160 



disorder, which from its long continuation 

 has been more fatal than any other to the 

 human race, had been a few years before intro- 

 duced into the northern parts of Chili, where it 

 has since from time to time re-appeared, attended 

 with great mortality to the natives. The southern 

 provinces have for more than a century been 

 exempted from its ravages, by the precautions 

 employed by the inhabitants, to prevent all com- 

 munication with the infected countries, as is the 

 case with the plague in Europe. 



Whilst Villagran was employing all his at- 

 tention, in maintaining as far as possible the 

 Spanish power in those parts, and in opposing 

 those victorious enemies who were endeavouring 

 to annihilate it, he saw himself on the point of 

 heing compelled to turn his arms against his own 

 countrymen. Francis Aguirre, who in Val- 

 divia's instructions had been named the second 

 as governor, on learning the death of that ge- 

 neral, quitted Cujo, where it appears he effected 

 nothing of importance, and with sixty men who 

 were left of his detachment, returned to Chili, 

 determined to possess himself of the government 

 cither by favour or force. His pretensions must 



outrage, entered the Araucanian territory, and thus, owing to 

 the suspicion of these barbarians, was a war excited, wiiich 

 was continued until Don Alonzo de Rivera returned a second 

 time to assume the government of the ]i'mgdom."-^^JerQnim9 

 Quiroga's Memoirs of the IVar of Chili, chap. 74r. 



