which was consolidated by the marriage of his daughter with Columbus's
native interpreter. It was useless, how ever, to try and make friends
with Caonabo, that fierce irreconcilable; and it was felt that only by
stratagem could he be secured. No sooner was this suggested than Ojeda
volunteered for the service. Amid the somewhat slow-moving figures of
our story this man appears as lively as a flea; and he dances across our
pages in a sensation of intrepid feats of arms that make his great
popularity among the Spaniards easily credible to us. He did not know
what fear was; he was always ready for a fight of any kind; a quarrel in
the streets of Madrid, a duel, a fight with a man or a wild beast,
a brawl in a tavern or a military expedition, were all the same to him,
if only they gave him an opportunity for fighting. He had a little
picture of the Virgin hung round his neck, by which he swore, and to
which he prayed; he had never been so much as scratched in all his
affrays, and he believed that he led a charmed life. Who would go out
against Caonabo, the Goliath of the island? He, little David Ojeda, he
would go out and undertake to fetch the giant back with him; and all he
wanted was ten men, a pair of handcuffs, a handful of trinkets, horses
for the whole of his company, and his little image or picture of the
Virgin.

Columbus may have smiled at this proposal, but he knew his man; and Ojeda
duly departed with his horses and his ten men. Plunging into the forest,
he made his way through sixty leagues of dense undergrowth until he
arrived in the very heart of Caonabo's territory and presented himself at
the chiefs house. The chief was at home, and, not unimpressed by the
valour of Ojeda, who represented himself as coming on a friendly mission,
received him under conditions of truce. He had an eye for military
prowess, this Caonabo, and something of the lion's heart in him; he
recognised in Ojeda the little man who kept him so long at bay outside