History of the Spanish Conquest of Yucatan and of the Itzas Part 9

"And it was ordered that Spanish men-at-arms should be recruited at once, and that notice of this determination should be given to the Alcaldes Mayores and to Don Roque de Soberanis y Centeno, Governor of the Province of Yucatan.

"At this time the President had all the chief citizens of the City of Guatemala called together.... He urged each one to aid with his person or with whatever aid of his he could...." The result of this appeal was a quickened activity in the recruiting and in the collecting of supplies and munitions of war. At the same time Don Joseph de Escals was applied to for aid in the collecting of donations or voluntary gifts.

The Voluntary Contributions. Toward the end of 1694 the donations began to come pouring in. A list of them will give some idea of the scale on which operations were carried out.

Don Joseph de Escals sent from Sonsonate 350 pesos, which he got by selling 56 horses given by the citizens.

Don Juan Jeronimo de Mexia, Corregidor of Huehuetenango, 100 pesos from the citizens and 100 of his own as well as 14 horses.

Quasaltenango, 14 horses but no money.

Acasaguastlan, through Captain Don Miguel de Azanon, its Corregidor, 34 horses but no money.

Chiquimula, 70 horses and 50 pesos.

Soconusco, 30 horses and 6 mules.

Esquintepeque and Guazacapan, 13 horses, 2 mules, and 23 pesos.

San Salvador, 60 horses, 11 mules, and 200 pesos.

Teconicapa and Huehuetenango, 33 horses, 800 fowl, and 400 bushels of maize.

Guatemala, 1176 pesos, 49 horses, and 7 mules.

Don Jacobo Barba of Zuchitepeque, 100 pesos.

Don Francisco Lopez de Albizuri, two soldiers and paid for the entire time of the campaign.

Don Juan de Galvez, 20 horses.

Don Estevan de Medrano, four soldiers for six months.

The totals of the donations were 2399 pesos, 354 horses, 22 mules, 420 bushels of maize, 800 fowl, etc.

Quarrels between Soberanis and the Bishop of Yucatan. While matters were going forward in a fairly satisfactory manner in Guatemala, affairs were quite unsatisfactory in Yucatan, where the quarrels between Don Roque de Soberanis and the Bishop of Yucatan r.e.t.a.r.ded all preparations.

At length the Viceroy of Mexico despatched Don Francisco Sarasa as Oidor to look into the situation and to report on it. As a result of his investigations Soberanis was deprived of his office. Believing that he could best defend himself by going in person to Mexico, Soberanis left Yucatan for the viceregal court. The natural step for the Viceroy, Conde de Galve, was to appoint Martin de Ursua y Arizmendi as Governor _ad interim_ and this was done.

Finding himself in possession (albeit only temporarily) of the government of Yucatan, and in view of the fact that he already held the necessary orders and cedulas for the opening of the road to Guatemala and for the conversion of the Indians along the route, as well as the advices from the President of Guatemala speaking of the matter, Ursua decided it was best to put them into immediate execution.

The year 1695 was already started and it was necessary to set to work at once, not only on the actual work of the entrada, but also on the task of getting the good will of the Cabildo of the city of Merida, of the Bishop, of the province of San Francisco, and of the Count of Galve, Viceroy of New Spain.

President Barrios Decides to Join the Entrada in Person. Villagutierre (lib. iv, cap. 4) goes on to inform us that after enough arms, munitions, food supplies, and small gifts for the Indians were got together, and just as the troops and the monks were on the point of setting off on their march to the woodlands. President Barrios Leal made up his mind to go with them in person. Villagutierre (p. 228) thus graphically describes the effect of his proposal: "In spite of the fact that the Ecclesiastical and Secular Cabildos of that City of Guatemala tried to dissuade him from his plan, urging him to notice that although that undertaking was so glorious and so much to the service of G.o.d and the King, and so greatly favored by all, by the public welfare and by the good of Christendom, he ought not to risk his life so wantonly upon it; and although they also warned him of the terribleness of the attacks which were always suffered in the stomach because of the hardships of the painful journey and country ride, bad resting-places, worse roads and lack of a.s.sistance, rest and tranquillity, which would put his health in evident danger, so that all felt he ought to give up, or at least postpone his journey until he was more hale and hearty in health; in spite of all these and other objections nothing arose from all these representations, and fears which sufficed to change the fervent zeal of the bold President who, in replying, first thanked them all for the great attention and affection with which they looked to his convenience, and then said that the greatest safety lay only in his being the first in all dangers in the service of Both Majesties."

The gallant old President (who appears to have been subject to apoplectic seizures) wished to be in command of the army, but in case he were forced to fall back at any time to a place of safety, he appointed an a.s.sistant, who was Don Bartolome de Amezquita, Fiscal of that Audience of Guatemala.

Amezquita, then, was Captain General of the entrada, taking the Chiapas division. Captain Juan Diaz de Velasco was made leader of the Vera Paz division. Don Tomas de Mendoza y Guzman was made leader of the Huehuetenango division.

When the pay, supplies, and baggage had been distributed among the soldiers, the President gave out his final orders as to the length of a day's journey. He had already sent ahead to the Alcalde Mayor of Ocozingo in Chiapas ordering that suitable _ranchos_ be put up in certain places to shelter the royal army when it should arrive. While the Indians of Ocozingo were working on these they had been attacked by some Lacandon Indians when scarcely a house had been completed. All these unmistakable evidences of the proximity of the notorious Lacandones made Barrios choose the Chiapas division for himself, as it was the most likely to come across them.

At the same time the President ordered Don Tomas (de Mendoza?) de Guzman to go ahead with one hundred men and act as escort for the Indians while they were putting up the houses near Ocozingo or any more convenient place. Barrios had already informed Ursua that he intended to set out in January, 1695, and the latter was to enter the unsubdued area from the north at the same time. Surveyors were to go ahead of the main body of men, and by means of smudges were to afford the greatest possible facility for the road openers, who thus would be prevented from going astray.

The Expedition Sets out from Guatemala City. At length the expedition really did start. (Villagutierre, pp. 234 ff.) Besides the soldiers and Indian bearers there were many friars, among whom were Padre Fray Diego de Ribas, Padre Fray Antonio Margil, Missionary Padre Fray Pedro de la Concepcion, Master Cano, and others. As the army set off, all the citizens and n.o.bility of Guatemala flocked to see them. The first day's journey led to Ixtapa, where they spent the night; the next day they went to Pazon, then to Huehuetenango, which they entered on January 23, 1695, having journeyed forty-six leagues from Guatemala.

In Huehuetenango the President, the monks, the officers, and the men all met with a warm welcome from the inhabitants. It is but natural that, on the eve of an undertaking which must have appeared very formidable to them, a large part of the time should be given up to religious exercises. Captain Melchor Rodriguez Mazariegos joined the party at the head of fifty men. Mazariegos himself, together with the standard-bearer Juan Salvador de Mata and Sergeant Pedro de Chaves Galindo, were all serving without pay, and many other people from the region, as well as some from Tabasco, joined the army voluntarily.

Events at Huehuetenango. On January 29, Amezquita arrived from Guatemala, where he had been making some final arrangements. Barrios spent his time at Huehuetenango in paying the new troops, distributing horses and supplies, and making all the final arrangements.

It was not long before the news of the departure of the President reached Ursua in Yucatan. (Villagutierre, pp. 235 ff.) The whole enterprise was so important for the service of G.o.d, the King, the public weal, and the souls of the Indians that Ursua immediately set about his preparations for the share his government was to take in it.

Ursua's Activities. Ursua did not follow the example of the President by going in person at the head of his troops; instead he ordered Captain Alonso Garcia de Paredes, Perpetual Regidor of San Francisco de Campeche and Captain for War of the District of Sacabchen, to a.s.semble what troops he could and to go with them to meet the President, under whose orders he should place himself, reporting to Ursua all occurrences of importance. For all this Ursua gave Paredes the t.i.tle of Aide or the Captain General of las Montanas. Francisco Gonzalez Richardo was appointed subchief, second in command only to Ursua.

An Army Sets out from Yucatan for the Montana. When all the usual and needful preparations had been made, the army set out from Yucatan. As soon as they left the settled part of the province they entered the territory of the Quehaches, whom they put to flight after a sharp skirmish. Paredes' soldiers, however, refused to go on without reenforcements, so the expedition had to turn back.

Padres Cano and Avendano y Loyola. We have already reviewed the events up to 1695, in which year the two great divisions of the Spanish forces set out to subdue the dangerous Itzas and Lacandones. Hereafter we will, in the main, trust to two religious writers, whose accounts of the succeeding events are very vivid. Maestro Fray Agustin Cano accompanied that division of the army which was led by President Barrios; Padre Fray Andres de Avendano y Loyola, a Franciscan, accompanied Ursua's division.

Cano's Account of the Entrada from Guatemala. For the sake of continuity we will begin by quoting Cano's account of the entrada from Guatemala: "My Lord, Your Majesty having been pleased to appoint me in the Royal decree of Nov. 24, 1692, to enter into the territories of the heathen, to try to bring about their conquest, in the due obedience and execution of which, I personally took part in the expeditions into those lands which they have made during these years through the Province of Vera Paz, wishing to correspond to the Royal favor by which Your Majesty has been pleased to appoint me for this purpose; I understand that it is my duty to inform Your Majesty of what has happened in these expeditions, making up for the delay of this report by the simple truth and clearness of the information which up to the present time could not be given without a great deal of confusion on account of the strange character of the events."

The Route Followed by Cano. "The President [Barrios] ... finally determined to enter by way of Chiapas, and that I should go by way of Vera Paz with Captain Juan Diaz de Velasco and seventy men as an escort to the priests. Accordingly, in the month of March, of the said year '95, we started from the town of Cahabon, which is the last town of Vera Paz; seven priests of my order, and we entered by very rough paths into the highlands of the Chol, where we found many Indians, some baptized, others heathen, and the more we penetrated those highlands, the more numerous did we find the families in their hamlets, without the form of towns. We told all these people that the object of our journey was to search for them so that they should come together in towns in such a way that we should be able to come and live with them in order to teach them the law of G.o.d and to administer the holy Sacraments to them, and that we also wished that all the people of their tribe and of all the other tribes in those highlands should know G.o.d, and should come together in towns. Thus we went, pa.s.sing from some farms to others in prosecution of our journey to the Lake, and we left all the Indians peaceful and satisfied with the promise which they made us to gather together in towns. In this we were obtaining plenty of good results, since we taught them the Christian doctrine of which most of the baptized Indians were totally ignorant. The children whom their fathers brought to us were baptized, and the grown people confessed themselves, many who had relapsed were consecrated anew, and the Holy Sacraments were administered to some Christian Indians who were found dying in their houses.

"After pa.s.sing through the Province of Chol, which stretches from Cahabon forty-five or fifty leagues, we came upon another tribe which is called the Mopanes, among whom Spaniards or ministers of the holy gospel had never entered, and, although the difference in language was of some embarra.s.sment, G.o.d willed that we should find some Mopan Indians who understood the Chol language and by means of these we declared to them the purpose of our journey. This had good results at that time in the case of some adults, who, being dangerously ill, asked for holy baptism, and in the case of some sick children whom their fathers brought and who went to Heaven as the first-fruits among this tribe. Their princ.i.p.al cacique, Taximchan, fled from us, and although we made various endeavors to draw him to us, he always deceived us with false promises. But we made friends with four other caciques of this tribe of the Mopanes Indians, called, in their paganism, the Cacique Zac, the Cacique Tuzben, the Cacique Yahcab, and the Cacique Tezec.u.m.

They came to see us with a part of their families, and every day there came many Mopanes Indians to buy knives and many other little trifles which the soldiers sold in exchange for blankets. We presented them with salt, and for this they came to see us and to sell us their fruit, and apparently they were becoming friendly."

The Chols and the Mopanes. "On account of the many Indians who came every day to see us, and of the many farms and farm-buildings which we saw in those highlands, we knew that that tribe of Mopanes was very numerous. They all go naked like the Chols, and differ from them only in their hair, in that they do not wear it of the same length like the Chols, but cut the hair on the front part of the head and only wear it long behind. It is a race more robust and barbarous than the Chols; they have idols of diabolical forms, some of which we found, and they have many other superst.i.tions, about which it would take long to tell.

We found very little frankness in their nature and we found that they have relations with the Ahizaes Indians of the Lake; and we even learned that they all were of one Ytza nation, calling themselves Mopan Ytza; Peten Ytza and these Mopanes were subject to the petty King of the Lake, about which and about its Island of Peten and about its caciques they gave us much information, although they always refused to show us the way thither. Nevertheless, we prevailed upon the Cacique Zac to show us the way from Mopan as far as the first plain, and from there forward our guide was the Cacique Yahcab, who knew the Chol language, by means of which he served as an interpreter, though a very unskilled one.

"In this way we had some means of prosecuting our journey to the Lake, and having written to the President by way of Vera Paz what had been done, and leaving in Mopan two priests to take care of those Indians, with twenty men for their protection, we priests, five in number, pa.s.sed onward with Captain Juan Diaz de Velasco and fifty men."

From Mopan to the Lake. "We traveled from Mopan toward the Lake a matter of thirty-two leagues, in which the confusion of our guide and interpreter, the Cacique Yahcab, delayed us much more than our ignorance of the way; for he, whether from his want of knowledge, or from malice, said at each stream or small river that there was no more water till we reached the Lake. Having then come to a small river called Chacal, we made a halt while some of our men crossed with the guide and proceeded to reconnoiter the path, and they went forward in such a way that they reached the Lake and discovered the great _Peten_ or island which stands in the middle of it, and which, according to the story of those who went there, must be distant from Chacal a matter of fourteen or sixteen leagues. Our people met many Ahizaes Indians, who came from the Lake to the sh.o.r.e armed with bows and arrows, and they, at the first sight of our people, got their bows ready; but the Indian Yahcab, who had been told what to do, calmed them by telling them that we were traders, which the Ahizaes heard with much pleasure. But when the said interpreter of ours went on to tell them that with these merchants were some Padres to teach them the law of G.o.d, the Ahizaes raised a great whispering among themselves; and as our people were unable to give the Ahizaes more reasons than those which that rude interpreter had studied and offered, there was no way to pacify them, and it was not known what they said, but all was confusion and disturbance, which resulted in fighting and general encounters, in which our men received no damage, but of the Ahizaes some were killed and wounded and two of them were captured; one of these was called Quixan and the other Chan. These two Indians uniformly said that the Ahizaes had taken up arms because they had had notice that we had come to Mopan, and that they had not perceived any other people in their lands either in the direction of Yucatan or in any other direction; which agreed with our not having any sign either from the people who went with the said President Don Jacinto, nor of those whom he had sent with the Padres de la Merced, although we made every effort to find them. I wished that the said two Indians, or one of them, should go with a message for his companions, but the affair was so stained with blood, and the time was so advanced that it did not permit of these delays, and the Captain gave sufficient reason for a contrary decision; and the Ahiza Indian called Chan quickly removed any doubt by fleeing by night, as a result of which we took more care of the remaining Indian called Quixan. Seeing, then, that at that time we were not able to get any result in that Ahiza nation, as they had taken up arms and we, not understanding their language, were not able to persuade them nor to come to an agreement with them; so that, if we went on, it would only be to continue a war against the will of our Majesty, as expressed in the Royal decree, and without any hope of good results, since we were not able to enter into the Island for want of canoemen and of instruments to make canoes, and for the same reason we could not go across the Lake in search of the people of the said President."

Cano Advises Return. "Seeing also that the rains were beginning with great fury, and that our people were becoming sick because of the change of weather, to which was added our finding ourselves in such want of supplies that we scarcely had what was needed to return to Mopan; for these reasons I advised the Captain that we should return to Mopan, and that there we should await news of the said President, and that when we had received this news we should see what ought to be done. This plan we carried out, taking in our company the Ahiza Indian called Quixan, treating him kindly and carefully."

Explanations of their Withdrawal Sent to Guatemala. At this juncture an unfortunate controversy sprang up. Cano says that he and his companions wrote to Guatemala, explaining why they had withdrawn. Their explanations were not accepted, however, because a false report had gained credence to the effect that Don Jacinto Barrios had reached Lake Peten. The authorities in Guatemala persisted in believing the latter report, and they charged the Padres with trying to discredit the President. The General a.s.sembly then issued a decree in which they ordered Captain Velasco at once to return to the lake and fortify himself there on pain of losing all his property like a traitor.