the admiral thought they would have been burnt up alive together with their ships.  On the first day of the calm, being fair, nothing could withstand the heat, had not GOD relieved them with the rain and fog.  Having therefore got a little way to the northwards into seven degrees of latitude, he resolved not to hold any farther to the south, but to sail due west in that parallel, at least till he saw how the weather settled, because he had lost many casks in consequence of the hoops starting with the great heat, and the corn and all other provisions were scorched up.

About the middle of July, the admiral observed the latitude with great care, and found a wonderful difference between the appearances there and in the parallel of the Azores.  For at the Azores, when the constellation of the great bear was to the right or east, then the north star is lowest, and from that time began to rise; so that when the great bear was over head, the north star had risen two degrees and a half, and being passed, that began again to descend the five degrees it had ascended.  This he observed very carefully, several times when the weather was very fit for his purpose.  But at the place where he now was in the torrid zone these appearances were quite contrary; for when the great bear was at its greatest elevation, he found the north star six degrees high; and when in six hours the bear came to the west the north star was then eleven degrees high; when the bear was quite depresssed and could not be seen because of the obliquity of the pole, the north star was six degrees high, so that the difference was ten degrees, and the north star described a circle having a diameter of ten degrees; whereas, in other places, it made but five, and in a different position as to the great bear, for at the Azores the polar star was lowest when the bear was in the west, and here the north star was lowest when the bear was at its greatest elevation.  The admiral, not being complete master of this subject, thought this of very difficult comprehension; and observes that probably when at the equinoctial, the full orbit of the star is seen; whereas, the nearer one approaches the pole it seems the less, because the Heavens are more oblique.  As for the variation, I believe the star has the quality of all the four quarters, like the needle, which if touched to the east side points to the east, and so of the west, north, and south; wherefore, he that makes a compass covers the loadstone with a cloth, all but its north part, or that which has the power to make the needle point to the north.

On Tuesday the 31st of July, 1498, having sailed many days west, insomuch that the admiral believed the Caribbee islands were to the north, he resolved to discontinue that western course, and to make for Hispaniola, because he was greatly in want of water, and almost all his provisions had perished, and because he was afraid lest some mutiny or disorder might have broken out in the colony during his long absence, which in