ng to the
unanimous testimony of those who inhabit its banks, the tide recedes
hardly a cubit from the shore. The inhabitants of Hispaniola and the
neighbouring islands confirm this fact.

When the coast was left dry, the Spaniards returned to their culches,
but were dumfounded to find all of them damaged and filled with sand.
Though dug out of tree trunks some were broken and split open, the
cables that had held them having been snapped. To repair them they
used moss, bark, some very tough marine plants and grasses. Looking
like shipwrecked men and almost dead with hunger (for the storm had
swept away almost all their stores), they set out to return. The
natives say that at all times of the year the incoming and the
outgoing tides fill the islands of the gulf with a frightful roaring
sound; but that this principally happens during the three months
indicated by Chiapes, and which correspond to October, November, and
December. It was just within the month of October and, according to
the cacique, it was under that and the two following moons that the
tempest prevailed.

After devoting some days to rest, Vasco Nunez crossed the territory
of another unimportant cacique and entered the country of a second,
called Tumaco, whose authority extended along the gulf coast. Tumaco,
following the example of his colleagues, took up arms; but his
resistance was equally vain. Conquered and put to flight, all of his
subjects who resisted were massacred. The others were spared, for the
Spaniards preferred to have peaceful and amicable relations with those
tribes.

Tumaco was wanted, and the envoys of Chiapes urged him to come back
without fear, but neither promises nor threats moved him. Having
inspired him with fears for his own life, extermination for his
family, and ruin for his town, if he held out, the cacique decided to
send his son to the Spaniards. After presenting this young man with
a robe and other similar gifts, Vasco sent him back, begging him to
inform his father of the resources and bravery of the strangers.

Tumaco was touched by the kindness shown to his son, and three days
later he appeared; he brought no present at first, but in obedience to
his orders, his attendants gave six hundred and fourteen pesos of gold
and two hundred and forty selected pearls and a quantity of smaller
ones. These pearls excited the unending admiration of the Spaniards,
though they are not of the finest quality, because the natives cook