blacks of the mountain, [92] but at all events said Spaniards are to make no trouble for the Indians whom they find in the villages, but rather must treat them well. In order that this may have effect, it is necessary for the governor to send twenty or thirty horses to the said district, so that the Spaniards may get over the country, for the roads are intolerable, especially from the fort to Santa Rossa de Banguen. That is a distance of six leguas of very troublesome sandy ground without a drop of fresh water in the dry season. There is a distance of six leguas also from Santa Rossa de Banguen to Nuevo Toledo, where one cannot find a tree under which to rest. Accordingly, without the said horses, nothing can be done, for all those who should go to the said places run great risk from the sun, as happened when Adjutant Alvaro Martin Franco went to the said villages to hold the elections, when almost all the Spaniards who accompanied him fell sick. Said horses will be of great use to the soldiers in hunting, for this country has abundance of game. With the horses also they can overrun the land of Buquil, and terrorize intractable persons. Since said Spaniards often go to and fro between these villages and to Buquil, no Indian will go to the mountain, since no harm is done to them in the village; and those of the mountain considering their restlessness and that they are not safe and that the Spaniards destroy their fields will descend to sow and to live in the settlement. For today, if those of the mountain do not descend, it is because they fear that the Spaniards will punish them for not having descended before. In order to suppress all their bad customs, after having preached against them, proving them with natural arguments which are very easy and clear, with some examples which cause them horror, the most efficacious means which I find is for the father to investigate all their customs, and to understand them thoroughly, so that he may know them all; and then to make fun of the Indians because they do not know that that is bad. If this is not sufficient, it is efficacious for the father to make them afraid that he is going to retire because they refuse to learn good customs, and abandon their abuses and atrocities, so that in such an event the Spaniards may come upon them and kill them all; and by means of the fear which they have the father can do whatever he wishes with them.