Who discredits the atrocities perpetrated by Ovando in Hispaniola, Pizarro in Peru, and Cortez in Mexico,because they filled the ears of the Spanish Court with protestations of their benignant rule?

Who discredits the atrocities perpetrated by Ovando in Hispaniola, Pizarro in Peru, and Cortez in Mexico,because they filled the ears of the Spanish Court with protestations of their benignant rule?

In that year, however, a royal decree, while excluding Jews and Moors, authorized the transportation of negroes born in Christian lands; and some of these were doubtless carried to Hispaniola in the great fleet of Ovando, the new governor, in 1502.

Ovando's reports of this experiment were conflicting.

"Ovando was allowed a brilliant retinue and a body guard.

"To Ovando were allowed a brilliant retinue and a body-guard.

The natives, driven to despair, resisted, and in the encounters between the naked islanders and the mailed invaders Juan Ponce distinguished himself so that Nicolos de Ovando, the governor, made him the lieutenant of Juan Esquivél, who was then engaged in "pacifying" the province of Higüey.

This was enough to awaken his ambition to explore it, and having asked permission of Ovando, it was granted.

After Don Diego's arrival in la Española he received a letter from the king, dated September 15, 1509, saying, "Ovando wrote that Juan Ponce had not gone to settle the island of San Juan for want of stores; now that they have been provided in abundance, let it be done.

Bobadilla, the Admiral's successor, made this obligation to work on the land extend to the mines, and in the royal instructions given to Ovando, who succeeded Bobadilla, these abuses were confirmed, and he was expressly charged to see to it "that the Indians were employed in collecting gold and other metals for the Castilians, in cultivating their lands, in constructing their houses, and in obeying their commands."

As early as 1502 a certain Juan Sanchez had obtained permission to introduce five caravels of negro slaves into that island free of duty, though Ovando complained that many of them escaped to the mountains and made the Indians more insubordinate than ever; but in San Juan a special permission to introduce negroes was necessary.

Ovando, who was governor at the time, protested strongly on the ground that the negroes escaped to the forests and mountains, where they joined the rebellious or fugitive Indians and made their subjugation much more difficult.

When the promising result of Ponce's first visit to the island was communicated to King Ferdinand by Ovando, the Governor of la Española, his Highness replied in a letter dated Valladolid, September 15, 1509: "I note the good services rendered by Ponce and that he has not gone to settle the island for want of means.

No doubt it would; for we know how serviceable in that way Ovando found it, when he plotted to seize the beautiful Anacaona, who governed the province of Xaragua in Hayti.

E. He was formerly called Obando; and is named Nicholas de Ovando by Herrera: Perhaps he had a commandary of the above name.

He arrived before San Domingo on the 29th of June, but the new governor Nicholas de Ovando would not permit him to come into the harbour, for which reason he was constrained to sail to the westwards.

[Note 1: Don Nicholas de Ovando, Comendador de Lares, and later

He was commissioned by the brother of Nicholas Ovando, Grand Commander of the Order of Alcantara and governor of the island, to explore Hispaniola.