Caso, an intimate friend of him who at that time was president of the Indias. He said to them, "Where are you going? There is no fleet, for the president of the Indias has told me so." In spite of all this, the religious were all moved by a higher impulse; and although it was true that, on account of the plague, it had been ordered that there should be no fleet, one was afterward permitted to sail. The religious reached Sevilla after much hardship; because in many places they were unwilling to admit them to the towns, or to private houses, or even to our own convents, so great was the fear of the plague. They were even unwilling to be satisfied with the evidence that the religious brought with them that they were healthy. When they reached Sevilla they saw the plague-stricken taken almost dead to the hospitals and even this did not frighten them. They were in the Guerta del Corco [i.e., "garden of the deer"]; and there one of them was taken with the plague, and was carried suddenly off in two more days. Even then, not one of them even thought of giving up the voyage, although they saw the plague and death within the house where they were dwelling. The Lord favored them so that no one else took the plague. When they saw the danger more clearly, they gave greater thanks to Him who had not only rescued them from it, but had taken from them the fear which they naturally had of it--especially as they had almost all come on foot, asking alms, all the way from the innermost parts of Castilla la Vieja; and though they were persons who were not inured to that sort of hardship, and therefore were the more likely to fall sick, especially in a season of plague. [The religious who died was Fray Juan de Solis, a son of the licentiate Jofre de Solis. He was a man of jovial disposition and fond of company, but corrected his weakness when he proposed to go to the Philippinas. His relatives and several of his fellow-friars tried to dissuade him, but he insisted upon going. In Sevilla, as there was no lay religious with them, he undertook the duty of cooking for the rest of the company; and it may be that the great heat and consequent exhaustion were the reasons for his being taken by the plague.] When the religious reached Sevilla, they were received with much joy and charity by father Fray Diego de Soria. Everything they had--their books, their clothes, their money, and everything, down to their very handkerchiefs--all became common property; if they had any debts unpaid, the community took charge of these, and the religious were left without any care, and even without the use of anything for themselves, except the habit which they wore. From that day they even said all their masses for the community, which provided for every one what he had need of, while no one possessed anything (not even by permission) except books. Everything else was in common for all of them; and hence they did not have to think of carrying anything with them for the voyage,