In point of character,--considering the term in the largest and broadest possible sense,--we shall probably not find very much to admire. The moral atmosphere which he created about him was not much better or much worse than the general atmosphere of the age in which he lived. He entered no protest against any of the abuses of the time. On the contrary, he was ever ready to avail himself of those abuses whenever he could do so to his own advantage. In his age the most sensitive natures were beginning to revolt against the horrors of the slave-trade. But Columbus, in his letters and his journal describing his first voyage, points out the riches that would result to Spain by filling the slave-markets with captives from the newly discovered islands. He repeatedly urged a policy of slave-catching upon the Government; and gave just offence by persistency in such a policy, after receiving a plain intimation that it could not be adopted. There is no evidence that he ever abandoned the idea that a true policy required that ships in going from the mother-country to the islands should be loaded with cattle, and that the same ships in going back from the islands to the mother-country should be loaded with slaves. His first letters glow with accounts of the gentleness and hospitality of the natives. The Indians regarded the new comers as visitors from heaven. When Columbus’s own vessel was shipwrecked, the inhabitants on the coast not only rendered every possible assistance, but offered to give up everything they had for the accommodation of the unfortunate visitors. Columbus himself testifies that the native cacique shed “tears of sympathy.” Such was the spirit with which the Spaniards were met, and such was the spirit until the policy of kidnapping and devastation was begun. Gradually the Spaniards began to seize the natives as prisoners whenever opportunity offered. Men were found to be less desirable captives than women and children.