Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/167

 THE SOUTHERN LAND. 19

Taumaco informed him, as well as lie could mal<c himself understood, that if he sought the coast of the great Terra Firma, he would light upon it sooner by going to the south than to the island of Santa Cruz ; for in the south there were lands very fertile and populous, and running down to a great depth towards the said south. In consequence of which Pedro Eernandez de Quiros abandoned his idea of going to colonize the island of Santa Cruz, and sailed southward with a slight variation to the south-west, discovering many islands and islets, which were very populous and of pleas- ing a^Dpearancc, until, in fifteen degrees and twenty minutes south, he discovered the land of the Baia de San Felipe y Santiago, which, on the side that he first came upon, ran from east to west. It appeared to be more than one hundred leagues long ; the country was very populous, and, although the people were dark, they were very Avell favoured ; there were also many plantations of trees, and the temperature was so mild that they seemed to be in Paradise ; the air, also, was so healthy, that in a few days after they arrived all the men who were sick recovered. The land produced most abundantly many kinds of very delicious fruits, as well as animals and birds in great variety. The bay, also, was no less abundant in fish of excellent flavour, and of all the kinds wdrich are found on the coast of the sea in Spain. The Indians ate for bread certain roots like the batata, either roasted or boiled, which when the Spaniards tasted they found them better eating and more sustaining than biscuit.

For certain reasons (they ought to have been very weighty) which hitherto have not been ascertained with entire cer- tainty, Pedro Fernandez de Quiros left the Almiranta and the Zabra in the said bay, and himself sailed with his ship, the Capitana, for Mexico, from whence he again came to this court to advocate anew the colonization of that land, and was again sent back to the viceroy of Peru, and died at Panama on his return voyage to Lima. The admiral Luis