After the expedition spotted land on Oct. 12, friendly Arawak Indians greeted the ships. In exchange for bringing back riches to Spain's monarchs, Columbus had been promised 10 percent of all profits and governorship of the land he grabbed. In 1495, Indians were shipped to Spain as slaves, many dying. But far more Indians were enslaved in their homelands to harvest gold from bits of dust found in streams. Almost all were dead in two generations.
History tells a different story.
But Las Casas had a change of heart. He described a cooperative Indian society in a bountiful land, a generally peaceful culture that occasionally went to war with other tribes. Yet there'd been no subjugation of the kind brought by Columbus. My eyes have seen these acts so foreign to human nature, and now I tremble as I write. It's true that Columbus was a gifted navigator, personally brave and tenacious.