Columbus continued to sail along the northern coast of Cuba and explored
about half that shore. He then returned to the east, governed by the
assurances of the natives that on an island named Babegue he would find
men who used hammers with which to beat gold into ingots. This gold,
as he understood them, was collected on the shore at night, while the
people lighted up the darkness with candles.

At the point where he turned back, he had hauled his ships up on the
shore to repair them. From this point, on the second of November, he
sent two officers inland, one of whom was a Jew, who knew Chaldee,
Hebrew and a little Arabic, in the hope that they should find some one
who could speak these languages. With them went one of the Guanahani
Indians, and one from the neighborhood.

They returned on the night between the fifth and sixth of November.
Twelve leagues off they had found a village of about fifty large
houses, made in the form of tents. This village had about a thousand
inhabitants, according to the explorers. They had received the
ambassadors with cordial kindness, believing that they had descended
from heaven.

They even took them in their arms and thus carried them to the finest
house of all. They gave them seats, and then sat round them on the
ground in a circle. They kissed their feet and hands, and touched them,
to make sure whether they were really men of flesh and bone.

It was on this expedition that the first observation was made of that
gift of America to the world, which has worked its way so deep and far
into general use. They met men and women who "carried live coals, so
as to draw into their mouths the smoke of burning herbs." This was the