AMONG THE CARIBS. 75 



voyage, with a large fleet, fully equipped, September 

 25, 1493. On the second day of November he first 

 sighted land, and in exploring the shores of the island 

 Guadeloupe he found the people of whom he 

 was in search. " Here the Spaniards first saw the 

 tinana, or pine-apple, the flavor and fragrance of 

 which astonished and delighted them. But what 

 struck them with horror was the sight of human bones, 

 vestiges, as they supposed, of unnatural repasts, and 

 skulls apparently used as vases and other household 

 utensils. These dismal objects convinced them that 

 they were now in the abodes of the Cannibals, or 

 Caribs, whose predatory expeditions and ruthless char- 

 acter rendered them the terror of these seas. 



" In several hamlets they met with proofs of the 

 cannibal propensities of the natives. Human limbs 

 we r e suspended to the beams of the houses as if curing 

 for provisions; the head of a young man, recently 

 killed, was yet bleeding ; some parts of his body were 

 roasting before the fire, others boiling with the flesh 

 of geese and parrots." 



On the following day the boats landed and suc- 

 ceeded in taking and bringing off a boy and several 

 women. From them Columbus learned that the in- 

 habitants of this island were in league with two neigh- 

 boring islands, but made war upon all the rest. They 

 even went on predatory enterprises, in canoes made 

 from the hollowed trunks of trees, to the distance of 

 one hundred and fifty leagues. 



Their arms were bows and arrows, pointed with the 

 bones of fishes or shells of tortoise, and poisoned with 

 the juice of a certain herb. They made descents 

 upon the islands, ravaged the villages, carried off the 



