The high-way leading to Peru, and to the cities of Buenos-Ayres and Sta. Fè, was seldom free from carnage and robberies, never from danger: insomuch that travellers always either suffered or apprehended murder from the savages. There was no such thing as security. Neither the summits of the highest hills, nor the deepest recesses of the forests afforded any defence. The Abipones examined all places, like hounds, and seldom returned empty-handed. On St Joseph's day, before dawn, a vast troop of Abipones, under their leader Alaykin, burst into the estate of Sinsacate, which is about ten leagues distant from the city. This place was then administered by the secular priest Carranza. A great number of people, who had assembled the day before from the neighbouring estates, intending to be present at divine service in the church of Jesus and Mary, were there at that time. The savages either slew, or carried into captivity all they saw. The number of captives, Spaniards and Indians, was five and twenty: many more were slain, and the rest saved themselves by flight; every thing was plundered, and the mules and horses which filled the neighbouring fields, driven away. The estate was saved by the lofty walls of the church Jesus Maria, though it suffered a great loss of cattle. The soldiers of Cordoba, moved by the dreadful report, at last arrived from the city, that, though unable to restore life to the dead, they might at least procure the liberty of the crowd of captives. They pursued the fugitive Abipones for some time, till their further progress was stopped by a vast lake, which, though crossed by the Indians without hesitation, seemed to the Cordobans an ocean impassable on horseback, and requiring the assistance of a boat; so that they were obliged to retire out of sight of the enemy. The people of Cordoba, notwithstanding that they excel in point of horsemanship, are little qualified to pursue the savages, from their inability to swim; the cause of this deficiency is that most of them live in a place where swimming is not customary, or where there is no opportunity for practising it. There is a place, between Cordoba and St. Iago, called Rio Seco. Scattered here and there in little valleys between the hills are great numbers of well-peopled estates, and cattle of every description. In this place is a large, elegant stone church, which owes its celebrity to an image of the Virgin Mary, and whither numbers flock from all parts, as it has been distinguished by the favour of Heaven and the gifts of the pious. The Abipones had informed themselves of this circumstance from their Spanish captives. The opulence of the place afforded them great hopes of a rich booty. Having diligently examined every thing through their spies, they resolved to occupy the narrow straits of the rocks, and block up all the ways, to deprive the Spaniards of the means of flight. They either slew, or made captive, all they found in the neighbouring fields, and in the