to hunt, and so great was the heat that Master Edward Brookes fell
down dead, one of the sailors telling Nathaniel that the poor man's
fat was melted until he could no longer live; but Captain Smith,
who knows more concerning such matters than all this company rolled
into one, save I might except Master Hunt, declared that the fat
of a live person does not melt, however great the heat. It is the
sun shining too fiercely on one's head that brings about death,
and thus it was that Master Brookes died.



A VARIETY OF WILD GAME


Our gentlemen who had the heart to make prisoner of so honest, upright
a man as my master, did not cease their sport because of what had
befallen Master Brookes, but continued at the hunting until they
had brought down two wild boars and also an animal fashioned like
unto nothing I had ever seen before. It was something after the
manner of a serpent, but speckled on the stomach as is a toad, and
Captain Smith believed the true name of it to be Iguana, the like
of which he says that he has often seen in other countries and that
its flesh makes very good eating.

If any one save Captain Smith had said this, I should have found
it hard to believe him, and as it was I was glad my belief was
not put to the test. Two days afterward we were come to an island
which Master Hunt says is known to seamen as Monica, and there it
was that Nathaniel went on shore in one of the boats, coming back
at night to tell me a most wondrous story.