s of the
past. They are ruled in that island by greater fear, as they retained
more accurately in their memory certain cases that served them as
examples and warnings. For, at a certain time, the sky was so leaden
that for two years not a drop of rain fell. There was an Indian who
violated the respect that he owed to his blood and to nature, with
regard to a daughter of his. Although he tried to bury the crime in
the depths of his silence, it cried out to the sky as an offense,
and was heard distinctly as a sin; for the effect, as ungrateful as
evil, always turns against its cause. He was a person of influence,
and respect for him did not allow any investigation to be made;
but, the villages grieving over the public calamity, and unable to
endure their forced famine, men trampled under foot respect and laws,
in their judgment that tolerance in so execrable an evil had also
vexed and hardened the sky. By common consent they seized father and
daughter, and, shutting them up in a cage well weighted with stones,
threw them into the sea. In return they experienced from the sky
approbation for their avenging zeal, in the heavy rain with which it
received them. For at all times God preserves the credit to virtue,
and even among barbarians imposed penance on vice, so that those who
became familiars of vice could have no excuse. [64]

The Joloans executed the same punishment with equal severity, but
through malicious information. God, who is always the protector of
innocence, shielded the wretched; for when they cast two other fathers
in the same manner [into the water], he took away the weight of the
stones, and gave the men strength to keep afloat, without abandoning
them for a whole day, so that, the report of the matter having
reached the king, the wonder forced him to seek new information,
by which he discovered falsity and recognized innocence. In all the
nations innocence considers God as its advocate, and in desperate
cases rests secure on His protection.

Judges in suits or causes follow the simple laws of nature, and have no
embarrassment of laws and doubts and contrary interpretations. They
have no delays by reports or prolixity of writs, for they do not
waste a single dedo [65] of paper in that. The accusation, the plea,
and the evidence are quickly heard--all in the manner of the time
of Noah. If there is no testimony, they admit the parties to the
oath, which contains terrifying imprecations. With that plea the