The Voyage of Aguirre in Search of El Dorado. 211 



the State, left Peru in search of certain countries, of which some 

 Brazilian Indians had given a tempting description. After 

 various difficulties and dangers, he made his way from Lima to 

 a spot on the Amazon, in the interior of the continent, and ra- 

 ther less than half way towards the mouth of the gigantic river. 

 The young knight, who was accompanied by a beautiful lady, 

 the Doiia Inez de Atienza, appears to have conducted his 

 operations with considerable skill. He was a brave and accom- 

 plished soldier, but far too mild a commander for the turbulent 

 marauders he had undertaken to lead. Such an expedition, in 

 imperfect vessels, through an unknown country, could not be 

 devoid of hardships, and as these were encountered, mutinous 

 feelings, which had manifested themselves from the beginning, 

 gathered increasing strength, until, on the 1st January, 1561, 

 TJrsua and his lieutenant were murdered, and one Don Fernando 

 chosen as chief, while Aguirre was appointed " master of the 

 camp." The new commander commenced his administration 

 by calling a council, at which he proposed that all the officers 

 should sign a document incriminating TJrsua, and representing 

 his assassination as a necessary act done in a spirit of loyal 

 obedience to the King of Spain. By this trick, Fernando hoped to 

 secure the favour of his sovereign as well as the profit of the anti- 

 cipated discovery of the golden lands. Such a scheme might have 

 succeeded with villains of the common sort, but the new camp 

 master was a monster of a different stamp, and with the reckless 

 daring of unblushing infamy, he signed himself the f ' Traitor 

 Aguirre," and ridiculed the idea of employing deceit. From 

 this moment he became the real leader of the expedition, and 

 from time to time he kept up his prestige by a series of revolting 

 murders and atrocities, which are very wearisome and disgust- 

 ing reading in Father Simon's memoirs. Of course, Don Fer- 

 nando did not escape from so dangerous a rival, and not even 

 the beauty and sorrows of Doiia Inez could preserve her life 

 from this tiger chief. As a career of crime, that of Aguirre is 

 most extraordinary, and it gives us no little insight into the 

 character of the kind of persons who joined these adventures, to 

 find that such a mad monster should have been able to retain 

 his command. It is not our intention to follow his guilty steps ; 

 but it may afford some consolation to know that both he and 

 his principal followers were finally disposed of in pursuance 

 of the decrees of the King of Spain. 



In a geographical point of view, the voyage of Aguirre has 

 been invested with a fictitious importance by a theory which 

 Mr. Markham espouses, and according to which he managed to 

 pass from the Amazon to the Orinoco by way of the Rio Negro 

 and the Cassiquiare Canal. Humboldt, who was acquainted 

 with Simon's book, assigned to him a much more probable route, 



