The extension of the Spanish occupation from Santo Domingo, as an early seat of the administration, to the South American mainland, belongs to the first decades of the sixteenth century. During this period the Spaniards founded Santa Marta and Cartagena; explored and occupied the Isthmus; and Andagoya established his brief authority on the Pacific coast south of Panama. [Sidenote: Occupation of Tierra Firme] [Sidenote: Indians under the British and the Spanish] It was in this period, moreover, that the Spanish government granted to the German company of the Welsers a charter to an extensive region of Tierra Firme, where the agents of this company devoted their activity, almost exclusively to hunting Indians for the slave-market. On a part of the northern coast of South America Bartolomé de las Casas proposed to plant a proletariat colonial administration as the beginning of a practical reform of Spain’s colonial policy. When this enterprise was wrecked by its internal weakness, Las Casas turned to the business of the Church and to unsparing criticism of the Spanish government. On its practical side the conduct of the government doubtless required modification, but the plan to introduce Spanish labourers and negroes to perform all the work of the colony, if it had been thoroughly and successfully carried out, would indeed have lifted the burden of labour from the Indians, but it would also have made it impossible for the Indians to have a place in the new society. The performance of a certain amount of work was an essential condition of the Indian’s existence in regions occupied by the Spaniards. He had to work or disappear, as he disappeared before the British settlers in North America, who made no provision for incorporating him in the communities which they organized. The Spaniards had a very different plan for the social development of their American colonies. They proposed to form communities with important mediæval features; they recognized distinct classes and feudal superiority and dependence. This method of social organization provided a place for the Indians, although a subordinate place, nevertheless a place where their continued existence would be assured on condition of performing a certain amount of labour. But when Las Casas faced the question of reforming the Spanish policy, he appears to have advocated, if not the worst possible solution, at least a project that could have had no happy outcome for the Indians. [Sidenote: Las Casas]