place they constructed a bridge by which they passed
to the other side, and entered into a country called
Guema, which was so poor, that they could only get
fruit and herbs to subsist upon. Travelling onwards
from that place, they came to a district where the
people had some degree of civilization, and wore cotton
clothing of their own manufacture, and used canoes.
They here built a brigantine, in which, and in some
canoes, procured or taken from the natives, they embarked
their sick, with their treasure, provisions, and spare
apparel, under the charge of Francis de Orellana;
while Gonsalvo Pizarro marched by land with the rest
of the people along the river, going every night into
the boats. In this manner they proceeded for
about 200 leagues; when one night, on coming to the
river side, in hopes of joining the boats as usual,
Pizarro could not see or hear of them. He and
his people were reduced, by this unfortunate incident,
to a state of almost utter despair: In a strange,
poor, and barren country, without provisions, clothing,
or any other convenience, and at a vast distance from
their friends, with a prodigious extent of difficult
and dangerous road interposed between them and Quito,
they were reduced to the necessity of eating their
horses, and even their dogs. Yet holding a good
heart, they proceeded onwards in their journey for
eighteen months, penetrating, as is said, almost 500
leagues, without ever seeing the sun or any thing
else to comfort them. At length, of the 200 men
who had set out from Quito, only ten returned thither;
and these so weak, ragged, and disfigured, that they
could not be recognized. Orellana went 5 or 600
leagues down the river, passing through various countries
and nations on both sides, among whom he affirmed
that some were Amazons[94]. From the mouth of
that river, Orellana went home to Spain, and excused
himself for having deserted Pizarro, and those who
marched by land, by alleging, that he had been forced
down the river by the strength of the current, which
he was utterly unable to stem. By some, this river
is named after Orellana, who first navigated its waters;
and others call it the river of the Amazons, on account
of a female nation of warriors, who are said to inhabit
its banks[95].
In the year 1541, Don Stephen de Gama, the Portuguese
governor of India, went with a squadron into the Red
Sea, by the strait of Mecca, or of Babelmandel, and
came to anchor off the island of Macua, or Massoua;
from whence he sailed along the coast of Abyssinia,
or Ethiopia, to the island of Suachem, in lat. 20
deg. N. and to the harbour of Cossier, in 27 deg..
From thence, he crossed over to the Arabian shore,
and the city of Toro, and sailed from that place to
Suez, at the farther end of the Red Sea, and returned
from thence to India, having extended the Portuguese
knowledge of that sea farther than had ever been done
before. On the way between Cossier and Toro,
Gama is said to have found an island of brimstone,
which had been dispeopled by Mahomet, wherein many
crabs are bred, which increase nature, on which account,
they are much sought after by the unchaste.