THE BOOK OF
EXPLORERS
The Spanish take an early leadPortugal gets discouraged
Chapter 11
Meanwhile, the Spanish were winning. The fSpanish Explorers may not have been very good at finding new continents, but they knew a lot about helping themselves
2Which is why they helped themselves to most of the gCaribbean islands,
3hAnd Florida,
4And Central America, including iTexas,
5And to large chunks of jSouth America.
6In fact, it turned out that the conquistadors were even better at making history in the new world than anyone had imagined.
7For example, if there was any kgold around, they could smell it all the way from Spain,
8And therefore got very good at navigating from Spain to places where the Indians,
9As the native Americans were called,
10lFor some reason,
11Had worked hard to mine gold and turn it into mheathen jewelry and art.
12Being pretty ardent nChristians, the conquistadors disapproved of heathen jewelry and art,
13Especially when it was made of gold,
14And oappropriated it from the Indians,
15So that it could be taken back to Spain and used in a pproper Christian way,
16Thus saving the qIndians from eternal hell and damnation,
17rWhich was a particular specialty of the Spanish.
18For example, there was a conquistador named sCortés who saved the Aztecs from eternal hell and damnation,
19tBy taking all their gold,
20And converting them to Christianity,
21uBy killing most of them.
22There was another vconquistador who saved the Inca,
23aBy taking all their gold,
24bAnd converting them to Christianity,
25cBy killing most of them.
26And there was yet another dconquistador who performed the same great service for the Mayans,
27And so on,
28Which is why so many enations in Central and South America are Christian and still speak Spanish today,
29Except for the ones who speak Portuguese.
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