Father Fray Estebán de Sousa, having concluded the business which he had to transact in Manila, returned to Siám; and the king of that country sent him as his ambassador to the king of Portugal, accompanied by two Siamese nobles [mandarines] who carried a rich present. With them he went to Goa, where the viceroy of India sent him on his way to Lisboa with the best ship that he had. But when they arrived at the Cape of Good Hope the ship was dashed to pieces, at the place which is called "the false cape," and most of its people perished, including one of the Siamese nobles. Father Fray Estebán and another religious of Ours--a Portuguese named Fray José de Gracia, who had spent several years in Filipinas--with a very few others, saved their lives. They traveled by land more than forty leguas, through those desert shores of Africa, where they encountered only lions of fearful size; they saved themselves from the lions at night by surrounding themselves with fires, on account of the antipathy which those fierce beasts have for fire. They ate some herbs of the field, and, weakened by hunger and fatigue, they fell dead along the way; more than forty Portuguese perished, among them two religious of the Society of Jesus, for they were old men and unable to travel so far, or to suffer such privations. After many days, having endured incredible sufferings, they reached a city which the Dutch have at the Cape of Good Hope, called Santa Elena; they were received there with much kindness, and the Dutch treated them very well, and relieved their many necessities. Father Fray Estebán returned to Goa, and by order of his provincial went back to Siám, where in the Bandel [97] of the Portuguese he made a hermitage; and there, allowing his beard to grow, he devoted himself wholly to prayer and mortification, being an example for all the Europeans in that kingdom. He had his grave always open, in which he often placed himself, and there meditated on the end of the glories of this world. In the year 1698 he returned to Manila, in order to procure a bell for his hermitage and some other articles for its adornment, and to collect some alms. In the following year he went back to Siám, to continue that mode of life, [which he did] until the year 1709, when they found him dead in his hermitage, on his knees; they buried him in the grave which he had always kept open. The spirit of this religious was approved in Manila by men consummate in virtue--especially by fathers Fray Francisco de la Concepción and Fray José Orense, Franciscans, who were very spiritual men, and well qualified to decide on souls truly mystical. He practiced great mortification in his food, for he never ate flesh or fish, but only fruits (and those without any additional relish), roasted sweet potatoes and bananas, and a little boiled rice.