[3] Pigafetta mentions that the female musicians of the King of Cebu were quite naked, or only covered with an apron of bark. The ladies of the Court were content with a hat, a short cloak, and a cloth around the waist.
[4] Perhaps the same reason induced the Chinese to purchase crucifixes at the time of their first intercourse with the Portuguese; for Pigafetta says: “The Chinese are white, wear clothes, and eat from tables. They also possess crucifixes but it is difficult to say why or where they got them.”
[5] One line here omitted.—C.
[6] Apud Camarines quoque terrain eodem die quator decies contremuisse, fide dignis testimoniis renuntiatum est: multa interim aedificia diruta. Ingentem montem medium crepuisse immani hiatu, ex immensa vi excussisse arbores per oras pelagi, ita ut leucam occuparent aequoris, nec humor per illud intervallum appareret. Accidit hoc anno 1628.—S. Eusebius Nieremberqius, Historia Naturae, lib. xvi., 383. Antwerpiae, 1635.
[7] At Fort William, Calcutta, experiments have proved the extraordinary endurance of the pine-apple fibre. A cable eight centimeters in circumference was not torn asunder until a force of 2,850 kilogrammes had been applied to it.—Report of the Jury, London International Exhibition.
[8] Sapa means shallow.
[9] To the extraordinary abundance of these annulates in Sikkin, Hooker (Himalayan Journal, i, 167) ascribes the death of many animals, as also the murrain known as rinderpest, if it occurred after a very wet season, when the leech appears in incredible numbers. It is a known fact that these worms have existed for days together in the nostrils, throat, and stomach of man, causing inexpressible pain and, finally, death.
[10] Gemelli Careri has already mentioned them.
[11] I discovered similar formations, of extraordinary beauty and extent, in the great silicious beds of Steamboat Springs in Nevada.