who were thatching a house. Even greater was the contrast when the new governor entered the town next day, with his wife, Dona Isabel, on one hand, and on the other a bishop in robes and miter, with friars chanting the Te Deum, and a train of gaily dressed cavaliers smiling scornfully at the tattered, sunburned colonists.
But not many weeks later, one of these same men in lace and satin staggered through the streets of Antigua, begging in vain for a morsel of food, and finally dropped dead in the sight of all. There was not enough food for such a multitude, and besides, the newcomers died by hundreds of the fevers. This is probably why Pedrarias did not at once put Balboa to death, under the pretext of what he had done to Nicuesa and Enciso. For although he was bitterly jealous of Balboa's success, Pedrarias realized that the other's men were seasoned veterans, and his own were sickly recruits. Besides, the bishop and some of the other officials befriended Balboa. So he was merely fined, imprisoned a few days, and then released. If he had been a wiser man, Balboa would have returned to Spain, where he was now a great hero, but instead, he stayed to watch Pedrarias at his work.
And dreadful work it was. Balboa had killed like a soldier, but Pedrarias tortured like a fiend. He had been instructed to establish a line of posts between the two oceans, and sent his lieutenant, Juan de Ayora, to locate the first fort at a place on the Atlantic coast called Santa Cruz. A chief who spread a feast for him, thinking to welcome his old friend Balboa, was tortured until he gave up all his gold, and then burned alive because it was not enough. As for the other chiefs Ayora caught,
