perhaps our gods not better than those of other nations? 31.31. The friars having nothing to reply, calmed them as best they could. They sought out the thirty Spaniards, telling them the harm they had done and beseeching them to depart, but they would not go; on the contrary they gave the Indians to understand, that it was the friars themselves who had made them come there,—which was the height of all malice. 32.32. At last the Indians determined to kill the friars; being warned by some Indian, the latter escaped one night. And when the friars had left, and the Indians perceived their innocence and virtue and the malice of the Spaniards, they sent messengers a distance of fifty leagues after them, praying them to return, and asking their pardon for the anxiety they had caused them. 33.33. The friars, being servants of God and zealous for those souls, gave them credence, and returned to the country where they were received like angels, the Indians rendering them a thousand services; and they stayed there four or five months longer. 34.34. As that country was so distant from New Spain, the Viceroy’s efforts to expel those Christians from it were fruitless, and they persisted in remaining there although he had them proclaimed traitors; and because they never ceased their outrages and habitual oppression of the Indians, it seemed to the monks that, sooner or later the natives would become disgusted with such perverse works, and that perhaps the evil consequences would fall on them, especially as the evil deeds of the Spaniards constantly disturbed the Indians and prevented them from preaching to them in tran‐ quillity. They therefore determined to abandon the kingdom. 35.35. Thus the country was left without the light and help of doctrine; and those souls were abandoned to the obscurity of ignorance and misery, in which they formerly were. The Indians were deprived, till better times should come, of assistance and the diffusion of the knowledge of God, which they had been already receiving with eagerness; it was just as though we were to deprive plants of water a few days after planting them: and this was brought about by the inexpiable fault and consummate malice of those Spaniards. The Province of Santa Maria