The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]

These celebrated words, preserved in all the records of the times, and repeated by all historians, were the first indications the Spaniards had of Peru. They were much excited on hearing them, and endeavored to extract from the youth further information of the country he had mentioned; he insisted on the necessity of having at least a thousand men, to give them a chance of success in its subjugation, offered to serve them himself as their guide, to aid them with his father's men, and to put his life in pledge for the veracity of his words.

Balboa was transported by the prospect of glory and fortune which opened before him; he believed himself already at the gates of the East Indies, which was the desired object of the government and the discoverers of that period; he resolved to return in the first place to the Darien to raise the spirits of his companions with these brilliant hopes, and to make all possible preparations for realizing them. He remained, nevertheless, yet a few days with the caciques; and so strict was the friendship he had contracted with them that they and their families were baptized, Careta taking in baptism the name of Fernando, and Comogre that of Carlos. Balboa then returned to the Darien, rich in the spoils of Ponca, rich in the presents of his friends, and still richer in the golden hopes which the future offered him.

At this time, and after an absence of six months, arrived the magistrate Valdivia, with a vessel laden with different stores; he brought likewise great promises of abundant aid in provisions and men. The succors, however, which Valdivia brought were speedily consumed; their seed, destroyed in the ground by storms and floods, promised them no resource whatever; and they returned to their usual necessitous state. Balboa then consented to their extending their incursions to more distant lands, as they had already wasted and ruined the immediate environs of Antigua, and he sent Valdivia to Spain to apprise the admiral of the clew he had gained to the South Sea, and the reported wealth of those regions. Valdivia took with him fifteen thousand pieces of gold, which belonged to the King as his fifth, and a charge to petition for the thousand men which were necessary to the expedition, and to prevent the adventurers being compelled to exterminate the tribes and caciques of the Indians, for otherwise, being so few in number, they would be driven, to avoid their own destruction, to the slaughter of all who would not submit themselves. This commission, however, together with the rich presents in gold sent by the chiefs of the Darien to their friends, and Valdivia, with all his crew, were no doubt swallowed by the sea, as no trace of them was ever afterward discovered.

To the departure of Valdivia succeeded immediately the expedition to the gulf and the examination of the lands situated at its inner extremity. There lay the dominions of Dabaibe, of whose riches prodigious reports were spread, especially of an idol and a temple represented to be made entirely of gold. There Cemaco, and the Indians who followed him, had taken refuge, and had never lost either the wish or the hope of driving away the invading horde who had usurped their country.

Balboa marched against them by land with sixty men, and Colmenares went by water with as many more to take the enemy by surprise. The former did not find Cemaco; but Colmenares was more fortunate, for he surprised the savages in Tichiri. He commanded the general to be shot with arrows in his presence, and sentenced the lords to be hanged. And so terrified were the Indians by this example that they never durst in future elevate their thoughts to independence.

It was now deliberated to send new deputies to Spain to acquaint the King with the state of the colony, and on the road to touch at Espanola to entreat for necessary aid in case Valdivia might have perished on the voyage, which event had no doubt taken place. It is said that Balboa required this commission for himself, either ambitious of gaining favor at court or apprehensive that the colony at Darien might inflict upon him punishment due to usurpation; but his companions would not consent to his quitting them, alleging that, in losing him, they should feel deserted and without a guide or governor; he only was respected, and followed willingly by the soldiers; and he only was feared by the Indians. They suspected that, if they permitted of his departure, he would never return to share those labors and troubles which were from time to time accumulating upon them, as had already happened with others. They elected Juan de Caicedo, the inspector, who had belonged to the armament of Nicuesa, and Rodrigo Enriquez de Colmenares, both men of weight and expert in negotiation and held in general esteem. They believed that these would execute their charge satisfactorily, and that both would return, because Caicedo would leave his wife behind him; and Colmenares had realized much property, and a farm in the Darien, pledges of confidence in and adhesion to the country. It being thus impossible for Balboa to proceed to Spain, in protection of his own interests he manoeuvred for gaining at least the good graces of the treasurer, Pasamonte; and probably it was on this occasion that he sent him the rich present of slaves, pieces of gold, and other valuable articles, of which the licentiate Zuazo speaks in his letter to the Senor de Chieves. At the same time the new procurators took with them the fifth which belonged to the King, together with a donative made him by the colony; and, happier than their predecessors, they left the Darien in the end of October, and reached Spain the end of May in the year following.