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This severe order brought back the Spanish infantry to their duty, and they attacked the entrenchments of the enemy with so much vigour that at length they forced their way into the camp of the Araucanians. Antiguenu exerted his utmost efforts to oppose the assailants; but he was at length forced along by the crowd of his soldiers, who were thrown into irretrievable confusion and fled.
On the same day, an officer named Cadeguala, who had obtained great reputation in the Arancanian army for his courage and military skill, was proclaimed toqui by the officers. About this time, while the Araucanians were valiantly endeavouring to oppose the Spanish arms, the English also planned an expedition against them in that remote quarter of the world.
At the commencement of his administration, he endeavoured to come to an accommodation with the Araucanians, with which view he set at liberty all the prisoners of that nation who were confined in the different garrisons.
While Alonzo Rivera applied himself with every possible energy to check the progress of the Araucanians and to guard the frontier of the Biobio, he was removed, from the government of Chili to that of Tucuman, as a punishment for having presumed to marry the daughter of the celebrated heroine Innes Águilera, without having obtained the royal permission.
A collation was prepared for the Araucanians, of which they heartily partook; and despising the knife and fork, helped themselves plentifully with their fingers.
The poet Ercilla has made the name of the Araucanians so famous that it were improper now to change the appellation.
But, notwithstanding the horrible slaughter produced by the cannon and musquetry of the enemy, the Araucanians continually supplied the places of those who were slain by fresh troops. Three times they retired in good order beyond the reach of the musquetry; and as often, resuming new courage, they returned vigorously to the charge, which they urged with the most determined and persevering valour.
Both of these are included in history under the name of Araucanians . Their long and obstinate wars with the Spaniards, with the Puelches and with each other, have greatly diminished their numbers; but they have been still more diminished by the havoc which has been made among them by brandy, that curse of the American Indians, for which they have often been known to sell their wives and children, and to engage in savage scenes of civil bloodshed, entailing wide and endless deadly feuds.
Lincopichion came there likewise at the time appointed, accompanied by the four hereditary toquis of the Araucanians, and a great number of ulmens and other natives.
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