Note 180 — Chapter 30

The substantial character of the houses was noted also by Antonio de Espejo, toward the close of 1582, on his journey northward to New Mexico. Espejo speaks of these Indians, the Jumanos, or Patarabueyes, as occupying five villages from about the junction of the Conchos northward up the Rio Grande for twelve days' journey, and as numbering ten thousand souls—but Espejo's estimates of population are always greatly exaggerated. More important is his statement that the Jumanos knew something of Christianity which they had gleaned years before from three Christians and a negro, whom he naturally believed to have been "Alvaro Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, y Dorantes, y Castillo Maldonado, y un negro," who had made their escape from Narvaez's fleet. This is one of the few definite points of the narrative that can be established without question. See Coleccion de Documentos Inéditos relativos ... de América y Oceanía, XV. 107 (1871).