Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 24, 2025
The queen, we see, thus endeavored to make the inquiry as easy and friendly as possible for the great navigator. But the Royal Commissioner, Don Juan Agnado, acted like many another man suddenly vested with authority; he carried it with a higher hand than kings themselves!
We have already read of the high-handed manner in which Juan de Agnado acted some years before when sent out to investigate; but, by comparison with Bobadilla, Agnado had been gentleness itself. Bobadilla was a stern and rigorous churchman, comendador, or commander, of one of the famous religious-military orders in Spain.
Arriving at Isabella at the moment when the Admiral was trying to capture the chief Caonabo in the interior of the island, Agnado snubbed Bartholomew Columbus, threw several officials into prison, put himself at the head of the garrison, and announced that he was going inland after the Admiral!
Bartholomew Columbus, whom the sovereigns had appointed lord lieutenant for life, had not been a very wise governor, as will soon be apparent. It was only a little while before the Admiral sailed home with Agnado that gold mines had been discovered on the south coast of Espanola.
Columbus, who had received word of Agnado's advent into Isabella, hurried to meet him there. Seeing himself in a sorry plight, he told Agnado that he would immediately go back to Spain and answer his sovereigns' inquiries in person. This was in October, 1495. But all sorts of ill luck prevented his going.
A frightful hurricane tore over the island and sank the four vessels which Agnado had brought; then a wanderer came in with tales of a real gold mine in the south of the island and the report had to be investigated. Next, the several forts which had been built had to be strengthened and stocked with provisions; so that it was not till March, 1496, that the Admiral was ready to sail.
Nearly two and one half years had passed since he and Agnado had left the island in the hands of their successor, Bartholomew Columbus. During that time no change for the better had come to it. The mistakes on the part of officers, and the rebellions on the part of the people, now made a longer list than ever.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking