Editorial note — BOOK V
Francis Augustus MacNutt translation
[Note 4: The story of the disorders, privations, and unrest, as told by Las Casas, Columbus, and others, makes cheerless reading; the misfortunes of the colonists were due to their inveterate idleness, their tyranny, which had alienated the good-will of the natives, and to the disillusionment that had dispersed their hope of speedily and easily won riches.]
[Note 5: Herrera (iii., 6) speaks of her as la insigne Anacaona ... mujer prudente y entendida ... etc. She composed with unusual talent the arreytos or folk-ballads the natives were fond of singing. Las Casas describes her dreadful death in his Brevissima Relacion.]