Page:Vol 3 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/358

338 Ever since the close of the sixteenth century, after Viceroy Velasco had colonized the regions about San Luis Potosí, Cololotlan, and San Miguel Mezquitic with Tlascaltec and Chichimec families, missionaries had begun to enter the wild districts of the Sierra Gorda and Tamaulipas, to convert the numerous tribes, which were supposed to have taken up their abode in this part of the country after the conquest. These efforts seem to have been attended with very little success. Toward the end of the seventeenth century six Dominican missions had been established in Sierra Gorda territory. The friars were soon driven away, however; the churches were burned, the missions destroyed, and the Spaniards who had settled in the vicinity were compelled to abandon the country.

In 1704 Francisco Zaraza was made lieutenant captain-general, and commissioned to bring the revolted aborigines under subjection; hitherto all the efforts to that effect of the alcaldes and captains of militia had been unavailing. Zaraza opened a campaign against the natives, but was killed during an attack, without having accomplished anything decisive. In his place was appointed Gabriel Guerrero de Ardila, who with a force of eight hundred cavalry defeated the natives and compelled them to enter into a treaty of peace. This occurred in 1715, and the conditions of the treaty were most favorable to the Indians, who were to retain their liberty and be