CHAP. VIII. COMPRISES A PERIOD OF FOURTEEN YEARS, Daring Enterprises of the Toquis Lientur and Putapichion. LONCOTHEGUA having resigned, the chief command of the Araucanian armies was conferred upon Lientur. The military expeditions of this Toqui were always so rapid and unexpected, that the Spaniards gave him the appellation of the wizard. He appointed Levipillan his lieutenant-general, by whom he was perfectly seconded in the execution of all his designs. Notwithstanding the Bio-bio was lined with sentinels and fortresses, he always contrived some means of passing and repassing it without experiencing any loss. His first enterprise was the capture of four hundred horses intended to remount the Spanish cavalry. He next ravaged the province of Chillan, and the Corregidor having marched to meet him, he entirely defeated and slew him, together with two of his sons, and several of the magistrates of the city. Five days after this action he proceeded towards St. Philip of Austria, or Yumbel, with six hundred infantry and four hundred horse, whom he sent out in several divisions to ravage the country in the vicinity, leaving only two hundred to guard the narrow pass of the Congrejeras. Rebolledo, the commander of the place, provoked at his temerity, dispatched seventy horse to take possession of the abovementioned defile and cut off his retreat, but they were received with such bravery by the troops of Lientur, that they were compelled to retire for security to a hill, after having lost eighteen of their number, with their captain. Rebolledo sent to their assistance three companies of infantry, and the remainder of the cavalry. Lientur, who by this time had arrived with all his army, immediately formed his troops in battle array, fell upon the Spaniards, notwithstanding the continual fire of their musketry, and at the first encounter put the cavalry to flight. The infantry, being thus left exposed, were almost all cut in pieces; but thirty-six prisoners were taken by the victors, who were distributed in the several provinces of the country. Had Lientur at that time invested the place, it must inevitably have fallen into his hands: but, for some reason which does not appear, he de ferred the siege until the following year, when his attempts to take it were rendered ineffectual by the valiant defence of Ximenes, the commander. This failure was, however, recompensed by the capture of Neculguenu, the garrison of which he put to the sword, and made prisoners of all the auxiliaries who dwelt in the neighbourhood. These successes were followed by many others equally favourable, whence, according to contemporary writers, who are satisfied with mentioning them in general terms, he was considered as the darling child of fortune. Ulloa, more a victim to the mortification and anxiety caused by the successes of Lientur than to sickness, died on the 20th of November,* * About this time the governor of Peru, D. Geronimo Luiz de Cabrera, made an expedition in search of the city of the Cesares-the El Dorado of Chili. In Charles 5th's reign the bishop of Placencia is said to have sent out four ships to the Moluccas; when they had advanced about twenty leagues within the straits of Magalhaens, three of them were driven on shore and lost, but the crew escaped, The fourth got back into the North Atlantick, and when the weather abated again attempted the passage, and reached the place where her comrades had been lost. The men were still on the shore, and entreated to be taken on board; this was impossible there was neither room nor provisions, and there they were left. An opinion prevailed that they got into the interior of Chili, settled there, and became a nation who are called the Cesares. It was believed that their very ploughshares are of gold. Adventurers reported that they had been near enough to hear the sound of their bells; and it 1620, and was, according to the established custom, succeeded by the eldest of the auditors, Christopher de la Cerda, a native of Mexico. For the better defence of the shores of the Biobio, he built there the fort which still goes by his name; he had also a number of encounters with Lientur, and during the short period of his government, which continued but a year, was constantly occupied in protecting the Spanish settlements. His successor, Pedro Sores Ulloa, was said that men of a fair complexion had been taken who were supposed to be of this nation.-Ovalle, L. 1. c. 5. do. L. 1. c. 10. The existence of this city was long believed. Even after Feyjor had attempted to disprove, the Jesuit Mascardi went in search of it with a large party of Puelches, and was killed by the Poy-yas on his return from the fruitless quest-Dobreyhoffer, T. 3, 407. The groundwork of this belief is satisfactorily explained by Falkner, c. 4. p. 112. "The report," he says, "that there is a nation in these parts, descended from Europeans, or the remains of shipwrecks, is, I verily believe, entirely false and groundless, and occasioned by misunderstanding the accounts of the Indians, For if they are asked in Chili concerning any inland settlement of Spaniards, they give an account of towns and white people, meaning Buenos Ayres, &c. &c. and so vice versa, not having the least idea that the inhabitants of these two distant countries are known to each other. Upon my questioning the Indians on this subject, I found my conjecture to be right; and they acknowledged, upon my naming Chiloé, Valdivia, &c. (at which they seemed amazed) that those were the places they had mentioned ander the description of European settlements."-E. E. continued the war with similar fortune, until his death, which happened on the 11th of September, 1624. He was succeeded by his brother-in-law, Francisco Alava, who retained the office only six months. Lientur at length, advanced in years, and fatigued with his continual exertions, resigned, in 1625, the chief command to Putapichion, a young man, of a character for courage and conduct very similar to his own, who had passed the early part of his youth among the Spaniards, as a slave to one Diego Truxillo. The Spaniards also possessed at the same time a commander of uncommon valour and military skill this was Don Louis de Cordova, lord of Carpio, and nephew to the viceroy of Peru, by whom he was abundantly supplied with warlike stores and soldiers, and ordered, in the name of the court, not to confine himself to defensive war, but to attack directly the Araucanian territory in various quarters. His first care on his arrival at Conception was to introduce a reform of the military, and to pay the soldiers the arrears that were due to them. Those offices that were vacant he conferred on the Creoles, or descendants of the conquerors, who had been for the most part neglected; and by this measure, not only obtained their esteem, but that of all the inhabitants. After having established order in the government, he directed his cousin Alonzo Cordova, whom he had ap |