For the better understanding of the second case, we must assume that one of the ways in which God has been best served in that mission is in persuading the Indians who have two or three wives to abandon them and to content themselves with one. The means used to accomplish this end was to condemn polygamy, to the assembled natives, as a state unworthy of the nobility of man, saying that they ought not to make themselves beasts and brutes by having so many wives. Our Lord granted a fortunate outcome to this effort, for the men were thus persuaded to give up their wives. The Indians were so impressed by this teaching that once when a swarm of locusts lit in the grain-fields of a certain village, they accounted for it by saying that God had sent this pest on the people of that village, because the men were wont to keep two wives. There was an Indian chief of high rank in the island of Leite, by the name of Umbas, one of the most prominent among the chiefs on account of his riches and the good government which he maintained in the villages under his rule, and the thoroughness with which he fulfilled all his responsibilities; he was esteemed by not only the Indians but the Spaniards. All eyes were turned to him, and consequently, had he but become a Christian, large numbers of people would have followed his example, for he was regarded by the rest, even in distant parts, as a pattern to follow. This Indian had two wives, and being frequently urged, with many entreaties and arguments, to abandon one of them, so great was his love for his sons that he could not make up his mind to divorce one of the women, preferring not to be separated from their children. He was urged in the church, before all the people of the village, to divorce one of his wives; but he only answered that he had already been told this. Many of our fathers, as well as his encomendero, therefore besought him with great earnestness to be baptized, but all in vain. But finally, seeing that all the rest (and especially one of his sons, also much esteemed and beloved) were abandoning their wives, he said that he would do the same after he had harvested his rice, for which the time had arrived--alleging as a reason that since he and they had toiled together in the sowing, they should together enjoy the harvest; and when that had been done, he would remain with but one wife. But the Lord, who already had just cause against him, by His lofty judgments prevented him from carrying out this intention; for, very soon afterward, when he suspected no misfortune, he was stabbed by an Indian whom he tried to seize. No second blow was needed, for he fell to the ground dead, thus ending his disobedience and obduracy. Of the fervor of the Christians of Ogmuc. Chapter XXXXV.