America: Being the Latest, and Most Accurate Description of the Nevv VVorld / Containing the Original of the Inhabitants, and the Remarkable Voyages Thither. The Conquest of the Vast Empires of Mexico and Peru, and Other Large Provinces and Territories, with the Several European Plantations in Those Parts. Also Their Cities, Fortresses, Towns, Temples, Mountains, and Rivers. Their Habits, Customs, Manners, and Religions. Their Plants, Beasts, Birds, and Serpents. With an Appendix, Containing, Besides Several Other Considerable Additions, a Brief Survey of What Hath Been Discover'd of the Unknown South-land and the Arctick Region.

by John Ogilby

An Appendix,

CONTAINING

Partly a farther prosecution of the Descriptions of some Provinces already treated of in the foregoing Book, partly an Account of some other Discoveries than what have hitherto been deliver’d in any Description of the NEW WORLD.

CHAP. I.
Rio de la Plata.

The River De la Plata, by the Natives call’d Paranaguazu, is next to the River of the Amazones, the greatest in the World, and falls into the Northern Ocean between the Capes Antonio and Maria, lying thirty Leagues one from another: It receives from East and West divers Rivers as far as the Lake Xarays, lying three hundred Leagues up in the Countrey from the Mouth of La Plata. Also into the fore-mention’d Lake fall several Streams, which spring out of the Peruvian Mountains Andes.

The first that Sail’d into this great River, Anno 1515. to an Island lying in the middle of it, was John Dias de Solis, who rashly going ashore, was kill’d and eaten, together with several Portugueses.

Sebastian Gabottus his Expedition.

Eleven years after this Accident, Sebastian Gabottus set Sail from Spain to go to the Spicy Islands through the Straights of Magellan, but was forc’d, for want of Provisions, and the unwillingness of his Seamen, to put into the River La Plata; in which being advanc’d thirty Leagues, he Anchor’d near an Island, which he call’d St. Gabriel: from whence going seven farther, he discover’d a Stream which fell into La Plata. This River he call’d St. Salvador, and cast up a Fort at the Mouth of it, where an Inlet afforded a convenient Harbor for Shipping; he found the River La Plata to be generally ten Leagues broad, and full of Isles; and to the Westward of it, the River Zaracaranna, inhabited on the South side by a subtil People call’d Diagnitas. At the place where Zaracaranna disembogues into La Plata he built a Castle, and calling the same Castello di Santo Spirito, went up farther, leaving on the West side the People Tenbues, Mequaretas, Mepenes, and Aigais; to the Eastward, the Quiloacas and Santana, and struck up out of the River La Plata, North-East into the Stream Parana, in which he had gone, two hundred Leagues, and pass’d by many Isles, when he went out of the same into the Stream Paraguay; where being set upon by the Countrey People, who were busie in Tilling the Ground, he lost so many of his Men, that he was forc’d, without any farther Exploit, to return with the Portuguese Pilot, Diego Garcia, who Sailing up the same River, had met with Gabottus in Paria; and because both had gotten some Silver, they call’d the River, from that Metal, De la Plata. The farther Discovery whereof lay neglected nine years after, when Peter Mendoza Sailing with eleven Ships, carrying eight hundred Men, to the Island Gabriel, built the Fort Buenos Ayres, on the South side of it, where many People dying of Hunger, little was done.