Bartoleme de Las Casas gives an account of the effects of Spanish
             subjugation of the mainland and islands that comprise the Indies in the forty-nine
             years that Spanish settlers arrived in Hispaniola. He could have called his account
             "How to Depopulate in Less than 50 Years."
             He describes the native populations in a detailed and sympathetic account,
             which serves as a dramatic backdrop to his description of their treatment by the
             Spanish, which led to their eradication.
             Las Casas, by his own account and from opinions of sympathetic secular
             Spanish and missionaries, paints a picture of a native population unable to defend
             itself against violence because of their nature and their way of life. He says they are
             obedient and faithful to their new Spanish masters and to the Catholic faith which
             many do not object converting to. He counts among their many virtues humility,
             peacefulness, intelligence, friendliness, and openness to the Catholic faith. Their way of
             life is very simple and is not motivated by power or wealth. Their food, lodging, and
             Onto this backdrop of admiration and sympathy, Las Casas describes the
             ravages by the Spanish oppressors to the native population that eventually
             destroyed them. He branded them beasts using terror, torture, and death. Las
             Casas must have seen the oppressors defiling and contradicting the instructions
             given by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain in 1493 to Christopher Columbus on his second voyage to the Indies. Of utmost importance was the conversion of the population to Catholicism and teaching them Spanish to facilitate teaching. Their deaths through war, execution, disease, torture, and harsh treatment during enslavement meant
             that millions died before conversion, and, to the Spanish thinking, were beyond redemption because they died heathens. In addition, the instructions warned Columbus to scrutinize the Spani
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