Columbus_ The Four Voyages - Laurence Bergreen [103]
While methodically sounding the harbor, he and his men were alarmed by the sight of seventy giant canoes, paddles churning through the sea, Indians shouting, ready to attack. “After I anchored, they came down to the beach in numbers to cover the earth, all painted up with a thousand colors, primarily brown, and all of them naked; they wore various kinds of feathers on their heads, their chests and bellies were covered with palm fronds, and they shouted at the top of their lungs and threw spears, although they did not strike us.” Columbus feigned indifference, occupying himself by taking on wood and water, repairing his battered vessels, indirectly letting the Indians know that their bellicose gestures would accomplish nothing. To flee would only encourage the Indians, who, Columbus reminded himself, were so inexperienced that they would grasp a Spanish sword by the blade “without thinking they can be hurt.”
According to Ferdinand, Columbus resolved to “scare them right at the start” by sending small craft filled with crossbowmen who wounded at least six or seven Indians by a conservative estimate. The brawl settled matters for the moment.
Columbus’s Indian interpreter sailed to shore in a longboat to conduct diplomacy among the inhabitants, and once he had calmed their anxieties, struck a deal, the outlines of which quickly became apparent. “A multitude of canoes came peacefully from the neighboring villages to trade their things and provisions for our trinkets.” He obtained all he wished, except for the gold that he believed was just waiting to be discovered.
Having repaired the damage sustained by his flagship in the battle, Columbus was planning to return to Cuba when his departure was delayed by a surprising defection. “A young Indian came aboard saying he wished to go to Castile,” and he was followed by canoes bearing his relatives and supporters pleading with him to return, but they failed to persuade him. “To escape the tears and lamentations of his sisters, he hid where they could not see him,” Ferdinand noted of the drama. The Indian had his way and remained aboard ship. The defection was complete. “The Admiral marveled at the firm resolution of this Indian and ordered him to be well treated.”
That night, the fleet rode at anchor in Santa Gloria’s idyllic harbor, and in the morning, May 6, the Admiral raised sail, and traveled fifteen miles west along the Jamaican coast, dropping anchor again in a horseshoe-shaped place of refuge that instantly became Puerto Bueno.
Onshore, Indians donned brightly colored feather headdresses and masks, and hurled their poison spears at Columbus’s ships. Undeterred by what he considered a ritual show of force, the Admiral sent a party of men ashore in a longboat to scrounge for water and wood and the opportunity to repair their leaky boats, only to meet with a hail of stones. To tame the warriors, Columbus sent another boat with sailors armed with crossbows, whose arrows injured and killed several. To teach the Indians a lesson, Bernáldez recalled, the Spanish deployed a vicious dog that “bit them and did them great hurt, for a dog is worth ten men against the Indians.”
The following day, a half-dozen Indians appeared onshore with offerings of cassava bread, fruit, and fish to appease the Spanish invaders. Columbus and his men helped themselves to the Indians’ bounty, all they could want with the exception of gold. On May 9, the newly repaired ships raised anchor and sailed from Puerto Bueno, again in a westerly direction, to a spacious harbor Columbus named El Golfo de Buen Tiempo, the Fair Weather Gulf—now known as Montego Bay. Inevitably, a storm blew up. Without giving a reason, striking out