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Updated: May 15, 2025
The city of Isabella having made considerable progress, the church being open for service, Columbus prepared to lead an expedition to the mountains of Cibao. Jealousy of Columbus' superior merits and the rewards he had received had been for some time rankling in the hearts of some of his officers.
His nephew occupied important cabinet positions under the new administration. The general opposition to President Victoria and to the method of electing him found expression in revolutionary uprisings throughout the country, especially in the Cibao and Azua. Ex-President Vasquez, ex-President Morales and several Jimenista generals took the field independently.
At last, after passing mountain ranges that made their hearts faint, and rich valleys that made them hopeful again, the explorers came to the mountains of Cibao, and passing over the first range found themselves in a little valley at the foot of the hills where a river wound round a fertile plain and there was ample accommodation for an encampment.
The difficulty of land transportation explains why, with the exception of three cities in the Cibao, all important towns are located on the seacoast. It also makes plain why water transportation is preferred to travel by land, and the inhabitants of the north and south await the bi-weekly steamer rather than make the trip overland, which in the most favorable cases will take about three days.
Two governments were now established, General Ignacio Maria Gonzalez being proclaimed president in the Cibao, and General Cesareo Guillermo in Santo Domingo. An agreement was reached by them on April 13, 1878, and Guillermo became provisional president of the entire country.
Columbus immediately despatched Bartholomew with a party to examine the mines; and sure enough they found in the river Hayna undoubted evidence of a wealth far in excess of that contained in the Cibao gold-mines. Moreover, they had noticed two ancient excavations about which the natives could tell them nothing, but which made them think that the mines had once been worked.
He, though obliged to respect and honour the admiral, who had left him the command of 360 foot and 14 horse, with orders to travel all over the island, and to reduce it to the obedience of their Catholic Majesties and the Christians, particularly the province of Cibao, whence the chief profit was expected; yet acted in every thing contrary to his orders and instructions, insomuch, that when the admiral was gone, he went with all his men to the great plain called Vega Real, or the Royal Plain, ten leagues from Isabella, where he remained without ever endeavouring to traverse and reduce the island.
During this time the Admiral despatched some thirty of his men in different directions to explore the district of Cipangu, which is still called Cibao. This is a mountainous region covered with rocks and occupying the centre of the island, where, the natives explained by signs, gold is obtained in abundance. The Admiral's explorers brought back marvellous reports of the riches of the country.
After proceeding about thirty leagues, he came to the river Neyva, which, issuing from the mountains of Cibao, divides the southern side of the island. Crossing this stream, he dispatched two parties of ten men each along the sea-coast in search of brazil-wood. They found great quantities, and felled many trees, which they stored in the Indian cabins, until they could be taken away by sea.
The real campaigns and expressions of the people's will have therefore been the revolutions, and politics and revolutions have thus come to be regarded as going hand in hand. In a town of the Cibao an expression of the garrulous landlady of the inn attracted my attention. The old lady, after regaling me with the local gossip, started with her own troubles.
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