THE FIRST GIANT.—THE ISLANDS OF GEESE AND GOSLINGS.—THE DANCING GIANTS
The skin was that of a guanaco, a kind of llama.
Our historian thus describes the guanaco:
"This beast has its head and ears of the size of a mule, and the neck and body of the fashion of a camel, the legs of a deer, and the tail of a horse, and it neighs like a horse. There are great numbers of these animals in the same place."
Patagonia is the land of these strange animals, which are still found there, and are hunted by Indians who lie upon the ground with drawn bows. The animal has great curiosity, and he draws near this living snare and is killed. When tame he is an interesting companion, but if angered he suddenly emits a great quantity of offensive liquid from his nose, like a half bucket of water, which he throws upon the offender. He is the South American camel.
This giant when he made himself ready to meet the adventurers had shoes of leather or skins, and carried a bow made of the "gut of a beast" and a bundle of cane arrows feathered, at the end of which were small white stones.
"The Captain caused food and drink to be given to him.
Then the crew began to show him some of the presents they had brought, among them a looking-glass."[82]
When the giant saw himself in the glass he was filled with wonder. It was as though his own ghost had appeared to him. There were men behind him curious to see how he would be affected. He leaped back with such force as to tumble them over. They were but pigmies to him.
The Captain now gave the giant two bells, a mirror, a comb, and beads, and sent him back to the shore.
One of the giants of the country saw him coming back, ran to the habitation of the giants, and summoned the giant people to the shore to meet him. They came, almost naked, leaping and singing, and pointing upward to Heaven. What a sight it must have been!
The women were laden with goods. The sailors beckoned them to the ships to trade.
Queerly enough, the women brought with them a baby or little guanaco, which they led by a string. Our historian learned that when these giants wished to capture the old guanacos or camels they fastened one of the little guanacos to a bush, and the old ones came to the bush to play with it, and so became an easy prey.
"Six days afterward, our people going to cut wood," writes the Knight, "saw another giant, who raised his hands toward Heaven
"When the Captain General came to know of it, he sent to fetch him with his ship's boat, and brought [83]him to one of the little islands in the port. This giant was of a better disposition than the other, and was a gracious and amiable person, he loved to dance and leap. When he leaped, he caused the earth to sink to a palm's depth at the place where his feet touched."
The good giant remained for a time with the adventurers. They gave him the name of John. They learned him to pronounce the name of Jesus.
"Say Pater Noster," said they.
"Pater Noster," said the giant.
"Say Ave Maria," said the men.
"Ave Maria," said the susceptible giant.
They made him presents when he went away, among them some of the many tinkling bells.
"We must capture some of these people," said the Captain, "and take them to Spain for wonders."
So the explorers began to study how to secure some interesting specimens of these tall people, to excite the wonder of the people of Spain
CAPTURING A GIANT.—MAGELLAN'S DECISION.
The attempts to capture wild giants greatly interested Pigafetta.
Our historian says that it was "done by gentle and cunning means, for otherwise they would have done a hurt to some of our men."
One day some sailors saw four giants hidden in some bushes, and they were unarmed. They brought these into the power of the Captain. Two of them were young, and such as would excite admiration anywhere for their noble development.
They gave these two lusty young Herculeses as many knives, mirrors, bells, and trinkets as they could hold in their hands, and while the delighted youths were thus abounding in riches, the Captain said:
"Now show them the iron fetters."
The two youths could but wonder at these when they were brought.
The Captain ordered that the fetters be presented to them.[85]
But their hands were already full. What could they do with them? Where could they put them?
The Captain signified to them that he would ornament their feet with the fetters. To this they consented.
So the fetters were put on the feet of each of them, like necklaces or rings, but when the young giants saw a blacksmith bring a hammer and rivet the fetters, they began to be distrustful and presently greatly agitated. They tried to walk, but they could not move.
Our historian thus describes their fury when they saw that they were helplessly bound:
"Nevertheless when they saw the trick which had been played on them they began to be enraged, and to foam like bulls, crying out to the devil to help them." We do not see why our Knight should have taken this view of the case; we would think that two human beings who had been so treacherously deceived, might have been regarded as appealing to the Deity of justice.
"The hands of the other two giants were bound," says the original narrative, "but it was with great difficulty; then the Captain sent them back on shore, with nine of his men to conduct them, and to bring the wife of one of those who had remained in irons, because he regretted her greatly." This last touch gives us a very favorable view of this young giant.
But on being conducted away, one of the two [86]giants who were to be liberated, untied his hands and escaped. As soon as he found that he was free, his feet were picked up nimbly indeed. He flew, as it were, his long strides leaving his late captors far behind him. He had no heart to trust Europeans again. He rushed to his native town, but he found only the women there, who must have been greatly alarmed; the men had gone to hunt.
He rushed after the hunters to tell them how his companions had been betrayed.
What became of the other giant whose hands were bound? He struggled, too, to break the cords, seeing which, one of the men struck him on the head. He became quiet when he saw that he was helpless, and led the men to the giant's town where the women and children were.
The men concluded to pass the night there, as it was near night and everything there looked harmless and inviting.
But during the night the other giant who had gone to meet the hunters returned with his companions. These saw the bruised head of the giant who had also been bound, and warned the women who began to run. We are told that the youngest "ran faster than the biggest" and that the men "ran faster than horses," at which we can not wonder. The fleeing giant shot one of the men from the ships, and he was buried there on shore. The [87]poor giant in irons who had lamented for his wife probably never saw the giantess again.
The methods of treating sickness in the town of the giants were curious. For an emetic one ran a stick down his throat. For a headache, one cut a gash on the forehead, not unlike the old method of bleeding. The philosophy of this latter treatment was interesting—blood did not remain with pain, and pain departed with blood—quite true; white people have advanced theories as conclusive.
"When one of them dies," says our Knight, "ten devils appear and dance around the dead man." One of the poor giants who was forced to remain on board said he had seen devils with horns, and hair that fell to their feet, who spouted fire. There seems to be the color of the European imagination in this statement
The giants lived on raw meat, thistles, and sweet root, and one of them drank a "bucket of water" at a time.
The expedition remained at St. Julian five months, and acquired much information about the country from the captive giants with whom they learned to talk by sign language.
They here set up a cross on a mountain and took possession of the country in the name of the King of Spain. They called the signal elevation where they planted the cross the Mount of Christ.
The primitive people of the shores of Brazil and [88]Patagonia delighted in exciting the wonder of their visitors. Many of these people who thought that the Europeans had come down from the sky, where they conceived all life must be wonderful indeed, liked to show them some of the feats that the people of the earth could do. The people who came down from the sky they reasoned had great wisdom in sailing the seas, but they were not giants. They could trail a lantern along the sea in the night air in some unaccountable way, but they did not know how to run with flying feet on the land or how to wing arrows with unerring aim into the sky and sea.
One day there came from a company of the primitive people, a champion in an art of which the Europeans could have never heard. They had seen these people run, leap, and vault with almost magic power, but they had never seen one who could make a tube of himself.
This new champion approached the men in the usual way, inviting attention. He carried in his hand an arrow which was a cubit and a half long.
He tilted it, opened his great mouth to receive it, dropped it into his throat, when, amid muscular contortions, it began to descend. The sailors watched him with amazement as it went down. It disappeared at last, having, as we are told, descended to the "bottom of his stomach." It seemed to cause him no pain.
THE MUTINY AT PORT JULIAN.—THE STRAITS.—1519.
Days of mutiny came in the cold waters.
The spirit of disloyalty that had found expression in the inspector broke out anew at Port St. Julian. It spread through the officers and crews of three of the ships. These caused to be published the resolution that they would sail no farther.
LUIS DE MENDOZA
"You are leading us to destruction," said the mutineers.
Luis de Mendoza, Captain of the Victoria, the treasurer of the expedition, was a leader of the mutiny. Another disturbing spirit was Gasper de Queixada, Captain of the Concepcion.
Magellan, of the kind heart, had, as we have seen, the resolution to meet emergencies. This expedition was his life. It must not be opposed, hindered, or thwarted. He lived in his purpose. He must stamp out the mutiny. He no more used gentle and courteous words. He thundered his will
One day Ambrosia Fernandez, his constable, came to him, and said:[92]
"Three crews are ready to mutiny, to force you to go back."
Magellan saw that he must make the leaders of these ships his prisoners, or that he would become theirs.
"Constable," he said, "pick out sixty trusty men and arm them well. Go with them on board the treasurer's ship, and arrest Mendoza and lay him dead on the deck."
The fleet was moored in line. It was flood tide, and Mendoza's ship rode astern of Magellan's, and the ship of Queixada, ahead.
Magellan prepared his own crew to face the consequences of a tragedy should one occur. He ordered his hawser to be attached to the cable, and called his crew to arms.
When the flood tide was at its height, Fernandez, the constable, prepared to execute his order.
He appeared before the ship of the mutinous Mendoza, and asked to be received on board.
"Back to your own ship," said the mutineer. "I command the Victoria."
"But we are few against many," said the constable, "and I have a message from the Admiral which I must deliver."
He was helped on board the Victoria.
His feet had no sooner touched the deck than he seized Mendoza.
"I arrest you in the name of the Emperor."[93]
The armed men that the constable had left on the boat rushed on board.
The crew of the Victoria, stood aghast. They saw the power of the Admiral's mind.
Magellan brought his ship alongside the Victoria.
He led his armed crew on board the Victoria, and halted before a terrible scene. Mendoza had been stabbed by the constable, and the crew of the Victoria plead for mercy, and promised to be loyal to the Admiral.
In this hour of tragedy and terror Magellan bore his ship around to Queixada's, and made the officers and crew of the Concepcion his prisoners. The leaders of the mutiny were executed. It was a necessity.
Magellan caused also the sentence he had imposed on the inspector and his accomplice to be carried out here.
Carthagena and Sanches were led from their prison to the shore.
As the sails were being lifted to depart, they were marooned—left with some provisions, among which were some bottles of wine, on the desert shore.
There were hearts that pitied them as the ships sailed away. There was one who plotted to rescue them. It was Gormez.
They left them some biscuits with the bottles of wine.[94]
"It is the last bread they will ever eat," said their companions.
"And the last wine that they will ever drink," said a loyal priest on board.
But there was one on board that shook his head.
f he could have his will the two would eat bread and drink wine again in the convents of beautiful Seville.
The execution of the disloyal Spaniards again awakened the jealousy of Gormez. He probably began to plan about this time to separate the Antonio from the expedition, and lead her back to Spain. His heart was with the inspector and friar far away on the desolate shore.
The ships sailed away, and the marooned priests saw them disappear.
"They were cast aside for opposing a madman," reasoned Gormez. "Magellan is no fit leader of an expedition. If I had full command of the Antonio, I would rescue the inspector, if I were to find him alive."
But he could not take the Antonio back while Mesquita, Magellan's loyal cousin, was in command. Had he breathed a breath of disloyalty in the presence of this Portuguese, he might have himself been deposed from his position and marooned, as had been the inspector and the friar.
A dark plot began to form in the pilot's mind. If he could incite the crew against Mesquita in some [95]hour of peril, he might cause him to be imprisoned on his own ship, and then he could succeed to the command, and take the Antonio back to Spain.
And he would also endeavor to rescue the inspector and the friend of the inspector who had been marooned. If he could rescue them and take them back with him to Spain, they would be powerful witnesses for him against Magellan.
Gormez now waited his opportunity. A jealous man seeks for a principle of life to ease his conscience and justify evil deeds. Gormez had two principles to sustain him in his disloyalty. The one was that he could lead a better expedition, and the other the merciful rescue of his two companions who had been marooned for the same opinions that he had from the first carried in his heart. So calling treachery, loyalty and sympathy, he awaited an hour favorable to his plan.
If he could return to Spain he would offer his services to Portugal or to Spain to lead an expedition to the Spice Islands that should be conducted in some more promising way than by the winter seas.
As the ships sailed on into the clouds and cold, the sailors were filled with apprehension. But the farol still shone at night like a star in the changing atmosphere. They had expected that the extremity of South America would point West, but this was not the case. Whither were they tending?
It was the middle of October. The water grew colder and the land became more desolate. Suddenly a bay appeared and the continent seemed to part. The sea poured its tides to the East amid towering mountains, and a strait appeared, which now bears the name of Magellan.
The soul of the Admiral thrilled. It was the fulfillment of his visions. He called the opening to the swift channel Cape Virgins, as he discovered it on the day on which the Church commemorated the martyrdom of the "eleven thousand virgins."
His lone lantern entered the straits. The way was toward the East.
Magellan sent the ship Antonio, which was commanded by his cousin Alvaro de Mesquita, to explore the bay, of which ship Gormez still held the position of pilot. The mutineer's hour had come.
The pilot entered the bay, but presently a powerful tide carried the ship back, and beyond the sight of the flag and the lantern of Magellan.
The jealous Portuguese had seen enough to know that great perils were before the fleet or that a glory like to that of Columbus was now likely to fall to the lot of Magellan. He determined to be revenged upon the Admiral for supplanting him in accepting the favors of the King.
He called the crew secretly about him.
"You are rushing on to ruin," he said. "I can take you back to Spain. Put Mesquita in irons, and [97]let us return. Mesquita advised Magellan to execute our comrades!"
The crew, overcome by the perils of the situation, obeyed the pilot.
Mesquita was placed in irons, and the pilot bore the Antonio away from the wintry seas, and turned her prow toward Spain.
But untrue as the sailors were to Magellan, he was true to them. He delayed the expedition for their return, and sent out the Victoria in search of them. The Victoria's crew planted signal standards, under which were letters.
Now perhaps for the first time Magellan was master of the expedition. He supposed at first that the Antonio had become lost in the terrible tides, but he still suspected treachery.
As the fleet entered the straits, the hills at night blazed with fires. The explorers thought these fires were volcanoes. They were signal fires kindled by the natives. Magellan gave the place the name of "Tierra del Fuego"—the "Land of Fire," a name that it still bears.
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