Page:The gilded man (El Dorado) and other pictures of the Spanish occupancy of America.djvu/119

Rh The island of Margarita was to afford the first base for this enterprise. Aguirre reached it in seventeen days, sailing around Trinidad. The appearance of the two brigantines excited general astonishment. Aguirre knew how to appeal to the emotions of the inhabitants. The governor of the island and some of the other officers went down to the landing to see the new-comers. Aguirre seized and imprisoned the governor; his men then captured the fort; and before the people of Margarita came to their senses the island had passed without drawing a sword into the hands of the Marañones. The royal treasury was immediately seized, independence of Spain was proclaimed, and provisions and ammunition for the further prosecution of the campaign were energetically collected, by gentle means or forcible. Aguirre now needed larger and swifter vessels for the execution of his audacious plan, for Nombre de Dios and Panamá were to be surprised in the same manner as Margarita had been, before the news of the event could spread. A large vessel, which had brought the Dominican-Provincial Montesinos with his military escort to Venezuela, was anchored before Maracapanna (the present Piritú), on the coast of the mainland, opposite Margarita. Some of the Maranones were sent to seize the vessel. Instead of doing that, they took the opportunity to desert the standard of rebellion and surrender to the Provincial, to whom they also made a circumstantial confession of all the atrocities which Aguirre and his band had committed. Fray Francisco de Montesinos was shocked by the story, and at once sent messengers to all the settlements in Venezuela. The report of