CASAS, Was, Bartolome de las, Spanish prelate, better known as 'the Apostle of the Indies:° b. Seville 1474; d. Madrid, July 1566. In his 19th year he accompanied his father,. who sailed with Columbus, to the West Indies. Five years afterward he returned to Spain, and pursuing his studies he entered the priest hood. He accompanied Columbus in his second voyage to Hispaniola (Haiti), and on the con quest of Cuba settled there, and distinguished himself by his humane conduct toward the op pressed natives. He set at liberty the Indians who had fallen to his share in the division; and so much was he interested for them, that in 1516 he went to Spain to lay a statement of their case before King Ferdinand, whose death at that time prevented any measures for their benefit. The regent, Cardinal Ximenes, how ever, appointed a commission to examine cir cumstances on the spot, and to determine ac cordingly. Las Casas was to accompany them, with the title of Protector of the Indians. The commissioners found that it was impos sible to liberate the Indians, and therefore en deavored to secure their humane treatment; but Las Casas, still dissatisfied, remonstrated so warmly that he was obliged to take refuge in a convent from the rage of the planters. He again returned to Europe; and on the accession of Charles V, in consequence of his representa tions, the council appointed a chief judge to re-examine the. points of controversy between the partisans of Indian liberty and the colonists. Las Casas, in his zeal for the Indians, became the author (or the encourager at least) of the slave-trade, by proposing to purchase negroes from the Portuguese in Africa to supply the planters with laborers, of the want of whom they complained; and this was unfortunately put into execution. He next applied for a grant of an unoccupied tract, in order to try his own plan' with a new colony. This he at length obtained, and with 200 persons, whom he persuaded to accompany him, landed at Porto Rico in 1521, but found that an expedi tion was advancing to ravage this very tract, and convey its inhabitants to Hispaniola as slaves. He endeavored in vain to prevent the
threatened danger, and with the few who still adhered to him returned to Hispaniola to solicit succor. During his absence the natives at tacked the colonists with such success that in a short time not a Spaniard remained in that part of South America. Las Casas, in despair at the failure of his project, retired to the Domini can convent at Saint Domingo, and assumed the habit of the order. Notwithstanding his retirement his zeal in the cause of the Indians did not abate; and being sent on a mission to Spain by a chapter of his order at Chiapas in 1542, he pleaded their cause with his pristine warmth, and composed his famous treatise