concerning the renewal of AEson and the researches of the sibyl of
Erythraea.

[Note 3: The reference is to the fabulous waters of eternal
youth in quest of which Juan Ponce de Leon set forth. The country is
Florida.]

We have now discoursed sufficiently of the length and the breadth of
this continent, of its rugged mountains and watercourses, as well of
its different regions.

It seems to me I should not omit mention of the misfortunes that have
overtaken some of our compatriots. When I was a child, my whole
being quivered and I was stirred with pity in thinking of Virgil's
Alchimenides who, abandoned by Ulysses in the land of the Cyclops,
sustained life during the period between the departure of Ulysses
and the arrival of AEneas, upon berries and seeds. The Spaniards of
Nicuesa's colony of Veragua would certainly have esteemed berries and
seeds delicious eating. Is it necessary to quote as an extraordinary
fact that an ass's head was bought for a high price? Why do many such
things, similar to those endured during a siege, matter? When Nicuesa
decided to abandon this sterile and desolate country of Veragua, he
landed at Porto Bello and on the coast which has since been named Cape
Marmor, hoping to there find a more fertile soil. But such a terrible
famine overtook his companions that they did not shrink from eating
the carcasses of mangy dogs they had brought with them for hunting and
as watch-dogs. These dogs were of great use to them in fighting with
the Indians. They even ate the dead bodies of massacred Indians, for
in that country there are no fruit-trees nor birds as in Darien, which
explains why it is destitute of inhabitants. Some of them combined to
buy an emaciated, starving dog, paying its owner a number of golden
pesos or castellanos. They skinned the dog and ate him, throwing his
mangy hide and head into the neighbouring bushes. On the following day
a Spanish foot-soldier finding the skin, which was already swarming
with worms and half putrid, carried it away with him. He cleaned off
the worms and, after cooking the skin in, a pot, he ate it. A number
of his companions came with their bowls to share the soup made from
that skin, each offering a castellano of gold for a spoonful of soup.
A Castilian who caught two toads cooked them, and a man who was ill
bought them for food, paying two shirts of linen and spun gold which
were worth quite six castellanos. One day the dead body of an Indian
who had bee