YBARRA LETTER OF DR. DIEGO ALVAREZ CHANCA 443 
we touched at none of these because we were anxious to convey 
comfort and consolation to our people, who had been left on the 
first voyage in the island of Hispaniola. It did not please God, 
however, to grant us our desire, as will hereafter appear in this 
narrative. 
“The next day at the dinner hour we arrived at an island which 
seemed to be worth finding, for judging by the extent of cultiva- 
tion in it, it appeared very populous.’ We went thither and put 
into harbor.” 
“The difference between these Caribbees and the other Indians, 
with respect to dress, consists in wearing their hair very long, while 
the others have it clipt irregularly; also because they engrave on 
their heads innumerable cross-like marks and different devices, each 
according to his fancy; and they make these lasting marks with 
sharpened bamboo sticks. All of them, both the Caribbee and the 
other Indians, are beardless, so that it is an unusual thing to 
find one of these men with a beard. The Caribbees whom we have 
taken prisoners have their eyes and eyebrows stained circularly 
around, which I think they do for ostentation and also because it 
gives them a ferocious appearance.* 
having a broken and elevated surface, and its soil is fertile. Now it is 
called only Antigua, and is the most important of the Leeward group of 
the British West Indies; its population, including that of the island of Bar- 
buda, is at present 36,819 inhabitants. 
-1Called by Columbus, St. Martin. It is of triangular shape, each side being 
from 9 to 11 miles long. The climate is healthy, but there is little natural 
water to drink, the inhabitants depending almost entirely on rain water. 
Since 1648 it has been divided between France and Holland. The French 
portion, a dependency of Guadeloupe, has an area of 20 square miles and 
a population of 3,500. The Dutch portion is a dependency of Curacao, has an 
area of 18 square miles, and a populataion of 3,984 inhabitants. 
2Grand Bay must have been this harbor. 
’The dyeing material they used for that purpose was obtained from the 
red or yellowish-red seeds of a small tree, called by the Indians catabi, now 
known in the French West India Islands by the name of roucouyer, in 
Spanish bija (Bira orellana), and in English arnotta and annotte, whose 
leaves are heart-shaped. It is;now employed for coloring cheese and butter, 
and, in Germany, for coloring white wines. In Jamaica it is used as medi- 
cine, in the treatment of dysentery, and is considered to possess astringent 
and stomachic qualities. 
Those marks and stains about the face and head of the Caribbees re- 
mind me of the similar custom of the ancient Romans, who after their vic- 
torious return entered Rome riding in their chariots with the face and neck 
painted red, in imitation of fire, as stated by Christopher Landino in his 
commentaries to Dante’s “ Divine Comedy”; and as was also done by the 
ancient Britons, as recorded by Julius Caesar in his famous Commentaries. 
