nd it deserted: the inhabitants had gone to
join other Indians who were gathering for war. No one appeared to whom
they could give notice of their pacific intentions, and the tidings
that an Indian had been killed had gone before them.

Setting out again, still under the guidance of the Cozumel Indian, they
reached a town named Ake. Here they found themselves confronted by a
great multitude of Indians, who had lain in ambush, concealed in the
woods.

These Indians were armed with quivers of arrows, sticks burned at the
ends, lances pointed with sharp flints, and two-handed swords of very
hard wood. They had flutes, and large sea-shells for trumpets, and
turtle-shells which they struck with deers' horns. Their bodies were
naked, except around the loins, and stained all over with earth of
different colours, and they wore stone rings in their ears and noses.

The Spaniards were astonished at seeing such strange figures, and the
noise that they made with the turtle-shells and horns, accompanied by a
shout of voices, seemed to make the hills quake. The adelantado
encouraged the Spaniards by relating his experience of war with the
Indians, and a fearful battle commenced, which lasted all that day.
Night came to put an end to the slaughter, but the Indians remained on
the ground. The Spaniards had time to rest and bind up their wounds,
but kept watch all night, with the dismal prospect of being destroyed
on the next day.

At daylight the battle began again, and continued fiercely till midday,
when the Indians began to give way. The Spaniards, encouraged by hope
of victory, pressed them till they turned and fled, hiding themselves
in the woods; but, ignorant of the ground, and worn out with constant
fighting, the victors could only make themselves masters of the field.
In this battle more than twelve hundred Indians were killed.

In the beginning of the year 1528, the adelantado determined again, by
slow marches, to reconnoiter the country; and, having discovered the
warlike character of the inhabitants, to avoid as much as possible all
conflict with them. With this resolution, they set out from Ake in the
direction of Chichen Itza, where, by kindness and conciliation, they
got together some Indians, and built houses of wood and poles covered
with palm leaves.

Here the adelantado made one unfortunate and fatal movement.
Disheartened by not seeing any signs of gold, and learning from the
Indians that the glittering metal