_How Alvarado marches to the province of Tutepec, to build a town
there; and how far he succeeded in subduing the country, and in
founding a colony._
To give an account of Alvarado's expedition to the province of Tutepec,
we must return to the period immediately following the conquest of
Mexico. It will be remembered that after the news of the fall of that
large city had spread through the provinces, ambassadors arrived from
all parts to congratulate Cortes on this great victory over the Mexican
power, and the different tribes declared themselves vassals of our
emperor. Among the more powerful tribes which submitted on this occasion
was that of the Tecuantepec--Tzapotecs, whose ambassadors brought with
them a present in gold, stating at the same time that they were at war
with their neighbours, the Tutepecs, who had commenced hostilities with
them, because they had submitted to the Spanish crown. This tribe
inhabited the coast on the South Sea, they added,--and possessed great
quantities of gold, both in the raw material and in ornaments; they
themselves now came to request Cortes to assist them against their
enemies with some of his cavalry, musketeers, and crossbow-men.
Cortes assured them, in a very affectionate manner, that he would send
Tonatio (as they called Alvarado) with them. He accordingly despatched
Alvarado thither with a considerable detachment, consisting of one
hundred and eighty men, among whom there were thirty-five horse; and a
further reinforcement of twenty men, most of whom were crossbow-men,
would join him in the province of Guaxaca, where the captain Francisco
de Orozco commanded in chief.
Alvarado left Mexico in the year 1522, and first of all marched to a
mountainous district, where it was said disturbances had recently broken
out; but he found all in profound peace here, and the inhabitants well
disposed towards the Spaniards; nevertheless, he appears to have been
very tardy in his movements, for he did not reach Tutepec until forty
days after. The inhabitants, who had received intelligence of his
approach, came out to meet him with every show of magnificence, and
conducted him to the most populous of all their townships, where stood
the temples and their largest buildings. The houses were very crowded,
and made of straw, for in this excessively hot climate the dwellings
have no upper stories, and are not built of stone. Father Olmedo here
observed to Alvarado, that it would not be advisable to quarter the
troops in the houses, for if the inhabitants were to take it into their
heads to set fire to the town there would be no possibility of escape.
Alvarado considered his apprehensions well founded, and encamped with
his men at the extremity of the town. The cazique soon after arrived
with a valuable present in gold, which he repeated almost every day, and
provided the troops with abundance of provisions. When Alvarado found
what a quantity of gold the inhabitants possessed, he ordered them to
make him a pair of stirrups of the finest gold, and gave them a couple
of his own for a pattern; and indeed those they made turned out very
good.
Notwithstanding all the gold which Alvarado received from this cazique,
he ordered him to be imprisoned a few days after his arrival, as the
people of Tecuantepec had assured him that the whole province was upon
the eve of rising up in arms against him, and that the chiefs of Tutepec
had only invited him to quarter his troops in the large houses in the
heart of their town, that they might set fire to them, and burn him,
with all his men, to death.
Many credible persons have asserted that Alvarado's only motive for ill
using this cazique was, to extort more gold from him; one thing,
however, is certain, that he gave Alvarado gold to the value of 30,000
pesos, and that he died in prison from excessive grief. Father Olmedo
indeed strove to give him every consolation in his last days, but all
his endeavours proved fruitless; melancholy had sunk too deeply into
his heart. The caziquedom then devolved upon his son, from whom Alvarado
extorted even more gold than from the father.
Alvarado then sent a small detachment of his troops to visit the other
townships of the province, and distributed these among the settlers of
the new town which he founded, to which he gave the name of Segura,
because most of the new inhabitants had formerly settled in the town of
Segura de la Frontera, or Tepeaca. After he had done all this, he
ordered the vast quantity of gold he had collected from the townships to
be securely packed, in order that he might take it with him to Mexico,
and hand it over to Cortes; for he pretended that the latter had desired
him to collect all the gold he possibly could, as it was to be forwarded
to his majesty, to make up for the loss of that which Jean Florin had
carried off to France; and that he had received particular instructions
from our general not to divide any of it among the men who accompanied
him on this expedition. When Alvarado was about to make preparations for
his departure, a certain portion of his troops, mostly musketeers and
crossbow-men, formed a conspiracy to put him and his brothers to death,
because he had refused, after their repeated solicitations, to give them
any share of the gold, or to distribute among them any very lucrative
Indian townships.
This plot was fortunately discovered to father Olmedo by one of the
conspirators, named Trebijo, the evening preceding the night on which
the bloody deed was to have been carried out. Father Olmedo instantly
communicated what he had heard to Alvarado, who was about to start, in
company of some of the conspirators, to go a hunting. Alvarado therefore
pretended to be taken with a sudden pain in his side, and turning to
those who were to have accompanied him, he said, "Gentlemen, I must
return to my quarters; let a barber immediately come to bleed me."
As soon as Alvarado had arrived in his quarters he sent for his brothers
Jorge and Gonzalo Gomez, with the alcaldes and alguacils; he then
ordered the conspirators to be seized, and two of them, after a short
trial, were sentenced to the gallows. One of these men was a certain
Salamanca, of Condado, who had formerly been a pilot; the other was
Bernardino Levantisco, and both of them died like good Christians, after
father Olmedo had fully convinced them of the enormity of their crime.
This example of severity brought the remaining conspirators to their
proper senses; so that Alvarado was enabled to depart with the gold for
Mexico without any fear.
Alvarado had certainly laid the foundation of a new town, but it soon
fell to nothing again; for the settlers had obtained very poor lands;
the climate was excessively hot, and very unhealthy; many of the
Spaniards soon fell ill, and the Indian naborias and slaves whom they
had brought with them died away very fast. The place swarmed with
moschitoes, mice, and even lice;--to which was added, that Alvarado had
carried off all the gold. The inhabitants therefore determined to leave
the new town, and to settle elsewhere; so that they soon dispersed, and
some returned to Mexico, some settled in Guaxaca, and others in
Guatimala. When Cortes received intelligence of this, he instituted a
formal inquiry into all the circumstances, and it was found that the
determination to abandon the new town had been agreed upon in a council
held by the alcaldes and regidors of the place. Sentence of death was
then pronounced against the guilty personages; but father Olmedo begged
so hard of Cortes to mitigate this severe sentence, that the latter at
length, though very reluctantly, yielded to his prayers, and altered the
sentence into that of banishment.
Such was the ill-fated termination of the colony of Tutepec, which never
after rose again, for every one feared the unhealthy climate, though the
country was uncommonly rich. When the inhabitants, who could not forget
Alvarado's cruel and unjust treatment, saw that all the Spaniards were
leaving, they revolted anew, which obliged Alvarado to return, and he
again forced them to lay down their arms and to sue for peace.