[Footnote 28: Indians distributed to be employed as domestic
servants.]

[Footnote 29: Small pieces of ordnance.]

[Footnote 30: XII, p. 89.]




CHAPTER XI

CALAMITIES--PONCE'S SECOND EXPEDITION TO FLORIDA AND DEATH

1520-1537

Among the calamities referred to by Friar Abbad as visitations of
Providence was one which the Spaniards had brought upon themselves.
Another epidemic raged principally among the Indians. In January, 1519,
the Jerome friars wrote to the Government from la Española: " ... It
has pleased our Lord to send a pestilence of smallpox among the Indians
here, and nearly one-third of them have died. We are told that in the
island of San Juan the Indians have begun to die of the same disease."

Another scourge came in the form of ants. "These insects," says Abbad,
quoting from Herrera, "destroyed the yucca or casabe, of which the
natives made their bread, and killed the most robust trees by eating
into their roots, so that they turned black, and became so infected
that the birds would not alight on them. The fields were left barren
and waste as if fire from heaven had descended on them. These insects