Columbus shelters from a storm at Saona and watches a lunar eclipse

… its head, and the part of it that was outside, was so misshapen that it was little less in size than a cask or a butt, the tail like a tunny’s and very long, and with two very large wings at the sides. The Admiral knew, from the appearance of this fish and from other signs in the sky, that the weather wished to change, and so he labored to find some harbor in which to anchor and be safe if a storm should gather, and it pleased God that he managed to reach a small island that the Indians called Adamaney, which we now call la Saona, a name that I believe the Admiral himself or his brother the Adelantado gave it. This islet makes a strait of about a league, or little more, between it and this island of la Española, and it seems to me, if I have not forgotten, that this strait runs two leagues in length, because I have been in it, though many years ago; there he entered, already in a heavy storm, alone, and anchored, on the 15th of September; …