America -- Discovery and exploration; Discoveries in geography
Then they found
A desolate harbor called San Juliano,
Where the fierce flame of mutiny broke forth,
Spaniard on Portuguese turned treacherously
Till in the red midwinter sunrise towered
The place of execution, and an end
Was made of the two traitors. Outward flashed the sail
And left the sea-birds there to tell the tale.
Beyond there lay a bleak and misty shore,
And in the fog a wild gigantic form
White-haired, a savage, called a greeting to them.
Friendly the huge men were, and took these men,
Bearded and strange, for kinfolk of their god,
Setebos, from his home beyond the moon,
And from their great shoes filled with straw for warmth
Magalhaens named them men of Patagonia.
Westward they steered, and buffeted by winds,
They found a narrow channel, where the fleet
Halted for council. One returned to Spain
Laden with falsehood and with mutiny.
On sailed the others valiantly, their hearts
Remembering their Admiral's haughty words
Flung at his craven captain, "I will see
This great voyage to the end, though we should eat
The leather from the yards!" And thus they reached
The end of that strait path of Destiny,
And saw beyond the shining Western Sea.
Northward the Admiral followed that long coast
Past Masafuera--then began his flight
Across the great uncharted shining sea.
And surely there was never stranger voyage.
The winds were gentle toward him, and no more
The dreadful laughter of the tempest shrilled,
Or down upon them pounced the hurricane.
Therefore Magalhaens, giving thanks to God,
Named it Pacific, and the lonely sea.
Still bore him westward where his heart would be.
Alone with all the stars of Christendom
He set his course,--if he had known his fate
Would he have stayed his hand? Before the end
Fate the old witch, who often loves to turn
A man's words on him, kept the ships becalmed
Even to thirst and famine; when instead
They fed on leather, gnawed wood, and ate mice
As did the Patagonian giants, when
They begged such vermin for a savage feast.
Then Fate, her jest outworn, blew them to shore
On the green islands called the Isles of Thieves,
And brought them to more islands--and still more,
A kingdom of bright lands in sunny seas.
Here did the Admiral land, and raise the Cross
Above that heathen realm,--and here went down
In battle for strange allies in strange lands.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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