WHOLE VOL. THE WEST INDIES — VAZQUEZ DE ESPINOSA 257 



by trustworthy persons who were present, residents of the city, that 

 the earth rose in some places a stade (1.85 yards) into the air, 

 undulating from one side to the other, as if indicating that it could 

 not abide them. Since they were all much terrified by these threaten- 

 ing portents, they brought out and held the Holy Sacraments in the 

 center of the plaza, begging God to show mercy and lay aside His 

 righteous anger ; that they would appease Him by abandoning that 

 accursed site, where such dreadful murder and sacrilege had been 

 committed in the violent assassination of His prelate and shepherd. 

 So in their fear they deserted the city and that location, and settled 

 down 6 leagues farther on toward the Pacific near the Indian village 

 of Sutiaba. Here, thanks to the goodness of God, since they had 

 moved and resettled, their city is growing, and it would appear that 

 after their abandonment of that spot, Our Lord has shown His 

 customary clemency. 



739. When I was in those provinces the first time, in the year 

 1613, I went to see the ruins of the city and the residence of the 

 Bishop, where the blood was said to be still fresh, and there certainly 

 were splashes of it on the ruined wall at the spot where they mur- 

 dered him ; and this circumstance, together with the sight of the 

 ruins of the city and its temples prostrate, which were once noble 

 buildings but had been utilized as material for the construction of 

 the new city — all this moved me to compassion. 



740. The new city of Leon will count 80 Spanish residents. The 

 Cathedral is here, with some Prebendaries in residence ; but the 

 Bishop usually lives in Granada, 24 leagues away. There is a Merce- 

 darian convent here. What was observed in the case of this city and 

 its inhabitants shows what respect should be paid to prelates, of 

 whom His Divine Majesty said, by the mouth of David, "Touch not 

 Mine anointed, etc." ; He enjoins respect for them in neither per- 

 mitting such misdeeds nor in leaving them unpunished ; for one 

 person committed the crime and the whole city paid for it. 



741. Almost the same thing happened in Comayagua in Honduras, 

 where a sainted Franciscan friar, Don Luis de Andrada, was Bishop. 

 Don Juan Guerra de Ayala, Governor of these provinces, inflicted 

 a penalty unjustly on a certain honorable personage, and it was the 

 duty of the church to defend his cause as its own. The Governor 

 was therefore requested by the Bishop to deliver his prisoner to the 

 church, from whose custody he had unjustly taken him. He refused 

 to grant the request, and the fires of his passion ran so high against 

 the Bishop that the latter was obliged to excommunicate him for 

 his disobedience. The Governor tried to force the Bishop to absolve 



