My informer said, when he was pursuing an Indian, the man cried out for mercy, at the same time that he was covertly loosing the bolas from his waist, meaning to whirl it round his head and so strike his pursuer.

"I however struck him with my sabre to the ground, and then got off my horse, and cut his throat with my knife." This is a dark picture; but how much more shocking is the unquestionable fact, that all the women who appear above twenty years old are massacred in cold blood?
When I exclaimed that this appeared rather inhuman, he answered, "Why, what can be done?
they breed so!" Every one here is fully convinced that this is the most just war, because it is against barbarians.

Who would believe in this age that such atrocities could be committed in a Christian civilised country?
The children of the Indians are saved, to be sold or given away as servants, or rather slaves for as long a time as the owners can make them believe themselves slaves; but I believe in their treatment there is little to complain of.
In the battle four men ran away together.

They were pursued, one was killed, and the other three were taken alive.

They turned out to be messengers or ambassadors from a large body of Indians, united in the common cause of defence, near the Cordillera.