The Admiral Proposed To Continue The Voyage, But Was Told That The
Inspector James Marque Had Gone On Shore With Eight Soldiers, At Which
Conduct He Was Much Offended.
Parties of men were sent out in different
directions, but could not find him, on account of the thickness of the
woods.
Other parties were again sent on shore, who fired muskets and
sounded trumpets, yet all to no purpose, and Columbus was inclined to
leave Marque to his fate, being much concerned at the delay. Yet lest
these men might perish, he ordered the ships to take in wood and water,
and sent Alonso de Ojeda, who commanded one of the caravels, with forty
men, to view the country, and to search for Marque and his party. Ojeda
returned without any tidings of the stragglers, and reported that in
travelling six leagues he had waded through twenty-six rivers, many of
which took his men to the middle. In this excursion much cotton was seen,
and a vast variety of birds in the woods. At length, on Friday the 8th
November, the inspector and his men returned, excusing himself that he had
lost his way in the prodigiously thick woods, and was unable to get back
sooner: But the admiral ordered him to be put under arrest for going on
shore without leave. In some of the houses at this island, cotton was
found both raw and spun, and likewise a strange sort of looms in which it
was wove by the natives. The houses were well constructed, and better
stored with provisions than those in the islands which were discovered in
the first voyage: But they found abundance of human heads, hung up in the
houses, and many baskets full of human bones, from which it was concluded
that the natives were canibals, or fed on human flesh.
On the 10th November he coasted along the island of Guadaloupe, towards
the north-west, steering for Hispaniola, and discovered a very high island,
which he called Montserrate, because it resembled the rocks of that
place. He next found a very round island, everywhere perpendicular, so
that it seemed impossible to get upon it without the assistance of ladders,
and which he named Santa Maria la Redonda, or the round island of St
Mary. To another island he gave the name of Santa Maria et Antigua or
ancient St Mary, the coast of which extended fifteen or twenty leagues.
Many other islands were seen to the northward, which were very high, and
covered with woods. He anchored at one of these which he named St Martin;
and at another on the 14th November, which he named Santa Cruz, or the
Holy Cross. They took four women and two children at this island; and as
the boat was returning from the shore, a canoe was met in which there were
four men and a woman, who stood on their guard. The woman shot arrows as
well as the men, and one of her arrows pierced through a buckler.
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