Anchors were weighed at daybreak on November 10th.  About noon of the next day the fleet reached an island which Juan de la Cosa laid down on his map with the name Santa Maria de Monserrat.  From the Indian women on board it was understood that this island had been depopulated by the Caribs and was then uninhabited.  On the same day in the afternoon they made another island which, according to Navarrete, was named by the Admiral Santa Maria de la Redonda (the round one), and seeing that there were many shallows in the neighborhood, and that it would be dangerous to continue the voyage during the night, the fleet came to anchor.

On the following morning (the 13th) another island was discovered (la Antigua); thence the fleet proceeded in a northwesterly direction to San Martin, without landing at any place, because, as Chanca observes, “the Admiral was anxious to arrive at ‘la Espanola.’”

After weighing anchor at San Martin on the morning of Thursday the 14th, the fleet experienced rough weather and was driven southward, anchoring the same day off the island Aye-Aye (Santa Cruz).

Fernandez, the Admiral’s son, in his description of his father’s second voyage, says that a small craft (a sloop) with twenty-five men was sent ashore to take some of the people, that Columbus might obtain information from them regarding his whereabouts.  While they carried out this order a canoe with four men, two women, and a boy approached the ships, and, struck with astonishment at what they saw, they never moved from one spot till the sloop returned with four kidnaped women and three children.

When the natives in the canoe saw the sloop bearing down upon them, and that they had no chance of escape, they showed fight.  Two Spaniards were wounded—­an arrow shot by one of the amazons went clear through a buckler—­then the canoe was overturned, and finding a footing in a shallow place, they continued the fight till they were all taken, one of them being mortally wounded by the thrust of a lance.

To regain the latitude in which he was sailing when the storm began to drive his ships southwestward to Aye-Aye, the Admiral, after a delay of only a few hours, steered north, until, toward nightfall, he reached a numerous group of small islands.  Most of them appeared bare and devoid of vegetation.  The next morning (November 15th) a small caravel was sent among the group to explore, the other ships standing out to sea for fear of shallows, but nothing of interest was found except a few Indian fishermen.  All the islands were uninhabited, and they were baptized “the eleven thousand Virgins.”  The largest one, according to Navarrete, was named Santa Ursula—­“la Virgin Gorda” (the fat Virgin) according to Angleria.