Page:First Voyage Round the World.djvu/145

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VOYAGE IN THE SOUTH PACIFIC
65

the sun, rain, and wind, and we left them for four or five days in the sea, and then we put them a little on the embers, and so ate them; also the sawdust of wood,[1] and rats which cost half-a-crown[2] each, moreover enough of them were not to be got. Besides the above-named evils, this misfortune which I will mention was the worst, it was that the upper and lower gums of most of our men grew so much[3] that they could not eat, and in this way so many suffered, that nineteen died, and the other giant, and an Indian from the county of Verzin. Besides those who died, twenty-five or thirty fell ill of diverse sicknesses, both in the arms and legs, and other places, in such manner that very few remained healthy. However, thanks be to the Lord, I had no sickness. During those three months and twenty days we went in an open sea,[4] while we ran fully four thousand leagues in the Pacific sea. This was well named Pacific, for during this same time we met with no storm, and saw no land except two small uninhabited islands, in which we found only birds and trees. We named them the Unfortunate Islands; they are two hundred leagues apart from one another, and there is no place to anchor, as there is no bottom. There we saw many sharks, which are a kind of large fish which they call Tiburoni. The first isle is in fifteen degrees of austral latitude,[5] and the other island is in nine degrees. With the said wind we ran each day fifty or sixty leagues,[6] or more; now with the wind astern, sometimes on a wind[7] or otherwise. And if our Lord and his Mother had

  1. "Segature de asse." "Segature di tavole." Milan.
  2. "Escu, mezzo-ducato." Milan edition.
  3. Effects of scurvy. Gama’s seamen suffered in the same way, after passing the Cape of Good Hope.
  4. "Nous allasmes en ung goulfe."
  5. "En tirant au vent haustral." For these islands, see the log book of Francisco Albo.
  6. The Milan edition has here: "According to the reckoning we made with the chain astern."
  7. "Aulcunesfoys a lorce ou autrement."