Benito Cereno

Delano’s boat is swiftly dispatched to rescue the three sailors in the water. Meanwhile, the guns are readied, but the San Dominick maneuvers out of range. Cereno reveals that a sailor disabled the San Dominick’s guns at the onset of the revolt. He asks Delano not to pursue the ship, as the rebels are likely to kill the remaining white sailors. Delano dismisses this warning, attributing Cereno’s caution to his crushed spirit, and decides to send boats to capture the San Dominick. He is boarding one himself when Cereno warns him that doing so means throwing away his life. The officers also advise against the captain’s involvement, and Delano ultimately heeds their counsel, opting to stay behind.

When Delano’s men approach the San Dominick and open fire, the rebels respond by cutting off a white sailor’s fingers and hurling hatchets at the boats. Delano’s men instruct the Spanish sailors to cut off the ship’s sails, facilitating the pursuit of the San Dominick. In the meantime, various people are killed, including Atufal. Without sails, the rebels cannot navigate the ship, and Delano’s men board the San Dominick , with one of them exclaiming “follow your leader!” (98). During hand-to-hand combat, many rebels are killed, and some of Delano’s men sustain injuries. The San Dominick is then brought back into the harbor.

The two ships sail together to Chile and then proceed to Lima, Peru: their final destination, where the incident will be investigated. Despite an initial improvement in Cereno’s health, a setback occurs upon reaching Lima. He is welcomed in a religious institution, where he will receive care. The narrator then reveals that the forthcoming extracts are translated from one of the official Spanish documents, shedding light on the preceding narrative and uncovering the true history of the San Dominick. The narrator writes that the document contains Cereno’s testimony, which was “held dubious for both learned and natural reasons” (100); because of his mental state, his words initially faced skepticism, but other sailors later confirmed them.

The official document is written by a notary of the Spanish monarch and declares that the criminal trial of the rebels on the San Dominick began on September 24, 1799. Cereno, the first witness, declares that on May 20, the ship left Chile bound to Callao, a coastal city in Peru, with various goods to trade, 160 enslaved people belonging to Alexandro Aranda, and 36 crew members. Cereno lists some of the Black passengers, including Babo, Atufal, and Francesco. The enslaved passengers slept on deck and were not kept in chains, as Aranda believed them to be docile.

On the seventh day after leaving port, the enslaved passengers suddenly revolted, led by Babo and Atufal. They killed many crew members with weapons, including handspikes and hatchets, or by throwing them overboard. Cereno asked Babo and Atufal to stop the violence and assured them that he would obey their orders. Babo asked Cereno to take the rebels back to Senegal. Cereno argued that the distance involved and the lack of provisions made this impossible, but Babo threatened to kill all the white sailors if Cereno did not grant their wish. They agreed to try to reach a coast to replenish their water supply, and they decided to go to the island of Santa Maria. Cereno hoped a passing vessel would save them. In the following days, the rebels killed Alexandro Aranda and hung his corpse in place of the ship’s former figurehead, a statue of Christopher Columbus. Showing the skeleton to Cereno, Babo asked him whether he thought it was a white person’s based on the whiteness of the bones and instructed him to “keep faith with the blacks from here to Senegal” (110), warning Cereno that he would otherwise “follow [his] leader” (107). He repeated the same speech to every remaining Spanish sailor and ordered the destruction of the boats in case the sailors tried to escape.

When the San Dominick approached Santa Maria and saw the Bachelor’s Delight, Babo ordered the skeleton on the bow be covered with canvas and gave Cereno and the others a story to tell, threatening to kill them if they gave anything away. He set six men on the deck to distribute hatchets if needed, pretended to keep Atufal in chains, and put four older Black men in charge of maintaining order. Throughout Captain Delano’s visit, Babo stayed by his side, playing the part of the faithful servant to observe Cereno. Some crew members tried to alert Captain Delano to what was happening but failed because of their fear and because of Delano’s naivete. The rebels struck one sailor on the head with a knife when he expressed hope Delano would save him, and another, who was killed, carried a jewel that he hoped to bring to a shrine in Peru as thanks for having survived. In his account, Cereno expresses his gratitude to Delano for his generosity. Cereno concludes by asserting that, at 29 years old, he is now mentally and physically broken and will retire to a monastery.

The narrator says that this deposition is “the key to fit into the lock of the complications that precede it” (118), shedding light on the mysteries at the heart of this narrative. The narrator then describes a conversation between Delano and Cereno during their trip to Lima. Cereno noted that Delano suspected Cereno and not Babo of being a murderer despite spending many hours with Cereno. Cereno concluded that this was the effect of machinations and deceptions. Delano told him to forget the past, but Cereno replied that only non-human things are capable of forgetting the past and that the shadow of the past loomed over him.

Months after the trial, Babo is put to death. His body is burned and his head fixed on a pole in a plaza for all the white passersby to see. His face is turned toward the church where Aranda’s bones rest and toward the monastery where Cereno, three months later, dies. The narrator ends by stating that Cereno did indeed follow his leader.