Note 905 — Chapter XI

The rapid disappearance of the Cuban aborigines has been the subject of much comment. Between the years 1512-32 all but some 4000 had perished, although they are supposed to have originally numbered about a million, distributed in 30 tribal groups, whose names and territories have all been carefully preserved. But they practically offered no resistance to the ruthless Conquistadores, and it was a Cuban chief who even under torture refused to be baptized, declaring that he would never enter the same heaven as the Spaniard. One is reminded of the analogous cases of Jarl Hakon, the Norseman, and the Saxon Witikind, who rejected Christianity, preferring to share the lot of their pagan forefathers in the next world.