Columbus_ The Four Voyages - Laurence Bergreen [192]
His misery was so intense, and prospects for surviving from one day to the next so uncertain, that as his ships nosed their way toward Hispaniola, he confessed, “I wished I had never set out.” The conditions were the most adverse that he had endured during his years in the Caribbean. “The other ship, half-submerged, hastened to find a harbor. I struggled against the sea in the midst of the storm. As my ship sank Our Lord miraculously brought me to land.” He stopped scratching his pen to reflect, “Who could believe what I am writing?”
Paraphrasing Marco Polo’s celebrated remark that his Travels did not contain even half of all that had occurred to him, Columbus claimed, “In this letter, I have reported but a hundredth of what happened. Those who were with the Admiral can bear witness to it.” Even if much of the tumult had occurred in his mind, it was nonetheless overwhelming.
In these dire conditions, Columbus changed course once again. Now the fleet stood for Jamaica because, Ferdinand explained, “the easterly winds and strong westward-running currents would have never let us make Hispaniola—especially since the ships were so riddled by shipworms.” The crew continued to work the three pumps morning, noon, and night, but by Midsummer Day’s eve, June 23, “the water in our ship rose so high that it was almost up to the deck.” The men clung to a floating wreck, capable of only rudimentary navigation. But the instinct to survive drove them on against overwhelming odds. “With great toil we continued in this state until daybreak when we made a harbor in Jamaica named Puerto Bueno” on the northern coast, later called Dry Harbour.
From the deck of his sinking ship, the broad harbor appeared benign, but no source of fresh water was apparent, nor did they see an Indian village where they could replenish themselves. Risking one more day aboard the flimsy ship, Columbus sailed eastward to a haven that he named Santa Gloria, now St. Ann’s Bay, a sequence of shallow bay, alluvial fan, and marsh. Approaching the shore, Columbus and his men beheld aromatic cedar, rosewood, ebony, mahogany, palmetto palm, coconut palm, and blue mahoe, which grows to sixty feet, whose wood contains blue, green, and yellow tints and whose flowers change color from yellow to orange to dark red. Through the trees, the men caught sight of showy parrots, iridescent hummingbirds, and cuckoos. Plump little todies, similar in shape to kingfisher birds, with green wings and crimson gorgets, flitted nervously from branch to branch.
The crew angled the boats toward the beach. “Since we were no longer able to keep the ships afloat, we ran them ashore as far as we could, grounding them both close together board and board, and shoring them up on both sides so they could not budge.” When beached, the ships were nearly swamped at high tide, but they were alive and safe—for now.
Having exhausted their usefulness at sea, the ships became makeshift fortresses. On the fore and stern castles, the exhausted men cobbled together cabins, “making our position as strong as possible so the Indians could do us no harm; for at that time the island was not yet inhabited or subdued by Christians.” A sense of loneliness and stillness descended, relieved only by the fluttering wind, the muffled crash of distant surf, and faint birdcalls. Stranded in these rotting structures only a “crossbow shot from land,” Columbus, Ferdinand, and the other crew members faced another test of survival.
“The Indians of that country, who proved to be a kind and gentle people, presently came in canoes to barter their wares and provisions,” Ferdinand remarked. Columbus designated two of his men to monitor the trading for food with the eager hosts. To keep track of his small band of survivors, and prevent mischief, Columbus endeavored to keep his men aboard the beached shipwrecks rather than wander into the woods. As he knew from experience, “Our people by nature being disrespectful,