that they should redound to the profit of their subjects. He granted
universal permission to work the mines, exacting only an eleventh of the
produce for the crown. To prevent any diminution in the revenue, it became
necessary, of course, to increase the quantity of gold collected. He
obliged the caciques, therefore, to furnish each Spaniard with Indians, to
assist him both in the labors of the field and of the mine. To carry this
into more complete effect, he made an enumeration of the natives of the
island, reduced them into classes, and distributed them, according to his
favor or caprice, among the colonists. The latter, at his suggestion,
associated themselves in partnerships of two persons each, who were to
assist one another with their respective capitals and Indians, one
superintending the labors of the field, and the other the search for gold.
The only injunction of Bobadilla was, to produce large quantities of ore.
He had one saying continually in his mouth, which shows the pernicious and
temporizing principle upon which he acted: "Make the most of your time,"
he would say, "there is no knowing how long it will last," alluding to the
possibility of his being speedily recalled. The colonists acted up to his
advice, and so hard did they drive the poor natives, that the eleventh
yielded more revenue to the crown than had ever been produced by the third
under the government of Columbus. In the meantime, the unhappy natives
suffered under all kinds of cruelties from their inhuman taskmasters.
Little used to labor, feeble of constitution, and accustomed in their
beautiful and luxuriant island to a life of ease and freedom, they sank
under the toils imposed upon them, and the severities by which they were
enforced. Las Casas gives an indignant picture of the capricious tyranny
exercised over the Indians by worthless Spaniards, many of whom had been
transported convicts from the dungeons of Castile. These wretches, who in
their own countries had been the vilest among the vile, here assumed the
tone of grand cavaliers. They insisted upon being attended by trains of
servants. They took the daughters and female relations of caciques for