Notable Voyagers, From Columbus to Nordenskiold

by William Henry Giles Kingston; Henry Frith

The country appeared to be cultivated in some places, and in others covered with fruit-trees and plants, and abounding with monkeys. He was, however, greatly astonished at finding the water still fresh, and that it became more and more so the farther he proceeded. It was that season, however, when the rivers which empty themselves into the Gulf of Paria are swollen by rains. He was surprised also at the calmness of the sea, not being aware that the only two entrances were by the Serpent’s and Dragon’s Mouths into this large expanse of water.

For some time no inhabitants were met with. At length the ships brought up at the mouth of the river, and immediately a canoe with three Indians came off to the caravel anchored nearest the shore, when the captain, springing in, upset her, and the people, as they were swimming, were secured. Being brought to the Admiral, they were presented with beads, hawks’ bells, and sugar. The report they gave in consequence, on returning on shore, induced many other natives to come off. They were tall, finely formed, and graceful in their movements, being armed with bows and arrows and targets. The men wore cotton cloths of various colours about their heads and loins, but the women were destitute of clothing. They brought maize and other eatables, with beverages, some white, made from maize, others green, expressed from various fruits. They judged of everything by the sense of smell. As they came near they smelt the boat, then smelt the people, as they did all the articles offered them. Although setting little value on the beads, they were delighted with the hawks’ bells, and still more so with anything of brass. Taking some of the people as guides, he proceeded west for eight leagues, to a point which he called the Needle. So beautiful was the country, that he gave it the name of The Garden.

Here many natives came off, and invited the Admiral on shore in the name of their King. Many wore collars and burnished plates of that inferior kind of gold, called by the Indians guanin, and they pointed to a land in the west, from whence they said it came; but the cupidity of the Spaniards was excited by strings of pearls round the arms of some of them. These, they said, were procured at the sea-coast on the northern side of Paria, and they showed the mother-of-pearl shells from which they were taken.

To secure specimens to be sent to Spain, Columbus dispatched some boats to that part of the shore. Numbers of the natives came down, and treating the Spaniards as beings of a superior order, regaled them with bread and various fruits of excellent flavour. They had among them tame parrots, one of light green with a yellow neck, and the tips of the wings of a bright red, others of a vivid scarlet, except some azure feathers in the wing. These they gave to the Spaniards, who, however, cared for nothing but pearls, many necklaces and bracelets of which were given by the Indian women in exchange for hawks’ bells or articles of brass.

The Spaniards returned on board highly delighted at the way they had been treated, while the quantity of pearls seen among the natives raised the sanguine anticipations of Columbus, who was anxious to send the finest specimens to the sovereigns.

Still believing the peninsula of Paria to be an island, he sailed on westward until compelled, by finding the water more shallow as he advanced, to anchor, when he sent a caravel to explore. She returned the following day with a report that at the end of the gulf there was an opening of two leagues, which led into an inner gulf, into which flowed a quantity of fresh water by four openings. It was in reality the mouth of the large river now called the Paria. To the inner gulf Columbus gave the name of the Gulf of Pearls.

Finding no passage to the westward, the ships proceeded in an opposite direction for the Boca del Dragon. On the 13th of August they anchored in a fine harbour, to which Columbus gave the name of Puerto de Gatos. Here also were seen mangroves growing in the water with oysters clinging to the branches, their mouths open, as the Spaniards supposed, to receive the dew which was afterwards thought to be transformed into pearls. That they were thus formed was believed until comparatively late years.

The passage through which he was about to pass is extremely dangerous after the rainy season, and the water which rushes through it foams and roars as if breaking on rocks. Scarcely had the ships entered than the wind died away, and shipwreck appeared imminent, but they were at length carried through by the current of fresh water into the open sea.

Columbus now stood to the westward, running along the northern coast of Paria, still supposing it to be an island, intending to visit the Gulf of Pearls. To the north-east he saw the two islands of Tobago and Granada, and on the 15th those of Margarita and Cubagua, afterwards famed for their pearl fishing.

On approaching the latter, a number of Indians were seen fishing for pearls. A boat being sent to communicate with them, a seaman offered a broken piece of gaily-painted porcelain to a woman who had round her neck a string of pearls, which she readily gave in exchange.