given him certain things to eat, Diego de Rojas became worse, and some of his servants said that he had been poisoned by order of Felipe Gutiérrez. Believing this to be true Diego de Rojas drank a great quantity of oil. The captain Felipe Gutiérrez, when informed of this suspicion, declared his innocence. He assured Diego de Rojas, and all who might disbelieve him, that he never had any such evil thought, and that no one would regret the loss of his companion so much as himself. When the poison arrived near the heart, Diego de Rojas, seeing himself so near death, requested Felipe Gutiérrez to appoint in his place Francisco de Mendoza, whom he loved as if he were his son. Felipe Gutiérrez answered that although, under the authority they held from Vaca de Castro, this could not be done, the command should, after Rojas' death, remain vested in the two, and that he was delighted to please him. After this, Diego de Rojas died during a violent fit of retching. He was a native of the city of Burgos: a valiant man, liberal, anxious always to do what was right. In war he was always cautious, at all times watching and patrolling like any other soldier. It is believed that if he had lived these regions would have been completely explored. His death was due to the poison in the herb, for which a plant of such virtue as an antidote was afterwards discovered, that the poison lost its strength, and the wounded were cured by means of it. CHAPTER XCVII _How Pero López de Ayala discovered the river Soconcho, found a well-peopled region, and returned to where the general Felipe Gutiérrez was, and how they all set out for that region._ Before the death of the captain Diego de Rojas, Pero López de Ayala had started out with a few mounted Spaniards to explore to the eastward; passing without meeting with any resistance over wide arid wastes and dense _algarrobo_ forests, peopled by other Indians, who showed no inclination to attack them. At length they reached the banks of the river called _Soconcho_,[159] and found large villages on both sides. Reflecting that it would not be prudent to advance farther with so small a force, they returned to report to their leaders. When Felipe Gutiérrez heard what they had seen and discovered, he resolved to move his camp as far as the province of _Tesuna_, a distance of six leagues. He first sent Francisco de Mendoza to fetch certain Spaniards who had remained in Tucumá. In this service Mendoza heard much yelling and had some skirmishes with the Indians.