od. Solitary, solitary! He divided the most
determined of us--so many from each ship--into two bands and sent in
two directions. We were to search, if necessary, through ten leagues.
We went, but returned empty of news of clothed men. We found desolate
forest, and behind that a vast, matted, low growth, impenetrable and
extending far away. At last we determined that Felipe Garcia had seen
white cranes. Unless it were magic--

We sailed on and we sailed on. The _Cordera_, the _Santa Clara_ and
the _San Juan_ were in bad case, hurt in that storm between Jamaica and
Cuba, and wayworn since in those sandy seas, among those myriad islets.
Our seamen and our shipmasters now loudly wished return to Isabella.
He pushed us farther on and farther on, and still we did not come to
anything beyond those things we had already reached, nor did we come
either to any end of Cuba. And what was going on in Hispaniola--in
Isabella? We had sailed in April and now it was July.

It became evident to him at last that he must turn. The Viceroy and the
Admiral warred in him, had long warred and would war. Better for him had
he never insisted upon viceroyship! Then, single-minded, he might have
discovered to the end of his days.

We turned, the _Cordera_, the _Santa Clara_ and the _San Juan_, and
still he believed that the long, long coast of Cuba was the coast of the
Asia main. He saw it as a monster cape or prolongation, sprouting into
Ocean-Sea as sprouts Italy into Mediterranean. Back--back--the way
we had come, entering again that white sea, entangled again among a
thousand islets!

At last we came again to that Cape of the Cross to which we had escaped
in the Jamaica tempest. One thing he would yet do in this voyage and
that was to go roundabout homeward by Jamaica and find out further
things of that great and fair island. We left Cuba that still we thought
was the main. Santiago or Jamaica rose before us, dark blue mountains
out of the dark blue sea. For one month we coasted this island, for
always the weather beat us back when we would quit it, setting our sails
for Hispaniola.

We came to Hayti upon the southern side, and because of some
misreckoning failed of knowing that it was Hayti, until an Indian in a
canoe below us, called loudly "El Almirante!" And yet Isabella was the
thickness of the island from us, and the weather becoming foul, we beat
about for long days, struggling eastward and pushed back, and again
parting upon a st