Yet deluded by his hopes, he had still to learn wisdom. He knew that about eighty leagues distant from the city of St. Iago, was a place named Hierro, which runs out into an extensive plain covered with rich grass. Not a stone or even a pebble is to be seen in the whole vicinity. Here and there appears out of the turf a plank, or the trunk of a tree, having the appearance of iron, except that by its shining it bears some sort of resemblance to silver. The good man now thought he had reached the summit of his wishes, for he swore that silver mixed with iron lay concealed in this place, to the great amusement of all that heard him. He gave a little piece of this metal, which he had eagerly snatched up, to a smith to be melted in the city. The Spaniards who were present privily slipped some pieces of silver money into the furnace. When, therefore, he beheld the melted mass, consisting of silver and that kind of iron flowing from the furnace, he thought himself the happiest of mankind. But understanding that he had been cheated, and cajoled, he flew into a rage, and threatened the authors of the deceit with every thing that was dreadful. An European smith, after carefully trying that exotic metal with fire, informed me that it was a sort of iron, but so hard and so brittle, that no art would be sufficient to bend or reduce it to any kind of form, and consequently that it was of no use whatever. I will tell you another anecdote of the same kind. A certain merchant of Cordoba was involved in very great pecuniary difficulties, to extricate himself from which he forsook his old calling, and took up that of a physician, in which he was never properly instructed;—a metamorphosis by no means uncommon amongst the Europeans who reside in America. Deserters from the army and navy, if they exercise any handicraft trade, will never find a wife in Paraguay. To obviate this objection they apply themselves to merchandise. Whoever has his shop filled with tallow-candles, cheese, knives, needles, scissors, linen or woollen neck-handkerchiefs, and some flagons of brandy, is styled a merchant, immediately becomes noble, is esteemed superior to the vulgar, and fit to make any marriage connection, or hold any magistracy. Reduced to ruin, from merchants they suddenly become physicians. These ignorant quacks, who in Europe hardly know how to shave a beard, breathe a vein, cut the nails, apply cupping-glasses to the skin, administer an injection, or spread a plaster, give themselves out for Galens in Paraguay, and slay the rich with impunity at all hours of the day. Such an one was Bartholomew. Finding his purse no way filled by the diseases and deaths of others, and being universally dreaded, he at length changed his mind, forsook his gallipots, and turned his thoughts towards metals, the last anchor of his hopes. A vague report had been spread that in the mountains near Cordoba, signs of hidden gold had manifested themselves.