held in great estimation, using it both as food and money. There was a
beverage also extracted from maize or Indian corn, resembling beer. Their
provisions consisted of bread made of maize, and roots of various kinds,
similar to those of Hispaniola. From among these articles, Columbus
collected such as were important to send as specimens to Spain, giving the
natives European trinkets in exchange, with which they were highly
satisfied. They appeared to manifest neither astonishment nor alarm when
on board of the vessels, and surrounded by people who must have been so
strange and wonderful to them. The women wore mantles, with which they
wrapped themselves, like the female Moors of Granada, and the men had
cloths of cotton round their loins. Both sexes appeared more particular
about these coverings, and to have a quicker sense of personal modesty
than any Indians Columbus had yet discovered.

These circumstances, together with the superiority of their implements and
manufactures, were held by the admiral as indications that he was
approaching more civilized nations. He endeavored to gain particular
information from these Indians about the surrounding countries; but as
they spoke a different language from that of his interpreters, he could
understand them but imperfectly. They informed him that they had just
arrived from a country, rich, cultivated, and industrious, situated to the
west. They endeavored to impress him with an idea of the wealth and
magnificence of the regions, and the people in that quarter, and urged him
to steer in that direction. Well would it have been for Columbus had he
followed their advice. Within a day or two he would have arrived at
Yucatan; the discovery of Mexico and the other opulent countries of New
Spain would have necessarily followed; the Southern Ocean would have been
disclosed to him, and a succession of splendid discoveries would have shed
fresh glory on his declining age, instead of its sinking amidst gloom,
neglect, and disappointment.