Collected Uncollected Writings David

Foster Wallace
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://textbookfull.com/product/collected-uncollected-writings-david-foster-wallace/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...

Gesturing Toward Reality David Foster Wallace and

Philosophy 1st Edition Robert K. Bolger

https://textbookfull.com/product/gesturing-toward-reality-david-
foster-wallace-and-philosophy-1st-edition-robert-k-bolger/

David Foster Wallace s Infinite Jest A Reader s Guide

Second Edition Stephen J. Burn

https://textbookfull.com/product/david-foster-wallace-s-infinite-
jest-a-reader-s-guide-second-edition-stephen-j-burn/

The Simpler Way Collected Writings of Ted Trainer 1st

Edition Samuel Alexander

https://textbookfull.com/product/the-simpler-way-collected-
writings-of-ted-trainer-1st-edition-samuel-alexander/

Baller Heritage Bay Series Book 5 1st Edition M.A.

Foster [Foster

https://textbookfull.com/product/baller-heritage-bay-series-
book-5-1st-edition-m-a-foster-foster/
Selected Writings René Magritte

https://textbookfull.com/product/selected-writings-rene-magritte/

Critical Writings James Joyce

https://textbookfull.com/product/critical-writings-james-joyce/

Wallace at Bay Wallace of the Secret Service Book 7

3rd Edition Wilson

https://textbookfull.com/product/wallace-at-bay-wallace-of-the-
secret-service-book-7-3rd-edition-wilson/

International Law's Collected Stories Sofia Stolk

https://textbookfull.com/product/international-laws-collected-
stories-sofia-stolk/

Collected Fiction 2024 Edition Beth Goder

https://textbookfull.com/product/collected-fiction-2024-edition-
beth-goder/
NOTES ON THE COLLECTION 3

PART ONE: FICTION

THE PLANET TRILLAPHON AS IT STANDS IN RELATION TO THE
BAD THING. 6
1983, The Amherst Review Volume XII 6
OTHER MATH 22
SOLOMON SILVERFISH 26
CRASH OF ‘69 58
ORDER AND FLUX IN NORTHAMPTON 70
RABBIT RESURRECTED 97
THE FIFTH COLUMN: A NOVEL — WEEK ELEVEN 101
BRIEF INTERVIEW #16 105
ALL THAT 106

PART TWO: NON-FICTION

MATTERS OF SENSE AND OPACITY 116
THE HORROR OF PRETENTIOUSNESS 118
FORT WAYNE IS SEVENTH ON HITLER’S LIST 121
THE MILLION-DOLLAR TATTOO 125
EXPLORING INNER SPACE 128
TRAGIC CUBAN ÉMIGRÉ AND A TALE OF THE ‘DOOR TO
HAPPINESS’ 131
PRESLEY AS PARADIGM 136
PORTRAIT OF AN EYE 140

1
IRIS’ STORY: AN INVERSION OF PHILOSOPHICAL SCEPTICISM 145
LETTER TO MICHAEL PIETSCH 149
QUO VADIS—INTRODUCTION 150
GOD BLESS YOU, MR. FRANZEN 152
LETTER TO DON DELILLO 153
THE FLEXICON 159
100-WORD STATEMENT 164
THIS IS WATER 165

2
 NOTES ON THE COLLECTION

The reason for there being notes to a shoddy samizdat PDF collecting the uncollected
writings of David Foster Wallace is because I, the person compiling the writings, have
not done an outstanding job. Not because I haven't tried, but because:
1. English is not my first language, which potentially causes a whole slew of
problems.
2. The files from which I have sourced this collection were not always in good
condition, and as such, sometimes barely intelligible.
3. The writings were originally published in various papers with differing
standards. For example, differing usage of the en dash (–), the em dash (—), the
horizontal bar (―), and line breaks.
4. Sometimes it is hard to know if a mistake, say a misspelling of a technical word,
is intentional or not (some of these papers do not seem to have been edited
that well.)
5. Wallace’s writings often border on being cybertext, further complicating the
two points above.

I have tried my best to deal with these issues. (Though if you are doing serious
academic work on, say, DFW’s use of the em dash, I suggest you not use the versions
here.)

Another point I would like to touch on is the fact that some of the texts really only
make sense in the context in which they originally appeared. A review of another book
for instance, may not be interesting if you haven’t read the book in question, but then
again, some of DFW’s reviews have appeared in his essay collections. Other times
however, the text that DFW has written is presumably not even intended to be read in
isolation, arguably this is the case with The Fifth Column, Quo Vadis, and The Flexicon.

The first nine writings together comprise the fiction in this collection, and are mostly
fairly straight-forward short stories. The exceptions being Rabbit Resurrected, a poke (of
sorts) at John Updike’s Rabbit novels; and The Fifth Column: A Novel - Week Eleven,
which is DFW’s contribution to a weekly serial. The rest of the collection comprises
his uncollected non-fiction works, most of which are fairly short reviews. The

3
collection ends with a transcript of DFW’s famous speech This is Water. It is included
basically because a speech of his on Kafka was included in Consider the Lobster.

There are a few known writings that I have not been able to obtain, and which are
therefore not included in this collection. The ones that I know are missing are:
Ralph and the Legal Milestone, The Piano in the Pantechnicon, The Enema Bandit and the Cosmic
Buzzer, as well as some unpublished Pale King fragments, I’m told. Hopefully these
(and anything else that might surface) will be found and included in future versions of
this collection. If you have a chance to visit the Harry Ransom Center, take good
quality photographs of the relevant works by DFW stored there, and incorporate
these writings into this collection, it would be virtually complete.

This is version 1.2, completed on the 23rd of April 2021.

4
PART ONE: FICTION

5
 THE PLANET TRILLAPHON AS IT STANDS IN
RELATION TO THE BAD THING.
1983, The Amherst Review Volume XII

I've been on antidepressants for, what, about a year now, and I suppose I feel as if I'm
pretty qualified to tell what they're like. They're fine, really. but they're fine in the same
way that, say, living on another planet that was warm and comfortable and had food
and fresh water would be fine: it would be fine, but it wouldn't be good old Earth,
obviously. I haven't been on Earth now for almost a year, because I wasn't doing very
well on Earth. I've been doing somewhat better here where I am now, on the planet
Trillaphon, which I suppose is good news for everyone involved.

Antidepressants were prescribed for me by a very nice doctor named Dr. Kablumbus
at a hospital to which I was sent ever so briefly following a really highly ridiculous
incident involving electrical appliances in the bathtub about which I really don't wish
to say a whole lot. I had to go to the hospital for physical care and treatment after this
very silly incident, and then two days later I was moved to another floor of the
hospital, a higher, whiter floor, where Dr. Kablumbus and his colleagues were. There
was a certain amount of consideration given to the possibility of my undergoing
E.C.T., which is short for “Electroconvulsive Therapy,” but E.C.T. wipes out bits of
your memory sometimes — little details like your name and where you live, etc. —
and it's also in other respects just a thoroughly scary thing, and we — my parents and
I — decided against it. New Hampshire, which is the state where I live, has a law that
says E.C.T. cannot be administered without the patient's knowledge and consent. I
regard this as an extremely good law. So antidepressants were prescribed for me
instead by Dr. Kablumbus, who can be said really to have had only my best interests at
heart.

If someone tells about a trip he’s taken, you expect at least some explanation of why
he left on the trip in the first place. With this in mind perhaps I'll tell some things
about why things weren't too good for me on Earth for quite a while. It was extremely
weird, but, three years ago, when I was a senior in high school, I began to suffer from
what I guess now was a hallucination. I thought that a huge wound, a really huge and
deep wound, had opened on my face, on my cheek near my nose, that the skin had

6
just split open like old fruit, that blood was seeping out, all dark and shiny, that veins
and bits of yellow cheek-fat and red'gray muscle were plainly visible, even bright
flashes of bone, in there. Whenever I'd look in the mirror, there it would be, that
wound, and I could feel the twitch of the exposed muscle and the heat of the blood
on my cheek, all the time. But when I'd say to a doctor or to Mom or to other people,
"Hey, look at this open wound on my face, I'd better go to the hospital," they'd say.
"Well, hey, there's no wound on your face, are your eyes OK?" And yet whenever I'd
look in the mirror, there it would be, and I could always feel the heat of the blood on
my cheek, and when I'd feel with my hand my fingers would sink in there really deep
into what felt like hot gelatin with bones and ropes and stuff in it. And it seemed like
everyone was always looking at it. They'd seem to stare at me really funny, and I'd
think "Oh God. I'm really making them sick, they see it, I've got to hide, get me out of
here." Butthey were probably only staring because I looked all scared and in pain and
kept my hand to my face and was staggering like I was drunk all over the place all the
time. But at the time, it seemed so real. Weird. weird. weird. Right before graduation
— or maybe a month before, maybe — it got really bad, such that when I'd pull my
hand away from my face I'd see blood on my fingers, and bits of tissue and stuff, and
I'd be able to smell the blood, too, like hot rusty metal and copper. So one night when
my parents were out somewhere I took a needle and some thread and tried to sew up
the wound myself. It hurt a lot to do this. because I didn't have any anesthetic, of
course. It was also bad because, obviously, as I know now. there was really no wound
to be sewn up at all, there. Mom and Dad were less than pleased when they came
home and found me all bloody for real and with a whole lot of jagged unprofessional
stitches of lovely bright orange carpet-thread in my face, They were really upset. Also,
I made the stitches too deep — I apparently pushed the needle incredibly deep — and
some of the thread got stuck way down in there when they tried to pull the stitches
out at the hospital and it got infected later and then they had to make a real wound
back at the hospital to get it all out and drain it and clean it out. That was highly
ironic. Also, when I was making the stitches too deep I guess I ran the needle into a
few nerves in my cheek and destroyed them, so now sometimes bits of my face will
get numb for no reason, and my mouth will sag on the left side a bit. I know it sags
for sure and that I've got this cute scar, here, because it's not just a matter of looking
in the mirror and seeing it and feeling it; other people tell me they see it too, though
they do this very tactfully.

7
Anyway, I think that year everyone began to see that I was a troubled little soldier,
including me, Everybody talked and conferred and we all decided that it would
probably be in my best interests if I deferred admission to Brown University in Rhode
Island, where I was supposedly all set to go, and instead did a year of "Post-Graduate"
schoolwork at a very good and prestigious and expensive prep school called Phillips
Exeter Academy conveniently located right there in my hometown. So that's what I
did. And it was by all appearances a pretty successful period, except it was still on
Earth, and things were increasingly non-good for me on Earth during this period,
although my face had healed and I had more or less stopped having the hallucination
about the gory wound, except for really short flashes when I saw mirrors out of the
corners of my eyes and stuff.

But, yes, all in all things were going increasingly badly for me at that time, even though
I was doing quite well in school in my little "Post-Grad" program and people were
saying, "Holy cow, you're really a very good student, you should just go on to college
right now, why don't you?" It was just pretty clear to me that I shouldn't go right on to
college then, but I couldn't say that to the people at Exeter, because my reasons for
saying I shouldn't had nothing to do with balancing equations in Chemistry or
interpreting Keats poems in English. They had to do with the fact that I was a
troubled little soldier. I'm not at this point really dying to give a long gory account of
all the cute neuroses that more or less around that time began to pop up all over the
inside of my brain, sort of like wrinkly gray boils,but I'll tell a few things. For one
thing, I was throwing up a lot, feeling really nauseated all the time, especially when I'd
wake up in the morning. But it could switch on anytime, the second I began to think
about it: If I felt OK, all of a sudden I'd think,"Hey, I don't feel nauseated at all,
here." And it would just switch on, like I had a big white plastic switch somewhere
along the tube from my brain to my hot and weak stomach and intestines, and I would
just throw up all over my plate at dinner or my desk at school or the seat of the car, or
my bed, or wherever, It was really highly grotesque for everyone else, and intensely
unpleasant for me, as anyone who has ever felt really sick to his stomach can
appreciate. This went on for quite a while, and I lost a lot of weight, which was bad
because I was quite thin and non-strong to begin with, Also, I had to have a lot of
medical tests on my stomach, involving delicious barium-drinks and being hung
upside down for X-rays, and so on, and once I even had to have a spinal tap, which

8
hurt more than anything has ever hurt me in my life, I am never ever going to have
another spinal tap.

Also, there was this business of crying for no reason, which wasn't painful but was
very embarrassing and also quite scary because I couldn't control it. What would
happen is that I'd cry for no reason, and then I'd get sort of scared that I'd cry or that
once I started to cry I wouldn't be able to stop, and this state of being scared would
very kindly activate this other white switch on the tube between my brain with its boils
and my hot eyes. and off I'd go even worse, like a skateboard that you keep pushing
along. It was very embarrassing at school, and incredibly embarrassing with my family,
because they would think it was their fault, that they had done something b~d, It
would have been incredibly embarrassing with my friends, too, but by that time I really
didn't have very many friends, So that was kind of an advantage, almost. But there was
still everyone else. I had little tricks I employed with regard to the "crying problem."
When I was around other people and my eyes got all hot and full of burning salt-water
I would pretend to sneeze, or even more often to yawn, because both these things can
explain someone's having tears in his eyes, People at school must have thought I was
just about the sleepiest person in the world, But, really. yawning doesn't exactly
explain the fact that tears are just running down your cheeks and raining down on
your lap or your desk or making little wet star-puckers on your exam papers and stuff,
and not too many people get super-red eyes just from yawning, So the tricks probably
weren't too effective. It's weird but even now, here on the planet Trillaphon, when I
think about it at all, I can hear the snap of the switch and my eyes more or less start to
fill up, and my throat aches. That is bad. There was also the fact that back then I got
so I couldn't stand silence, really couldn't stand it at all. This was because when there
was no noise from outside the little hairs on my eardrums or Wherever would
manufacture a noise all by themselves, to keep in practice or something. This noise
was sort of a high, glittery, metallic, spangly hum that really for some reason scared
the living daylights out of me and just about drove me crazy when I heard it, the way a
mosquito in your ear in bed at night in summer will just about drive you crazy when
you hear it. I began to look for noise sort of the way a moth looks for light. I'd sleep
with the radio on in my room, watch an incredible amount of loud television, keep my
trusty Sony Walkman on at all times at school and walking around and on my bike
(that Sony Walkman was far and away the best Christmas present I have ever
received). I would even maybe sometimes talk to myself when I had just no other

9
recourse to noise, which must have seemed very crazy to people who heard me, and I
suppose was very crazy, but not in the way they supposed. It wasn't as if I thought I
was two people who could have a dialogue. or as if I heard voices from Venus or
anything. I knew I was just one person, but this one person, here, was a troubled little
soldier who could withstand neither the substance nor the implications of the noise
produced by the inside of his own head.

Anyway, all this extremely delightful stuff was going on while I was doing well and
making my otherwise quite worried and less-than-pleased patents happy school-wise
during the year, and then while I was working for Exeter Building and Grounds
Department during the following summer, pruning bushes and crying and throwing
up discreetly into them, and while I was packing and having billions of dollars of
clothes and electrical appliances bought for me by my grandparents, gelling all ready
to go to Brown University in Rhode Island in September. Mr. Film, who was more or
less my boss at "B and G," had a riddle that he thought was unbelievably funny. and
he told it to me a lot. He'd say, "What's the color of a bowel movement?" And when I
didn't say anything he'd say. "Brown! har har harl" He'd laugh. and I'd smile, even after
about the four-trillionth time, because Mr, Film was on the whole a fairly nice man,
and he didn't even get mad when I threw up in his truck once. I told him my scar was
from getting cut up with a knife in high school, which was essentially the truth.

So I went off to Brown University in the fall, and it turned out to be very much like
"P.G." at Exeter: it was supposed to be all hard but it really wasn't, so I had plenty of
time to do well in classes and have people say "Outstanding" and still be neurotic and
weird as hell. so that my roommate, who was a very nice, squeakingly healthy guy
from Illinois, understandably asked for a single instead and moved out in a few weeks
and left me with a very big single all my very own. So it was just little old me and
about nine billion dollars worth of electronic noise-making equipment, there in my
room, after that.

It was quite soon after my roommate moved out that the Bad Thing started. The Bad
Thing is more or less the reason why I'm not on Earth anymore. Dr, Kablumbus told
me after I told him as best I could about the Bad Thing that the Bad Thing was
"severe clinical depression." I am sure that a doctor at Brown would have told me
pretty much the same thing, but I didn't ever go to see anyone at Brown, mainly

10
because I was afraid that if I ever opened my mouth in that context stuff would come
out that would ensure that I'd be put in a place like the place I was put after the
hilariously stupid business in the bathroom.

I really don't know if the Bad Thing is really depression. I had previously sort of
always thought that depression was just sort of really intense sadness, like what you
feel when your very good dog dies, or when Bambi's mother gets killed in Bambi. I
thought that it was that you frowned or maybe even cried a little bit if you were a girl
and said "Holy cow, I'm really depressed, here," and then your friends if you have any
come and cheer you up or take you out and get you ploughed and in the morning it's
like a faded color and in a couple days it's gone altogether. The Bad Thing — which I
guess is what is really depression — is very different, and indescribably worse. I guess
I should say rather sort of indescribably, because I've heard different people try to
describe "real" depression over the last couple years. A very glib guy on the television
said some people liken it to being underwater, under a body of water that has no
surface, at least for you, so that no matter what direction you go, there will only be
more water, no fresh air and freedom of movement, just restriction and suffocation,
and no light. (I don't know how apt it is to say it's like being underwater, but maybe
imagine the moment in which you realize, at which It hits you that there is no surface
for you. that you're just going to drown In there no matter which way you swim;
imagine how you'd feel at that exact moment, like Descartes at the start of his second
thing, then imagine that feeling in all its really delightful choking intensity spread out
over hours, days, months … that would maybe be more apt.) A really lovely poet
named Sylvia Plath, who unfortunately isn't living anymore, said that it's like having a
jar covering you and having all the air pumped out of the jar, so you can't breathe any
good air (and imagine the moment when your movement is invisibly stopped by the
glass and you realize you're underglass...). Some people say It's like having always
before you and under you a huge black holewithout a bottom, a black, black hole,
maybe with vague teeth in It. and then your being part of the hole, so that you fall
even when you stay where you are (…maybe when you realize you're the hole, nothing
else…).

I'm not incredibly glib, but I'll tell what I think the Bad Thing is like. To me it's like
being completely, totally, utterly sick. I will try to explain what I mean. Imagine feeling
really sick to your stomach. Almost everyone has felt really sick to his or her stomach,

11
so everyone knows what it's like: it's less than fun. OK. OK. But that feeling is
localized: it's more or less just your stomach. Imagine your whole body being sick like
that: your feet. the big muscles in your legs, your collar-bone. your head, your hair,
everything, all just as sick as a fluey stomach. Then, If You can imagine that, please
imagine it even more spread out and total. Imagine that every cell in your body, every
single cell in your body is as sick as that nauseated stomach. Not just your own cells,
even, but the e. coli and lactobacilli in you. too, the mitochondria, basal bodies, all sick
and boiling and hot like maggots in your neck. your brain. all over, everywhere. in
everything. All just sick as hell. Now imagine that every single atom in every single cell
in your body is sick like that. sick, intolerably sick. And every proton and neutron in
every atom … swollen and throbbing, off-color, sick, with just no chance of throwing
up to relieve the feeling. Every electron is sick. here. twirling off balance and all erratic
in these funhouse orbitals that are just thick and swirling with mottled yellow and
purple poison gases. everything off balance and woozy. Quarks and neutrinos out of
their minds and bouncing sick all over the place. bouncing like crazy. Just imagine that,
a sickness spread utterly through every bit of you, even the bits of the bits. So that
your very … very essence is characterized by nothing other than the feature of
sickness; you and the sickness are, as they say, "one."

That's kind of what the Bad Thing is like at its roots. Everything in you is sick and
grotesque. And since your only acquaintance with the whole world is through parts of
you like your sense-organs and your mind, etc. — and since these parts are sick as hell,
the whole world as you perceive it and know it and are in it comes at you through this
filter of bad sickness and becomes bad. As everything becomes bad in you, all the
good goes out of the world like air out of a big brokenballoon. There's nothing in this
world you know but horrible rotten smells, sad and grotesque and lurid pastel sights,
raucous or deadly-sad sounds. Intolerable open-ended situations lined on a continuum
with just no end at all… Incredibly stupid, hopeless ideas. And just the way when
you're sick to your stomach you're kind of scared way down deep that it might maybe
never go away, the Bad Thing scares you the same way, only worse, because the fear is
itself filtered through the bad disease and becomes bigger and worse and hungrier
than it started out. It tears you open and gcts in there and squirms around.

Because the Bad Thing not only attacks you and makes you feel bad and puts you out
of commission, it especially attacks and makes you feel bad and puts out of

12
commission precisely those things that are necessary In order for you to fight the Bad
Thing, to maybe get better, to stay alive. This is hard to understand, but it's really true.
Imagine a really painful disease that, say, attacked your legs and your throat and
resulted in a really bad pain and paralysis and all-around agony in these areas. The
disease would be bad enough, obviously, but the disease would also be open-ended;
you wouldn't be able to do anything about it. Your legs would be all paralyzed and
would hurt like hell… but you wouldn't be able to run for help for those poor legs,
just exactly because your legs would be too sick for you to run anywhere at all. Your
throat would burn like crazy and you'd think it was just going to explode ... but you
wouldn't be able to call out to any doctors or anyone for help, precisely because your
throat would be too sick for you to do so. This is the way the Bad Thing works: it's
especially good at attacking your defense mechanisms. The way to fight against or get
away from the Bad Thing is clearly just to think differently, to reason and argue with
yourself. just to change the way you're perceiving and sensing and processing stuff.
But you need your mind to do this, your brain cells with their atoms and your mental
powers and all that, your self, and that's exactly what the Bad Thing has made too sick
to work right. That's exactly what it has made sick. It's made you sick in just such a
way that you can't get better. And you start thinking about this pretty vicious situation,
and you say to yourself, "Boy oh boy, how the heck is the Bad Thing able to do this?
You think about it really hard, since it's in your best interests to do so — and then all
of a sudden it sort of dawns on you ... that the BadThing is able to do this to you
because you're the Bad Thing yourself! The Bad Thing is you. Nothing else: no
bacteriological infection or having gotten conked on the head with a board or a mallet
when you were a little kid, or any other excuse; you are the sickness yourself. It is what
"defines'' you, especially after a little while has gone by. You realize all this. here. And
that, I guess, is when if you're all glib you realize that there is no surface to the water.
or when you bonk your nose on the jar's glass and realize you're trapped, or when you
look at the black hole and it's wearing your face. That's when the Bad Thing just
absolutely eats you up, or rather when you just eat yourself up. When you kill yourself.
All this business about people committing suicide when they're "severely depressed;"
we say, "Holy cow, we must do something to stop them from killing themselves!"
That's wrong. Because all these people have, you see, by this time already killed
themselves, where it really counts. By the time these people swallow entire medicine
cabinets or take naps in the garage or whatever, they've already been killing themselves
for ever so long. When they "commit suicide," they're just being orderly. They're just

13
giving external form to an event the substance of which already exists and has existed
in them over time. Once you realize what's going on, the event of self destruction for
all practical purposes exists. There's not much a person is apt to do in this situation,
except "formalize" it, or, if you don't quite want to do that, maybe "E.C.T." or a trip
away from the Earth to some other planet, or something.

Anyway, this is more than I intended to say about the Bad Thing. Even now, thinking
about it a little bit and being introspective and all that, I can feel it reaching out for
me, trying to mess with my electrons. But I'm not on Earth anymore.

I made it through my first little semester at Brown University and even got a prize for
being a very good introductory Economics student, two hundred dollars, which I
promptly spent on marijuana, because smoking marijuana keeps you from getting sick
to your stomach and throwing up. It really does: they give it to people undergoing
chemotherapy for cancer, sometimes. I had smoked a lot of marijuana ever since my
year of "P.G." schoolwork to keep from throwing up, and it worked a lot of the time.
It just bounced right off the sickness in my atoms, though. The Bad Thing just
laughed at it. I was a very troubled little soldier by the end of the semester. I longed
for the golden good old days when my face just bled.

In December the Bad Thing and I boarded a bus to go from Rhode Island to New
Hampshire for the holiday season. Everything was extremely jolly. Except just coming
out of Providence, Rhode Island, the busdriver didn't look carefully enough before he
tried to make a left turn and a pickup truck hit our bus from the left side and
smunched the left front part of the bus and knocked the driver out of his seat and
down into the well where the stairs onto and off of the bus are, where he broke his
arm and I think his leg and cut his head fairly badly. So we had to stop and wait for an
ambulance for the driver and a new bus for us. The driver was incredibly upset. He
was sure he was going to lose his job, because he'd messed up the left turn and had
had an accident, and also because he hadn't been wearing his seatbelt — clear
evidence of which was the fact that he had been knocked way out of his seat into the
stairwell, which everybody saw and would say they saw — which is against the law if
you're a bus driver in just about any state of the Union. He was almost crying, and me
too, because he said he had about seventy kids and he really needed that job, and now
he would be fired. A couple of passengers tried to soothe him and calm him down,

14
but understandably no one came near me. Just me and the Bad Thing, there. Finally
the bus driver just kind of passed out from his broken bones and that cut, and an
ambulance came and they put him under a rust-colored blanket. A new bus came out
of the sunset and a bus executive or something came too, and he was really mad when
some of the incredibly helpful passengers told him what had happened. I knew that
the bus driver was probably going to lose his job, just as he had feared would happen.
I felt unbelievably sorry for him, and of course the Bad Thing very kindly filtered this
sadness for me and made it a lot worse. It was weird and irrational but all of a sudden
I felt really strongly as though the bus driver were really me. I really felt that way. So
Ifelt just like he must have felt, and it was awful. I wasn't just sorry for him, Iwas sorry
as lim, or something like that. All courtesy of the Bad Thing. Suddenly I had to go
somewhere, really fast, so I went to where the driver's stretcher was in the open
ambulance and went in to look at him, there. He had a bus company ID badge with
his picture, but I couldn't really see anything because it was covered by a streak of
blood from his head. I took my roughly a hundred dollars and a bag of "sinsemilla"
marijuana and slipped it under his rusty blanket to help him feed all his kids and not
get sick and throw up, then I left really fast again and got my stuff and got on the new
bus. It wasn't until, what, about thirty minutes later on the nighttime highway that I
realized that when they found that marijuana with the driver they'd think it was maybe
his all along and he really would get fired, or maybe even sent to jail. It was kind of
like I'd framed him, killed him, except he was also me, I thought, so it was really
confusing. It was like I'd symbolically killed myself or something, because Ifelt he was
me in some deep sense. I think at that moment I felt worse than I'd ever felt before,
except for that spinal tap, and that was totally different. Dr. Kablumbus says that's
when the Bad Thing really got me by the balls. Those were really his words. I'm really
sorry for what I did and what the Bad Thing did to the bus driver. I really sincerely
only meant to help him, as if he were me. But I sort of killed him, instead.

I got home and my parents said "Hey, hello, we love you, congratulations:' and I said
"Hello, hello, thank you, thank you," I didn't exactly have the "holiday spirit," I must
confess, because of the Bad Thing, and because of the busdriver, and because of the
fact that we were all three of us the same thing in the respects that mattered at all.

The highly ridiculous thing happened on Christmas Eve. It was very stupid, but I
guess almost sort of Inevitable given what had gone on up to then. You could just say

15
Chicago. Silverfish sat still with his pajama bottoms at his feet and looked for a
moment, maybe two moments, at the muted orange light that pumped down slowly
into Sophie. From the end of her line of a profile,from her pillow, where more light
lay, came Sophie's voice.
'So then it's Ira who's calling at such an hour?' Silverfish was out of bed in only
the shirt of his pajamas. You could tell from Sophie's voice that she had not slept.
Silverfish shook through a pile of clothes on a chair and found his yesterday pants
from heaviness in pockets. Shorts luckily were still inside the pants. He smelled at his
shorts and his voice came through them. 'So then it was
Ira-the-I'm-too-important-and-sensitive-an-artist-not-to-mention-intellectual-to-obey-
the-basic-laws-and-rules-of-life-we-are-all-expected-to-respect-and-instead-go-drinkin
g-to-drive-around-the-city-so-drunk-I’m-legless-and-somehow-God-knows-how-it-co
uld-only-happen-to-Ira-cracked-up-against-Kretzman's-car-right-in-front-of-the-Dem
pster-precinct-house Schoenweiss, may his large ass hang from the ceiling by the
man's kishkas while Kretzman jabs at it with anything sharp he can find, the sharper
the better, until I get there.' Silverfish found his shoes and two socks which who knew
if they matched.
Sophie turned herself carefully on her back to look at the outline of Silverfish,
who was tying shoes against the edge of the bed. 'Zero Kretzman's car? As in Mr.
D.A. the prosecutor Kretzman?'
'As in Ira-I'm-constantly-in-middle-of-the-night-trouble Schoenweiss who my
wife had to be his sister!' roared Silverfish. He leaped on the bed with the agility of
such a younger person and straddled Sophie. He bit her on her shoulder. He snatched
her wig from her night-stand and flipped it with ease of practice up onto the Pyrex IV
jar, which tink led and rocked on its stand. Silverfish kissed Sophie's sternum. He
flicked at her stomach. 'Fat!' he hissed. 'Whose fat pink obscene wife of mine is the
sister of a klotz, also by the way fat.' Sophie was laughing as loud as she might. The
sound echoed in her chest as in a system of wire. With her unconnected arm she felt
at the buttons on Silverfish's top. 'You still have on a pajama shirt, Mr.
fat-wife-klotz-relative-lawyer-on-a-mission-of-mercy Silverfish.'
'For Ira and Kretzman I should wear a tuxedo? Maybe also with tails? I should
pretend this isn't a bother?' Silverfish felt Sophie struggling quietly to breathe under
his weight and gently rose up off her, walked across the mattress with grace in shoes
and went to his dresser for his keys. He found a tie by the keys and threw it around his
neck. Sophie breathed and watched him in the ditty light.

27
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
Ojeda and Pizarro, he was not altogether unfit to hold a Spanish
commission.
 CHAPTER XIV.
DIFFICULTIES AND DISCOURAGEMENTS.

[Æt. 59; 1495]

MARGARITE and Father Boyle, as has been mentioned, had

sailed for Spain while Columbus was absent on his cruise in search
of China. Arriving in Spain, they told a series of able and effective
falsehoods, judiciously seasoned with a little genuine truth. They
said it gave them the greatest pain to speak in disparaging terms of
their superior officer, but a stern sense of duty compelled them to
say that the misguided man was a liar and a scoundrel. All the
Admiral’s stories of fertile islands, rich gold-mines, delightful climate,
and amiable heathens clamoring for conversion, were without any
foundation. Hispaniola was a wretched, fever-stricken place, wholly
unfit for colonization. As for Columbus and his brother Bartholomew,
they were cruel tyrants, who required Spanish gentlemen to work
and made sick men get out of their beds, where they were
comparatively comfortable, in order to engage in ridiculous
expeditions after gold that never existed. Of the two, Don
Bartholomew was perhaps the more objectionable, which was
unfortunate, inasmuch as the Admiral, having put to sea in search of
more of his worthless islands, had undoubtedly been drowned.
It must be confessed that, in one respect, Margarite and Boyle
did tell the truth. There were chills and fever in the new colony, and
when the King and Queen saw the returned colonists visibly shaking
before them, they believed in the unhealthfulness of Hispaniola and
all the accompanying lies told by the malicious and malarious
complainants. They therefore resolved to send one Diego Carillo to
Hispaniola as an investigating committee, to ascertain if there was
anybody capable of telling the exact truth about the state of affairs.
 But before Carillo could sail, Don Diego Columbus arrived, and
as he brought considerable gold with him, the monarchs formed the
opinion that he had the air of a man of strict veracity. He admitted
that there was a part of the island of Hispaniola, a long distance from
the colony, where it was said that chills and fever prevailed, and he
was inclined to believe that the report was true. As for the climate of
Isabella and its vicinity, he regarded it as exceptionally healthful. He
reported that the Admiral had positively been to the mainland of
China, and regretted that he had thoughtlessly forgotten to bring
back confirmatory tea-chests.
Don Diego further assured the King and Queen that since the
fortunate departure from Hispaniola of two objectionable persons
whom he would not name, but who, he was informed, had recently
arrived in Spain with a full cargo of assorted falsehoods, the affairs
of the colony had been very prosperous. Of course, to bold and
restless spirits there was a certain monotony in swinging in
hammocks all day long, and eating delicious fruit, in a climate that
was really perfect, and there were men who even grew tired of
picking up nuggets of gold; but Don Diego was confident that, with a
very few exceptions, the colonists enjoyed their luxurious life and, on
the whole, preferred Hispaniola to Paradise.
Ferdinand and Isabella weighed the gold brought by Don Diego,
and decided to believe him. They thereupon cancelled Carillo’s
appointment, and appointed in his place Juan Aguado, a personal
friend of Columbus, who, it was understood, would go to Hispaniola
in the character of a visiting statesman, and, after examining such
witnesses as Columbus might introduce to him, would return home
and make a report that would completely satisfy the Admiral.
In spite of this apparently friendly action, they gave Columbus
just cause of complaint by throwing open the business of exploration,
the monopoly of which they had formally given to him. They
authorized any Spaniard to fit out exploring expeditions, under
certain restrictions, and to discover continents, islands, and seas,
without any limitation as to number; the discoverers to pay the
Crown one third of all the gold they might find. Columbus was greatly
grieved at this, not only because he feared that injudicious explorers
would discover unhealthy islands, and would thus bring exploration
into disrepute, but because it was a distinct breach of faith on the
part of the King and Queen. As for the gracious permission which
they gave him to freight a vessel to trade with the New World
whenever any other explorer should freight one for the like purpose,
he evidently did not trust himself to express his opinion of such a
hollow mockery of his rights.
In August, 1495, Don Juan Aguado sailed for Hispaniola with a
fleet loaded with supplies and a pocket filled with a royal decree,
written on the best of parchment and ordering that the colony of
Isabella should consist of not over five hundred people. The astute
monarchs had perceived that the larger the colony might be the
more numerous and contradictory would be the complaints which the
colonists would make, and hence they resolved to limit the
complaint-producing capacity of the colony, and to render it
impossible for more than five hundred distinct accounts of the infamy
of Columbus and the climate to be brought to their royal ears.
As Aguado was supposed to be a firm friend of the Admiral, Don
Diego Columbus decided to return with him to Isabella, which he
accordingly did, arriving some time in October. We can imagine how
glad Columbus must have been to find that his good though tedious
brother’s affection forbade him to desert his own dear Christopher.
The latter was in the interior when Aguado arrived, and that officer
immediately proceeded to astonish Don Bartholomew by putting on
what Bartholomew rightly characterized as airs. Aguado announced
that he had come to put things to rights, and that the colonists now
had a real friend to whom they could complain when insulted and
oppressed by domineering Italians. As Isabella was undoubtedly a
dull place, the colonists eagerly availed themselves of the new
occupation of making complaints against Columbus and his brother,
and displayed a promptness and industry of which they had never
before given any signs. Don Bartholomew instantly sent word to his
brother that a new and alarming kind of lunatic had arrived from
Spain, with a royal commission authorizing him to raise the great
adversary of mankind, and that the sooner the Admiral returned the
better.
 Columbus hastened to Isabella, where he greeted Aguado with
such overwhelming politeness that the fellow became wretchedly
unhappy. He had hoped to be able to report that Columbus had
insulted him and treated the royal commission with contempt, but he
was disappointed. He was a little cheered up, however, by a
tremendous hurricane which wrecked all the Spanish ships except
one, and kept the air for a time full of Spanish colonists, natives, and
fragments of ruined buildings. This he thought would read very well
in his intended report on the general infamy of the climate, and,
despairing of obtaining anything better, he resolved to return to
Spain as soon as a new vessel could be built. The Admiral
announced that he intended to return with him, a piece of news that
greatly discontented Aguado, who foresaw that after he had made
his report concerning Columbus the latter would be entirely capable
of making a report concerning Aguado.
[Æt. 60; 1496]

About this time a young Spaniard arrived from the interior with a
most welcome story. He had run away from Isabella on account of
having nearly killed a fellow-colonist, and had met a beautiful female
cacique living on the river Ozema, near the present site of San
Domingo, who had fallen violently in love with him. From her he had
learned of rich gold-mines, and he humbly trusted that Columbus
would condescend to look at them and to overlook his little
indiscretion in the matter of his fellow-colonist. The Admiral, secretly
feeling that any man who killed one of his colonists was a benefactor
of the human race, kindly forgave him and went with him to inspect
the mines, which he found to be apparently so rich that he instantly
overhauled his Old Testament and his Geography, and decided that
he had found the original land of Ophir.
A new scientific person, who had been sent out to supersede the
worthless Fermin Cedo, was ordered to take his crucibles, transit
instruments, and other apparatus, and make a satisfactory assay of
the mines. He did so, and, being a clever man, reported to the
Admiral that the gold was unusually genuine, and that the ore would
probably average three hundred dollars to the ton. At least, that is
what he would have reported had he been a modern expert
investigating mining property in behalf of British capitalists, and we
need not suppose that there were no able assayers prior to the
discovery of silver in Colorado. Columbus read the report, expressed
a high opinion of the scientific abilities of the assayer, and ordered a
fort to be built in the neighborhood of the mines.
Carrying with him specimens of gold from the new mines, and
the report of the scientific person, Columbus sailed for Spain, in
company with Aguado, on the 10th of March, 1496. He left Don
Bartholomew as Governor during his absence, and took with him the
captive chief Caonabo, either as a specimen of the kind of heathen
produced by the island, or because he thought it might be possible to
convert the chief with the help of the many appliances in the
possession of the church at home. He wisely refrained from taking
any slaves, Don Diego having informed him that the Queen had
ordered his previous consignment of five hundred to be sent back to
Hispaniola and set at liberty.
The homeward-bound fleet consisted of only two vessels, but
they met with as much head-wind as if they had been a dozen ships
of the largest size, and on the 10th of April they were compelled to
stop at Guadaloupe for water and provisions. Here they were
attacked by armed women as well as men. Several of these early
American advocates of the equality of the sexes were captured, and
set at liberty again when the ships sailed. One of them, however,
improved the time by falling in love with Caonabo, whom she insisted
upon accompanying, and Columbus consented to carry her to Spain
as a beautiful illustration of the affectionate character of the Western
heathen.
It was the 20th of April when the fleet left Guadaloupe, and
Cadiz was not reached until the 11th of June. The provisions were so
nearly exhausted that during the latter part of the voyage the sailors
were almost in a state of starvation. Of course, when the provisions
were scarce and the men were put on short allowance, the prisoner
Caonabo and his affectionate female friend received their share of
food, for Columbus would never have permitted the unfortunate pair
to starve. Still, it did happen that Caonabo died on the voyage, and
history is silent as to what became of his companion.
 [Æt. 60–62; 1496–98]

The returned colonists told dismal stories of their sufferings, but

their stories were superfluous. Their wretched appearance; the way
in which they clung to the lamp-posts and shook them till the glass
rattled; and the promptness with which they rushed into the drug-
stores and demanded—each for himself, in a single breath—“Six-
dozen-two-grain-quinine-pills-and-be-quick-about-it!” furnished
sufficient evidence of the sort of climate in which they had lived. It
was useless for Columbus and his friends to say that the
appearance and conduct of the shaking colonists were due to sea-
sickness and long confinement on shipboard without proper
provisions. The incredulous public of Cadiz could not be thus
imposed upon, and the visible facts as to the colonists offset in the
popular mind the magnificent stories of the mines of Ophir which the
Admiral circulated as soon as he landed. The monarchs sent him a
courteous invitation to visit the court, but he was in great doubt as to
the kind of reception which Margarite, Father Boyle, and Aguado
would prepare for him. In order to show that he felt himself greatly
humiliated by the credence which had been given to the reports
against him, he dressed himself in a Franciscan’s coarse gown, and
let his beard grow. On his way to court he paraded some thirty
Indians whom he had brought with him, dressed principally in gold
bracelets, and thereby created the false and alarming impression on
the public mind that the Black Crook had broken out with much
violence.
The King and Queen, when they saw the gold that Columbus
had brought, and read the scientific person’s certificates that it was
genuine, decided to disregard all the complaints against the Admiral.
Aguado had nothing to repay him for his long voyage, and no one
would listen to his report. It is believed that he finally published it as
an advertisement at so much a line in the local Cadiz paper, and
sent marked copies to all his friends. If so, he benefited no one but
the printers, and did Columbus no apparent injury.
[Æt. 60; 1496–98]

Columbus was promised eight ships for a third exploring

expedition, but the money was not in the treasury, or, at all events,
the King and Queen could not make up their minds to spare it. They
were engaged in two or three expensive wars and one or two difficult
marriages, and were really quite pinched for money. At last, however,
they gave Columbus an order for the amount; but before it was paid,
Pedro Alonzo Niño, who had been sent with supplies to Hispaniola,
returned to Cadiz and announced that his ships were filled with gold.
The monarchs therefore recalled their order, and in its stead gave
Columbus a draft on Niño, to be paid from his cargo of gold. Further
investigation showed that Niño had spoken figuratively, and that he
had no actual gold, but only a cargo of slaves, who, he estimated,
would bring more or less gold if sold in the market.
Meanwhile the monarchs had appropriated all their ready money
for purposes of slaughter and matrimony, and so were compelled to
decline advancing funds for the new expedition until their business
should improve.
Columbus had already lost much of his original popularity, and
was daily losing what remained. That he had discovered new
countries nobody denied; but the complaint was that he had selected
cheap and undesirable countries. The Queen, however, still admired
and trusted him, for the Admiral was a man of remarkably fine
personal appearance. She confirmed all the previous honors and
privileges that had been promised to him, which looks as if in those
days a royal promise became outlawed, as the lawyers say, in one or
two years unless it was renewed—a rule which must have greatly
simplified the practice of diplomacy. Inasmuch as there had been a
vast excess of expenses over receipts in the exploration business,
Columbus was released from the obligation to pay an eighth of the
cost of every expedition, and was given a large tract of land in
Hispaniola, with the title of Duke, which title he refused, since it was
inferior in rank to his title of Admiral.
[Æt. 62; 1498]

While waiting for the expedition to be made ready, Columbus

improved the time by making his will. In this document he committed
the task of recovering the Holy Sepulchre to his son Diego, and
directed him to save up his money by putting it in the savings bank,
until he should have enough to pay for a crusade. Curiously enough,
Don Diego never was able to accumulate the necessary sum, and
the Holy Sepulchre is still waiting to be delivered. It was wise,
however, in the Admiral to delegate this great duty to his son, and
thus to free himself from an obligation which could not but interfere
with the business of exploration. The more we can shift our burdens
upon our descendants, the better time we shall have. This is the
great principle upon which all enlightened nations base their financial
policy.
Early in 1498 the royal business had so far improved that two
vessels loaded with supplies were sent to Hispaniola, and
preparations were made for fitting out a fleet of six ships and a force
of five hundred men. The five hundred men were not easily found. It
was the popular belief that chills and fever were not worth the trouble
of so long a voyage, and that there was little else to be got by
serving under Columbus. In this emergency, the sentences of
criminals in the Spanish jails were commuted to transportation to the
New World, and a pardon was offered to all persons for whom the
police were looking—with the exception of heretics and a few other
choice criminals—who should surrender themselves and volunteer to
join the fleet. In this way the required number of men was gradually
obtained. In point of moral character the expedition might have
competed with an equal number of Malay pirates or New York
plumbers. We are even told that some hardened and habitual
musicians were thus carried by Columbus to the once peaceful and
happy island of Hispaniola, taking with them their accordions and
guitars. This is a blot upon the Admiral’s character which his most
ardent admirers cannot overlook.
 CHAPTER XV.
HIS THIRD EXPEDITION.

[Æt. 62; 1498]

THE perseverance of Columbus triumphed over all obstacles.

The expedition was finally ready, and on the 30th of May, 1498, the
Admiral went on board the flag-ship and, after remarking “All ashore
that’s goin’!” and “All aboard!” rang the final bell and started once
more for the New World. Just as he was about to embark, one
Breviesca, a clerk in the Indian Agents’ Bureau, met him on the
wharf and told Columbus that he would never return.
“What, never?” exclaimed the astonished Admiral.
“Well, hardly ever,” replied the miscreant.
Of course Columbus instantly knocked him down, and went on
board his vessel in a just but tremendous rage. He wrote to the
Queen, informing her of the affair, and sincerely regretting that he
had lost his temper. Long afterwards his enemies were accustomed
to refer to the brutal way in which he had attacked an estimable and
inoffensive gentleman, as a proof of his ungovernable temper, his
Italian fondness for revenge, and his general unfitness for any post
of responsibility.
The fleet steered first for Madeira, and then for the Canary
Islands, touching at both places; and at the latter surprising—as
historians assure us—a French privateer with two Spanish prizes.
What there was about Columbus or his fleet that was so surprising,
has, of course, been left to our imagination, in accordance with the
habit of historians to omit mentioning details of real interest. The
Frenchman was attacked by the Spaniards, but managed to escape
together with one of his prizes. The other prize was retaken by the
Spanish prisoners on board of her, and given up to Columbus, who
turned the vessel over to the local authorities.
From the Canaries the fleet sailed to the Cape Verde Islands,
where the Admiral divided his forces. Three ships he sent direct to
Hispaniola, and with the other three he steered in a south-westerly
direction, to make new discoveries. He soon discovered the hottest
region in which he had ever yet been—the great champion belt of
equatorial calms. There was not a breath of wind, and the very
seams of the ships opened with the intense heat. It was evident to
the sailors that they must be very close to the region where,
according to the scientific persons of the period, the sea was
perpetually boiling, and they began to fear that they would be
roasted before the boiling process could begin. Luckily, a gentle
breeze finally sprung up, and Columbus, abandoning the rash
attempt to sail farther south, steered directly west, and soon passed
into a comforting, cool, and pleasant climate.
On the 31st of July he discovered the island of Trinidad, and in
view of the fact that his ships were leaky, his water almost gone, and
his body alternately shaken by fever and twisted by gout, it was high
time that land should have been found.
The following day the flag-ship was suddenly attacked by a
canoe full of fierce natives, who threw spears and other unpleasant
things at the Spaniards, and fought with great bravery. Columbus,
determined to strike terror into the enemy, ordered his musicians to
assemble on deck and play familiar airs—probably from “Pinafore.”
The result surpassed his most sanguine expectations. The unhappy
natives fled in wild dismay as soon as the music began, and yelled
with anguish when the first cornet blew a staccato note, and the man
with the bass trombone played half a tone flat. When we remember
that the good Queen Isabella had particularly ordered Columbus to
treat the natives kindly, we must earnestly hope that this cruel
incident never came to her presumably pretty ears.
The fleet was now off the south shore of Trinidad, and the
mainland was in plain sight farther west. Columbus at first supposed
that the mainland was only another island, and after taking in water
he sailed west, with the intention of sailing beyond it. Passing
through the narrow strait between Trinidad and the continent, he
entered the placid Gulf of Paria, where to his astonishment he found
that the water was fresh. Sailing along the shore, he landed here and
there and made friendly calls on the natives, whom he found to be a
pleasant, light-colored race, with a commendable fondness for
exchanging pearls for bits of broken china and glass beads. No
opening could be found through which to sail farther westward, and
Columbus soon came to the opinion that he had this time reached
the continent of Asia.
One thing greatly astonished him. He had been fully convinced
that the nearer he should approach the equator the blacker would be
the people and the hotter the climate. Yet the people of Paria were
light-colored, and the climate was vastly cooler than the scorching
regions of the equatorial calms. Remembering also the remarkable
conduct of the stars, which had materially altered their places since
he had left the Cape Verde Islands, and reflecting upon the unusual
force of the currents which had latterly interfered severely with the
progress of the ship, Columbus proceeded to elaborate a new and
attractive geographical theory. He wrote to Ferdinand and Isabella
that, in his opinion, the world was not exactly round, like a ball or an
orange, as he had hitherto maintained, but that it was shaped like a
large yellow pear. He assumed that the region which he had now
reached corresponded to the long neck of the pear, near the stem,
as it appears when the pear is resting on its larger end. He had
consequently sailed up a steep ascent since leaving Spain, and had
by this means reached a cool climate and found light-colored
heathen.
This was a very pretty theory, and one which ought to have
satisfied any reasonable inventor of geographical theories; but
Columbus, warming with his work, proceeded still further to
embellish it. He maintained that the highest point of the earth was
situated a short distance west of the coast of Paria, and that on its
apex the Garden of Eden could be found. He expressed the opinion
that the Garden was substantially in the same condition as when
Adam and Eve left it. Of course a few weeds might have sprung up
in the neglected flower-beds, but Columbus was confident that the
original tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the
conversationally disposed animals, were all to be found in their
accustomed places. As for the angel with the two-edged sword, who
had been doing sentry duty at the gate for several thousand years,
there could be no doubt that should an explorer present to him a
written pass signed by the Pope, the angel would instantly admit him
into the Garden.
Columbus now felt that, whatever failures might seem to
characterize his new exploring expedition, he had forever secured
the gratitude and admiration of the pious Queen. To have almost
discovered the Garden of Eden in a nearly perfect state of repair was
certainly more satisfactory than the discovery of any amount of gold
would have been. Still, he thought it could do no harm to mention in
his letter to the Queen that pearls of enormous value abounded on
the coast, and that the land was fertile, full of excellent trees and
desirable fruits, and populous with parrots of most correct
conversational habits, and monkeys of unusual moral worth and
comic genius.
Although Columbus failed to visit the Garden of Eden, either
because he had no pass from the Pope or because he could not
spare the time, it must not be imagined that he did not believe his
new and surprising theory. In those happy days men had a capacity
for belief which they have since totally lost, and Columbus himself
was probably capable of honestly believing even wilder theories than
the one which gave to the earth the shape of a pear and perched the
Garden on the top of an imaginary South American mountain.
As the provisions were getting low, and the Admiral’s fever was
getting high—not to speak of his gout, which manifested a tendency
to rise to his stomach—he resolved to cease exploring for a time,
and to sail for Hispaniola. He arrived there on the 19th of August,
after discovering and naming a quantity of new islands. The currents
had drifted him so far out of his course, that he reached the coast of
Hispaniola a hundred and fifty miles west of Ozima, his port of
destination. Sending an Indian messenger to warn Bartholomew of
his approach, he sailed for Ozima, where he arrived on the 30th of
August, looking as worn out and haggard as if he had been engaged
in a prolonged pleasure-trip to the Fishing Banks.
Don Bartholomew received his brother with the utmost joy, and
proceeded to make him happy by telling him how badly affairs had
gone during his absence. Bartholomew had followed the Admiral’s
orders, and had proved himself a gallant and able commander. He
had built a fort and founded a city at the mouth of the Ozima, which
is now known as San Domingo. Leaving Don Diego Columbus in
command of the colony, he had marched to Xaragua, the western
part of the island, and induced the Cacique Behechio and his sister
Anacaona, the widow of Caonabo, to acknowledge the Spanish rule
and to pay tribute. He had also crushed a conspiracy of the natives,
which was due chiefly to the burning of several Indians at the stake
who had committed sacrilege by destroying a chapel. These were
the first Indians who were burnt for religious purposes, and it is a pity
that Father Boyle had not remained in Hispaniola long enough to
witness the ceremony which he had so often vainly urged the
Admiral to permit him to perform. Probably Don Bartholomew was
not responsible for the burning of the savages, for he evidently
sympathized with the revolted natives, and suppressed the
conspiracy with hardly any bloodshed.
[Æt. 62–64; 1498–1500]

The colonists, both old and new, were of course always

discontented, and cordially disliked the two brothers of the Admiral.
The chief judge of the colony, Francisco Roldan, undertook to
overthrow the authority of the Adelentado, and to make himself the
ruler of the island. After much preliminary rioting and strong
language Roldan openly rebelled, and with his followers besieged
Don Bartholomew in Fort Concepcion, in which he had taken refuge,
and from which he did not dare to sally, not feeling any confidence in
his men. Roldan was unable to capture the fort, but he instigated the
natives to throw off Bartholomew’s authority, and convinced them
that he, and not the Adelentado, was their real friend.
The opportune arrival of the two supply ships, which sailed from
Spain while Columbus was fitting out his third expedition, probably
saved the authority and the life of Don Bartholomew. He immediately
left the fort and, going to San Domingo, took command of the newly
arrived troops, and proclaimed Roldan a traitor, which greatly
relieved his mind. The traitor thereupon marched with his men to
Xaragua, where they led a simple and happy life of vice and
immorality. The discord among the Spaniards induced the natives to
make another attempt to gain their liberty, but the Adelentado, in a
brilliant campaign, once more reduced them to subjection. Two
native insurrections, a Spanish rebellion, and unusual discontent
were thus the chief features of the pleasant story with which
Columbus was welcomed to Hispaniola.
Before he could take any active measures against Roldan,
except to issue a proclamation expressly confirming Don
Bartholomew’s assertion that he was a traitor, the three ships which
he had sent direct to Hispaniola when he divided his fleet at the
Cape Verde Islands, arrived off the coast of Xaragua, and perceiving
Spaniards on the shore, imagined that they were respectable
colonists. Roldan fostered that delusion until he had obtained arms
and supplies, when he admitted that from the holiest motives he had
rebelled against the tyranny of the Adelentado.
The men of the fleet, learning that Roldan’s followers were a set
of reckless scoundrels, were inclined to think that perhaps
transportation was not such a terrible affair after all, and began to
desert with great alacrity, and to join the rebels. The ships therefore
put to sea, and their commander, on arriving at San Domingo,
informed Columbus that Roldan would probably surrender if it was
made an object to him to do so.
The Admiral was anxious to march on Xaragua, capture Roldan,
and make an example of him; but his unpopularity and that of his
brothers was so great that he did not dare to risk leaving San
Domingo, lest it should rebel as soon as his back was turned. In
order to rid himself of some of the malcontents, he fitted out five
vessels, and offered a free passage to Spain to every one who
wished to return. The ships sailed, carrying letters from both
Columbus and Roldan, in which each described the other in
uncomplimentary terms.
 Columbus would now have marched against Roldan, but he
could not find more than seventy men who felt well enough to march
with him. The rest said they had headaches, or had sprained their
ankles, and really must be excused. There was nothing left to do but
to negotiate with the rebel leader, and compromise matters.
Columbus began by offering a free pardon to Roldan if he would
immediately surrender. Roldan, in his turn, offered to pardon
Columbus if he would agree to certain conditions. These
negotiations were continued for a long time, and after various
failures the Admiral succeeded in obtaining a compromise. He
agreed to reappoint Roldan Chief Judge of the colony; to grant him a
certificate that all the charges which had been made against him
were malicious lies; to give him and his followers back pay, slaves,
and compensation for their property which had been destroyed; to
send back to Spain such of the rebels as might wish to return, and to
give the remainder large grants of land. On these conditions Roldan
agreed to overlook what had passed and to rejoin the colony. This
successful compromise served years afterwards as a model for
Northern Americans when dealing with their dissatisfied brethren,
and entitles Columbus to the honor of being the first great American
compromiser.
Having thus settled the dispute, the Admiral wrote to Spain,
explaining that the conditions to which he had agreed had been
extorted by force and were therefore not binding, and that on
Roldan’s massive cheek deserved to be branded the legend Fraud
first triumphant in American History. He asked that a commissioner
should be sent out to arrest and punish the rebel chief, and to take
the place of Chief Judge now fraudulently held by Roldan.
There is of course no doubt that Columbus would have hung
Roldan with great pleasure had he been able to do so. He was
compelled by force of circumstances to yield to all the rebel’s
demands, but nevertheless it was hardly fair for him to claim that his
acts and promises were not binding. Still, it should be remembered
that he was suffering from malarial fever, and it is notorious that even
the best of men will tell lies without remorse if they live in a malarious
region and have houses for sale or to let.
 The Admiral, having thus restored order, was about to return to
Spain to explain more fully his conduct and that of Don Bartholomew,
when he heard that four ships commanded by Alonzo de Ojeda had
arrived at Xaragua. He immediately suspected that something was
wrong, and that in Ojeda he would have a new and utterly
unscrupulous enemy to deal with. Foreseeing that an emergency
was about to occur in which a skilful scoundrel might be of great
assistance to him, he gave Roldan the command of two ships, and
sent him to ascertain what Ojeda intended to do. The wily Roldan
anchored just out of sight of Ojeda’s fleet, while the latter, with fifteen
men only, was on shore. Landing with a strong force, and placing
himself between Ojeda and his ships, he waited for the latter to meet
him and explain matters.
Ojeda soon appeared, and was delighted to see a gentleman of
whom he had heard such favorable reports. He said he was on his
way to San Domingo, and had merely landed for supplies. He had
been authorized to make discoveries by Fonseca, the Secretary of
Indian Affairs, and his expedition had been fitted out with the
assistance of Amerigo Vespucci and other enterprising merchants.
He had been cruising in the Gulf of Paria, and had his ships loaded
with slaves. As soon as he could he intended to visit Columbus, who,
he regretted to say, was probably the most unpopular man in Spain,
and would soon be removed from his command. Roldan returned to
San Domingo with this information, and both he and the Admiral
agreed that they did not believe anything that Ojeda had said.
Meanwhile Ojeda, having met with many of Roldan’s former
adherents, who still lingered in Xaragua, was informed by them that
Columbus had not given them their back pay. Ojeda said that such
injustice made his blood boil, and that if they would join him he would
march to San Domingo and put an end to the base Italian tyrant. The
new rebellion was prevented by the arrival of Roldan with a
respectable array of troops, and Ojeda promptly went on board his
flag-ship. Roldan wrote to him asking for an interview, and reminding
him that rebellion was a crime which every good man ought to abhor.
Ojeda, replied that such was precisely his opinion, and he must
refuse to have anything to do with a man who had lately been a
rebel.
Soon afterward Ojeda sailed away in a northerly direction,
keeping near the shore, and Roldan marched along the coast to
intercept him in case he should land. Arriving at a place called by the
natives Cahay, Ojeda sent a boat ashore, which was captured by
Roldan, and in order to regain it he was finally forced to consent to
parley with his antagonist. The result was that Ojeda promised to sail
immediately for Spain. Having made this promise he naturally landed
soon after on another part of the island, but being followed by
Roldan he finally abandoned Hispaniola and sailed for Cadiz with his
cargo of slaves.
The Admiral was greatly pleased at this signal illustration of the
wisdom of the proverb about setting a rogue to catch a rogue, and
writing Roldan a complimentary letter, requested him to remain for a
little while in Xaragua.
While Ojeda’s ships were at Xaragua, Columbus had passed
sentence of banishment on Hernando de Guevara, a dissolute young
Spaniard, and sent him to embark on board one of Ojeda’s vessels.
He arrived at Xaragua after the ships had left, and Roldan ordered
him to go into banishment at Cahay. Guevara, however, had fallen in
love with an Indian maid, the daughter of Anacaona, and wanted to
remain in Xaragua and marry her. Roldan would not listen to him,
and the unhappy youth went to Cahay, where he stayed three days
and then returned. There was a spirited quarrel between him and
Roldan, and the latter finally yielded and allowed Guevara to remain.
The grateful young man immediately conspired against Roldan
and the Admiral. He had a cousin, De Mexica, a former associate of
Roldan’s in rebellion, who immediately took up the cause of the
exile. De Mexica soon convinced his ex-rebel friends that the
spectacle of Roldan, as an upright, law-abiding man, was simply
revolting, and that he and Columbus ought to be killed. He had
gathered a small force together, when he and his chief associates
were suddenly surprised by the Admiral, arrested, tried, and hanged
before they had time to realize that anything was the matter.
 Don Bartholomew was dispatched to Xaragua to aid Roldan, and
the two, after arresting Guevara, stamped out the new rebellion with
remorseless energy. This time there was no compromise, and a
suspicion began to prevail that rebellion was not so safe and
profitable an industry as it had been hitherto.
 CHAPTER XVI.
HIS RETURN IN DISGRACE.

[Æt. 64; 1500]

ON the 23d of August, 1500, two ships arrived at San Domingo,

commanded by Don Francisco de Bobadilla, who had been sent out
by the Spanish monarchs as a commissioner to investigate the state
of the colony. The enemies of Columbus had at last succeeded in
prejudicing Ferdinand and Isabella against him. Ojeda, the returned
colonists, Roldan’s rebels, and the letters of Roldan himself, all
agreed in representing the Admiral as a new kind of fiend, with
Italian improvements, for whom no punishment could be sufficiently
severe.
Ferdinand calculated the total amount of gold which Columbus
had either carried or sent to Spain, and, finding it smaller than he
had expected, could no longer conceal his conviction that Columbus
was a cruel, tyrannical, and wicked man. Isabella had hitherto
believed in the Admiral, and had steadily stood by him while under
fire, but in face of the evidence which had latterly been submitted to
her, and in view of the cargo of slaves that had been sent from
Hispaniola to Spain in spite of her orders, she was compelled to
admit that an investigation should be made, and sanctioned the
appointment of Bobadilla, with the understanding that he would let
no guilty man escape.
The average historian is always very indignant with the
monarchs for sending Bobadilla to San Domingo, and regards that
act as a wanton persecution of a great and good man. But the cold
and sceptical inquirer will ask how it happened that every person
who came under the Admiral’s authority, with the exception of his two
brothers, invariably made complaints against him. It is true that the