“I have observed that these people have no religion, neither are they idolaters, but are a very gentle race, without the knowledge of any iniquity. They neither kill, steal, nor carry weapons, and are so timid that one of our men can put a hundred of them to flight, although they readily sport and play tricks with them. They have the knowledge that there is a God above, and are firmly persuaded that we have come from heaven. They quickly learn such prayers as we repeat to them, and also to make the sign of the cross.’ ...
“Along the Rio de Mares, which I left last evening, [Sunday, the eleventh of November,] there is undoubtedly considerable mastic, and the quantity might be increased, for the trees when transplanted easily take root. They are of a lofty size, bearing leaves and fruit like the lentisk. The tree, however, is taller and has a larger leaf than the lentisk, as is mentioned by Pliny, and as I have myself observed in the island of Scio, in the Archipelago. I ordered many of these trees to be tapped in order to extract the resin, but as the weather was rainy all the time I was on the river, I was unable to procure more than a very small quantity, which I have preserved for your highnesses.... Great quantities of cotton might be raised here, and sold profitably, as I think, without being carried to Spain, but to the cities of the Grand Khan, which we shall doubtless discover, as well as many others belonging to other sovereigns. These may become a source of profit to your highnesses by trading there with the productions of Spain and of the other countries of Europe. Here also is to be found plenty of aloe, which, however, is not of very great value, but the mastic assuredly is, as it is found nowhere else than in the previously mentioned island of Scio, where, if I rightly remember, it is produced to the amount of fifty thousand ducats annually.”
Columbus further remarks, that at this point, near the river which he had called Rio del Sol, “he found the weather somewhat cold, and, as it was in the winter, he thought it not prudent to prosecute his discoveries any farther toward the north.”[156]
A copy of a part of the map of the New World (tabvla terre nove) contained in the edition of Ptolemy’s Geography printed at Strasburg in 1513. (This part of the original is 9½ inches long.)
Speaking of his explorations along the coast of Cuba, in his letter to Rafael Sanchez, the admiral says: “I sailed along its coast toward the west, discovering so great an extent of territory that I could not imagine it to be an island, but the continent of Cathay.... I continued on my course, still expecting to meet with some town or city, but after having gone a great distance, and not arriving at any, and finding myself proceeding toward the north, which I was desirous to avoid on account of the cold, and, moreover, meeting with a contrary wind, I determined to return to the south, and therefore put about and sailed back to a harbor that I had observed.”[157]
On Monday, the twelfth of November, they had sailed by sunset eighteen leagues, east by south, to a cape which Columbus called Cabo de Cuba. “On the following Wednesday he entered a spacious and deep harbor,” containing so many islands that they could not be counted.... He declares that it is his opinion these islands are the innumerable ones which, on the maps, are placed at the extreme part of the East, and says that he believes they contain great riches, precious stones, and spicery, and extend far to the south, spreading out on each side. He named this place La Mar de Nuestra Senora, and the port, near the strait that extends to these islands, Puerto del Principe.
On Wednesday, the twenty-first of November, when the vessels were about eighty miles southeast of Puerto del Principe, “the admiral” says Las Casas, “found they were forty-two degrees north of the equator as at Puerto de Mares,[158] but he says here that he has stopped using the quadrant until he should go on land that he might mend it. From this statement it would seem that he doubted that he was so far from the equator, and he had reason, for it was not likely since these islands are in ⸺ degrees.[159] To know whether the quadrant was in good working order, it is said that he took an observation to see if he was north as high as Castile; and if this be true, and he was as high as Florida, what is the situation of the islands already mentioned?[160] Moreover, it is said that the heat was great. It is evident that if he were along the coast of Florida, it should not have been hot, but cold.[161] And it is also manifest that in no part of the world in the latitude of forty-two degrees is great heat experienced except by some accidental cause, and even this exception I [Las Casas] believe has never been known.”