CHAP, in.] WEST INDIES. 89 



enormities committed by the Spanish nation in the 

 conquest of the New World ; a conquest, on a low 

 estimate, effected by the murder of ten millions of the 

 species ! But although the accounts which are trans- 

 mitted down to us of this dreadful carnage, are au- 

 thenticated beyond the possibility of dispute, the mind, 

 shrinking from the contemplation, wishes to resist 

 conviction, and to relieve itself by incredulity. Such 

 at least is the apology w T hich I would frame for the 

 author of the American History, when I find him at- 

 tempting, in contradiction to the voice and feelings 

 of all mankind, to palliate such horrible wickedness. || 

 Yet the same author admits, that in the short inter- 

 val of fifteen years subsequent to the discovery of the 

 West Indies, the Spaniards had reduced the natives of 

 Hispaniola " from a million to sixty thousand."* It 

 is in vain that he remarks on the bodily feebleness of 

 these poor Indians, and their natural incapacity for 

 labour. Such a constitutional defect, if it existed, en- 

 titled them to a greater lenity , but the Spaniards dis- 

 tributed them into lots, and compelled them to dig 



|| Introduction to the History of America, by Dr. Robertson, vol, i. 

 p. 10. " It is to be hoped" (says this author) " that the Spaniards will 

 " at last discover this system of concealment to be no less impolitic than 

 " illiberal. From what I have experienced in the course of my inquiries, 

 <c I am satisfied, that upon a more minute scrutiny into their early cpera= 

 " tions in the New World, however REPREHENSIBLE," (a tender ex- 

 pression), "the actions of individuals may appear, the conduct of the 

 " nation will be placed in a more favourable light. 1 ' This opinion, how- 

 ever, needs no other refutation than that which is to be found in the sub- 

 sequent pages of the learned Author's History. 



* History of America, vol. i. book iii. p. 185, 

 Vol. I. M 



