The inhabitants of Tumbez and its vicinity had been disposed to receive their Spanish visitors as guests, and to treat them with the utmost courtesy and kindness. But the tidings had reached them of the terrible outrages which they had inflicted upon the inhabitants of Puna. They therefore attacked the Spaniards as they approached the shore on their rafts and endeavored to prevent their landing. But the invaders, with musketry and a cannon which they had with them, speedily drove off their assailants, and with horses and hounds planted their banners upon the shore. They then marched directly upon Tumbez, confident of gathering, from the decorations of her palaces and her temples, abounding wealth. Bitter was their disappointment. The Peruvians, conscious of their probable inability to resist the invaders, had generally abandoned the city, carrying with them, far away into the mountains, all their treasures. The Spaniards, who had entered the city with hideous yells of triumph, being thus frustrated in the main object of their expedition, found, by inquiry, that at the distance of several leagues easterly from the sea-coast, among the pleasant valleys of the mountains, there were populous cities, where abundance of booty might be found. The whole number of Spaniards, then invading Peru, did not exceed two hundred and fifty. The Peruvians were daily becoming more deeply exasperated. With such a number of men, and no fortified base to fall back upon, Pizarro did not deem it safe to enter upon a plundering tour into the interior. Keeping therefore about one hundred and thirty men with him, and strongly fortifying himself at Tumbez, he sent De Soto, at the head of eighty men, sixty of whom were mounted, back into the mountains, to search for gold, and to report respecting the condition of the country, in preparation for future expeditions.