among themselves, and each one of them took one of us by the hand and led us to their dwellings. With these people we suffered greater hunger than with the others, because the only thing we ate all day was two handfuls of that fruit. It was so green and had so much milky juice that it burned our mouths. There was little water and it made anyone who ate it very thirsty. Since we were so hungry we bought two dogs from them, trading for them some nets, a hide that I used as a cover and some other things.

I've already mentioned that we went naked all this time. Since we were not used to this, we shed our skins twice a year like serpents. The sun and the air caused very large sores on our chests and backs, which caused much pain because of the great loads we had to carry, the weight of which caused the ropes to cut our arms. The country is very rugged and overgrown. We often gathered firewood in the woods, and by the time we carried it out, we were scratched and bleeding in many places, since the thorns and thickets we brushed against cut any skin they touched. Many times the gathering of firewood cost me a great deal of blood and then I could not carry it or drag it out. When I was afflicted in this way, my only comfort and consolation was to think about the suffering of our redeemer Jesus Christ and the blood he shed for me, and to consider how much greater was the torment he suffered from the thorns than what I was suffering at that time.

I traded with these Indians, in bows and arrows and nets and made combs for them. We made mats, which they need very much. Even though they know how to make them, they do not want to be occupied in doing other things because they have to search for food instead. When they work on them, they suffer a great deal from hunger. At other times they would tell me to scrape and soften skins. I was never better off than the days they gave me skins to scrape, because I would scrape them very