tc." also dwells upon the policy
pursued by certain Spanish adventurers and officials towards the natives
of the islands:

"The Spaniards pretended to have recognized the natives of these islands
as being anthropophagous, and asked the king of Castile permission to
capture them, i.e., to take and make them slaves (which they did
elsewhere without permission), so they did not approach the Antilles
except armed, and in the character of enemies; and the Indians who
inhabited them prepared to make upon them the most cruel war, as soon as
they saw vessels off their coasts, be it openly or from ambush in the
woods, or by surprise attacks, when the strangers wanted to take water
or leave the vessels, which irritated these people and many a Spaniard
regretted having obliged them to go to such extremities.

"Things of this kind happened in the Antilles during the fifteenth
century when the Spaniards were busy making other discoveries, wherever
gold or silver attracted them and for the conservation of which and the
exploitation of mines they could not furnish a sufficient number of men.
They had no idea of settling down to cultivate the soil of these lands,
and waiting only to procure the convenience of taking on water or
leaving their invalids to recuperate on St. Christopher island, they
made peace with the Indians who inhabited this island, and continued to
treat as enemies all those of other islands.

"When at the end of this century and the beginning of the sixteenth, the
English and French sailed on the seas of America, the first with more
considerable forces like those conducted by Drake, Walter Raleigh,
Kenits and others, and the French with less armaments, the voyages of
the ones and the others in those little frequented climates made some
other compatriots conceive the idea of establishing themselves on
American soil and found colonies, which would furnish subsistence to a
considerable number of their nation and serve as retreat to those
vessels where they could renew their supplies. In this way in 1625 two
adventurers, the one French, named d'Enemene 'de la maison de Duil en
Normandie,' the other also a gentleman, an Englishman named V. Varnard,
moved by the same desire landed on the same day on St. Christopher's,
which they had chosen for their purpose and from there all the French
and British settlements in the Antilles radiated."

These records of visits to the West Indies by Dutch, English, French and
other tra