and Jamaica had become. Thus, within a few score
years of Columbus’s first American landfall, the Antillean
aborigines had been almost completely eliminated.26
As the number of humans plummeted, the population of
imported domesticated animals shot upward. The first con
tingent of horses, dogs, pigs, cattle, chickens, sheep, and
goats arrived with Columbus on the second voyage in 1493.
The animals, preyed upon by few or no American predators,
troubled by few or no American diseases, and left to feed
freely upon the rich grasses and roots and w s
