No little competition was afforded these Faeneros by the _Changadores_, adventurers of a more reckless order who made their incursions into the country without licence and against the law. Corresponding precisely to the buccaneers of the farther north, they slew where opportunity offered, taking refuge in Brazil when pursued, until their growing numbers enabled them from time to time to offer armed resistance to the officers of the Crown sent to chastise them. Attracted by this commerce, pirates, whether of Portuguese or other nationality, would occasionally make descents, and would raid and harry the cattle in their turn. The Indians, for their part, were not slow in availing themselves of this new and convenient source of livelihood, and, according to a Uruguayan writer became "carnivorous from necessity and equestrian from force of imitation." In 1680 a more serious danger threatened the Banda Oriental. At the beginning of that year a Portuguese fleet came to anchor off the island of San Gabriel. Eight hundred soldiers and a number of colonist families were disembarked at Colonia del Sacramento on the mainland, where they founded a township. On learning of this invasion the Governor of Buenos Aires, José de Garro, immediately demanded the evacuation of the place. As a reply to this request, Lobo, the Portuguese commander, triumphantly produced a map on which Colonia was represented as in Brazilian territory. A strenuous geographical discussion ensued, at the conclusion of which Garro, having failed to convince the intruders of the inaccuracy of the chart by more subtle arguments, resolved to expel the enemy by force. With this end in view he obtained the loan of three thousand Indians from the Jesuits, who were by this time becoming accustomed to the lending of men and arms for such patriotic purposes. With this force, stiffened by the presence of three hundred Spaniards, he captured the hostile settlement, taking prisoners the Portuguese Governor and garrison. It is related that the Spanish general had prepared a striking _ruse de guerre_ that was to serve in this assault. Four thousand loose horses were to be driven to the front of the charging forces, and upon these animals the first devastation of the artillery fire of the defenders was to expend itself. The Indians, however, whose destined place was in the vanguard, raised some powerful objections to this scheme of attack. Considering with reason that a backward rush of the wounded and terrified beasts--like that of the elephants of a previous age--would promise greater disaster to themselves than to the enemy, they protested against the living bulwark with its many possibilities. Thus the town was captured without the aid of the horses, and the first of the many combats that reddened the shore of Colonia ended in favour of Spain.