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
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
out of the Powels and Mines of the said Countries by the Indians where as we have said they perished This Ruler with his Complices found out new inventions to rack torment force and extort Gold from the Indians One of his Captains in a certain Excursion undertaken by the Command of his Governour to make Depraedations destroy'd Forty Thousand Persons and better exposing them to the edge of the Sword Fire Dogs and veriety of Torments of all which a Religious Man of the Order of St Francis Franciscus de S. Romano who was then present was an Eye-Witness Great and Injurious was the blindness of those praesided over the Indians as to the Conversion and Salvation of this People for they denyed in Effect what they in their flourishing Discourse pretended to and declar'd with their Tongue what they contradicted in their Heart for it came to this pass that the Indians should be commanded on the penalty of a bloody War Death and perpetual Bondage to embrace the Christian Faith and submit to the Obedience of the Spanish King as if the Son of God who suffered Death for the Redemption of all Mankind had enacted a Law when he pronounced these words Go and teach all Nations that Infidels living peaceably and quietly in their Haereditary Native Country should be impos'd upon pain of Confiscation of all their Chattels Lands Liberty Wives Children and Death it self without any praecedent instruction to Confess and Acknowledge the true God and subject themselves to a King whom they never saw or heard mention'd before and whose Messengers behav'd themselves toward them with such Inhumanity and Cruelty as they had done hitherto Which is certainly a most foppish and absured way of Proceeding and merits nothing but Scandal Derision nay Hell it self Now suppose this Notorious and Profligate Governour had bin impower'd to see the Execution of these Edicts perform'd to the end they might appear more Just and Equitable thereby for of themselves they were repugnant both to Law and Equity yet he commanded or they who were to see the Execution thereof did it of their own Heads without Authority that when they phansied or proposed to themselves any place that was well stor'd with Gold to rob and feloniously steal it away from the Indians living in their Cities and Houses without the least suspicion of any ill Act. These wicked Spaniards like Thieves came to any place by stealth half a Mile off of any City Town or Village and there in the Night published and proclaim'd the Edict among themselves after this manner You Cacies and Indians of this Continent the Inhabitants of such a Place Which they named We declare or be it known to you all that there is but one God one Pope and one King of Castile who is Lord of these Countries appear forth without delay and take the Oath of Allegiance to the Spanish King as his Vassals So about the Fourth Watch of the Night or Three in the Morning these poor Innocents overwhelm'd with heavy Sleep ran violently on that place they named set Fire to their Hovels which were all thatcht and so without Notice burnt Men Women and Children kill'd whom they pleas'd upon the Spot but those they reserv'd as Captives were compell'd through Torments to confess where they had hid the Gold when they found little or none at their Houses but they who liv'd being first stigmatized were made Slaves yet after the Fire was extinguisht they came hastily in quest of the Gold. Thus did this Wicked Man devoted to all the Infernal Furies behave himself with the Assistance of Profligate Christians whom he had listed in his Service from the 14th to the 21. or 22. Year together with his Domestick Servants and Followers from whom he received as many Portions besides what he had from his Salves in Gold Pearls and Jewels as the Chief Governour would have taken and all that were constituted to execute any kind of Kingly Office followed in the same Footsteps every one sending as many of his Servants as he could spare to share in the spoil Nay he that came hither as Bishop first of all did the same also And at the vory time as I conjecture the Spaniards did depraedate or rob this Kingdom of above Ten Hundred Thousand Crowns of Gold Yet all these their Thefts and Felonies we scarce find upon Record that Three Hundred Thousand Castilian Crowns ever came into the Spanish King's Coffers yet there were above Eight Hundred Thousand Men slain The other Tyrants who governed this Kingdom afterward to the Three and Thirtieth year depriv'd all them of Life that remain'd among the Inhabitants Among all those flagitious Acts committed by this Governour while he rul'd this Kingdom or by his Consent and Permission this must by no means be omitted A certain Cacic bestowing on him a Gift voluntarily or which is more probable induced thereunto by Fear about the weight of Nine Thousand Crowns but the Spaniards not satisfied with so vast a Sum of Money sieze him fix him to a Pole extended his Feet which being mov'd near the Fire they demanded a larger Sum the Cacic overcome with Torments sending home procur'd Three Thousand more to be brought and presented to them But the Spaniards adding new Torments to new Rage and Fury when they found he would confer no more upon them which was because he could not or otherwise because he would not they expos'd him so long to that Torture till by degrees of heat the Marrow gusht out of the Soles of his Feet and so he dyed Thus they often murder'd the Lords and Nobles with such Torments to Extort the Gold from them One time it hapned that a Century or Party of One Hundred Spaniards making Excursions came to a Mountain where many People shunning so horrid and pernicious an Enemy conceal'd themselves who immediately rushing on them putting all to the Sword they could meet with and then secur'd Seventy or Eighty Married Women as well as Virgins Captives but a great Number of Indians with a fervent desire of recovering their Wives and Daughters appear'd in Arms against the Spaniards and when they drew near the Enemy they unwilling to lose the Prey run the Wives and Maidens through with their Swords The Indians through Grief and Trouble smiting their Breasts brake out into these Exclamations O perverse Generation of Men O Cruel Spaniards What do you Murder las Iras In their Language they call Women by the Name of las Iras as if they had said To slay Women is an Act of bloody minded Men worse than Brutes and Wild Beasts There was the House of a Puissant Potentate scituated about Ten or Fifteen Miles from Panama whose Name was Paris very Rich in Gold and the Spaniards gave him a visit who were entertained with Fraternal Kindness and Courteously received and of his own accord presented the Captain with a Gift of Fifteen Thousand Crowns who was of opinion as well as the rest of the Spaniards that
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
Peregrination in this and of Damnation in the World to come not only to Indians whose Number is numberless but even to Spaniards themselves by whose help and assistance he committed such detestable Butcheries and flagitious Crimes I supplicate Almighty God that he would please to have Mercy on his Soul and require no other satisfaction than the violent Death which turn'd him out of this World. A farther Discourse of New Spain And some Account of Panuco and Xalisco AFter the perpetration of all the Cruelties rehearsed in New Spain and other places there came another Rabid and Cruel Tyrant to Panuco who acted the part of a bloody Tragedian as well as the rest and sent away many Ships loaden with these Barbarians to be sold for Slaves made this Province almost a Wilderness and which was deplorable Eight Hundred Indians that had Rational Souls were given in Exchange for a Burthen-bearing-Beast a Mule or Camel. Well He was made Governour of the City of Mexico and all New Spain and with him many other Tyrants had the Office of Auditors confer'd upon them Now they had already made such a progress toward the Desolation of this Region that if the Franciscans had not vigorously opposed them and that by the King's Council the best and greatest Encourager of Vertue it had not speedily bin prevented that which hapned to Hispaniola in Two Years had bin the Fate of Hispania nova namely to be unpeopled deserted and intomb'd in its own Ruins A Companion of this Governour employed Eight Thousand Indians in Erecting a Wall to inclose his Garden but they all dyed having no Supplies nor Wages from him to support themselves at whose Death he was not in the least concern'd After the first Captain before spoken of had absolutely profligated and ruin'd the Panuconians Fifteen Thousand whereof perished by carrying their Bag and Baggage At length he arriv'd at the Province of Machuacan which a Forty Miles Journey from Mexico and as Fertile and Populous The King to honour him in the Rencounter with a Multitude of People marcheth toward him from whom he had received One Thousand Services and Civilities very considerable who gratefully requited him with Captivity because Fame had nois'd it abroad that he was a most Opulent Prince in Gold and Silver and to the end he might extort from and purge him of his Gold he was cruciated with Torments after this manner his Body was extended Hands bound to a Post and his Feet put into a pair of Stocks they all the while applying buring Coals to his Feet at a tormenting distance where a Boy attended who by little and little sprinkled them with Oyl that his Flesh might roast the better Before him there stood a Wicked Fellow presenting a Bow to his Breast charged with a Mortal Arrow if let fly behind him another with Dogs held in with Chains which he threatned to let loose at him which if done he had bin torn to pieces in a moment and with these kind of Torments they racked him to extort a Confession where his Treasures lay till a Franciscan Monk came and deliver'd him from his Torments but not from Death for he departed this miserable Life not long after And this was the severe Fate of many Cacics and Indian Lords who dyed with the same Torments which they were expos'd to by the Spaniards in order to the engrossing of their Gold and Silver to themselves At this very time A certain Visiter of Purses rather than Souls hapned to be here present who finding some Indian Idols which were hid for they were no better instructed in the Knowledge of the true God by reason of the Wicked Documents and Dealings of the Spaniards detain'd Grandees as Slaves till they had deliver'd him all their Idols for he phancied they were made of Gold or Silver but his Expectation being frustrated he chastised them with no less Cruelty than Injustice and that he might not depart bubbled out of all his hopes constrain'd them to redeem their Idols with Money that so they might according to their Custom Adore them These are the Fruits of the Spanish Artifices and Juggling Tricks among the Indians and thus they promoted the Honour and Worship of God. This Tyrant from Mechuacam arrives at Xalisco a Country abounding with People very fruitful and the Glory of the Indians in this respect that it had some Towns Seven Miles long and among other Barbarisms equal to what you have read which they acted here this is not to be forgotten that Women big with Child were burthen'd with the Luggage of Wicked Christians and being unable to go out their usual time through extremity of Toil and Hunger were necessitated to bring them forth in the High-wayes which was the Death of many Infants At a certain time a profligate Christian attempted to devirginate a Maid but the Mother being present resisted him and endeavouring to free her from his intended Rape whereat the Spaniard enrag'd cut off her Hand with a short Sword and stab'd the Virgin in several places till she Expir'd because she obstinately opposed and disappointed his inordinate Appetite In this Kingdom of Xalisco according to report they burnt Eight Hundred Towns to Ashes and for this Reason the Indians growing desperate beholding the dayly destruction of the Remainders of their matchless Cruelty made an Insurrection against the Spaniards slew several of them justly and deservedly and afterward fled to the insensible Rocks and Mountains yet more tender and kind than the stony-hearted Enemy for Sanctuary where they were miserably Massacred by those Tyrants who succeeded and there are now few or none of the Inhabitants to be found Thus the Spaniards being blinded with the Lustre of their Gold deserted by God and given over to a Reprobate Sense not understanding or at least not willing to do so that the Cause of the Indians is most Just as well by the Law of Nature as the Divine and Humane they by Force of Arms destroying them hacking them in pieces and turning them out of their own Confines and Dominions nor considering how unjust those Violencies and Tyrannies are wherewith they have afflicted these poor Creatures they still contrive to raise new Wars against them Nay they conceive and by Word and Writing testifie that those Victories they have obtain'd against these Innocents to their ruine are granted them by God himself as if their unjust Wars were promoted and managed by a just Right and Title to what they pretend and with boasting Joy return Thanks to God for their Tyranny in imitation of those Tyrants and Robbers of whom the Prophet Zechariah part of the Fourth and Fifth Verses Feed the Sheep of the slaughter whose Possessors slay them and hold themselves not guilty and they that sell them say Blessed be the Lord for ye are rich Of the Kingdom of JUCATAN AN Impious Wretch by his Fabulous Stories and Relations to the King of Spain was made Praefect of the Kingdom of Jucatan in the
Hands who frequently playd the Pirate and rob'd on that shore detesting it as a wicked thing because they had lost that place where they use to be treated with as great Hospitality and Freedom as if they had been under their own Roof Nay they transported from this place among them to the Isles of Hispaniola and St. John Two Millions of Men and upward and made the Coast a Desert It is most certainly true that they never ship off a Vessel freighted with Indians but they pay a third part as Tribute to the Sea besides those who are slaughter'd when found in their own Houses Now the Soarce and Original of all this is the ends they have propos'd to themselves For there is a necessity of taking with them a great number of Indians that they may gain a great sum of Mony by their Sale now the Ships are very slenderly furnished with Provisions and Water in small Quantity to satisfie few lest the Tyrants who are term'd Owners or Proprietors of Ships should be at too great expence in Victualling their Vessels nay they scarce carry Food enough with them to maintain the Spaniards that manage the Vessel which is the reason so many Indians dye with Hunger and Thirst and of necessity they must be thrown over-board Nay one of them told me this for a Truth that there being such a Multitude of Men thus destroy'd a Ship may sail from the Isle of Lucaya to Hispaniola which is a Voyage of Twenty Leagues and upward without Chart or Compass by the sole Direction on Observation of dead fluctuating Carkasses But afterward when arriv'd and driven up into the Isle whither they are brought to be sold there is no Person that is in some small measure compassionate but would be extreamly mov'd and discompos'd at the sight viz. to spie old Men and Women together with Naked Children half starv'd Then they separate Parents from Children Wives from their Husbands about Ten or Twenty in a Company and cast lots for them that the Detestable Owners of the Ships may have their share who prepare Two or Three Ships and equip them as a Fleet of Pirates going ashore ravaging and forcing Men out of their Houses and then robbing them But when the lot of any one of them falls upon a parcel that hath an aged or diseased Man the Tyrant whose Allotment he is usually bursts out as followeth Let this old Fellow be Damm'd why do you bestow him upon me must I think you be at the charge of his Burial And this sickly Wretch how comes he to be one of my allotted portion must I take care for his cure Not I. Hence you may guess what estimate and value the Spaniards put upon Indians and whether they practise and fulfil that Divine and Heavenly precept injoyning mutual Love and Society There can be nothing more cruel and detestable then the Tyrannical usage of the Spaniards towards Indians in their Pearl-Fishing for the Torments undergone in the unnatural Exenteration and tearing out with Paracidal hands the richer bowels of our common Mother or the inward cruciating racks of the most profligate Heaven daring Desperado can admit of no comparison with these although the extracting or digging for Gold is one of the sharpese subterranean Drudgeries they plunge them down four or five ells deep under Water where swimming about without breathing they eradicate and pull up Oisters wherein the Pearls are engendred Sometimes they rise up to the superficies of the Water with Nets full of Oisters for respiration and Air but if these miserable Creatures stay but a little more then is Ordinary to rest themselves the Hangman is immediately upon them in a Canow or small Boat who beating them with many stripes drag them by the hair of the head under Water that they may drudge again at their expiâ—cation or Pearl Fishing Their Food is Fish and the same which contains the Pearls and Cassabus made of Roots with a few Mahids the Bread of that Countrey in the former there is little or no nutriment or substance and the other is not made without great trouble nor for all this have they a sufficient allowance thereof to support nature Their Lodging or Bed is the Earth confined to a pair of Stocks for fear they should run away And it frequently happens that they are drown'd with the toil of this kind of Fishing and never more seen for the Tuberoms and Maroxi certain Marine Monsters that devour a complete proportioned Man wholly at once prey upon them under Water You must consider withall that it is impossible for the strongest constitution to continue long under Water without breathing and they ordinarily dye through the extream rigor of the Cold spitting Blood which is occasioned by the too great compression of the Breast procreated by a continued holding breath under Water for by too much cold a profluvium of blood follows Their hair naturally black is changed into a combust burnt or Sun-colour like that of the Sea Wolves their shoulders and backs covered or overspread with a saltish humor that they appear rather like Monsters in humane shape then Men. They have destroy'd all the Lucayans by this intolerable or rather Diabolical exercise for the accustomary emolument or gain of lucre and by this means gain'd to the value of fifty sometime one hundred Crownsof every individual Indian They sell them though it was prohibited publickly for the Lucayans were excellent Swimmers and several perished in this Isle that came from other Provinces Of the River Yuya Pari. THis River washeth the Province arising from its head or fountain in another Region Two Hundred miles off and better By this a wretched Tyrant entred it and laid waste the Land for the space of many miles and murder'd abundance of them by Fire and Sword c. At length he died violently and all his Forces moldred away of themselves many succeeded him in his iniquity and cruelty and 〈◊〉 dayly destroy them sending to Hell the Souls redeemed by the blood of the Son of God. Of the Kingdom of Venecuela OUR Sovereign Lord the King in the Year 1526 over-perswaded by fallacious appearances for the Spaniards use to conceal from His Majesties knowledge the dammages and detriments which God himself the Souls and state of the Indians did suffer intrusted the Kingdom of Venecuela longer and larger then the Spanish Dominions with its Government and absolute Jurisdiction to some German Merchants with power to make certain Capitulations and Conventions who came into this Kingdom with Three Hundred Men and there found a benign mild and peaceable people as they were throughout the Indies till injured by the Spaniards These more cruel then the rest beyond comparison behav'd themselves more inhumanely then rapacious Tygres Wolves and Lyons for they had the jurisdiction of this Kingdom and therefore possessing it with the greater freedom from controul lay in wait and were the more vigilant with greater care and avarice to understand the
Cruelties and repeated Barbarisms are Offensive to the Reader he having sailed already too long and too far in an Ocean of Innocent Indian Blood I have omitted all but Two or Three Stories not taken notice of by the Author One of the Tyrants who followed the steps of John Ampudia a notorious Villain gave way to a great Slaughter of Sheep the chief Food and Support of the Spaniards as well as Indians permitting them to kill Two or Three Hundred at a time only for their Brains Fat or Suet whose Flesh was then altogether useless and not fit to be eaten but many Indians the Spaniards Friends and Confederates followed them desiring they might have the hearts to feed upon whereupon they butchered a great many of them for this only Reason because they would not eat the other parts of the Body Two of their gang in the Province of Peru kild Twenty Five Sheep who were sold among the Spaniards for Twenty Five Crowns merely to get the Fat and Brains out of them Thus by the frequent and extraordinary Slaughter of their Sheep above a Hundred Thousand Head of Cattel were destroy'd And upon this Account the Region was reduced to great penury and want and at length perished with Hunger Nay the Province of Quito which abounded with Corn beyond Expression by such proceedings as these was brought to that Extremity that a Sextarie or small Measure of Wheat was sold for Ten Crowns and a Sheep at as dear a rate This Captain taking leave of Quito was followed by a poor Indianess with loud Cries and Clamours begging and beseeching him not to carry away her Husband for she had the charge of Three Children and could not possibly supply them with Victuals but they must inevitably dye with hunger and though the Captain repulsed her with an angry brow at the first yet she approacht him a second time with repeated Cries saying that her Children must perish for want of Food but finding the Captain inexorable and altogether unmov'd with her Complaints and her Husband not restor'd through a piquant necessity wedded to despair she cut off the Heads of her Children with sharp Stones and so dispatcht them into the other World. Then he proceeded farther to another City and sent some Spaniards that very Night to take the Indians of the City of Tulilicui who next day brought with them above a Hundred Persons some of which whom he lookt upon to be able to carry burthens he reserved for his own and his Soldiers service and others were chain'd and perished in their Fetters But the little Infants he gave to the Cacic of Tulilicui abovesaid to be eaten up and devoured whose skins are stuft with Ashes hang up in his House to be seen at this very day And in the close of this Letter he shuts up all with these words 't is here very remarkable and never to be forgotten that this Tyrant being not ignorant of the Mischiefs and Enormities executed by him boastingly said of himself They who shall travel in these Countreys Fifty years hence and hear the things related of me will have cause to say declare that never such a Tyrant as I am marched through these Regions and committed the like Enormities Now not to quit the Stage without one Comical Scene or Action whereon such Cruelties have been lively personated give me leave to acquaint you with a Comical piece of Grammatical Learning in a Reverend Religioso of these parts sent thither to convert the West-Indian Pagans which the Author mentions among his Reasons and Replications and all those I pass by as immaterial to our purpose many of them being repeated in the Narrative before The weight and burthen of initiating the Indians into the Christian Faith lay solely on the Spaniards at first and therefore Joannes Colmenero in Sancta Martha a Fantastic Ignorant and Foppish Fellow was under Examination before us and he had one of the most spatious Cities committed to his Charge as well as the Care and Cure of the Souls of the Inhabitants whether he understood how to fortifie himself with the sign of the Cross against the Wicked and Impious and being interrogated what he taught and how he instructed the Indians whose Souls were instrusted to his Care and Conduct he return'd this Answer That if he damn'd them to the Devils and Furies of Holl it was sufficient to retrieve them if he pronounced these Words Per Signin Sanctin Cruces A Fellow fitter to be a Hogherd than a Shepherd of Souls This Deep Bloody American Tragedy is now concluded and my Pen choakt up with Indian Blood and Gore I have no more to say but pronounce the Epilogue made by the Author and leave the Reader to judge whether it deserves a Plaudite The Spaniards first set Sail to America not for the Honour of God or as Persons moved and incited thereunto by fervent Zeal to the True Faith nor to promote the Salvation of their Neighbours nor to serve the King as they falsely boast and pretend to do but in truth only stimulated and goaded on by insatiable Avarice and Ambition that they might for ever Domineer Command and Tyrannize over the West-Indians whose Kingdoms they hoped to divide and distribute among themselves Which to deal candidly is no more nor less intentionally than by all these indirect wayes to disappoint and expel the Kings of Castile out of those Dominions and Territories that they themselves having Usurped the Supreme and Regal Empire might first challenge it as their Right and men possess and enjoy it FINIS