While we were thus looking about us we observed fifteen Indians approaching from the side of the morass, who, on coming up, touched the ground with their hands and kissed it. These were the chiefs of the township, and they begged of Cortes, in a half-crying tone of voice, not to set fire to their buildings. They had, they said, but recently settled in this spot, and had been compelled to fortify themselves thus strongly from fear of their enemies; whom, if I do not mistake, they termed Lacandones. These people had burnt down their two former towns which lay on the plain, had plundered them of all they possessed, and had killed numbers of their countrymen. On our further march we should pass over the ashes and ruins of their former habitations. These chiefs then related the cause of their enmity, and described their mode of warfare. Upon this Cortes inquired of them what had induced them to dress so large a quantity of turkeys and other fowls? To which the chiefs replied, that they again expected an attack from the Lacandones, who would be sure, if victorious, to carry off all their property and fowls; they had therefore determined to eat up all their provisions before the enemy arrived; but if they themselves proved victorious, they would march into the enemy's towns, plunder them in their turn, and so make up for their recent losses. Cortes told them he was extremely sorry to hear of their wars, but that it was not in his power to render them any assistance at present, as he was obliged to continue his march. This tribe, to whom the two other large townships also belonged, through which we passed on the following day, were termed the Mazotecs, a name which, in their language, denotes the land or the nation of the wild deer, and this was indeed a most appropriate appellation, as the reader will presently see. From this place we took two guides with us, who led us over the ruins of the two townships above mentioned, and gave us some further account of the Spaniards whom we should find at a considerable distance further on. CHAPTER CLXXVIII. _We continue our march, and what further happened to us._ After we had quitted this fortified township, we came into an extensive open plain, on which, as far as the eye could reach, there was not a tree to be seen, and the heat was more excessive than we had ever experienced before. This plain abounded with wild deer, which were so little shy that we could easily catch them with our horses, and in a very short time we killed upwards of twenty. On questioning our guides how it came that these animals were neither afraid of our horses nor anything else, and so easily to be caught, they answered that the Mazotecs revered them as beings of a superior nature, because they appeared such to them from their external form, and their idols had strictly commanded the people not to kill or in any way to scare them.