BOOK of thofe very men who had betrayed her, to be publicly hanged. 1505. Reduction of the Indians, and its effects. OVERAWED and humbled by this atrocious treatment of their princes and nobles, who were objects of their highest reverence, the people in all the provinces of Hifpaniola fubmitted, with out farther resistance, to the Spanish yoke. Upon the death of Ifabella, all the regulations tending to mitigate the rigour of their fervitude were forgotten. The fmall gratuity paid to them as the price of their labour was with drawn; and at the fame time the tasks impofed $500. upon them were increased. Ovando, without any restraint, diftributed Indians among his friends in the island. Ferdinand, to whom the queen had left by will one half of the revenue arifing from the fettlements in the New World, conferred grants of a fimilar nature upon his courtiers, as the leaft expenfive mode of reward. ing their services. They farmed out the Indians, of whom they were rendered proprietors, to their countrymen fettled in Hifpaniola; and that wretched people, being compelled to labour in order to fatisfy the rapacity of both, the exac e Oviedo, lib. iii. c. 12. por J III. 2506. tions of their oppreffors no longer knew any BOOK bounds. But, barbarous as their policy was, and fatal to the inhabitants of Hifpaniola, it produed, for fome time, very confiderable effects. By calling forth the force of a whole nation, and exerting it in one direction, the working of the mines was carried on with amazing rapidity and fuccefs. During feveral years, the gold brought into the royal fmelting-houses in Hif paniola amounted annually to four hundred and fixty thousand pefos, above a hundred thousand pounds sterling; which, if we attend to the great change in the value of money fince the beginning of the fixteenth century to the present times, muft appear a confiderable fum. Vaft fortunes were created, of a fudden, by fome. Others diffipated in oftentatious profufion, what they acquired with facility. Dazzled by both, new adventurers crowded to America, with the moft eager impatience, to fhare in those treasures which had enriched their countrymen; and, notwithstanding the mortality occafioned by the unhealthiness of the climate, the colony continued to increased. OVANDO governed the Spaniards with wifdom Progrefs of and justice, not inferior to the rigour with the colony. BOOK III. 1506. Political regulation of Ferdinand. which he treated the Indians. He established equal laws; and, by executing them with impar tiality, accustomed the people of the colony to reverence them. He founded feveral new towns in different parts of the island, and allured inhabitants to them, by the conceffion of various immunities. He endeavoured to turn the attention of the Spaniards to fome branch of industry more useful than that of fearching for gold in the mines. Some flips of the fugar-cane having been brought from the Canary islands by way of experiment, they were found to thrive with fuch increase in the rich foil and warm climate to which they were tranfplanted, that the cultivation of them foon became an object of com merce. Extenfive plantations were begun; fugar-works, which the Spaniards called ingenio's, from the various machinery employed in them, were erected, and in a few years the manufacture of this commodity was the great occupation of the inhabitants of Hifpaniola, and the most confiderable fource of their wealth. THE prudent endeavours of Ovando, to pro, mote the welfare of the colony, were powerfully feconded by Ferdinand. The large remittances which he received from the New World opened Oviedo, lib. iv. c. 8. his III. 1506. 1507. his eyes, at length, with refpect to the import- BOOK ance of those discoveries, which he had hitherto affected to undervalue. Fortune, and his own addrefs, having now extricated him out of those difficulties in which he had been involved by the death of his queen, and by his disputes with his fon-in-law about the government of her domi nions, he had full leifure to turn his attention to the affairs of America. To his provident fagacity, Spain is indebted for many of those regulations which gradually formed that system of profound, but jealous policy, by which the governs her dominions in the New World. He erected a court, diftinguished by the title of the Cafa de Contratacion, or Board of Trade, compofed of perfons eminent for rank and abilities, to whom he committed the administration of American affairs. This board affembled regularly in Seville, and was invefted with a diftinct and extenfive jurifdiction. He gave a regular form to ecclefiaftical government in America, by nominating archbishops, bishops, deans, toge ther with clergymen of fubordinate ranks, to take charge of the Spaniards established there, as well as of the natives who fhould embrace the Chriftian faith. But, notwithstanding the obfequious devotion of the Spanish court to the f Hift. of the Reign of Charles V. vol. ii. p. 6, &c. S 2 Papal 1 III. 1507. BOOK Papal See, fuch was Ferdinand's folicitude to prevent any foreign power from claiming jurifdiction, or acquiring influence, in his new dominions, that he reserved to the crown of Spain the fole right of patronage to the benefices in America, and ftipulated that no papal bull or mandate fhould be promulgated there, until it was previously examined and approved of by his council. With the fame fpirit of jealousy, he prohibited any goods to be exported to America, or any person to settle there, without a fpecial licence from that council. The num ber of the minishes faft. BUT, notwithstanding this attention to the Indians di- police and welfare of the colony, a calamity impended which threatened its diffolution. The original inhabitants, on whofe labour the Spaniards in Hifpaniola depended for their profperity, and even their existence, wafted fo faft, that the extinction of the whole race feemed to be inevitable. When Columbus difcovered Hifpaniola, the number of its inhabitants was computed to be at least a million". They were now reduced to fixty thousand in the space of fifteen years. This confumption of the human fpecies, no lefs amazing than rapid, was the effect of feyeral concurring canfes. The natives of the Ame * Herrera, dec. i. lib. vi. e. 19, 20. Ibid. dec. i. lib. x. c. 12. |