While leading a new colony of Spaniards to settle in Xauxa, they
receive news of the death of Guaritico,[13] brother of Atahualpa.
Afterwards they passed through the land of Guamachucho,[14]
Adalmach,[15] Guaiglia,[16] Puerto Nevado, and Capo Tombo,[17] and
they hear that in Tarma many Indian warriors are waiting to attack
them, on account of which they take Calichuchima prisoner, and then
proceed intrepidly on their journey to Cachamarca,[18] where they
find much gold.
At this time he [the Governor] had just finished distributing the gold
and silver which were in that house among the Spaniards of his company,
and Atabalipa gave the gold belonging to the royal fifths to the
treasurer of H. M. who took charge of it in order to carry it to the
city of Xauxa where he [the Governor] intended to found a colony of
Spaniards on account of the reports he had of the good surrounding
provinces and of the many cities which there were about it. To this
end, he had the Spaniards arranged in order and provided with arms and
other things for the journey, and when the time for departure came, he
gave them Indians to carry their gold and burdens. Before setting out,
having heard how few soldiers there were in San Miguel[19] for the
purpose of holding it, he took, from among those Spaniards whom he was
to take with him, ten cavalrymen and a captain, a person of great
cautiousness, whom he ordered to go to that city where he was to
maintain himself until ships should arrive with troops who might guard
it, after which he was to go to Xauxa where he himself was about to
found a village of Spaniards and melt the gold which he bore, promising
that he would give them all the gold that was due them with as much
punctuality as if they were actually present, because his [the
captain's] return [to San Miguel] was very necessary, that being the
first city to be settled and colonized for the Caesarian Majesty as
well as the chief one because in it they would have to wait there to
receive the ships which should come from Spain, to that land.[20]
In this manner they set out with the instructions which the Governor
gave them as to what they were to do in the pacification of the people
of that region. The Governor set out one Monday morning, and on that day
travelled three leagues, sleeping by the shore of a river where the news
reached him that a brother of Atabalipa called Guaritico had been killed
by some captains of Atabalipa at his command. This Guaritico was a very
important person and a friend of the Spaniards, and he had been sent by
the Governor from Caxamalca to repair the bridges and bad spots in the
road. The cacique pretended to feel great heaviness because of his
death, and the Governor himself regretted it because he liked him, and
because he was very useful to the Christians. The next day the Governor
set out from that place, and, by his marches, arrived in the land of
Guamachucho, eighteen leagues from Caxamalca. Having rested there two
days, he set out for Caxamalca[21] nine leagues ahead, and arrived there
in three days, and rested four in order that his troops might have
repose and opportunity to collect supplies for the march to Guaiglia,
twenty leagues from there. Having left this village, he came in three
days to the Puerto de Nevado, and a morning's march brought him within a
day's journey of Guaiglia; and the governor commanded a captain of his,
who was the Marshal D. Diego de Almagro, to go with troops and take a
bridge two leagues from Guaiglia, which bridge was built in a manner
that will soon be related. This captain captured the bridge, which is
near a strong mountain that dominated that land. The Governor did not
delay in arriving at the bridge with the rest of his men, and having
crossed it, he went on, in another morning, which was Sunday, to
Guaiglia. Arrived there, they soon heard mass and afterwards entered
certain good rooms; having rested there eight days, he set forth with
the soldiers, and the next day crossed another bridge of osiers,[22]
which was above the said river which here passes through a very
delectable valley. They journeyed thirty leagues to the point where
captain Hernando Pizarro came when he went to Pachacamac,[23] as will be
seen in the long account which was sent to H. M. of all that was done on
that journey to Pachacamac, from there to the city of Xauxa and back to
Caxamalca, on the occasion on which he took with him the captain
Chilichuchima and other matters which do not concern us here. The
Governor changed his route, and, by forced marches, arrived at the land
of Caxatambo.[24] From there he went on without doing more than to ask
for some Indians who should carry the gold of H. M. and of the soldiers,
and always using great vigilance in learning of the affairs which took
place in the land, and always having both a vanguard and a rear-guard as
had been done up to that time for fear that the captain Chilichuchima
whom he had with him, would hatch some treasonable plot, all the more so
on account of the suspicion he felt owing to the fact that neither in
Caxatambo nor in the eighteen leagues after it had he met with any
warriors, nor were his fears lessened during a halt in a village five
leagues beyond because all the people had fled without leaving a living
soul. When he had arrived there, a Spaniard's Indian servant, who was
from that land of Pambo[25] distant from here some ten leagues, and
twenty from Xauxa, came to him saying that he had heard that troops had
been assembled in Xauxa to kill the Christians who were coming, and that
they had as captains Incorabaliba, Iguaparro, Mortay[26] and another
captain, all four being important men who had many troops with them, and
the servant added that they had placed a part of this force in a village
called Tarma five leagues from Xauxa in order to guard a bad pass that
there was in a mountain and to cut and break it up in such a way that
the Spaniards could not pass by. Informed of this, the governor gave
orders that Chilichuchima should be made a prisoner, because it was held
to be certain that that force had been made ready by his advice and
command, he thinking to flee the Christians and to go to join it. Of
these matters the cacique Atabalipa was unaware, and on this account,
these [Spanish] troops did not permit any Indian to pass by in the
direction of the cacique who might give notice of these affairs. The
reason why these Indians had rebelled and were seeking war with the
Christians was that they saw the land being conquered by the Spaniards,
and they themselves wished to govern it.
The Governor, before setting out from that place, sent a captain with
troops to take a snowy pass three leagues ahead and then to pass the
night in some fields near Pombo,[27] all of which the captain did, and
he passed the pass with much snow, but without encountering any
obstacle. And the Governor crossed it likewise, without any opposition
save for the inconvenience caused by the snow falling upon them. They
all spent the night in that waste without a single hut, and they lacked
for wood and victuals. Having arrived in the land of Pombo, the Governor
provided and commanded that the soldiers should be lodged with the best
order and caution possible, because he had news that the enemy were
increasing every moment, and it was held to be certain that he would
come here to assail the Spaniards, and because of this, the Governor
caused the patrols and sentinels to be increased, always spying upon the
progress of the enemy. After he had waited there another day for certain
envoys whom the cacique Atabalipa had sent to learn what was going on in
Xauxa, one came who told how the warriors were five leagues from Xauxa
on the road from Cuzco and were coming to burn the town so that the
Christians should not find shelter, and that they intended afterward to
return to Cuzco to combine under a captain named Quizquiz who was there
with many troops who had come from Quito by command of Atabalipa for
the security of the land. When this was learned by the Governor, he
caused to be made ready seventy-five light horse, and with twenty peones
who guarded Chilichuchima, and without the impediment of baggage, he set
out for Xauxa, leaving behind the treasurer with the other troops who
were guarding the camp baggage and the gold of H. M., and of the
company. The day on which he set out from Pombo, he travelled some seven
leagues, and he halted in a village called Cacamarca,[28] and here they
found seventy thousand pesos of gold in large pieces, to guard which the
Governor left two Christians from the cavalry in order that when the
rear-guard should arrive, it might be conducted well guarded. Then, in
the morning, he set forth with his men in good array, for he had word
that three leagues from there were four thousand men. And on the march
three or four light horsemen went ahead so that, if they should meet a
spy of the enemy's, they might take him prisoner to prevent his giving
warning of their coming. At the hour of noon, they arrived at that bad
pass of Tarma where warriors were said to be waiting to defend it. The
pass seemed to be so full of difficulties that it would be impossible to
go up it, because there was a bad road of stone down into the gully
where all the riders had to dismount, after which it was necessary to go
up the heights by a slope about a league long, the greater part of which
was steep and difficult forest, all of which was crossed without any
Indians who were said to be armed making an appearance. And in the
afternoon, after the hour of vespers, the Governor and his men arrived
at that village of Tarma where, because it was a bad site and because he
had news that Indians were coming to it to surprise the Christians, he
did not wish to linger longer than was necessary for feeding the horses
and allaying their own hunger and fatigue so as to enable them to go
forth prepared from that place which had no other level spot than the
plaza as it was on a small slope surrounded by mountains for the space
of a league. As it was already night, he made his camp here, being
always on the alert and having the horses saddled. And the men were
without [proper] food and even without any comfort because there was
neither fire-wood nor water, nor had they brought their tents with them
to shelter them, because of which they all nearly died of cold on
account of the fact that it rained much early in the night and then
snowed so that the arms and clothes were drenched. But each one sought
the best remedy he could, and so that evil and troublous night passed to
the dawn when he commanded that all mount their horses so as to arrive
early at Xauxa which was four leagues from there. When two had been
crossed over, the Governor divided the seventy-five soldiers between
three captains, giving fifteen to each, and taking with him the
remaining twenty and the twenty peones who were guarding Chilichuchima.
In this order they journeyed to Porsi a league from Xauxa, having given
each captain orders as to what he was to do, and they all halted in a
small village which they encountered. Then they all marched on in
complete accord, and gave a look at the city. They all halted again on a
slope within a quarter of a league of it.