Washington Irving

The provided selections from Irving's book do not give a complete picture of the crimes committed by Columbus and other Spaniards in the New World. Irving is largely sympathetic to Columbus and has clearly chosen not to cover at length or in detail the crimes committed by the Spaniards, as depicted more objectively in other works. Instead, Irving glosses over the crimes or minimizes and excuses them as necessary. In the section on Columbus' appearance in court in Spain to answer charges against him, Irving once again casts Columbus in the best possible light, emphasizing above all others' Columbus' words in defense of himself.

For the most part, Irving presents Columbus' voyage and exploits in the New World as if he were Jacques Cousteau on a pleasant and amiable journey to exotic locales, as if Columbus were a sociologist of sorts rather than a leader in a conquering army:

Continuing his course, he arrived one evening in sight of a great island covered with beautiful forests, and indented with fine havens. It was called by the natives Boriquen, but he gave it the name of San Juan Bautista; it is the same since known

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s without questioning their veracity or the obviously self-serving motivation behind them: I ought to be judged as a captain, sent to subdue a numerous and hostile people. . . . It ought to be considered that I have brought all these under subjection to their majesties, giving them dominion over another world, by which Spain, heretofore poor, has suddenly become rich. whatever errors I might have fallen into, they were not with an evil intention (Irving 432). Isabella is thereby convinced of Columbus' goodness and no further investigation into his crimes is pursued. Irving does go into much greater detail on the crimes committed by those who came after Columbus. After quoting another writer who believes that "Columbus' discovery of the new world was . . . the effort of an active genius . . . and executed with no less courage than perseverance" (Irving 437), Irving goes on to blame later atrocities against Native Americans on a rogue element of criminals, painting an indignant picture of the capricious tyranny exercised over Indians by worthless Spaniards, many of whom had been transported convicts from the dungeons of Castile. These wretches, who in their own country had been the vilest of the vile, here assumed the tone
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Approximate Word count = 1725
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)

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