^o6 ULLOA*S VOYAGE TO SOUTH AMERICA. 



place where this river joined another ; the Indians having informed him that there 

 he would meet with a great plenty. The command of this veflel he gave to Fran- 

 eifco de Orellana, his lieutenant-general and confident, recommending to him all 

 the diligence and punctuality which their extremity required. After failing eighty 

 leagues Orellana arrived at the junftion of the two rivers, but met with nothing of 

 what he had been fent for ; being difappointed in the provifions he fought, the trees 

 not bearing any fruit, or the Indians having already gathered it. His return to 

 Pizarro feemed very difficult, if not impracticable, on account of the rapidity of the 

 current ; befides, he could not think of returning, without bringing with him that 

 relief fo earneftly expeded ; lb that, after long debating the matter with himfelf, he 

 determined, without the privity of his companions, to fail with the current to the 

 fea. But this could not long remain a fecret, the hoifting the fails fufficiently demon- 

 ftrating his intentions ; and fome vehemently oppofmg fuch a defertion, as they called 

 it, were near coming to blows. But at length Orellana, by plaufible reafons and 

 magnificent promifes, pacified them ; and the oppofition ceafing, he continued his 

 voyage, after fetting afhore Hernando Sanchez de Vargas to perifli with hunger, as 

 being the ring-leader of the malcontents ; and perfifting in his inveftives againft Orel- 

 lana's projeft. 



Pizarro, furprifed at having no account of Orellana, marched by land to the place 

 where he had ordered him, and near it met with Hernando Sanchez de Vargas, who 

 acquainted him with the whole affair of the veflel ; at which Pizarro feeing himfelf 

 without refource, a confiderable part of his men dead, the other fo exhaufled with 

 fatigue and hunger that they dropt down as they marched, and thofe in the beft ftate 

 reduced to mere fkeletons ; he determined to return to Quito, which, after fatigues 

 and hardfhips even greater than the former, he at laft reached with a handful of men 

 in the year 1542, having only reconnoitred fome rivers, and the adjacent country; a 

 fervice difproportionate to the lofs of fo many men, and the miferies fuffered in this 

 enterprife. 



This was the firft expedition of any confequence, to make difcovery of the river 

 Maranon : and if the fuccefs of Pizarro was not equal to his force and zeal, he was at 

 leaft the inftrument of its being entirely accomplifhed by another ; and to his refolu- 

 tion in preffing forward through difficulties and dangers, and by his expedient of 

 building the armed veflel, mull, in fome meafure, be attributed the happy event of 

 Orellana's voyage, who, with a conft:ancy which fiiowed him worthy of his general's 

 favour, reconnoitred the famous river of the Amazons through its whole extent, the 

 adjacent country, its innumerable iflands, and the multitude and difference of nations 

 inhabiting its banks. But this remarkable expedition deferves a more particular 

 detail. 



Orellana began to fail down the river in the year 1541 ; and in his progrefs through 

 the feveral nations along its banks, entered into a friendly conference with many, 

 having prevailed upon them to acknowledge the fovereignty of the Kings of Spain 

 formally, and with the confent of the caciques took possession of it. Others, not fo 

 docile, endeavoured to oppofe, with a large fleet of canoes, his further navigation : 

 and with thefe he had feveral fharp encounters. In one Indian nation bravery was fo 

 general, that the women fought with no lefs intrepidity than the men ; and by their 

 dexterity Ihowed that they were trained up to the exercife of arms. This occafioned 

 Orellana to call them Amazons ; which name alfo pafled to the river. The ' fcene of 

 this action, according to Orellana's own account, and the defcription of the place, is 

 thought to have been at fome difl:ance below the jundion of the Negro and Maranon. 



I Thus 



