war. The cultivation of the earth had been generally neglected; several of
the provinces had been desolated during the late troubles; a great part of
the Indians had fled to the mountains, and those who remained had lost all
heart to labor, seeing the produce of their toils liable to be wrested
from them by ruthless strangers. It is true, the Vega was once more
tranquil, but it was a desolate tranquillity. That beautiful region, which
the Spaniards but four years before had found so populous and happy,
seeming to inclose in its luxuriant bosom all the sweets of nature, and to
exclude all the cares and sorrows of the world, was now a scene of
wretchedness and repining. Many of those Indian towns, where the Spaniards
had been detained by genial hospitality, and almost worshiped as
beneficent deities, were now silent and deserted. Some of their late
inhabitants were lurking among rocks and caverns; some were reduced to
slavery; many had perished with hunger, and many had fallen by the sword.
It seems almost incredible, that so small a number of men, restrained too
by well-meaning governors, could in so short a space of time have produced
such wide-spreading miseries. But the principles of evil have a fatal
activity. With every exertion, the best of men can do but a moderate
amount of good; but it seems in the power of the most contemptible
individual to do incalculable mischief.

The evil passions of the white men, which had inflicted such calamities
upon this innocent people, had insured likewise a merited return of
suffering to themselves. In no part was this more truly exemplified than
among the inhabitants of Isabella, the most idle, factious, and dissolute
of the island. The public works were unfinished; the gardens and fields
they had begun to cultivate lay neglected: they had driven the natives
from their vicinity by extortion and cruelty, and had rendered the country
around them a solitary wilderness. Too idle to labor, and destitute of any
resources with which to occupy their indolence, they quarrelled among