HISTORY OF THE SPANISH CONQUEST OF YUCATAN AND OF THE ITZAS

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different from their own garments and from those of the three Cehaches
Indians, whom we took along as guides, they ran away excitedly,--mother
and children,--as if we might kill them, so that it was no little work
that we had to pacify them with gentle words and loving caresses,
though we had more trouble in quieting the minds of the brother-in-law,
the cacique and the other Indian authorities, who in a moment ran
together at their cries, all with the intention of making war on us,
for they all came with bows and arrows in their hands.

"But as we wished to sow in their hardened hearts the pure grain of
evangelical seed which should have a more fruitful growth than that
which fell among the thistles and thorns, we began as genuine workmen
of Christ to till the soil of their hearts with the loving hoe of
caresses, embracing them joyfully, as one who had fallen in with the
ewe which had been lost for so many centuries, (the influence of our
soft words and the moderation of our prudent acts, resisting all the
weight of their immoderate acts) at which most people were frightened;