_Of the great disturbances in the city of Arequipa when tidings
came respecting the new laws, and how Francisco de Carbajal
departed from Lima._
When Alonso Palomino and Antonio de Ribera came to the city of Cuzco
with the news of the ordinances, the Governor Vaca de Castro sent one
Tomas Vasquez, with all the haste he could make to the city of Arequipa
with a letter. It desired the citizens not to be disturbed, and to make
no trouble whatever when they should hear the news about the Viceroy
and the ordinances because, when his Majesty was informed that it would
not be for the good of his service if they were enforced, he would very
shortly amend them. It ended by telling them to send representatives to
Lima to state their grievance. Tomas Vasquez set out from Cuzco and
arrived at the end of seven days, finding the principal citizens in the
church. After they had read the letter Vasquez showed them a copy of the
ordinances. When their provisions were understood there was a great
disturbance, and the bells were rung as if it were a signal for war. A
citizen of Arequipa named Miguel Cornejo took the ordinances in his
hand, went up into the pulpit where the preachers deliver their sermons,
and when all the people had assembled at the sound of the bell, he began
to read the new laws before them all. When he came to the place where
the King ordered that, when the _Encomenderos_ died, all their grants
were to revert to the crown, there arose great shouts of dissent, all
declaring that they would die rather than allow it to be enforced, and
they said the same with regard to all the other laws. Among those who
were there the tumult was as great as it had been at Lima, the people
going about sullenly, and discussing it one with another, saying that
they were all disinherited and ruined after having, with so much labour
and fatigue, discovered the province, and that they were ill paid for
it. The Captain Alonso de Caceres procured that the tumult should cease,
as such words could do them no good. So leaving this we come to the
arrival of Carbajal.
Francisco de Carbajal wished to return to Spain knowing, from his
experience in war, that there must be disturbances in all the provinces
on the arrival of the Viceroy. He tried hard to induce the municipality
of Lima to let him go, but he could not attain his desire, because the
authorities did not wish any ship to leave the port until the Viceroy
should come. Seeing that there was little chance of attaining his end,
he determined to go to the city of Arequipa, believing that he might
find a ship in the port of Quilca, on board of which he might take a
passage. He therefore departed from Lima in haste, with all the money he
possessed, divining the great calamity that was threatening the country.
For it pleased God that Carbajal should not leave the country but that
he should be the scourge for the punishment of many, as he was, for so
many perished by his order that it causes grief to think of it.