[Footnote 31:  The West Indian islands were inhabited at the time of discovery by at least three races of different origin.  One of these races occupied the Bahamas.  Columbus describes them as simple, peaceful creatures, whose only weapon was a pointed stick or cane.  They were of a light copper color, rather good-looking, and probably had formerly occupied the whole eastern part of the archipelago, whence they had been driven or exterminated by the Caribs, Caribos, or Guaribos, a savage, warlike, and cruel race, who had invaded the West Indies from the continent, by way of the Orinoco.  The larger Antilles, Cuba, la Espanola, and Puerto Rico, were occupied by a race which probably originated from some southern division of the northern continent.  The chroniclers mention the Guaycures and others as their ancestors, and Stahl traces their origin to a mixture of the Phoenicians with the Aborigines of remote antiquity]

[Footnote 32:  Abbad says 30.]

CHAPTER XIII

DEPOPULATION OF THE ISLAND—­PREVENTIVE MEASURES—­INTRODUCTION OF NEGRO SLAVES

1515-1534

The natural consequence of natural calamities and invasions was the rapid disappearance of the natives.  “The Indians are few and serve badly,” wrote Sedeno in 1515, about the same time that the crown officers, to explain the diminution in the gold product, wrote that many Indians had died of hunger, as a result of the hurricane. " ...  The people in la Mona,” they said, “have provided 310 loads of bread, with which we have bought an estate in San German.  It will not do to bring the Indians of that island away, because they are needed for the production of bread.”

Strenuous efforts to prevent the extinction of the Indians were made by Father Bartolome Las Casas, soon after the death of King Ferdinand.  This worthy Dominican friar had come to the court for the sole purpose of denouncing the system of “encomiendas” and the cruel treatment of the natives to which it gave rise.  He found willing listeners in Cardinal Cisneros and Dean Adrian, of Lovaino, the regents, who recompensed his zeal with the title of “Protector of the Indians.”  The appointment of a triumvirate of Jerome friars to govern la Espanola and San Juan (1517) was also due to Las Casas’s efforts.  Two years later the triumvirate reported to the emperor that in compliance with his orders they had taken away the Indians from all non-resident Spaniards in la Espanola and had collected them in villages.

Soon after the emperor’s arrival in Spain Las Casas obtained further concessions in favor of the Indians.  Not the least important among these were granted in the schedule of July 12, 1520, which recognized the principle that the Indians were born free, and contained the following dispositions: 

1st.  That in future no more distributions of Indians should take place.

2d.  That all Indians assigned to non-residents, from the monarch downward, should be ipse facto free, and be established in villages, under the authority of their respective caciques; and