We
counted eight. Only one was a long craft, holding twenty
men; the others came in cockle boats, with one or two or
three. Not only canoes, but they came swimming, men and
boys, all a dark grace in the cerulean, lucid sea. They were
so fearless--for we came from heaven and would not harm
them. We were going to make them rich; we were going
to "save" them.
A score perhaps were helped aboard the _Santa Maria_.
The Pinta, the Nina, had others. They were like children,
touching, staring, excitedly talking and gesturing among
themselves, or gazing in a kind of fixed awe, asking of the
least sailor with all reverence, bowing themselves before the
Admiral, the over-god. The Admiral moved richly dressed,
rapt and benignant, yet sparing a part of himself to keep
all order, measure, rightness on the ship, and another part
to find out with keen pains, "What of other lands? What
of folk who must be your superiors?"
They had brought offerings. Half a dozen parrots perched
around, very gorgeously colored, loquacious in a speech we
did not know. We had stacks of the large round thin
cakes baked on stones which afterwards we called cassava,
and great gourds, "calabashes" filled with fruit, and balls
of cotton in a rude thread. We gave beads, bits of cloth,
little purses, and the small bells that caused extravagant
delight.
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