1492

by Mary Johnston

  CHAPTER XXXVIII

  THE ships were the _Consolacion_, the _Margarita_, the _Juana_ and the_San Sebastian_, all caravels and small ones, the _Consolacion_ thelargest and the flagship. The _Margarita_, that was the Adelantado'sship, sailed badly. There was something as wrong with her as had beenwith the _Pinta_ when we started from Palos in '92.

  The men all told, crews and officers and adventurers, were less than twohundred.

  Pedro de Terreros, Bartholomew Fiesco, Diego Tristan, Francisco dePorras were the captains of the caravels Juan Sanchez and Pedro Ledesmathe chief pilots. Bartholomew Fiesco of the _Consolacion_ was a Genoeseand wholly devoted to the greater Genoese. We had for notary DiegoMendez. There were good men upon this voyage, and very bold men.

  The youth Fernando Colon sailed with his father. He was now fourteen,Don Fernando, slim, intelligent, obedient and loving always to theAdmiral.

  Days of bright weather, days and days of that marvelous favorable windthat blows over Ocean-Sea. The twenty-fifth of May the Canaries sankbehind us. On and on, all the sails steady.

  We were not first for Hispaniola. All must be strange, this voyage!Jamaica, not San Domingo, was our star. Rest there a moment, takefood and water, then forth and away. West again, west by south. He wasstraitly forbidden to drop anchor in any water of Hispaniola. "For why?"said they. "Because the very sight of his ships will tear asunder againthat which Don Nicholas de Ovando is healing!"

  The _Margarita_, that was next to the _Consolacion_ in greatness, sailedso infirmly that mercy 'twas the seas were smooth. It was true accident.She had been known at Palos, Cadiz and San Lucar for good ship. Butat Ercilla where we must stop on the Sovereigns' business, a storm hadbeaten her upon the shore where she got a great wound in her side. Thatwas staunched, but all her frame was wrenched and she never did wellthereafter. In mid-June we came to an island of the Caribs which theycalled Mantineo. Here we rested the better part of a week, keeping goodguard against the Caribs, then sailed, and now north by west, along avast curve, within a world of islands. They are great, they are small,they are of the extremest beauty! San Martin, Dominica, Guadaloupe,San Juan--the Boriquen whence had come, long ago, that Catalina whomGuacanagari aided--and untouched at, or under the horizon, many anotherthat the Admiral had named; _Santa Maria_ la Antigua, Santa Cruz, SantaUrsula, Montserrat, Eleven Thousand Virgins, Marigalante and all beside.What a world! Plato his Atlantis. How truly old we are God only knows!

  The _Margarita_ sailed most badly. At San Juan that is the neighborgreat island to Hispaniola, council, two councils, one following theother. Then said the Admiral, "We are to find the Strait that shall atlast carry us to clothed Asia of all the echoes, and to find we have butfour small ships and one of them evidently doomed. And in that one sailsmy brother. What is the Sovereigns' command? 'Touch not on your outwardway at Hispaniola!' What is in their mind here? 'Hale and faring well,you have no need.'--But if we are not hale and faring well by a fourthof our enterprise? They never meant it to a drowning man, or one whosewater cask was empty! Being Christian, no! We will put into San Domingoand ask of Don Nicholas de Ovando a ship in place of the _Margarita_."

  Whereat all cheered. We were gathered under palms, upon a fair point ofland in San Juan le Bautista. Next day we weighed anchor, and in pictureSan Domingo rose before us.

  He felt no doubt of decent welcome, of getting his ship. Fifteen sailhad gone out with Ovando. Turn the cases around, and he would havegiven Ovando welcome, he would give him a good ship. How much more thenChristopherus Columbus! The enterprise was common in that all stood toprofit. It was royal errand, world service! So he thought and sailed insome tranquillity of mind for San Domingo.

  But the Adelantado said in my ear. "There will be a vast to-do! MaybeI'll sail the _Margarita_ to the end." He was the prophet!

  It was late June. Hispaniola rose, faint, faint, upon the horizon.All crowded to look. There, there before us dwelled countrymen, fellowmariners, fellow adventurers forth from the Old into the New! It washaven; it was Spain in the West; it was Our Colony.

  The Admiral gazed, and I saw the salt tears blind his eyes. His son wasbeside him. He put his hand upon the youth's shoulder. "Fernando, thereit is--I found and named it Hispaniola!"

  The weather hung perilously still, the sea glass. It was so clear above,below, around, that we seemed to see by added light, and yet there wasno more sunlight. All the air had thinned, it seemed, away. Every sailfell slack. Colors were slightly altered. The Admiral said, "There iscoming a great storm."

  The boy Fernando laughed. "Why, father!"

  "Stillness before the leap," said the Admiral. "Quiet at home becausethe legions have gone to muster."

  It was hard to think it, but too often had it been proved that he wasin the secret of water and air. Now Bartholomew Fiesco the Genoese said."Aye, aye! They say on the ships at Genoa that when it came to weather,even when you were a youngster, you were fair necromancer!"

  The sky rested blue, but the sea became green oil. That night there wereall around us fields of phosphorescence. About midnight these vanished;it was very black for all the stars, and we seemed to hear a sighing asfrom a giant leagues away. This passed, and the morning broke, silentand tranquil, azure sky and azure sea, and not so sharply clear asyesterday. The great calm wind again pushed us.

  Hispaniola! Hispaniola! Her mountains and her palms before us.

  We coasted to the river Hayna and the Spanish city of San Domingo. Threehours from sunset down in harbor plunged our anchors, down rattled oursails.

  The _Consolacion's_ long boat danced by her side. The Admiral wouldsend to land but one boat, and in it for envoy Pedro de Terreros, awell-speaking man and known to Don Nicholas de Ovando. Terreros wasenvoy, but with him the Admiral sent Juan Lepe, who through the years inHispaniola had tried to heal the sick, no matter what their faction.The Admiral stayed upon the _Consolacion_, the Adelantado upon the_Margarita_.

  The harbor was filled with ships. We counted eighteen. We guessed thatthey were preparing for sailing, the little boats so came and wentbetween. And our entry had caused excitement. Ship and small boat hailedus, but to them we did not answer. Then came toward us from the shore along boat with the flag of Spain and in it an official.

  Our wharf! Juan Lepe had left it something more than a year and a halfago. San Domingo was grown, many Spaniards having sailed for the westin that time. I saw strangers and strangers, though of Spanish blood.Walking with the officer and his people to the Governor's house gavetime for observation and swift thought. Throng was forming. One hadearly cried from out it, "That's the doctor, Juan Lepe! 'Tis the Admiralout there!" That it was the Admiral seemed to spread. San Domingo buzzedlike the air about a hive the first spring day. Farther on, out pushed aknown voice. "Welcome, welcome, Doctor!" I looked, and that was Sancho.Luis Torres was in Spain. I had seen him in Cadiz. The crowd wasthickening--men came running--there was cry and query. Suddenly rose acheer. "The Admiral and the Adelantado in their little ships!" At oncecame a counter-shout. "The Genoese! The Traitors!"

  I saw--I saw--I saw that there was some wisdom in King Ferdinand!

  The Governor's house that used to be the Viceroy's house. State--state!They had cried out upon the Genoese's keeping it--but Don Nicholasde Ovando kept more. While we waited in the antechamber I saw, out ofwindow and the tail of my eye, files of soldiery go by. Ovando would nothave riot and disturbance if twenty Admirals hung in the offing! Hekept us waiting. He would be cool and distant and impregnable behindthe royal word. Juan Lepe saw plainly that that lavish and magnanimousperson aboard the _Consolacion_ would not meet here his twin. TheAdelantado must still, I thought, sail the _Margarita_. And yet, lookingat all things, that exchange of ships should have been made. A Spaniard,wheresoever found, should have cried "Aye!" to it.

  The Governor's officer who still kept by us was not averse to talk. Allthose preparing ships in the harbor? Why, they were the returning fleetthat brought Don Nicholas in. Sailing to-morrow--hence the hubbub o
nland and water. They had a lading now! He gazed a moment at us, and aswe seemed sober folk, saw no reason why we should not have the publicnews. Forth it came like water out of bottle. Bobadilla was returning."A prisoner?" "Why, hardly that! Roldan, too." "A prisoner?" "Why,not precisely so." Many of the old regime--Bobadilla's regime--werereturning and Roldan men likewise. Invited to go, in fact, though withno other harsh treatment. One of the ships would be packed with Indianrebels, Gwarionex among them. Chained, all these. The notable thingabout the fleet, after all that, was the gold that was going! A treasurefleet! Bobadilla _had_ gathered gold for the crown. He was taking, theysaid, a sultan's ransom. He had one piece that weighed, they said, fivethousand castellanos. Roldan too had gold. And the Governor was sendingno man knew how much. More than that-- He looked at us, then, being akindly soul, quoth, "Why shouldn't the Admiral know? Alonso de Carvajalhas put on board the _Santa Clara_ for the Admiral's agent in Cadiz fivethousand pieces--fully due, as the Governor had allowed."

  Door was opened. "His Excellency the Governor will see you now."

  Why tarry over a short story? Don Nicholas de Ovando pleaded smoothlythe Sovereign's most strict command which _in any_ to disobey were plainmalfeasance! As he spoke he looked dreamily toward blue harbor and the_Consolacion_. And as to a ship! Every ship, except two or three, oldand crippled and in the hands of the menders, no whit better it wascertain than the _Margarita_, was laded and on the point of sailing.Literally he had none, absolutely not one! He understood that Jamaicawas expressly named to the Admiral for resting and overhauling. Careenthe _Margarita_ there and rectify the wrong--which he trusted was notgreat. If ships had been idle and plentiful--but he could not splinterany from the fleet that was sailing to-morrow. He was sorry--and trustedthat the Admiral was in health?

  Terreros said, "His ship is worse off than you think, Excellency. Hehas great things to do, confided into his hands by the Sovereigns whotreasure him who found all. Here is emergency. May we carry to himinvitation to enter San Domingo for an hour and himself present hiscase?"

  But no--but no--but no! Thrice that!

  The Governor rose. Audience was over.

  For the rest he was courteous--asked of the voyage--and of the Admiral'snotion of the Strait. "A great man!" he said. "A Thinker, a Seer." Hesent him messages of courtesy three-piled. And so we parted.

  This was the Governor of whom one said long afterwards,

  "He was a good governor for white men, but not for Indians."

  As life and destiny would have it, in the place without the Governor'shouse I met him who was to say it. Terreros and I with the same escortwere for the water side, the _Consolacion's_ long boat. The crowd keptwith us, but His Excellency's soldiers held it orderly. Yet there wereshouts and messages for the Admiral, and for this one and that oneaboard our ships. Then came a young man, said a word to the officer withus, and put out his hand to mine. It was that Bartolome de Las Casaswith whom I had walked the white road, under moon, before the innbetween Seville and Cordova.