by Indians crowned with flowers, giving his benediction as he passed, to turn away (according to himself) the plague, and to insure a fertile harvest.  Not being content with the opportunities which life afforded, he instituted an evening service in church in order to prepare for death.”

These, however, were only some of the milder uses to which the Bishop put his histrionic talents in order to prove his claim to sainthood.

The fortunes of Cardenas varied considerably, but on the whole his extraordinary versatility kept him afloat in the public estimation.  He at one time, however, very nearly incurred the popular resentment owing to his having taken up the body of a suicide, and caused it to be interred in holy ground from the force of a mere whim.  The uproar consequent on this he managed to overrule, and having got the better of Don Gregorio, the Civil Governor, the Bishop actually elected himself Governor in his place, and now became supreme in Asuncion, from which place the Jesuits were forced to flee in haste to their establishments in the country.

Each side now brought endless charges against the other, and in the middle of the wordy warfare the validity of Cardenas’s appointment to the Bishopric was questioned.  Nevertheless, Cardenas succeeded in retaining his office, and after a while issued a declaration excommunicating the entire Order of the Jesuits, after which, having sworn to the people that he possessed a Decree from the King of Spain, he issued an order commanding the expulsion of the Jesuits from Paraguay.  This was carried into effect at Asuncion, and the College of the Order was sacked and gutted by fire.  Outside the boundaries of the capital, however, this command had no effect whatever, and the great settlements of the Jesuits far away in the forests were totally unaffected by any mandate given at Asuncion.

The Bishop had now gone too far in his policy of aggression.  The High Court at Charcas summoned him to appear before its tribunal at once, and to give his reasons for the expulsion of the Jesuits and his appointment of himself as Governor of Paraguay.  At the same time a new Governor, Don Sebastian de Leon, was appointed to Paraguay.  Cardenas determined to resist.  He raised an army, and, claiming Divine inspiration, promised his followers an undoubted victory, and ordered them to supply themselves with cords in order to bind the prisoners which should fall to their share.  The rival forces met just outside Asuncion.  The unfortunate troops of Cardenas found no use for their cords, since, totally defeated, they fled in haste.  Judging mercy to be most seasonable at this juncture, the new Governor commanded his men to march to the capital, but to desist from pursuing the defeated forces.

In the meanwhile Cardenas had lost no time.  Realizing his complete defeat, he had fled secretly to Asuncion.  Arriving there ahead of Don Sebastian de Leon’s forces, he had dressed himself in his finest robes and seated himself on the throne of the cathedral.  It was there that Don Sebastian de Leon found him when he entered.