They Set
Sail From Seville, In High Expectations Of Acquiring Riches, On The 10th
Of August, 1519.
The 3d October, the fleet arrived between Cape Verd and
the islands of that name.
After being detained by tedious calms on the
coast of Guinea for seventy days, they at last got to the south of the
line, and held on their course to the coast of Brazil, of which they
came in sight in about the latitude of 23 deg. S. They here procured
abundant refreshments of fruits, sugar-canes, and several kinds of
animals.
Proceeding about 2 1/2 degrees farther south, they came into a country
inhabited by a wild sort of people, of prodigious stature, fierce and
barbarous, and making a strange roaring noise, more like the bellowing
of bulls, than human speech. Notwithstanding their prodigious bulk,
these people were so nimble that none of the Spaniards or Portuguese
were swift enough to overtake them. At this place there was a fine river
of fresh water, the mouth of which was fully seventeen leagues wide, in
which there were seven islands, the largest of which they named the
island of St Mary, where they procured some jewels.[2] Proceeding
along this coast towards the south, they fell in with two islands so
abounding in seals and penguins, that they might have laden all their
five ships with them in a short time. The penguins are a black, heavy,
unwieldy fowl, extremely fat, covered with a sort of down instead of
feathers, and having a bill like that of a raven; drawing their entire
subsistence from the sea, as fish is their only food.
[Footnote 2: These jewels may possibly have been a few pearls. The
indications in the text are too vague to afford even a guess at the
situation of the river and its seven islands; only it may be mentioned,
that the most northern part of the coast of Patagonia is in lat. 38 deg. S.
and that no river answering the description in the test is to be found
on all that coast - E.]
They next advanced to about the latitude of 49 deg. 30' S. where they were
forced to remain for five months, owing to the severity of the weather,
it being now winter in these southern parts. They here passed their time
very unpleasantly, and for a long time believed the country to be
uninhabited, but at length a savage came to visit them. He was a brisk
jolly fellow, very merrily disposed, and came towards them singing and
dancing. On coming to the shore of the haven in which the ships had
taken refuge, he stood there for some time, throwing dust upon his head.
This being observed, some persons were sent ashore to him in a boat, and
making similar signs of peace; and he came along with them on board,
without any appearance of fear or hesitation. The size and stature of
this person was such as in some measure entitled him to be deemed a
giant, the head of one of the ordinary-sized Spaniards only reaching to
his waist, and he was proportionally large made.
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