de Orbe Novo (V. 2) Book

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: the same countries with two ships. These countries are north of Hispaniola, Cuba, and the Lucayan islands, and not distant from the Baccalaos, Chicora, and Duraba, of which I have above spoken at length. After having described the manners and customs of these nations, after having enumerated the excellent ports and immense rivers, the Spaniards say they found plains overgrown with ilex, oaks, and olives, where wild grape vines rioted over the forest trees, and all other trees common in Europe. They give these particulars, not in an ordinary summary, but in a voluminous heap of letters. But what need have we of what is found everywhere in Europe? It is towards the south, not towards the frozen north,1 that those who seek fortune should bend their way; for everything at the equator is rich. Your Holiness will learn a laughable fact and a singular rumour concerning this voyage, which rapidly exploded. Estevcn Gomez found nothing he expected to discover, but rather than return with empty hands, he violated our instructions which forbade him to use violence against any natives and filled his ship with people of both sexes, all innocent and half naked, who had lived contentedly in huts. Hardly had he reached the port whence he had sailed, than an individual, hearing of the ship's arrival with a cargo of slaves, mounted his horse and without waiting for further information galloped to us, and quite out of breath exclaimed: "Esteven Gomez has returned with a ship-load of cloves and precious stones." He hoped to be well rewarded, and, without comprehending the stupidity of this man, the partisans of Gomez went about the court with exclamations of joy. They loudly proclaimed that Gomez had brought not slaves (esclavos)but cloves (claws), cutting off the first half of the word. In the ...Read More