On Sunday the 28th of October, the admiral drew near the coast of Cuba, which appeared much finer than any of the islands he had seen hitherto, there being hills, mountains, plains, and waters, with various sorts of trees; and he gave it the name of _Juanna_ or _Joanna_, in honour of the princess of Spain. He anchored in a great river, to which he gave the name of San Salvador, for a good omen. The wood appeared very thick, and composed of tall trees, bearing blossoms and fruit quite different from those of Spain, and frequented by numberless birds. Wanting some information, the admiral sent to two houses in sight, but the inhabitants fled away, taking their nets and fishing tackle, and accompanied by a dog that did not bark. He would not allow any thing to be touched, but went on to another great river, which he named _De la Luna_, or Moon river; and thence to another which he called _Mares_, or Sea river, the banks of which were thickly peopled, but the inhabitants all fled to the mountains, which were thickly clothed with many kinds of tall trees. The Indians he had brought with him from Guanahani, said that there were gold and pearls to be found here; which last he thought likely, as muscles were seen. These Indians added that the continent was only ten days sail from this island; but, from a notion he had imbibed from the writings of Paul, a physician of Florence, and though he was in the right, it was not the land he imagined[5]. Believing that the Indians would be afraid if many men were to land, he sent only two Spaniards on shore, along with one of the Guanahani Indians, and one belonging to Cuba who had come on board in a canoe. The Spaniards were Roderick de Xeres, a native of Ayamonte, and Lewis de Torres, who had been a Jew, and spoke Hebrew and Chaldee, and some Arabic. These people were furnished with toys to barter, and were restricted to six days, having proper instructions of what they were to say in the name of their Catholic majesties, and were directed to penetrate into the country, informing themselves of every thing worth notice, and not to do any injury to any of the natives. In the mean time, the admiral refitted the ships, and found all the wood they used for fuel produced a kind of gum like mastic, the leaf and fruit much resembling the lentisc, but the tree was much larger. In this river of Mares, the ships had room to swing, having seven or eight fathoms water at the mouth, and five within. There were two small hills on the west side of the river, and a pleasant flat cape running out to the W.N.W. This was afterwards the port of Barocoa, which the adelantado Velasquez called Assumption.