When we left the “fenced pueblo” (for so we called it), we entered from there onwards on a good and flat road all through treeless savannahs with a sun so hot and strong that greater noontide heat we had never felt throughout our march. As we went along those flat plains we saw many deer and they hardly ran at all, so that we soon overtook them on horseback, however little we raced after them, and over twenty of them were killed.

On asking the guides we had with us why the deer ran so little, and why they were not frightened at the horses nor at anything else, they replied that in those pueblos, which I have already said they call the Mazatecas, they are considered to be gods, because gods have appeared in their shape, and their Idol has commanded them not to kill or frighten them, and they have not done so, and this is the reason why they do not run away.

During that chase the horse of a relation of Cortés, named Palacios Rubios, died, for the fat of his body melted from having galloped so much.

Let us leave this chase and I will say that we soon reached the settlements already mentioned by me, and it was sad to see them all destroyed and burnt. As we went on our way, as Cortés always sent scouts ahead on horseback and active men on foot, they overtook two Indians, natives of another pueblo which was ahead of us on the road we had to take, who were returning from the chase laden with a great lion and many iguanas,