Renteria was in Jamaica, where he had gone to buy seed, stock and so on for their farm. While there he had stayed in a Franciscan convent during the season of Lent, and had given much time to prayer and meditation. For a long time he had been troubled about holding the Indians as slaves, but he had thought that if he and his partner were to give up the savages, they would only be worse off. Now, however, as he thought and prayed, a plan occurred to him: He would go to Spain and get permission to found schools, where the Indian children might be gathered in and taught, and thus some of them might be saved; for he saw clearly that if things kept on as they were, it would not be long before all the Indians on the islands would be destroyed. As soon as Renteria received Las Casas' letter he hurried home, wondering why his friend also wanted to go to Spain, and eager to tell him what he had in mind. Renteria was a very popular man, so when he landed, not only Las Casas was there to meet him but the governor and many other friends; therefore, it was night before the two partners had a chance to talk quietly together. Then each listened in astonishment to the plan of the other. Finally they decided that as the plan of Las Casas was the more important, and as he was a priest and of a noble family and could therefore more easily get a hearing at court, he should be the one to go. They sold everything that Renteria had brought from Jamaica,--even the farm itself being disposed of,--in order to raise money for the journey. Now, while the two friends had been occupied with these thoughts and plans, the Dominicans had been coming to the conclusion that they could do no good in Cuba, since they could not help the Indians and the Spaniards would not listen to them, and they decided to send one of their number with Las Casas to San Domingo,--from which port he was to sail for Spain,--for the purpose of asking for instructions from their superior, Pedro de Cordova. A young deacon went also, and all three soon started on their journey. The Dominican, however, was taken ill and died before the party reached San Domingo. Pedro de Cordova sympathized heartily with Las Casas, though warning him that he would meet with many difficulties; but the man who is afraid to undertake a thing because of the difficulties in the way is not much of a man, and Las Casas was only the more determined to keep on. The Dominicans were very poor and had never been able to finish their humble monastery building, so they sent Father Montesino, who had preached the famous sermon against slavery the year after their coming to Hispaniola, with Las Casas to Spain, that he might try to raise the money needed; and in 1515 they sailed. As soon as they arrived in Seville, Montesino introduced Las Casas to the good bishop of Seville, who did all he could to help him, giving him a letter to the King and to others of the court that might in all probability be interested.