Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/515

489 SPANISH COLONIAL POLICY. 489 The spirit of enterprise had flagged, and the nation chapter had experienced something like disappointment on '- — contrasting the meagre results of their own discov- eries with the dazzling successes of the Portuguese, who had struck at once into the very heart of the jewelled east. The reports of the admiral's third voyage, however, and the beautiful specimens of pearls which he sent home from the coast of Paria, revived the cupidity of the nation. Private adven- turers now proposed to avail themselves of the license already granted, and to follow up the track of discovery on their own account. The govern- ment, drained by its late heavy expenditures, and jealous of the spirit of maritime adventure begin- ning to show itself in the other nations of Europe,^ willingly acquiesced in a measure, which, while it opened a wide field of enterprise for its subjects, secured to itself all the substantial benefits of dis- covery, without any of the burdens. The ships fitted out under the general license were required to reserve one tenth of their tonnage for the crown, as well as two thirds of all the gold, and ten per cent, of all other commodities which they should procure. The government promoted these expeditions by a bounty on all vessels of six hundred tons and upwards, engaged in them.^ 5 Among the foreifjn adventur- thus encroaching, as it were, on ers were the two Cabots, who the very field of discovery preoccu- sailed in the service of the English pied by the Spaniards, monarch, Henry VII., in 1497, and ^ Muiloz, Hist, del Nuevo-Mun- ran down the whole coast of North do, lib. 5, sect. 32. — Navarrete, America, from Newfoundland to Coleccion de Viages, Doc. Dip]., within a few degrees of Florida, no. 86. VOL. II. 62