store of fine pieces of cotton cloth, and cotton beds. In his house we
had good store of bread, fish, hens, and Indian drink, and so rested
that night; and in the morning, after we had traded with such of his
people as came down, we returned towards our galley, and brought with us
some quantity of bread, fish, and hens.

On both sides of this river we passed the most beautiful country that
ever mine eyes beheld; and whereas all that we had seen before was
nothing but woods, prickles, bushes, and thorns, here we beheld plains
of twenty miles in length, the grass short and green, and in divers
parts groves of trees by themselves, as if they had been by all the art
and labour in the world so made of purpose; and still as we rowed, the
deer came down feeding by the water's side as if they had been used to
a keeper's call. Upon this river there were great store of fowl, and
of many sorts; we saw in it divers sorts of strange fishes, and of
marvellous bigness; but for lagartos (alligators and caymans) it
exceeded, for there were thousands of those ugly serpents; and the
people call it, for the abundance of them, the River of Lagartos, in
their language. I had a negro, a very proper young fellow, who leaping
out of the galley to swim in the mouth of this river, was in all our
sights taken and devoured with one of those lagartos. In the meanwhile
our companies in the galley thought we had been all lost, for we
promised to return before night; and sent the Lion's Whelp's ship's boat
with Captain Whiddon to follow us up the river. But the next day, after
we had rowed up and down some fourscore miles, we returned, and went on
our way up the great river; and when we were even at the last cast for
want of victuals, Captain Gifford being before the galley and the rest
of the boats, seeking out some place to land upon the banks to make
fire, espied four canoas coming down the river; and with no small joy
caused his men to try the uttermost of their strengths, and after a