An old Taíno man tells Columbus of islands where gold grows

… This man came to the ship after the king, and the Admiral gave him some things of the said trade goods, and there the Admiral learned that they called the king Cacique in their language. On this day little gold was traded, so he says; but the Admiral learned from an old man that there were many neighboring islands at 100 leagues and more, as far as he could understand, in which very much gold is born, and in the others, so far as to tell him that there was an island that was all gold, and in the others that there is so great a quantity that they gather it and sift it as with sieves, and melt it and make bars and a thousand works: they show the shape by signs. This old man pointed out to the Admiral the course and the place where it was: the Admiral resolved to go there, and said that if the said old man were not so principal a person of that king he would have detained him and taken him with him, or if he knew the language he would have begged him, and he believed, as the man stood well with him and with the Christians, that he would have gone with him gladly; …