Veragua! We would go there. Again we hoisted sail
and in our ships, now all unseaworthy, crept again in a bad
wind along the coast of gold,--Costa Rico. At last we
saw many smokes from the land. That would be a large
Indian village. We beat toward it, found a river mouth and
entered. But Veragua must have heard of us from a swift
land traveler. When a boat from each ship would approach
the land--it was in the afternoon, the sun westering fast
--a sudden burst of a most melancholy and awful din came
from the forest growing close to water side.
One of our men cried "Wizards!" The Admiral spoke
from the stern of the long boat. "And what if they be
wizards? We may answer, `We are Christians!' "
The furious din continued but now we were nearer. "Besides,"
he said, "those are great shells and drums."
Our rowers held off. Out of the forest on to the narrow
beach started several hundred shell-blowing, drum-beating
barbarians, marvelously feathered and painted and with
bows and arrows and wooden swords.
An arrow stuck in the side of our boat, others fell short.
The Admiral rose, tall, broad-shouldered, though lean as
winter where there is winter, with hair as white as milk.
He held in his hand a string of green beads and another of
hawk bells which he made to ring, but he did not depend
more upon them than upon what he held within him of
powerful and pacific.
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