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Updated: May 2, 2025
He was besides so puffed up by the victory which he had gained over the viceroy, that he believed himself able to resist any power which could now be brought against him. Alarcon went accordingly to Panama, whence he brought back to Peru the prisoners who had been taken at that place by Hinojosa, and was accompanied on his return by the son of Gonzalo.
They were caught in a severe storm which so greatly frightened the men on the Santa Catalina, "more afraid than was need," remarks Alarcon, that they cast overboard nine pieces of ordnance, two anchors, one cable, and "many other things as needful for the enterprise wherein we went as the ship itself."
The farther they proceeded the farther apart they were, but Alarcon kept a constant and faithful lookout for the other party the whole time, never losing an opportunity to inquire its whereabouts. Coronado had left a well-provisioned ship, the San Gabriel, at Aguaiauall, for Alarcon to bring along.
This was the highest point reached on the first visit. Everywhere the people were treasuring the crosses which had been given them, kneeling before them at sunrise. Alarcon kept on up the river till he "entered between certain very high mountains, through which this river passeth with a straight channel, and the boats went up against the stream very hardly for want of men to draw the same."
This coincides very well with Alarcon's estimate of eighty-five leagues, for Diaz did not follow the windings of the stream as Alarcon was forced to do with his boats. At the place down the river, Diaz found a tree bearing an inscription: "Alarcon reached this point; there are letters at the foot of this tree."
This expectation appears absurd to us now when we understand the geography, but there was nothing out of the way about the supposition at that time. As it happened, the two divisions never met, nor were they able to communicate even once. So far as rendering Coronado any assistance was concerned, Alarcon might as well have been on the coast of Africa.
* Fernando Consag entered the river, 1746, looking for mission sites, and two centuries before that was Alarcon. This he called Adams River in honour of the President of the United States. Following it south-west through the Pai Ute country for twelve days he came to its junction with what he called the Seedskeedee, knowing it to be the same stream so called in the north. This was the Colorado.
This would take him to the 34th parallel, and would coincide with his eighty-five leagues, and also with the position of the first mountains met with in going up the river, the Chocolate range. Alarcon was not so inexperienced that he would have represented eighty-five leagues on the course of the river as equalling four degrees of latitude.
And until the facts were known, how hopeless to attempt to ascend such a river, as did Alarcon, Ives and Wheeler! Useless for Commerce. As already stated, it is the most useless of the large rivers of the world as a carrier of ships of commerce. No boat, carrying produce of field, mill or mart, has ever passed up or down its course.
These had been warlike, and it was proposed to kill all of Alarcon's party to prevent the others from gaining a knowledge of this country. But the old man declared Alarcon to be the son of the sun and took his part. Finally it was decided to ask him whether he were a Christian or the son of the sun.
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