On April 8, 1543, the Governor returned to Asuncion, worn out and ill with ague. There he found all confusion. Domingo de Irala, a clever, ambitious Biscayan soldier who had been interim Governor before Nuñez had arrived, had worked upon the people, saying that Nuñez wished to take away their property. As their chief property was in Indians whom they had enslaved, this rendered Nuñez most unpopular, and the same kind of allegations were laid against him as were laid against the Jesuits when in their turn they denounced slavery in Paraguay. All the complaints were in the name of liberty, as generally is the case when tyranny or villainy of any sort is to be done. So Alvar Nuñez[45] tells us in his Commentaries that at the hour of the Ave Maria ten or twelve of the ‘factious’ entered his house where he lay ill in bed, all shouting ‘Liberty!’ and to prove they were all good patriots one Jaime Resquin put a bent crossbow to his side, and forced him to get out of bed, and took him off to prison amid a crowd all shouting ‘Liberty!’ The friends of liberty (upon the other side) attempted a rescue, but the patriots[46] were too strong. So the unpatriotic Governor was thrown, heavily ironed, into a cell, out of which to make room they let a murderer who was awaiting death. ‘He’ (Alvar Nuñez grimly remarks) ‘made haste to take my cloak, and then set off down the street at once, calling out “Liberty!”’ That everything should be in order, the patriots confiscated all the Governor’s goods and took his papers, publishing a proclamation that they did so because he was a tyrant. Unluckily, the Indians have not left us any commentaries, or it would be curious to learn what they thought as to the tyranny of Alvar Nuñez. Most probably they thought as the Indians of the Jesuit missions thought at the expulsion of the Jesuits from Paraguay, as is set forth in the curious memorial addressed in 1768 by the people of the Mission of San Luis to the Governor of Buenos Ayres, praying that the Jesuits might be suffered to remain instead of the friars, who had been sent to replace them against the people’s will.[47] Having got the Governor into prison, the patriots had to elect another chief, and the choice naturally ‘fell’ upon Domingo de Irala, who, having been interim Governor, had never ceased intriguing from the first. He promptly put his friends in office, after the fashion of all Governors, whether they enter office to the cry of ‘Liberty’ or not. The friends of Alvar Nuñez, in the usual Spanish fashion (long sanctified by use and wont), declared themselves in opposition—that is, they roamed about the land, proving by theft and murder that their love of liberty was just as strong as that of those in power. Things shortly came to such a pass that no one could leave his house by night. The marauding Guaycurús burnt all the suburbs, and threatened to attack the town. Nuñez himself was guarded day and night by four men armed with daggers in a close prison.