FERNANDO ALARCHON a.d. 



1540. 

 may company with them. These men receive no kind 

 of reward for this incestuous act of the people of that 

 countrey, because they have libertie to take whatsoever 

 they find in any house for their food. I saw likewise 

 certaine women which lived dishonestly among men : 

 and I asked the old man whether they were married, who 

 answered me noe, but they were common women, which 

 lived apart from the married women. I came at length 

 after these discourses to pray them to send for those 

 Indians, which they said had bin at Cevola, & they told 

 me that they were eight dayes journey distant from that 

 place, but that notwithstanding there was one among 

 them which was their companion and which had spoken 

 with them, as he met them on the way, when they 

 went to see the kingdome of Cevola, and that they 

 told him that he were not best to goe any farther, 

 for he should find there a fierce nation like us, and 

 of the same qualities and making, which had fought 

 much with the people of Cevola, because they had killed 

 a Negro of their company, saying. Wherefore, have yee 

 killed him ? what did he to you ? did he take any bread 

 from you, or do you any other wrong ? and such like 

 speach. And they said moreover, that these people 

 were called Christians, which dwelt in a great house, & 

 that many of them had oxen like those of Cevola, and Oxen of 

 other litle blacke beasts with wooll and homes, & that ^^'^°^^- 

 some of them had beasts which they rode upon, which 

 ran very swiftly ; & that one day before their departure, 

 from sunne rising untill sunne setting these Christians 

 were all day in comming thither, & all of them lodged 

 in that place where others had lodged, & that these two 

 met with two Christians, which asked them whence they 

 were, & whether they had fields sowen with corne ; and 

 they told them that they dwelt in a farre country, and 

 that they had corne, and that then they gave each of 

 them a litle cap, and they gave them another to cary 

 to their other companions, which they promised to do, 

 & departed quickly. When I understood this, I spoke 



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