Ojeda sailed
from Cadiz for Paria with four ships and a concourse of
adventurers. With him went the pilot Juan de la Cosa,
and a geographer of Florence, Messer Amerigo Vespucci.
It came to us in Hispaniola that Ojeda was gone. Now
I saw the Admiral's heart begin to break. Yet Ojeda in
his voyage did not find the Earthly Paradise, only went
along that coast as we had done, gathered pearls, and returned.
Time passed. Other wild and restless adventurers beside
Roldan broke into insurrections less than Roldan's. The
Viceroy hanged Moxica and seven with him, and threw into
prison Guevara and Requelme. Roldan, having had his long
fling--too powerful still to hang or to chain in some one
of our forts--Roldan wrote and received permission, and
came to San Domingo, and was reconciled.
Suddenly, after long time of turmoil, wild adventure and
uncertainty, peace descended. Over all Hispaniola the Indians
submitted. Henceforth they were our subjects; let
us say our victims and our slaves! Quarrels between Castilians
died over night. Miraculously the sky cleared. Miraculously,
or perhaps because of long, patient steering
through storm. For three months we lived with an appearance
of blossoming and prospering. It seemed that it might
become a peaceful, even a happy island.
The Viceroy grew younger, the Adelantado grew younger,
and Don Diego, and with them those who held by them
through thick and thin.
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