In several parts of the island, however, cold does prevail; Your Holiness will understand that this is due to the position of the mountain ranges, as I shall later demonstrate.  The cold, however, is never sufficiently severe to inconvenience the islanders with snow.  Perpetual spring and perpetual autumn prevail in this fortunate island.  During the entire year the trees are covered with leaves, and the prairies with grass.  Everything in Hispaniola grows in an extraordinary fashion.  I have already related elsewhere that the vegetables, such as cabbages, lettuces, salads, radishes, and other similar plants, ripen within sixteen days, while pumpkins, melons, cucumbers, etc., require but thirty days.  We have also stated that animals brought from Spain, such as oxen, attain a greater size.  When describing the growth of these animals, it is claimed that the oxen resemble elephants and the pigs, mules; but this is an exaggeration.  Pork has an agreeable taste and is wholesome, because the pigs feed upon mirobolanes and other island fruits, which grow wild in the forests, just as in Europe they eat beech nuts, ilex berries, and acorns.  Grape-vines also grow in an extraordinary fashion, despite the absence of all attention.  If any one chooses to sow wheat in a mountain region exposed to the cold, it flourishes wonderfully, but less so in the plain, because the soil is too fertile.  To one unheard-of-thing people have certified upon oath; that the ears are as thick round as a man’s arm and one palm in length, and that some of them contain as many as a thousand grains of wheat.  The best bread found in the island is that made from the yucca, and is called cazabi.  It is most digestible, and the yucca is cultivated and harvested in the greatest abundance and with great facility.  Whatever free time afterwards remains, is employed in seeking gold.

The quadrupeds are so numerous that already the exportation to Spain of horses and other animals and of hides has begun; thus the daughter gives assistance in many things to the mother.  I have already elsewhere given particulars concerning red wood, mastic, perfumes, green colouring material, cotton, amber, and many other products of this island.  What greater happiness could one wish in this world than to live in a country where such wonders are to be seen and enjoyed?  Is there a more agreeable existence than that one leads in a country where one is not forced to shut himself in narrow rooms to escape cold that chills or heat that suffocates?  A land where it is not necessary to load the body with heavy clothing in winter, or to toast one’s legs at a continual fire, a practice which ages people in the twinkling of the eye, exhausts their force, and provokes a thousand different maladies.  The air of Hispaniola is stated to be salubrious, and the rivers which flow over beds of gold, wholesome.  There are indeed no rivers nor mountains nor very few valleys where gold is not found.  Let us close now with a brief description of the interior of this fortunate island.