Then these same Indians came as near as thirty paces from us, along with fifty men. They wore the clothes of the Christians, and they stood still and began parleying with us. Among these Indians, if anyone stands still at a few paces distance from his enemy and talks to him, he has usually nothing very good in his mind.
Seeing this, we put ourselves on our defence as well as we could, and asked of them what had become of our companions. They told us they were in their town, and invited us also to enter it. But we would not do so, for we perfectly well understood their malice.
Then they shot at us with their bows, but they resisted not long, and soon fled away to their town, whence they came out again with six hundred men against us. We had no other protection than a great wood, our four guns, and the sixty[270] Indians of the Carios who had come with us from Noster Signora desumsion. Nevertheless, we defended ourselves four days and four nights, always shooting one at another, and in the fourth night we secretly left the wood and went off, because we had not much to eat, and our enemies had become too strong for us, as the saying goes: Many dogs cause the death of the hare.
[270] Schmidt speaks of twenty, not sixty, men with whom he set out.
Thence we travelled six days through wild forests, more lonely than any I had ever seen, and I may say that I have travelled far and wide. We had nothing to eat, and had to satisfy ourselves with roots and honey that we found here and there. We could not even afford the necessary time to hunt for game, so fearful were we that the enemy might overtake us by night.
At length we came to a nation called Bijessija,[271] where we remained four days and took victual, but we dared not enter the place because we were so few.
[271] Mbiaçai, the land opposite the island of Santa Catalina.
In this country there is a river called Urquaie,[272] wherein we have seen snakes which are called in Spanish Schue Eiiba Thuescha.[273] They are fourteen paces in length and two fathoms thick in the middle of the body. They do great harm, to wit, when a man takes a bath or an animal drinks in a river or would swim across it, such a snake, swimming under water, comes to the man or animal, puts its tail around them under water and there eats them. That animal has always its head above water, in order to watch around for man or beast.
[272] Uruguay.
[273] This extraordinary name is not Spanish. The great snake described by Schmidt must be the Boa, which lives near the watering-places waiting for its prey.