On the receipt of Cortes' letter, Sandoval would gladly that instant have set out for Naco if he had not previously despatched a great part of his troops into the surrounding townships in search of provisions and fodder for our horses. He was therefore compelled to await the return of these troops, which, moreover, had been detained in passing a river, where they had left a small detachment to guard the canoe that had ferried them across. Besides this, Sandoval had had daily skirmishes with the Indians of the townships lying on the Golfo Dulce, so that he deemed it necessary to send a further reinforcement of eight men, under my command, as a further guard to the canoe. Here we were obliged to observe the utmost vigilance, for one night a great body of Indians fell suddenly upon us, in the hopes, if they found us off our guard, to capture the canoe and set fire to our huts. However silently they came creeping along, we received timely notice of their approach, and we eight men, with four Mexicans, boldly advanced against them, and quickly sent them back from whence they came, though two Spaniards and one of the Mexicans were slightly wounded by the enemy's arrows. Upon this three of us marched further on to some huts where several invalid Mexicans and Spaniards had remained behind. These people we conducted safely to Sandoval, with the exception of one Spaniard, who died of exhaustion a couple of miles from the township, where the former was quartered with the rest of the troops. This soldier was one of those who had but recently arrived from Spain, and we were obliged to leave his body on the road from want of sufficient hands to carry it.
When I had given Sandoval my report of everything that had befallen us on our march, he was excessively angry with us for not having brought the dead body either on our shoulders or on one of the horses. I told him very coolly that each of the horses as it was had carried two sick persons, and that we ourselves had been obliged to walk on foot. One of my companions, however, a certain Villa Nueva, was not quite so cool as myself, but told Sandoval in a passion that we had trouble enough to drag ourselves along without loading ourselves with the dead, and as for