Chapter Index

× Proem 1. Which Tells When the Fleet Sailed, and of the Officers and People Who Went with It 2. How the Governor Came to the Port of Xagua and Brought a Pilot with Him 3. How We Arrived in Florida 4. How We Entered the Land 5. How the Governor Left the Ships 6. How We Entered Apalachee 7. What the Land is Like 8. How We Left Aute 9. How We Left the Bay of Horses 10. Of Our Skirmish with the Indians 11. What Happened to Lope de Oviedo with Some Indians 12. How the Indians Brought Us Food 13. How We Found Out about Other Christians 14. How Four Christians Departed 15. What Happened to Us in the Village of Misfortune 16. How Some Christians Left the Isle of Misfortune 17. How the Indians Came and Brought Andrés Dorantes and Castillo and Estebanico 18. How He Told Esquivel's Story 19. How the Indians Left Us 20. How We Escaped 21. How We Cured Some Sick People 22. How They Brought Other Sick People to Us the Following Day 23. How We Left after Having Eaten the Dogs 24. About the Customs of the Indians of That Land 25. How the Indians Are Skilled with a Weapon 26. About the Peoples and Languages 27. How We Moved On and Were Welcomed 28. About Another New Custom 29. How They Stole from One Another 30. How the Custom of Welcoming Us Changed 31. How We Followed the Corn Route 32. How They Gave Us Deer Hearts 33. How We Saw Traces of Christians 34. How I Sent for the Christians 35. How the Mayor Received Us Well the Night We Arrived 36. How We Had Them Build Churches in That Land 37. What Happened When I Wanted to Leave 38. What Happened to the Others Who Went to the Indies
TOC
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some women belonging to a group that lived further away arrived. Finding out where their lodges were, we set out for them, although the Indians pleaded with us to wait until the next day because these lodges were far away and there was no trail to them. They said that the women had arrived tired, but that after they had rested, they would leave with us the following day and be our guides. Nonetheless, we took leave of them. A short while later the women, who had come with some others from the same village, followed us.

Since there were no trails in that country, we lost our way and wandered around for four leagues. Then we reached a watering place where we found the women who had set out after us. They told us how difficult it had been for them to reach us. We left the place with the women as guides, crossing a chest-deep river in the afternoon. It was probably as wide as the river in Seville, with a swift current. At sunset we reached a place with a hundred Indian lodges. Before we reached them, all the people in them came out to greet us with a frightful shouting and a slapping of their thighs. They had hollow gourds with pebbles in them, which is a sign of great solemnity, since they bring them out only for dances and for healing ceremonies, and no one else dares touch them. They say that those gourds have powers and that they came from heaven, because there are none in that land. They do not know where the gourds come from, except that they are washed down by the rivers during floods.

These people were so awed and excited that they rushed to reach us and touch us. The press of the crowd was so great that they nearly squeezed us to death. They lifted us and carried us to their lodges without letting our feet touch the ground. They were pressing us so hard that we rushed into the lodges they had prepared for us, where we refused to consent to any more festivities for us that night. They spent the entire night dancing and in arevtos among themselves. The following morning they brought everyone from that village so that we could touch them and bless them as we had done