THE CONQUERORS OP THE NEW WORLD AND THEIR BONDSMEN
Is a book on the history of modern slavery. "The history of every na- tion," says the author, "tells of some great transaction peculiar to that nation ; something which aptly illustrates the particular characteristics of the people, which shows, as we may say, the part in human nature which that nation explains and renders visible." After pointing out what he conceives to be the "great transaction" distinctive of England, France, and Germany, he leaves the reader to infer that "mo- dern slavery "--the kidnapping and reduction to bondage of races "guilty of a skin not coloured like their own" was the peculiarity of Por- tuguese and Spaniards. And there is more philosophy in this than may at first appear. Their Southern position, with their Oriental admixture of Moors and Jews, introduced them naturally to Oriental domestic in- stitutions; giving to their slavery a more slavish character than apper- tains to the adseripti ftlebee of the Northern nations. The fact that both peoples were continually exposed to suffer servitude themselves, as cap- tives of the Moors of Barbary, might bring them to look upon it as a fortune of war : they were prepared to suffer it themselves, and became more indifferent to inflicting it upon others. The introduction of slavery into the New World has generally been as- Filled to the unfortunate philanthropy of Las Cases, who suggested the importation of Blacks to save the native Americans from destruction by labours to which they were physically unequal. By the citation of pas.. sages from contemporary chroniclers or original documents, the author of the work before us shows that such was not the case. A trade in Negro slaves from Africa to Portugal sprang up with the first discovery of Negroland under Prince Henry, and grew into a traffic as regular as that of gold or any other commodity. A similar slavery was esta- blished in Spain ; but its origin is uncertain, or whether the Negroes were obtained from Barbary or through Portugal. If Spanish traffic really dates from 1399, the Portuguese discoverers could not have been the originators ; though our author seems inclined to charge the whole Peninsular trade upon them. At all events, the annals of Ortiz de Zuniga tell, that by 1474, eighteen years before the discovery of America, there were many Negro slaves in Seville, and that regulations were expressly established in their favour, which Ortiz attributes to En- rique the Third, before 1400. Previous to 1450, the Portuguese slave- trade may be considered established ; for the following extract refers to a distribution of Lancarote's return cargo, and his expedition of discovery took place about 1444. The description differs little from those of later times, but is curious for its early date and as being the first upon record. " It is to be found in the chronicles of Azurara. The good chronicler is torn to the heart at the sorrow he witnesses, but still believes it to be for good, and that he must not let his mere earthly commiseration get the better of his piety." The reader will perceive that some of the captives were Moors of the Great Desert, where it borders on the Atlantic.
"The other day, which was the 8th of August, very early in the morning, by reason of the heat, the mariners began te bring-to their vessels, and, as they had been commanded, to draw forth those captives to take them out of the vessel: whom, placed together on that plain, it was a marvellous sight to behold, for amongst them there were some of a reasonable degree of whiteness, handsome and well-made; others less white, resembling leopards in their colour; others as black as Ethiopians, and so ill-formed, as well in their faces as their bodies, that it seemed to the beholders as if they saw the forms of a lower hemisphere. But what heart was that, how hard soever, which was not pierced with sorrow seeing that company: for some had sunken cheeks, and their faces bathed in tears, looking at each other; other were groaning very dolorously, looking at the heights of the heavens, fixing their eyes upon them, crying out loudly, as if they were asking succour from the Father of Nature; others struck their faces with their hands, throwing themselves on the earth; others made their lamentations in songs, according to the customs of their country, which, although we could not under- stand their language, we saw corresponded well to the height of their sorrow. But now, for the increase of their grief, came those who had the charge of the distribution ; and they began to pat them apart one from the other, in order to equalize the portions; wherefore it was necessary to part children and parents, husbands and wives, and brethren from each other. Neither in the partition of friends and relations was any law kept, only each fell where the lot took him. 0 powerful Fortune who goest hither and thither with thy wheels, compassing the things of the world as it pleaseth thee, if thou canst place before the eyes of this miserable nation some knowledge of the things that are to come after them (cousas postumeiras) that they may receive some consolation in the midst of their great sadness I and you others who have the business of this partition, look with pity on such great misery, and consider how can those be parted whom you cannot disunite? Who will be able to make this partition without great difficulty ? for while they were placing in one part the children that saw their parents in another, they sprang up perseveringly and fled to them; the mothers enclosed their children in their arms and threw themselves with them on the ground, receiving wounds with little pity for their own flesh so that their children might not be torn from them! And so, with labour and diffi- culty, they concluded the partition; for, besides the trouble they had with the captives, the plain was full of people, as well of the place as of the villages and neighbourhood around, who in that day gave rest to their hands, the mainstay of their livelihood, only to see this novelty. And as they looked upon these things, some deploring, some reasoning upon them, they made such a riotous noise as greatly to disturb those who had the management of this distribution. The In- fante was there upon a powerful horse, accompanied by his people, looking out his share, but as a man who for his part did not care for gain; ter, of the forty-six souls which fell to his fifth, he speedily made his choice, as all his principal riches were in his contentment, considering with great delight the salvation of those souls which before were lost. And certainly his thought was not vain, for as soon as they bad knowledge of our language they readily became Christians; and I, who have made this history in this volume, have seen in the town of Lagos young insa and young women, the sons and grandsons of those very captives, born in this land, as good and as true Christians as if they had lineally descended since the commencement of the law of Christ from those who were first baptized."
The case of Negro slavery in America seems equally clear. The in- structions to Ovando the Governor of Hispaniola, who in 1501 super- seded Bobadilla the enemy of Columbus, forbade "Jews, Moors, or new converts, to go to the Indies, or to be permitted to remain there: but Negro slaves born in the power of Christians' were to be allowed to pass to the Indies; and the officers of the royal revenue were to receive the money to be paid for their permits." This permission did not remain a dead letter : soon after Ovando had come to the government, he wrote to request that "no Negro slaves should be sent to Hispaniola; for they fled among the Indians and taught them bad customs, and never :could be caught." At the same time, it appears that they continued to be sent. Las Cases, however, might be the means of establishing the direct slave trade from Africa to America; the permission of 1501 only referring to "slaves born in the power of Christians."
As the plan of The Conquerors of the New World and their Bondsmen is to trace the progress of African exploration under Prince Henry of Portugal step by step, and subsequently to describe the dis- coveries and conduct of Columbus and his successors, the writer travels over ground that has been frequently trodden since Robertson first mapped out the way. The single object of this author gives specifi- cality and freshness to his narrative. His predecessors look at the matter geographically or generally. They give an account of the distance one adventurer advanced beyond his predecessor, with some account of the country discovered or the hardships endured : or they fix their attention upon the principal figures, and produce an artistica' narrative in which they are to be exhibited dramatically; their faults not to be overlooked, but still presented according to Aristotle's rule for the hero of a tragedy. Thus, the obvious defects of Columbus, which we lately noted in the review of the Haklnyt Society's edition of his Letters, would not be omitted ; but they must be touched lightly, the main object being to excite sympathy for the hero by fixing attention on his merits and misfortunes, and giving prominence to the ingratitude and vices of those who oppress him. Neither discovery nor general character is overlooked in The Conquerors of the New World and their Bondsmen ; but the main object Is the slave-trade, or rather, those motives of habit and profit which first induced it in Europe, and the cir- cumstances of the New World which (however unrighteously) rendered labourers necessary to the Spanish conquerors to supply food and gold. This singleness of purpose gives greater unity and fulness to the narrative ; imparting to it an original interest notwithstanding the frequency with which the subject has been handled, and furnishing at the same time greater economical information than more scientific or more dramatically constructed works.
The spirit of the writer is just and philosophical. Although appre- ciating in their full extent the horrors of the slave system and the crimes and treachery of the Spaniards in the New World, he indulges in no ex- aggerated declamation, and allows to the originators of the Negro slave- trade a conscientious desire to convert the infidels—at least subject them to baptism. He also places the character of Columbus and of Ferdinand and Isabella on a jnster footing, by throwing himself into the contempo- rary position of the parties, not looking upon Columbus with the accu- mulated glory of more than three centuries shining upon him. We, who see the discoveries and their results, may be astonished at the delays and disappointments of Columbus; but Ferdinand had an unquestioned right to pause when such a startling scheme accompanied by so large demands was presented to him. In like manner, our author justifies the suspen- sion of Columbus; and shows that he was not only the adviser of an Indian slave-trade, but its actual founder, against the expressed wishes of the Sovereigns,—though Ferdinand does not appear to have refused the profits when they fell in his way. The style of the volume is peculiar ; a mixture of the personification of Carlyle and the juvenile simplicity of Leigh Hunt, but very quiet, and scarcely rising into mannerism. It does not appear to be even an imita- tion, but natural to the mind of the writer, which has the catholicity and toleration of the two writers we have mentioned, without the extreme peculiarities of either. The manner, too, is well adapted to the subject; which is expositional as well as narrative, involving frequent remarks almost of the nature of essays.
A part of the interest of the book arises from the extracts from the older chronicles, where any full account or striking circumstance is to be presented. This is particularly the case with the descriptions of the Negroes at home ; in whom four hundred years seem to have made little difference. The following is Ca da Mosto's account of their markets in 1454.
"As the author was several days on shore, he went three or four times to see one of their markets or fairs, which was kept on Mondays and Fridays in a mea- dow not far from the place where he was lodged. Hither repaired with their wares both men and women, for four or five miles about; and those who lived at a greater distance went to other markets nearer them. The great poverty of this people appeared in the goods found in these fairs; which were a few pieces of cotton cloth, cotton yarn, pulse, oil, millet, wooden tubs, palm mats, and every- thing else for the use of life. Here also one meets with arms, and small quanti- ties of gold. As they have no money or coin of any kind, all trade is carried on by way of barter; exchanging one thing for another, according to the different values. These Blacks, both men and women, came to gaze on Ca da Moats, as if he had been a prodigy; and thought it a great curiosity to behold a white man, for they load never seen any before. They were as much astonished at his dress as his colour; being clothed after the Spanish fashion, with a black damask waistcoat, and a cloak over it They admired the woollen cloth, of which they have none; and seemed much surprised at the sight of the waistcoat. Some catching him by the arms and hands, which they rubbed with spittle, to see if the whiteness was natural or artificial; and finding that his skin was not painted, their wonder continued. The end of his going to these markets was chiefly to see what quantity of gold was brought thither."
Some of these passages curiously indicate the unsophisticated man- ners of the times. The mind associates not only gravity but severity with the crafty and politic Ferdinand the Catholic; yet this is the man- ner in which he was mobbed by suitors. "When I was at Granada at the time the most serene Prince Don Miguel died, more than fifty of them, (Spaniards who had returned from the Indies,) as men without shame, bought a great quantity of grapes, and sat themselves down in the Court of the Alhambra, uttering loud cries, saying, that their Highnesses and the Admiral made them live in this poor fashion on account of the bad pay they received, with many other dishonest and unseemly things, which they kept re- peating. Such was their effrontery, that when the Catholic King came forth they all surrounded him, and got him into the midst of them, saying, 'Pay! pay!'
and if by chance I and my brother, who were pages to the most serene Queen, happened to pass where they were, they shouted to the very heavens' saying,' Look at the Bons of the Admiral of Mosquito-land, of that man who has discovered the lands of deceit and disappointment, a place of sepulchre and wretchedness to Spanish hidalgoes '; adding many other insulting expressions; on which account we excused ourselves from passing by them."
The present volume occupies about a century, (1418-1512,) closing when Diego Columbus had succeeded his father and the Junta had pas- sed the first laws for the regulation of the Indians. Another volume is intended to complete the work : which it can hardly do on the present scale, if the subject is to be treated other than very generally.
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