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These fabricators of charts often commit vast mistakes from ignorance; thus these same islands and that part of the continent nearest them are twice inserted in their charts, as if they were different countries; and though cape Garcias a Dios, and that they call Cape . The occasion of this mistake was, that after the admiral had discovered these countries, one John Diaz de Solis, from whom the Rio de Plata was named Rio de Solis because he was there killed by the Indians, and one Vincent Yanez Pinzon, who commanded a ship in the first voyage when the admiral discovered the Indies, set out together on a voyage of discovery in the year 1508, designing to sail along that coast which the admiral discovered in his voyage from Veragua westwards; and following almost the same track which he had done, they put into the port of Cariari and passed by Cape Garcias a Dios as far as Cape Casinas, which they called Cape Honduras, and they named the before mentioned islands the Guanaias, giving the name of the biggest to them all.
The admiral sailed along the coast de las Orejas, or the Mosquito shore, eastwards to Cape Garcias a Dios, or Thanks be to GOD, so called on account of the difficulty of getting there, having laboured seventy days to get only sixty leagues to the eastwards of Cape Casinas or Honduras.
Columbus exchanged some commodities with these Indians; and inquiring at them where gold was to be found, they pointed towards the east, on which he altered his course in that direction. The first land he came to was Cape Casinas in the province of Honduras, where his brother landed and took formal possession.
There being nothing worthy of notice in the islands of Guanaia, he sailed thence to a point which he called Casinas, in order to find out the strait before mentioned.
It received this name on account of its abounding in the trees which produce a species of fruit known by the name casinas to the natives of Hispaniola; which fruit is rough like a spongy bone, and good to eat, especially when boiled.
The people nearest to Cape Casinas, or Honduras, wear those painted shirts or jackets before mentioned, and clouts before their nudities; and likewise use certain coats of mail made of cotton, strong enough to defend them against their native weapons, and even to ward off the stroke of some of ours.
Then sailing southwards for the continent, we came to certain islands, where we went on shore on the biggest only called Guanaia; whence those who make sea charts took occasion to call all those the islands of Guanaia, which are almost twelve leagues from that part of the continent now called the province of Honduras, but which the admiral then named Cape Casinas.
The land first discovered in this voyage was the island of Guanaia off Cape Casinas or Cape Honduras, therefore W.S.W. from Jamaica, not south. Guanaia seems to be the island named Bonaea in our maps, about ten leagues west from the isle of Ratan. A blank is left here in the edition of this voyage published by Churchill.
This is an obvious error, as New Spain is to the west of Cape Casinas, off which the admiral now was. If bounds for New Spain, the canoe must have come from the eastwards; if going with commodities from the westwards it was bound from New Spain.
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