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As a symbol of possession he built a heap of stones in the form of an altar, and that posterity might not accuse them of falsehood, they inscribed the name of the King of Castile here and there on the tree trunks on both slopes of that summit, erecting several heaps of stones. Finally the Spaniards arrived at the residence of a cacique called Chiapes.
The names of the monarchs of Castile were engraven on the trunks of the trees, and with shouts and acclamations they descended the sierra and entered the plain. They arrived at some bohios, which formed the population of a chief, called Chiapes, who had prepared to defend the pass with arms.
He pledged himself to land there and to conquer, exterminate, and massacre the cacique. To give effect to his words, he ordered the canoes to be prepared, but both Chiapes and Tumaco amicably urged him to postpone this enterprise until the return of fair weather, as no canoe could ride the sea at that season of the year. This was in November when storms and hurricanes prevail.
English miles at the least from East to West, betweene the one Sea and the other. Spaniards at Tichiri, gaue an ouerthrow vnto that mighty king Chemaccus, hauing an armie of an hundred Canoas and 5000. men, and the said Vasques Nunnes not long after, with his small number, did put to flight king Chiapes his whole armie.
No one will henceforth rage against or envy the riches of Stoïdes or Ceylon, of the Indian Ocean or the Red Sea. But let us come back to our subject. Vasco determined to have that part of the sea where Chiapes obtained his pearls explored by swimmers. Although the weather was bad and a storm threatened, the cacique, to please him, ordered thirty of his divers to repair to the oyster beds.
But enough of this digression, and let us resume our subject. Influenced by the advice of the caciques Chiapes and Tumaco, Vasco Nuñez decided to postpone his visit to the island until spring or summer, at which time Chiapes offered to accompany him. Meanwhile he understood the caciques had nets near the coasts where they fished for pearl oysters.
In the beginning of the year 1515, de Avila sent Gaspar Morales with 150 men to the Gulf of St Michael, to discover the islands of Tararequi , Chiapes, and Tumaccus.
A cacique, the friend of Balboa, gave him many canoes, or boats made of one tree, with which they passed to the Isle of Pearls, where they were at first resisted; but Chiapes and Tumaccus pacified the cacique of that island, who submitted himself, and received baptism, taking the name of the governor, Pedro Arias, and presented Morales with a basket of pearls weighing 110 pounds, some of which were as large as hazel nuts, weighing 20, 25, 26, and even 31 carats, each of four grains; and one of these pearls was sold for 1200 ducats.
He borrowed from the cacique nine of those barques dug out of single tree trunks, which the natives call culches; and accompanied by eighty of his own men and guided by Chiapes, he sailed on a large river which led him to the territory of another cacique called Coquera. This chief, like the others, wished at first to resist and drive out the Spaniards.
Taking the nine barques he had borrowed from Chiapes, in which he had already crossed the river, he embarked with eighty of his companions, all at that time in good health. Chiapes did his best to discourage this enterprise, counselling Vasco on no account to risk himself in the gulf at that period of the year, as during three months it is so tempestuous that navigation becomes impossible.
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