United States or Armenia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
After proceeding about thirty leagues, he came to the river Neyva, which, issuing from the mountains of Cibao, divides the southern side of the island. Crossing this stream, he dispatched two parties of ten men each along the sea-coast in search of brazil-wood. They found great quantities, and felled many trees, which they stored in the Indian cabins, until they could be taken away by sea.
The Caribs used arrows poisoned with the juice of the manchineel, or pointed with formidable shark's-teeth, their clubs of Brazil-wood were three feet long, and their lances of hardened wood were thrown with great adroitness and to a great distance.
Her companions were attired in classic costumes made of taffetas of various colors, shot with gold, and their ringlets were adorned with all kinds of glittering gems.... Other nymphs carried darts of Brazil-wood tipped with black and white tassels, and carried horns and trumpets suspended by ribbons of white and black.
Humboldt thinks that the wood called Brazil-wood was supposed to have come from it, as it was known before the South American Brazil was discovered. A manuscript history of Ireland, written about 1636, in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy, says that Hy-Brasail was discovered by a Captain Rich, who saw its harbor but could never reach it.
In 1503, Americus Vespucius discovered the Bay of All Saints, and took home a cargo of Brazil-wood, monkeys and parrots; but no permanent settlement was effected upon the shores of the new continent, and the rich treasures of this great country remained for some years longer buried and unknown to man, for the wild Indians who lived here knew not their value.
They generally bring a quantity of it as merchandise in plates, and it is sold at moderate rates. These vessels return to Japon at the season of the vendavals, during the months of June and July. They carry from Manila their purchases, which are composed of raw Chinese silk, gold, deerskin, and brazil-wood for their dyes.
Wares of China and Japan and the spices of the southern Moluccas were carried in Chinese or Malay junks to Malacca, and thence by Arab or Indian merchants to Paulicut or Calicut in southern India. To these ports came also ginger, brazil-wood, sandal-wood, and aloe, above all the precious stones of India and Persia, diamonds from Golconda, rubies, topaz, sapphires, and pearls.
They constructed, near the stern, in the space of a few hours, a cabin covered with palm-leaves, sufficiently spacious to contain a table and benches. These were made of ox-hides, strained tight, and nailed to frames of brazil-wood.
The ministers, reduced nearly to starvation, found themselves under a tyranny worse than that from which they had fled. At length he drove them from the fort, and forced them to bivouac on the mainland, at the risk of being butchered by Indians, until a vessel loading with Brazil-wood in the harbor should be ready to carry them back to France.
It was therefore agreed upon between the master and me to proceed farther along this coast, which we did accordingly for 260 leagues to a certain harbour, where we determined upon erecting a fort, in which we left twenty-four of our men who had been saved out of the admirals ship . We remained five months at this harbour, occupied in building the fort, and in loading our ships with Brazil-wood; our stay being protracted by the small number of our hands and the magnitude of our labour, so that we only made slow progress.
Word Of The Day