There is no direct evidence,
however, that Las Casas made his proposition out of any regard for the
negro. Charles V. resolved to allow a thousand negroes to each of the
four islands, Hayti, Ferdinanda, Cuba, and Jamaica. The privilege of
importing them was bestowed upon one of his Flemish favorites; but he
soon sold it to some Genoese merchants, who held each negro at such a
high price that only the wealthiest colonists could procure
them. Herrera regrets that in this way the prudent calculation of Las
Casas was defeated.
This was the first license to trade in slaves. It limited the number
to four thousand, but it was a fatal precedent, which was followed by
French, Spanish, and Dutch, long after the decay of the Spanish part
of Hayti, till all the islands, and many parts of Central America,
were filled with negroes.
It is pleasanter to dwell upon those points in which the brave and
humane Las Casas surpassed his age, and prophesied against it, than
upon those which he held in common with it, as he acquiesced in its
instinctive life. At first it seems unaccountable that the argument
which he framed with such jealous care to protect his Indians and
recommend them to the mercy of Government was not felt by him to apply
to the negroes with equal force.
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