It may be proper to remark here, that the first Paulistas who entered the river Paraguay met with two nations, denominated _Payagoas_, and _Guaycurus_; both numerous and formidable; the first from its large armadas, and the second from the dexterity of the natives on horseback, from which they acquired the denomination of Cavalleiros. The Payagoas, from time immemorial, were always masters of the navigation of the Paraguay and its confluents, as far as nature offered no impediments. The Guaycurus had also always possessed the adjacencies of the same river, for the space of three hundred and fifty miles at least. As it is an indubitable fact, that there were no horses in South America previous to its discovery by Pinson, in 1500, and that they were first introduced into this country by its two conquering nations, Spain and Portugal, it cannot be difficult to define, with tolerable certainty, the epoch when the Guaycurus first obtained these animals, which they used at all times, even in their shortest excursions, and with which they rendered themselves so formidable to all the circumjacent nations, not excepting the conquerors of the country. It would appear probable that they first derived the horse from the colonists of Assumption, rather than from those of Peru. If they were in former times powerful in war canoes, they only retained a sufficient number for passing from one to the other side of rivers, on discovering that the horse was more useful and advantageous for war, or for depredations upon the distant tribes. Such was the state of those two nations about the year 1720, when their reciprocal aversion was converted into a firm alliance, the Guaycurus soon becoming equally formidable upon both elements, with an establishment of war canoes little inferior to that of the Payagoas. They continued to annoy the rising province from the year 1725 to the year 1768, at which period a disunion occurred, and the Payagoas descended to the low Paraguay, formed an alliance, or, more properly speaking, subjected themselves to the Spaniards of the province of Paranna, where they fixed their habitations, and have lived since 1774, a little below Assumption. Two causes are said to have influenced the Payagoas in this separation; the great diminution of numbers which they had sustained in repeated conflicts with the Spaniards and Portuguese, and their jealousy of the Guaycurus, who they now found were not less powerful upon the waters than in the field.