Columbus: The Four Voyages, 1492-1504 (33 page)

Keeping his composure, the chieftain “asked many times if the country that gave birth to such men was not indeed heaven,” in Peter Martyr’s transcription. Among the Indians, Columbus gathered, “earth was a shared asset, like sun and water, and . . . ‘mine and yours’ concepts, which are the seeds of all evils, do not apply.” The cacique explained that his people were “satisfied with little, and in that land there are more fields available to cultivate than there is need.” It was a golden age for the Indians, Columbus recalled. “They do not surround their properties with ditches, walls, or hedges; they live in open fields, without laws, books, or judges; they behave naturally in a just manner. They consider evil and wicked anyone who delights in harming others.”

The old man’s ideas challenged the explorer’s assumptions about the world beyond Spain. Perhaps the church might not have a monopoly on the afterlife, blasphemous as that notion was. Perhaps Spain did not have a monopoly on empire. Perhaps he was on a voyage of redemption. Or damnation. He would find out.

It began with a clap of thunder as the crew raised anchor off Cape Cruz, Cuba, on July 16, “so sudden, violent, and with such a downpour of rain, that the deck was placed underwater,” Columbus said. They struck sail and pushed their heaviest anchors overboard to secure a mooring amid the flashes of lightning. By the time they had accomplished that task, so much water had seeped through the “floor timbers that the sailors could not get it out with the pumps, especially because they were all very tired and weak from too little food.” To sustain them through their difficult labors, “all they had to eat daily was a pound of rotten biscuits and a pint of wine.” Drawing on their last reserves of strength, the men struggled to prevent the vessel from sinking.

Weakened, Columbus cowered before the onslaught of the elements, and confided to his journal: “I am on the same ration as the others. May it please God that this be for His service and that of Your Highnesses. Were it only for myself, I would no longer bear such pains and dangers, for not a day passes that we do not look danger in the face.” And yet he persisted; there was no other choice.

The storm eventually blew itself out, and two days later, on July 18, their weather-beaten ship returned to Cape Cruz, due north of Jamaica. A delegation of cheerful Indians brought cassava bread, fish, and abundant fruit to the weak and starving Spaniards. When the men recovered, Columbus desired to sail for Hispaniola, but, with the wind being contrary, he stood for Jamaica.

 

Four days later, the fleet glided into the translucent waters surrounding Jamaica, where still more Indians plied the sailors with lusty greetings and succulent victuals, “which they liked much better than what they had received on all the other islands.”

Early one morning, a canoe approached, bearing an Indian who gave little gifts to every Spaniard in sight, except Columbus. “I was off to one side reciting some prayers I find helpful,” he wrote, and “did not immediately see the gifts or the determination of the approach of this man.” Eventually he did take notice of the cacique’s theatrical entrance. “In the largest canoe he came in person with his wife and two daughters, one of whom was about eighteen years, very beautiful, completely naked as they are accustomed to be, and very modest; the other was younger, and two stout sons and five brothers and other dependents; and all the rest must have been his vassals,” Columbus later told his friend Bernáldez. Two or three men had their faces painted with colors in the same pattern, and each wore on his head a large feather helmet, and on his forehead a round disk as large as a plate. Each held in his hand a gadget that he tinkled. As for the cacique, he wore ornaments fashioned of
guanín
, a gold alloy, around his neck. To Columbus, the finery resembled “eight-carat gold.” Some were as large as plates, he claimed, and shaped like fleurs-de-lis. Except for a finely worked girdle, the rest of his body was exposed. And his wife was naked, “except in the one spot of her pudendum, which was covered by a little cotton thing no bigger than an orange peel.” Her older daughter wore around her middle a single string of small and very black stones, from which hung something made of “green and red stones fastened to woven cloth.”

The cacique and his entourage came aboard Columbus’s caravel, turned to address the Admiral of the Ocean Sea, and amid torrents of praise for Spain, declared, “I have decided to go to Castile with you and obey the King and Queen of this world.”

Columbus considered those words carefully. “He said all this so reasonably I was wonder struck.” As a distracting wind shifted one way and then another, he invited the cacique and his entourage to remain aboard ship for the day, “staying out in the open sea until the waves became enormous.” The ship heaved and groaned in the heavy weather. “By this time the women were most afraid, crying and asking their husband and father to go back home,” Columbus observed. “From that moment, they knew the sea, and what it meant to face the sea.” To Columbus, it meant an occasion to master the elements, and by extension, to confront his destiny; to the terrified Indians, it meant the experience of terror before the power inherent in the universe. “And they wanted him [the cacique] to be aware how painful this was for them because they were the ones who most wanted to go to Castile.” Reflecting on his wife, his daughter, and his young son, barely six or seven, “whom he always held in his arms,” the cacique swallowed his pride and acknowledged the wisest course would be to return to the safety of land. To honor the decision, Columbus and he exchanged gifts, and the Admiral, not to be outdone in magnanimity, said that he also gave gifts to the cacique’s brothers and the rest of his retinue.

Shifting his attention to the cacique’s children, who were as naked as their parents, Columbus desired “the older daughter dressed, but her mother said no because they were not used to it.” In fact, she had been cowering behind her parents, “hugging herself with her arms, covering her chest and face,” and uncovering it “only when expressing wonder.” She talked throughout the long day at sea, “but always behaved in this honest and chaste manner.” When they were safely anchored, Columbus reluctantly dispatched his distinguished Indian guests, who were “very sad at parting, and so was I, because I would have liked very much to bring him to Your Highnesses as he was the very person for knowing all the secrets of the island.” They had been spared a grueling transatlantic crossing and an uncertain future in Spain.

Within days, Columbus took it upon himself to explore the southern portion of the island of Jamaica. Perhaps here he would find sufficient quantities of gold to satisfy his avarice.

 

They appeared behind the mist like a giant turquoise dragon. They were the Blue Mountains of Jamaica, one of the largest continuous mountain ranges in the Caribbean, reaching an altitude of over 7,400 feet at the highest point, swathed in lush vegetation sheltering five hundred species of flowering plants, half of which existed nowhere else on the planet. Fluttering
mariposas
darted among the trees, including the stupendous Homerus swallowtail (
Papilio homerus
), the largest butterfly in the Western Hemisphere, with a six-inch wingspan of flickering black and gold. Hundreds of avian species looked on, in search of their next meal. The richness and diversity of life in the region equaled anything to be found in Marco Polo’s extravagant
Travels
.

As Jamaica’s Blue Mountains came into view on August 19, Columbus led the fleet past a point that he named Cabo del Farol, or Signal Fire, after spying an Indian bonfire. The ships completed a windward passage to the island of Hispaniola.

In the midst of this natural splendor the fleet spent another three days, until a canoe bearing Indians arrived.

“Almirante!”
they shouted in recognition.

Columbus had become a legendary presence in these parts, both feared and welcomed.

They sailed along the suffocating, overgrown coast, enduring dreary afternoon squalls and the menace of distant thunder, until, on August 19, “he lost sight of that island and headed directly for Hispaniola,” leaving Jamaica and the promise of easy gratification in his wake. All he had discovered by this point in his voyage was that it would be difficult or impossible to attain his goal without the help of God.

Within a day or two Columbus took refuge on a compact island, Alta Vela, only to realize that he had become separated from the other two ships comprising his fleet. This was not the first time he had lost track of the small fleet. He appeared to be losing his grip on the voyage and on himself. He ordered men to climb to the island’s highest point, but even they saw nothing but an endless expanse. Hungry and restless, his men slaughtered seals simply by walking up to the creatures as they slept on the beach and bludgeoning them to death.

After six days, the two missing ships appeared, and the reunited fleet sailed for the island Columbus called Beata, twelve leagues distant. Expecting more of the hospitality to which he had become accustomed, Columbus was startled by Indians “armed with bows and poisoned arrows and carrying cords in their hands issued from that village, making signs that those cords were tying up the Christians they would capture.” Undeterred, the three boats landed, and after a brief exchange, the Indians “put aside their arms and offered to bring the Christians bread, water, and all else they had.” Even more pleasing, they had heard of Christopher Columbus, and wished to meet him. And so they did, after which the fleet sailed on.

Passing an island, Columbus decided to name it after his companion Michele de Cuneo of Savona, who explained, “out of love for me, the Lord Admiral called it La Bella Saonese. He made a gift of it, and I took possession . . . by virtue of a document signed by a notary public.” By such contrivances ancient lands passed into contemporary hands. Cuneo surveyed his new realm, where he “uprooted grass and cut trees and planted the cross and also the gallows.” Cuneo was pleased; it was beautiful, he decided, counting thirty-seven villages “with at least 30,000 souls.”

On the night of September 14, Columbus “observed an eclipse of the moon and was able to determine a difference in time of about five hours and twenty-three minutes between that place and Cadiz,” said Ferdinand.

This statement has inspired centuries of questions about Columbus’s precise whereabouts at this time (uncertain), his facility with celestial navigation (limited), and even his honesty in reporting his findings (open to question). But the deceptions and lapses reveal the limits of his abilities as a navigator and his instinctive desire to obscure his location when it seemed to place him beyond the limits of “India.” In “India,” he reigned supreme, thanks to the proclamations of Ferdinand and Isabella, and was entitled to great wealth and prestige. If he had inadvertently strayed into some uncharted part of the world, his findings and claims would be open to challenge and probably worthless. Better to hope that all would come right in the end than to try to understand his actual location in a global context. One of the great paradoxes of this explorer’s mental habits was his reluctance to contemplate alternative answers to unresolved questions about navigation. He did not wish to “discover” the “unknown.” For Columbus, who believed that all had been foretold and guided by the will of God, there was no such thing.

For those who shared Columbus’s mysticism, a lunar eclipse was freighted with significance. It occurs when the moon passes behind the earth so that the earth prevents the sun’s rays from striking the moon. The sun, the earth, and the moon are aligned, with the earth in the middle. The previous lunar eclipse, May 22, 1453, coincided with the fall of Constantinople, and now it was happening again, imbuing his voyage with cosmic significance.

 

C
olumbus was planning to return to La Isabela, when the character of the voyage abruptly changed, and disturbing gaps in the account appear. After five days riding out a gale, the fleet had become separated once more; eventually the two missing caravels reappeared, and on September 24, the restored fleet made for the eastern end of Hispaniola to another island, this one called Amona by the Indians. Instead of returning to what had become his home port in the Indies, Columbus “repaired his ships with the clear purpose of ravaging again the islands of the cannibals and burning all their canoes, so that these rapacious wolves would not injure sheep any longer.” But the campaign against the cannibals failed to materialize.