Columbus_ The Four Voyages - Laurence Bergreen [143]
Several days later, Columbus heard of an Indian bearing a gold nugget the size of an apple. So there was gold, after all. Then men bedecked with gold, as well as ornamental necklaces and beads, arrived in canoes. The women wore strings of colored pearls on their arms. Entranced by the gold, Columbus opened negotiations for more of these precious objects to present to Ferdinand and Isabella. In high spirits, he happened upon an encampment of unusually charming and hospitable Indians, and with his men gladly partook of their red and white fermented beverages. Only the weather troubled him. “I am cold enough to need a cloak every morning, I say, even though I am so close to the equator.”
He sailed on in search of pearls, hailing Indians who might be helpful in his quest. As his dependable source, he relied on the Naturalis historia of Pliny, the Roman scientist, historian, and compiler, who led Columbus to believe that pearls generated from drops of dew forming within oysters when their shells were open. Observing abundant dew, and sizeable oysters, or creatures that he took to be oysters, Columbus expected to find pearls everywhere, even in the oysters he spotted growing on the branches of mangroves. However, he was mistaken: the mollusks were not oysters, and the pearls elusive. He continued to be undone by his hopes, his dreams, and his avarice.
Columbus risked leading his squadron to disaster as he entered alarmingly shallow water: only four fathoms deep, equivalent to twenty-four feet. The ships required at least three fathoms’ clearance for safe passage. Fortunately, the violent currents—three by his count—running past the Dragon’s Mouth carried them past the shoals to deeper waters.
The next day, August 13, he resumed his westward run along Paria’s northern coast, giving thanks to God for his deliverance and coming to grips with the new lands he had discovered within days of his arrival.
“Your Highnesses have won these vast lands which are an other world”—otro mundo, in his words—“in which Christendom will have so much enjoyment and our faith in time so great an increase.” The term “other world” marked a shift in his thinking. He had given up on the idea that he was exploring Marco Polo’s ancient India, in search of the Grand Khan, and instead had stumbled across something entirely new and troubling. “I have come to believe that this is a mighty continent that was hitherto unknown.” That was a true discovery, something utterly unexpected. That singular fact did not automatically mean that he now realized that Hispaniola and the other islands of the “Indies” lay far distant from India. It meant he was more perplexed than ever before. His voyages of confirmation had become voyages of doubt. He was equipped to confirm cherished myths, not explode them.
After leaving Venezuela’s Paria Peninsula, Columbus had seen the islands of La Asunción (now Tobago) and Concepción (now Grenada). On August 14, 1498, he discovered Margarita, located in the Caribbean Sea between latitudes 10°52’ N and 11°11’ N and longitudes 63°48’ Wand 64°23’ W. He named the splendid, mountainous island, about fifty miles long and twelve miles across, in honor of Margarita of Austria. The name also punned on the Spanish word for “pearl,” in recognition of the nacreous objects scattered about the region.
As his westward cruise lasted into mid-August, he heard reports of the gems from others on his ships, but as his son Ferdinand revealed, “The Admiral . . . could not give as full account of it as he wished because continual watching had made his eyes bloodshot, and therefore he had to write down what he was told by his sailors and pilots.”
Later that August, as Columbus gave orders to proceed north and west toward Santo Domingo, the crew spied a small caravel approaching them, the first ship they had seen since their departure from Spain. The approaching craft fired a warning shot,