carried by fifty women clothed with silk from their waists to their
knees. They went two and two with a man between in the midst of them.
Each one carried a large dish upon which were small dishes with various
viands; ten of the oldest of these women were the mace-bearers. They
proceeded in this way to the prahu, and presented everything to the
king who was sitting on a carpet under a red and yellow canopy. As
they were returning, they caught some of our men who had come out of
curiosity and who were obliged to make them presents of some trifle
to get free. After that the king sent also to us a present of goats,
cocoanuts, wine, and other things.
This day we bent on the ships new sails, upon which was the cross of
St. James, of Gallicia, with letters which said: “This is the figure of
our good fortune.”
Tuesday, we presented to the king some pieces of artillery; that is
some arquebuses which we had taken as prizes in the Indies, and some of
our swivel-guns with four barrels of powder. We took on board each ship
eighty barrels of water. Wood we were to find at the island of Mare,
where the king had already five days ago sent a hundred men to prepare
it, and near which we were to pass.
This day, the King of Bachian, with the consent of the King of Tadore,
came on shore, preceded by four men holding up daggers in their hands,
to make alliance with us: he said, in the presence of the King of
Tadore and of all his suite, that he would always be ready for the
service of the King of Spain, that he would keep in his name the cloves
left in his island by the Portuguese, until another Spanish squadron
arrived there, and he would not give them up without his consent. He
sent through us to the King of Spain a present of a slave and two
bahars of cloves. He would have wished to have sent ten bahars, but our
ships were so heavily laden, that we could not receive any more.
He also gave us for the King of Spain two most beautiful dead birds.
These birds are as large as thrushes; they have small heads, long
beaks, legs slender like a writing pen, and a span in length; they have
no wings, but instead of them long feathers of different colours, like
plumes: their tail is like that of the thrush. All the feathers, except
those of the wings, are of a dark colour; they never fly, except when
the wind blows. They told us that these birds come from the terrestrial
Paradise, and they call them “bolon dinata” that is divine birds.
The King of Bachian was a man of about seventy years of age. Not only
did the King of Bachian recognise the King of Spain as his Sovereign;
but every king of Maluco wrote to him that he desired always to be his
faithful subject.
One day the King of Tadore sent to tell our men, who dwelt in the
magazine for the merchandise, that they should take care not to go out
of the house by night, since there were certain men, natives of the
country, who by anointing themselves, walk by night in the shape of
men without heads: and if they meet anyone to whom they wish ill, they
touch his hand and anoint his palm, and that ointment causes him soon
to grow ill, and die at the end of three or four days. But if they meet
three or four persons together they do not touch them, but make them
giddy. He added that he had a watch kept to discover them, and he had
already had several executed.
When they build a new house, before going to inhabit it, they make a
fire round it, and give many feasts there. Then they fasten to the roof
of the house a pattern or sample of everything that is to be found in
the island, persuaded that by that means none of those things will be
ever wanting to whoever inhabits the house.
Wednesday morning everything was prepared for our departure from
Maluco. The Kings of Tadore, of Giailolo, and of Bachian, and a son of
the King of Tarenate had come to accompany us as far as the island of
Mare. The ship “Victoria” made sail and stood out a little, waiting
for the ship “Trinity”; but she had much difficulty in getting up the
anchor, and meanwhile the sailors perceived that she was leaking very
much in the hold. Then the “Victoria” returned to anchor in her former
position. They began to discharge the cargo of the “Trinity” to see if
the leak could be stopped, for it was perceived that the water came in
with force as through a pipe, but we were never able to find out at
what part it came in. All that day and the next we did nothing else but
work at the pumps, but without any advantage.
Hearing this, the King of Tadore came at once to the ships, and
occupied himself with us in searching for the leak. For this purpose
he sent into the sea five of his men, who were accustomed to remain
a long time under the water, and although they remained more than
half-an-hour they could not find the fissure. As the water inside the
ship continually increased, the king, who was as much affected by it as
we were, and lamenting this misfortune, sent to the end of the island
for three other men, more skilful than the first at remaining under
water.
He came with them early the next morning. These men dived under water
with their hair loose, thinking that their hair, attracted by the
water which penetrated into the ship, would indicate to them the leak,
but though they remained more than an hour in the water, they did not
find it. The king, seeing that there was no remedy for it, said with
lamentation, “Who will go to Spain to take news of me to the king our
lord?” We answered him that the “Victoria” would go there, and would
sail at once to take advantage of the east winds, which had already
commenced. The “Trinity,” meanwhile, would be refitted and would wait
for the west winds and go to Darien, which is on the other side of the
sea, in the country of Diucatan.[383] The king approved our thoughts,
and said that he had in his service two hundred and twenty-five
carpenters who would do all the work under the direction of our men,
and that those who should remain there would be treated as his own
children, and he said this with so much emotion that he moved us all to
tears.
We, who were on board the “Victoria,” fearing that she might open,
on account of the heavy cargo and the long voyage, lightened her by
discharging sixty hundred weight of cloves, which we had carried to
the house where the crew of the “Trinity” were lodged. Some of our own
crew preferred to remain at Maluco rather than go with us to Spain,
because they feared that the ship could not endure so long a voyage,
and because, mindful of how much they had suffered, they feared to die
of hunger in mid-ocean.
Saturday, the 21st December, day of St. Thomas the Apostle, the King
of Tadore came to the ships and brought us the two pilots, whom we had
already paid, to conduct us out of these islands. They said that the
weather was then good for sailing at once, but, having to wait for the
letters of our companions who remained behind, and who wished to write
to Spain, we could not sail till midday. Then the ships took leave of
one another by a mutual discharge of bombards. Our men accompanied us
for some distance with their boat, and then with tears and embraces we
separated. Juan Carvalho remained at Tadore with fifty-three of our
men: we were forty-seven Europeans and thirteen Indians.
The king’s governor[384] came with us as far as the island of Mare:
we had hardly arrived there when four prahus laden with wood came up,
which in less than an hour we got on board. We then took the south-west
course.
In all the above-mentioned islands of Maluco are to be found cloves,
ginger, sagu, which is their bread made of wood, rice, cocoa-nuts,
plantains, almonds larger than ours, sweet and bitter pomegranates,
sugar-canes, oil of cocoa and of sesame, melons, cucumbers, pumpkins,
comilicai,[385] which is a refreshing fruit the size of a water-melon,
another fruit like a peach called guave, and other eatable vegetables.
They also have goats and fowls, honey produced by bees not larger than
ants, which make their hives in trunks of trees. There are also parrots
of many kinds, and amongst them there are white ones called Catara, and
red ones called Nori, which are the most sought after, not so much for
the beauty of their plumage, as because they talk more clearly. One of
these is sold for a bahar of cloves.
It is hardly fifty years since the Moors conquered Maluco and dwelt
there. Before that, these islands were inhabited only by Gentiles, who
did not care for the cloves. There are still some families of them who
have taken refuge in the mountains, where the cloves grow.
The island of Tadore is in 0 deg. 27 min. North latitude, and 161 deg.
west of the line of demarcation;[386] it is 9 deg. 30 min. distant from
the first island of this archipelago, named Zamal, to the south-east
and a quarter south. The island of Tarenate is in 0 deg. 40 min. of N.
latitude. Mutir is exactly under the equinoctial line. Machian is in 0
deg. 15 min. S. latitude, and Bachian in 1 deg. of the same latitude.
Tarenate, Tadore, Mutir, and Machian, are like four high and pointed
mountains,[387] upon which the clove trees grow. Bachian is not visible
from these four islands, but it is a larger island than any of those.
Its clove mountain is not so high nor so pointed as those of the other
islands, but it has a larger base.
(_Book IV of the Milan Edition._)
+Return from the Moluccas to Spain.+
Pursuing our voyage, after having taken in wood at the islet of Mare,
we passed between the following islands:—Caioan, Laigoma, Sico, Giogi,
Cafi, Laboan,[388] Toliman, Titameti, Bachian, Latalata, Jabobi, Mata,
and Batutiga. They told us that in the island of Cafi the people were
small and dwarfed like the Pigmies; they have been subjected by force
by the King of Tadore. We passed outside of Batutiga to the west, and
we steered between west and south-west, and we discovered some islets
to the south, on which account the pilots of Maluco said it would be
better to cast anchor so as not to drift at night among many islets and
shoals. We, therefore, altered our course to south-east, and went to
an island situated in 2 deg. S. latitude, and fifty-three leagues from
Maluco.
This island is named Sulach;[389] its inhabitants are Gentiles, and
have not got a king. They eat human flesh; both men and women go naked,
except a piece of the bark of a tree of two fingers’ breadth before
their natural parts. There are many other islands around here inhabited
by anthropophagi. These are the names of some of them:—Silan, Noselao,
Biga, Atulabaon, Leitimor, Tenetum, Gonda, Kailaruru, Mandan and
Benaia.[390] We left to the east the islands named Lamatola and Tenetum.
Having run ten leagues from Sulach in the same direction, we went to a
rather large island named Buru, in which we found plenty of victuals,
such as pigs, goats, fowls, sugar-canes, cocoa-nuts, sagu, a certain
food of theirs made of bananas called kanali, and chiacare, which
here they call Nanga.[391] The chiacare are fruit like water-melons,
but knotty on the outside; inside they have some small red fruit like
plums, they have not got a stone in the middle, but instead of that
have a certain pith like a white bean, but larger, they are tender to
eat like chestnuts. We found here another fruit which externally is
like a pine cone, and it is yellow, but white inside; on cutting, it is
something like a pear, but much softer and better tasted. Here it is
called comilicai. The inhabitants of this island are Gentiles, and have
no king: they go naked like those of Sulach. The island of Buru is in 3
deg. 30 min. S. latitude, and seventy-five leagues from Maluco.
To the east of this island, at a distance of ten leagues, there is
another one larger, and which borders on Giailolo, and it is named
Ambon.[392] It is inhabited by Moors and Gentiles, but the former
are on the sea shore, and the others in the interior; these are also
anthropophagi. The products of this island are the same as those of
Buru. Between Buru and Ambon, there are three islands surrounded by
reefs named Vudia, Kailaruru and Benaia. To the south of Buru, at a
distance of four leagues, is another small island named Ambalao.
At thirty-five leagues from Buru, south and a quarter south-west, is
Bandon, with thirteen other islands. In six of them grow mace and
nutmeg. Zoroboa is the largest of them, Chelicel, Saniananpi, Pulai,
Puluru, and Rasoghin, the other six are Unuveru, Pulanbaracan, Lailaca,
Mamica, Man, and Meut. In these islands nutmegs are not found, but only
sagu, rice, cocoanuts, bananas, and other fruits, and they are near one
another. The inhabitants of these are Moors, and have no king. Bandan
is in 6 deg. of S. latitude, and 163 deg. 30 min. longitude from the
line of demarcation. As this island was a little out of our course, we
did not go to it.
Leaving the island of Buru in the direction south-west and a quarter
west, about eight degrees of latitude,[393] we arrived at three other
islands near each other named Zolot,[394] Nocemamor, and Galian. Whilst
we sailed amidst these islands, a great storm fell upon us, for which
we made a vow of a pilgrimage to our Lady della Guida. We put the ship
before the storm and made for a rather high island, which afterwards
we learned was named Mallua, but before we could reach it, we had
to struggle much with the squalls of wind which descended from the
mountains and with the currents. The inhabitants of this island are
savages, and more beasts than men; they eat human flesh; they go naked,
except the usual piece of bark to cover their natural parts. But when
they go to fight they wear on the back, the breast, and the flanks,
pieces of buffalo hide, ornamented with shells,[395] and boars’ tusks,
and tails of goat skins, hanging before and behind. They wear the hair
raised high up by means of cane combs with long teeth, which go through
it. They wrap up their beards with leaves, and enclose them in cases or
tubes of reed, a thing which seemed to us very ridiculous. In one word
these were the ugliest men we had seen in these Indies. Both their bows
and arrows are made of reeds, and they carry their food in bags made of
leaves. When their women saw us they came towards us with their bows
drawn, but when we had given them some presents we soon became friends.
We passed fifteen days in this island in caulking the ship whose sides
had suffered. We found here goats, fowls, wax, cocoanuts, and pepper.
For a pound of old iron they gave fifteen pounds of wax or of pepper.
There are two kinds of pepper here, the long and the round. The long
pepper is like the flower of the hazel tree in winter; its plant is
like ivy, and like it clings to trees; its leaves are like those of
the mulberry tree; it is called luli. The round pepper grows like the
other, but its fruit is in ears like Indian corn, and the grains are
pulled off in the same manner; it is called lada. The fields here are
full of pepper plants.
Here we took a man to conduct us to some island where we could find
plenty of victuals.
The island of Mallua is in 8 deg. 30 min. S. latitude, and 169 deg. 40
min. longitude from the line of demarcation.
The old pilot from Maluco related to us, whilst sailing, that in this
neighbourhood there was an island named Aruchete, the inhabitants
of which, men and women, are not more than one cubit high, and they
have ears as large and as long as themselves, so that when they lie
down one serves them for a mattress, and with the other they cover
themselves.[396] They are shorn and naked, their voices are shrill,
and they run very swiftly. They dwell under ground, live on fish and
a certain substance which grows between the bark and the wood of a
tree, which is white and round like coriander comfits, and which is
named ambulon. We would have gone there willingly, but the shoals and
currents did not allow of it.
Saturday the 25th of January, (1522), at 22 o’clock,[397] we left
the island of Mallua; and the following day, having run five leagues
to the south-south-east, we arrived at a large island called Timor. I
went ashore alone to speak to the head man of a village named Amaban,
about his providing us with victuals. He offered me buffaloes, pigs,
and goats, but when it was a question of the goods which he wanted in
exchange, we could not come to an agreement, because he asked a great
deal, and we had got very little to give. Then as we were constrained
by hunger, we took the measure of detaining on board the ship the chief
of another village named Balibo, who had come there in good faith with
a son of his; and we imposed upon him as a ransom for recovering his
liberty, to give six buffaloes, ten pigs, and ten goats. He, being much
afraid that we should kill him, quickly gave orders to have all this
brought to us; and as there were only five goats and two pigs, they
gave us instead an additional buffalo. We then sent him ashore with
his son, and he was well pleased when we not only left him free, but
also gave him some linen, some Indian cloths of silk and cotton, some
hatchets, some Indian knives, scissors, looking-glasses, and some of
our knives.
The chief man, whom I went to speak to first, has only women in his
service; all were naked like those of the neighbouring islands, and
wear in their ears small gold rings with tufts of silk hanging from
them; on their arms they wear many rings of gold and copper, which
often cover them up to the elbow. The men are naked like the women, and
wear attached to their necks round plates of gold, and on their heads
reed combs ornamented with gold rings. Some of them, instead of gold
rings, wore in their ears dried necks of gourds.
In this island there are buffaloes, pigs, and goats, as has been said;
there are also fowls and parrots of various colours. There is also
rice, bananas, ginger, sugar canes, oranges, lemons, beans and almonds.
We had approached that part of the island where there were some
villages with their chiefs or head men. On the other side of the island
are the dwellings of four kings, and their districts are named Oibich,
Lichsana, Suai, and Cabanaza. Oibich is the largest place. We were told
that in a mountain near Cabanaza, very much gold is found, and its
inhabitants buy whatever they want with small pieces of gold. All the
trade in sandal wood and wax, carried on by the people of Malacca and
Java, is done here; and indeed, we found here a junk which had come
from Lozon[398] to trade in sandal wood; for white sandal wood only
grows in this country.
These people are Gentiles; we were told that when they go to cut sandal
wood, the devil appears to them in various forms, and tells them that
if they want anything they should ask him for it; but this apparition
frightens them so much, that they are ill of it for some days.[399] The
sandal wood is cut at a certain phase of the moon, and it is asserted
that if cut at another time it would not be good. The merchandise
most fitting for bartering here for sandal wood is red cloth, linen,
hatchets, iron, and nails.
This island is entirely inhabited. It extends a long way from east to
west, and little from north to south. Its south latitude is in 10 deg.,
and the longitude 174 deg. 30 min. from the line of demarcation.
In all these islands that we visited in this archipelago, the evil of
Saint Job prevailed, and more here than in any other place, where they
call it “for franki”, that is to say, Portuguese illness.[400]
We were told that at a day’s voyage, west-north-west from Timor, there
was an island in which much cinnamon grows, called Ende;[401] its
inhabitants are Gentiles, and have no king. Near this are many others
forming a series of islands as far as Java Major, and the Cape of
Malacca. The names of these islands are Ende, Tanabuton, Crenochile,
Bimacore, Azanaran, Main, Zubava, Lombok, Chorum, and Java Major, which
by the inhabitants is not called Java but Jaoa.
In this island of Java are the largest towns; the principal of them
is Magepaher,[402] the king of which, when he lived, was the greatest
of all the kings of the neighbouring islands, and he was named Raja
Patiunus Sunda. Much pepper grows there. The other towns are—Dahadama,
Gagiamada, Minutarangam, Ciparafidain, Tuban, Cressi,[403] and
Cirubaya.[404] At half a league from Java Major are the islands of
Bali, called Java Minor, and Madura, these are of equal size.
They told us that in Java Major, it was the custom when one of the
chief men died, to burn his body; and then his principal wife, adorned
with garlands of flowers, has herself carried in a chair by four men
throughout the town, with a tranquil and smiling countenance, whilst
comforting her relations, who are afflicted because she is going to
burn herself with the corpse of her husband, and encouraging them not
to lament, saying to them, “I am going this evening to sup with my dear
husband, and to sleep with him this night.” Afterwards, when close to
the place of the pyre, she again turns towards the relations, and after
again consoling them, casts herself into the fire and is burned. If she
did not do this she would not be looked upon as an honourable woman,
nor as a faithful wife.
Our old pilot related to us other extravagant things. He told us that
the young men of Java ... and that in an island called Ocoloro, below
Java Major, there are only women who become pregnant with the wind,
and when they bring it forth, if the child is a male, they kill it,
and if a female, they bring it up; and if any man visits their island,
whenever they are able to kill him, they do so.
They also related to us that beyond Java Major, towards the north
in the Gulf of China, which the ancients named Sinus Magnus, there
is an enormous tree named Campanganghi,[405] in which dwell certain
birds named Garuda,[406] so large that they take with their claws,
and carry away flying, a buffalo, and even an elephant, to the place
of the tree, which place is named Puzathaer. The fruit of this tree
is called Buapanganghi, and is larger than a water melon. The Moors
of Burné, whom we had with us in the ships, told us they had seen two
of these birds, which had been sent to their king from the kingdom of
Siam. No junk, or other vessel, can approach this tree within three or
four leagues, on account of the great whirlpools which the water makes
there. They related to us, moreover, how in a wonderful manner what
is related of this tree became known, for a junk, having been carried
there by the whirlpools, was broken up, and all the seamen perished,
except a child who attached himself to a plank and was miraculously
borne near the tree, upon which he mounted. There he placed himself
under the wing of one of these birds, which was asleep, without its
perceiving him, and next day the bird having taken flight carried him
with it, and having seen a buffalo on the land, descended to take it;
the child took advantage of the opportunity to come out from under its
wing, and remained on the ground. In this manner the story of these
birds and of the tree became known, and it was understood that those
fruits which are frequently found in the sea came from that place.
We were told that there were in that kingdom, on the banks of the
rivers, certain birds which feed on carrion, but which will not touch
it unless another bird has first eaten its heart.
The Cape of Malacca is in 1 deg. 30 min. of S. latitude. To the east
of that Cape are many cities and towns, of a few of which I will
note the names—Singapola, which is at the Cape, Pahan, Kalantan,
Patani, Bradlini, Benan, Lagon, Cheregigharan, Trombon, Joran, Ciu,
Brabri, Banga, India, Jandibum, Laun, Langonpifa. All these cities are
constructed like ours, and are subject to the King of Siam who is named
Siri Zacabedera, and who inhabits Iudia.
Beyond Siam is situated Camogia; its king is named Saret Zacabedera;
next Chiempa, the king of which is named Raja Brahami Martu. There
grows the rhubarb, and it is found in this manner: men go together in
companies of twenty or twenty-five, to the woods, and at night ascend
the trees, both to get out of the way of the lions, the elephants, and
other wild beasts, and also to be able better to smell the odour of
the rhubarb borne to them by the wind. In the morning they go to that
quarter whence they have perceived that the odour comes, and seek for
the rhubarb till they find it. This is the rotten wood of a large tree,
which acquires its odour by putrefaction.[407] The best part of the
tree is the root, but the trunk is also good, which is called Calama.