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Show Se 82 LEADING FACTS OF NEW MEXICAN HISTORY three months of the year they do not eat anything else and drink very bad water. There is lack of fire-wood, but great abundance of mosquitoes. Their lodges are made of matting and built on oyster shells, upon which they sleep in hides, which they only get by chance. There we remained to the end of April, when we went to the seashore, where we ate blackberries for a whole month, during which time they danced and celebrated incessantly.’’ The Spaniards had not been on the island a great while, when the natives desired to make physicians of them; they declined all knowledge, however, of the healing art and refused to assume the responsibility of being medicine men. But the Indians were not to be denied, and ‘‘they withheld food from us until we should practice what they required,’’ and ‘‘at last, finding ourselves in great want we were constrained to obey; but not without fear lest we should be blamed for any failure or success.’’ 77 In this manner, under duress, the Spaniards became full-fledged disciples of Esculapius and performed some miraculous cures, if we are to believe the story of Alvar Nufiez Cabeza de Vaca. In his Relacion he says: ‘‘Our method was to bless the sick, breathing upon them, and recite a Pater Noster and an Ave Maria, praying with all earnestness to God our Lord that he would give health and influence to them to make us some good return. In his clemency he willed that all those for whom we supplicated should tell the others that they were sound and in health, directly after we made the sign of the blessed cross over them. For this, the Indians treated us kindly; they deprived themselves of food that they might give to us, and presented us with skins and some trifies.’’ These shipwrecked unfortunates were undoubtedly the first exponents of Christian Science practicing with success upon this continent. Their system seems to have acted like a charm, for it is related that every time they made the sign of the cross the patient immediately recovered. Naturally they became very important personages and great medicine men. The inhabitants of all this region wore no clothes, with the exception of the women and young girls, and theirs was a very scanty attire. They had no chief. They spoke two languages, those of one being called Capoques, those of the other, Han.”* : ‘‘They have a c W., Spanish Explorers in the Southe ge, I. W., Spanish Explorers in the Southern United States, p. 53. rn United States, p. 54, THE FIRST SPANISH ee EXPLORERS ee 83 a custom when they meet, or from time to time when they visit, of remaining half an hour before they speak, weeping; and, this over, he that is visited first rises and gives the other all he has, which is received, and after a little while he carries it away, and often goes without saying a word.”’ Alvar Nufiez Cabeza de Vaca made up his mind to escape to the mainland. Meanwhile Dorantes, Estevan, the negro from Azamor, and the remainder of the DORANTES AND CASTILLO ATTEMPT TO Spaniards, following anESCAPE — THEY ARE SEPARATED FROM other band of Indians with ALVAR NUNEZ CABEZA DE VACA whom they had been living, had become separated from him and had gone down the coast leaving Lope de Oviedo and another Spaniard’? on the island ®° because they were too ill to travel. note: ‘‘Important as it is in affording evidence of the route of Cabeza de Vaca and his companions, it is not possible, with our present knowledge of the former tribes of the coast region of Texas, to identify with certainty the various Indians mentioned by the narrator. Whether the names given by him are those which the natives applied to themselves or are those given by other tribes is unknown, and as no remnant of this once considerable coast population now exists, the only hope of the ultimate determination of these Indians lies in the historical archives of Texas, Mexico, and Spain. The two languages and stocks represented on the island of Malhado — the Capoque and the Han — would seem to apply to the Karankawan and Attacapan families respectively. The Capoques (called Cahoques on p. 87) are seemingly identical with the Cocos who lived with the Mayayes on the coast between the Brazos and Colorado Rivers in 1778, and with the Cokes, who as late as 1850, are described as a branch of the Koronks (Karankawa). Of the Han people nothing more definite is known than that which is here recorded.’’ : 79 Hodge, F. W., Ibid, p. 55. Hierronymo de Alvaniz, the notary; also called Alaniz. ' 80 Hodge, F. W., Ibid, note, p. 57: ‘‘ The identification of Malhado island me difficult problem. On general principles Galveston island would seem to supply the conditions, in that 1t more likely would have been inhabited by two distinct tribes, perhaps representing distinct linguistic families, as it is known to have been inhabited by Indians (the Karankawa) at a later period, besides having the smaller island or islands behind it. But its size and the other conditions are not in favor of the identification, for its length is at least twice as great as that of Malhado, as given in the narrative, and it is also more than pre leagues from its nearest end to the first stream that the Spaniards erossed after departing from the island (Oviedo, p. 593). Mr. James Saree gests that the so-called Velasco island, next south of Galveston fulfills the requirements, as indeed it does topographically, omee maser me islan ' ms “ a ee ae that it is really a peninsula. Aside from this, it possesses all the Bynes > — length and width, distance from the first stream to ae sou features nor w : and having the necessary island or islands (Mud and San Luis) 0 a accou to difficult not is it shore. Accepting Mr. Baskett’s determination, eee e |