Since his return from the sea beyond the mountains, Balboa had devoted himself assiduously to the improvement of the colony: erecting huts for dwellings, extending the area of cultivated ground, and devising means for inspiriting the lonely inhabitants of this isolated post in the wilderness. The demands upon his time were constant and pressing, for he was looked up to as the savior of the colony, while the simple natives regarded him almost as a father, and came to him for advice on all occasions. Having heard nothing from Spain since the sailing of Arbolancha, the arrival of Pedrarias and his fleet took him by surprise; but it did not destroy his balance. If he had but known that, at that very time, his messenger was being received at court, and that the old king, charmed by the story of discovery, the pearls and the gold, already repented of the slight he had put upon him, Balboa might have assembled his veterans and prevented the landing of Pedrarias. They were only one-fourth the number of the new arrivals, but every man was a seasoned soldier, and there would have been little doubt as to the result of an encounter. But fate played Vasco Nuñez false again, for Arbolancha had passed Pedrarias on the ocean and arrived in Spain too late to change the decision of the king, who then regretted that he had not rewarded Balboa with the governorship of Darien. He was the governor, in fact, elected to office by the votes of his adoring comrades; but Pedrarias came with royal authority, and Balboa bowed to the decree of the king. There was doubt in the mind of Pedrarias as to the nature of his reception by Balboa; for he knew himself as a usurper, who had come out to reap the rewards of another, so he sent an envoy to announce his arrival and ascertain the sentiment ashore. This emissary, says the old chroniclers, expected to find the governor of the Golden Castile seated, of course, on a golden throne and lording it over a horde of captive slaves. What, then, was his astonishment to find the redoubtable Vasco Nuñez de Balboa, Conqueror of the Mountains, and Pacificator of the Indians, overseeing a group of natives who were engaged in thatching his humble hut with straw! He wore no robe of state, but merely a cotton shirt over one of linen, cotton _pantolones_, or wide trousers, and hempen sandals, called _alpargatas_, on his feet. He looked up from his work as the messenger approached, and, seeing that he was a stranger, saluted him with courtly dignity. Without manifesting emotion of any sort, he received the message, to which he replied: "Convey to Don Pedrarias de Avila my congratulations on his safe arrival, of which I am rejoiced to hear, and say also that I am ready, with my companions, to receive and to serve him who cometh in the name of the king."