The negro slave-trade was at this time comparatively a new thing. It was one of the proximate results of fifteenth-century maritime discovery. The Portuguese were foremost in it, organizing for the purpose a company at Lagos, and a factory at Arguin, about the middle of the century, Prince Henry receiving his fifth. Europe, however, offered no profitable field for African slave labor, and but for the discovery of America the traffic probably never would have assumed large proportions. Public sentiment was not in those days averse to slavery, particularly to the enslavement of the children of Ham. And yet neither Isabella nor Ferdinand was at all disposed, in regard to their New World possessions, to follow the example of Portugal on the coast of Africa. Though they had scarcely made personal the application that the practice was one of the chief causes of Rome's ruin, yet they seemed instinctively opposed to it in this instance. They did not want these creatures in Spain, they had no use for them. In regard to the ancient custom of enslaving prisoners of war, particularly the detested and chronically hostile Moors, it was different. This New World had been given them for a higher purpose. Its natives were not the enemies of Spain; they were innocent of any offence against Spain. It was better, it was more glorious, there was higher and surer reward in it, to Christianize than to enslave. This the clergy constantly urged; so that in Spain the passion for propagandism was greater than the passion for enslaving. Columbus must have been aware of this when in 1495 he sent by Torres, with the four ship-loads of Indian slaves, the apology to their Majesties that these were man-eating Caribs, monsters, the legitimate prey of slave-makers wherever found. Peradventure some of them might be made Christians, who when they had learned Castilian could be sent back to serve as missionaries and interpreters to aid in delivering their countrymen from the powers of darkness. This was plausible, and their Majesties seemed content; but when Columbus pressed the matter further, and requested that arrangements should be made for entering extensively into the traffic, they hesitated. Meanwhile the Genoese launched boldly forth in the old way, not only making slaves of cannibals but of prisoners of war; and whenever slaves were needed, a pretence for war was not long wanting. Thereupon, with another shipment, the admiral grows jubilant, and swears by the holy Trinity that he can send to Spain as many slaves as can be sold, four thousand if necessary, and enters upon the details of capture, carriage, sale, and return cargoes of goods, with all the enthusiasm of a sometime profitable experience in the business. Further than this he permits enforced labor where there had been failure to pay tribute, and finally gives to every one who comes an Indian for a slave.