The investigation did not take place until November, 1573. Though brief it was thorough and searching. But it disclosed little that was to the discredit of Menendez, and nothing that was really serious. He seems to have been a somewhat gloomy and cruel fanatic, but a man of integrity and singular loyalty to his sovereign and his faith. He was zealous and energetic, but better fitted to command a ship or a fleet, or indeed an army, than to govern a state. Yet in both respects he failed. His chief concern in Cuba, as we have seen, was to promote her military defences; but he left La Fuerza incomplete, while the inestimable economic potentialities of the island were altogether neglected. So in Florida, he aimed at conquest with the sword and little else; and while he succeeded in holding the land against French assaults and intrigues, he did not develop there a colony comparable with those which were being developed elsewhere in the New World; and he had the mortification of seeing, in the closing years of his life, French, Dutch and British privateers swarming in defiance of him the seas which Spain claimed for her exclusive own.
It was just a month after the beginning of the investigation into his affairs that Menendez was superseded in office by the appointment as governor of Cuba of Don Gabriel Montalvo. This gentleman was a nobleman of great distinction in Spain. He was a Knight of the Order of Saint James, and he was also high sheriff of the Court of the Holy Inquisition in the city of Granada. The latter office indicates him to have been a man after the King's own heart. It remains to be added that Menendez returned to Spain after being superseded, and died there a few months later, at Santander; men said, of a broken heart at the enforced abandonment of his ambitions in Florida.
Little either attractive or grateful is to be found in the record of the condition of Cuba during the administration of Menendez, or as he left it to his successor. Rich as the island was in agricultural possibilities—it might well have been said of Cuba as Douglas Jerrold said of Australia, "Earth is here so kind, that just tickle her with a hoe and she laughs with a harvest"—and few as were its inhabitants, it yet produced not enough to feed those few. It produced nothing with which to clothe them. After the decline of gold mining, the raising of cattle became the chief industry; chiefly for their hides, which were an important article of export. Bayamo was the centre of this industry, and was also the centre of a thriving but illegitimate commerce.
In fact the whole southeastern part of the Cuban coast was the resort of contraband traders, who brought thither silks and linens, wines, and sometimes cargoes of slaves, to exchange without paying tariff duties for hides and the valuable woods with which Cuba abounded. No attempt was made, at least with any efficiency, by the governor or the royal officials at Havana to stop this lawless trade. Now and then, however, the Supreme Court at Hispaniola interfered, arrested citizens of Bayamo, Manzanillo, and Santiago itself, and fined them heavily. Then the government at Havana, which had done nothing to enforce the law, remonstrated and protested against so much money being taken from Cuba to Hispaniola.
The island was, nevertheless, making some progress; appropriately enough through a reversal of the conditions which had formerly involved it in disaster. The Mexican adventure of Cortez had drawn away from Cuba men and resources almost to the exhaustion of the island. But now that country began sending men and means back to Cuba. Cortez had long been dead, but under his successors the wealth of Mexico was being wondrously developed, as was indeed that of Peru and other South American countries. Some of the commerce between South America and Spain went by other routes, though a considerable portion of it passed by the shores of Cuba and utilized that island as a stopping place, to its material benefit. But all the Mexican traffic followed the Cuban route, the most of it passing along the north coast and making Havana a port of call or of refuge. Florida, too, which had likewise drawn much from Cuba, was now sending men and supplies back to the island.
By 1575 Havana was the commercial metropolis of the West Indies, and it had for some years been the practical capital of the island, though Santiago continued nominally to enjoy that distinction until 1589. Vessels from Vera Cruz, bearing the treasures of New Spain, and from Nombre de Dios, laden with the wealth of Castilla del Oro and of Peru, thronged the harbor, and contributed to the trade of the city. To meet the requirements of the thousands of transient visitors, houses in the city were multiplied in number, and plantations in the suburbs extended their borders. The people began to realize how profitable a business was to be conducted in providing supplies of food for the ships' companies. And while the southeastern part of the island was, as we have seen, in a backward condition, the northwestern part entered upon an era of progress and prosperity.
DonGabrielMontalvowas appointed to be Governor of Cuba early in December, 1573. As was the custom in those days, however, he delayed for some time actual assumption of office, so that it was not until October 29, 1574, that he entered upon his duties. He was also charged with some important duties in Florida, but they were subordinate to those in Cuba. He made his home in the island and spent most of his time there. Indeed, he seems to have planned to make his home at Santiago, and to restore that place to its former prestige. On coming to Cuba he landed at Manzanillo instead of coming to Havana, and sent Diego de Soto to be his representative, practically deputy governor, at the latter place. From Manzanillo he went straight to Santiago, refurbished the governor's house and the public buildings, and began planning an elaborate system of harbor defences worthy of the capital of the island. He was naturally received with great joy by the people of Santiago and of the eastern end of the island generally, who saw in him, as they thought, a promise of restoration of that region to its former importance.
From Santiago the governor set out on a tour of the eastern cities and towns, and had got as far as Bayamo when there came a hurried and urgent appeal for him to come to Havana. There was trouble in the city. Diego de Soto, the deputy governor there, had made Gomez de Rojas commander of La Fuerza—that reckless and truculent younger brother of Juan de Rojas whom Governor Mazariegos had once exiled from the island for disorderly if not criminal conduct. Now Gomez de Rojas was a land owner, and therefore, under the law, ineligible thus to serve. But confiding in the powerful influence of his family he ignored the law and held his place in defianceof all protests and demands for his retirement. The town council demanded his retirement, and the populace of Havana raged against him, but he shut himself up in the unfinished fort, trained his guns against the town, and prepared to resist with force any attempt which might be made by force to compel his resignation.
Such was the emergency which sent a message post haste to the new governor asking him to hasten to Havana. He came, and at his coming Gomez de Rojas capitulated without a blow. Montalvo rebuked him severely and imposed upon him a heavy fine, which was paid. But in this the governor incurred the hostility of the Rojas family. The feud was taken up by Juan Bautista de Rojas, who had succeeded his cousin Juan de Ynestrosa, deceased, as royal treasurer. This official charged the governor with conniving with smugglers and receivers of smuggled goods, and also with those who exported goods to countries with which traffic was prohibited, and on that account demanded for himself the right to inspect vessels and their cargoes; a function which had been exercised by the governor.
This demand was curtly rejected by Montalvo, who appears to have been a stickler for dignity and technical rights. Thereupon De Rojas made appeal to the King, coupling the appeal with a detailed and bitter arraignment of the governor and an impeachment of his integrity. This seems to have impressed the king deeply, for he presently decided the controversy in favor of his own treasurer. He sent word to the governor that thereafter he should not inspect or even visit ships, but should leave that whole business in the hands of the royal treasurer. The advantage thus gained was mercilessly pressed by the Rojas family, with the purpose of compelling the retirement of Montalvo. They accused him of employing for his own private work slaves belonging to the crown and intended for employment on La Fuerza and other public works. They charged him specifically with having made Bartolome Morales a notary for a consideration of five hundred ducats; a transaction the evil of which consisted not in selling the appointment for cash, but in selling it for so little to a favored friend when it might have been sold to someone else for twice as much. Finally he was accused of corruption and maladministration in connection with La Fuerza, in that he had appointed friends to places at exorbitant salaries, and that he had ignored the suggestions of the royal officials in completing the plans of the fort.
These charges were serious, and there is reason to think that some of them, at least, were true. The Rojas family made them and repeated them to the king, again and again, until that monarch was constrained to remark that the time seemed to be near at hand when an investigation would have to be ordered, and Montalvo's administration be brought to a close. Nevertheless the king's favorable disposition toward Montalvo was potent, and prevailed. The governor had been appointed, as was the custom, for the specific term of four years, reckoned from the date of his appointment and not of his actual assumption of office, and the king delayed calling for an investigation until the four years were so nearly expired that they would be entirely filled out by the time the investigation was completed and a new governor was ready to take the place.
The order for the investigation was given in February, 1577, and at the same time, on February 13, Captain Francisco Carreño was named to succeed Montalvo as governor. The investigation was vigorously prosecuted, and some of the charges against Montalvo were proved. Yet so great was the king's personal regard for him that he was permitted to go with a nominal fine, and was retained in the royal service in important capacities for some years thereafter. He remained governor of Cuba until the accession of his successor, which did not occur until June 2, 1578.
The administration of Montalvo was unfavorably marked by three things. One was, the continuance of thecontraband trade already referred to, in both imports and exports; in which, as already related, the governor himself was charged with participating. Montalvo at any rate gave the appearance of striving to suppress it. He sent agents to investigate the business, some of whom found their own relatives engaged in it and therefore refrained from reporting upon it, and some were prevented by the people from executing that for which they had been sent. Not merely the people, but the local officials all along the southeastern coast did all in their power to hamper and prevent investigation or any interference with the contraband trade. Indeed, alcaldes and other officials were foremost among those engaged in the unlawful commerce.
The second feature of the administration was the persistent ravages of the French. Despite the fact that they were engaged in contraband trade with the people of Cuba, the French were at this time the most frequent raiders of Cuban coast towns; sometimes directing their attacks against the very towns in which they had been peacefully trading, while the people were quite ready at any time to trade with those who just before had visited them with fire and sword and demands for ransom. It was a curious circumstance that by far the most efficient guardian of Cuba against such raids was that same Gomez de Rojas who had been exiled by Mazariegos and who had illegally assumed command of La Fuerza and had bitterly quarreled with Montalvo. After being compelled to leave La Fuerza he had taken to seafaring, and as commander of a Spanish vessel he drove more than one French privateer away from the neighborhood of Havana.
Montalvo was the first to urge that Cuba be protected not alone with land fortifications and batteries but also by naval vessels. Particularly he wished for a powerful war-galley, which the king did not provide him. In 1576 French raiders attacked Santiago, and were with difficulty repulsed; upon which Montalvo sarcastically reported that if another such attack occurred he wouldhimself be relieved of the necessity of fortifying the harbor and city of Santiago, for the place would cease to exist. A little later a daring French raid was made upon Spanish shipping just outside the harbor of Havana. This greatly incensed Montalvo, and caused him to renew his pleadings for a galley. He urged that the whole Cuban coast should be patrolled by light, swift vessels, preferably frigates, and that strong galleys should be stationed at the chief ports. He would have had the frigates, at any rate, built in Cuba and at least partly paid for by that island; but the Havana municipal council protested against this, demanding that Cuba be entirely exempted from the costs of defending her from enemies. The result was that in the lack of means of defence Cuba suffered more and more from the ravages of privateers and freebooters, which became more frequent as the island increased in population and wealth and thus became better worth raiding.
The third unfavorable feature of the time was the haggling over La Fuerza. Begun by De Soto, and later almost entirely rebuilt, that famous fortress seemed to be under some malign spell which made it a source of injury rather than of benefit to Havana. Year after year passed, appropriation after appropriation was made and expended, and still it remained unfinished. Man after man undertook the task of completing it, only to fail and lose his personal reputation either for efficiency or for honesty. Moreover, as the work proceeded grave faults were developed, both in plan and in construction. The fort, which at first had been denounced as needlessly large, was seen to be entirely too small to shelter a garrison sufficient for the defence of Havana. The original design had been to make it a shelter to which all the people of the town could flee in case of attack, and it might have served this purpose at a time when the people of Havana were numbered by scores, or at most by a hundred or two. But with the figures extending into thousands it became evident that La Fuerza wasentirely inadequate to any such purpose. Indeed, it was realized that that design was ill-conceived, for if the place was to grow into a considerable city it would be impracticable and undesirable to make any fortification large enough to hold all the population.
The construction was also faulty. The fort was built of stone, but there had thoughtlessly been chosen for the purpose a stone which had the advantages of being plentiful and so soft as to be easily worked. Unhappily it had also the very serious disadvantages of being so soft that it would probably soon be battered to fragments by cannon balls, and of being so porous that water soaked into and through it as through a sponge. During the rainy season the place was flooded, water standing in pools on the floor, and the magazine being so wet that gunpowder could not be kept there without spoiling; wherefore another building, of wood, had to be provided for that purpose. The same kind of stone was used, moreover, for the reservoir which was to provide fort and city with water, with the result that its contents quickly leaked out. There arose a proverbial saying in the city that the powder magazine was always wet and the water reservoir was always dry; and it was sarcastically proposed that the functions of the two be exchanged. The powder would be kept dry in the reservoir, and there would always be plenty of water in the magazine! Nor was this the only error in construction. The whole structure was said to be dangerously weak, so that if all its guns should be fired simultaneously, the shock might tumble the walls into ruin. The guns were available for use in only a narrow zone; they were of too short range to carry to the other extremity of the harbor, and they were so placed that they could not be depressed so as to hit vessels which had come close in toward the water front of the city. Therefore a hostile ship with long range guns could lie out of reach of La Fuerza and bombard the fort and city at will. Or one could sail swiftly in, running the gantlet of the narrowzone of fire, and gain a place under the walls of the fort where it would be quite safe for the guns of the latter while it could use its own at short range with deadly effect. It was also complained that the parapet was too low to afford shelter to the men serving the guns, and that the four big wooden gates were a source of fatal weakness.
It was presently perceived, too, that fortifications elsewhere than in the heart of the city were needed for adequate defence of the place. Especially were such works needed at the headlands commanding the entrance to the harbor. Without them, a daring enemy might seize one of those spots, bring up some long range guns from his ships, and have not only Havana but La Fuerza itself at his mercy. Montalvo appears to have recognized this need, and to have urged the construction of such forts, especially on the Cabañas hill, but to no avail. Instead, the royal government proposed the construction of a strong wall around the entire city, including the water front. It actually ordered that work to be undertaken, the first step being to destroy a large part of the city, including the church, to make room for the wall. Against this suicidal policy Montalvo effectively protested, declaring that if the city were thus demolished it would never be rebuilt, and also pointing out that the day of walled cities was past. In the face of his representations the wall scheme was abandoned; but his wise suggestions of forts commanding the harbor were not acted upon until years afterward.
It is to be recorded to his credit that Montalvo gave more attention than his immediate predecessors had done to development of some of the natural resources of the island. He interested himself in forestry, and soon had an immense trade in timber and lumber between Cuba and Spain. The exquisite cabinet work of the Escurial, in Spain, was made of wood from the forests of Cuba—mahogany, ebony, ironwood, cedar, and what not. Wood was supplied for other purposes, too, notably for ship-building. It was at this time that interest arose in the great island just off the southern coast, which at that time was so richly clad with pine forests as to receive from Montalvo on that account its present name of "Isle of Pines." During the administration of Menendez the whole island was granted to Alfonso de Rojas for a cattle range, a purpose for which it was admirably adapted, and there are legends to the effect that the water between the Isle of Pines and Cuba was at times so shallow as to make it possible to drive herds of cattle across from the one land to the other. It is to be observed, in passing, that thus early in history was the Isle of Pines recognized as an integral part of Cuba.
Montalvo also did much to promote agriculture, and the raising of swine. He endeavored to revive interest in both gold and copper mining, and seems to have been persuaded that there were enormously rich deposits of the former metal hidden somewhere on the island, in places known only to the natives. He strove diligently and persistently to get from the few surviving Indians information concerning these mines, but in vain. If the Indians knew, they would not tell; but it seems altogether probable that they did not know, and that no such mineral wealth existed on the island.
It was in Montalvo's time, too, that what was destined to become Cuba's greatest industry had its permanent establishment. At various times and places thitherto men had experimented with sugar growing and manufacture, with varying degrees of success. But every such undertaking had after a while been abandoned, either for lack of profit or because of the superior attractions of something else. It was not until 1576 that plantations were established which were never to be abandoned but were to continue in cultivation down to this present time, and that sugar mills of similar permanence were put into operation. The scene of this epochal enterprise was the region around Havana, particularly between Havana and Matanzas. There in the year named at least three millswere established, a fact indicating that a considerable area was planted in cane. These mills were of the most primitive description, each consisting of three wooden rollers, formed of logs of trees denuded of the bark, mounted in a rude frame of timber, and caused to revolve by a long pole of which one end was fastened to the end of one of the upright rollers while to the other was hitched a mule or an ox, which walked in a circle around the "mill." The expressed juice was caught in trays or jars of earthenware, and then was boiled in open pans. The sugar thus produced was not refined beyond the stage of what would now be considered a very coarse brown sugar, but it served the uses of the island. It does not appear that any considerable quantity was exported until a number of years later. These primitive establishments in 1576 were, however, the beginning of Cuba's gigantic sugar industry.
One other incident of Montalvo's administration must be recalled, to wit, his quarrel with the church, or at least with the Bishop. Diego Sarmiento, who became Bishop in De Soto's time, had been gathered to his fathers, and had been succeeded by Bishop Durango. The latter had in turn died, and in 1560 had been succeeded by Bernardino de Villapando, who spent only three years in the island and then departed for Mexico under unpleasant charges of embezzlement of funds. The charges against him do not appear to have been pressed, nor did they affect his standing in the church, for he was presently transferred to the then much more important see of Guatemala. Moreover, despite the charges made against him, he was recognized as a most energetic and successful prelate. He established many mission stations throughout the island, and expedited the completion of the cathedral at Santiago.
Upon his promotion to Guatemala after three years' service Bishop Villapando was succeeded by Juan de Burgos, who continued with much success the work of his predecessor. He secured the erection of a large churchschool on the site now occupied by the Hospital of San Juan de Dios, at Havana, and there the famous missionary preachers and teachers, Juan Roger and Francisco Villaroel, gave instruction to Indian youths in the Christian religion and in the Spanish tongue. In connection with this school there was built the church of San Juan de Dios, and from the establishment thus founded by Bishop Burgos grew the first hospital in Havana. It took originally the form of a military hospital, for the soldiers of the Havana garrison and for soldiers in transit to or from Florida, Mexico and other places. It is recorded that for his work Bishop Burgos depended entirely upon the offerings of the people; demonstrating what could be accomplished by an honest and businesslike administrator.
The next Bishop of Cuba was Pedro del Castillo, who came to the island from the University of Salamanca. He was a most aggressive and strenuous prelate, with policies of his own and with the courage to enforce them. Arriving in Cuba in 1570, he glanced at Santiago when he landed there, crossed the island to Havana, where he spent a little time, and then proceeded to Bayamo, where he established his home, preferring that to any other city of Cuba. He then laid claim to the island of Jamaica as a part of his bishopric, and succeeded in carrying that point despite the opposition of the Archbishop at Hispaniola. Then he complained that the royal officials were not properly collecting the tithes, or at any rate were not paying him his proper revenue; wherefore he himself began collecting the tithes. This brought him into conflict with the crown, a circumstance which did not alarm him nor swerve him from his course. He made a number of appointments of the clergy under him which he deemed to be for the good of their parishes but which made him unpopular with them. Also he incurred much unpopularity among the people by his insistence upon certain reforms in their morals.
This strenuous policy presently led Castillo intoconflict with Montalvo. The Governor thought that the Bishop ought to reside at Santiago, where were his official residence and also the Cathedral. Castillo refused to do so, on the nominal ground that he considered Santiago an unhealthful spot. There is reason to suspect, however, that he preferred Bayamo because of certain very rich legacies which had been left years before for the erection of a masonry church and parochial school at that place. The provisions of these wills had not been carried out, and the strenuous Bishop set himself to the task of finding out why the church and school had not been built, and of getting possession of the legacies and administering them himself. In the litigation which ensued he quarrelled with Montalvo so bitterly that he excommunicated him; an act which the governor did not take greatly to heart. The strife between the two accentuated, however, the antagonism between church and state which was even at that early time beginning to prevail.
SAN FRANCISCO CHURCH
One of the most ancient of the many ecclesiastical edifices in Havana, built in 1575 and rebuilt in 1731, and presenting a singularly perfect and characteristic example of ancient Spanish architecture. In late years it was used by the Government for a custom house, and post office. The illustration presents it in its earlier aspect with its former surroundings restored.
SAN FRANCISCO CHURCH
Itwould be easy for the reflective historian to engage in many interesting and pertinent observations concerning the time in which Captain Francisco Carreño became governor of Cuba. It was the year 1577. That was the year in which the sixth religious war in France began, a struggle which made inevitable the still greater religious wars which followed, in which not merely two factions in France but the two great powers of Spain and England were the chief belligerents. That was the year, too, in which Sir Francis Drake began his voyage around the world, which was perhaps the most momentous since that of Columbus in 1492, since it led directly to the strife between Spain and England in America, the English conquest of Cuba, the foundation of the English colonies in North America, and the subsequent development of the United States; all having the most direct and important bearing upon the fortunes of Cuba.
Albeit he was a native of that city of Cadiz in the harbor of which Drake performed one of his most daring and most famous feats, Carreño probably entered upon his governorship with no premonitions of what was in store. While Drake was furrowing the strange expanses of the South Sea, it was French privateers that chiefly troubled the Spanish Main and menaced the ports of Cuba. Their favorite cruising ground was in the waters between Cuba and Jamaica, and between Cuba and Hispaniola, and their menace to Cuba was chiefly to the ports between Cape Maysi and Cape Cruz, and in the Gulf of Guacanabo. The chief sufferers, as also the chief gainers from contraband trade, were Santiago, Manzanillo, and the settlements at the mouth of the Guantanamo River. The people of those places were neversure whether an approaching French vessel was bent on contraband trade or war and plunder; and indeed the Frenchman himself sometimes left that question to be answered after he had landed and viewed the place. He then decided which would be the more profitable, to trade with the people or to plunder them. At times, too, it must be confessed, the Spaniards were in similar uncertainty whether to receive the French as traders or to slay them—if they could—as enemies.
Carreño was the first governor of Cuba to die in office, his death occurring on April 27, 1579. His administration thus lasted only two years; but they were years filled with hard work on his part and with much progress for the island. The sugar industry which had been founded in the preceding administration prospered and expanded, and caused a considerable increase in slave-holding. Negro slaves were the favorite workmen on the plantations and at the mills, and a large number of them was needed at each establishment. The increase in the number of slaves caused, however, some anxiety lest there should be servile insurrections, such as had occurred on the Isthmus of Panama, in Mexico and elsewhere; so that in 1579 the government refused to permit any more to be imported, even though they were wanted by the governor himself. It is recorded that his personal request for a thousand negroes to work at copper mining was refused by the King, or by the Council for the Indies.
Anxiety was caused, also, by the increasing number of free negroes, and of slaves who were practically free. Most of the entirely free negroes had been slaves but had bought their freedom from their masters for cash. This was not particularly difficult, since the market value of the best negro slaves at that time was only from fifty to sixty pesos. Those practically free were slaves who were permitted by their owners to live where they pleased and work as they pleased, on condition of paying their masters certain royalties every week or month. InCarreño's time there were hundreds of negroes of these classes in and about Havana, and probably still more of them in the eastern end of the island. The anxiety concerning them arose from two causes. One was, the fear that they might incite the slaves to insurrection, placing themselves at the head of the movement; a fear which was not at that time realized. The other was, the fear that they would build up objectionable communities. Thus in Havana they occupied a quarter of the town by themselves, in which their wooden cabins were huddled closely together; the sanitary conditions were bad; and the danger of fire which might imperil the whole town was obviously imminent. There was in Carreño's time a movement to procure their deportation to Florida or elsewhere, and to forbid the residence of free negroes in Cuba; but it did not become effective.
It is agreeable to remember that in spite of the obviously objectionable nature of the institution of slavery, and in spite of the fears and anxieties which have been mentioned, negro slavery in Cuba in those early days was not marked with the distressing features which it has elsewhere borne. It was probably more humane than it was two and a half centuries later in the United States. The slaves were seldom sold by one master to another, and never in circumstances which separated husband and wife, or parents and young children. Severe physical punishments were prohibited. Their masters were compelled to feed them well, and to provide them with decent and comfortable clothes. There was no personal or social prejudice against them, but they were permitted to attend church and to frequent all public places on equal terms with the Spaniards. Ordinarily they were not permitted to carry weapons; but those who occupation seemed to make it desirable for them to be armed, such as cattle-rangers, and messengers travelling from one part of the island to another, were permitted to bear arms just as white men would have done. Moreover, the free negroes were called upon equally with the whites to serve assentinels on the water fronts of cities, and were of course provided with arms. There are no authentic records of intermarriage between Spaniards and negroes, yet neither is there any proof that it did not occasionally occur. We have already seen that amalgamation with the Indians was not unknown, and in other Spanish colonies of those and later days there were some fusions with African blood.
What is chiefly to be remembered, however, is that negroes, although enslaved, were regarded in Cuba as human beings, with immortal souls, no less than their masters, and that they were invariably so treated. There was no pretence that they were of an intrinsically inferior race, or that they were suffering from the primaeval curse of Canaan or of Ham. And when they gained their freedom and became educated, they were treated socially and politically according to their merits, without regard for the color of their skin.
In the most literal sense, the administration of Carreño was marked with constructive statesmanship. As a statesman this Governor set about enlarging and improving Havana and other cities, and providing them with public and private buildings commensurate with the needs of an increasing population. He laid out enough of the streets of Havana to establish for all time the plan of that city. He encouraged the building of houses, or at any rate discouraged the holding of town sites unimproved, by making distributions of lots to all who wished them, on condition that the owners would promptly build. If they did not build within six months, their titles were forfeited. Another important reform effected by him was the substitution of adobe or other masonry for wood as building material. By the end of his administration fully half of the houses in Havana had walls of masonry, and a considerable number had also tiled roofs.
It was Carreño, too, who began the building of the first custom house in Cuba, at Havana. The king had ordered Montalvo to undertake this enterprise, but heappears to have taken no steps whatever in that direction, not even selecting a site. Carreño essayed the task with characteristic energy. He selected an appropriate site, at the water front and close to the principal wharf, where an excellent rock foundation was to be found, and there he planned to erect a building of solid masonry, seventy feet long and two stories high. The royal government approved the plans, and the work was promptly entered upon.
Finally, it was impossible that the new governor should not be seriously concerned with La Fuerza. Carreño found that long-delayed edifice practically finished, according to the old plans; its though condition was, as hitherto suggested, decidedly unsatisfactory. He began by insisting upon clearing away all buildings of any kind close to the fort. This had been ordered nearly a score of years before but had never been done. The purpose was, of course, to strengthen the fort by leaving no shelter near its walls which might harbor or facilitate the approach of a hostile force. Then he insisted upon building an additional story on La Fuerza. This he declared was necessary, for barracks for the garrison, and for a storage place for gunpowder, the fort proper being flooded more than half the time. Doubtless these needs were real, and Carreño intended to meet them with the new story. Yet it seems also to have been his plan thus to secure for himself living quarters more pleasant than the house which had been assigned to him for that purpose. There was much opposition to his plans for enlarging La Fuerza, but he persisted in them, and they were nearly completed at the time of his death.
During the administration of Governor Carreño the question of the distribution, proprietorship and use of land became of much social and economic importance in Cuba. The population of the Island was still small, and yet because of the immense size of the tracts which many settlers had appropriated for cattle ranges nearly all the accessible and available area had been taken up. In theeastern part of the Island there was practically no unclaimed land left excepting that in the mountains and some almost impenetrable swamps, and already many controversies and not a few forcible conflicts had arisen over rival claims. Thus far no private ownership of land was authorized outside of building sites in the towns and cities. Cattle ranges and farms were held under indefinite leases from the Crown, subject to forfeit if the land were permitted to remain unoccupied and unused for the space of three years. These grants were made by the municipal government in the name of the Crown. At first the tracts thus taken were of unlimited extent and indeed their boundaries were defined in only the vaguest possible manner. The result naturally was that innumerable and interminable conflicts arose over overlapping claims.
To correct such evils and to provide for a more equitable distribution of land in future, Alfonso Caceres, who had been sent to investigate the administration of Governor Menendez, was charged with a complete revision of the land system of the Island and with the prescribing of new rules and regulations for subsequent grants and titles. In entering upon that work he found some settlers holding enormous tracts which they had never attempted to utilize. Of these he summarily voided the titles and assigned the land to others. Such areas were quickly taken up by new comers, in smaller and definitely bounded tracts, so that by the time of Governor Carreño practically the only unoccupied lands of considerable extent and practical value were to be found in the extreme west end of the Island.
Around Havana and some other large municipalities there were reserved unassigned zones of from fifteen to twenty miles in width which were kept practically as public game preserves. No grants of cattle ranges were made in them. But they were infested by many stray cattle and hogs which had escaped from the ranges beyond and were there running at large in practically awild state, and these were regarded as fair game for hunters from the cities. It was, however, insisted that anyone killing such stray animals must bring their hides to market with the ears attached, so as to prove that they were indeed wild strays, since then their ears would be unbranded while all the animals on the ranges had their ears branded with their owner's marks.
The Government wisely desired to encourage agriculture, even at the expense of stock raising, the latter occupation having been expanded disproportionately to the former. It was accordingly provided that grants of land for farming purposes might be made within this hunting zone, and also that such grants might be made of land already apportioned for cattle ranges, the owners of the ranges thus invaded being indemnified by other grants of land elsewhere. By this means a varied agricultural industry was gradually developed to the great advantage of the Island, though for many years cattle raising remained the chief industry. During Carreño's administration more than 20,000 hides were exported yearly, and in the great demand for leather at that time this trade was exceedingly profitable. Of course a large amount of meat was also produced, but the difficulty of preserving it in the warm climate of Cuba caused much of it to go to waste, so that yearly thousands of heads of cattle were slaughtered for their hides alone, their carcasses being left to the dogs and buzzards.
The sudden death of Carreño caused some curious complications in the Government of the Island. As he had been appointed for a definite term of four years, and as that term was scarcely half expired, no successor had yet been chosen for him. In this emergency the Supreme Court of Hispaniola appointed a temporary governor to discharge the functions of the office until the Crown should make a permanent appointment. The choice of the court fell upon a lawyer, Gaspar de Torres. Even he was not appointed until several months after the death of Carreño, and in fact not until after the King had selected a permanent Governor to succeed Carreño. However, as the permanent Governor would not take office until the expiration of the term for which Carreño had been appointed it was necessary for the temporary Governor to fill the vacancy. Torres was appointed in October, 1579, but did not actually assume office until the first of January, 1580. Little is known of his antecedents, but he appears to have been an unworthy member of the legal profession. He was possessed of an itching palm. As a result his brief administration was filled with scandals and with controversies and conflicts, practically all arising from his pecuniary greed and from the unscrupulous means which he employed for satisfying it.
He came into conflict with the powerful and numerous Rojas family, and particularly with the most conspicuous member, Juan Bautista Rojas, the Royal Treasurer. This latter official declared that Torres was the worst Governor Cuba had ever had, and that he misappropriated more funds than all his predecessors put together. Apparently as Torres had been appointed merely to fill out Carreño's unexpired term, he determined to make hay while the sun shone. He took office in January, 1580. Eight months later a judicial investigation into his administration was ordered, as a result of which he was very quickly convicted of misappropriation of funds and was ordered to refund several thousand ducats which had been improperly collected and retained by him. Instead of refunding, however, he absconded, leaving his bondsman to make good his liabilities.
Theregularly appointed successor of Governor Carreño was another soldier, to wit, Captain Gabriel de Luzan. He was an army veteran who had performed distinguished service in the Netherlands and elsewhere and was personally known to and greatly favored by the King. He was selected for the governorship and was informed of the appointment in the early fall of 1579, a few weeks before the malodorous Torres was appointed by the Court of Hispaniola. It was intended, however, that he should not actually take office until the expiration of the full term for which Carreño had been appointed, and he accordingly had much time to attend to his affairs in Spain and elsewhere before removing to Havana. His duties were not to begin until 1581. But he removed to Cuba in the fall of 1580 while Torres was being investigated. There came to Cuba with him Juan Ceballos, who had been selected for Lieutenant-Governor. Both of these officials were to receive the same salaries that their predecessors had received, although Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, vigorously protested that their salaries should be reduced by one-half.
Governor Luzan was very soon involved in numerous controversies, largely over questions of dignity and precedents among insular officials. Something of the spirit of the formal Spanish Court appears to have permeated Cuba at this time, and the insular and municipal officials became as great sticklers for forms and ceremonies and for recognition of their comparative ranks as any of the Grandees at Seville or Madrid. Thus Jorge de Balza, Adjutant General of the Royal Forces in the Island, insisted upon the privilege of wearing his sword at meetings of the municipal council of Havana, of which he was ex officio a member, although it was a penaloffense for anyone else, even the Governor himself, to wear a sword or dagger in that assembly. Another controversy arose, as might confidently be assumed, over La Fuerza. The office of captain or commander of that fortress paid a salary of 300 ducats, on which account several former governors had appointed themselves to the place and had drawn that salary for themselves. Governor Carreño regarded this practice as reprehensible. It was not right, he said, for the Governor to hold another office and to draw a second salary. Therefore, he appointed his own son, a lad just in his teens, to be Captain of La Fuerza and to draw the salary. Whether the boy had the spending of the money himself or dutifully handed it over to his father is not a matter of record.
Governor Luzan stopped this nonsense and put a real soldier at the head of the Fort and then quarreled with him. This commander was Captain Melchior Sarto de Arana, an expert soldier who had been Luzan's comrade in arms in the wars of Spain, in the Netherlands and in Italy. He and his family moved into that upper story of La Fuerza which Carreño had insisted upon building, regarding it as the most desirable place of residence in Havana. The unhappy garrison in the lower part of the building was subject to the dampness which there prevailed, to the great detriment of health. Indeed conditions were so bad that their weapons became almost ruined with rust and it was almost impossible to keep gunpowder in condition for use. The Governor appears to have envied Captain Arana his quarters in the Fort, but he was not able to displace him, and so he turned his own attention to completing the Custom House for his own use. Governor Torres had stopped all work upon this latter building because of some uncertainty concerning the site, and had appropriated to his own use some of the funds which had been provided for completing it. But Luzan secured the necessary funds, hurried the work of construction and soon moved in to the fine new quarters which that building provided.
This gave great umbrage to the royal accountant of the Island, one Pedro de Arana, who does not appear to have been related, unless very remotely, to the Commander of the Fort. He declared that the Governor had no right to live in the Custom House, that the King's money had not been appropriated for any such purpose. It was true, he admitted, that a part of the Custom House building had been designed for an official residence. But it was not for the Governor, but for one of the royal officials. Now as Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, had a fine house of his own, the meaning of this suggestion was obvious. The royal accountant wanted the place for himself. He indeed went so far as to order the Governor, in the King's name, to vacate the building. But he did not venture to move in and take possession himself, and so the Governor presently returned and remained. In retaliation Luzan personally charged Pedro de Arana with various illegal acts, particularly in violating the law which forbade royal officials to encourage any trade. He declared that Arana was the owner, or half owner, of a vessel trading between Cuba and Yucatan, a vessel which was built to be chiefly used for smuggling. He also said that Arana was organizing an expedition to seek and raise sunken treasure ships along the coast and was planning to establish cattle ranches in Bermuda. On the strength of these charges, which were probably true, he began a searching investigation into Arana's affairs, raided his house and ordered him to be arrested by his namesake and confined in a cell in La Fuerza. To this, however, Captain Melchior de Arana demurred. It was not that he did not regard the accountant as worthy of arrest. But he held that it was beneath his dignity to arrest a mere civilian and beneath the dignity of the Fort to serve as a prison for him. The arrest, he said, should be made by the sheriff, and the prisoner should be confined in the civil jail. At this the Governor was furious and he retaliated by sending the sheriff to arrest Captain Melchior de Arana and to confine him not in the military fortress but in the civil jail. A little later, however, he had the Captain transferred to a cell in La Fuerza. Then he made his brother-in-law, Juan de Ferrer, Captain of the Fort in Melchior's place.
In his strenuous dealings with the royal accountant the Governor appears merely to have anticipated the King himself. At any rate, a very little while after he had begun his investigation of Pedro de Arana the instructions came to him from Madrid that he should pursue precisely that course. This naturally encouraged him to renewed zeal in the prosecution. And the result was that in March, 1582, he removed Arana from the office of royal accountant and appointed Manuel Diaz temporarily to fill his place. At this Arana made his way to Hispaniola, there to appeal to the Supreme Court against the Governor. He did more than appeal. He made grave charges against Luzon and got the court to order an investigation. The court appointed as chief inquisitor into Luzan's affairs Garcia de Torquemada, who went to Cuba in April, 1583, taking Arana along with him. Diaz made no attempt to maintain his title to the office, but, regarding discretion as the better part of valor, left Havana and repaired to his plantation in the Far West. But the Governor and also Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, who sided with him against Arana, stood their ground.
In the meantime, early in 1582, the King became dissatisfied with the fast and loose game which was being played at Havana, and chiefly at La Fuerza, and determined to take matters into his own hand. He did so by appointing a Captain-General to be Commander of the Fortress, who should be independent of the Governor of Cuba. This involved some awkward complications. The Governor, Luzan, had been regularly commissioned as Captain-General as well as Governor. And the King naturally hesitated for a time over the question of appointing another man to the same place. He would have preferred that the Governor and Captain-General shouldhave continued to be one and the same man. But that seemed no longer practicable, unless indeed he should dismiss Luzan altogether, which he was not yet prepared to do. He therefore consulted with the Council for the Indies, and in conjunction with that body finally decided to make a new appointment. Luzan was to continue to bear the nominal title of Captain-General, so as to give him rank comparable with that of the military and naval commanders who might visit Havana with the fleets of Spain. But the same title with real authority over the fortifications and defenses of Havana, and indeed a measure of authority over the fortifications and defenses of the entire Island, was to be given to another man.
The man selected for the new Captain-Generalship was a practical soldier of experience named Diego Hernandez de Quiñones. He took office in July, 1582, and found La Fuerza substantially complete, save for the construction of a moat, and containing a garrison of 120 men, the majority of whom were always more or less sick because of the dampness and unsanitary conditions of the place. The fortress had been completed, however, in some respects in a highly unsatisfactory way. Thus there was no stairway inside the building connecting the lower and upper stories. There was a stairway on the outside of the building, constructed of wood and it was obvious that in case of attack that stairway might easily be destroyed by cannon shot and thus communications between the two stories of the fortress be cut off. The moat had not yet been constructed, and numerous wooden and even some masonry houses had been constructed close to the fort, which might give sheltered approach to an attacking party.
The King and the Council obviously apprehended some friction between the Governor and the newly appointed Captain-General, and they therefore prepared an elaborate code of rules and regulations intended to avert such trouble and to conduce to harmonious co-operation between the two officials. Thus it was provided that inall matters of law relating exclusively to the soldiers, the Captain-General should have entire jurisdiction. In all matters relating entirely to civilians, the Governor should have jurisdiction. In cases in which both soldiers and civilians were concerned the two officials should act together with concurrent jurisdiction, and in case they could not agree the senior royal official at Havana should act as umpire between them.
This plan seemed fair enough and was expected to work well. But Luzan immediately protested against the whole scheme with much vigor and even violence of speech. In this he was heartily supported by the town council of Havana. When his protests were ignored by the Crown, or at least were not favorably heeded, he asked to be relieved from office as Governor and to be assigned to duty elsewhere. This request the King refused to grant, at the same time bidding Luzan to avoid any quarrel or disagreement with Quiñones. In spite of this admonition within a few weeks a bitter quarrel arose over the case of a soldier and a civilian who had had some strife over an alleged insult offered by the soldier to a young woman. From this there developed a bitter feud between the Governor and the Captain-General which soon became apparently irreconcilable. Each reviled the other, not only in his public capacity but in relation to his private life and morals. The partisans of each took up the strife and the entire city was soon involved in it.
Such was the deplorable state of affairs, when, as already related, Torquemada began his investigations. He found affairs in what seemed to him as bad a state as possible. The City of Havana, and indeed the entire Island of Cuba, were rent by faction. The Governor and the Captain-General each had a band of armed retainers in Havana, and these were at the point of open conflict which would amount practically to civil war. Regarding the emergency as critical, Torquemada acted promptly and strenuously. He ordered both the Governor and the Captain-General under arrest, commanding Luzanto remain within his own dwelling and Quiñones to remain within La Fuerza. Then he literally read the riot act to them both. He reproved them scathingly for their lack of loyalty to the King in letting personal animosities and jealousies have sway over their sense of duty. He secured from each a full statement of his complaints and grievances against the other. Then he compelled them to submit their cases to a tribunal consisting of himself, the Captain of a Mexican fleet who happened to be visiting Havana, and two judges of the Supreme Court of Hispaniola. As a result of the deliberations of this tribunal the two men were compelled to shake hands and pledge friendship and co-operation. They were then released from arrest and told to attend to their respective duties without any more nonsense.
This did not halt Torquemada, however, in his investigation of the general conduct of Luzan's administration in other respects than the quarrel with Quiñones. The charges which were made against the Governor were of a very serious character. It was said that he had interfered with the administration of justice by preventing people who had grievances from communicating with the courts or with the royal government in Spain. He had defied the authority of the Supreme Court in Hispaniola and treated it with contempt. He had enriched himself by taking bribes. He had encouraged desertions of soldiers from the garrison of La Fuerza. He had interfered with the functions of the Royal Treasurer and other officials. In view of these accusations Torquemada ordered Luzan to relinquish the exercise of all official functions until the truth or falsity of the charges could be determined. Then he removed from Havana to Bayamo and summoned Luzan to follow him thither in order that the case might be tried in a place free from the local influence of Havana. Luzan obeyed the order but at the same time sent his sister to Spain to intercede with the King and the Council for the Indies, and also senther husband to Hispaniola to plead his cause before the Supreme Court.
The result was that in mid August of 1584 the Supreme Court reversed Torquemada's order and authorized Luzan to resume the full exercise of his powers and functions as Governor. Luzan at once did so and immediately the old quarrel with Quiñones was resumed. So furious did their strife become that within three months the Supreme Court reversed its own orders and restored that of Torquemada. At this Quiñones cast off all restraint and summarily ordered Luzan to leave Havana and to go to Santiago to protect that place against the hostile raiders who were hourly expected to descend upon the Cuban coast. Luzan demurred, whereupon Quiñones threatened him with arrest. Thereupon Luzan left Havana, but instead of going to Santiago went to Guanabacoa and thence by slow degrees to Bayamo, where he opportunely arrived, as we shall see, at the beginning of January, 1586.
In the interim the civil affairs of Havana were conducted by the Town Council until the end of 1585, when one of Menendez's soldiers, Pedro Guerra de la Vega, was sent by the Supreme Court of Hispaniola to serve as Mayor. He got on well enough with Quiñones, but not with Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, who frankly declared him unfit for office and charged him with possessing a too itching palm. His administration of affairs seems to have been confined to purely local matters and, as we shall see, in a very short time, before the spring of 1586, Luzan was again exercising his full civil authority as Governor, though still most of the time absent from Havana. Quiñones was also in full authority as Captain-General, and these two former enemies were acting together in complete accord.
This radical change in the aspect of affairs was due to an impending crisis, the most serious thus far in the history of the Island. A new enemy had arisen, farmore formidable than any the Island had yet known. For years Cuba had been harried by French privateers often little better than pirates, but now the English rovers of the sea began to infest the Spanish Main. In 1577 Sir Francis Drake entered upon his memorable voyage around the world, defiantly navigating that South Sea which Spain has regarded as exclusively her own, and ravaging the Peruvian treasure ships even more ruthlessly than the French had preyed upon those of Mexico. Early in Luzan's administration warnings were given that this bold adventurer was planning a descent upon the West Indies and probably, therefore, upon Cuba.
This menace naturally caused great alarm at Havana and throughout the Island, and urgent appeals were made to the royal government and also to the Viceroy in Mexico for aid. It was represented that galleys were needed to patrol and to defend the coast. Artillery was needed for La Fuerza and for other fortifications at Havana and elsewhere. A larger garrison was also needed for La Fuerza. To these and other like appeals the King made no satisfactory reply. He apparently had no galleys nor men to spare for the defense of the Island. The best he would do was to direct Luzan to utilize his own resources to the full. A military census of the Island was to be taken, the first in its history, and all available men including Indians and negroes, were to be mustered into service.
The result of this enrolment, which was made in the spring of 1582, was unsatisfactory. In Havana itself only 226 men fit for service could be found, and no other town on the Island could furnish more than a quarter as many. They were, moreover, chiefly men unused to arms and therefore of little prospective value against the formidable fighting men whom Drake was reported to have in his train. As for La Fuerza, sickness and desertion had so depleted its garrison that not a score of able-bodied men were left. Quiñones gathered in reinforcements of 60 or 70, chiefly young and inexperiencedmen and thus raised the apparently effective strength to something less than 100, when more than 200 were considered necessary. Two small brass cannon and a supply of powder and small arms came from Spain, and Luzan either purchased or requisitioned from a visiting ship four more small cannon. The Governor also destroyed, by burning, all the houses which had been built close to La Fuerza so as to leave an open zone of considerable strength around that fortress.
Despite the conflict between Luzan and Quiñones already recorded, some substantial progress was made, especially by the latter, in strengthening the defenses of Havana to meet the coming storm. La Fuerza was improved in various respects, though it was impossible to get rid of the dampness which pervaded the place. On the Punta at the entrance to the harbor trenches were dug and a gun platform was built. The efficiency of these was unsparingly ridiculed by the Royal Treasurer, Rojas, and indeed Quiñones himself soon realized their unsatisfactory character. He therefore undertook the construction of the real fort, and by the end of 1583 had it sufficiently completed to permit the mounting of eight pieces of artillery. He then declared that if he were properly supplied with powder and shot he could defend Havana against all comers. He did not wish more soldiers, and indeed he strongly protested against the levies from Mexico for which Luzan had sent. During the spring of 1583 about 100 men did arrive from Mexico under a Captain who looked to Luzan and not to Quiñones for orders; a circumstance which naturally added to the confusion and conflict of authority. But after a few months Luzan himself agreed with Quiñones in regarding the men as practically worthless, and assented to their shipment back to Mexico.
Such, then, was the state of affairs when in 1585 war began between Spain and England. English adventurers infested Spanish territory on the main land in the northern part of the vast region which the Spanish still called Florida. They planned an English colony at the Bay of Santa Maria and renamed that place "Roanoke" and they also renamed that part of Florida after the Queen of England; calling it "Virginia." The news of this invasion appears to have been known in Cuba, by the way of Southern Florida, before it was known in Spain, and a fleet vessel was accordingly sent from Havana to bear the tidings to the King and to ask for further protection from Cuba.
There was a period of hesitancy and uncertainty, and then the storm broke. On January 10th, 1586, Sir Francis Drake landed in Hispaniola and occupied the City of Santo Domingo, the nominal capital of all the Spanish West Indies. Some of the judges of the Supreme Court at that place escaped and fled to Cuba, where they arrived a week later with the startling news. Luzan, as already related, was then at Bayamo, and it was there that he received the news. He was startled and alarmed, but appears not to have been panic stricken. Indeed he acted with coolness and judgment and in a manner which must be regarded as going far toward redeeming his reputation from the reproaches which he had formerly incurred. Discreetly assuming that Drake's attack upon Cuba, whenever it was made, would be not at Bayamo but at the Capital and metropolis itself, his first thought was for Havana. Immediately upon receiving the news from Santo Domingo he dispatched horsemen across country from Bayamo to Havana to bear the tidings toQuiñones, bidding them also to spread the news through all the country as they went and to command all towns to marshal all available men and send them on to Havana for the reinforcement of that place. As soon as possible he also sent two vessels from Bayamo to Havana laden with men and supplies. Ignoring their former quarrels in the face of the common danger he wrote to Quiñones outlining his plans for a defense of the Island and urging that an appeal should be sent to Mexico for aid, from which country it could be procured much more quickly than from Spain. Then he hastened to Santiago and from that port sent two vessels to Spain to tell the King what had happened at Santo Domingo and what was being done to avert, if possible, a like calamity at Havana.
The Governor's appeals to the various municipalities were not without effect. The people of Cuba seemed to be aroused by the imminence of danger to a better degree of public spirit than they had ever before manifested. Bayamo, Sancti Spiritus, Puerto Principe, and even poor little Trinidad, the smallest and weakest town of the Island, contributed men and arms to their full ability, and when at the beginning of May these levies were mustered in Havana they numbered more than 225 efficient men, tolerably well armed. Luzan himself remained at Bayamo, in the absence of orders or even permission to return to Havana, professing readiness and eagerness to serve the King there or elsewhere, wherever he could be of most use. At Havana Quiñones was in command, loyally supported by the Town Council, the royal officials and the entire community. Even the austere and censorious Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, who had been the bitter critic and opponent of Quiñones, forgot his animosity and hastened to offer his services in any capacity in which they might be utilized. It is related that Rojas, despite his years, his wealth and his social dignity, worked as a common laborer with pick-axe and shovel in digging trenches and throwing up breastworks for the fortification of the town, thus setting an example which left no other citizenany excuse for shirking duty and indeed went far toward inspiring the whole community with patriotic fervor. A proclamation was also issued by the Mayor, Pedro de la Vega, addressed to all citizens who, because of debts, quarrels, crimes, or other causes, had sought sanctuary in the church or gone into hiding in the jungle, asking them to come forward and aid in the defense of Havana, and promising them immunity from arrest or prosecution and a period of a fortnight's grace in which to return to their asylums or their hiding places after the need of their services was ended. This extraordinary call was responded to by scores of fugitives.
There was no neglect, either, in preparation for the defense of the suburbs of Havana. Chorrera was generally regarded not only as a possible but as a very probable landing point for the invaders, from which a march could be made by land against Havana. It was not practicable to fortify the place strongly enough to prevent the landing of any considerable force, but a small camp was established there, occupied by a company of horsemen, who were to keep watch day and night for the approach of the enemy, and upon his first appearance were to ride post-haste to Havana with the news. The first horseman was to set out the moment the enemy was sighted in the distance. A second was to follow as soon as the fleet was near enough for the number of vessels and their approximate strength and men and guns to be determined. A third would set out the moment the enemy's intention, either of landing there or of proceeding on to Havana, was ascertained. A fourth would wait until the enemy was actually landing and his numbers could be determined, and would then hasten after the others with the news.
Nearer the city there were several other possible landing places at inlets of the coast and some of these were fortified with earth-works and artillery. Chief among these was the inlet of San Lazaro, where in addition to earth works an enclosed fort of timber, stone and earthwas constructed with several cannons mounted on a platform. At the entrance to the harbor of Havana itself the strongest preparations were made. At Punta a dozen guns were in readiness to make that the chief point of defense outside of La Fuerza itself. Much attention was given to all roads leading into the city for several miles around; particularly toward the west from which direction the attack was chiefly expected. Some of the roads were blocked altogether, others were mined and provided with pitfalls. Still others were screened and hidden with trees and brushwood so as to serve as secret means of passage for the Spaniards in advancing against or retreating from the enemy, and these were so mined that after having served their purpose to the Spaniards they could be readily destroyed. Elsewhere trees, underbrush and jungle were cleared away so that there would be no cover nor concealment for the invading force. Trenches and earth-works were constructed between La Fuerza and Punta, and the former fortress was provisioned and prepared for a siege. Special parapets of timber, stone and earth were constructed upon the top of the fort, and numerous houses and other buildings near it were destroyed in order that there might be no shelter for an attacking force.
Nor was the possibility of an attack from the eastward overlooked. On the Morro headland at the important entrance a battery of three guns was placed, well protected by breast-works of timber, stone and earth, and the coast from Morro to Matanzas was continually patrolled by horsemen on the lookout for the coming of strange vessels, and under orders similar to those which had been given to the watchmen at Chorrera. As for the harbor itself, a great chain was stretched across its entrance buoyed with logs and fastened with a huge padlock at the foot of the Morro headland.
Finally the few swift sailing vessels which could be mustered into the service were kept cruising off the shore to espy the approaching squadron. They were not sufficiently strong to give battle, but they could give warning to the city. Also they could bear to Spain or to Mexico tidings of what occurred. Thus one vessel lay in the estuary of the Puercos River, ready to flee to Mexico, while another cruised around Ycacos Point, to hasten to Spain to tell if Havana should fall into the hands of the foe.
Meanwhile in Havana itself all possible forces were mustered for defense. The volunteers from the other towns were drilled into an efficient state of discipline. Such was their zeal that they gladly served without pay while a considerable number of them in addition provided their own rations at their own cost. For the necessary expenses of their maintenance Rojas, the Royal Treasurer, used what royal funds were in hand regardless of the purpose for which they had been designed, and when these were insufficient he collected taxes without authority, on the principle that the safety of the city and Island was the supreme law. At the beginning of April some welcome aid arrived from Mexico, which even Quiñones was now glad to have. The Viceroy sent four vessels, bearing about 300 fighting men, with six months' supplies of food and with pay for eight months in advance. These increased the force under Quiñones to more than 900 well-trained soldiers. During the month of April Luzan arrived from Bayamo with nearly 100 more men, thus increasing the garrison of Havana to about 1,000. This was a force which the Captain-General confidently believed would be able to resist and to repulse any force which Drake might be able to land.
Luzan had meantime, in February, received from Spain orders to resume the governorship of the Island with full power, to return to Havana, and to consider his term of office indefinitely prolonged. He had been appointed in 1579 for a term of four years and had assumed office in 1580, so that his original term was by this time long since expired. Reckoning the four years fromhis actual assumption of office in the summer of 1580 his term had ended in 1584. If his return to Havana was not altogether agreeable to Quiñones, and it is quite probable that it was not, at least a semblance of harmony was preserved between them, and there was certainly efficient if not cordial co-operation. To this auspicious state of affairs the Royal Treasurer contributed in no small degree.
In fact, in the face of the great peril which confronted it, all Cuba arose to the occasion with a unity of public spirit never before known in its history, and wholly admirable. All the officials, civil and military, insular and royal, were in accord, and all classes of the population, Spaniards, Indians and negro slaves were loyal and devoted in their support. In these circumstances it is of fascinating interest to speculate upon what might have happened had Drake made the expected descent upon Havana. It is well within the limit not only of possibility but of probability that he would have been decisively defeated. It is even possible that in the conflict with more than a thousand well-armed, well trained and resolute Spaniards, than whom there were then no braver or better fighting men in all the world, he would himself have been captured or slain. And such a disposition of Francis Drake in the summer of 1586, only two years before the descent of the Invincible Armada upon the shores of England, might well have changed the history of the world.
But this was not to be. Some say that Drake did not intend to attack Havana at that time, preferring to raid Carthagena, as he did. Some say that by means of spies he ascertained the strength of Havana's defenses and deemed it, therefore, prudent not to meddle with that place. Some say that there was an interposition of Providence to dissuade him from what might have been a disastrous fiasco. We have also, as we shall presently see, the testimony of some Spanish fugitives, which is entirely plausible, though not certainly correct. Conjecture is inconclusive. Only the fact remains that Drake passed by and left Cuba unassailed.
From the latter part of February until the beginning of May no word of his doings came to Havana; anxiety meanwhile prevailing and preparations for his anticipated arrival being unabated. At last word came, most ominous. A vessel from Spain, a heavily armed frigate, had been searching for Drake. It had tracked him from Santo Domingo to Carthagena, and had found him in full possession of the latter place. There apparently, after two months' occupancy, he was preparing for some fresh adventure. This information convinced the Cuban authorities that the great struggle was at hand, and that the approach of the enemy would be from the westward by way of Cape San Antonio. After despoiling Carthagena Drake's logical course would be to raid Havana, and preparations for defense were therefore redoubled. Nor were these anticipations soon to be dispelled. A few weeks later, on May 27th, a courier arrived from Cape San Antonio, the western extremity of the Island, with the news that five days before a powerful British armada, doubtless Drake's, had touched at that point for fresh water and other supplies. It was no mere raiding flotilla of privateers, such as those with which the French had long been troubling the Cuban coasts, but it was a fleet of thirty-sail, probably with two or three thousand soldiers aboard, and with artillery far superior both in number and range to all the defenses of Havana. The courier could not tell what the intentions of the fleet were or what was its destination. Possibly it was simply seeking to anticipate and capture the treasure ships of Spain coming from Mexico or from Darien with the silver, gold and gems of Peru and Golden Castile. More probably it was planning the conquest of Havana, as Santo Domingo and Carthagena had been conquered. This latter supposition seemed to be confirmed two dayslater, when another messenger arrived from the west, telling that it was indeed Drake's fleet and that it had sailed from Cape San Antonio eastward toward Havana.