with one wife, except their chief or king, to whom they give twenty. The women seem to me to work more than the men. I have not been able to learn whether they have any property of their own. It seems to me that what one possessed belonged to all, especially in the matter of eatables. I have not found in those islands any monsters, as many imagined; but, on the contrary, the whole race is well formed, nor are they black as in Guinea, but their hair is flowing, for they do not dwell in that part where the force of the sun's rays is too powerful. It is true that the sun has very great power there, for the country is distant only twenty-six degrees from the equinoctial line. In the islands where there are high mountains, the cold this winter was very great, but they endure it, not only from being habituated to it, but by eating meat with a variety of excessively hot spices. As to savages, I did not even hear of any, except at an island which lies the second in one's way coming to the Indies._[22] _It is inhabited by a race which is regarded throughout these islands as extremely ferocious, and eaters of human flesh. These possess many canoes, in which they visit all the Indian islands, and rob and plunder whatever they can. They are no worse formed than the rest, except that they are in the habit of wearing their hair long, like women, and use bows and arrows made of reeds, with a small stick at the end, for want of iron, which they do not possess. They are ferocious amongst these exceedingly timid people; but I think no more of them than of the rest. These are they which have intercourse with the women of Matenino,[23] the first island one comes to on the way from Spain to the Indies, and in which there are no men. These women employ themselves in no labor suitable to their sex, but use bows and arrows made of reeds like those above described, and arm and cover themselves with plates of copper, of which metal they have a great quantity._ [Illustration: THE RETURN OF COLUMBUS IN CHAINS TO SPAIN. Marble statuary by Senor V. Vallmitjana, formerly in the Ministry of the Colonies, Madrid; now in Havana, Cuba. (See page 31.)]