in hope and to lessen their fear
which they had of the long way, when that day the sailors reckoned the
distance 18 leagues, said he had counted only 15, having decided to
lessen the record so that the crew would not think they were as far from
Spain as in fact they were." _Historie del Signor Don Fernando Colombo_
(London ed., 1867), pp. 61-62.

[95-1] Las Casas in his _Historia_, I. 267, says "on that day at
nightfall the needles northwested that is to say the fleur de lis which
marks the north was not pointing directly at it but verged somewhat to
the left of north and in the morning northeasted that is to say the fleur
de lis pointed to right of the north until sunset."

The _Historie_ agrees with the text of the Journal that the needle
declined more to the west, instead of shifting to an eastern declination.

The author of the _Historie_ remarks: "This variation no one had ever
observed up to this time," p. 62. "Columbus had crossed the point of no
variation, which was then near the meridian of Flores, in the Azores, and
found the variation no longer easterly, but more than a point westerly.
His explanation that the pole-star, by means of which the change was
detected, was not itself stationary, is very plausible. For the pole-star
really does describe a circle round the pole of the earth, equal in
diameter to about six times that of the sun; but this is not equal to the
change observed in the direction of the needle." (Markham.)

[96-1] _Garjao._ This word is not in the Spanish dictionaries that I have
consulted. The translator has followed the French translators MM.
Chalumeau de Verneuil and de la Roquette who accepted the opinion of the
naturalist Cuvier that the _Garjao_ was the _hirondelle de mer_, the
_Sterna maxima_ or royal tern.

[96-2] _Rabo de junco_, literally, reedtail, is the tropic bird or
Phaethon. The name "boatswain-bird" is applied to some other kinds of
birds, besides the tropic bird. _Cf._ Alfred Newton, _Dictionary of
Birds_ (London, 1896). Ferdinand Columbus says: _rabo di giunco_, "a bird
so called because it has a long feather in its tail," p. 63.

[96-3] This remark is, of course, not true of the tropic bird or _rabo de
junco_, as was abundantly proved on this voyage.

[97-1] See p. 96, note 2.

[98-1] _Alcatraz._ The rendering "booby" follows Cuvier's note to the
French translation. The "booby" is the "booby gannet." The Spanish
dictionaries give pelican as the meaning of _Alcatr