r that you want to change it. You shall not do so without
our special approval. If there is just reason for moving you must
first inform me."

Caparra remained for the time the only settlement, and was honored
with the name of "City of Puerto Rico." A municipal council was
installed, and the king granted the island a coat of arms which
differed slightly from that used by the authorities till lately.

The next settlement was made on the south shore, at a place named
Guanica, "where there is a bay," says Oviedo, "which is one of the
best in the world, but the mosquitoes were so numerous that they alone
were sufficient to depopulate it." [81] The Spaniards then moved to
Aguada, on the northwestern shore, and founded a settlement to which
they gave the name of their leader Soto Mayor.

This was a young man of aristocratic birth, ex-secretary of King
Philip, surnamed "the Handsome." He had come to the Indies with a
license authorizing him to traffic in captive Indians, and Ponce,
wishing, no doubt, to enlist the young hidalgo's family influence at
the court in his favor, made him high constable (_alguacil mayor_) of
the southern division (June, 1510).

The new settlement's existence was short. It was destroyed by the
Indians in the insurrection of February of the following year, when
Christopher Soto Mayor and 80 more of his countrymen, who had
imprudently settled in isolated localities in the interior, fell
victims of the rage of the natives.

Diego Columbus proposed the reconstruction of the destroyed
settlement, with the appellation of San German. The king approved, and
near the end of the year 1512, Miguel del Torro, one of Ponce's
companions, was delegated to choose a site. He fixed upon the bay of
Guayanilla, eastward of Guanica, and San German became the port of
call for the Spanish ships bound to Paria. Its proximity to the "pearl
coast," as the north shore of Venezuela was named, made it the point
of departure for all who wished to reach that coast or escape from the
shores of poverty-stricken Puerto Rico--namely, the dreamers of the
riches of Peru, those who, like Sedeno, aspired to new conquests on
the mainland, or crown officers who had good reasons for wishing to
avoid giving an account of their administration of the royal revenues.
The comparative prosperity which it enjoyed made San German the object
of repeated attacks by the French privateers. It was burned and
plundered several times during the forty-