The Indians were considered desirable neighbors, and were encouraged to dwell near the castle, and even within the city. On a map drawn as early as 1638 the spot now occupied by the old Catholic cemetery near the head of Tolomato Street is marked "Hermitage of our Lady of Guadalupe, with the territory occupied by the Indians of the town Tolomato."

   Large numbers of Franciscan missionaries continued to arrive at St. Augustine, and adventurous monks, who had pined in their convents in the Old World for more work to do, found room for their energies in Florida, as the adventurous soldiers had done before them.

   Early in the seventeenth century one of these Franciscans wrote a book called "La Doctrina Cristiana" in the Yamasee dialect. This volume, which is said to have been the first book written in the language of any of the North American Indians, has received an extended notice at the hands of Buckingham Smith, Esq.

   The labors of the missionaries were not without difficulties and discouragements, nor free from dangers. Toward the close of the sixteenth and at the beginning of the seventeenth century there were several of the worthy fathers who sacrificed their lives in noble efforts to instruct the Indians.