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
La Relación - page 81

we could not deal with them. As we went through those valleys, they all went in a row, each one of them carrying a club three palms long. Whenever one of the many hares around there leaped up, so many people surrounded it and clubbed it that it was amazing thing to see. This way they made it go from one man to another. This seemed to me to be the best type of hunting imaginable, because sometimes the hares would come up to someone's hands. When we stopped at nightfall, they had given us so many hares that each of us carried eight or ten loads of them. We could not see those who had bows; they went separately through the mountains hunting deer, and at night they came bringing for each one of us five or six deer and birds and quail and other game. Everything those people found and killed they brought before us, not daring to take a bite even if they were starving, until we had blessed it. And the women brought many mats which they used to make lodges for us, each one of us having one for himself and all the people attached to him. When this was done, we would tell them to roast the deer and the hares and all that they had caught, and they did this very quickly in ovens they would make for this. We would take a little of everything and would give the rest to the leader of the people who had come with us, telling him to distribute it among them all. Each person would bring his portion to us so that we could breathe on it and make the sign of the cross on it; otherwise they would not dare eat it. Often three or four thousand people accompanied us, and it was very difficult for us to breathe on and bless each one's food and drink. They would come to ask our permission to do many other things, which indicates how we were inconvenienced by them. The women would bring us prickly pears and spiders and worms and whatever

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