The Men Followed Us At The
Distance Of A Stones-Throw, Always Speaking Among Themselves, And
Apparently As Much Afraid Of Us As We Were Of Them,; For When We Stopped
They Did The Same, And Only Continued To Advance As We Retreated, Always
Keeping At A Respectful Distance.
When at length we reached the boats, and
had pushed off from the shore, they all leapt into the
Sea, and shot a
number of their arrows against us, of which we were not now in much fear.
We fired two shots among them, more for the purpose of intimidation than
of killing them; and scared by the report, they all fled away into the
woods, and we saw no more of them. All of these people went naked, as has
been said of the other natives whom we had seen; and on account of the
prodigious size of these men, we named this place the island of Giants.
Proceeding on our voyage at no great distance from this last place, we had
frequent encounters with the natives, as they were unwilling to allow of
any thing being taken from their country. On this account, and because our
stock of provisions had become scanty, as we had been near a year at sea,
we resolved on returning to Spain. Since our departure from the Cape Verde
islands, we had been always in the torrid zone, and had twice crossed the
equator, insomuch that the remaining provisions in our ships were much
injured by the heat of the climate.
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