With such auspicious beginnings, Ours continued to penetrate the province, and, going up and down that river, sowed the divine word.  It fell to the lot of father Fray Jacinto de San Fulgencio, also one of the eight above mentioned—­who regarded but lightly the hardships that were represented to him, with unfortunate examples, as having encountered other ministers of the gospel—­to journey more than fifty leguas, preaching the faith of Jesus Christ to the villages.  He had serious and frequent difficulties in making himself heard; for the devil appeared in a visible form to the Indians, persuading them not to admit those fathers into their country, because of whom, so they said, dire calamities and troubles must happen to them.  But, as it was the cause of God, all the deceits and cunning of that common enemy remained only threats.

It was no little work to make the Indians leave so many wives as each one had, obliging them to marry the first, and to free their slaves whom they miserably oppressed.  But he attained it with his mildness, the inoffensive method by which our religious succored the weakness of those Indians.  Thus did they obtain permission to travel through the shores of that river, gaining souls for heaven, and building a dwelling in the village of Linao. [52]

In that did the superb zeal of father Fray Jacinto de San Fulgencio excel wonderfully.  For having resolved to go up the river together with some Butuan Indians, already Christians, and arriving at the said place of Linao, and seeing that its inhabitants were gentler and more docile, he erected an altar in a chosen house, where he placed the images—­from which the heathen received great joy, praising their beauty.  Then he assembled the chief men of the district, and preached them a sermon, in which he informed them who the true God is, and bade them abandon the customs and rites of the devil.  They jested at such a proposition, but were soon subdued—­especially one, who declared the location of their god or divata.  Father Fray Jacinto was overjoyed at that, and schemed how he might see such place of worship, which was located on the other side of the river.  Commending himself, then, to Jesus Christ, whose cause he was advancing, he ordered a boat to be launched and went to look for the idol.  Some Indians went out to meet him, brandishing their lances in order to prevent his entrance.  Others more humane, persuaded him that he should abandon that undertaking, saying that, if he wished to build a church there, they would give him a better location.  The father answered mildly that that house was very much to his purpose because it was large, and all could gather in it in order to be instructed in the mysteries of the faith.  The Indians who accompanied the pious father feared that a quarrel was about to ensue, and that fear went with them even to the door [of the house].  The father entered the place of worship boldly, to the wonder of all.  He saw