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The flotilla consisted now of but two caravels, without boats, almost without provisions, and with 7000 miles of ocean to traverse. It sailed along the coast, passed the port of El Retrete, discovered the group of islands called the Mulatas, and at length entered the Gulf of Darien. This was the farthest point east reached by Columbus.
The whole party agreed to establish a colony at this place, which they named Santa Maria el Antiqua del Darien, the first part of the name being that of a church in Seville, and Darien being the Indian name of the river.
Two modes only offer themselves either to embark in the kind of mail stage which goes from Darien through Savannah, Augusta, and Columbia, to Camden, or to take a water passage either to Charleston or Georgetown. Either of these being accomplished, new difficulties will occur in getting from Statesburgh northward. I must be at New-York the first week in November.
The Spanish governor capitulated next day, on condition of being transported with his garrison to the mainland, and four of his soldiers who had formerly been banditti in the province of Darien agreed to become guides for the English.
Anson with his three ships gone to two, gone ultimately to one is henceforth what Spanish War there officially is. Anson could not meet those Vernon-Wentworth gentlemen "from the other side of the Isthmus of Darien," the gentlemen, with their Enterprise, being already bankrupt and away.
Moschetoes, flies, and cockroaches abounded. Thursday, September 6, 1804 Just returned from Darien. And what took you to Darien? To see the plantation of Mr. Butler on an island opposite that town, and to meet a day sooner the letters which I expected from you. In the last object I have been again disappointed, which I ascribe wholly to the irregularity of the mails.
This population was computed, at the period when I travelled there, to be 3000. These people have not the ferocity of the Darien and Cunas Indians, on the left bank of the Atrato; who often attack the boats trading with the town of Quidbo in the Choco; they also make incursions on the territory of Uraba, in the months of June and November, to collect the fruit of the cacao-trees.
At the council aboard Captain Sawkins' ship, it was given out, to all the assembled buccaneers, that the Spaniards had made peace with the Darien Indians. This was bad news; but Captain Bournano was able to assure the company "that since the conclusion of the said peace, they had been already tried, and found very faithful"; for they had been of service to him in his late foray.
Fortunately he had been warned by a letter from Zamudio, who had found means to send it via Hispaniola, of the threatening purpose of Pedrarias and the great expedition. Balboa stood well with the authorities in Hispaniola. Diego Columbus had given him a commission as Vice-Governor of Darien, so that as Darien was clearly within Diego Columbus's jurisdiction, Balboa was strictly under authority.
Considered merely as a place of residence, the isthmus was a paradise. A colony placed there could not fail to prosper, even if it had no wealth except what was derived from agriculture. But agriculture was a secondary object in the colonization of Darien.
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