there firing the Cities and Murdering all the Inhabitants violently deprived them of all their Goods which he did designedly for the space of an hundred and twenty miles to the eâ—d that if his Companions should follow them they might find the Countrey laid wast and so be destroyed by the Indians in revenge for the dammage they had received by him and his Forces which hapned accordingly for the Chief Commander whose order the abovesaid Captain had disobey'd and so became a Rebel to him was there slain But many other bloody Tyrants succeeded him who from the year 1524 to 1535. did unpeople and make a Desert of the Provinces of Naco and Hondurae as well as other places which were lookt upon as the Paradise of delights and better peopled then other Regions insomuch that within the Term of these eleven years there fell in those Countries above two Millions of Men and now there are hardly remaining Two Thousand who dayly dye by the severity of their Slavery But to return to that great Tyrant who outdid the former in cruelty as is hinted above and is equal to those that Tyrannize there at present who travelled to Guatimala he from the Provinces adjoyning to Mexico which according to his prosecuted journey as he himself Writes and testifies with his own hand in Letters to the Prince of Tyrants are distant from Guatimala four hundred miles did make it his urgent and dayly business to procure Ruin and Destruction by slaughter Fire and Depopulations compelling all to submit to the Spanish King whom they lookt upon to be more unjust and cruel then his inhumane and blood-thirsty Ministers Of the Kingdom and Province of GUATIMALA THIS Tyrant at his first entrance here acted and commanded prodigious Slaughters to be perpetrated Notwithstanding which The Chief Lord in his Chair or Sedan attended by many Nobles of the City of Vltlatana the Emporium of the whole Kingdom together with Trumpets Drums and great Exultation went out to meet him and brought with them all sorts of Food in great abundance with such things as he stood in most need of That Night the Spaniards spent without the City for they did not judge themselves secure in such a well-fortified place The next day he commanded the said Lord with many of his Peers to come before him from whom they imperiously challenged a certain quantity of Gold to whom the Indians return'd this modest Answer that they could not satisfie his Demands and indeed this Region yielded no Golden Mines but they all by his command without any other Crime laid to their Charge or any Legal Form of Proceeding were burnt alive The rest of the Nobles belonging to other Provinces when they found their Chief Lords who had the Supreme Power were expos'd to the Merciless Element of Fire Kindled by a more merciless Enemy for this Reafon only because they bestow'd not what they could not upon them viz. Gold they fled to the Mountains their usual Refuge for shelter commanding their Subjects to obey the Spaniards as Lords but withal strictly and expresly prohibiting and forbidding them to inform the Spaniards of their Flight or the Places of their Concealment And behold a great many of the Indians addrest themselves to them earnestly requesting they would admit them as Subjects being very willing and ready to serve them The Captain replyed that he would not entertain them in such a Capacity but instead of so doing would put every individual Person to Death if they would not discover the Receptacles of their Fugitive Governours The Indians made answer that they were wholly ignorant of the matter yet that they themselves their Wives and Children should serve them that they were at home they might come to them and put them to Death or deal with them as they pleas'd But the Spaniards O wonderful went to the Towns and Villages and destroy'd with their Lances these poor Men their Wives and Children intent upon their Labour and as they thought themselves secure and free from danger Another large Village they made desolate in the space of two hours sparing neither Age nor Sex putting all to the Sword without Mercy The Indians perceiving that this Barbarous and Hard-hearted People would not be pacified with
Humility large Gifts or unexampled Patience but that they were butcher'd without any Cause upon serious Consultation took up a Resolution of getting together in a Body and fighting for their Lives and Liberty for they conceiv'd it was far better since Death to them was a necessary Evil with Sword in Hand to be kill'd by taking Revenge of the Enemy then be destroy'd by them without satisfaction But when they grew sensible of their want of Arms Nakedness and Debility and that they were altogether incapable of the management of Horses so as to prevail against such a furious Adversary recollecting themselves they contriv'd this Stratagem to dig Ditches and Holes in the High-way into which the Horses might fall in their passage and fixing therein purposely sharp and burnt Posts and covering them with loose Earth so that they could not be discern'd by their Riders they might be transfixed gored by them The Horses fell twice or thrice into those holes but afterward the Spaniards took this Course to prevent them for the future and made this a Law that as many of the Indians of what Age or Sex soever as were taken should be cast into these Ditches that they had made Nay they threw into them Women with Child and as many Aged Men as they laid hold of till they were all fill'd up with Carkasses It was a sight deserving Commiseration to behold Women and Children gauncht or run through with these Posts some were taken off by Spears and Swords and the remainder expos'd to hungry Dogs kept short of Food for that purpose to be devour'd by them and torn in pieces They burnt a Potent Nobleman in a very great Fire saying That he was the more Honour'd by this kind of Death All which Butcheries continued Seven Years from 1524 to 1531. I leave the Reader to judge how many might be Massacred during that time Among the Innumerable Flagitious Acts done by this Tyrant and his Co-partners for they were as Barbarous as their Principal in this Kingdom this also occurs worthy of an Asterism in the Margin In the Province of Cuzcatan in which S. Saviour's City is seated which Country with the Neighbouring Sea-Coasts extends in Length Forty or Fifty Miles as also in the very City of Cuzcatan the Metropolis of the whole Province he was entertain'd with great Applause For about Twenty or Thirty Thousand Indians brought with them Hens and other necessary Provisions expecting his coming He accepting their Gifts commanded every single Spaniara to make choice of as many of these People as he had a mind to that during their stay there they might use them as Servants and forced to undergo the most servile Offices they should impose on them Every one cull'd out a Hundred or Fifty according as he thought convenient for his peculiar service and these wretched Indians did serve the Spaniards with their utmost strength and endeavour so that there could be nothing wanting in them but Adoration In the mean time this Captain requird a great Sum of Gold from their Lords for that was the Load-stone attracted him thither who answered they were content to deliver him up all the Gold they had in possession and in order thereunto the Indians gathered together a great Number of Spears gilded with Orichalcum which had the appearance of Gold and in truth some Gold in them intermixt and they were prefented to him The Captain ordered them to be toucht and when he found them to be Orichalcum or mixt Metal he spake to the Spaniards as followeth Let that Nation that is without Gold be accursed to the Pit of Hell. Let every Man detain those Servants he Elected let them be clapt in Irons and stigmatiz'd with the Brand of Slavery which was accordingly done for they were all burnt who did not escape with the King 's Mark. I my self saw the Impression made on the Son of the Chiefest Person in the City Those that escap'd with other Indians engaged the Spaniards by Force of Arms but with such ill success that abundance of them lost their Lives in the Attempt After this they return'd to Guatimala where they built a City which God in his just Judgments with Three Deluges the First of Water the Second of Earth the Third of Stones as big as half a score Oxen all concurring at one and the same time laid Level with its own Ashes Now all being slain who were capable of bearing Arms against them the rest were enslav'd paying so much per Head for Men and Women as a Ransom for they use no other servitude here and then they were sent into Pecusium to be sold by which means together with their slaughters committed upon the Inhabitants they destroy'd and made a Desert of this Kingdom which in Breadth as well as Length contains One Hundred Miles and with his Associates and Brethren in Iniquity Four Millions at least in Fifteen or Sixteen Years that is from 1524 to 1540 were murdered and dayly continues destroying the small residue of that People with his Cruelties and Brutishness It was the usual Custom of this Tyrant when he made War with any City or Province to take along with him as many of those Indians he had subjugated as he could that they might fight with their Country-men and when he had in his Army Twenty or sometimes Thirty Thousand of them and could not afford them sustenance he permitted them to feed on the Flesh of other Indians taken Prisoners in War and so kept a Shambles of Man's Flesh in his Army suffered Children to be kill'd and roasted before his Face They butcher'd the Men for their Feet and Hands only for these Members were accounted by them Dainties most delicious Food He was the Death of many by the intolerable Labour of carrying Ships by Land causing them to Transport those Vessels with Anchors of a vast weight from the Septentrional to the Mediterranean Sea which are One Hundred and Thirty Miles distant as also abundance of great Guns of the largest sort which they carried on their bare naked shoulders so that opprest with many great and ponderous Burthens I say no more than what I saw they dyed by the way He separated and divided Families forcing Married Men from their Wives and Maids from their Parents which he bestow'd upon his Marriners and Soldiers to gratifie their burning Lust All his Ships he freighted with Indians where Hunger and Thirst discharg'd them of their Servitude and his Cruelty by a welcome Death He had two Companies of Soldiers who hackt and tore them in pieces like Thunder from Heaven speedily O how many Parents has he robb'd of their Children how many Wives of their Husbands and Children of their Parents How many Adulteries Rapes and what Libidinous Acts hath he been guilty of How many hath he enslav'd and opprest with insufferable Anguish and unspeakable Calamities How many Tears Sighs and Groans hath he occasion'd To how many has he bin the Author of Desolation during their
Year of our Lord 1526 And the other Tyrants to this very day have taken the same indirect Measures to obtain Offices and screw or wheedle themselves into publick Charges or Employments for by this Praetext and Authority they had the greater opportunity to commit Theft and Rapine This Kingdom was very well peopled and both for Temperature of Air and the Plenty of Food and Fruits in which respect it is more Fertile than Mexico but chiefly for Hony and Wax it exceeds all the Indian Countries that hath hitherto bin discover'd It is Three Hundred Miles in Compass The Inhabitants of this place do much excel all other Indians either in Politie or Prudence or in leading a Regular Life and Morality truly deserving to be instructed in the Knowledge of the true God. Here the Spaniards might have Erected many fair Cities and liv'd as it were in a Garden of Delights if they had not through Covetousness Stupidity and the weight of Enormous Crimes rendred themselves unworthy of so great a Benefit This Tyrant with Three Hundred Men began to make War with these Innocent People living peaceably at home and doing injury to none which was the ruine of a great Number of them Now because this Region affords no Gold and if it did the Inhabitants would soon have wrought away their lives by hard working in the Mines that so he might accumulate Gold by their bodies and Souls for which Christ was Crucified For the generality he made slaves of those whose lives he spared and sent away such Ships as were driven thither by the Wind of report loaden with them exchanging them for Wine Oyl Vinegar Salt Pork Garments Pack Horses and other Commodities which he thought most necessary and fit for his use He proposed to them the choice of Fifty Virgins and she that was the fairest or best complexioned he bartered for a small Cask of Wine Oyl Vinegar or some inconsiderable quantity of salt Pork the same exchange he proffered of Two or Three Hundred well-disposed Yound Boys and one of them who had the Mind or presence of a Princes Son was given up to them for a Cheese and One Hundred more for a Horse Thus he continued his flagitious courses from 1526 to 1533 inclusively till there was news brought of the Wealth and Opulence of the Region of Perusia whither the Spaniards marcht and so for some time there was a Cessation of this Tyranny but in few days after they returned and acted enormous Crimes robbed and imprisoned them and committed higher offences against the God of Heaven nor have they yet done so that now these Three Hundred Miles of Land so populous as I said before lies now uncultivated and almost deserted No Solifidian can believe the particular Narrations of their Barbarism and Cruelty in those Countreys I will only relate two or three Stories which are fresh in my memory The Spaniards used to trace the steps of Indians both Men and Women with curst Currs furious Dogs an Indian Woman that was sick hapned to be in the way in sight who perceiving that she was not able to avoid being torn in pieces by the Dogs takes a Cord that she had and hangs her self upon a Beam tying her Child which she unfortunately had with her to her foot and no sooner had she done yet the Dogs were at her tearing the Child but a Priest coming that way Baptiz'd it before quite dead When the Spaniards left this Kingdom one of them invited the Son of some Indian Governour of a City or Province to go along with him who told him he would not leave or desert his Native Countrey whereupon he threatned to cut off his ears if he refus'd to follow him But the Youth persisting resolutely that he would continue in the place of his Nativity he drawing his Sword cut off each Ear notwithstanding which he persever'd in his first opinion and then as if he had only pincht him smilingly cut off his Nose and Lips. This Rogue did lasciviously boast before a Priest and as if he had merited the greatest applause commended himself to the very Heavens saying He had made it his chief Trade or Business to impregnate Indian Women that when they were sold afterward he might gain the more Money by them In this Kingdom or I 'm certain in some Province of New Spain A Spaniard Hunting and intent on his game phancyed that his Beagles wanted food and to supply their hunger snatcht a young little Babe from the Mothers breast cutting off his Arms and Legs cast a part of them to every Dog which they having devour'd he threw the remainder of the Body to them Thus it is plainly manifest how they value these poor Creatures created after the image of God to cast them to their Canibal-Curs But that which follows is if possible a sin of a deeper dye I pretermit their unparallel'd Impieties c. and only close all with this one Story that follows Those haughty obdurate and execrable Tyrants who departed from this Countrey to Fish for Riches in Perusia and four Monks of the Order of St. Francis with Father James who Travelled thither also to keep the Countrey in Peace and attract or mildly perswade by their Preaching the remnant of Inhabitants that had outlived a septenisial Tyranny to embrace the knowledge of Christ I conceive these are the persons who in the year 1534 Travelling by Mexico were sollicited by several Messengers from the Indians to come into their Countrey and inform them in the knowledge of one God the true God and Lord of the whole World to this end they appointed Assemblies and Councils to examine and understand what Men they were who called themselves Fathers and Friers what they intended and what difference there was between them and the Spaniards by whom they had been so molested and tormented but they received them at length upon this condition that they should be admitted alone without any Spaniards which the Father 's promised for they had permission nay an express Mandate from the President of New Spain to make that promise and that the Spaniards should not do them the least detriment or injury Then they began to Preach the Gospel of Christ and to explicate and declare the pious intention of the King of Castile of all which they had notice by the Spaniards for seven years together that they had no King nor no other but him who oppressed them with so much Tyranny The Priests continued there but forty days but behold they bring forth all their Idols to be committed to the flames and then their Children which they tendred as the apple of the Eye that they might be instructed They also erected Temples and Houses for them and they were desired to come to other Provinces and Preach the Gospel and introduce them into the knowledge of God and the Great as they stilled him King of Castile And the Priests perswasions wrought so effectually on them that they condescended to that
and Carthagena hastening to the Conquest of Perusia Anno Dom. 1539. and they accompanied with many more going farther from this Region endeavoured to penetrate into the Heart of this Countrey where they found about Three Hundred Miles from Carthagena and St. Martha many admirable Provinces and most fruitful Land furnished with an even-tempered or meek-spirited People as they are in other parts of India very rich in Gold and those sorts of precious Stones known by the name of Emralds To which Province they gave the Name of Granada upon this Account because the Tyrant who first arrived in these Regions was born in the Kingdom of Granada belonging to these parts now they that spoiled these Provinces with their rapine being wicked cruel infamous Butchers and delighting in the essusion of Humane Hood having practically experimented the piacular and grand Enormities perpetrated among the Indians and upon this account their Diabolical Actions are so great so many in number and represented so grievously horrid by circumstantial aggravations that they exceed all the villanies committed by others nay by themselves in other Regions I will only select and cull out a few out of so great a number which have been transacted by them within these three years for my present purpose A certain Governour because he that went to commit depredations and spoils in the Kingdom of Granada would not admit him as a Companion in his Robberies and Cruelties set up an Inquisition and produced proofs confirmed by great evidence whereby he palpably lays open and proves the Slaughters and Homicides he committed and persists in to this very day which were read in the Indian Courts of Judicature and are there now Recorded In this Inquisition the Witnesses depose that when all these Kingdoms enjoy'd Peace and Tranquillity the Indians serv'd the Spaniards and got their living by constant day-labour in Tilling and Manuring the Ground bringing them much Gold and many Gems particularly Emeralds and what other Commodities they could and possessed their Cities and Dominions being divided among the Spaniards to procure which is the chiefest of their care and pains and these are the proper measures they take to obtain their proposed ends to wit heaping and treasuring up of Gold and Riches Now when all the Indians were under their accustomed Tyranny A certain Tyrant and Chief Commander took the King and Lord of the whole Country and detain'd him Captive for six or seven moneths demanding of him without any reason store of Gold and Emeralds The said King whose name was Bogota through fear promised him a House of Gold hoping in time to escape out of his clutches who thus plagu'd him and sent some Indians for Gold who frequently and at several times brought him a great quantity of Gold and many Jewels but because the King did not according to promise bestow upon him an Appartment made of pure Gold he must therefore forfeit his Life The Tyrant commanded him to be brought to Tryal before himself and so they cite and summon to a Tryal the greatest King in the whole Region and the Tyrant pronounced this Sentence that unless he did perform his Golden Promise he should be exposed to severe Torments They rackt him poured boiling Soap into his Bowels chain'd his Legs to one post and fastened his Neck to another two men holding his Hands and so applyed the scorching heat of the Fire to his Feet the Tyrant himself often casting his Eye upon him and threatning him with death if he did not give him the promised Gold and thus with these kind of horrid torments the said Lord was destroy'd which while they were doing God being willing to manifest how displeasing these Cruelties are to His Divine Majesty the whole City that was the Stage on which they were acted was consumed by Fire and the rest of the Captains following his example destroy'd all the Lords of that Region by Fire and Faggot Once it fell out that many Indians addressed themselves to the Spaniards with all Humility and Simplicity as they use to do who thinking themselves safe and secure behold the Captain comes into the City where they were to do their work and commands all these Indians sleeping and taking their rest after Supper being wearied with the heavy drudgery of the day to be slain by the Sword And this stratagem he put in practice to make a greater impression of fear on all the minds of the Inhabitants and another time a certain Captain commanded the Spaniards to declare upon Oath how many Cacics and Indians every individual person had in his Family at home who were presently lead to a publick place and lost their Heads so there perisht that bout four or five hundred Men. The Witnesses depose this of a particular Tyrant that by beating cutting off the Hands and Noses of many Women as well as Men and destroying several persons in great numbers he exercised horrid Cruelties Then one of the Captains sent this bloody Tyrant into the Province of Bogota to inquire who succeeded that Prince there whom he so barbarously and inhumanely Murder'd who traveling many miles in this Country took as many Indians as he could get some of which because they did not tell him who was Successor of this Deceased Prince had their Hands cut off and others were exposed to hunger-starv'd Currs to be devour'd by them and thus many of them perished miserably Another time about the fourth Watch early in the morning he fell upon several Cacics Noblemen and other Indians who lookt upon themselves to be safe enough for they had their faith and security given that none of them should receive any damage or injury relying upon this they left the Mountains their lurking places without any suspition or fear and returned to their Cities but he seized on them all and commanding them to extend their hands on the ground cut them off with his own Sword saying that he punished them after this manner because they would not inform him what Lord it was that succeeded in that Kingdom The Inhabitants of one of these Provinces perceiving that four or five of their Governours were sent to the other World in a fiery Vehicle or Chariot being terrified therewith took to the Mountains for Sanctuary there being four or five thousand in number as appears by good Evidence and the aforesaid Captain sends a Tyrant more cruel than any of the rest after them The Spaniards ascend the Mountain by force for the Indians were naked and unarm'd Proclaiming Peace if they would desist and lay down their Arms which the Indians no sooner heard but quitted their Childish Weapons and this was no sooner done but this Sanguinary Spaniard sent some to possess themselves of the Fortifications and they being secur'd to attaque the Indians Thus they like Wolves and Lyons did rush upon this flock of Sheep and were so tired with slaughter that they were forced to desist for a while and take breath which done the Captain commands
them to fall to it again at the same bloody rate and precipitate all that survived the Butchery from the top of the Mountain which was of a prodigious height and that was perform'd accordingly And the Witnesses farther declare upon Oath that they saw the bodies of about seven hundred Indians falling from the Mount at one time like a Cloud obscuring the Air who were all broken to pieces This very Tyrant came once to the City Cota where he surprized abundance of Men together with fifteen or twenty Cacics of the highest rank and quality whom he cast to the Dogs to be torn Limb-meal in pieces and cut off the Hands of several Men and Women which being run through with a pole were exposed to be view'd and gaz'd upon by the Indians where you might see at once seventy pair of hands transfixed with Poles nor is it to be forgotten that he cut off the Noses of many Women and Children The Witnesses farther depose that the Cruelties and great Slaughters committed in the aforesaid new Kingdom of Granada by this Captain and other Tyrants the Destroyers of Mankind who accompany him and have power still given them by him to exercise the same are such and so hainous that if his Majesty does not opportunely apply some remedy for the redress and prevention of such mischiess for the future since the Indians are daily slaughtered to accumulate and enrich themselves with Gold which the Inhabitants have been so rob'd of that they are now grown bare for what they had they have disposed to the Spaniards already this Kingdom will soon decay and be made desolate and consequently the Land being destitute of Indians who should manure it will lye fallow and incultivated And here is to be noted how pestilential and inhumane the cruelty of these Tyrants hath been and how violently exercised when as in two or three years space they were all slain and the Country wholly desolate and deserted as those that have been Eye-witnesses can testifie they having acted like Merciless Men not having the fear of God and the King before their Eyes but by the instigation of the Devil so that it may well be said and affirmed not one Person will be left alive unless his Majesty does retard and put a stop to the full career of their Cruelties which I am very apt to believe for I have seen with these very eyes of mine many Kingdom laid waste and depopulated in a small time There are other stately Provinces on the Confines of the New Kingdom of Granada as Popayan and Cali together with three or four more above five hundred miles in length which they destroyed in the same manner as they have done other places and laid them absolutely waste by the prementioned Slaughters who were very Populous and the Soil very Fruitful They who came among us from those Regions report that nothing can be more deplorable or worthy of pity and commiseration then to behold such large and great Cities totally ruinated and intombed in their own Ashes and that in a City adorn'd with 1000 or 2000 Fabricks there are hardly now to be seen 50 standing the rest being utterly demolished or consum'd and levelled to the ground by Fire and in some parts Regions of 100 miles length containing spacious Cities are found absolutely destroyed and consumed by Fire Finally many great Tyrants who came out of the Perusian Kingdoms by the Quuonians Travelled to the said new Kingdom of Granada and Popayan and by Carthagena and the Vrabae they directed their course to Calisium and several other Tyrants of Carthagena assault Quito who joyn'd themselves in an intire Body and wholly depopulated and laid waste that Region for the space of 600 miles and upward with the loss of a prodigious number of poor Souls nor as yet do they treat the small remnant of so great and innocent a people with more humanity then formerly I desire therefore that the Readers who have or shall peruse these passages would please seriously to consider whether or no such Barbarous Cruel and Inhumane Acts as these do not transcend and exceed all the impiety and tyranny which can enter into the thoughts or imagination of Man and whether these Spaniards deserve not the name of Devils For which of these two things is more eligible or desirable whether the Indians should be delivered up to the Devils themselves to be tormented or the Spaniards That is still a question Nor can I here omit one piece of Villany whether it ought to be postpon'd or come behind the cruelty of Brute Animals that I leave to decision The Spaniards who are conversant among the Indians bred up curst Curs who are so well instructed and taught that they at first sight fly upon the Inhabitants tearing them limb by limb and so presently devour them Now let all persons whether Christians or not consider if ever such a thing as this reacht the ears of any Man they carry these Dogs with them as Companions where ever they go and kill the fettered Indians in multitudes like Hogs for their Food thus sharing with them in the Butchery Nay they frequently call one to the other saying lend me the fourth part of one of your Slaves to feed my Dogs and when I kill one I will repay you as if they had only borrowed a quarter of a Hog or Sheep Others when they go a Hunting early in the morning upon their return if you ask them what sport had you to day at the Game They will answer enough enough for my Dogs have killed and worried 15 or 20 Indian Vassals Now all these things are plainly prov'd upon those Inquisitions and Examinations made by one Tyrant against another What I beseech you can be more horrid or barbarous But I will desist from Writing any longer at this time till some Messenger brings an account of greater and blacker Impieties if greater can be committed or else till we come to behold them again as we have done for the space of forty two years with our own Eyes I will only make this small addition to what I have said that the Spaniards from the beginning of their first entrance upon America to this present day were no more sollicitous of promoting the Preaching of the Gospel of Christ to these Nations then if they had been Dogs or Beasts but which is worst of all they expresly prohibited their addresses to the Religious laying many heavy Impositions upon them dayly afflicting and persecuting them that they might not have so much time and leasure at their own disposal as to attend their Preaching and Divine Service for they lookt upon that to be an impediment to their getting Gold and raking up riches which their Avarice stimulated them so boundlesly to prosecute Nor do they understand any more of a God whether he be made of Wood Brass or Clay then they did above an hundred years ago New Spain only exempted which is a small part of America and was
visited and instructed by the Religious Thus they did formerly and still do perish without true Faith or the knowledge and benefit of our Religious Sacraments I Frier Bartholomeas de las Casas or Casaus of the Order of St. Dominick who through they mercy of God am Arriv'd at the Spanish Court Cordially wishing the expulsion of Hell or these Hellish Acts out of the Indies fearing least those Souls redeemed by the pretious Blood of Christ should perish eternally but heartily desiring that they may acknowledge their Creator and be saved as also for the care and compassion that I ever had for my Native Countrey Castile dreading least God should destroy it for the many sins committed by the Natives her Children against Faith Honour and their Neighbours I have at length upon the request of some Persons of great Quality in this Court who are servently zealous of the Houour of God and moved with pitty at the Calamities and Afflictions of their Neighbours though I long since proposed it within my self and resolved to accomplish it but could not being distracted with the avocations of multiplicity of constant Business and Employment have leisure to effect it I say I have at length finished this Treatise and Summary at Valencia Deceinb 8. An. Dom. 1542 when they were arrived at the Height and utmost Degree of executing Violences Oppressions Tyranny Desolations Torments and Calamities in all the aforesaid Regions Inhabited by the Spaniards though they are more Cruel in some places than other yet Mexico with its Confines were more favourably treated than the rest of the Provinces And indeed no Man durst openly and publickly do any injury to the Inhabitants for there some Justice which is no where else in India though very little is done and practised yet they are grievously opprest with intolerable Taxes But I do really believe and am fully perswaded that our Sovereign Lord Charles the Fifth Emperour and King of Spain our Lord and Prince who begins to be sensible of the Wickedness and Treacheries which have been and still are committed against this Miserable Nation and distressed Countries contrary to the Will and Pleasure of God as well as His Majesties that he will in time for hitherto the Truth hath been concealed and kept from his Knowledge with as great Craft as Fraud and Malice totally extirpate and root up all these Evils and Mischiefs and apply such proper Medicines an may purge the Morbifick and peccant Humours in the Body Politick of this New World committed to his Care and Government as a Lover and Promoter of Peace and Tranquillity God preserve and bless him with Renown and a happy Life in his Imperial State and prosper him in all his Attempts that he may remedy the Distempers of the Christian Church and Crown him at last with Eternal Felicity Amen After I had published this Treatise certain Laws and Constitutions enacted by his Majesty then at Baraclona in the Month of December An. Dom. 1542 promulgated and published the Year ensuing in the City of Madera whereby it is provided as the present Necessities requir'd that a period be put to such great Enomrities and Sins as were committed against God and our Neighbours and tended to the utter Ruine and Perdition of this New World. These Laws were published by his Majesties Order several Persons of highest Authority Councellors Learned and Conscientious Men being assembled together for that purpose and many Debates made at Valedolid about this weighty Affair at lenght by the unanimous Consent and Advice of all those who had committed their Opinions to Writing they were made publick who traced more closely therein the Laws of Christ and Christianity and were judged Persons pure free from and innocent of that stain and blemish of depriving the Indians of their Treasures by Theft and Rapine which Riches had contaminated and fullied the Hands but much more the Souls of those who were enslav'd by those heaps of Wealth and Covetousness now this obstinate and hot pursuit after Wealth was the Original of all those Evils committed without the least Remorse or Check of Conscience These Laws being thus promulgated the Courtiers who promoted these Tyrants took care that several Copies should be transcribed though they were extremely afflicted to see that there was no farther hopes or means to promote the former Depredations and Extortions by the Tyranny aforesaid and sent them to several Indian Provinces They who took upon them the Trouble and Care of Extirpating and Oppressing by different ways of Cruelty as they never observed by Method or Order but behav'd themselves most inordinately and irregularly having perused these Diplomata or Constitutions before the new made Judges appointed to put them in Execution could Arrive or be Landed they by the assistance of those as 't is credibly rumour'd nor is it repugnant to truth who hitherto favour'd their Criminal and Violent Actions knowing well that these Laws and Proclamations must necessarily take effect began to grow mutinous and rebel and when the Judges were Landed who were to Execute these Mandates laying aside all manner of Love and Fear of God were so audacious as to contemn and set at nought all the â—â—verence and Obedience due to their King and so became Traytors demeaning themselves like Blood-Thirsty Tyrants costitute and void of all Humanity More particularly this appear'd in the Perusian Kingdoms where An. Dom. 1542 they acted such Horrid and Stuendous Enormities that the like were never known or heard in America or throughout the whole World before that time Nor were they only practised upon the Indians who were mostly destroy'd but upon themselves also God permitting them by his just Judgment to be their own Executioners and sheath their Swords in one anothers Bowels In like manner the other parts of this New World being moved by the Example of these Rebels refused to yield Obedience to those Laws The rest pretending to petition his Majesty turn Rebellious themselves for they would not voluntarily resign those Estates Goods and Chattels they have already usurped nor willingly manumit those Indians who were doomed to be their Slaves during Life and where they restrain'd the Murdering Sword from doing Execution they opprest them gradually with personal Vassalage injust and intolerable Burthens which his Majesty could not possibly hitherto avert or hinder because they are all universally as well those of high as low degrees some more some less some publickly and openly others clancularly and secretly so naturally addicted to Rob Thieve and Steal and thus under pretext of serving the King they dishonour God and defraud his Imperial Majesty Here the Author having finished the matter of Fact in this Compendious History for Confirmation of what he has here written quotes a tedious and imperfect Epistle as he styles it beginning and ending abruptly and anonymous withal contanining the Cruelties committed by the Spaniards the same in effect as our Author has prementioned now in regard that I judge such reiterated
Provisions and others their Wives and Children in lurking holes but some to avoid the obdurate and dreadful temper of such a Nation sought their Refuge on the craggy tops of Mountains for the Spaniards did not only entertain them with Cuffs Blows and wicked Cudgelling but laid violent hands also on the Governours of Cities and this arriv'd at length to that height of Temerity and Impudence that a certain Captain was so audacious as to abuse the Confort of the most puissant king of the whole Isle From which time they began to consider by what wayes and means they might expel the Spaniards out of their Countrey and immediately took up Arms. But good God what Arms do you imagin Namely such both Offensive and Defensive as resemble Reeds wherewith Boys sport with one another more than Manly Arms and Weapons Which the Spaniards no sooner perceived but they mounted on generous Steeds well weapon'd with Lances and Swords began to exercise their bloody Butcheries and Stratagems and over-running their Cities and Towns spar'd no Age or Sex nay not so much as Women with Child but ripping up their Bellies tore them alive in pieces They laid Wagers among themselves who should with a Sword at one blow cut or divide a Man in two or which of them should decollate or behead a Man with the greatest dexterity nay farther which should sheath his Sword in the Bowels of a Man with the quickest dispatch and expedition They snatcht young Babes from the Mothers Breasts and then dasht out the Brains of those Innocents against the Rocks others they cast into Rivers scoffing and jeering them and call'd upon the Bodies when falling with derision the true testimony of their Cruelty to come to them and inhumanely exposing others to their Merciless Swords together with the Mothers that gave them Life They erected certain Gibbets large but low made so that their Feet almost reacht the ground every one of which was so order'd as to bear Thirteen Persons in Honour and Reverence as they said blasphemously of our Redeemer and his Twelve Apostles under which they made a Fire to burn them to Ashes whilst hanging on them But those they intended to preserve alive they dismiss'd their Hands half cut and still hanging by the Skin to carry their Letters missive to those that fly from us and ly sculking on the Mountains as an exprobration of their flight The Lords and Persons of Noble Extract were usually expos'd to this kind of Death they order'd Gridirons to be placed and supported with wooden Forks and putting a small Fire under them these miserable Wretches by degrees with loud Shreiks and exquisite Torments at last Expird I once saw Four or Five of their most Powerful Lords laid on these Gridirons and thereon roasted and not far off Two or Three more over-spread with the same Commodity Man's Flesh but the shril Clamours which were heard there being offensive to the Captain by hindring his Repose he commanded them to be strangled with a Halter The Executiouer whose Name and Parents at Sevil are not unknown to me prohibited the doing of it but stopt Gags into their Mouths to prevent the hearing of the noise he himself making the Fire till that they dyed when they had been roasted as long as he thought convenient I was an Eye-Witness of these and an innumerable Number of other Cruelties And because all Men who could lay hold of the opportunity sought out lurking holes in the Mountains to avoid as dangerous Rocks so Brutish and Barbarous a People Strangers to all Goodness and the Extirpaters and Adversaries of Men they bred up such fierce hunting Dogs as would devour an Indian like a Hog at first sight in less than a moment Now such kind of Slaughters and Cruelties as these were committed by the Curs and if at any time it hapned which was rarely that the Indians irritated upon a just account destroy'd or took away the Life of any Spaniard they promulgated and proclaim'd this Law among them that One Hundred Indians should dye for every individual Spaniard that should be slain Of the Kingdoms contained in Hispaniola This Isle of Hispaniola was made up of Six of their greatest Kingdoms and as many most Puissant Kings to whose Empire almost all the other Lords whose Number was infinite did pay their Allegiance One of these Kingdoms was called Magua signifying a Campaign or open Country which is very observable if any place in the Universe deserves taking notice of and memorable for the pleasantness of its Soituation for it is extended from South to North Eighty Miles in breadth Five Eight and in some parts Ten Miles in length and is on all sides inclosed with the highest Mountains above Thirty Thousand Rivers and Rivulets water her Coasts Twelve of which prodigious Number do not yield at all in magnitude to those famous Rivers the Eber Duer and Guadalquivir and all those Rivers which have their Sourse or Spring from the Mountain lying Westerly the Number whereof is Twenty Thousand are very rich in Mines of Gold on which Mountain lies the Province of rich Mines whence that exquisite pure Gold of Twenty Four Carracts weight takes denomination The King and Lord of this Kingdom was named Guarionex who governed within the Compass of his Dominions so many Vassals and Potent Lords that every one of them was able to bring into the Field Sixteen Thousand Soldiers for the service of Guarionex their Supream Lord and Soverain when summoned thereunto Some of which I was acquainted with This was a most Obedient Prince endued with great Courage and Morality Naturally of a Pacifick Temper and most devoted to the Service of the Castilian Kings This King commanded and ordered his Subjects that every one of those Lords under his Jurisdiction should present him with a Bell full of Gold but in succeeding times being unable to perform it they were commanded to cut it in two and fill one part therewith for the Inhabitants of this Isle were altogether unexperienced and unskilful in Mine-works and the digging Gold out of them This Cain proffer'd his Service to the King of Castile on this Condition that he would take care that those Lands should be cultivated and manur'd wherein during the Reign of Isabella Queen of Castile the Spaniards first set footing and fixed their Residence extending in length even to Santo Domingo the space of Fifty Miles For he declar'd nor was it a Fallacie but an absolute Truth that his Subjects understood not the practical use of digging in Golden Mines To which promises he had readily and voluntarily condescended to my own certain knowledge and so by this means the king would have received the Annual Revenue of Three Millions of Spanish Crowns and upward there being at that very time in that Island Fifty Cities more ample and spacious than Sevil it self in Spain But what returns by way of Remuneration and Reward did they make this so Clement and Benign Monarch can you imagine no
other but this They put the greatest Indignity upon him imaginable in the Person of his Consort who was violated by a Spanish Captain altogether unworthy of the Name of Christian He might indeed probably expect to meet with a conveninent time and opportunity of revenging this Ignominy so injuriously thrown upon him by preparing Military Forces to attaque him but he rather chose to abscond in the Province De los Ciquayos wherein a Puissant Vassal and subject of his Ruled devested of his Estate and Kingdom and there live and dye an Exile But the Spaniards receiving certain information that he had absented himself connived no longer at his Concealment but raised War against him who had received them with so great humanity and kindness and having first laid waste and desolate the whole Region at last found and took him Prisoner who being bound in Fetters was convey'd on board of a ship in order to his transfretation to Castile as a Captive but the Vessel perished in the Voyage wherewith many Spaniards were also lost as well as a great weight of Gold among which there was a prodigious Ingot of Gold resembling a large Loaf of Bread weighing 3600 Crowns Thus it pleased God to revenge their enormous Impieties A Second Kingdom was named Marien where there is to this day a Haven upon the utmost Borders of the Plain or open Countrey toward the North more fertil and large then the Kingdom of Portugal and really deserving constant and frequent Inhabitants For it abounds with Mountains and is rich in Mines of Gold and Orichalcum a kind of Copper Mettal mixt with Gold The Kings name of this place was Guacanagari who had many powerful Lords some whereof were not unknown to me under his subjection The first that Landed in this Kingdum when he discovered America was an Admiral well stricken in years who had so hospitable and kind a reception from the aforesaid Guacanagari as well as all those Spaniards that accompanied him in that Voyage giving them all imaginable help and assistance for the Admirals Vessel was sunk on their Coasts that I heard it from his own mouth he could not possibly have been entertained with greater Caresses and Civilities from his own Parents in his own Native Country But this King being forced to fly to avoid the Spanish slaughter and Cruelty deprived of all he was Master of died in the Mountains and the rest of the Potentates and Nobles his subjects perished in that servitude and Vassalage as you shall find in this following Treatise The Third Kingdom was distinguished by the Appellation of Maquana another admirable healthful and fruitful Region where at present the most refined Sugar of the Island is made Caonabe then Reigned there who surmounted all the rest in Power State and the splendid Ceremonies of His Government This King beyond all expectation was surpriz'd in his own Palace by the great subtilty and industry of the Spaniards and after carried on board in order to his Transportation to Castile but there being at that time six Ships Riding in the Haven and ready to set Sail such an impetuous storm suddenly arose that they as well as the Passengers and Ships Riding in the Haven and ready to set Sail such an impetuous storm suddenly arose that they as well as the Passengers and Ships Crew were all lost together with King Canabao loaded with Irons by which judgment the Almighty declared that this was as unjust and impious an Act as any of the former This King had three or four Brothers then Living Men of strength and Valour who being highly incensed at the Captivity of their King and Brother to which he was injuriously reduc'd having also intelligence of the Devastations and Butcheries committed by the Spaniards in other Regions and not long after hearing of their Brothers death took up Arms to revenge themselves of the Enemy whom the Spaniards met with and certain party of Horse which proved very offensive to the Indians made such havock and slaughter among them that the half of this Kingdom was laid waste and depopulated Xaraqua is the Fourth Kingdom and as it were the Centre and middle of the whole Island and is not to be equalled for fluency of Speech and politeness of Idiom or Dialect by any Inhabitants of the other Kingdoms and in Policy and Morality transcends them all Herein the Lords and peers abounded and the very Populace exceled in stature and habit of Body Their King was Behechio by name who had a Sister called Anacaona and both the Brother as well as Sister had loaded the Spaniards with Benefits and singular acts of Civility and by delivering them from the evident and apparent danger of Death did signal services to the Castilian Kings Bebechio dying the supreme power of the Kingdom fell to Anacaona But it hapned one day that the Governour of an Island attended by 60 Horse and 30 Foot now the Cavalry was sufficiently able to unpeople not only the Isle but also the whole Continent he summoned about 300 Dynasta's or Noblemen to appear before him and commanded the most powerful of them being first crouded into a Thatcht Barn or Hovel to be exposed to the fury of the merciless Fire and the rest to be pierced with Lances and run through with the point of the Sword by a multitude of Men And Anacaona her self who as we said before sway'd the Imperial Scepter to her greater honour was hanged on a Gibbet And if it fell out that any person instigated by Compassion or Covetousness did entertain any Indian Boys and mount them on Horses to prevent their Murder another was appointed to follow them who ran them through the back or in the hinder parts and if they chanced to escape Death and fall to the ground they immediately cut off his Legs and when any of those Indians that survived these Barbarous Massacres betook themselves to an Isle eight miles distant to escape their Butcheries they were then committed to servitude during Life The Fifth Kingdom is Hiquey over whom Queen Hiquanama a superannuated Princess whom the Spaniards Crucified did preside and Govern. The number of those I saw here burnt dismembred and rackt with various Torments as well as others the poor Remnants of such matchless Villanies who surviving were enslaved is infinite But because so much might be said concerning the Assassinations and Depopulating of these people as cannot without great difficulty be published in Writing nor do I conceive that one single part of 1000 that is here contained can be fully displayed I will only add one remark more of the prementioned Wars in lieu of a Corollary or Conclusion and aver upon my Conscience that notwithstanding all the above-named Injustice profligate Enormities and other Crimes which I omit tho sufficiently known to me the Indians did not nor was it in their power to give any greater occasion for the Commission of them than Pious Religioso's Living in a well regulated Monastic Life did