land was getting clear of undergrowth. As later buccaneers have
noted, the upper land of the isthmus is wooded with vast trees, whose
branches shut out the sun. Beneath these trees a man may walk with
pleasure, or indeed ride, for there is hardly any undergrowth. The
branches are so thick together that the lower ground receives no
sunlight, and, therefore, little grows there. The heat of the sun is
shut out, and "it is cooler travelling there ... in that hot region,
than it is in ... England in the summer time." As the men began to
ascend, the Maroons told them that not far away there grew a great tree
about midway between the oceans, "from which we might at once discern
the North Sea from whence we came, and the South Sea whither we were
going." On the 11th of February, after four days of slow but steady
climbing, they "came to the height of the desired hill, a very high
hill, lying East and West, like a ridge between the two seas." It was
ten o'clock in the forenoon, the hour at which the dinner halt was made.
Pedro, the Maroon chief, now took Drake's hand, and "prayed him to
follow him if he was desirous to see at once the two seas which he had
so longed for." Drake followed Pedro to the hilltop, to the "goodly and
great high Tree," of which the Maroons had spoken. He found that they
had hacked out steps upon the bole, "to ascend up near unto the top,"
where they had built a pleasant little hut of branches thatched from the
sun, "wherein ten or twelve men might easily sit." "South and north of
this Tree" the Maroons had felled certain trees "that the prospect might
be the clearer." At its base there was a number of strong houses "that
had been built long before," perhaps by an older people than the
Cimmeroons. The tree seems to have been a place of much resort among
that people, as it lay in their paths across the isthmus, and towards
the west.

Drake climbed the tree with Pedro to the little sunny bower at the top.
A fresh breeze which was blowing, had blown away the mists and the heat
haze, so that the whole isthmus lay exposed before him, in the golden
sunlight. There to the north, like a bright blue jewel, was "the
Atlantic Ocean whence now we came." There to the south, some thirty
miles away, was "that sea of which he had heard such golden reports."
He looked at the wonderful South Sea, and "besought Almighty God of His
goodness, to give him life and leave to sail once in an English ship, in
that sea." The praye