cries and exclamations of pleasure; and they had good reason to be
delighted, for they had become so wearied of bad living, and of working
the water out of the ships, that all sighed most anxiously for land.
The pilots of the fleet reckoned on that day, that between leaving Ferro
and first reaching land, we had made eight hundred leagues; others said
seven hundred and eighty (so that the difference was not great), and
three hundred more between Ferro and Cadiz, making in all eleven hundred
leagues; I do not therefore feel as one who had not seen enough of the
water. On the morning of the aforesaid Sunday, we saw lying before us
an island, and soon on the right hand another appeared: the first[110]
was high and mountainous, on the side nearest to us; the other[111]
flat, and very thickly wooded: as soon as it became lighter, other
islands began to appear on both sides; so that on that day, there were
six islands to be seen lying in different directions, and most of them
of considerable size. We directed our course towards that which we had
first seen, and reaching the coast, we proceeded more than a league in
search of a port where we might anchor, but without finding one: all
that part of the island which met our view, appeared mountainous, very
beautiful, and green even up to the water, which was delightful to see,
for at that season there is scarcely any thing green in our own country.
When we found that there was no harbour there,[112] the admiral decided
that we should go to the other island, which appeared on the right, and
which was at four or five leagues distance: one vessel however still
remained on the first island all that day seeking for a harbour, in case
it should be necessary to return thither. At length, having found a good
one, where they saw both people and dwellings, they returned that night
to the fleet, which had put into harbour at the other island,[113] and
there the admiral, accompanied by a great number of men, landed with the
royal banner in his hands, and took formal possession on behalf of their
Majesties. This island was filled with an astonishingly thick growth of
wood; the variety of unknown trees, some bearing fruit and some flowers,
was surprising, and indeed every spot was covered with verdure. We found
there a tree whose leaf had the finest smell of cloves that I have ever
met with; it was like a laurel leaf, but not so large: but I think it
was a species of laurel. There were wild fruits of various kinds, some
of which our men, not very prudently, tasted; and upon only touching
them with their tongues, their countenances became inflamed,[114] and
such great heat and pain followed, that they seemed to be mad, and
were obliged to resort to refrigerants to cure themselves. We found no
signs of any people in this island, and concluded it was uninhabited;
we remained only two hours, for it was very late when we landed, and
on the following morning we left for another very large island,[115]
situated below this at the distance of seven or eight leagues. We
approached it under the side of a great mountain, that seemed almost
to reach the skies, in the middle of which rose a peak higher than all
the rest of the mountain, whence many streams diverged into different
channels, especially towards the part at which we arrived. At three
leagues distance, we could see an immense fall of water, which looked
of the breadth of an ox, and discharged itself from such a height that
it appeared to fall from the sky; it was seen from so great a distance
that it occasioned many wagers to be laid on board the ships, some
maintaining that it was but a series of white rocks, and others that it
was water. When we came nearer to it, it showed itself distinctly, and it
was the most beautiful thing in the world to see from how great a height
and from what a small space so large a fall of water was discharged. As
soon as we neared the island the admiral ordered a light caravel to run
along the coast to search for a harbour; the captain put into land in a
boat, and seeing some houses, leapt on shore and went up to them, the
inhabitants fleeing at sight of our men; he then went into the houses
and there found various household articles that had been left unremoved,
from which he took two parrots, very large and quite different from any
we had before seen; he found a great quantity of cotton, both spun and
prepared for spinning, and articles of food, of all of which he brought
away a portion; besides these, he also brought away four or five bones
of human arms and legs. On seeing these we suspected that we were
amongst the Caribbee islands, whose inhabitants eat human flesh; for the
admiral, guided by the information respecting their situation which he
had received from the Indians of the islands discovered in his former
voyage, had directed his course with a view to their discovery, both
because they were the nearest to Spain, and because this was the direct
track for the island of Española, where he had left some of his people.
Thither, by the goodness of God and the wise management of the admiral,
we came in as straight a track as if we had sailed by a well known and
frequented route. This island is very large, and on the side where we
arrived it seemed to us to be twenty-five leagues in length. We sailed
more than two leagues along the shore in search of a harbour. On the part
towards which we moved appeared very high mountains, and on that which we
left extensive plains; on the sea coast there were a few small villages,
whose inhabitants fled as soon as they saw the sails. At length after
proceeding two leagues we found a port late in the evening. That night
the admiral resolved that some of the men should land at break of day in
order to confer with the natives, and learn what sort of people they
were; although it was suspected, from the appearance of those who had
fled at our approach, that they were naked, like those whom the admiral
had seen in his former voyage. In the morning several detachments under
their respective captains sallied forth; one of them returned at the
dinner hour, with a boy of about fourteen years of age, as it afterwards
appeared, who said that he was one of the prisoners taken by these
people. The others divided themselves, and one party took a little boy,
whom a man was leading by the hand, but who left him and fled; this boy
they sent on board immediately with some of our men; others remained,
and took certain women, natives of the island, together with other women
from among the captives who came of their own accord. One captain of this
last company, not knowing that any intelligence of the people had been
obtained, advanced farther into the island and lost himself, with the
six men who accompanied him: they could not find their way back until
after four days, when they lighted upon the sea shore, and following
the line of coast returned to the fleet.[116] We had already looked
upon them as killed and eaten by the people that are called Caribbees;
for we could not account for their long absence in any other way, since
they had among them some pilots who by their knowledge of the stars
could navigate either to or from Spain, so that we imagined that they
could not lose themselves in so small a space. On this first day of our
landing several men and women came on the beach up to the water’s edge,
and gazed at the ships in astonishment at so novel a sight; and when a
boat pushed on shore in order to speak with them, they cried out “tayno
tayno,” which is as much as to say, “good,” and waited for the landing
of the sailors, standing by the boat in such a manner that they might
escape when they pleased. The result was, that none of the men could be
persuaded to join us, and only two were taken by force, who were secured
and led away. More than twenty of the female captives were taken with
their own consent, and other women natives of the island were surprised
and carried off: several of the boys, who were captives, came to us
fleeing from the natives of the island who had taken them prisoners.
We remained eight days in this port in consequence of the loss of the
aforesaid captain, and went many times on shore, passing amongst the
dwellings and villages which were on the coast; we found a vast number of
human bones and skulls hung up about the houses, like vessels intended
for holding various things. There were very few men to be seen here, and
the women informed us that this was in consequence of ten canoes having
gone to make an attack upon other islands. These islanders appeared to us
to be more civilised than those that we had hitherto seen; for although
all the Indians have houses of straw, yet the houses of these people
are constructed in a much superior fashion, are better stocked with
provisions, and exhibit more evidences of industry, both on the part of
the men and the women. They had a considerable quantity of cotton, both
spun and prepared for spinning, and many cotton sheets, so well woven as
to be no way inferior to those of our country. We inquired of the women,
who were prisoners in the island, what people these islanders were:
they replied that they were Caribbees. As soon as they learned that we
abhorred such people, on account of their evil practice of eating human
flesh, they were much delighted; and, after that, if they brought forward
any woman or man of the Caribbees, they informed us (but secretly), that
they were such, still evincing by their dread of their conquerors, that
they belonged to a vanquished nation, though they knew them all to be in
our power.
We were enabled to distinguish which of the women were natives, and
which were captives, by the Caribbees wearing on each leg two bands of
woven cotton, the one fastened round the knee, and the other round the
ankle; by this means they make the calves of their legs large, and the
above-mentioned parts very small, which I imagine that they regard as
a matter of prettiness: by this peculiarity we distinguished them. The
habits of these Caribbees are brutal. There are three islands: the one
called Turuqueira; the other, which was the first that we saw, is called
Ceyre;[117] the third is called Ayay: there is a resemblance among the
natives of all these, as if they were of one race, and they do no injury
to each other; but each and all of them wage war against the other
neighbouring islands, and for the purpose of attacking them, make voyages
of a hundred and fifty leagues at sea, with their numerous canoes, which
are a small kind of craft made out of a single trunk of a tree. Their
arms are arrows, in the place of iron weapons, and as they have no iron,
some of them point their arrows with tortoise-shell, and others make
their arrow heads of fish spines, which are naturally barbed like coarse
saws: these prove dangerous weapons to a naked people like the Indians,
and may cause death or severe injury, but to men of our nation they are
not very formidable. In their attacks upon the neighbouring islands,
these people capture as many of the women as they can, especially those
who are young and beautiful, and keep them as concubines; and so great
a number do they carry off, that in fifty houses no men were to be
seen; and out of the number of the captives, more than twenty were
young girls. These women also say that the Caribbees use them with such
cruelty as would scarcely be believed; and that they eat the children
which they bear to them, and only bring up those which they have by their
native wives. Such of their male enemies as they can take alive, they
bring to their houses to make a feast of them, and those who are killed
they devour at once. They say that man’s flesh is so good, that there
is nothing like it in the world; and this is pretty evident, for of the
bones which we found in their houses, they had gnawed everything that
could be gnawed, so that nothing remained of them but what was too tough
to be eaten: in one of the houses we found the neck of a man, undergoing
the process of cooking in a pot. When they take any boys prisoners, they
dismember them, and make use of them until they grow up to manhood, and
then when they wish to make a feast they kill and eat them, for they say
that the flesh of boys and women is not good to eat. Three of these boys
came fleeing to us thus mutilated.
At the end of four days arrived the captain who had lost himself with
his companions, of whose return we had by this time given up all hope;
for other parties had been twice sent out to seek him, one of which
came back on the same day that he rejoined us, without having gained
any information respecting the wanderers: we rejoiced at their arrival,
regarding it as a new accession to our numbers. The captain and the men
who accompanied him brought back some women and boys, ten in number.
Neither this party, nor those who went out to seek them, had seen any of
the men of the island, which must have arisen either from their having
fled, or possibly from their being but very few men in that locality;
for, as the women informed us, ten canoes had gone away to make an attack
upon the neighbouring islands. The wanderers had returned from the
mountains in such an emaciated condition, that it was distressing to see
them. When we asked them how it was that they lost themselves, they said
that the trees were so thick and close that they could not see the sky.
Some of them who were mariners had climbed the trees to get a sight of
the stars, but could never see them, and if they had not found their way
to the sea coast, it would have been impossible to have returned to the
fleet. We left this island eight days after our arrival.[118] The next
day at noon we saw another island,[119] not very large, at about twelve
leagues distance from the one we were leaving. The greater part of the
first day of our departure we were kept close in to the coast of this
island by a calm, but as the Indian women whom we brought with us said
that it was not inhabited, but had been dispeopled by the Caribbees, we
made no stay in it. On that evening we saw another island:[120] and in
the night finding there were some sand-banks near, we dropped anchor, not
venturing to proceed until the morning. On the morrow another island[121]
appeared, of considerable size, but we touched at none of these because
we were anxious to convey consolation to our people who had been left
in Española; but it did not please God to grant us our desire, as will
hereafter appear. Another day at the dinner hour we arrived at an
island[122] which seemed worth the finding, for judging by the extent
of cultivation in it, it appeared very populous. We went thither and put
into harbour, when the admiral immediately sent on shore a well manned
barge to hold speech with the Indians, in order to ascertain what race
they were, and also because it was necessary to gain some information
respecting our course; although it afterwards plainly appeared that
the admiral, who had never made that passage before, had taken a very
correct route. But as matters of doubt should always be brought to as
great a certainty as possible by inquiry, he wished the natives to be
communicated with, and some of the men who went in the barge landed and
went up to a village, whence the inhabitants had already withdrawn and
hidden themselves. They took in this island five or six women and some
boys, most of whom were captives, like those in the other island; for,
as we learned from the women whom we had brought with us, the natives of
this place also were Caribbees. As this barge was about to return to the
ships with the capture which they had made, a canoe came along the coast
containing four men, two women, and a boy; and when they saw the fleet
they were so stupified with amazement, that for a good hour they remained
motionless at the distance of nearly two gunshots from the ships. In this
position they were seen by those who were in the barge and also by all
the fleet. Meanwhile those in the barge moved towards the canoe, but so
close in shore, that the Indians, in their perplexity and astonishment as
to what all this could mean, never saw them, until they were so near that
escape was impossible; for our men pressed on them so rapidly that they
could not get away, although they made considerable effort to do so.
When the Caribbees saw that all attempt at flight was useless, they
most courageously took to their bows, both women and men; I say most
courageously, because they were only four men and two women, and our
people were twenty-five in number. Two of our men were wounded by the
Indians, one with two arrow-shots in his breast, and another with one in
his side, and if it had not happened that they carried shields and wooden
bucklers, and that they soon got near them with the barge and upset
their canoe, most of them would have been killed with their arrows.
After their canoe was upset, they remained in the water swimming and
occasionally wading (for there were shallows in that part), still using
their bows as much as they could, so that our men had enough to do to
take them: and after all there was one of them whom they were unable to
secure till he had received a mortal wound with a lance, and whom thus
wounded they took to the ships. The difference between these Caribbees
and the other Indians, with respect to dress, consists in their wearing
their hair very long, while the others have it clipt irregularly and
paint their heads with crosses and a hundred thousand different devices,
each according to his fancy; which they do with sharpened reeds. All
of them, both the Caribbees and the others, are beardless, so that
it is a rare thing to find a man with a beard: the Caribbees whom we
took had their eyes and eyebrows stained, which I imagine they do from
ostentation. It gave them a more formidable appearance. One of these
captives said, that in an island belonging to them called Cayre[123]
(which is the first that we saw, though we did not go to it), there is
a great quantity of gold; and that if we were to take them nails and
tools with which to make their canoes, we might bring away as much gold
as we liked. On the same day we left that island, having been there
no more than six or seven hours; and, steering for another point of
land[124] which appeared to lie in our intended course, we reached it
by night. On the morning of the following day we coasted along it, and
found it to be a large extent of country, but not continuous, for it was
divided into more than forty islets.[125] The land was very high and
most of it barren, an appearance which we have never observed in any of
the islands visited by us before or since: the surface of the ground
seemed to suggest the probability of its containing metals. None of us
went on shore here, but a small latteen caravel went up to one of the
islets and found in it some fishermen’s huts; the Indian women whom we
brought with us said they were not inhabited. We proceeded along the
coast the greater part of that day, and on the evening of the next we
discovered another island called Burenquen,[126] which we judged to be
thirty leagues in length, for we were coasting along it the whole of one
day. This island is very beautiful and apparently fertile: hither the
Caribbees come with the view of subduing the inhabitants, and often carry
away many of the people. These islanders have no boats nor any knowledge
of navigation; but, as our captives inform us, they use bows as well as
the Caribbees, and if by chance when they are attacked they succeed in
taking any of their invaders, they will eat them in like manner as the
Caribbees themselves in the contrary event would devour them. We remained
two days in this island, and a great number of our men went on shore, but
could never get speech of the natives, who had all fled, from fear of
the Caribbees. All the above-mentioned islands were discovered in this
voyage, the admiral having seen nothing of them in his former voyage.
They are all very beautiful and possess a most luxuriant soil, but this
last island appeared to exceed all the others in beauty. Here terminated
the islands, which on the side towards Spain had not been seen before
by the admiral, although we regard it as a matter of certainty that
there is land more than forty leagues beyond the foremost of these newly
discovered islands, on the side nearest to Spain. We believe this to be
the case, because, two days before we saw land, we observed some birds
called rabihorcados (or pelicans), marine birds of prey which do not sit
or sleep upon the water, making circumvolutions in the air at the close
of evening previous to taking their flight towards land for the night.
These birds could not be going to settle at more than twelve or fifteen
leagues distance, because it was late in the evening, and this was on
our right hand on the side towards Spain; from which we all judged that
there was land there still undiscovered; but we did not go in search of
it, because it would have taken us round out of our intended route. I
hope that in a few voyages it will be discovered. It was at dawn that
we left the before-mentioned island of Burenquen,[127] and on that day
before nightfall we caught sight of land, which though not recognized
by any of those who had come hither in the former voyage, we believed to
be Española, from the information given us by the Indian women whom we
had with us: and in this island we remain at present.[128] Between it and
Burenquen[129] another island appeared at a distance, but of no great
size. When we reached Española the land, at the part where we approached
it, was low and very flat,[130] on seeing which, a general doubt arose
as to its identity; for, neither the admiral nor his companions, on the
previous voyage, had seen it on this side.
The island being large, is divided into provinces; the part which we
first touched at, is called Hayti; another province adjoining it, they
call Xamaná; and the next province is named Bohio, where we now are.
These provinces are again subdivided, for they are of great extent.
Those who have seen the length of its coast, state that it is two
hundred leagues long, and I, myself, should judge it not to be less
than a hundred and fifty leagues: as to its breadth, nothing is hitherto
known; it is now forty days since a caravel left us with the view of
circumnavigating it, and is not yet returned.[131] The country is very
remarkable, and contains a vast number of large rivers, and extensive
chains of mountains, with broad open valleys, and the mountains are very
high: it does not appear that the grass is ever cut throughout the year.
I do not think that they have any winter in this part, for at Christmas
were found many birds-nests, some containing the young birds, and others
containing eggs. No four-footed animal has ever been seen in this or any
of the other islands, except some dogs of various colours, as in our
own country, but in shape like large house-dogs; and also some little
animals, in colour, size, and fur, like a rabbit, with long tails, and
feet like those of a rat; these animals climb up the trees, and many who
have tasted them, say they are very good to eat:[132] there are not any
wild beasts. There are great numbers of small snakes, and some lizards,
but not many; for the Indians consider them as great a luxury as we do
pheasants: they are of the same size as ours, but different in shape. In
a small adjacent island[133] (close by a harbour called Monte Christo,
where we stayed several days), our men saw an enormous kind of lizard,
which they said was as large round as a calf,[134] with a tail as long as
a lance, which they often went out to kill: but bulky as it was, it got
into the sea, so that they could not catch it. There are, both in this
and the other islands, an infinite number of birds like those in our own
country, and many others such as we had never seen. No kind of domestic
fowl has been seen here, with the exception of some ducks in the houses
in Zuruquia; these ducks were larger than those of Spain, though smaller
than geese,—very pretty, with flat crests, most of them as white as snow,
but some black.