Page:Narrative of the Proceedings of Pedrarias Davila (Haklyut, 34).djvu/38

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xxii
INTRODUCTION.

they are a noble and generous race. We are indebted for a very complete knowledge of their characteristics to the narratives of Andagoya and Wafer.[1]

Having given us an account of the Indians, Andagoya relates the proceedings of several exploring expeditions in which he served. His first employment was in the final adventure of the ill-fated Vasco Nuñez. Andagoya was serving with the great discoverer when, with incredible labour, he transported the brigantines, in pieces, over the forest-covered mountains, when he reached the shores of the South Sea for a second time, and when he was recalled by old Pedrarias to be judicially murdered at Acla.[2] After the death of Vasco Nuñez, Andagoya went with the Governor Pedrarias to Panama, and received from him a repartimiento of Indians. He married a maid who was in attendance on the governor's wife, and when Panama received the title of a city from Charles V in 1521, Andagoya was appointed one of its first Regidores. But he continued to be actively employed with various exploring expeditions, and he gives an account of their proceedings in his narrative. After the founding of Panama he went with the licentiate Espinosa to discover Nicaragua, and returned by land.[3] The unsuccessful expedition of Gonzalo de Badajos, who went down the Bayanos river in 1516, and penetrated beyond Nata, on the Pacific side of the isthmus,[4] was followed by that of Espinosa, in which Andagoya also served.[5] He was

  1. Dampier's Voyages, iii, p. 344 (3rd edit., London, 1729).
  2. Pages 18 to 22.
  3. Pages 24 and 25.
  4. Pages 26 and 27.
  5. Pages 28 to 31.