be in safety close to the shore.  In this place we were detained nine days by bad weather.  At first the Indians came very familiarly to trade in such articles as they had to dispose of; but our seamen used to steal privately on shore and commit a thousand insolencies like covetous dissolute fellows, insomuch that they provoked the Indians to break the peace, and several skirmishes happened between them and our people.  The Indians at length took courage to advance to our ships which lay with their sides close to the shore, intending to do us some harm; but their designs turned out to their own detriment, although the admiral always endeavoured to gain them by patience and civility.  But perceiving their insolence to increase, he caused some cannon to be discharged, thinking to frighten them; this they answered with loud shouts, thrashing the trees with their clubs and staves, and showed by threatening signs that they did not fear the noise.  Therefore to abate their pride and to surprise them with respect for the Christians, the admiral ordered a shot to be fired at a company of them that stood upon a hillock near the shore; and the ball falling among them made them sensible that our thunder carried a bolt along with it, and in future they dared not to show themselves even behind the hills.

The people of this country were the handsomest we had yet seen among the Indians, being tall and thin, without large bellies, and with agreeable countenances.  The country was all plain, bearing little grass and few trees.  In the harbour there were crocodiles or alligators of a vast size, which go on shore to sleep, and they scatter a scent as if all the musk in the world were together:  They are fierce and ravenous, so that if they find a man asleep they drag him to the water and devour him, but they are fearful and cowardly when attacked.  These alligators are found in many other parts of the continent, and some affirm that they are the same with the crocodiles of the Nile.

Finding that the violent winds from the E. and N.E. did not cease, and that no trade could be had with those people, the admiral resolved to go back that he might make farther inquiry into the reports of the Indians concerning the mines of Veragua, and therefore returned on Monday the 5th of November to Porto Bello ten leagues westwards.  Continuing his course next day, he was encountered by a west wind which was quite contrary to his new design, though favourable for that which he had been attempting for three months past, but expecting that this wind would not last long because the weather was unsettled, he bore up against the wind for some days; but when the weather would seem a little favourable for going to Veragua, another wind would start up and drive us back again to Porto Bello, and when almost in hopes of getting into port we were quite beat off again.  Sometimes there were such incessant flashes of thunder and lightning that the men durst hardly open their eyes, the ships