themselves also under the water: afterward that they were seen on the
surface going toward the sunset. For this we gave many thanks to God
our Lord. We had before despaired of ever hearing more of Christians.
Even yet we were left in great doubt and anxiety, thinking those
people were merely persons who had come by sea on discoveries.
However, as we had now such exact information, we made greater speed,
and, as we advanced on our way, the news of the Christians continually
grew. We told the natives that we were going in search of that people,
to order them not to kill nor make slaves of them, nor take them from
their lands, nor do other injustice. Of this the Indians were very
glad.

We passed through many territories and found them all vacant; their
inhabitants wandered fleeing among the mountains, without daring to
have houses or till the earth for fear of Christians. The sight was
one of infinite pain to us, a land very fertile and beautiful,
abounding in springs and streams, the hamlets deserted and burned, the
people thin and weak, all fleeing or in concealment. As they did not
plant, they appeased their keen hunger by eating roots and the bark of
trees. We bore a share in the famine along the whole way; for poorly
could these unfortunates provide for us, themselves being so reduced
they looked as tho they would willingly die. They brought shawls of
those they had concealed because of the Christians presenting them to
us; and they related how the Christians at other times had come
through the land, destroying and burning the towns, carrying away half
the men, and all the women and the boys, while those who had been able
to escape were wandering about fugitives. We found them so alarmed
they dared not remain anywhere. They would not nor could they till the
earth, but preferred to die rather than live in dread of such cruel
usage as they received. Altho these showed themselves greatly