at regular intervals. The fathers chose some
of these traders and taught them the songs. They learned very quickly,
and also played an accompaniment on their musical instruments. When they
were ready they started, with an assortment of all kinds of articles
such as the Indians particularly liked,--knives, scissors, little
looking-glasses, and so on.

As they had been instructed, the four peddlers went first to a great
native prince. His people all came flocking to buy, and when the
business of the day was over, they took pains to win his favor by making
him a present.

After supper they took out their musical instruments and began to play
and chant the verses they had learned. Hundreds of dusky warriors,
attracted by the sweet strains, sat about in the moonlight and listened.

Next night many more natives came, and when the song was ended, the
chief asked to have it explained. This was just the opportunity the
traders had been waiting for. They told the chief that they sang only
what they had heard, and that only the _padres_ could explain the
verses.

"Who are the _padres_?" asked the chief. In answer to this question,
they told him they were men who dressed always in white and black, wore
their hair like a garland about the head, did not eat meat, never
married, did not seek for gold, and sang the praises of God day and
night.

The chief was much struck by this description, especially by the fact
that the _padres_ did not seek gold, his experience with Spaniards being
that they loved gold above everything else in the world, and that all
the miseries the Indians had suffered at their hands had been caused by
their insane desire to possess it.

At last, though it was a difficult matter to persuade these Indians to
allow any Spaniard to enter their country, they decided to send the
young brother of the chief out with the traders, and if he should find
these _padres_ all that had been represented, he was to invite them to
come and tell them of their religion.

Great was the joy in the little convent when they saw the prince coming
with the Indian traders. They did their best to make him welcome, and
after a few days, when he was ready to return, Father Luis Cancer was
sent with him.

What was the good father's astonishment to find crowds of people coming
to meet him, arches erected for him to pass under, and the roads swept
before his feet!

The Indians built a church for him at once,--made of the trunks of