Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/184

 36 RELATION OF

towns. They thanked me very much : the chief always con- tinued with me. They then told me the name of the coun- try : all came to me to make peace, and the chiefs assisted me, making their people get water and wood and carry it on board the ships. In this we spent six days.

The people of this island are of an agreeable conversation, understanding us very well, desirous of learning our lan- guage and to teach us theirs. They are great cruizers : they have much beard ; they are great archers and hurlers of darts ; the vessels in which they sail are large, and can go a great way. They informed us of more than forty islands, great and small, all peopled, naming them by their names, and telling us that they were at war with many of them. They also gave us intelligence of the island Santa Cruz, and of what had happened when the adelantado was there.

The people of this island are of ordinary stature : they have amongst them people white and red, some in colour like those of the Indies, others woolly-headed blacks and mulattoes. Slavery is in use amongst them. Their food is yams, fish, cocoa-nuts, and they have hogs and fowls.

This island is named Taomaco, and the name of the chief is Tomai. We departed from hence with four Indians whom we took, at which they were not much pleased : and as we here got wood and water, there was no necessity for us to go to the Island Santa Cruz, which, as I have said, is in this parallel sixty leagues farther on.

So we sailed from hence, steering S.S.E. to 12i° S. lati- tude, where we found an island like that of Taomaco, and with the same kind of people, named Chucupia : there is only one small anchoring place ; and passing in the offing, a small canoe with only two men came to me to make peace, and presented me some bark of a tree, which appeared like a very fine handkerchief, four yards long and three palms wide : on this I parted from them.