So tractable, so peaceable, are these people that I swear to your Majesties there is not in the world a better nation. They love their neighbors as themselves, and their discourse is ever sweet and gentle, and accompanied with a smile; and though it is true that they are naked, yet their manners are decorous and praiseworthy.
– Christopher Columbus
The Italian explorer about the Tainos on the island of San Salvador, in a letter to King and Queen of Spain. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown.