Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/516

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458
APPENDIX.

his route, he fell in with the venerable fathers, Francisco Carrion, and Antonio Zepeda, who were descending from Quimiri to assist father Izquierdo in his new settlement; and deprived them of life with the utmost cruelty. Triumphant, and rejoicing at the progress he had made in his wicked purpose, he reached Quimiri, where, having communicated to the Indians the butcheries he had just executed, and his determination to kill all the fathers, they attacked and fell on him and his partisans with such an abundance of clubs, stones, and billets of wood, that the assassins were quickly dispatched. A sister of this very Mangore, taking up a large stone, directed it with so true an aim, and with so much force, against the head of her brother, that she laid him senseless on the ground.

In consequence of the above melancholy events, the conversion of Santa Cruz remained for some time without protection, until the fervour of father Biedma led him to return thither, with a few companions, in the year 1681. He had previously made such improvements in the road between Andamarca and Sonomoro, as to render it passable by mules. In a little time he re-established the town of Santa Cruz,[1] and founded another town with the name of San Buenaventura of Savini. In the year 1684, he opened a road from Sonomoro to the junction of the rivers Ene and Perene; and being anxious to bring into the bosom of the church, the many nations dwelling on the banks of the river Paro, embarked in the year 1686,[2] and descended to the vicinity of the confluence of the river Pachitea with the Ucayali, where he was well received by the numerous nation of the Conivos. Having there founded a chapel and town, he returned, keeping on his route an exact diary, and recording the names of all the nations residing on the banks of upwards of forty rivers, all of which pay the tribute of their copious stores of water to the Gran-Paro. On the banks of the river Camarinigua, he established another town of Conivos,[3] under the denomination of San Joseph; and left there, in quality of converter, father Antonio Vital. This monk remained in the above town, until the sad tidings were brought to him, that the Piros had put to death father Biedma and his companions. Finding himself, therefore, alone, and without hope or prospect of succour, he descended in a canoe, with six Indians, by the Ucayali, as far as the river of the Amazons, by which he ascended, and penetrated into the interior by the Huallaga, he having been, at that time, the first and only individual, his Indian companions excepted, who had completed the course of the navigation of these rivers; since he penetrated from Jauxa, by Andamarca, to


  1. Amich, p. 41.
  2. Tena, lib. i. p. 76.
  3. Tena, lib. i. p. 101.
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