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We careened here; but as there is no fresh water to be had at this place in the dry season, we had to return to the valley of Valderas, but finding the river brackish we sailed three leagues nearer Cape Corientes, and anchored beside a small round isle four leagues north of that cape, and half a mile from the shore, opposite to a rivulet on the continent, where we filled our water casks.
In this part of the voyage he saw several fertile islands, belonging to the king of Quiloa, who is a powerful prince; his dominions extending from Cape Corientes almost to Mombaza, along nearly 400 leagues of coast, including the two islands near Sofala, that city itself and several others to Mozambique, many more all the way to Mombaza, with a great number of islands; from all which he derives large revenues.
The 7th January we passed point Pontique in lat. 20° 38' N. ten leagues from Cape Corientes, being the N.W. point of this bay of the valley of Valderas. A league beyond this point to the W. there are two little isles called the Pontiques, and beyond these to the north the shore is rugged for eighteen leagues.
In all this long passage across the Pacific, nearly in the lat. of 13° N. we saw neither fish nor fowl except once, when by my reckoning we were 5975 miles west from Cape Corientes in Mexico, and then we saw a vast number of boobies, supposed to come from some rocks not far off, which are laid down in some hydrographical charts, but we saw them not.
The mouth of this branch runs into the sea in lat. 18° 25' S. In his passage from the Terra de Natal, or Christmas Land, so named from having been discovered on Christmas day, and named, in this account of De Gamas voyage, the Land of Good People, De Gama missed Cape Corientes, forming the S.W. point of the channel of Mozambique, or Inner Passage, as it is now called, and overshot Sofala, the southern extremity of Covilhams discoveries, at which he was probably directed to touch, as Covilhams chart might have been of some use to direct his farther progress to Aden, and thence to Calicut or Cananor, on the Malabar coast.
Cape Corientes, of which we came in sight on the 11th, in lat. 20° 28' N. is pretty high, being very steep and rocky towards the sea, but flat on the top.
Louis is indebted to the Mississippi and Missouri; the position which Corientes will soon owe to the Parana and the Paraguay. Nijni lies at the very centre of that water communication which joins the Caspian and the Black Sea to the White Sea and the Baltic, and which, were it always summer, might almost have enabled Russia to dispense with roads and railroads.
The sandy bay affords a safe landing, and has a fresh-water river, navigable by boats, but becomes brackish in the end of the dry season, which is in February, March, and April. We continued cruizing off Cape Corientes till the 1st January, 1686, when we sailed for the valley of Valderas, proposing to provide ourselves with some beef, of which we were in great need.
After making Cape Lucas, the S. point of California, she runs over to Cape Corientes, in lat. 20° 26' N. whence she proceeds along the coast to Selagua, where the passengers for Mexico are landed, and then continues along the coast to Acapulco, where she usually arrives about Christmas.
The chief of these ports are San Jago, Byame, Santa Maria, Espiritu Santo, Trinidad, Zagoa, Cabo de Corientes, and others, on the south side of the island: on the north side are, La Havanna, Puerto Mariano, Santa Cruz, Mata Ricos, and Barracoa. This island hath two chief cities, to which all the towns and villages thereof give obedience. The first is Santa Jago, or St.
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