86* BYZANTE MARIA. May 1827. 



ligible, Spanish, and stated herself to be sister of Bysante, the 

 cacique of a tribe near the Santa Cruz River, who is an impor- 

 tant personage, on account of his size (which Maria described 

 to be immense), and his riches. In speaking of him, she said 

 he was very rich ; he had many mantles, and also many hides 

 (" muy rico, tiene muchas mantas y tambien muchos cueros''). 

 One of Maria's companions, a brother of Bysante, was the 

 tallest and largest man of this tribe ; and though he only 

 measured six feet in height, his body was large enough for a 

 much taller man. He was in great affliction : his daughter 

 had died only two days before our arrival ; but, notwithstand- 

 ing his sad story, which soon found him friends, it was not 

 long before he became quite intoxicated, and began to sing 

 and roar on the subject of his misfortunes, with a sound more 

 like the bellowing of a bull than the voice of a human being. 

 Upon applying to Maria, who was not quite so tipsy as her 

 brother, to prevent him from making such hideous noises, she 

 laughed and said, " Oh, never mind, he's drunk ; poor fellow, 

 his daughter is dead"" (Es boracho, povrecito, murio su hija) ; 

 and then, assuming a serious tone, she looked towards the sky, 

 and muttered in her own language a sort of prayer or invoca- 

 tion to their chief demon, or ruling spirit, whom Pigafetta, the 

 companion and historian of Magalhaens, called Setebos, which 

 Admiral Burney supposes to have been the original of one of 

 Shakspeare's names in the " Tempest" — 



" his art is of such power 



He would controul my dam's god Setebos."* 



Maria's dress was similar to that of other females of the 

 tribe ; but she wore ear-rings, made of medals stamped with a 

 figure of the Virgin Mary, which, with the brass-pin that 

 secured her mantle across her breast, were given to her by one 

 Lewis, who had passed by in an American sealing-vessel, and 

 who, we understood from her, had made them " Christians.'"* 

 The Jesuit Falkner, who lived among them for many years, 

 has written a long and, apparently, a very authentic account 



* Burney, i. 35 and 37. 



