woods, they said to me,
'Father our Commissioner, we wish to go forward with the benediction
and permission of your Reverence, to see if we can make greater
progress each day by some leagues, so as by this means to reach some
settlement, from which to send you some assistance, to aid your
Reverence; and if we should be delayed in getting out of the woods, and
should meet with the soldiers, we would send some of them whenever we
met them, so that they may extricate your Reverence and that you may
not perish in these forests. We are of no importance, and as such, we
shall not be missed. But as for your Reverence, on whose shoulders so
much depends, such as giving an account to our Prelate and to our Lord
the Governor of everything that has happened, your loss would be of
importance. Therefore we beg your Reverence to give us your blessing in
carrying out what has been said, giving us one of these Indians to
accompany us, and one of the two needles which you have, so as to
follow the direction to the west which we are taking.' I, that I might
never be held responsible for any loss or harm that might come to them,
granted them the Indian they picked out, the needle, blessing and
permission, although I knew we were yet very far off from arriving in
the four days that they thought.

"We took leave of each other with the mutual love and tenderness, which
the loving companionship of those who had followed me faithfully
through so great hardships required. We charged each other to remember
one another in our poor and humble prayers. With this they went off
with the benediction of God and of myself, I remaining with the three
Indians, though one was dying (and he died later) and the rest with
their strength exhausted as mine was.

"The departure of the Padres, my companions, and my beginning to
undergo new calamities, was all at the same time; for on those first
three days it was all passing through _akalchees_, or overflowed lands,
although they were dry but very much obstructed and closed up with low
and thorny trees which grew there, and with those cutting grasses which
I spoke of above, so that we were in constant trouble in passing
through them, reopening once more all the wounds which we had on our
legs. And at that time we found ourselves with bare feet and legs, and
with our clothes in pieces, without getting any more comfort from them
than to cover myself with them at night; also a steel for striking
fire, which by a