410 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 102 



The food they Hved on was corn, cassava, fruit, and fish. We did 

 not Stop at this settlement but went ahead. 



Chapter X 



Continuing the Description of the Maranon Expedition. 



1202. After leaving this settlement we traveled for 2 days through 

 uninhabited country ; and since there were many of us, we were hard 

 put to it, for we were over 900 persons, and we could not fish in 

 the river, which was now so narrow — it was 4 or 5 leagues — that 

 the currents were very strong, and we should have been much worse 

 off if we had not come so well supplied with provisions. Within 

 these 2 days we reached the Province of Cararo, as our Indian 

 interpreters told us we should within that time, and so it came about ; 

 and over 300 canoes put out to welcome us in the middle of the 

 river; those with fewest in them had 10 and others 12 savages, all 

 shouting loudly "Capito ! Capito !" meaning Captain ; and they made 

 Gov. Pedro de Ursua a great gift of over 50 canoes of fish, corn, 

 yams, and peanuts, and they did the same for most of the soldiers, 

 for they were very eager for the trade goods which the Governor 

 and the soldiers gave them. There in front of them all the harque- 

 bussiers fired a salvo for Gov. Pedro de Ursua, and many trumpets 

 and drums were heard on the river. Plereupon Lope de Aguirre 

 again remarked to Juan Alonso de la Bandera and Cristobal de 

 Chaves that things would certainly seem better in the plaza at Lima 

 than where they were there. 



They carried the Governor off to lodge in a very good chief's 

 cabin, and the force lodged in the other cabins which were very 

 good ; the settlement was very extensive, of over 8,000 Indians. 

 The chieftains came all day long to visit the Governor, certainly 

 excellent people, of excellent disposition and very well-disposed ; 

 they were all dressed in fine, gay cotton shirts decorated with colored 

 embroidery after the fashion of Peru ; they all wore in their nostrils 

 spirals of very fine high-grade gold, and plaques on their breasts 

 and little gold eagles and other valuable pieces of jewelry. The 

 soldiers begged the Governor that they might explore and subdue 

 that country, for with such nice and intelligent and orderly people 

 and such a rich and prosperous country, it stood to reason that all 

 the surrounding region was very rich and prolific country, for that 

 fine gold could not come from the Kingdoms of Peru ; we were over 

 300 leagues down the Maranon and 500 from the Rio de Los Moti- 

 lones from whose province we had set out and where we had built 



