56 ACCIDENTAL DISCOVERY Oi AME1ITCA. 



LIB. i. an( j furious, without any intermission. I my selfe going to 

 the Indies, parting from the Canaries, have in fifteene daies 

 discovered the first land peopled by the Spaniards. And 

 without doubt this voiage had been shorter, if the Mariners 

 had set vp all their sailes to the Northerne winds that blew. 

 It seemes therefore likely to me that, in times past, men 

 came to the Indies against their wills, driven by the furie 

 of the winds. In Peru, they make great mention of cer- 

 taine Giants, which have been in those parts, whose bones 

 are yet seene at Manta and Puerto Viejo, of a huge greatnes, 

 and by their proportion they should be thrice as big as the 

 Indians. 1 At this day they report that the Giants caine by 

 sea, to make warre with those of the Countrie, and that 

 they made goodly buildings, whereof at this day they shew 

 a well, built with stones of great price. They say moreover, 

 that these men committing abominable sinucs, especially 

 against nature, were consumed by fire from heaven. In 

 . like sort, the Indians of Yea and Arica report, that in old 

 time they were wont to saile farre to the Hands of the 

 West, and made their voiages in Scales skinnes blowne up. 2 

 So as there wants no witnesses to prove that they sailed in 

 the South sea before the Spaniards came thither. Thus we 

 may well couiecture that the new world began to be in 

 habited by men that have been cast vpon that coast by the 

 violence of the Northerne winds, as wee have seene in 

 our age. So it is, being a matter verie considerable, that 

 the workes of nature of greatest importance for the most 

 part have been found out accidentally, and not by the In 

 dustrie and diligence of man. The greatest part of phisicall 

 hearbes, of Stones, Plants, Mettalls, Perle, gold, Adamant, 

 Amber, Diamont, and the most part of such like things, 

 with their properties and vertues, have rather come to the 



1 Sec my note on the story of these giants at page 190 of my transla 

 tion of Cieza de Leon. 



* See my Introduction to the translation of Cit^t de Leon. p. xlv. 



