The Earthly Paradise -4
"After eating, a page brought a belt which is like those of Castile in shape, but of a
different make, which he took and gave me, and also two wrought pieces of gold, which
were very thin, as I believe they obtain very little of it here, although I consider they are
very near the place where it has its home, and that there is a great deal of it. I saw that a
drapery that I had upon my bed pleased him. I gave it to him, and some very good amber
beads which I wore around my neck and some red shoes and a flask of orange-flower
water, with which he was so pleased it was wonderful; and he and his governor and
counsellors were very sorry that they did not understand me, nor I them. Nevertheless I
understood that he told me that if anything from here would satisfy me that all the island
was at my command. I sent for some beads of mine, where as a sign I have a 'excelente'
of gold upon which the images of your Highnesses are engraved, and showed it to him,
and again told him the same as yesterday, that your Highnesses command and rule over
all the best part of the world, and that there are no other such great Princes: and I showed
him the royal banners and the others with the cross, which he held in great estimation:
and he said to his counsellors that your Highnesses must be great Lords, since you had
sent me here from so far without fear: and many other things happened which I did not
understand, except that I very well saw he considered everything as very wonderful."
Later in the day Columbus got into talk with an old man who told him that there was a
great quantity of gold to be found on some island about a hundred leagues away; that
there was one island that was all gold; and that in the others there was such a quantity that
they natives gathered it and sifted it with sieves and made it into bars. The old man
pointed out vaguely the direction in which this wonderful country lay; and if he had not
been one of the principal persons belonging to the King Columbus would have detained
him and taken him with him; but he decided that he had paid the cacique too much
respect to make it right that he should kidnap one of his retinue. He determined, however,
to go and look for the gold. Before he left he had a great cross erected in the middle of
the Indian village; and as he made sail out of the harbour that evening he could see the
Indians kneeling round the cross and adoring it. He sailed eastward, anchoring for a day
in the Bay of Acul, which he called Cabo de Caribata, receiving something like an
ovation from the natives, and making them presents and behaving very graciously and
kindly to them.
It was at this time that Columbus made the acquaintance of a man whose character shines
like a jewel amid the dismal scenes that afterwards accompanied the first bursting of the
wave of civilisation on these happy shores. This was the king of that part of the island, a
young man named Guacanagari. This king sent out a large canoe full of people to the
Admiral's ship, with a request that Columbus would land in his country, and a promise
that the chief would give him whatever he had. There must have been an Intelligence
Department in the island, for the chief seemed to know what would be most likely to
attract the Admiral; and with his messengers he sent out a belt with a large golden mask
attached to it. Unfortunately the natives on board the Admiral's ship could not understand
Guacanagari's messengers, and nearly the whole of the day was passed in talking before
the sense of their message was finally made out by means of signs. In the evening some
Spaniards were sent ashore to see if they could not get some gold; but Columbus, who
had evidently had some recent experience of their avariciousness, and who was anxious
to keep on good terms with the chiefs of the island, sent his secretary with them to see
that they did nothing unjust or unreasonable. He was scrupulous to see that the natives
got their bits of glass and beads in exchange for the gold; and it is due to him to
remember that now, as always, he was rigid in regulating his conduct with other men in
accordance with his ideas of justice and honour, however elastic those ideas may seem to
have been. The ruffianly crew had in their minds only the immediate possession of what
they could get from the Indians; the Admiral had in his mind the whole possession of the
islands and the bodies and souls of its inhabitants. If you take a piece of gold without
giving a glass bead in exchange for it, it is called stealing; if you take a country and its
inhabitants, and steal their peace from them, and give them blood and servitude in
exchange for it, it is called colonisation and Empire-building. Every one understands the
distinction; but so few people see the difference that Columbus of all men may be
excused for his unconsciousness of it.
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