These Birds Never Fly Except When Favoured By The
Wind.
The Mahometans allege that these birds come from Paradise, and
therefore call them the birds of God.
Besides cloves, the Molucca islands produce ginger, rice, sago, goats,
sheep, poultry, popinjays, white and red figs, almonds, pomegranates,
oranges and lemons, and a kind of honey which is produced by a species
of fly less than ants. Likewise sugar-canes, cocoa-nuts, melons, gourds,
and a species of fruit, called camulical, which is extremely cold. The
isle of Tidore is in lat. 0 deg. 45' N. and long. 127 deg. 10' E.[18] and about
9 deg. 30' W. from the Ladrones,[19] in a direction nearly S.W. Formerly the
natives of these islands were all heathens, the Moors or Mahometans
having only had footing there for about fifty years before the arrival
of the Spaniards. Ternate is the most northerly of these islands, and
Batchian is almost under the line, being the largest of them all.[20]
[Footnote 18: This is the true position, reckoning the longitude from
Greenwich. In the original the longitude is said to be 170 deg. W. from the
first meridian of the voyagers, being Seville in Spain, which would give
174 deg. E. from Greenwich; no great error, considering the imperfect way in
which the longitude was then reckoned at sea. - E.]
[Footnote 19: This is a gross error, perhaps of the press, as the
difference of longitude is 16 deg. 30'. - E.]
[Footnote 20: The northern end of Batchian is in lat. 0 deg. 28', and its
southern extremity in 0 deg. 40', both south. - E.]
Departing from Tidore, the Spaniards were attended by several kings in
their canoes to the isle of Mare,[21] where this royal company took
leave of them with much apparent regret. In this isle they left one of
their ships which was leaky, giving orders to have it repaired, for its
return to Spain. Being now reduced to forty-six Spaniards and thirteen
Indians, they directed their course from Mare towards the S.W. passing
the isles named Chacotian, Lagoma, Sico, Gioghi, Caphi, Sulacho,
Lumatola, Tenetum, Bura [Bouro?] Arubon [perhaps Amboina?] Budia,
Celaruri, Benaia, Ambalao, Bandon [perhaps Banda?] Zorobua, Zolot,
Moceuamor, Galian, and Mullua, besides many others possessed by
Mahometans, heathens, and canibals. They stopped fifteen days at
Mallua to repair their ship, being in 8 deg. N. lat. and 169 deg. long.
according to their reckoning. This island produces much pepper, both
long and of the ordinary round kind. The tree on which it grows climbs
like ivy, and its leaf resembles that of the mulberry. The natives are
canibals; the men wearing their hair and beards; and their only weapons
are bows and arrows.
[Footnote 21: Marhee Foul, a small isle between Tidore and Motir. - E.]
Leaving Mallua [Moa?] on the 25th January, 1522, they arrived at
Tima [Timor?] five leagues to the S.S.W. This island is in lat. 10 deg. S.
and long. 125 deg. E. where they found ginger, white sanders, various kinds
of fruits, and plenty of gold and provisions of all kinds. The people of
the Moluccas, Java, and Lozen [Luzon, or the principal island of the
Philippines], procure their sanders-wood from hence. The natives are
idolaters, and have the lues venerea among them, which is a common
distemper in all the islands of this great archipelago.
Leaving Timor on the 11th February, they got into the great sea called
Lantchidol, steering W.S.W. and leaving the coast of a long string of
islands on the right hand, and taking care not to sail too near the
shore, lest the Portuguese of Malacca should chance to discover them;
wherefore they kept on the outside of Java and Sumatra. That they might
pass the Cape of Good Hope the more securely, they continued their
course W.S.W. till they got into the latitude of 42 deg. S. though so sore
pinched by hunger and sickness, that some were for putting in at
Mosambique for refreshments; but the majority concluded that the
Portuguese would prove bad physicians for their distempers, and
determined therefore to continue the voyage homewards. In this course
they lost twenty-one of their men, and were at length constrained to put
in at the island of St Jago, one of the Cape Verds, to throw themselves
on the mercy of the Portuguese. So, venturing ashore, they opened their
miserable case to the Portuguese, who at first relieved their
necessities; but the next time they went on shore, detained all who came
as prisoners.
Those who still remained in the ship, now reduced to thirteen, having no
mind to join their companions in captivity, made all the haste they
could away, and being favoured by the winds, they arrived in the harbour
of San Lucar, near Seville, on the 7th September, 1522. He who commanded
this vessel, which had the good fortune to return from this remarkable
voyage, was Juan Sebastian Cano, a native of Guetaria in Biscay, a
person of much merit and resolution, who was nobly rewarded by the
emperor Charles V. To perpetuate the memory of this first voyage round
the world, the emperor gave him for his coat of arms the terrestrial
globe, with this motto, Prima me circumdedisti. The newly-discovered
straits at the southern extremity of South America, were at first named
the Straits of Vittori, after the ship which returned; but they soon
lost that name, to assume another which becomes them much better, in
honour of their discoverer, and have ever since been denominated the
Straits of Magellan.
This most celebrated voyage took up three years and twenty-seven days,
having commenced on the 10th August, 1519, and concluded on the 7th
September, 1522. By its success, the skill and penetration of the great
Columbus, who, only twenty-seven years before, had first asserted the
possibility of its performance, were fully established. One circumstance
was discovered in this voyage, which, although reason have taught us to
explain, could hardly have been expected a priori.
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