While the governor was in this situation, the officers and Domingo de Irala gave public permission to all their friends and partisans to go into the villages and huts of the Indians and take by force their wives, daughters, hammocks, and other of their possessions, a thing contrary to the service of His Majesty and the peace of the country. While this was going on they would scour the country, strike the Indians blows with sticks, carry them off to their houses, and oblige them to labour in their fields without any remuneration. When the Indians came and complained to Domingo de Irala and the officers, these answered that it was no affair of theirs, which pleased the Christians, because they knew that this answer was given to suit their pleasure and secure their support, for they might say that they had full liberty to do what they liked. These replies and bad treatment caused the country to be deserted. The natives withdrew to the mountains, and concealed themselves in places where the Christians could not find them. A large number were Christians, together with wives and children. When they left the settlement they lost the religious teaching of the monks and clergy, the governor having paid great attention to their religious instruction.