COUNT GALVE VICEROY TARRAHUMARIC REVOLT. 211 



and inlets of the eastern shores, as far as Florida, in order to 

 dislodge the intruders ; and, having obtained control over the 

 Indians of Coahuila he established a strong garrison, and founded 

 a colonial settlement, called the town of Monclova, with a hundred 

 and fifty families, in which there were two hundred and seventy 

 men capable of bearing arms against the French whom he expect- 

 ed to encounter in that quarter. 



The Conde de Monclova contemplated various plans for the con- 

 solidation and advancement of New Spain, but before two years 

 had expired he was relieved from the government and transferred 

 to the viceroyalty of Peru. 



Don Gaspar de Sandoval Silva y Mendoza, 

 Count de Galve. 

 XXX. Viceroy of New Spain. 

 1688. 



The Conde de Galve entered upon his government on the 17th 

 of September, 1688; and even before the departure of his predeces- 

 sor for Peru, he learned that the fears of that functionary had been 

 realized by the discovery of attempts by the French to found settle- 

 ments in New Spain. The governor of Coahuila in the course of 

 his explorations in the wilderness found a fort which had been 

 commenced, and the remains of a large number of dead French- 

 men, who had no doubt been engaged in the erection of the strong- 

 hold when they fell under the blows and arrows of the savages. 



Besides this intrusion in the north, from which the Spaniards 

 were, nevertheless, somewhat protected by the Indians who hated 

 the French quite as much as they did the subjects of Spain, — the 

 viceroy heard, moreover, that the Tarrahumare and Tepehuane 

 tribes had united with other wild bands of the north-west, and 

 Were in open rebellion. Forces were immediately despatched 

 against the insurgents, but they fared no better than the Spanish 

 troops had done in previous years in New Mexico. The love of 

 liberty, or the desire of entire freedom from labor, was in this case, 

 as in the former, the sole cause of the insurrection. When the 

 blow was struck, the Indians fled to their fastnesses, and when the 

 regular soldiery arrived on the field to fight them according to the 

 regular laws of war, the children of the forest were, as usual, no 

 where to be found ! Nor is it likely that the rebellion would 

 have been easily suppressed, or improbable that those provinces 



