Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/510

452 of these unfortunate converts. The monks were no sooner divested of this trust, than the Indians, finding themselves deprived of their spiritual teachers and guides, returned to the mountains, and to paganism. In the course of the following years infinite pains were taken to re-establish the above-mentioned conversions; but without being attended by any other result beside that of the sacrifice of friars Juan Valera, Francisco Huerta, and Juan Zavala, the former of whom was cruelly massacred by the barbarians, in the year 1694, at Huancabamba, and the latter, on the banks of the Ouimiri, about the same time.

These disastrous events, and the reflection that so many monks had from time to time perished by the hands of the infidels, made so strong an impression on those belonging to the provincial Order of the Twelve Apostles, that not one could be found with a sufficient resolution to undertake a new conquest, until the Divine Providence, in its unerring wisdom, directed the steps of the venerable founder of Ocopa, friar Francisco de San Joseph, in the year 1709, towards Tarma. Inspired by a fervent zeal for the salvation of the infidels, he solicited and encouraged the apostolical missionaries, friars Fernando de St. Joseph, Mateo Brabo, Honorio Matos, and Cristoval de San Joseph, to engage with him in this enterprise; and after he had executed a particular mission in the province of Tarma, penetrated with them, and two lay brothers, who joined the expedition, into the mountainous territory. They there laboured with so much zeal and activity, that in the year 1730, nearly the whole of the nations dwelling on the banks of the river Perene were converted, and collected in six populous towns, under the denominations of Quimiri, Nixandaris, Cerro de la Sal, Eneno, Pichana, and San Tadeo de los Autes.

In the above year, 1730, was discovered the great Pajonal, so called on account of the high grasses with which the mountains that surround it are thickly covered. This Pajonal constitutes a considerable portion of the mountainous territory which extends from the rivers Ene and Perene, more than forty leagues to the north, and thirty from west to east. On the north-west side it limits the Plain of the Sacrament, from which it is divided by the river Pachitea; and on the west it stretches to the very lofty mountains which contribute their copious streams to the great Paro. The spiritual conquest of the infidels inhabiting the Andes mountains of the Pajonal, was first undertaken by the venerable father, friar Juan de la Marca,