by Daniel Defoe
discovered a cursed conspiracy, which, had ittaken effect, would, besides the baseness of the fact, have ended intheir total destruction; in short, they had resolved to rob thisChilian, who was so kind to them; but, as I said, one of the lieutenantsdiscovered and detected this villanous contrivance, and quashed it, soas never to let the Spaniard know of it.
But, I say, to end this part, they were one-and-twenty days in thistraverse, for they could not go on so easy and so fast, now they were alittle army, as we did, who were but six or seven; at length they cameto the view of the open country, and, being all encamped at the edge ofa descent, the generous Spaniard (and his three servants) took hisleave, wishing them a good journey, and so went back, having, the daybefore, brought them some deer, five or six cows, and some sheep, fortheir subsisting at their entrance into, and travel through, the plaincountry.
And now they began to descend towards the plain, but they met with moredifficulty here than they expected; for, as I observed that the way forsome miles went with an ascent towards the farthest part of the hill;that continued ascent had, by degrees, brought them to a very great, andin some places, impassable descent; so that, however my guide found hisway down, when I was through, it was not easy for them to do it, whowere so many in number, and encumbered with mules and horses, and withtheir baggage, so that they knew not what to do; and, if they had notknown that our ships were gone away, there had been some odds but, likethe Israelites of old, they would have murmured against their leader,and have all gone back to Egypt. In a word, they were at their wits'end, and knew not what course to take for two or three days, trying andessaying to get down here and there, and then frightened withprecipices and rocks, and climbing up to get back again. The whole ofthe matter was, that they had missed a narrow way, where they shouldhave turned off to the south-east, the marks which our men had madebefore having not been so regular and exact just there, as in otherparts of the way, or some other turning being so very like the same,that they took one for the other; and thus, going straight forward toofar before they turned, they came to an opening indeed, and saw theplain country under them, as they had done before, but the descent wasnot so practicable.
After they had puzzled themselves here, as I said, two or three days,one of the lieutenants, and a man with him, seeing a hut or house of aChilian at some distance, rode away towards it; but passing into avalley that lay between, he met with a river which he could by no meansget over with the mules, so he came back again in despair. The captainthen resolved to send back to the honest rich Chilian, who hadentertained them so well, for a guide, or to desire him to give themsuch directions as they might not mistake.
But as the person sent back was one of those who had taken the journalwhich I mentioned, and was therefore greatly vexed at missing his way insuch a manner, so he had his eyes in every corner, and pulled out hispocket-book at every turning, to see how the marks of the places agreed;and at last, the very next morning after he set out, he spied theturning where they should all have gone in, to have come to the placewhich they were at before; this being so remarkable a discovery, he cameback again directly, without going on to the Chilian's house, which wastwo days' journey farther.
Our men were revived with this discovery, and all agreed to march back;so, having lost about six days in this false step, they got into theright way, and, in four more, came to the descent were I had beenbefore.
Here the hill was still very high, and the passage down was steep anddifficult enough; but still it was practicable, and our men could seethe marks of cattle having passed there, as if they had gone in driftsor droves; also it was apparent, that, by some help and labour of hands,the way might be led winding and turning on the slope of the hill, so asto make it much easier to get down than it was now.
It cost them no small labour, however, to get down, chiefly because ofthe mules, which very often fell down with their loads; and our mensaid, they believed they could with much more ease have mounted up fromthe east side to the top than they came from the west side to thebottom.
They encamped one night on the declivity of the hill, but got up early,and were at the bottom and on the plain ground by noon. As soon as theycame there they encamped and refreshed themselves, that is to say, wentto dinner; but it being very hot there, the cool breezes of themountains having now left them, they were more inclined to sleep than toeat; so the captain ordered the tent to be set up, and they made thewhole day of it, calling a council in the morning to consider whatcourse they should steer, and how they should go on.
Here they came to this resolution, that they should send two men aconsiderable way up the hill again, to take the strictest observationthey could of the plain with the largest glasses they had, and to markwhich way the nearest river or water was to be seen; and they shoulddirect their course first to the water, and that, if the course of itlay south, or any way to the east of the south, they would follow on thebank of it, and, as soon as it was large enough to carry them, theywould make them some canoes or shallops, or what they could do with themost ease, to carry them on by water; also, they directed them toobserve if they could see any cattle feeding at a distance, or the like.
The messengers returned, and brought word that all the way to the east,and so on to south-east, they could discover nothing of water, but thatthey had seen a great lake, or lough of water, at a great distance,which looked like a sea, and lay from them to the northward of the east,about two points; adding, that they did not know but it might afterwardsempty itself to the eastward, and it was their opinion to make the bestof their way thither.
Accordingly, the next morning, the whole body decamped, and marchedeast-north-east, very cheerfully, but found the way much longer thanthey expected; for though from the mountains the country seemed to lieflat and plain, yet, when they came to measure it by their feet, theyfound a great many little hills; little, I say, compared to the greatmountains, but great to them who were to travel over them in the heat,and with but very indifferent support as to provisions; so that, in aword, the captain very prudently ordered that they should travel onlythree hours in the morning and three in the evening, and encamp in theheat of the day, to refresh themselves as well as they could.
The best thing they met with in that part of the country was, that theyhad plenty of water, for though they were not yet come to any large,considerable river, yet every low piece of ground had a small rill ofwater in it; and the springs coming out from the rising grounds on thesides of the mountains being innumerable, made many such small brooks.
It cost them six days' travel, with two days' resting between, toadvance to that river of water, which, from the height of the mountains,seemed to be but a little way off. They could not march, by theircomputation, above ten or twelve miles a day, and rest every third daytoo, for their luggage was heavy, and their mules but few; also some oftheir mules became tired and jaded by their long march, or fell lame,and were good for nothing.
Besides all this, the days which I call days of rest were really not soto them, for those intervals were employed to range about and hunt forfood; and it was for want of that, more than for want of rest, that theyhalted every third day.
In this exercise they did, however, meet with such success, that theymade shift to kill one sort of creature or another every day, sufficientto keep them from famishing; sometimes they met with some deer, othertimes with the guinacoes, or Peruvian sheep, and sometimes with fowls ofseveral kinds, so that they did pretty well for food. At length, viz.,the seventh day, they came to a river, which was at first small, buthaving received another small river or two from the northern part of thecountry, it began to seem large enough for their purpose; and, as it raneast-south-east, they concluded it would run into the lake, and thatthey might fleet down this river, if they could make anything to carrythem.
But their first discouragement was, the country was all open, with verylittle wood, and no trees, or very few to be found large enough to makecanoes, or boats of any sort; but the skill of their carpenters, ofwhich th
ey had four, soon conquered this difficulty; for, coming to alow swampy ground on the side of the river, they found a tree somethinglike a beech, very firm good sort of wood, and yet soft enough to yieldto their tools; and they went to work with this, and at first made themsome rafts, which they thought might carry them along till the river wasbigger.
While this was doing, which took up two or three days, the men straggledup and down; some with their guns to shoot fowls, some with contrivancesto catch fish, some one thing, some another; when, on a sudden, one oftheir fishermen, not in the river, but in a little brook, whichafterwards ran into the river, found a little bit of shining stuff amongthe sand or earth, in the bank, and cried, he had found a piece of gold.Now, it seems, all was not gold that glistened, for the lump had no goldin it, whatever it was; but the word being given out at first, itimmediately set all our men a-rummaging the shores of every little rillof water they came at, to see if there was any gold; and they had notlooked
