King had appointed to colonize and command at the isthmus of Darien, in Terra Firma, having failed in their undertaking, the sovereign, in 1514, wrote to Hispaniola, permitting the Adelantado, Don Bartholomew, if so inclined, to take charge of settling the coast of Veragua, and to govern that country under the Admiral Don Diego, conformably to his privileges. Had the King consulted his own interest, and the deference due to the talents and services of the Adelantado, this measure would have been taken at an earlier date. It was now too late. Illness prevented Don Bartholomew from executing the enterprise; and his active and toilsome life was drawing to a close.

Many calumnies having been sent home to Spain by Pasamonte and other enemies of Don Diego, and various measures being taken by government, which he conceived derogatory to his dignity, and injurious to his privileges, he requested and obtained permission to repair to court, that he might explain and vindicate his conduct. He departed, accordingly, on April 9, 1515, leaving the Adelantado with the vice-queen, Dona Maria. He was received with great honor by the King; and he merited such a reception. He had succeeded in every enterprise he had undertaken or directed. The pearl fishery had been successfully established on the coast of Cubagua; the islands of Cuba and of Jamaica had been subjected and brought under cultivation without bloodshed; his con

duct as governor had been upright; and he had only excited the representations made against him, by endeavoring to lessen the oppression of the natives. The King ordered that all processes against him in the Court of Appeal and elsewhere, for damages done to individuals in regulating the repartimientos, should be discontinued, and the cases sent to himself for consideration. But with all these favors, as the Admiral claimed a share of the profits of the province of Castilla del Oro, saying that it was discovered by his father, as the names of its places such as Nombre de Dios, Porto Bello and El Retrete, plainly proved, the King ordered that interrogatories should be made among the mariners who had sailed with Christopher Columbus, in the hope of proving that he had not discovered the coast of Darien nor the gulf of Uraba. "Thus," adds Herrera, "Don Diego was always involved in litigations with the fiscal, so that he might truly say that he was heir to the troubles of his father."*

Not long after the departure of Don Diego from San Domingo, his uncle, Don Bartholomew, ended his active and laborious life. No particulars are given of his death, nor is there mention made of his age, which must have been advanced. King Ferdinand is said to have expressed great concern at the event, for he had an high opinion of the character and the talents of the Adelantado: "A man," says Herrera, "of not less *Herrera, decad. ii., lib. ii., cap. 7.

worth than his brother the Admiral, and who, if he had been employed, would have given great proofs of it; for he was an excellent seaman, valiant and of great heart."* Charlevoix attributes the inaction in which Don Bartholomew had been suffered to remain for several years to the jealousy and parsimony of the King. He found the house already too powerful; and the Adelantado, had he discovered Mexico, was a man to make as good conditions as had been made by the Admiral his brother. It was said, observed Herrera, that the King rather preferred to employ him in his European affairs, though it could only have been to divert him from other objects. On his death the King resumed to himself the island of Mona which had been given to him for life, and transferred his repartimiento of two hundred Indians to the vice-queen Dona Maria.

While the Admiral Don Diego was pressing for an audience in his vindication at court, King Ferdinand died, on the 23d of January, 1516. His grandson and successor, Prince Charles, afterwards the Emperor Charles V., was in Flanders. The government rested for a time with Cardinal Ximenes, who would not undertake to decide on the representations and claims of the Admiral. It was not until 1520 that he obtained from the Emperor Charles V. a recognition of his innocence of all the charges against him. The Emperor

• Herrera, decad. i., lib. x., cap. 16.

+ Charlevoix, Hist. St. Domingo, lib. v.

finding that what Pasamonte and his party had written were notorious calumnies, ordered Don Diego to resume his charge, although the process with the fiscal was still pending, and that Pasamonte should be written to, requesting him to forgot all past passions and differences and to enter into amicable relations with Don Diego. Among other acts of indemnification he acknowledged his right to exercise his office of viceroy and governor in the island of Hispaniola, and in all parts discovered by his father.* His authority was, however, much diminished by new regulations, and a supervisor appointed over him with the right to give information to the Council against him, but with no other powers. Don Diego sailed in the beginning of September, 1520, and on his arrival at San Domingo, finding that several of the governors, presuming on his long absence, had arrogated to themselves independence, and had abused their powers, he immediately sent persons to supersede them, and demanded an account of their administration. This made him a host of active and powerful enemies, both in the colonies and in Spain.

Considerable changes had taken place in the island of Hispaniola, during the absence of the Admiral. The mines had fallen into neglect, the cultivation of the sugar-cane having been found a more certain source of wealth. It became a by-word in Spain that *Herrera, decad. ii., lib. ix., cap. 7.

the magnificent palaces erected by Charles V. at Madrid and Toledo were built of the sugar of Hispaniola. Slaves had been imported in great numbers from Africa, being found more serviceable in the culture of the cane than the feeble Indians. The treatment of the poor negroes was cruel in the extreme; and they seem to have had no advocates even among the humane. The slavery of the Indians had been founded on the right of the strong; but it was thought that the negroes, from their color, were born to slavery; and that from being bought and sold in their own country, it was their natural condition. Though a patient and enduring race, the barbarities inflicted on them at length roused them to revenge, and on the 27th December, 1522, there was the first African revolt in Hispaniola. It began on a sugar plantation of the Admiral Don Diego, where about twenty slaves, joined by an equal number from a neighboring plantation, got possession of arms, rose on their superintendents, massacred them, and sallied forth upon the country. It was their intention to pillage certain plantations, to kill the whites, reinforce themselves by freeing their countrymen, and either to possess themselves of the town of Agua, or to escape to the mountains.

Don Diego set out from San Domingo in search of the rebels, followed by several of the principal inhabitants. On the second day he stopped on the banks of the river Nizao to rest his party and suffer reinforce