e
as Caravaro (III. 118). Ferdinand Columbus's account is practically
identical.

[394-1] Veragua in this letter includes practically all of the present
republic of Panama. The western quarter of it was granted to Luis Colon,
the Admiral's grandson, in 1537, as a dukedom in partial compensation for
his renouncing his hereditary rights. Hence the title Dukes of Veragua
borne by the Admiral's descendants. The name still survives in geography
in that of the little island Escudo de Veragua, which lies off the
northern coast.

[394-2] The eve or vigil of St. Simon and St. Jude is October 27.
According to the narrative in the _Historie_, on October 7, they went
ashore at the channel of Cerabora (Carambaru). A few days later they went
on to Aburema. October 17 they left Aburema and went twelve leagues to
Guaigo, where they landed. Thence they went to Cateva (Catiba, Las Casas)
and cast anchor in a large river (the Chagres). Thence easterly to
Cobrava; thence to five towns, among which was Beragua (Veragua); the
next day to Cubiga. The distance from Cerabora to Cubiga was fifty
leagues. Without landing, the Admiral went on to Belporto (Puerto Bello),
which he so named. ("Puerto Bello, which was a matter of six leagues from
what we now call El Nombre de Dios." Las Casas, III. 121.) He arrived at
Puerto Bello November 2, and remained there seven days on account of the
rains and bad weather. (_Historie_, pp. 302-306.) Apparently Columbus put
this period of bad weather a few days too early in his recollection of
it.

[394-3] Ciguare. An outlying province of the Mayas lying on the Pacific
side of southern Costa Rica. Peter Martyr, _De Rebus Oceanicis_, p. 240,
says, "In this great tract (_i.e._, where the Admiral was) are two
districts, the near one called Taia, and the further one Maia."

[395-1] See p. 311, note 5.

[395-2] Probably _casas_, houses, should be the reading here. In the
corresponding passage of the contemporary Italian version the word is
"houses." This information, mixed as it is with Columbus's
misinterpretations of the Indian signs and distorted by his
preconceptions, was first made public in the Italian translation of this
letter in 1505 and then gave Europe its first intimations of the culture
of the Mayas.

[395-3] _I.e._, in being on either side of a peninsula, Tortosa and
Fontarabia being on opposite sides of the narrowest part of the Spanish
peninsula.

[395-4] See p. 300, note 1.

[396-1] The Sp