After a voyage of thirty-eight days the fleet reached the island of Dominica. The approach of Columbus to the field of his former explorations is thus described: “On Saturday night, the second of November, the admiral perceiving a great change in the sky and winds, and having observed the heavy rains, and believing that he was near land, ordered most of the sails to be furled, and commanded all to be upon the watch, and not without cause for that same night, at daybreak, land was descried seven leagues to the westward, a high mountainous island, which he called Dominica (Sunday), because it was discovered on Sunday morning. Shortly afterward he saw another island, northeast of Dominica, and then another, and another after that, more northward. For this blessing which God had been pleased to bestow on them, all the men assembled on deck and sang the _Salve Regina_ and other prayers and hymns very devoutly, giving thanks to God, because in twenty days after departing from Gomera, [one of the Canary Islands,] they had made that land, estimating the distance between them to be between seven hundred and fifty and eight hundred leagues. Finding no convenient harbor in which to anchor on the east side of Dominica, they stood for another island, which the admiral called Marigalante, which was the name of his ship.”[175] Thence he proceeded northward “to a large island which he called Santa Maria de Guadalupe, to honor her and the request of the friars of the house of that name, to whom he had made promise to call some island by the name of their monastery.... Going ashore in the boat to view a village which they had observed, they found none of the inhabitants in it, the people having fled to the woods, except some children to whose arms they tied some baubles to allure their fathers when they returned. In the houses they found geese like ours, a great number of parrots, with red, green, blue, and white feathers, as large as common cocks. They also found pumpkins, and a kind of fruit which looked like our green pine-apples, but much larger, and inside full of solid substance like a melon, and much sweeter both in taste and smell, that grew on long stalks like lilies or aloes, wild about the fields.... They also saw other kinds of fruit and herbs different from ours; beds of cotton nets (_hamacas_), bows and arrows, and other things....