They approach the peak at ten in the morning. There is only a small, bare hilltop yet to be scaled, and then the view must stretch out before their eyes.

At this moment Balboa commands his men to stop. None of them is to follow him, for he does not want to share this first sight of the new ocean with anyone else. After crossing one gigantic ocean in our world, the Atlantic, he alone will be, now and for ever, the first Spaniard, the first European, the first Christian to set eyes on the still-unknown other ocean, the Pacific. Slowly, with his heart thudding, deeply aware of the significance of the moment, he climbs on, a flag in his left hand, his sword in his right hand, a solitary silhouette in the vast orb. Slowly he scales the hilltop, without haste, for the real work has already been done. Only a few more steps, fewer now, still fewer, and once he has reached the peak a great view opens up before him. Beyond the mountains, wooded and green as the hills descend below him, lies an endless expanse of water with reflections as of metal in it: the sea, the new and unknown sea, hitherto only dreamt of and never seen, the legendary sea sought in vain by Columbus and all who came after him, the ocean whose waves lap against the shores of America, India and China. And Vasco Núñez de Balboa looks and looks and looks, blissfully proud as he drinks in the knowledge that his are the first European eyes in which the endless blue of that ocean is mirrored.

Vasco Núñez de Balboa gazes long and ecstatically into the distance. Only then does he call up his comrades to share his joy and pride. Restless and excited, gasping for breath and crying out aloud, they scramble, climb and run up the last hill, they stare in amazement and gaze with astonishment in their eyes. All of a sudden Father Anselm de Vara, who is with the party, strikes up the Te Deum laudamus, and at once all the noise and shouting dies down, all the harsh, rough voices of those soldiers, adventurers and bandits uniting in the devout hymn. The Indios watch in astonishment as, at a word from the priest, they cut down a tree to erect a cross, carving the initials of the King of Spain’s name in the wood. And when the cross rises, it is as if its two wooden arms were reaching out to both seas, the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans, and all the hidden distance beyond them.

In the midst of the awed silence, Núñez de Balboa steps forward and addresses his soldiers. They did right, he says, to thank God who of his grace has granted them such honour, and pray to him to continue helping them to conquer that sea and all these lands. If they will continue following him faithfully, he adds, they will go home from these new Indies the richest Spaniards ever known. He solemnly raises his flag to all four winds, to take possession on behalf of Spain of all the distant lands where those winds blow. Then he calls the clerk, Andrés de Valderrabáno, telling him to write out a certificate recording this solemn act for all time to come. Andrés de Valderrabáno unrolls a parchment that he has carried in a closed wooden container with an inkwell and a quill all the way through the jungle, and commands all the noblemen and knights and men-at-arms—los caballeros e hidalgos y hombres de bien—“who were present at the discovery of the southern sea, the Mar del Sur, by the noble and highly honoured Captain Vasco Núñez de Balboa, His Majesty’s Governor”, to confirm that “this Master Vasco Núñez de Balboa was the man who first set eyes on that sea and showed it to his followers”.

Then the sixty-seven men climbed down the hill, and since that day, the 25th of September 1513, mankind has known of the last and hitherto undiscovered ocean on earth.

GOLD AND PEARLS

At last they are certain of it. They have seen the sea. And now to go down to its coast, feel the flowing water, touch it, taste it, pick up flotsam and jetsam from the beach! It takes them two days to climb down, and so that in future he will know the quickest way from the mountain range to the sea, Núñez de Balboa divides his men into separate groups. The third of these groups, under Alonzo Martín, is the first to arrive on the beach, and even the simple soldiers of this group of adventurers are so full of the vanity of fame, so thirsty for immortality, that Alonzo Martín himself, a plain, straightforward man, instantly gets the clerk to write down in black and white that he was the first to plunge his foot and his hand in those still-unnamed waters. Only after he has exchanged his small ego for a mote of immortality does he let Balboa know that he has reached the sea and felt its water with his own hand. Balboa immediately prepares for another grand gesture. Next day, Michaelmas Day by the calendar, he appears with only twenty-two companions on the beach, armed and girded like St Michael himself, to take possession of the new sea in a solemn ceremony. He does not stride into the water at once, but waits haughtily like its lord and master, resting under a tree until the rising tide sends a wave washing up to him, licking around his feet like an obedient dog. Only then does he stand up, slinging his shield on his back so that it gleams like a mirror in the sun, take his sword in one hand and in the other the flag of Castile bearing the portrait of the Virgin Mary, and stride into the water. Not until he is deep in those vast, strange waters, the waves breaking round his waist, does Núñez de Balboa, once a rebel and desperado, now the faithful servant and triumphant general of his king, wave the flag on all sides, crying in a loud voice: “Long live those high and mighty monarchs Ferdinand and Joanna of Castile, León and Aragón, in whose names and in favour of the royal Crown of Castile I take true, physical and lasting possession of all these seas and lands, coasts and harbours and islands, and I swear that should any prince or any other captain, Christian or heathen or of any other faith or rank whatsoever, lay claim to these lands and seas I will defend them in the name of the kings of Castile, whose property they are, now and for all time, as long as the world shall last and until the Day of Judgement.”

All the Spaniards repeat this oath, and for a moment their words drown out the roaring of the waves. Each man moistens his lips with seawater, and once again the clerk Andrés de Valderrabáno takes note of this act of possession, closing his document with the words: “These twenty-two men, as well as the clerk Andrés de Valderrabáno, were the first Christians to set foot in the Mar del Sur, and they all tried the water with their hands, and moistened their mouths with it, to see whether it was salt water like the water of the other sea. And when they saw that it was so they gave thanks to God.”

The great deed is done.