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After giving these instructions, and teaching the people how to behave, they returned, and left us with these Indians, who, mindful of what the others had said, began to treat us with the same respect and awe, and we travelled in their company for three days. They took us to where there were many Indians, and went ahead to tell them of our coming, repeating what they had heard and adding much more to it, for all these Indians are great gossipers and liars, particularly when they think it to be to their benefit. As we neared the lodges all the inmates came out to receive us, with much rejoicing and display, and, among other things, two of their medicine-men gave us two gourds. Thence onward we carried gourds, which added greatly to our authority, since they hold these ceremonial objects very high. Our companions sacked the dwellings, but as there were many and they only few in number, they could not carry away all they took, so that more than half was left to waste. Thence we turned inland for more than fifty leagues, following the slopes of the mountains, and at the end of them met forty dwellings.
There, among other things which they gave us, Andres Dorantes got a big rattle of copper, large, on which was represented a face, and which they held in great esteem. They said it had been obtained from some of their neighbors. Upon asking these whence it had come, they claimed to have brought it from the north, where there was much of it and highly prized. We understood that, wherever it might have come from, there must be foundries, and that metal was cast in molds. Leaving on the next day, we crossed a mountain seven leagues long, the stones of which were iron slags. At night we came to many dwellings, situated on the banks of a very beautiful river.
The inmates of these abodes came to receive us halfways, with their children on their backs. They gave us a number of pouches with silver and powdered antimony (or lead), with which they paint their faces, and many beads and robes of cow-skins, and loaded those who came with us with all their chattels. These people ate tunas and pine-nuts; there are in that country small trees of the sweet pine, the cones of which are like small eggs, but the nuts are better than those of Castilla, because the husks are thin. When still green they grind them and make balls that are eaten. When dried they grind the nuts with the husks, and eat them as meal. And those who received us, as soon as they had touched our bodies, returned to their houses on a run, then came again, and never stopped running back and forth. In this way they brought us a great many things for our journey.
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