t sail for Jamaica on the 14th of July, 1502.
Passing that island, he met with light and varying winds, and contrary
currents, in the archipelago of reefs and keys which he had previously
named the Queen's Garden.

INSUBORDINATION OF CREWS.

For about nine weeks he made so little progress that his crews began to
clamour for the abandonment of the expedition. The ships were worm-eaten
and leaky. Provisions were running short. The seamen had seen their
commander thrust away from what might be called his own door; and the
sight of his powerlessness had strengthened their independence until it
amounted to insubordination. Fortunately, however, before the discontent
broke out into open mutiny, a breeze sprang up from the east, and the
admiral easily persuaded his unruly crews that it was better to prosecute
their voyage than to remain beating about the islets waiting to return
home.

They were soon gladdened by the sight of the pine-clad slopes of the
little island of Guanaja, lying about forty miles from Truxillo, on the
coast of Honduras. Here there appeared a canoe, much more like the ships
of the old world than any they had seen before, manned by twenty-five
Indians who had come from the continent on a trading voyage among the
islands. Their cargo consisted of cotton fabrics, iron-wood swords, flint
knives, copper axe-heads, and a fruit called by the natives cacao, to
which the Spaniards were now introduced for the first time, but the merits
of which, as a beverage, they were not slow to appreciate. The admiral
treated these people with much kindness, and won their confidence at once
by presenting them with some of the glittering toys which never failed to
dazzle a barbarian eye.

AN INDIAN PILOT.

One old Indian, whom Columbus selected as apparently the most intelligent
of the band, consented to accompany him as pilot, and indicated, by signs,
his knowledge of a land, not far distant, where there were ships, and
arms, and merchandize, and, in fact, all the marks of civilization which
were displayed to him by the Spaniards themselves, and with which he
professed to be perfectly familiar. Whether he intended to mislead
Columbus, or whether, like most of his race, he was merely proud of being
impassive, and of being able to repress all indication of astonishment at
startling novelties, it is certain that his demeanour and his signs were
interpreted by the admiral to indicate an acquaintance with a country,
ri