When

disposition, these people are the most industrious and commercial of any of the savages. in their tents they are never idle. The women weave cloths of various colours; the men occupy themselves in making baskets and a variety of beautiful articles of wood, feathers, or skins, which are highly prized by their neighbours. They assemble every year on the Spanish frontier, where they hold a kind of fair that ususally continues for fifteen or twenty days. Hither they bring fossil salt, gypsum, pitch, bed-coverings, ponchos, skins, wool, bridle-reins beautifully wrought of plaited leather, baskets, wooden vessels, feathers, ostrich eggs, horses, cattle, and a variety of other articles; and receive in exchange, wheat, wine, and the manufactures of Europe. They are very skillful in traffic, and can with difficulty be overreached. For fear of being plundered by those who believe that any thing is lawful against infidels, they never all drink at the same time, but separate themselves into several companies, and while some keep guard the others indulge themselves. in the pleasures of wine. They are generally humane, complacent, lovers of justice, and possess all those good qualities that are produced or perfected by commerce.

The Chiquillanians, whom some have erroneously supposed to be a part of the Pehuenches, Hive to the north-east of then, on the eastern

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borders of the Andes. These are the most savage, and, of course, the least numerous of any of the Chilians, for it is an established fact that the ruder the state of savage life, the more unfavourable is it to population. They go almost naked, merely wrapping around them the skin of the guanco.* It is observable that all the Chilians who inhabit the eastern valleys of the Andes, both the Pehuenches, the Puelches, and the Huilliches, as well as the Chiquillanians, are much redder than those of their countrymen who dwell to the westward of that mountain, these mountaineers dress themselves in skins, paint their faces, live in general by hunting, and lead a wandering and unsettled life. They are no other, as I have hitherto observed, than the so much celebrated Patagonians, who have occasionally been seen near the straits of Magellan, and have been at one time described as giants, and at another as men a little above the common stature. It is true, however, that they are, generally speaking, of a lofty stature and great strength.

* The anonymous account of Chili published at Bologna in speaking of this nation, observes, that their language is guttural, and a very corrupt jargon of the Chilian,

CHAP. IV.

Government of the Marquis de Villar hermosa ; His Successes against Paynenancu; Capture and Death of that General; Enterprises of the Toqui Cayancura and his Son Nangoniel; Landing of the English in Chili; Operations of the Toqui Cadeguala.

As soon as information was received in Spain of the death of Quiroga, the king sent out as governor to Chili, Don Alonzo Sotomayor, with six hundred regular troops, who, in 1583, landed at Buenos Ayres, and from thence proceeded to Santiago. He immediately sent his brother Don Louis, whom he appointed to the new office of colonel of the kingdom, to succour the cities of Villarica and Valdivia, which were besieged by the Araucanians. That officer raised the sieges of those places after having twice defeated Paynenancu, who attempted to oppose his march. Notwithstanding these reverses the enterprising Toqui turned his arms against Tiburcio Heredia, and afterwards against Antonio Galleguillos, who were ravaging the country with a large body of cavalry; by these he was likewise de

feated, but the victors paid dearly for their victory.

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In the meantime the governor, having driven off the Pehuenches who infested the new settlement of Chillan, entered the Araucanian territory with seven hundred Spaniards, and a great number of auxiliaries, resolved to pursue the rigorous system of making war which had been adopted by Don Garcia, in preference to the mild and humane policy of his immediate predecessors. The province of Encol was the first that experienced the effects of his severity. He laid it entirely waste with fire and sword. Those who were taken prisoners were either hung or sent aw with their hands cut off, in order to intimidate their countrymen. The provinces of Puren, Ilicura, and Tucapel, would have shared the same fate, if the inhabitants had not secured themselves by flight before the arrival of the enemy, after setting on fire their houses and their crops. In the last province they took only three of the inhabitants prisoners, who were impaled. Notwithstanding these severities, a number of mustees and mulattoes joined the Araucanians, and even some Spaniards, among whom was Juan Sanchez, who acquired great reputation.

The Araucanian general, impelled either by his natural audacity, or by despair, on finding himself fallen in the estimation of the native in

habitants, opposed on the confines of the province of Arauco the whole Spanish army with only eight hundred men. They nevertheless. fought with such resolution that the Spaniards were not able to break them till after an obstinate contest of several hours, in which they lost a considerable number of men. Almost all the Araucanians were slain, Paynenançu himself was taken prisoner, and immediately executed. The victorious governor then rebuilt the fortress of Arauco, appointing the quarter-master Garcia Ramon to command it, and encamped on the shore of the river Carampangui.

The Araucanian valour, which had been depressed by the imprudent conduct of the mustee general, was excited anew by the elevation to that dignity, in 1585, of Cayancaru, one of their own countrymen, an Ulmen of the district of Mariguenu. One hundred and fifty messengers, furnished with symbolical arrows, were immediately dispatched to various quarters in search of aid. Every thing Every thing was put in motion, and in a short time a respectable army was assembled. The new Toqui determined to attack at midnight the Spanish camp, which still occupied the post of Karampangui, of whose exact situation he was informed by means of a spy. For this purpose he formed his army into three divsions, and gave the command of them to three valiant officers, Lonconobal, Antulevu, and Tarochina.

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