owing to the vast size of their mouth which reaches almost to the belly, and the head is shaped like an olive.  Though some of the people considered these creatures as foreboding misfortune, and others thought them bad fish, yet we were all thankful for them on account of the want we were now in:  We had been eight months at sea, so that all the flesh and fish we had brought from Spain was consumed, and owing to the heat and moisture of the atmosphere, the biscuit was become so full of maggots that many of the people waited till night before they could eat the pottage made of it, that they might not see the maggots; but others were so used to eat them that they were not curious to throw them away, lest they might lose their supper.

Upon Saturday the 17th of December we put into a large bay or port three leagues to the eastwards of Pennon called Huiva by the Indians, where we remained three days.  We there saw the Indians dwelling upon the tops of trees, like birds, laying sticks across the boughs upon which they build a kind of huts.  We conceived this might have been for fear of the griffins which are in that country, or to be out of reach of their enemies; for all along that coast the little tribes at every league distant are great enemies to each other and perpetually at war.  We sailed from this port on the 20th with fair weather but not settled, for as soon as we were got put to sea the tempest rose again and drove us into another port, whence we departed the third day, the weather being somewhat mended, but like an enemy that lies in wait for a man, it rushed out again and drove us to Pennon, but when we hoped to get in there the wind came quite contrary and drove us again towards Veragua.  Being at an anchor in the river the weather became again very stormy, so that we had reason to be thankful for having got into that port, where we had been before on the 12th of the same month.  We continued here from the 26th of December to the 3d of January 1508; when, having repaired the ship Gallega and taken on board a good store of Indian wheat, water, and wood, we turned back to Veragua with bad weather and contrary winds, which changed crossly just as the admiral altered his course.  This continual changing of the wind gave us so much trouble between Veragua and Porto Bello that the admiral named this Costo de Contrasses, or the Coast of Thwartings.

Upon Thursday, being the feast of the Epiphany, 6th January, we cast anchor near a river called Yebra by the Indians, but which the admiral named Belem or Bethlem, because we came to it on the festival of the three kings.  He caused the mouth of that river and of another to the westwards to be sounded; in the latter, called Veragua by the Indians, the water was shoal, but in the river Belem there were four fathoms at high water.  The boats went up this river to the town where we had been informed the gold mines of Veragua were situated.  At first