Chapter VI: Section IV

_Continuation of the Voyage to its Conclusion_.

A little before the death of Magellan, news were received of the Moluccas, the great object of this voyage. Leaving Mathan, they sailed for the island of _Bohol_, where they burnt the Conception, one of their ships, transferring its men, ammunition, and provisions into the other two. Directing their course from thence to the S.W. they came to the island of _Paviloghon_, inhabited by negroes. From thence they came to a large island named _Chippit_, in lat. 8° N. about 50 leagues W. from Zabut, and about 170° of longitude from their first departure.[13] This island abounds in rice, ginger, goats, hogs, hens, &c. and the Spaniards were kindly received by the king, who, in token of peace, marked his body, face, and the tip of his tongue, with blood which he drew from his left arm; in which ceremony he was imitated by the Spaniards. Sailing about 40 leagues from thence between the W. and S.W. or W.S.W. they came to a very large island, named _Caghaian_, thinly inhabited. The inhabitants were Mahometans, exiles from Borneo, rich in gold, and using poisoned arrows; a common practice in most of these islands. Sailing W.N.W. from this island 25 leagues, they came to _Puloan_, a fruitful island in lat. 9° 20' N. and 179° 20' of longitude W. from their first departure.[14] This island yields much the same productions as Chippit, together with large figs, battatos, cocoa-nuts, and sugar-canes; and they make a kind of wine of rice, which is very intoxicating, yet better than palm-wine. The natives go entirely naked, use poisoned arrows, and are greatly addicted to cock-fighting.

[Footnote 13: Bohal is one of the Philippine islands, in lat. 10° N. and long. 123° 50' E. from Greenwich. Paviloghon and Chippit must accordingly refer to some islands of the same group farther west.--E.]

[Footnote 14: Pulcan, Pulowan, or Paragua, the westermost of the Philippines, an island of considerable extent, in lat. 10° N. and long. 119° E. from Greenwich. From the direction of the voyage, the great island of Chaghaian of the text, was probably that now called Magindano.--E.]

They came next to the great and rich island of Borneo, in lat. 5° 5' N. the chief city containing not less than 25,000 houses. The king was a Mahometan of great power, keeping a magnificent court; and was always attended by a numerous guard. He sent several presents to the Spanish captains, and made two elephants be led out with rich silk trappings, to bring the Spanish messengers and presents to his palace. He has ten secretaries of state, who write every thing concerning his affairs on the bark of trees. His household is managed by women, who are the daughters of his principal courtiers. This country affords camphor, which is the gum of a tree called _Capar_; as also cinnamon, ginger, myrabolans, oranges, lemons, sugar, cucumbers, melons, and other fruits, with abundance of beasts and birds, and all other products of the equinoctial climate. The natives continually chew betel and areka, and drink arrack.

Leaving Borneo, they went to the island of _Cimbubon_, in, lat. 8° 7' N.[15] where they remained forty days, caulking and repairing their ships, and taking in a supply of fresh water. In the woods of this isle they found a tree, the leaves of which, when they fall to the ground, move from place to place as if alive. They resemble the leaves of the mulberry, having certain fibres produced from their sides resembling legs, and suddenly spring away when touched. Pigafetta, the author of this relation, kept one of these leaf-animals in a dish for eight days.[16] This isle produces ostriches, wild hogs, and crocodiles. They caught here a fish having a head like a sow, with two horns, its body consisting of one entire bone, and having a substance on its back resembling a saddle.

[Footnote 15: Perhaps Balambangan, in 8° 20' N.]

[Footnote 16: Harris observes, that this account is quite incredible: Yet it is certainly true that an insect of this description exists, though not the leaf of a tree, as erroneously supposed by Pigafetta.--E.]

From hence they sailed to certain islands named _Salo Taghima_, which produce fine pearls, and from whence the king of Borneo once procured two large round pearls, nearly as big as eggs. They came next to a harbour in the island of _Sarangani_, reported to yield both pearls and gold. At this place they pressed two pilots to conduct them to the Moluccas; and passing the islands named _Ceana, Canida, Cabiaia, Camuca, Cabalu, Chiari, Lipan_, and _Nuza_, they came to a fair isle in lat 3° 20' N. named _Sangir_.[17] Passing five other islands, they at last espied a cluster of five islands, which they were informed by the pilots were the Moluccas. This was on the 6th November, 1521, twenty-seven months after their departure from Spain. Trying the depth of the sea in the neighbourhood of these islands, they found it no less than fifty-one fathoms; though the Portuguese report that this sea is too shallow for being navigated, and is besides rendered extremely dangerous by numerous rocks and shelves, and by continual darkness; doubtless to deter any other nation from attempting to go there.

[Footnote 17: Sangir is in lat. 8° 35' N. and long. 125° 25 E. from Greenwich. The other islands enumerated in the text do not occur in modern maps.--E.]

They came to anchor in the port of _Tiridore_ [Tidore] on the 8th November, this being one of the chief of the Molucca islands. Although a Mahometan, the king of this island was so fond of the Spaniards, that he invited them to come on shore as into their own country, and to use the houses as their own, calling them his brethren and children; even changing the name of his island from Tidore to Castile. These Molucca islands are five in number, _Ternate, Tidore, Mortir, Makian_, and _Batchian_. Ternate is the chief of these islands, and its king once ruled over them all; but at this time Mortir and Makian were commonwealths, but Batchian was a separate monarchy. The clove-tree is very tall, and as big about as the body of a man, having large boughs, with leaves resembling those of the bay-tree, and the bark is of an olive colour. The cloves grow in large clusters at the extremities of the boughs; being at first white, but growing red when they come to maturity, and grow black when dried. While green, the flavour of the wood, bark, and leaves, is almost as strong as that of the cloves. These are gathered twice each year, in June and December, and if not taken in time, become very hard. Every man has his own particular trees, on which they bestow very little care. They have also in this isle a peculiar sort of tree, the bark of which, being steeped in water, may be drawn out in small fibres as fine as silk; of which the women make themselves a sort of aprons, which are their only cloathing.

Near Tidore is the large island of _Gilolo_, which is divided between the Mahometans and idolaters. The two Mahometan kings have themselves contributed liberally to the population of the island; one of them having 600 children, and the other 650. The pagans are more moderate in their conduct in this respect than the Mahometans, and are even less superstitious; yet it is said that they worship, for the rest of the day, whatever they first see every morning. In this island there grows a peculiar sort of reed, as big as a man's leg, which is full of limpid wholesome water. On the 12th November, a public warehouse was opened by the Spaniards in the town of Tidore, for the sale of their merchandise, which were exchanged at the following rates. For ten yards of good red cloth, they had one bahar of cloves, containing four cantars or quintals and six pounds; the cantar being 100 pounds. For fifteen yards of inferior cloth, they had one bahar. Likewise a bahar for 35 drinking glasses, or for 17 _cathyls_ of quicksilver. The islanders also brought all sorts of provisions daily to the ships, together with excellent water from certain hot springs in the mountains where the cloves grow. They here received a singular present for the king of Spain, being two dead birds about the size of turtle-doves, with small legs and heads and long bills, having two or three long party-coloured, feathers at each side, instead of wings, all the rest of their plumage being of a uniform tawny colour. These birds never fly except when favoured by the wind. The Mahometans allege that these birds come from Paradise, and therefore call them the birds of God.

Besides cloves, the Molucca islands produce ginger, rice, sago, goats, sheep, poultry, popinjays, white and red figs, almonds, pomegranates, oranges and lemons, and a kind of honey which is produced by a species of fly less than ants. Likewise sugar-canes, cocoa-nuts, melons, gourds, and a species of fruit, called _camulical_, which is extremely cold. The isle of Tidore is in lat. 0° 45' N. and long. 127° 10' E.[18] and about 9° 30' W. from the Ladrones,[19] in a direction nearly S.W. Formerly the natives of these islands were all heathens, the Moors or Mahometans having only had footing there for about fifty years before the arrival of the Spaniards. Ternate is the most northerly of these islands, and Batchian is almost under the line, being the largest of them all.[20]

[Footnote 18: This is the true position, reckoning the longitude from Greenwich. In the original the longitude is said to be 170° W. from the first meridian of the voyagers, being Seville in Spain, which would give 174° E. from Greenwich; no great error, considering the imperfect way in which the longitude was then reckoned at sea.--E.]

[Footnote 19: This is a gross error, perhaps of the press, as the difference of longitude is 16° 30'.--E.]

[Footnote 20: The northern end of Batchian is in lat. 0° 28', and its southern extremity in 0° 40', both south.--E.]

Departing from Tidore, the Spaniards were attended by several kings in their canoes to the isle of _Mare_,[21] where this royal company took leave of them with much apparent regret. In this isle they left one of their ships which was leaky, giving orders to have it repaired, for its return to Spain. Being now reduced to forty-six Spaniards and thirteen Indians, they directed their course from Mare towards the S.W. passing the isles named _Chacotian, Lagoma, Sico, Gioghi, Caphi, Sulacho, Lumatola, Tenetum, Bura_ [Bouro?] _Arubon_ [perhaps Amboina?] _Budia, Celaruri, Benaia, Ambalao, Bandon_ [perhaps Banda?] _Zorobua, Zolot, Moceuamor, Galian_, and _Mullua_, besides many others possessed by Mahometans, heathens, and canibals. They stopped fifteen days at _Mallua_ to repair their ship, being in 8° N. lat. and 169° long. according to their reckoning. This island produces much pepper, both long and of the ordinary round kind. The tree on which it grows climbs like ivy, and its leaf resembles that of the mulberry. The natives are canibals; the men wearing their hair and beards; and their only weapons are bows and arrows.

[Footnote 21: Marhee Foul, a small isle between Tidore and Motir.--E.]

Leaving _Mallua_ [Moa?] on the 25th January, 1522, they arrived at _Tima_ [Timor?] five leagues to the S.S.W. This island is in lat. 10° S. and long. 125° E. where they found ginger, white sanders, various kinds of fruits, and plenty of gold and provisions of all kinds. The people of the Moluccas, Java, and _Lozen_ [Luzon, or the principal island of the Philippines], procure their sanders-wood from hence. The natives are idolaters, and have the _lues venerea_ among them, which is a common distemper in all the islands of this great archipelago.

Leaving Timor on the 11th February, they got into the great sea called _Lantchidol_, steering W.S.W. and leaving the coast of a long string of islands on the right hand, and taking care not to sail too near the shore, lest the Portuguese of Malacca should chance to discover them; wherefore they kept on the outside of Java and Sumatra. That they might pass the Cape of Good Hope the more securely, they continued their course W.S.W. till they got into the latitude of 42° S. though so sore pinched by hunger and sickness, that some were for putting in at Mosambique for refreshments; but the majority concluded that the Portuguese would prove bad physicians for their distempers, and determined therefore to continue the voyage homewards. In this course they lost twenty-one of their men, and were at length constrained to put in at the island of St Jago, one of the Cape Verds, to throw themselves on the mercy of the Portuguese. So, venturing ashore, they opened their miserable case to the Portuguese, who at first relieved their necessities; but the next time they went on shore, detained all who came as prisoners.

Those who still remained in the ship, now reduced to thirteen, having no mind to join their companions in captivity, made all the haste they could away, and being favoured by the winds, they arrived in the harbour of San Lucar, near Seville, on the 7th September, 1522. He who commanded this vessel, which had the good fortune to return from this remarkable voyage, was Juan Sebastian Cano, a native of Guetaria in Biscay, a person of much merit and resolution, who was nobly rewarded by the emperor Charles V. To perpetuate the memory of this first voyage round the world, the emperor gave him for his coat of arms the terrestrial globe, with this motto, _Prima me circumdedisti_. The newly-discovered straits at the southern extremity of South America, were at first named the _Straits of Vittori_, after the ship which returned; but they soon lost that name, to assume another which becomes them much better, in honour of their discoverer, and have ever since been denominated the _Straits of Magellan_.

This most celebrated voyage took up three years and twenty-seven days, having commenced on the 10th August, 1519, and concluded on the 7th September, 1522. By its success, the skill and penetration of the great Columbus, who, only twenty-seven years before, had first asserted the possibility of its performance, were fully established. One circumstance was discovered in this voyage, which, although reason have taught us to explain, could hardly have been expected _a priori_. On the return of the Spaniards to their own country, they found they had lost a day in their reckoning, owing to the course they had sailed; whereas had they gone by the east, and returned by the west, they would have gained a day in their course.

Another circumstance, which served to heighten the reputation of Magellan, who deserves the sole honour of this voyage, was the difficulty experienced by other able commanders, who endeavoured to fellow the course he had pointed out. The first who made the attempt were two Genoese ships in 1526, but unsuccessfully. In 1528, Cortes, the conqueror of Mexico, sent two ships with 400 men, to endeavour to find their way through the straits of Magellan to the Moluccas, but without effect. Sebastian Cabot tried the same thing, by order of Emanuel king of Portugal, but was unable to succeed.