[408-3] I.e., in that it is clear to one who understands it, and blind to one who does not.
[408-4] Las naos de las Indias, i.e., the large ships for the Indies, i.e., Española.
[408-5] Bow-lines are ropes employed to keep the windward edges of the principal sails steady, and are only used when the wind is so unfavorable that the sails must be all braced sideways, or close hauled to the wind. (Major.)
[409-1] I.e., rigged with lateen sails in the Portuguese fashion.
[409-2] Columbus, in his marginal notes to his copy of the Historia Rerum ubique Gestarum of Pope Pius II. (Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini; Venice, 1477), summarized the description of the Massagetae in ch. XII. in part as follows: they “use golden girths and golden bridles and silver breast-pieces and have no iron but plenty of copper and gold.” Raccolta Colombiana, parte I., tomo II., p. 300. This description of the Massagetae goes back to Herodotus. While some habits ascribed to the Massagetae were like what Columbus observed in Veragua, their home was nowhere near eastern China.
[409-3] See [p. 393, note 3].
[409-4] The account in the Historie is radically at variance with this. The girls were brought on board and “showed themselves very brave since although the Christians in looks, acts, and race were very strange, they gave no signs of distress or sadness, but maintained a cheerful and modest (honesto) bearing, wherefore they were very well treated by the Admiral who gave them clothes and something to eat and then sent them back.” Historie, p. 299. Ferdinand gives the ages as eight and fourteen and says nothing of witchcraft except that the Indians were frightened and thought they were being bewitched when Bartholomew the next day ordered the ships’ clerks to write down the replies he got to his questions; ibid.
[410-1] A specimen of the Maya sculptures, of which such imposing remains are found in Yucatan. The translation follows Lollis’s emendation, which substitutes mirrado for mirando.
[410-2] Gato paulo. On this name, see [p. 341, note 3]. Ferdinand, in the Historie, relates this incident in more detail, from which it is clear that the pigs were peccaries which had been captured by the men. On the other hand, Ulloa, the Italian translator of the Historie, mistranslated gato paulo by “gatto,” “cat.”
[410-3] Begare. Columbus in recollecting this incident transferred to the monkey the Indian name of the wild pigs. The begare is the “peccary,” a native of America. Oviedo, lib. XII., cap. XX, gives baquira as the name of wild pigs in Nicaragua, and baquira and begare are obviously identical.