Cabeza De Vaca Argument

The argument that Cabeza De Vaca presented in his letter was the difference in the culture of native Americans to colonists. He states several unique customs that can be described as odd and deadly in several Native American tribes. For example, children are watched over very carefully, and are nursed until they are twelve, when they can take care of themselves. Women of the Malhado work much more than others. These were facts Cabeza De Vaca found when he lived among the people themselves. They accepted him over time, and treated him as one of their own. There were times when he had to endure the everyday life of the tribes, not eating for days at a time. This would often happy when someone died, whether in their own family or even someone else's. One would have to rely on neighbors to feed them if they want to live, so it was important to establish a good relationship with them. Often, today we couldn't trust our neighbors to care for us for three months.

Native Americans in some tribes never intended to kill one another at any time. If there was a conflict in some tribes, the men of the families would fight and then live somewhere in the woods. After they calmed down, they come back and are friends again. Disease is everywhere, because mosquitoes run rampant. Odd marriage customs bound families in different ways, often making a wife feed her own father. These were all customs and experiences Cabeza De Vaca had to support his argument. His ethos came from the experience itself. He lived in Native Americans tribe for a while. Pathos of this argument is strong since the Native Americans care so much for one another and would never purposely hurt another.

In the end Cabeza De Vaca grew angry at Christians for trying to captivate his Native American friends. This shows he had developed some kind of emotional attachment to them. As he wrote in his argument, "After this we had a hot argument with them, for they meant to make slaves of the Indians in our train." He had seen the Native Americans as family by the time he wrote this. And although he starved for days at a timr, he had trust in them and did not want them enslaved. In his argument, I think that he may have hinted that Native American tribes were better than colonists and their own setlements.