INTRODUCTION. 3 



the opportunity to escape, but first needlessly stabbed her son, and 

 then fled to Cuzco. 



That city was then governed by Castro, the successor of Pizarro, 

 who granted the assistance desired by Valdivia ; and Monroy led a 

 small body of recruits by land to Copiapo, while a considerable force 

 was conveyed by sea, under Juan Baptista Pastene, a noble Genoese. 

 Meantime Valdivia had obtained possession of the rich gold mines 

 of the valley of Quillota ; and, sensible that nothing effectual could 

 be done without a communication by sea with Peru, had begun to 

 build a vessel at the mouth of the river of Aconcagua, which rises 

 near the Cumbre pass of the Andes, traverses the whole valley of 

 Quillota, and falls into the dangerous bay of Concon, between the 

 harbours of Valparaiso and Quintero, neither of which receive any 

 considerable rivers. 



On receiving the reinforcement from Castro, Valdivia imme- 

 diately ordered Pastene to explore the coast of Chile, as far as the 

 straits of Magellan ; and then despatched him to Peru for fresh 

 succours, as the natives became daily more enterprising, and had 

 recently put to death the whole body of soldiers stationed at the 

 gold mines near Quillota, burned the vessel which was just finished, 

 and destroyed the store-houses at the mouth of the river. On re- 

 ceiving news of this disaster, Valdivia marched from Santiago, 

 revenged the death of his people by exercising as much cruelty as 

 possible towards the unhappy Quillotanes, and built a fort for the 

 protection of the miners. Thence he advanced to meet his new 

 reinforcements under Villagran and Escobar, who brought him 300 

 men from Peru ; and desiring to have an establishment in the north- 

 ern part of Chile, he pitched upon the beautiful plain at the mouth 

 of the Coquimbo, where he established the colony of La Serena, 

 commonly called Coquimbo, in 1543. 



The year following was marked by gaining over the Promaucian 

 Indians to the Spanish cause, to which they have ever since faithfully 

 adhered, impelled probably by their jealousy of their immediate 

 neighbours the Araucanians. Valdivia then pursued his conquests 



b 2 



