Chapter X

WRITERS OF PERU AND NEW GRANADA, 1600-1650.

I. _Juan Bautista Aguilar._ II. _Francisco Vásquez and Toribio
de Ortiguera._ III. _Cristóbal de Acuña._ IV. _Diego de Torres
Bollo._ V. _Antonio de la Calancha._ VI. _Bernabé Cobo._ VII.
_Alonso Mesía Venegas._ VIII. _Pedro Simón._ IX. _Rodríguez
Fresle and Alonso Garzón de Tahuste._ X. _Pedro Fernández de
Quiros, Gobeo de Victoria, and Fernando Montesinos._

I

[Sidenote: Peruvian topics]

[Sidenote: Aguilar defender of the Indians]

[Sidenote: _Restauración y reparo del Perú_]

Writers of Peru and New Granada in the first half of the seventeenth century had no single absorbing topic, such as the Araucanian war provided for the Chileans. Their attention was attracted by the abuses which the Indians suffered under hard masters, the exploration of the Amazon, the development of the religious orders, and the various phases of progress in the colonies. Juan Bautista Aguilar was one of those who appeared as defenders of the Indians. Their need of defence grew partly out of the fact that in Peru the Indians were less war-like than the Araucanians of Chile; they had been cowed by the rule of the Incas, the encomenderos, and the corregidores; and, in many cases, even the clergy and their concubines, taking advantage of a gentle-spirited people, imposed grievous burdens upon them. Aguilar was archdeacon of the cathedral of Arequipa, and in 1615 published, in folio, the _Restauración y reparo del Perú_. In this work and in a report which he sent to the king eight years later, he set forth the unfortunate state of the Indians, their needs, and the scandalous treatment of them by the corregidores, who enriched themselves by defrauding the Indians of their property, and by employing them as labourers with little or no compensation. This report was later sent from Spain to Peru, and Aguilar caused it to be printed together with communications from many prelates commending it. But the Spanish government in America, maintaining a certain esprit de corps, tolerated the notorious extortions of the corregidores, and remained generally unmoved by appeals for a more humane treatment of the natives.

II

[Sidenote: Exploration of the Amazon]

[Sidenote: Vásquez’s _Relación_]

[Sidenote: Position of Vásquez]

The most notorious events associated with the discovery and exploration of the Amazon were those connected with the expedition of Ursúa in 1560, embracing the conspiracy and revolt of Lope de Aguirre, the projected creation of an independent state under the nominal headship of Fernando de Guzmán, the tyrannical domination of the expedition by Aguirre after the murder of Ursúa and other members of the company, and the riotous pillaging of Venezuelan towns. A reliable narration of these events is the _Relación verdadera de todo lo que sucedió en la jornada de Omagua y Dorado_, written by El Bachiller Francisco Vásquez, who was a soldier of the expedition, but who refused to take the oath of allegiance to Fernando de Guzmán, or alienate himself from the kingdom of Castile, or renounce his loyalty to the king. Having served in this company until his escape from it at Margarita, Vásquez wrote with personal knowledge of the events he describes. His title of bachiller and the form of his narrative indicate that, although a private soldier, he possessed a degree of cultivation superior to that acquired by the majority of his comrades. His account was still in manuscript when Bollaert translated Simón’s _Sixta noticia historial_, which contained the history of Ursúa’s expedition. From it Simón derived the principal part of his information on the subject in question, and he did not hesitate to copy considerable parts of it and present them as his own in his _Conquistas de Tierra Firme_.[114]

[Sidenote: Ortiguera’s _Jornada_]

Another account of Ursúa’s expedition is found in Toribio de Ortiguera’s _Jornada del río Marañón_. This is more extensive than Vásquez’s narrative, and two of its chapters deal with the expedition of Gonzalo Pizarro and Orellana. Like the narrative by Vásquez, it remained many years in manuscript, but is now readily accessible in the _Nueva biblioteca de autores españoles_.[115] Other narratives of Ursúa’s expedition are found in Castellanos’ _Elegías de varones ilustres de las Indias_ (Part I, Elegía XIV), and in Piedrahita’s _Historia general del nuevo reino de Granada_.

The following paragraph is Francisco Vásquez’s description of Lope de Aguirre:

[Sidenote: Vásquez on Lope de Aguirre]

[Sidenote: Character of Aguirre]

[Sidenote: A Lutheran]

“The tyrant Lope de Aguirre was a man about fifty years old, small of stature and of an insignificant presence: ugly, with a small and emaciated face; eyes, which, if he looked fixedly, were restless in their sockets especially when he was offended. He had a keen and active mind for an unlettered person. He was a Biscayan, and, according to his statement, was born at Oñate in the province of Guipuzcoa. He was, however, unable to find out who his parents were, more definitely than what he communicated in a letter which he wrote to king Philip, in which he affirmed that he was an hidalgo; but judging him by his acts, he appears so cruel and perverse that there was not found or could be observed in him any goodness or virtue. He was turbulent and determined, particularly with his followers. He was a great sufferer from certain difficulties, especially as to sleeping, so that during all the time of his tyrannical rule he was seldom seen to sleep; except during a brief period in the day, he was always found awake. He walked much, and always burdened with considerable weight; he carried continually many arms on his back; went about often wearing two heavy coats of mail, with a sword, a dagger, and steel helmet, and carrying an arquebuse or a lance in his hand. At other times he wore a breastplate. He was naturally an enemy of the good and virtuous, and thus all virtuous and saintly acts appeared to him as bad. He was a friend and companion of low and vile men, and if one was a thief, or had a bad character, or was cruel, he was all the more Aguirre’s friend. He was always cautious, inconstant, false, and a deceiver; he was seldom known to tell the truth, and never, or very seldom, kept his word. He was vicious, lustful, gluttonous with all and often overcome with wine. He was a bad Christian, a Lutheran heretic or worse, for he did and said the things we have told in this narrative, the killing of priests, friars, women, and innocent persons for no fault, and without giving them an opportunity to confess, although they requested it, and preparations had been made. He had as a common vice commending his soul and body to the devil, mentioning his head, his legs, his arms, and all members. He never spoke a word without blasphemy and cursing God and His saints. He neither knew how to speak well nor spoke well of anybody, not even of his friends; he was a defamer of everything; and, finally there was no vice that was not represented in his person.”[116]

III

[Sidenote: Cristóbal de Acuña]

[Sidenote: Acuña on the Amazon]

Eighty years after Ursúa’s expedition Padre Cristóbal de Acuña made the journey of the Amazon, and recorded the results of his observations and inquiries. Immediately before undertaking this voyage Padre Acuña was the rector of the Jesuits’ college at Cuenca. The occasion of this journey was offered by the appearance in Quito of the officers of the expedition organized by Governor Noronha, of Pará. The commander of the expedition was Pedro de Texeira, who arrived in Quito in 1638. He remained in that city eleven months, while the bulk of the personnel of the expedition continued in camp near Ávila. The viceroy finally offered the needed supplies, and ordered Texeira and his followers to go back to Pará by the way they came. He also ordered two Jesuits, on their way to Spain, to accompany the expedition as far as Pará. These were Cristóbal de Acuña and Andrés Artieda. _El nuevo descubrimiento del gran río de las Amazonas_ was written by Acuña under orders he had received to make careful observations, to set down the names of the Indian tribes, to give an account of their manners and customs, to note the rivers flowing into the Amazon, and to describe the natural products of the country bordering on the river. The information gathered he was required to report to the Council of the Indies, and it was contained in a volume published in Madrid in 1641. When this voyage was undertaken, Portugal was still united to Spain, but before the book was issued this connexion had been dissolved. Referring to this subject Sir Clements R. Markham, following the French translator, says, “The wretched government of Philip IV, terrified lest the Portuguese should take advantage of any information contained in Acuña’s book, and forgetting that Texeira and all his officers knew quite as much about the Amazons as the Spanish priest, ordered every copy of the work to be immediately and effectually destroyed. It has consequently become exceedingly scarce.”[117]

[Sidenote: Service of Acuña]

Acuña was born at Burgos in 1597. In 1612, at the age of fifteen, he entered the order of the Jesuits, and later was sent to America. Shortly after his arrival in South America he became rector of the Jesuits’ college at Cuenca de Quito. He was called from this position for the journey from Quito to Pará, which lasted about eleven months, from January 16, 1639, to December 12 following. While waiting at Pará for a ship to take him to Spain, he wrote his _Nuevo descubrimiento_, and after its publication in Madrid in 1641 we find him at Rome as provincial of the Jesuits. Later he returned to America, where he was appointed calificador, or censor, for the Inquisition. He was living in Lima in 1675, and died there in that year.

[Sidenote: Earlier Amazon explorers]

[Sidenote: Dwarfs and Amazons]

In writing this account of the great river of the Amazons Acuña recognized that he was not the first to make this journey. He was aware that Orellana and Lope de Aguirre had preceded him. He referred also to various other attempts that had failed. In making clear and apparently well grounded statements of physical conditions as they doubtless appeared to him, the author at the same time shows an inclination to accept as true the marvellous tales that were told him. His mind received calmly the story of “a nation of dwarfs as small as little children,” and another story of a “people who all have their feet turned the wrong way, so that a person who did not know them, in following their footsteps, would always walk away from them.”[118] He finds, moreover, “the proofs of the existence of the province of the Amazons on this river are so numerous, and so strong, that it would be a want of common faith not to give them credit.”[119]

[Sidenote: Perpetuation of the race]

“There is no saying more common than that these women inhabit a province on the river, and it is not credible that a lie could have been spread throughout so many languages, and so many nations, with such an appearance of truth.[120] The Amazon women are of great valour, and they have always preserved themselves without the ordinary intercourse with men; and even when these, by agreement, come every year to their land, they receive them with arms in their hands, such as bows and arrows, which they brandish about for some time, until they are satisfied that the Indians come with peaceful intentions. They then drop their arms and go down to the canoes of their guests, where each one chooses the hammock that is nearest at hand (these being the beds in which they sleep); they then take them to their houses, and, hanging them in a place where their owners know them, they receive the Indians as guests for a few days. After this the Indians return to their own country, repeating these visits every year at the same season. The daughters who are born from this intercourse are preserved and brought up by the Amazons themselves, as they are destined to inherit their valour, and the customs of the nation, but it is not so certain what they do with the sons.”[121]

IV

[Sidenote: Torres Bollo]

Torres Bollo and Calancha were two important writers who dealt extensively with the progress of the religious orders.

[Sidenote: Torres Bollo’s offices]

[Sidenote: Torres Bollo in New Granada and Paraguay]

Diego de Torres Bollo’s known achievement in reorganizing and administering Jesuit affairs in America contributed to the popularity of his _Historia del Perú_. The most striking feature of his practical activity was the creation of three Jesuit provinces out of the hitherto existing single province of Peru. The last third of the sixteenth century and the first third of the seventeenth century were his effective years. He was born in 1550, at Villalpando, in old Castile. He studied at Salamanca, and was later sent to Madrid to enter upon a mercantile career, for which he seemed to find himself unfitted. He therefore withdrew from this undertaking, and was admitted to the order of the Jesuits in 1573. In 1581 he went to Peru. At that time he had already become a priest; and the next year he was appointed superior of the Jesuit establishment at Juli. Earlier that institution had been held to be only a mission, but Torres caused it to be transformed into a permanent residence of the order. He remained in Juli about three years, and was afterwards appointed rector of the college at Quito. On his arrival at Quito he found the inhabitants in revolt as a protest against taxes imposed by Viceroy García Hurtado de Mendoza. Torres’ service in allaying the disturbance was recognized by the king in a decree dated August 18, 1593. His residence in Quito was, however, short, for he was called to the college of Potosí, and held there the post of rector until 1599. In that year he was appointed to accompany the visitador, or inspector, of the province on his tour of inspection. The next year he was elected by the provincial congregation at Lima to the office of procurador, and proceeded to Rome and Madrid. At Madrid he received the favour of the king and of the Duque de Lerma. Taking advantage of this favourable reception, he used his influence to secure certain reforms in American affairs: the abolition of the decree which forbade the planting of vines in America and ordered the destruction of those that had already been planted; the establishment of a college for the sons of caciques in each bishopric of the Indies; the foundation of a college at Salamanca for the education of sons of American nobles; and also the creation of the Jesuit provinces of Nueva Granada and Paraguay.

Returning from Spain, he arrived at Lima on the 22nd of November, 1604, accompanied by fifty Jesuits, to be distributed among the three provinces. The inspector Páez, with whom Torres had been associated, had been appointed provincial, and Torres was now sent to New Granada to organize the newly created province. On this journey he visited the religious house at Cartagena, which he had founded in returning from Europe, and at Bogotá he created the establishment called Santa Clara. After three years spent in New Granada, visiting various parts of the country, he returned to Lima in 1607, and then went to the region of the south-east to organize the province of Paraguay. This province was made to embrace Chile besides Tucumán and the region about the great rivers that flow into the Río de la Plata, but Chile soon acquired a measure of independence as a vice-province. He continued his labours as provincial until 1618, when he retired to Buenos Aires. Later he was called to Chuquisaca, and died there August 8, 1638.

[Sidenote: Torres Bollo’s principal works]

Torres’ practical achievements established his reputation during his lifetime, and his writings have contributed to maintain the memory of his distinction in later generations. His principal work was _Comentarios del Perú; breve relación del fruto que se recoge de los indios_, which appeared first in Italian (Rome, 1603) and immediately afterwards in Spanish, Latin, French, and German. He is sometimes referred to as having also written a _Historia del Perú y de los acontecimientos notables acaecidos en los últimos años_, but this is really the same work as the one quoted above. His other writings, though less well known, are important as historical sources.

V

[Sidenote: Antonio de la Calancha]

Among the historians of the first part of the seventeenth century, who wrote on the affairs of Peru, Antonio de la Calancha occupies a place of special prominence. He was born in 1584 in Chuquisaca. His father was Captain Francisco de la Calancha, a Spaniard; his mother was a creole. At the age of fourteen he became a member of the Augustinian order in his native city. About the same time Miguel de Aguirre, the author of _Población de Valdivia_, was born in Chuquisaca, and also adopted the habit of the Augustinians. From the monastery Calancha went to the Augustinian college of San Ildefonso in Lima. Throughout his life the monastery, either in Lima or elsewhere, remained the principal centre of his activity, from which he went out almost daily to preach and to confess nuns. He was prior in Trujillo when that city was ruined by the earthquake of February 14, 1619. Later he held a similar office in Lima.

[Sidenote: _Crónica moralizada_]

Calancha’s principal and most widely known work is the first volume of the _Crónica moralizada del orden de S. Agustín en el Perú_. It was published in Barcelona in 1639. A second volume was completed about 1653, and the next year the author died suddenly at the age of seventy.[122] Under the title of _Histoire du Pérou_, a French translation of the first volume appeared in Toulouse in 1653.[123]

[Sidenote: Topics of Calancha’s _Crónica_]

Calancha’s first volume embraces the history of the Augustinian order in South America during nearly a hundred years following 1551; the founding of monasteries of the order in Peru, Ecuador, New Granada, and Chile; the succession of priors, and the monks and nuns who were distinguished by their labours or their virtues. It deals, moreover, with the topography and natural products of the country; with the antiquities and traditions of the Inca empire; with the events of the conquest and the internal conflicts of the invaders. The history of the Augustinians in Peru begins with the landing of twelve friars at Callao near the end of May, 1551. A month later these friars were installed in a house purchased with funds from the royal treasury.

[Sidenote: Study of astrology]

Besides his inquiries in ecclesiastical history Calancha was attracted to the study of astrology, from which he presumed to indicate the forces determining the general character of different aggregations of inhabitants within his horizon. Here is the diagnosis of the inhabitants of Potosí:

“In Potosí the signs of Libra and Venus predominate, and thus most of those who live there incline to be covetous, friends of music and festivities, zealous in the pursuit of riches, and somewhat given to lust; their planets are Jupiter and Mercury; the latter inclines them to be wise, prudent and intelligent in their trade and exchanges, and by Jupiter to be magnanimous and of liberal minds.”[124]

[Sidenote: Quality of the _Crónica_]

The delusions of his age were naturally shared by Calancha. His faith, his superstitions, and his disposition to see the law of nature set aside in a miracle at any moment seem to men of this more critical century incompatible with his evident learning and intellectual ability. Yet with all these qualities that seem to indicate a certain mental simplicity, he wrote a great narrative. The nine hundred and twenty-two double-column folio pages of the first volume, barring the record of the delusions and superstitions of his times, do not suggest weakness, but remain as a monument of intellectual vigor.[125]

VI

[Sidenote: Bernabé Cobo]

The natural history of America is especially emphasized by Bernabé Cobo in his _Historia del nuevo mundo_. This work consists of three parts, each part divided into a number of books. The fourteen books of the first part deal with the universe in general, the geography of Peru, the animal kingdom, plants, fishes, birds, insects, reptiles, and quadrupeds; the animals and plants introduced by the Spaniards and their increase; the nature, condition, and customs of the Indians, particularly the Indians of Peru. The second part, in fifteen books, contains an account of the discovery and occupation of the provinces of Peru; the governors, the viceroys, the rule of the Spaniards, and the conduct of the government with respect to the Indians; a description of Peru and a description of America outside of Peru. The third part deals chiefly with Mexico; the conquest and the general character of the country; the governors; the foundation of the city of Mexico; and the dependent islands as far as the Philippines.

[Sidenote: _Historia del nuevo mundo_]

The _Historia del nuevo mundo_, edited by Marcos Jiménez de la Espada, was published in four volumes (1890-1895) at Seville. Extracts from it had already been printed in Madrid and in Lima. These were a _Descripción del Perú_, edited by Antonio José Cavanilles in the _Anales de historia natural_ that was issued at Madrid between 1799 and 1804, and _Historia de Lima_, edited by Manuel González de la Rosa, in the first volume of the _Colección de historiadores del Perú_.

[Sidenote: Cobo’s Career]

[Sidenote: Cobo in Peru & Mexico]

Cobo had prepared himself for his somewhat ambitious undertaking by his studies at the Jesuit college at Lima, by keeping in mind his plan for many years, and by persistent and systematic observations and inquiries during his many and extensive journeys. He was born in Lopero, a town of Jaén in Spain, in 1582. He left Spain for America in 1596. He was carried away on the current of emigration, moved by the desire for adventure and wealth that set strongly towards Peru in the last half of the sixteenth century. He visited the Antilles and Venezuela, and arrived at Lima in the beginning of 1599. Through the influence of a Jesuit whom he met on the voyage from Panama to Callao, he obtained a scholarship, and entered the college of San Martín. Fifteen years later, in 1615, having been admitted to the Society, he was sent to Juli, and for three years was engaged in missionary work at Potosí, Cochabamba and La Paz. From 1618 to 1621 he was rector of the college at Arequipa, and afterwards, for five years, resided at the house of the Jesuits in Pisco. From 1627 to 1630 he was the rector of the college at Callao; but at the end of this service he was sent to Mexico, where he remained for twenty years. At a date not known with certainty he returned to Lima, and died there on the 9th of October, 1657, at the age of seventy-five. During the sixty-one years of his residence in America he gathered the detailed information that was embodied in his _Historia_, which, with the exception of the fragments already mentioned, remained in manuscript two hundred and fifty years.[126]

In the seventh chapter of the _Historia de Lima_ Cobo gives a glimpse of the valley of the Rimac as it appeared to him about a hundred years after the conquest:

[Sidenote: Valley of the Rimac]

“The river of Lima is the larger, the other is called Caraguayllo, and rises in the province of Canta, in the general cordillera, about twenty leagues from the sea, into which it empties two leagues from the mouth of the river of Lima. The irrigating ditches that lead out from these two rivers are innumerable; they are distributed throughout the valley; some are so big at their beginnings that they appear to be rivers of considerable volume, which draw their water from the river of Lima; we call them ditches of Surco, because they lead to a town of that name, the lands of which they irrigate, as well as those of three other towns, and altogether more than forty estates, or ranches, of Spaniards, residents of this city, and there is among them an estate comprising two leagues of land.

[Sidenote: The fair prospect of the Rimac valley]

“Through the efficiency of these canals, or ditches, which develop and fertilize the country, it is at all times green, pleasant, and delightful, offering to the view a fresh and serene spring; and all the country estates have houses whither the residents of Lima were accustomed to go for recreation (without misgivings lest rain might disturb their fiestas and pleasures, for it never rains); they add greatly to the beauty of the valley; especially are very marked the freshness and verdure, which the olive trees, the plantains, and the cane fields give to it. The innumerable gardens of fruit trees, such as orange, quince, pomegranate and fig; vineyards and orchards with all kinds of the fruits of the country and of Spain; the palms from afar seem to dominate the other trees; and the alfalfa fields with their perpetual and luxuriant freshness beautify all the environs of the city. They are so extensive that they occupy a good part of this level region, for the alfalfa is the common fodder of the horses and other work animals of the city and country, so that this city has very agreeable surroundings on all sides.”

VII

[Sidenote: Classes of Jesuit writings]

[Sidenote: _Cartas anuas_; _varones ilustres_]

The most numerous of the Jesuit writings were the _Cartas anuas_, or reports from the several districts concerning the work of the Jesuits and the most important general events of the period covered; the _Vidas de varones ilustres_, or the lives of distinguished Jesuits; and _Cartas de edificación_. Padre Alonso Mesía Venegas’ _Historia de los varones insignes de la provincia del Perú de la Compañía de Jesús_ is a conspicuous instance of the writings of the second class. The author was born in Seville in 1557; went to Peru with the family of Count Villar, the viceroy, in 1585; was educated under Jesuit influence and entered the order; became the procurador of Peru; and subsequently was appointed the rector of the college in Cuzco. In the execution of his duties as procurador he went to Rome and Madrid and on his return to America served as rector of the college at Potosí. It was Venegas who carried to Europe samples of quina, which had already been administered with beneficial results to the Condesa de Chinchón, wife of the viceroy.

[Sidenote: Venegas suspected and banished]

For a period of three years, from 1637 to 1640, Venegas was established at the college of San Pablo. Viceroy Mancera suspected him of being the author of certain reports sent to Spain, describing acts of the viceroy as arbitrary and unjust, and expelled him from Peru. A year later, the really guilty person having been discovered, the order of expulsion was revoked. Venegas then returned to the college of San Pablo, where he died October 17, 1649.

[Sidenote: Juan de Urquiza]

Another teacher and writer of Lima, whose death occurred at Porto Bello twenty years later than that of Venegas, was Juan de Urquiza. He had been engaged for twenty-four years in the college of Lima, and during this period he wrote _Tractatus de profundissima sciencia_ and _Relación de la fundación de la real audiencia del Cuzco_. The second of these documents was published in Madrid in 1795.[127]

VIII

[Sidenote: Pedro Simón’s _Noticias_]

[Sidenote: Life of Simón: his journeys]

[Sidenote: Simón on Lope de Aguirre]

An instance of long-delayed publication is offered by that part of Pedro Simón’s work which now forms the second, third, fourth and fifth volumes of his _Noticias historiales de las conquistas de Tierra Firme en las Indias occidentales_, written in the first half of the seventeenth century and printed in the last decade of the nineteenth century. Simón was born at Parrilla, near Cuenca, in Spain, in 1574, and began writing in 1623 at the age of forty-nine. He was educated in the monastery of San Francisco de Cartagena in Spain, and was sent to South America in 1604 to teach theology and the arts. The early part of Simón’s career in New Granada thus fell in the long incumbency of President Juan de Borja (1605-1626), whom he accompanied in the campaign against the Pijaos Indians. The first part of his _Noticias historiales_ dealt with the history of the early explorations of the territory now claimed by Venezuela, and is based largely on information gathered on a journey through that region. Embarking at Coro, he visited the Antilles, and returned to Bogotá. Among other places reached in his travels were Antioquía, Cartagena, and Santa Marta. During these journeys he collected much of the material for his narrative directly from persons who participated in the events in question, or who had lived near enough to them to hear and remember the current tales about them. Other sources were the writings of Castellanos and a manuscript of Bachiller Francisco Vásquez. “Indeed page after page of Simón is transcribed word for word from the manuscript of Vásquez.”[128] Still another source of information from which Simón may have drawn was Ortiguera’s manuscript account of the “Expedition down the Marañón” which does not differ essentially from that of Vásquez. The narration of the events of this expedition constitutes the most noteworthy section of the first part of Simón’s work. The four volumes more recently published treat of the discoveries made through the valley of the Magdalena, together with the discoveries, explorations, and early history of the regions about Cartagena, Popayán, Antioquía, and Chocó.[129]

[Sidenote: Death of Lope de Aguirre]

Simón’s account of the death of the bloodthirsty Lope de Aguirre furnishes an indication of the general characteristics of our author’s style and a suggestion of the voluminous details of his narratives:[130]

“The maestre del campo, seeing that he had the victory in his own hands, despatched a mounted messenger to inform the governor and others as to the satisfactory state of affairs, and then marched straight on Aguirre’s quarters.

[Sidenote: Aguirre murders his daughter]

[Sidenote: Ledesme scorned by the traitor]

“The traitor, on seeing that he had been abandoned by all except Llamoso, asked him why he had not gone with the rest, and taken advantage of the king’s pardon? Llamoso replied that he and Aguirre had been friends in life, and that he would live or die with him. Aguirre made no reply; he was crestfallen and lost; he went into an apartment where his daughter was (who was now a woman) in company with another female, named Tarralva, of Molina de Aragón in Castile, who had come from Peru in company with the traitors. She cannot have been of great age, for in 1612 I saw her (she was then very young) in the city of Barquisimeto. The devil instigated Aguirre to kill his daughter, so as to crown all his cruel acts with this most bloody and unnatural one, that of the destruction of his own flesh and blood. He said to her, ‘Commend thyself to God, my daughter, for I am about to kill thee, that thou mayest not be pointed at with scorn, nor be in the power of anyone who may call thee the daughter of a traitor.’ Torralva tried to save the girl, and even managed to take the loaded arquebuse from the hands of the father, which he was about to fire at his victim; but Aguirre had a poniard, and with it he took her life. Having done this, he rushed to the door of the apartment; but when he perceived that the king’s forces were upon him, his very hands lost the power of firing off his arquebuse at them, so as to sell his life dearly; and, in the most dejected manner, he threw all his arms on the ground, and went and leant upon a miserable barbacoa or bed place, that was in the room (opposite that in which he had killed his daughter). One of the first to enter (before the maestre del campo), was one Ledesme, a sword-cutler and inhabitant of Tucuyo, who when he saw García de Paredes enter, thinking to make himself of importance, said, ‘Here I have Aguirre as my prisoner.’ The traitor replied, ‘I do not give myself up to such a villain as you,’ and perceiving Paredes, said, ‘Señor maestre del campo, I beg that you, who are a caballero, will respect my rank, and listen, for I have many important things to say, for the good of the king’s service.’

“García de Paredes replied that he should be respected; but some of Aguirre’s former soldiers, fearing if he were allowed to live it might go hard with them—for he might reveal what they had done during the expedition—persuaded the maestre del campo that the best, safest, and most honourable course was to cut off his head at once, and before the governor’s arrival. This view of the case was not displeasing to the maestre del campo, and so he told Aguirre to prepare himself for death, and commanded two of his own Marañónes to shoot him down with their arquebuses. This they did at once and the traitor fell dead at their feet.... A soldier named Custodio Hernández now fell upon the dead body, and, by order of the maestre del campo, cut the head off and taking hold of the hair, which was very long, he brought it out to show it to the governor, who was just arriving thinking to do him honour.”

IX

[Sidenote: Rodríguez Fresle]

[Sidenote: Fresle’s book]

A striking little book of this period, but published later, is _Conquista y descubrimiento del nuevo reino de Granada_ by Rodríguez Fresle, sometimes referred to as _El Carnero_. It was written in the first half of the seventeenth century between April, 1636, and June, 1638, but it was not printed until 1859. The author was born in Bogotá April 25, 1566. His father was one of the conquistadores of the country. For a time he was in the service of Alonso Pérez de Salazar, a judge of the audiencia of his native city, and he accompanied him to Spain when he was promoted to be fiscal of the Council of the Indies. His patron died, however, six months after his appointment, and Rodríguez Fresle was left, as he said, “como hijo de oidor muerto.” He was left in poverty, and remained six years in Spain. After his return to New Granada he was engaged in agriculture, but there appears to be little information extant concerning the success of his undertakings in this field, or, in fact, concerning the later years of his life, and the date of his death is unknown. For a brief period of his later life, beginning the day he completed his seventieth year, he was occupied in writing his chronicle. Vergara refers to the author’s style as “natural y correcto, animadísimo a las veces”; no writer of his time excelled him in the _local flavour which he knew how to give_ to his lively narrative.[131]

[Sidenote: Garzón de Tahuste]

[Sidenote: _Poema heroico de San Ignacio_]

Two works by Alonso Garzón de Tahuste, belonging properly to this period, were lost as manuscripts. They were _Sucesión de prelados y jueces seculares del nuevo reino de Granada_ and _Historia antigua de los Chibchas_. The first of these existed in two copies, one in Madrid, used by Piedrahita, and the other in Bogotá, used by Zamora. Tahuste was born at Timaná about 1558, studied in Bogotá, and was for fifty years Cura Rector of the Cathedral of Bogotá, from 1585. The loss of these and other manuscripts, many of which would have had very little influence on the progress of literature, was to a certain extent due to the lack of facilities for printing in New Granada, and in a measure also to the neglect suffered by collections of books and papers in periods of social disturbance. One of the poems of the last half of the seventeenth century rescued from complete oblivion was the _Poema heroico de San Ignacio_ by Hernando Domínguez Camargo. It was published in Madrid in 1666, although not complete. It was written in octave stanzas, but does not rise above the lower levels of mediocrity.[132]

X

[Sidenote: Quiros’ Voyages]

Interesting narratives of adventure are contained in the third volume of Pedro Fernández de Quiros’ _Historia del descubrimiento de las regiones austriales_, edited by Justo Zaragoza (Madrid, 1876). Parts of the contents of these volumes were published by the Hakluyt Society (London, 1904) in an English translation by Sir Clements Markham, entitled, _The Voyages of Pedro Fernández de Quiros 1595 to 1606_. One of the most striking episodes of this work is the story of the dreadful voyage from the Santa Cruz islands to Manila, setting forth the almost complete destruction of the ship, the death of Adelantado Mendaña, the accession of his widow to the chief command, the starvation and death that exhausted and depleted the crew, and the hungry survivors’ final arrival in the Philippines. Here they were at first uncertain whether they had reached a friendly country or that of an enemy, for it had been reported in Peru, “that Japan was preparing an attack with a great fleet.”[133]

[Sidenote: Half-starved crew in the Philippines]

But they found the natives to be “peaceful Christians who brought fowls and pigs at two or three reals a piece together with palm wine, by drinking which some of us talked various languages; also many cocoa nuts, plantains, sweet canes, papayas, roots, water in bamboo joints, and fuel. They took in exchange reals, knives, and glass beads, which they value more than silver. During these days and nights the galley fire was never put out, nor was there any cessation of kneading and cooking, or of eating the boiled of one and the roast of another, so that they were eating day and night.... The sick, being so little accustomed to abundance of food, and eating without moderation, did themselves serious harm; three or four even died of it.”[134] In fact, fifty died on the voyage from Santa Cruz to Manila, where the vessel arrived on the 11th of February, 1596.

Quiros was by birth a Portuguese and was born in Evora in 1565. He was brought up in Lisbon, and at the age of twenty-four, in 1589, he married Ana Chacón, of Madrid. Six years later he accepted the post of chief pilot in the ship destined by Alvaro de Mendaña to take a colony to the Solomon Islands. The prospects for a peaceful voyage were not favourable. Mendaña’s wife and her two brothers and a quarrelsome old soldier as camp master offered adequate material for misunderstandings and hostility. The death of Mendaña and his brother-in-law Lorenzo Barreto, seemed to diminish somewhat the elements of conflict, but the arbitrary and unreasonable conduct of the widow in command, and the lack of discipline kept the ship’s company in turmoil and sometimes carried it to the verge of mutiny.

[Sidenote: Quiros and his great vision]

[Sidenote: Quiros furnished ships by the king]

Out of the experience of this voyage there came to Quiros the vision of a great antarctic continent stretching across the southern part of the earth from America to Asia. By proving to the world the existence of this continent he hoped to obtain for himself a place with Columbus and Da Gama in the list of the great discoverers. To acquire the means that would enable him to carry out his proposed undertaking he visited the viceroy in Lima, presented his project to the pope at Rome, and from Clement VIII and the duke Sesa he received letters recommending him to the Spanish government. In spite of the demoralization of the the court and the rapid decline of the government towards bankruptcy there remained still the hope of adding to the glory that Columbus had conferred upon the nation; and through the council of State the king issued an order to the viceroy of Peru instructing him to fit out two ships at Callao to enable Quiros to undertake a voyage for the discovery of the antarctic continent. The inevitable delays followed. Finally two ships were prepared, and in December, 1605, Quiros was ready to set sail to realize the object of his vision. A narrative of this voyage is found in the _Historia_ edited by Zaragoza.[135]

Quiros’ return, his disappointment, the poverty of his later years, and his many vain appeals to the king for further assistance are incidents in the melancholy ending of a great visionary.

[Sidenote: Pedro Gobeo de Victoria]

The _Naufragio y viaje en las costas del Perú_, by Padre Pedro Gobeo de Victoria, was one of the more widely circulated narratives of personal adventure. The author, whose experience furnished abundant material for his story, was born in Seville in 1560. He went to America at the age of thirteen and during his journeys was at various times engaged in combats with pirates, suffered shipwreck, and encountered about all the other perils known to land or sea. After many years of a troubled existence, he entered the order of the Jesuits at Lima in 1597. For thirteen years he enjoyed a comparatively peaceful existence. He returned to Spain in 1610. He died at Seville at the age of seventy. His book has been translated into various languages. A Latin translation was published in 1647, of which a new edition was issued in 1688. The first edition in Spanish appeared in 1610.[136]

About the middle of the seventeenth century attention was again directed to the history and institutions of the Inca Kingdom, this time by Fernando Montesinos, who wrote _Memorias antiguas históricas y políticas del Perú_. This treatise shows a large use of the imagination, and in this respect differs from the writings of Cieza de León and Sarmiento. The author passes in review some of the earlier writers on Peruvian history. He laments the confidence given to Garcilaso de la Vega; reproaches Xerés for his brevity; praises the accuracy of Zárate; finds Cieza de León’s descriptions true; and regards Las Casas as merely a declaimer. He sets down a long list of kings not discovered by other historians. His imagination is inflamed by the idea of much gold, and is given full play in his description of El Dorado, which he believes to exist in the interior of the continent. His fancy, moreover, determines the character of his work called _Ofir de España o memorias antiguas y nuevas del Perú_. He finds Peru to have been the Ophir of the Old Testament, and describes the route by which Solomon’s fleet reached that country. But Montesinos descends to the dreadful reality in his description of the auto de la fe held in Lima January 23, 1639. On this occasion eighty persons were sentenced, of whom twelve were burned. Certain practical treatises on metals were the result of his diligent literary activity; the titles of two of these are the following: _Directorio de beneficiadores de metales y arte de ellos_ and _Conservación del azogue que se pierde sobreaguado entre lamas y relaves_. The description of the auto de la fe was published in Madrid in 1640. A translation of the _Memorias_ into French was published by Ternaux-Compans in 1840, entitled _Mémoires historiques sur l’ancien Pérou_. In 1920 an English translation was issued in London by the Hakluyt Society.