_How the Indians who escaped front the hands of the Spaniards
returned to take counsel, and resolved, with much boldness, to
go forth again and fight them, and of the death of Diego de
Rojas._
In a former chapter we related how the Indians of a village where the
captains Diego de Rojas and Felipe Gutiérrez were encamped, had come
and fought with them; and that although more than two hundred were
killed, and as many more wounded, yet they sent messages to all the
districts announcing how few the Spaniards were, and ordering the
natives to assemble and to attack them vigorously, as it would be easy
to kill them all and their horses. The Indians were told to anoint the
points of their arrows with a very poisonous herb they have, for it
was known by experience that no one who was wounded by it ever escaped
death, and that for the liberty of their country and that they might
not be under greater subjection than their forefathers, they ought
not to fly from death if it should face them. Moreover, should any
of them be captured by the Spaniards, they were on no account to
reveal the antidote [to the arrow poison], for if that secret were
made known neither they nor any number of people who might join them
could prevail against the valour of the Spaniards or the fierceness
of the horses. As all desired to see the foreigners who had invaded
their provinces driven out again they assembled as large a force as
they could and after they had offered their accustomed sacrifices and
invoked the devil to their aid, marched in the direction where the
Spaniards were encamped.
Diego de Rojas and the other captains had decided to stay there a few
days, until they could receive information about the country ahead of
them. When the Indians approached them, the Spaniards saddled their
horses and rode towards them to give battle. As it is our Lord God's
will and pleasure that those unknown countries, so distant from Spain,
shall be opened up and His glorious standard of the Cross be known
there, He almost miraculously protects the Christians; that they may
find a way before them until they reach the extremity of the land,
where there is little left before seeing the sun complete its course
around the world. So it was that, though these Indians came armed with
arrows tipped with the poison we have mentioned, God watched over His
Christians. But no special favour was needful on that day, as a single
volley sufficed for the Indians' dispersal, and after a number of
them had fallen the conflict ceased. Diego de Rojas then sent Pedro
López de Ayala with forty horsemen to explore the country ahead. The
Indians, undismayed by their losses, fought on continuously during the
next two days, and Diego de Rojas doing his duty as a famous captain
in the midst of the fray, was wounded in the leg by an arrow. After
having chased and overtaken the Indians who had wounded him, they
retired to the camp. Diego de Rojas thought little of his wound, as
it was so small. But, since the herb was so poisonous, it began to
work. Diego de Rojas felt ill, and there being a woman in the camp,
who served Felipe Gutiérrez, she came to nurse him. After she had
given him certain things to eat, Diego de Rojas became worse, and some
of his servants said that he had been poisoned by order of Felipe
Gutiérrez. Believing this to be true Diego de Rojas drank a great
quantity of oil.
The captain Felipe Gutiérrez, when informed of this suspicion,
declared his innocence. He assured Diego de Rojas, and all who might
disbelieve him, that he never had any such evil thought, and that no
one would regret the loss of his companion so much as himself. When
the poison arrived near the heart, Diego de Rojas, seeing himself
so near death, requested Felipe Gutiérrez to appoint in his place
Francisco de Mendoza, whom he loved as if he were his son. Felipe
Gutiérrez answered that although, under the authority they held from
Vaca de Castro, this could not be done, the command should, after
Rojas' death, remain vested in the two, and that he was delighted to
please him.
After this, Diego de Rojas died during a violent fit of retching. He
was a native of the city of Burgos: a valiant man, liberal, anxious
always to do what was right. In war he was always cautious, at all
times watching and patrolling like any other soldier. It is believed
that if he had lived these regions would have been completely
explored. His death was due to the poison in the herb, for which a
plant of such virtue as an antidote was afterwards discovered, that
the poison lost its strength, and the wounded were cured by means of
it.