very monstrous in their form having hunches on their backs like camels, with long beards, and long manes like horses.  The Indians live by eating these oxen, and by drinking their blood, and clothe themselves in their skins.  Most of their food is raw, or at least slightly roasted, as they have no pots in which to boil their food.  They cut their meat with certain knives made of flint.  Their fruits are damsons, hazel-nuts, melons, grapes, pines, and mulberries.  They have dogs of such vast strength, that one of them will hold a bull, be he never so wild.  When the Indians remove from place to place, these dogs carry their wives, children, and household stuff on their backs; and are so strong as to carry fifty pounds at once[98].  I omit many other circumstances of this expedition, because the plan I have prescribed requires brevity[99].

In the year 1542, when Diego de Frietas was in the port of Dodra, in the kingdom of Siam, three Portuguese of his crew deserted, and went in a junk towards China.  The names of these men were, Antonio de Mota, Francis Zeimoro, and Antonio Pexoto; who directed their course for the city of Liampa, in lat. 30 deg.  N. or upwards[100].  Having encountered a great storm, they were driven to a distance from land distance from land, and came in sight of an island far to the east, in lat. 32 deg.  N. which they called Japan, and which seems to be the isle of Zipangri, mentioned by Marco Polo the Venetian, which in exceedingly rich in gold and silver, and other valuable commodities.

In the same year, 1542, Don Antonio de Mendoca, the viceroy of New Spain, sent certain sea captains and pilots to explore the Coast of Cape del Engannon, where a fleet, sent by Cortes, had been before.  They sailed as far as the latitude 40 deg.  N. when they came in sight of a range of mountains covered in snow, which they name Sierras Nevadas, or the snowy mountains in lat. 40 deg.N.  They here met with certain merchant ships, which carried on their stems the images of a kind of birds called Aleutarsi, and had their yards gilded, and their bows laid over with silver.  These seemed to belong to the islands of Japan or to China, as the people said that their country was within thirty days sail[101].  In the same year, the viceroy Mendoca sent a fleet of six ships, with 400 Spanish soldiers, and as many Mexicans, under the command of his brother-in-law, Rui Lopez de Villa Lobos, a person in high estimation, to the Mindanao islands.  They sailed on the eve of All Saints, from the harbour of Natividad, in lat. 20 deg.N. and shaping their course towards the west, they came in sight of the island of St Thomas, which had been before discovered by Hernando de Girijalva; and beyond that, in 17 deg.N, they got sight of another island, which they named La Nebulata or the Cloudy Island; and from thence, they came to another island, which they named Roca Partalia, or the cloven rock.  On the 3rd. of December, they discovered