Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Now, The Island Of Cuba, With The Same
Ciudades And Villas Which It Possesses At Present, Had Not In 1762
More than 200,000 inhabitants; and yet, among a people treated like
slaves, exposed to the violence and brutality of
Their masters, to
excess of labour, want of nourishment, and the ravages of the
small-pox - forty-two years would not suffice to obliterate all but the
remembrance of their misfortunes on the earth. In several of the
Lesser Antilles the population diminishes under English domination
five and six per cent annually; at Cuba, more than eight per cent; but
the annihilation of 200,000 in forty-two years supposes an annual loss
of twenty-six per cent, a loss scarcely credible, although we may
suppose that the mortality of the natives of Cuba was much greater
than that of negroes bought at a very high price.
In studying the history of the island we observe that the movement of
colonization has been from east to west; and that here, as everywhere
in the Spanish colonies, the places first peopled are now the most
desert. The first establishment of the whites was in 1511 when,
according to the orders of Don Diego Columbus, together with the
conquistador and poblador Velasquez, he landed at Puerto de Palmas,
near Cape Maysi, then called Alfa y Omega, and subdued the cacique
Hatuey who, an emigrant and fugitive from Hayti, had withdrawn to the
eastern part of the island of Cuba, and had become the chief of a
confederation of petty native princes. The building of the town of
Baracoa was begun in 1512; and later, Puerto Principe, Trinidad, the
Villa de Santo Espiritu, Santiago de Cuba (1514), San Salvador de
Bayamo, and San Cristoval de la Havana. This last town was originally
founded in 1515 on the southern coast of the island, in the Partido of
Guines, and transferred, four years later, to Puerto de Carenas, the
position of which at the entrance of the two channels of Bahama (el
Viejo y de Nuevo) appears to be much more favourable to commerce than
the coast on the south-west of Batabano.* (* A tree is still shown at
the Havannah (at Puerto de Carenas) under the shade of which the
Spaniards celebrated their first mass. The island, now called
officially The ever-faithful island of Cuba, was after its discovery
named successively Juana Fernandina, Isla de Santiago, and Isla del
Ave Maria. Its arms date from the year 1516.) The progress of
civilization since the sixteenth century has had a powerful influence
on the relations of the castes with each other; these relations vary
in the districts which contain only farms for cattle, and in those
where the soil has been long cleared; in the sea-ports and inland
towns, in the spots where colonial produce is cultivated, and in such
as produce maize, vegetables and forage.
Until the latter part of the eighteenth century the number of female
slaves in the sugar plantations of Cuba was extremely limited; and
what may appear surprising is that a prejudice, founded on religious
scruples, opposed the introduction of women, whose price at the
Havannah was generally one-third less than that of men.
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