province of Acla, to the place where the town now stands. He was there taken ill, so he returned to Darien, and sent the licentiate Gaspar de Espinosa, with all the troops he could collect, in a westerly direction.
The first inhabited district we came to was that of Comogre, and, being in Chiman (two leagues beyond Comogre) we heard that Badajoz was passing along the high road, at a distance of about a league from the place where we had pitched our camp. On sending for tidings from him, we learnt that he had been defeated in Paris, and had been flying through all the districts on the road. He gave us a guide to show us the way by which he had come, and thus we went from Chiman to the province of Pocorosa, and thence a journey of two leagues in a westerly direction brought us to Pararaca, where the district of Coiba commences. Thence four leagues in the same direction brought us to Tubanama, eight leagues more to Chepo, six more to Chepobar, two further on to Pacora, four more to Panama, four more to Periquete, four more to Tabore, and four more to Chame, which is the boundary of the language and province of Coiba.
We found all these provinces well peopled, and we passed through them without having recourse to war, for we had with us two horses, there then not being more in the land, and one hundred and fifty men.[1] From Chame to the province
- ↑ Herrera says that Espinosa met with opposition in Comogre and Pocorosa. He tried the prisoners, being a lawyer, hanging some, and cutting off the noses or hands of others, according to their alleged crimes. These civilians were often more cruel than the rudest soldiers. Well might Vasco Nuñez wish to be rid of all lawyers. In a letter to the king he says: "Most puissant lord, I desire to ask a favour of your Highness, and it is that your Highness will command that no bachelor of laws, nor of anything else unless it be of medicine, shall come to this part of the Indies on pain of heavy punishment, which your Highness shall order to be inflicted; for no bachelor of laws has ever come here who is not a devil, and who does not lead the life of a devil. And not only are they themselves evil, but they give rise to a thousand quarrels.
