On this "Island of Misfortune" Cabeza de Vaca's party was soon joined by that of one of the other boats, including Dorantes, so that altogether the island harbored about eighty Spaniards. Four men later attempted to reach Pánuco, but all perished but one. During the following winter disease raged among the little colony, reducing it to fifteen. Then the Spaniards became separated, Dorantes and his slave Estévan, now both the slaves of the Indians, were taken to the mainland, whither Cabeza de Vaca, weary of root-digging on the island shore, also escaped, becoming a trader among the Indians, journeying far inland and along the coast from tribe to tribe, for forty or fifty leagues. Every year during the five years that he plied his trade as a dealer in shells, sea-beads, medicine-beans, skins, ochre, and the like, he returned to Malhado, where Lope de Oviedo, and Alvarez, a sick companion, still remained. Finally the latter died, and Cabeza de Vaca and Oviedo again sought the main in the hope of reaching Christian people. Journeying southward along the coast, they crossed the Brazos and other rivers, and finally reached San Antonio Bay. Here Oviedo, owing to ill-treatment by the Indians, deserted Cabeza de Vaca, who shortly after also stole away from the savages and joined Dorantes, Castillo Maldonado, and the Moor (the sole survivors of the party of twelve who had left Malhado years before), whose Indian masters had come down the river, evidently the San Antonio, to gather walnuts. Once more together, the Christians planned to escape six months hence, when all the Indians from the surrounding country gathered on the southern Texas plains to eat prickly pears. But again were they doomed to disappointment, for although the savages assembled in the tuna fields, a quarrel arose among them (there was "a woman in the case"), which caused the Spaniards to be separated for another year. Their escape was finally accomplished in the manner they had planned; but their departure for the Christian land was not at once effected, by reason of the inhospitable character of the country, which compelled them to sojourn among other Indians until the beginning of another prickly-pear season. While among the Avavares, with whom the Spaniards lived for eight months, they resumed the treatment of the sick, a practice that had first been forced on them, by the natives of Malhado Island, under threat of starvation. With such success did the Spaniards, and especially Cabeza de Vaca, meet, that their reputation as healers was sounded far and wide among the tribes, thousands of the natives following them from place to place and showering gifts upon them.