And thus they feasted and were satisfied.
Like an enchanted Eden seemed the land,
For birds on dazzling many-colored wings
Made the trees blossom--parrots red, green, blue,
Humming-birds like live jewels in the air,
Strange ducks with spoon-shaped bills,--and overhead
Like some fantastic frieze of living gold,
The little yellow monkeys leaped and swung
Chattering of Setebos in their unknown tongue.
The old men lived beyond their sevenscore years--
Or so the people said. They made canots
Of logs that they carved out with heated stones.
They slept in hamacs, woven cotton swings.
Their chiefs were called cacichas--you may find
All this put down in the thrice precious book
Written by Pigafetta of Vicenza
For a queen's pleasure when the voyage was done.
Then from that shore they sailed, and southward bent,
And as the long days lengthened, till the nights
Were but star-circled midnight intervals,
They wondered of what race and by what seas
They should find kings at the antipodes.
Where a great river flowed into the sea
They found sea-lions,--on another isle
Strange geese, milk-white and sable, with no wings,
Who swam instead of flying, and they called
The place the Isle of Penguins.
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