Page:The Coronado expedition, 1540-1542.djvu/45

 also, the loss of the similar instructions which Coronado must have received when he started on his journey in the following February.

Friar Marcos, accompanied by a lay brother, Friar Onorato, according to Mendoza's "première lettre," left Culiacan on March 7, 1539. Coronado, now acting as governor of New Galicia, had escorted them as far as this town and had assured a quiet journey for a part of the way beyond by sending in advance six Indians, natives of this region, who had been "kept at Mexico to become proficient in the Spanish language and attached to the ways of the Christians." The friars proceeded to Petatlan, where Friar Onorato fell sick, so that it was necessary to leave him behind. During the rest of the journey. Friar Marcos was the only white man in the party, which consisted of the negro Estevan, the Indian interpreters, and a large body of natives who followed him from the different villages near which he passed. The friar continued his journey to "Vacapa," which Mr Bandelier identifies with the Eudeve settlement of Matapa in central Sonora, where he arrived two days before Passion Sunday, which in 1539 fell on March 23. At this place he waited until April 6, in order to send to the seacoast and summon some Indians, from whom he hoped to secure further information about the pearl islands of which Cabeza de Vaca had heard.

The negro Estevan had been ordered by the viceroy to obey Friar Marcos in everything, under pain of serious punishment. While the friar was waiting at Vacapa, he sent the negro toward the north, instructing him to proceed 50 or 60 leagues and see if he could find anything which might help them in their search. If he found any signs of a rich and populous country, it was agreed that he was not to advance farther, but should return to meet the friar, or else wait where he heard the good news, sending some Indian messengers back to the friar, with a white cross the size of the palm of his hand. If the news was very promising, the cross was to be twice this size, and if the country about which he heard promised to be larger and better than New Spain, a cross still larger than this was to be sent back. Castañeda preserves a story that Estevan was sent ahead, not only to explore and pacify the country, but also because he did not get on well with his superior, who objected to his eagerness in collecting the turquoises and other things which the natives prized and to the moral effect of his relations with the women who followed him from the tribes which they met on their way. Friar Marcos says nothing about this in his narrative, but he had different and much more important ends to accomplish by his report, compared with those of Castaneda, who may easily have gathered the gossip from some native.