Page:The West Indies, and Other Poems.djvu/89

suppression of the repartimentos, or divisions of the people, with the soil on which they were born. In another memorial, after detailing at great length the measures which ought to be pursued for the redress of the Indians, (the proper opportunity, certainly, to advocate the Negro Slave Trade, if he approved of it,) he adds,—'The Indians are not more tormented by their masters and the different public officers, than by their servants 'and by the negroes.'

The original accusation of Las Casas, translated from the words of Herrera, is as follows:—'The licentiate Bartholomew Las Casas, perceiving that his plans experienced on all sides great difficulties, and that the expectations which he had formed from his connexion with the High Chancellor, and the favourable opinion the latter entertained of him, had not produced any effect, projected other expedients, such as, to procure for the Castilians established in the Indies a cargo of negroes, to relieve the Indians in the culture of the earth and the labour of the mines; also, to obtain a great number of working men, (from Europe,) who should pass over into those regions with certain privileges, and on certain conditions, which he detailed.'

Let this statement be compared with Dr Robertson's most exaggerated account, avowedly taken from Herrera alone, and let every man judge for himself, whether one of the most zealous and indefatigable advocates of