ENTRANCES INTO THE MOUNTAINOUS TERRITORIES OF PERU. 451 



Providence, embarked at Ouimiri, and after having explored every part of the 

 river Perene, prosecuted their voyage by the Paro and Ucayali. Having reached 

 the vicinity of the river Aguaitai*, they were slain by the cruel Sipibos, or 

 Callisecas. 



The common report, that the mountain of salt abounded in mines of gold, ex- 

 cited at that time the avarice of several Spaniards, vs^ho, having selected a chief, 

 and prevailed on two Franciscan monks to bear them company, proceeded 

 thitherf. Although their presence gave great umbrage to the Indians, the latter 

 dissembled, and treated them with an apparent friendship and submission. The 

 Spaniards being desirous to penetrate still further into the mountainous territory, 

 embarked with the two monks, and proceeded on their voyage, with the aid of the 

 barbarians, who still persisted in their fiftitious friendship until the third day of 

 the navigation, when they recommended to them to lay aside their arms, on the 

 pretext that they might, with more convenience, be stowed in the canoes, and would 

 be less exposed to the wet. The Spaniards having yielded to their treacherous sugges- 

 tion, came to a winding of the river, where an ambush had been provided. They 

 were there, as well as the monks, slain by the arrows of the Indians, who had con- 

 cealed themselves on the bank, with the exception of two, who had the presence 

 of mind to snatch up each of them a pistol, with which they made head against the 

 savages. The latter, terrified at the fire-arms, allowed them to- pass unmolested, 

 and fled to the mountains, where they concealed themselves. By this miscarriage, 

 and others which succeeded, the conversion of the heathens inhabiting the moun- 

 tain of salt was irrecoverably lost:j;. 



In the year 1671, friar Alonzo Robles, accompanied by several priests and lay 

 brothers, proceeded from Huancabamba to the mountain of salt, where he suc- 

 ceeded in the conversion of eight hundred Indians belonging to the tribes of 

 Omages and Pacages§. In the year 1673, he augmented his spiritual conquest 

 by upwards of two hundred Indians, whom he fixed in a town to which he gave 

 the name of Santa Rosa of Quimiri, at a little distance from the spot where he 

 had made a settlement for the former. Other barbarians belonging to the Omages 

 tribe were converted daily, until at length several individuals, whose bounden duty 

 it was to watch over the prosperity of the church and state, instigated by base mo- 

 tives of self interest, obtained, in the year 1674||, the government and diredlion 



* Amich, p. 51. 

 § Tena, lib.i. p. 31. 



f Amich, p. 6. 

 |{ Amich, p. 33. 

 3 m2 



\ A. lich, p. 6. 



of 



