civil and criminal penalties." This evidently had reference to the persons
of Roldan and his followers, who were then in arms, and against whom
Columbus had sent home complaints; and this, by a violent construction,
Bobadilla seems to have wrested into an authority for seizing the person
of the admiral himself. In fact, in the whole course of his proceedings,
he reversed and confounded the order of his instructions. His first step
should have been to proceed against the rebels; this he made the last. His
last step should have been, in case of ample evidence against the admiral,
to have superseded him in office; and this he made the first, without
waiting for evidence. Having predetermined, from the very outset, that
Columbus was in the wrong, by the same rule he had to presume that all the
opposite parties were in the right. It became indispensable to his own
justification to inculpate the admiral and his brothers; and the rebels he
had been sent to judge became, by this, singular perversion of rule,
necessary and cherished evidences, to criminate those against whom they
had rebelled.

The intentions of the crown, however, are not to be vindicated at the
expense of its miserable agent. If proper respect had been felt for the
rights and dignities of Columbus, Bobadilla would never have been
intrusted with powers so extensive, undefined, and discretionary; nor
would he have dared to proceed to such lengths, with such rudeness and
precipitation, had he not felt assured that it would not be displeasing to
the jealous-minded Ferdinand.

The old scenes of the time of Aguado were now renewed with tenfold
virulence, and the old charges revived, with others still more
extravagant. From the early and never-to-be-forgotten outrage upon
Castilian pride, of compelling hidalgos, in time of emergency, to labor in
the construction of works necessary to the public safety, down to the