The Islands of Unwisdom

by Robert Graves

  The longer we remained among them, the worse grew the cruelty of our troops, who killed either as a demonstration against the General’s plan to settle the islands, or for mere sport. The natives were cowed and, though they ceased to run away at the sound of shots, obeyed their Chieftain’s order not to attempt revenge by use of arms. They kept out of our way as much as they dared, taking refuge in their part of the village, which the Colonel had placed out of bounds; but it would have wrung the heart of any man of feeling to see the grief which they displayed at the daily murder of their kinsfolk. The girls, who had been so ready to lie with our people, went about swollen-eyed and scarred by their own finger-nails, in no humour to think of love; so that, except for those who had been established in the huts now occupied by the officers and kept there against their will, none was to be had even by the lure of beads or mirrors. I do not know that any soldier was dishonourable enough to murder the native who was his comrade, yet for spite some murdered the comrades of others. In all, about two hundred islanders were killed before we sailed, and the most notorious of the killers was Sergeant Luis Andrada.

  On the 4th of August, the galeot now being repaired and sufficient fire-wood and water shipped to satisfy Don Alvaro—though the Chief Pilot demanded more—the high officers were informed that next day we should weigh anchor; but this was to remain a secret from their men until the last. The news leaked out, however, and the troops took their final pleasures, not baulking at rape, sodomy and other enormities, until they were recalled and confined on board. At dawn, a party was sent to the top of the triple-peaked hill, there to erect three wooden crosses, visible from the sea. They were to cut another cross on the smooth bark of a tree, with the year, day, and the names of our four vessels; but Don Lorenzo, who was charged with this task, omitted the Santa Ysabel from the inscription because of the hatred he bore the Admiral.

  As they returned, one Miguel Cierva, an unmarried settler, who had gambled away all he possessed and pledged himself deeply with notes of hand, straggled from the party and was not seen again. He was a smith by trade and a man of some piety. His desertion seems to have been unpremeditated—for he carried only his arquebus, powder and ball—a sudden act of desperation to be repented day and night when once he found himself alone. I have often wondered how he fared after our departure: whether the natives revenged themselves on him for their injuries; and whether, if they spared him, he found metal for working at his trade; and what he taught the natives; and, above all, how he managed to live without the comforts of religion.

  We sailed immediately upon the return of Don Lorenzo’s party. The villagers lined the beaches, watching us in silence, not knowing whether we meant to return, because we had not told them of our intentions. I was bitterly ashamed of all that had been done and left undone, and that night poured out my heart to the Chief Pilot. ‘Ay,’ said he, ‘were I a Spaniard I should now be ashamed of the name, as often in the East Indies I was ashamed to own myself a Portuguese. In years to come when other ships touch at these islands, they can expect no friendly welcome and the message of God’s love that might have been conveyed to willing ears will be rejected with scorn and hatred. I shall leave it to the doctors of theology to argue which is the greater sinner: he who licences crime, he who commits crime, or he who turns his back on crime when he has the power to prevent it. But of this I am assured: that for the necks of those who have sinned against these innocents a millstone is prepared that will sink them to the unplumbed bottom of the abyss.’

  It was my opinion that had the General kept firm control of the troops from the start, there would have been no need for any bloodshed, and we could have made noble use of our stay, both in our own interests and in those of God. But Don Alvaro shut his eyes and stopped his ears to murder, and the Vicar held that since we were to resume our voyage so soon as the galeot was repaired, he should not attempt to convert any islanders at all. It had been his experience in the interior of Peru, he declared, that to impart the rudiments of Christian doctrine to the wild Indians and then pass on, was far worse than to leave them in ignorance: they would mix the true faith with their own superstitions and breed blasphemous new heresies, and having no priest to hear their confessions, would go astray like sheep without a shepherd. I did not presume to contradict Father Juan, who was a man of great knowledge as well as piety; but I grieved that so good a people should be lightly abandoned to their error.

  Chapter 11

  SAN BERNARDO AND THE SOLITARY ISLE

  When we were four days out from Santa Cristina, Don Alvaro announced at the common table that we could now expect to sight the Isles of Solomon at any hour. The Chief Pilot gasped and stiffened in his seat, but did not contradict him. As soon as the meal was ended, however, he drew Don Lorenzo aside and said that this was a misconception: Don Alvaro must be thinking of the distance which he travelled in an equal number of days on his first voyage, though by the agreed reckoning of all the pilots, five hundred leagues stretched ahead of us still and we were making less than twenty-five a day. The principal cause of our slow progress was that the Santa Ysabel, too light in ballast, could not keep the pace except at the risk of capsizing under a full spread of canvas; the frigate, too, was a slow craft. He therefore begged Don Lorenzo to see to it that the troops and settlers were sparing of food, fuel and water, as he himself undertook that the sailors would be; otherwise we should all suffer before the journey was over.

  ‘You blow hot and cold, man!’ said Don Lorenzo. ‘At Paita you assured the crew that Don Alvaro’s skill in navigation equalled your own; now you suggest that he is an ignoramus who can err to the measure of one league in every three.’ He added, carelessly: ‘Nevertheless, I will warn my sergeants to check the waste of which you complain.’

  Whether he gave this warning, I cannot say; but if he did, it was disregarded. The chickens and pigs brought from Peru had by this time all gone into the pot, and the leavings of supper, hitherto set aside for them, were now tossed overboard, though they might well have been kept for breakfast on the following day. The water-steward reported to the Purser that fresh water was being used for washing, strictly against orders, and that the supply had fallen low. Don Gaspar carried the report to the General, who replied: ‘Patience, my friend! With God’s help and a steady breeze from the east we shall soon be at our journey’s end.’

  God sent us the wind we needed, but when we had covered a further two hundred leagues on a W.S.W. course, and still no land appeared, officers and men alike were grumbling openly at the length of the voyage, for which they blamed the Chief Pilot; who, however, behaved with exemplary loyalty towards the General. He would answer all unkind words with: ‘I am following my set course; I can do no more and I will not do less.’ Though he was ready to defend himself against any charge of incompetence, none came; Don Alvaro lacked the courage to admit his error and preferred to earn an undeserved reputation for patience by making no complaints and wearing a resigned and injured look.

  Doña Ysabel took Pedro Fernandez’s part against his detractors, especially those of the Colonel’s faction, and now made a habit of coming for a friendly chat to the Chart-room every evening after vespers, accompanied by Don Luis; and it may be mentioned here that Don Luis, who later made something of a name for himself as a navigator and cartographer, learned the rudiments of these arts from the Chief Pilot during our voyage. She treated Pedro Fernandez with so much kindness, and showed such respect for his opinions, that he told me one day: ‘Andrés, when I remember how the General’s Lady behaved at our first meeting with the natives, I can only give my thanks to the Virgin for having wrought such a change of heart. Lately I have never seen Doña Ysabel without a book of devotion in her hand and with her aid our affairs may yet prosper. Her brothers pay attention to what she says, the Colonel fears her, and Don Alvaro seldom opposes her wishes. She has great courage for a woman.’

  ‘Yes,’ said I, appearing to assent, ‘she is a noblewoman of Galicia and will go her own way through
thick and thin; God grant it may be a good one!’ I had seen enough of the world to know that Doña Ysabel was not yet old enough to turn devout, being then scarce twenty-seven and at the height of her beauty, and suspected that her kindness towards him was an off-shot of her enmity towards the Colonel: whose head she desired on a charger, as the dancer Salome desired the head of John the Baptist. In time of need, the Chief Pilot might prove an ally of great worth to her because the crew respected him. But still I could not understand why she should flaunt before him Fray Luis de Granada’s Symbol of the Faith, borrowed from Father Juan, a book which I had never once seen her read, though I was constantly called to the Great Cabin. Why should she trouble to feign piety for his sake?

  The Barreto brothers, who had come to regard the expedition as a family enterprise and their fellow-officers as underlings or retainers, ceased to have things their own way, now that the Colonel was up and about again. Our meals at the common table were no longer eaten with even the pretence of cordiality. The General sat at the head with Doña Ysabel, the two priests, the Chief Pilot, the Major, and the Barretos. They conversed in Galician, and Pedro Fernandez used Portuguese, which comes very near. The Colonel sat at the foot with the Captain of Artillery and his wife, the Adjutant and the ensigns; these spoke Castilian. In the middle were the merchants with their womenfolk, who favoured the Andalusian dialect, and myself. Occasionally Don Alvaro addressed a polite remark to the Colonel, or to the Captain of Artillery who was a morose man, disliked by both factions; for the rest, head and foot might have been separated by a hundred leagues of sea, so little communication passed between them.

  One day Don Lorenzo told a droll tale which reflected on the modesty of Castilian women and, a silence happening to fall at the foot of the table, Juan de Buitrago overheard it and took offence. He rose from his seat and, speaking in Galician to indicate the cause of his displeasure, asked Don Alvaro’s permission to carry cup and platter elsewhere; the Adjutant, for the sake of solidarity, then made the same request. Don Alvaro pretended not to know why they wanted to leave and, instead of asking his brother-in-law to apologize for the blunder, said that it would be discourteous for them to rise before the ladies did, unless both had suddenly been taken ill. The Ensign replied that only for the ladies’ sake would he consent to remain at a table where his countrywomen had been so grossly insulted by Don Lorenzo; and the Adjutant again supported him. Here the Colonel hammered on the board with the handle of his dagger, though not knowing what Don Lorenzo had said, and applauded them as fine fellows. ‘A true gentleman,’ he pronounced, ‘is known by his readiness to ignore even the foulest insult when ladies are present, rather than alarm them by publicly boxing the offender’s ears.’

  Hardly had they resumed their seats, when Doña Mariana made a murderous jest, in Galician again, which set the head of the table in a roar and enraged Juan de Buitrago still further, he being the only one of the Colonel’s faction who could understand it. Later, when we bade one another good-night, he would not give Don Lorenzo, who commanded his company, the customary salute, but took leave of him with only the slightest of bows. Don Lorenzo at once complained to the General, who reminded Don Juan that a junior officer is expected always to bid his seniors both good-day and good-night. Early the next morning, when the Adjutant and Ensign met Don Lorenzo, they cried with one voice: ‘Good-day, your honour—by order!’

  The truth was that the Ensign had recently received Don Alvaro’s permission to marry Luisa Geronimo, the eldest daughter of the poor Castilian family to which the child Juanito belonged; she was his junior by more than thirty years, and he had already been forced to listen with patience to much crude though friendly raillery from the Colonel and from his fellow-ensigns. Don Lorenzo’s story seemed to him one more shot fired at the same scarred target; but here, I think, he was in error.

  At dawn, on Sunday the 20th of August, when we had put another two hundred leagues behind us, the cry of ‘Land ho!’ rang from the cross-trees. The look-out had his reward, though this was not the land for which we had come in search, but four small, low islands, set in a close square, with sandy beaches and groves of coconut-palms. The circuit of the whole group seemed to be little more than eight leagues; we came upon it from the east, but near approach from that quarter was blocked by extensive sand banks.

  The General named the islands after San Bernardo, whose feast day it was, and announced at breakfast that he planned to work round to the west and despatch the frigate and galeot in search of an anchorage. Glancing around the table, he said: ‘Doubtless none of you gentlemen will be sorry to stretch his legs on those new shores and drink a refreshing draught or two from a green coconut? I consider it my duty to plant the Cross here and take possession in the King’s name. The islands are evidently inhabited; Captain Corzo sent word that shortly after dawn his look-out reported two canoes off the point to our south-west; they came out to reconnoitre but turned back at once.’

  A murmur of assent went up from both ends of the table, and the Chief Pilot remarked: ‘Our own look-out, who was posted higher than the galeot’s, saw only two floating logs; however, inhabitants or no inhabitants, if your Excellency can find safe anchorage and a stream of good water, and if the troops are this time ordered to assist my people, a couple of days might profitably be spent ashore.’

  Don Alvaro asked the Colonel whether, provided no attack threatened, he would set the soldiers to work beside the sailors; and he, to annoy Don Lorenzo, replied civilly that his soldiers would do whatever was needed for the common good. ‘And by the Head of Lucca!’ he added, ‘if they cannot shift more water and wood in one morning than an equal number of bare-footed, loose-hosed sailors could in a week, I’ll spit upon the rogues.’

  Both Don Lorenzo and the Chief Pilot were nettled by this, but a landing would none the less have been attempted, had not the Vicar wagged his forefinger in dissuasion. ‘My son,’ said he to Don Alvaro, ‘if you will listen to a priest who has lived many years longer in the world than any of the present company, you will not seek for a port in these islands, but sail straight on.’

  ‘But why, Father Juan?’ asked Don Alvaro in some surprise.

  The Vicar spread out his hands in a gesture of impotence. ‘Ah,’ he replied with a shrug and a dry cough, ‘the reason cannot be given. No, my son, it cannot be given even to you!’

  He would say no more; but his words carried such an air of conviction that Don Alvaro yielded and we resumed our previous course, leaving San Bernardo behind us. Many were the guesses made at Father Juan’s meaning. Some thought that he spoke as though he had been granted an angelic vision of warning; others, that he had been so grieved by the sins committed at our last port of call that he feared a repetition of them. My own view, which I kept to myself, was that he could not state his reasons without violating the sanctity of the confessional: I suspected that Doña Mariana had mentioned her determination to rejoin the Admiral when next they went ashore. I sat near Doña Mariana and saw her turn pale with mortification when Father Juan had his way, and choke back an angry protest; it was no secret that she was still much in love with her husband and hated this unnatural separation. If she contemplated any such action, the Vicar acted prudently, because Don Alvaro had undertaken to restore her to the Admiral only when the Isles of Solomon were reached; had she fled to him beforehand, her brothers would have tried to fetch her back by force, whereupon the Colonel and his faction would have made common cause with her husband and blood might have flowed.

  The wind now settled in the south-east and we were treated to a few light showers, but the sea remained calm. Dense cloud masses seemed to promise land to the south; they were so fixed in their position that they seemed to be settled along the summit of a lofty mountain range, but when the General ordered a change of course to the south-west, no land was to be seen. We kept between eight and twelve degrees South, sometimes steering due west, sometimes north-west, sometimes south-west, according to Don Alvaro’s fancy. The clouds alone
diversified the scene, and were very fanciful in their shapes: one afternoon a lion appeared in the sky, white with a yellow mane and seemed to have three curs attacking it from behind. This group did not alter in shape or colour until dusk, and on the next morning we saw a cloud like a cowled head, with features not unlike those of Don Alvaro, but meagre and with gaping lips; which many of us took for an ill omen. That same day an altar appeared in the east, on which sat a toad; after two hours the cross of the altar broke apart, but the toad increased in size and ugliness.

  By the 28th of August we had covered the appointed fifteen hundred leagues of our journey, and still found nothing; but on the following day we sighted a low, tree-covered island, surrounded by a reef of coral. It was about a league in circuit and seemingly uninhabited. Since no other land was near the General named it Solitary Isle. He ordered the frigate and galeot to sail inshore and search for a gap in the reef; the Admiral had been complaining of a great scarcity of water and fire-wood in the Santa Ysabel, which might be remedied here. The frigate, taking the lead, tried to enter a channel to the south, but soon we were loudly hailed and implored to stand off because the bottom was strewn with rocks. At one moment the lead struck a hundred fathoms, at the next only ten; and then no bottom was found at all. We changed course at once.