A week passed, the French occupying Havana at their ease and Angulo scouring the surrounding country, ostensibly for ransom money but in fact for men and arms. By the end of the week he had surreptitiously collected a force of 335 men, of whom about thirty-five were Spaniards and the rest negroes and Indians. They were armed chiefly with clubs and stones. Himself and eight others were mounted on horseback. With this motley force he hoped to surprise the French by night, and to capture Rojas's house, where he would take Sores himself prisoner and release the Spanish captives.
The desperate plan would probably have succeeded had not some of the Indians indiscreetly uttered their war cry as they rushed upon the house, arousing the Frenchmen and giving them time to close and bar the massive doors. The few Frenchmen who were sleeping outside of the house were quickly overcome and slain, and Angulo laid siege to the house itself, summoning Sores to surrender. The French commander was furious at what he not unreasonably regarded as a breach of the truce. Moreover, his brother was among those who had been killed outside the house. In a fury he ordered that all the Spanish prisoners in the house be put to death. This was quickly done, with the exception of Lobera, who was confined in an upper room. Sores reserved the killing of him for himself, and entered the room where Lobera was for that purpose. Lobera defended himself, meanwhile protesting that he had had no part in the treachery; and his evidently honest pleas moved a French officer to intervene in his behalf and to disarm Sores. Then, at the direction of Sores, Lobera showed himself at a window and addressed Angulo, reproaching him for the breach of truce, and imploring him to withdraw. Angulo refused, declaring that he had already recaptured the town, and that at daylight he would complete the work by capturing the Rojas house and its inmates.
With the coming of daylight, however, the folly of this course became apparent. Angulo had, indeed, a larger force than the Frenchmen still remaining in Havana; though as the latter were far the better armed a conflict between them would probably have been disastrous to the Spaniards. But the two ships in the harbor were now aroused and began firing upon the Spaniards with their artillery, while reenforcements of men for Sores put off for shore in boats. Sores and his companions made a fierce sally from the house. The few Spaniards made a stand, but the negroes and most of the Indians would not oppose clubs and stones to swords and arquebuses. They fled incontinently to the jungle, followed by Angulo himself.
His victory thus completed, Sores returned to the house where he had left Lobera locked in a room with the dead and dying. He absolved the commander from all responsibility for Angulo's treacherous conduct, and complimented him upon the valor with which he had defended La Fuerza as well as upon his good faith. He would not, however, release him without a ransom, according to the custom of the times. In default of the ransom, he would take him to France as a prisoner, though treated with all consideration. Lobera was without means, but his friends with whom he was permitted to communicate soon raised the required sum of two thousand two hundred pesos, and he was set at liberty. He thereafter went to Spain, carrying with him the news of what had happened to Havana.
The negotiations for the ransom of the town were less successful. Angulo had fled far inland, and could not be reached, and the Spaniards who remained could not offer more than a thousand pesos, a sum which Sores scorned. In default of ransom, therefore, the place was looted and burned. Three buildings alone remained standing: La Fuerza, the church, and the hospital. Indeed, the interior of the church was almost entirely destroyed. Sores and his men were fierce Huguenots, and they tore down the images of saints and took the robes and altar vestments to make cloaks for themselves. All the boats found in the harbor were burned. The neighboring estates for miles around were destroyed, and some of the negroes who offered resistance were hanged. The harbor was carefully surveyed and sounded, to facilitate future entries. Finally, his work being thus thoroughly done, Sores sailed away at midnight of August 5, less than a month after his arrival.
At the end of September a little French vessel, containing only a dozen men, entered the harbor, inspected the ruins of the city, and seized a Spanish caravel which lay there, taking it away with them to the harbor of Mariel, where there were several French ships. Ten days later the entire French force entered the harbor of Havana and landed many men. They did not, however, molest the Spanish residents nor destroy the new buildings which they were beginning to erect, but seemed to regard them with good humored tolerance, as too insignificant to merit attention. Indeed, there were only a few dozen of the Spanish, all told, and they were helpless and disheartened. The Frenchmen contented themselves with going to several of the outlying farms and taking all the hides they could find to add to the cargo which they were already carrying. They remained there, on amicable terms with the Spanish, for more than a fortnight, and then sailed away.
These things occurred at the time when Philip of Spain was marrying Queen Mary of England and was taking possession of the Netherlands, and when Spain vaunted herself as the foremost military power of the world. It must not be wondered at that the people of Cuba, and particularly of Havana, regarded themselves as grievously neglected by those who should have been their protectors, and bitterly reproached not alone the governor but even the King himself for not having afforded them more ample protection. The explanation was, doubtless, that Spain regarded Mexico, South America, and of course her European possessions, as of far greater importance than the island whose gold mines were about exhausted, which had failed to provide iron for Spanish artillery, and which had served chiefly as a stepping stone to more valuable lands. It was a strange irony of fate that the island which was thus slighted was destined to be the most faithful and the longest held of all the colonial possessions of Spain.
CHAPTER XVI
The disastrous events which have been related in the preceding chapter suggested to the Spaniards in Cuba and also to the government at Seville the desirability, if not the necessity, of establishing a more militant administration of affairs if the island was not to be the prey of all comers and perhaps ultimately be lost to the Spanish crown. Thitherto, with the exception of Velasquez and the possible exception of De Soto, every governor of the island had been a civilian and a lawyer. It seemed an experiment worth making, then, to appoint a military man to the office, in the hope that he would be better fitted to provide for the protection of the island against the privateers and corsairs who roved the seas in increasing numbers and with increasing boldness. True, immediately after the abdication of Charles I and the accession of Philip II, in 1556, a truce was concluded between France and Spain, which was to last five years. But few expected that it would last so long, as indeed it did not, being broken in two years; and even while it did last privateering was by no means abolished. In any case, be it peace or be it war, Spain had tried to hold her western empire by virtue of Divine Right and ecclesiastical decrees, and had failed. Now she would try holding what was left of it with military and naval force; and to that end would have a soldier for governor of Cuba.
The man chosen was indeed an expert and competent soldier, by no means devoid of statesmanship. Diego de Mazariegos had been one of the most efficient lieutenants of Cortez in Mexico, and distinguished himself as a brave and skilful fighter against the Indians. He had also given much attention to international relations, and to the privateering which had become such a scourge of the seas. Indeed, it was through some of his writings on this latter subject that the court of Seville was led to consider him as a candidate for the Cuban governorship. Dr. Angulo had been appointed in 1550, and five years was long enough, it was thought, for a man to serve, unless he served better than Angulo had done in the latter part of his term. So Mazariegos was selected to