History of the United States Volume I Part 8

To the day of his death, however, the discoverer of America never suspected that he had brought to light a new continent. Even during this his last expedition he maintained that the coast he had touched was that of Mangi, contiguous to Cathay, and that nineteen days of travel overland would have taken him to the Ganges. He arrived in Spain on September 12, 1504, and died at Segovia on May 20th of the next year.

His bones are believed to rest in the cathedral at Santo Domingo, transported thither in 1541, the Columbus-remains till recently at Havana being those of his son Diego. The latter, under the belief that they were the father's, were transferred to Genoa in 1887, and deposited there on July 2d of that year with the utmost ecclesiastical pomp.

[1500-1507]

As Columbus was ignorant of having found a new continent, so was he denied the honor of giving it a name, this falling by accident, design, or carelessness of truth, to Amerigo Vespucci, a native of Florence, whose active years were spent in Spain and Portugal. Vespucci made three voyages into the western seas. In the second, 1501, he visited the coast of Brazil, and pushed farther south than any navigator had yet done, probably so far as the island of South Georgia, in lat.i.tude 54 degrees.

His account of this voyage found its way into print in 1504, at Augsburg, Germany, the first published narrative of any discovery of the mainland. Although, as above noted, it was not the earliest discovery of the main, it was widely regarded such, and caused Vespucci to be named for many years as the peer, if not the superior of Columbus. The publication ran through many editions. That of Stra.s.sburg, 1505, mentioned Vespucci on its t.i.tle-page as having discovered a new "Southern Land." This is the earliest known utterance hinting at the continental nature of the new discovery, as separate from Asia, an idea which grew into a conviction only after Magellan's voyage, described in the next chapter. In 1507 appeared at St. Die, near Stra.s.sburg, a four-page pamphlet by one Lud, secretary to the Duke of Lorraine, describing Vespucci's voyages and speaking of the Indians as the "American race." This pamphlet came out the same year in another form, as part of a book ent.i.tled "Introduction to Cosmography," prepared by Martin Waldseemuller, under the nom de plume of "Hylacomylus." In this book the new "part of the world" is distinctly called "THE LAND OF AMERICUS, OR AMERICA," There is some evidence that Vespucci at least connived at the misapprehension which brought him his renown--as undeserved as it has become permanent--but this cannot be regarded as proved.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Amerigo Vespucci. Fac-simile of an old print.]

CHAPTER II.

EARLY SPANISH AMERICA

[1498]

As we have seen, Spain by no means deserves the entire credit of bringing the western continent to men's knowledge. Columbus himself was an Italian. So was Marco Polo, his inspirer, and also Toscanelli, his instructor, by whose chart he sailed his ever-memorable voyage. To Portugal as well Columbus was much indebted, despite his rebuff there.

Portugal then led the world in the art of navigation and in enthusiasm for discovery. Nor, probably, would Columbus have asked her aid in vain, had she not previously committed herself to the enterprise of reaching India eastward, a purpose brilliantly fulfilled when, in 1498, Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope and sailed to Calicut, on the coast of Malabar. Already before this Spain and Portugal were rivals in the search for new lands, and Pope Alexander VI. had had to be appealed to, to fix their fields. By his bull of May 3, 4, 1493, he ordained as the separating line the meridian pa.s.sing through a point one hundred leagues west of the Azores, where Columbus had observed the needle of his compa.s.s to point without deflection toward the north star. Portugal objecting to this boundary as excluding her from the longitude of the newly found Indies, by the treaty of Tordesillas, June 7, 1494, the two powers, with the Pope's a.s.sent, moved the line two hundred and seventy leagues still farther west. At this time neither party dreamed of the complications destined subsequently to arise in reference to the position of this meridian on the other side of the globe.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Vasco da Gama; From an old print.]

The meridian of the Tordesillas convention had been supposed still to give Spain all the American discoveries likely to be made, it being ascertained only later that by it Portugal had obtained a considerable part of the South American mainland Brazil, we know, was, till in 1822 it became independent, a Portuguese dependency. Spain, however, retained both groups of the Antilles with the entire main about the Gulf of Mexico, and became the earliest great princ.i.p.ality in the western world.

[1506-1513]

Before the death of Columbus, Spain had taken firm possession of Cuba, Porto Rico, and St. Domingo, and she stood ready to seize any of the adjoining islands or lands so soon as gold, pearls, or aught else of value should be found there. Cruises of discovery were made in every direction, first, indeed, in Central and South America. In 1506 de Solis sailed along the eastern coast of Yucatan. In 1513 the governor of a colony on the Isthmus of Darien, Vasco Nunez de Balboa, from the top of a lofty mountain on the isthmus, saw what is now called the Pacific Ocean. He designated it the South Sea, a name which it habitually bore till far into the eighteenth century. From this time the exploration and settlement of the western coast, both up and down, went on with little interruption, but this history, somewhat foreign to our theme, we cannot detail.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Balboa discovering the Pacific Ocean.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ponce de Leon]

The same year, 1513, Ponce de Leon, an old Spanish soldier in the wars with the Moors, a companion of Columbus in his second voyage, and till now governor of Porto Rico, began exploration to the northward. Leaving Porto Rico with three s.h.i.+ps, he landed on the coast of an unknown country, where he thought to find not only infinite gold but also the much-talked-about fountain of perpetual youth. His landing occurred on Easter Sunday, or Pascua Florida, March 27, 1513, and so he named the country Florida. The place was a few miles north of the present town of St. Augustine. Exploring the coast around the southern extremity of the peninsula, he sailed among a group of islands, which he designated the Tortugas. Returning to Porto Rico, he was appointed governor of the new country. He made a second voyage, was attacked by the natives and mortally wounded, and returned to Cuba to die.

[1518-1520]

Juan de Grijalva explored the south coast of the Gulf of Mexico, from Yucatan toward the Panuco. Interest attaches to this enterprise mainly because the treasure which Grijalva collected aroused the envy and greed of the future conqueror of Mexico, Hernando Cortez.

In 1518, Velasquez, governor of Cuba, sends Cortez westward, with eleven s.h.i.+ps and over six hundred men, for the purpose of exploration. He landed at Tabasco, thence proceeded to the Island of San Juan de Ulua, nearly opposite Vera Cruz, where he received messengers and gifts from the Emperor Montezuma. Ordered to leave the country, he destroyed his s.h.i.+ps and marched directly upon the capital. He seized Montezuma and held him as a hostage for the peaceable conduct of his subjects. The Mexicans took up arms, only to be defeated again and again by the Spaniards. Montezuma became a va.s.sal of the Spanish crown, and covenanted to pay annual tribute. Attempting to reconcile his people to this agreement he was himself a.s.sailed and wounded, and, refusing all nourishment, soon after died. With re-enforcements, Cortez completed the conquest of the country, and Mexico became a province of Spain.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hernando Cortes. From an old print.]

Vasquez de Ayllon, one of the auditors of the Island of Santo Domingo, sent two s.h.i.+ps from that island to the Bahamas for Indians to be sold as slaves. Driven from their course by the wind, they at length reached the sh.o.r.e of South Carolina, at the mouth of the Wateree River, which they named the Jordan, calling the country Chicora. Though kindly treated by the natives, the ruthless adventurers carried away some seventy of these. One s.h.i.+p was lost, and most of the captives on the others died during the voyage. Vasquez was, by the Emperor Charles V., King of Spain, made governor of this new province, and again set sail to take possession. But the natives, in revenge for the cruel treatment which they had previously received, made a furious attack upon the invaders.

The few survivors of the slaughter returned to Santo Domingo, and the expedition was abandoned. These voyages were in 1520 and 1526.

In connection with the subject of Spanish voyages, a pa.s.sing notice should be given to one, who, though not of Spanish birth, yet did much to further the progress of discovery on the part of his adopted country.

Magellan was a Portuguese navigator who had been a child when Columbus came back in triumph from the West Indies. Refused consideration from King Emmanuel, of Portugal, for a wound received under his flag during the war against Morocco, he renounced his native land and offered his services to the sagacious Charles V., of Spain, who gladly accepted them, With a magnificent fleet, Magellan, in 1519, set sail from Seville, cheris.h.i.+ng Columbus's bold purpose, which no one had yet realized, of reaching the East Indies by a westward voyage, After touching at the Canaries, he explored the coast of South America, pa.s.sed through the strait now called by his name, discovered the Ladrone Islands, and christened the circ.u.mjacent ocean the Pacific.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Montezuma mortally wounded by his own subjects.]

The ill.u.s.trious navigator now sailed for the Philippine Islands, so named from Philip, son of Charles V., who succeeded that monarch as Philip II. By the Tordesillas division above described, the islands were properly in the Portuguese hemisphere, but on the earliest maps, made by Spaniards, they were placed twenty-five degrees too far east, and this circ.u.mstance, whether accidental or designed, has preserved them to Spain even to the present time. At the Philippine Islands Magellan was killed in an affray with the natives. One of his s.h.i.+ps, the Victoria, after sailing around the Cape of Good Hope, arrived in Spain, having been the first to circ.u.mnavigate the globe. The voyage had taken three years and twenty-eight days.

[1528-1540]

The disastrous failure of the expedition of Vasquez de Ayllon to Florida did not discourage attempts on the part of others in the same direction.

Velaspuez, governor of Cuba, jealous of the success of Cortez in Mexico, had sent Pamphilo de Narvaez to arrest him. In this attempt Narvaez had been defeated and taken prisoner. Undeterred by this failure he had solicited and received of Charles V. the position of governor over Florida, a territory at that time embracing the whole southern part of what is now the United States, and reaching from Cape Sable to the Panuco, or River of Palms, in Mexico. With three hundred men he, in 1528, landed near Appalachee Bay, and marched inland with the hope of opening a country rich and populous. Bitterly was he disappointed.

Swamps and forests, wretched wigwams with their squalid inmates everywhere met his view, but no gold was to be found. Discouraged, he and his followers returned to the coast, where almost superhuman toil and skill enabled them to build five boats, in which they hoped to work westward to the Spanish settlements. Embarking, they stole cautiously along the coast for some distance, but were at last driven by a storm upon an island, perhaps Galveston, perhaps Santa Rosa, where Narvaez and most of his men perished. Four of his followers survived to cross Texas to the Gulf of California and reach the town of San Miguel on the west coast of Mexico. Here they found their countrymen, searching as usual for pearls, gold, and slaves, and by their help they made a speedy return to Spain, heroes of as remarkable an adventure as history records. These unfortunates were the first Europeans to visit New Mexico. Their narrative led to the exploration of that country by Coronado and others, and to the discoveries of Cortez in Lower California.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Death of Magellan.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ferdinand de Soto.]

Ferdinand de Soto, eager to rival the exploits of Cortez in Mexico, and of his former commander, Pizarro, in Peru, offered to conquer Florida at his own expense. Appointed governor-general of Florida and of Cuba, he sailed with seven large and three small vessels. From Espiritu Santo Bay he, in 1539, marched with six hundred men into the country of the Appalachians and discovered the harbor of Pensacola. After wintering at Appalachee he set out into the interior, said to abound in gold and silver. Penetrating northeasterly as far as the Savannah, he found only copper and mica. From here he marched first northwest into northern central Georgia, then southwest into Alabama. A battle was fought with the natives at Mavila, or Mobile, in which the Spaniards suffered serious loss. s.h.i.+ps that he had ordered arrived at Pensacola, but de Soto determined not to embark until success should have crowned his efforts. He turned back into the interior, into the country of the Chickasaws, marched diagonally over the present State of Mississippi to its northwest corner, and crossed the Mississippi River near the lowest Chickasaw Bluff. From this point the general direction of the Spanish progress was southwest, through what is now Arkansas, past the site of Little Rock, till at last a river which seems to have been the Was.h.i.+ta was reached. Down this stream de Soto and his decimated force floated--two hundred and fifty of his men had succ.u.mbed to the hards.h.i.+ps and perils of his march--arriving at the junction of the Red with the Mississippi River on Sunday, April 17, 1542. At this point de Soto sickened and died, turning over the command to Luis de Moscoso. Burying their late leader's corpse at night deep in the bosom of the great river, and constructing themselves boats, the survivors of this ill-fated expedition, now reduced to three hundred and seventy-two persons, made the best of their way down the Mississippi to the Gulf, and along its coast, finally reaching the Spanish town near the mouth of the Panuco in Mexico.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A Palisaded Indian Town in Alabama.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Burial of de Soto in the Mississippi at night.]

[1562]

Thus no settlement had as yet been made in Florida by the Spanish. The first occupation destined to be permanent was brought about through religious jealousy inspired by the establishment of a French Protestant (Huguenot) colony in the territory. Ribault, a French captain commissioned by Charles IX., was put in command of an expedition by that famous Huguenot, Admiral Coligny, and landed on the coast of Florida, at the mouth of the St. John's, which he called the River of May. This was in 1562. The name Carolina, which that section still bears, was given to a fort at Port Royal, or St. Helena. Ribault returned to France, where civil war was then raging between the Catholics and the Protestants or Huguenots. His colony, waiting for promised aid and foolishly making no attempt to cultivate the soil, soon languished. Dissensions arose, and an effort was made to return home. Famine having carried off the greater number, the colony came to an end. In 1564 Coligny sent out Laudonniere, who built another fort, also named Carolina, on the River of May. Again misfortunes gathered thickly about the settlers, when Ribault arrived bringing supplies.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fort Carolina on the River of May.]

[1565]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Pedro Melendez.]

But Spain claimed this territory, and Pedro Melendez a Spanish soldier, was in 1565 sent by Philip II. to conquer it from the French, doubly detested as Protestants. He landed in the harbor and at the mouth of the river, to both of which he gave the name St. Augustine. Melendez lost no time in attacking Fort Carolina, which he surprised, putting the garrison mercilessly to the sword. The destruction of the French colony was soon after avenged by Dominic de Gourgues, who sailed from France to punish the enemies of his country. Having accomplished his purpose by the slaughter of the Spanish garrison he returned home, but the French Protestants made no further effort to colonize Florida.

Spain claimed the land by right of discovery, but, although maintaining the feeble settlement at St. Augustine, did next to nothing after this to explore or civilize this portion of America. The nation that had sent out Columbus was not destined to be permanently the great power of the New World. The hap of first landing upon the Antilles, and also the warm climate and the peaceable nature of the aborigines, led Spain to fix her settlements in lat.i.tudes that were too low for the best health and the greatest energy. Most of the settlers were of a wretched cla.s.s, criminals and adventurers, and they soon mixed largely with the natives.

Spain herself greatly lacked in vigor, partly from national causes, partly from those obscure general causes which even to this day keep Latin Europe, in military power and political accomplishments, inferior to Teutonic or Germanic Europe.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Indians devoured by dogs. From an old print.]

[1570]

Moreover, the Spaniards found their first American conquests too easy, and the rewards of these too great. This prevented all thought of developing the country through industry, concentrating expectation solely upon waiting fortunes, to be had from the natives by the sword or through forced labor in mines, Their treatment of the aborigines was nothing short of diabolical. Well has it been said: "The Spaniards had sown desolation, havoc, and misery in and around their track. They had depopulated some of the best peopled of the islands and renewed them with victims deported from others. They had inflicted upon hundreds of thousands of the natives all the forms and agonies of fiendish cruelty, driving them to self-starvation and suicide, as a way of mercy and release from an utterly wretched existence. They had come to be viewed by their victims as fiends of hate, malignity, and all dark and cruel desperation and mercilessness in pa.s.sion. The h.e.l.l which they denounced upon their victims was shorn of its worst terror by the a.s.surance that these tormentors were not to be there. Las Casas, the n.o.ble missionary, the true soldier of the cross, and the few priests and monks who sympathized with him, in vain protested against these cruelties."

To all these causes we must add the narrow colonial policy of Spain.

Imitating Venice and ancient Carthage instead of Greece, she held her dependencies under the straitest servitude to herself as conquered provinces, repressing all political or commercial independence. A similar restrictive policy, indeed, hampered the colonies of other nations, but it was nowhere else so irrational or blighting as in Spanish America.

CHAPTER III.

EXPLORATION AND COLONIZATION BY THE FRENCH AND THE ENGLISH