This island is inhabited by a certain people who are considered very warlike by their neighbors.  These eat human flesh.  The said people have many kinds of row-boats, in which they cross over to all the other Indian islands, and seize and carry away everything that they can.  They differ in no way from the others, only that they wear long hair like the women.  They use bows and darts made of reeds, with sharpened shafts fastened to the larger end, as we have described.  On this account they are considered warlike, wherefore the other Indians are afflicted with continual fear, but I regard them as of no more account than the others.  These are the people who visit certain women, who alone inhabit the island Mateunin[15], which is the first in passing from Hispana to India.  These women, moreover, perform no kind of work of their sex, for they use bows and darts, like those I have described of their husbands; they protect themselves with sheets of copper, of which there is great abundance among them.

They tell me of another island, greater than the aforesaid Hispana, whose inhabitants are without hair, and which abounds in gold above all the others.  I am bringing with me men of this island and of the others that I have seen, who give proof of the things that I have described.

Finally, that I may compress in few words the brief account of our departure and quick return, and the gain, I promise this, that if I am supported by our most invincible sovereigns with a little of their help, as much gold can be supplied as they will need, indeed as much of spices, of cotton, of chewing-gum (which is only found in Chios), also as much of aloes-wood, and as many slaves for the navy, as their majesties will wish to demand.  Likewise rhubarb and other kinds of spices, which I suppose these men whom I left in the said fort have already found, and will continue to find; since I remained in no place longer than the winds forced me, except in the town of the Nativity, while I provided for the building of the fort and for the safety of all.  Which things, although they are very great and remarkable, yet they would have been much greater if I had been aided by as many ships as the occasion required.

Truly great and wonderful is this, and not corresponding to our merits, but to the holy Christian religion, and to the piety and religion of our sovereigns, because what the human understanding could not attain, that the divine will has granted to human efforts.  For God is wont to listen to his servants who love his precepts, even in impossibilities, as has happened to us on the present occasion, who have attained that which hitherto mortal men have never reached.  For if anyone has written or said anything about these islands, it was all with obscurities and conjectures; no one claims that he had seen them; from which they seemed like fables.  Therefore let the King and Queen, the princes and their most fortunate kingdoms, and all other countries of Christendom, give thanks