uccess. After having wept and sighed and poured out complaints for
his miseries, after having overwhelmed his rescuer, Colmenares, with
thanks and almost rolled at his feet, Nicuesa, when the fear of
starvation was removed, began, even before he had seen the colonists
of Uraba, to talk airily of his projects of reform and his intention
to get possession of all the gold there was. He said that no one had
the right to keep back any of the gold, without his authorisation, or
that of his associate Hojeda. These imprudent words reached the ears
of the colonists of Uraba, and roused against Nicuesa the indignation
of the partisans of Enciso, Hojeda's deputy judge, and that of Nunez.
It therefore fell out that Nicuesa, with sixty companions, had
hardly landed, so it is reported, before the colonists forced him to
re-embark, overwhelming him with threats. The better intentioned of
the colonists were displeased at this demonstration, but fearing a
rising of the majority headed by Vasco Nunez, they did not interfere.
Nicuesa was therefore obliged to regain the brigantine, and there
remained with him only seventeen of his sixty companions. It was the
calends of March in the year 1511 when Nicuesa set sail, intending to
return to Hispaniola and there complain of the usurpation of Vasco
Nunez and the violent treatment offered the judge, Enciso.

He sailed in an evil hour and no news was ever again heard of that
brigantine. It is believed the vessel sank, and that all the men were
drowned. However that may be, Nicuesa plunged from one calamity into
another, and died even more miserably than he had lived.

After the shameful expulsion of Nicuesa, the colonists consumed the
provisions Colmenares had brought, and soon, driven by hunger, they
were forced to plunder the neighbourhood of the colony like wolves of
the forest. A troop of about one hundred and thirty men was formed
under the leadership of Vasco Nunez, who organised them like a band
of brigands. Puffed up by vanity, he sent a guard in advance, and had
others to accompany and follow him. He chose Colmenares[1] as his
associate and companion. From the outset of this expedition he
determined to seize everything he could find in the territory of the
neighbouring caciques, and he began by marching along the shore of
the district of Coiba, of which we have already spoken. Summoning the
cacique of that district, Careca, of whom the Spaniards had never had
reason to complain, he haug