who was the friend of Vasco Nuñez, and had sent him certain letters,[1] to have their heads cut off.[2]
This sentence having been executed, Pedrarias set out for the islands of Pearls with all the troops that were at Acla. The ships were there, with the people who had remained in the South Sea. Thence he went in the ships to Panama, where he founded the present city,[3] the rest of the people going round by land with the licentiate Espinosa. The governor divided the land amongst the four hundred citizens who then settled in Panama, leaving a certain portion
- ↑ Hernando de Arguello was the last victim. His crime was that he had written to warn Vasco Nuñez of his danger, and his letter was intercepted. The sun had set before his turn came, and the people entreated Pedrarias to spare him, but the hateful old man exclaimed: "I would sooner die myself than spare one of them." He was executed in the dark.
- ↑ The death of Vasco Nuñez was one of the greatest calamities that could have happened to South America at that time. He had collected his little fleet in the bay of San Miguel, and was about to sail away into the unknown ocean which he had discovered. He would thus have become the discoverer of the great empire of the Yncas, and the conquest of Peru would have formed a very different story from that which is now interwoven with the ill-omened name of Pizarro. For Vasco Nuñez was one of those men who are born to govern their fellows. He had the true genius of a statesman and a warrior, was as humane and judicious as he was firm of purpose and indomitable of will. And this great man was destined to fall through the mean jealousy of a miserable old dotard, whom chance had kicked into power. His execution took place in 1517. He was in his forty-second year.
Oviedo says that Pedrarias witnessed the judicial murder of Vasco Nuñez from between the reeds of a wall which was close to the scaffold. "For this inhuman act," says Herrera, "Pedrarias was never called to account, but on the contrary was continued in the government."
- ↑ Herrera says that Panama was much disliked by the settlers, on account of its unhealthy situation, and that 40,000 men were computed to have died there of disease within the first twenty-eight years after the founding of the city. Tello de Guzman had landed at Panama (a place abounding in fish in the Indian language) in 1515, and Pedrarias founded the city in 1519. It received its privileges from Charles V in 1521.
Espinosa was ordered to proceed against him, using the evidence of Garavita and the sentry.
