given employment as ship's purser, for which he was well
suited. He expressed great contrition for what he had done, and I
honestly believe at the time he intended to serve us faithfully. But
treachery once practised is oft-times repeated, so I made up my mind to
keep a watchful eye on Pedro de Castro lest we again be caught
tripping.

We now proceeded northward, coasting with great care a succession of
small rocky islands that appeared to be uninhabited. As we proceeded,
the weather became rough and tempestuous, the sea running so high that
it sometimes threatened to engulf us. During the whole of our voyage we
had not met with such a mountainous sea.

At last we perceived a land to the north, trending to the north-east,
of which the coast seemed to be one continuous rock, remarkably level
at the top, and of a reddish colour, against which the sea broke with
such fury as to make a landing impossible, but Donna Isabel declared
this rock to be one of the islands of Armenio we had come in search of.
As there were no other islands to be seen, we concluded that during the
ages which had passed since the white-skinned people inhabited them,
the continuous beating of the waves had gradually demolished the
islands until nothing remained but the plateau of red rock to which we
had come, and over which the sea sometimes swept in a mass of foam.
But, having come to the island of her dreams, Donna Isabel would not
leave it until we had ascertained, beyond doubt, that a landing was
impracticable. It was not handsome, white-skinned natives whom we had
come in search of, she said, but solid gold, which neither tempests nor
seas can destroy. In order to satisfy her, we remained several days in
the vicinity of this mass of rocks, hoping that the weather would
moderate, so as to make possible a landing upon it, and at last we were
rewarded for our patience by a lull in the heavy breakers, so that the
pinnace, of which I took charge, was able to approach close to the
steep and jagged shore. Thereupon six of the Spaniards leaped
overboard, trusting to their skill as swimmers to make the land, which
they did, remaining on shore for upward of an hour. When they returned
they reported the rock to be a mass of auriferous quartz, in which was
embedded more gold than they had ever thought to see in one place, but
so tightly wedged was it between the crevices that they had been unable
to bring any of it away except a few small specimens which