River of Darkness

by Buddy Levy

  Realizing that they were outnumbered and that despite the recent sustenance, his men were no doubt still too frail to put up much of a fight, Orellana strode toward the shore and took up a position on the high riverbank. Using language he had learned from Delicola and the other native chiefs and guides, Captain Orellana assured the assembled Indians that they need not fear and urged them to come close, for he only wished to talk. In time, two brave Indians approached, and resorting at times to his rough lexicon, Orellana continued with passive overtures of friendship, proffering some small trinkets reserved for such purposes as well as some Spanish clothes. He asked that they take these and his words of peace to their own lord, for he wished to parley with him.

  Almost immediately, an overlord did return. Orellana understood this man to be a chief because, compared to the other warriors, he was attired in more ceremonial garb. The chief appeared peaceful, and he walked directly to Orellana and his captains, all of whom welcomed him with warm embraces. Orellana proceeded with an elaborate presentation of gifts, including Spanish boots and belts, and other items that, though hardly useful, would have been intriguing to the chief. After these formal introductions and pleasantries, the chief asked if there was anything in particular that Orellana and his men needed (he no doubt knew from messengers by now that the Spaniards had been singularly focused on food since their arrival). Orellana was quick in his reply: at present, the only thing they required was food.

  The chief issued orders to some of his men, waved them away, and soon food in abundance began to arrive, a bounty in woven baskets: “meats, partridges, turkeys, and fish of many sorts.” The Spaniards were elated. Orellana thanked the chief profusely and then asked whether he might persuade other chiefs from the surrounding area to visit, as Orellana wished to speak with them as well. The chief took his leave, saying that indeed he would return with others, for there were thirteen lords in the vicinity, and they, too, would want to meet these Spaniards.

  So, Captain Orellana’s first encounter with a native village had been a generally peaceful one. It is clear that his approach of using language and diplomacy before violence was effective, at least in this instance, and a diametric departure from the techniques favored by his own captain, Gonzalo Pizarro, who no doubt would already have tortured and killed a good portion of the villagers. Orellana’s leadership and tactics—and his skill with oratory and communication—did not go unnoticed by his friar, who claimed “his knowledge of the language was, after God, the deciding factor in preventing us from perishing on that river.”

  The village was called Imara, and given the apparent cordiality and generosity of their hosts, Orellana thought it prudent to stay for a time, at least until his men could recover their strength. Seven of the Spaniards, despite now receiving regular sustenance, were fatally ill from a combination of starvation, exhaustion, and fevers, and they lay convulsing in tremulous agony. Orellana knew, also, that he must decide what to do about his own leader, Gonzalo Pizarro, and his compatriots awaiting food many days and now hundreds of miles back upriver.*

  The village of Imara was a godsend to Orellana’s company. It rested on an elevated bank above the river, carved out some distance away from one of the many miasmatic swamps that characterize Amazonia. The people of Imara were probably ancestors of the Huaoranis (or Waoranis), and the village was simple, yet organized, comfortable, and well designed. The tidy huts were framed with strong bamboo stalks, and had thatched roofs to keep out the torrential rains and oppressive sun, and walls of woven plant fibers and strips of leaves. To avoid inundating floodwaters, they were built on stilted platforms so high above the ground (some more than ten feet) that stairs, cut from tree trunks, were required to enter the main rooms. Around the huts lay cleared plantations of yuca and maize. Canoes were moored or beached at the riverside, next to fishing nets hung from trees and other gear—javelins and darts and throwers, used for hunting and fishing.

  Orellana and his men were hosted there in comfort, and over the next few days, villagers approached these strange foreigners warily, the men mostly gawking with fascination from a safe distance, the women bringing food. Regardless of the hospitality, Orellana maintained constant round-the-clock surveillance of the perimeter, keeping armed guards always at alert. The people of Imara appeared friendly, and gave every indication of tranquillity, but the trust of a conquistador like Orellana only extended as far as his sword point, and he had no intention of appearing vulnerable to an attack.

  In due course some of the region’s chiefs arrived as well, one after another in ordered succession, coming to show their respect but also out of deep curiosity to see what the Spaniards looked like and to witness firsthand their inexplicable weaponry and their stupendous watercraft. Orellana was happy to oblige, and once all the chiefs had assembled, Orellana decided that the time was right for the standard requerimiento.

  Despite Orellana’s linguistic skills, it is inconceivable that the villagers and their chiefs would have completely understood the far-reaching import and utter affront of the requerimiento, which, of course, required they accept Christ in lieu of their own gods and the Spanish king as their sovereign, and that they become vassals of Spain and subject to Christian preaching and education, for which they would receive untold rewards, including peace, prosperity, and everlasting life. If they had fully comprehended, they might well have swarmed the Spaniards en masse straightaway, killing them down to the last man. Regardless, Orellana—as a dutiful conquistador—stood before his gracious hosts and, with his men of the cloth and the Basque scribe Francisco de Isásaga at his side, “spoke to them at great length on behalf of His Majesty, and in the latter’s name took possession of this said land.” Orellana had a cross erected in the village, but no baptisms or conversions took place just yet, for Orellana had more pressing business matters to attend to.

  To ensure the legality of his actions—as was the Spanish custom—Orellana directed Isásaga to draw up the official documents, and that done, he gathered his men together both to rally their morale and to discuss their options, to talk to them “on the subject of what steps it was proper to take in the interest of their expedition and their salvation.” Despite the good fortune of their arrival among the nonviolent and generous people of Imara, Orellana well comprehended that their condition remained tenuous. By the rough calculations of some of his men with navigational understanding, since they had left Pizarro at Christmas Camp, the river had swept Orellana and his companions hundreds of miles downstream, certainly well past Delicola’s vaguely described confluence. After much contemplation and discussion, Orellana broached the topic of heading back upstream, at the very least sending a small contingent to inform Gonzalo Pizarro of the dire reality—that bringing food in sufficient quantities was not going to be possible.

  The men were bolstered by Orellana’s speechmaking and impressed with his show of leadership thus far. “The companions were very happy to see the good courage that the Captain had within him and to see with what patience he bore up under the hardships which were falling to his lot, and they spoke to him some very kind words,” assuring him that they were united, and behind him, whatever he chose to do. Yet there were murmurs among some that they hoped going back upriver was not among his wishes, so desolate was the uninhabited land that lay behind them. Memories of intense hunger were still very much in the men’s minds.

  Francisco Orellana fully understood his orders, however, and knew that Pizarro and the rest of the men were no doubt, as had been previously agreed upon, making their way downstream after Orellana, looking for any signs of where he might have camped, or any messages. Pizarro might well have found the junction that Orellana had clearly missed. Dutifully, he offered a monetary incentive to any six able men who would head back up the river in two canoes. He added that they could take with them the two black slaves and some Indian guides from Imara as oarsmen, and asked that these volunteers carry with them letters describing the “news of what was happening.”

&n
bsp; The men hemmed and grumbled, discussing Orellana’s proposal. They mulled it over, some arguing that the length of time it would take to go back upstream would result in certain death, so that no amount of money would be worth it. Others reasoned that by now Captain Pizarro had probably turned back anyway, or gone off in search of food on his own. They had come eight days downstream. Who could even begin to imagine how long it would take them—should they miraculously survive the ordeal—to go back? It was certain suicide.

  In the end, only three volunteers came forward, perhaps hoping to endear themselves to their captain with a show of bravado. However, they eventually balked, too, by adding an impossible contingency: they would go only if some of the crossbowmen and harquebusiers came along. Orellana, as fair and diplomatic a captain as he was, could not afford to spare his only weaponry, and in any event neither the crossbowmen nor the harquebusiers had any interest in going. They were at a stalemate. Tension hung as thick as the humid air around them. It was, of course, well within Orellana’s power at this moment to simply order at swordpoint certain men to make the voyage. But he was of a different mien and temperament; he was a different kind of leader. Orellana’s priest would later say that his captain believed, both in his dealings with the natives and with his own men, “that kind treatment was the proper procedure to be followed.”

  Orellana stood on the banks of the Napo and on the brink of a momentous decision. From just beyond, in the village, came the raspy sound of women grating manioc on boards, the pulp from the tasty tubers falling into long wooden urns. Squealing children scurried about naked, their tiny feet squelching in the mud. Orellana knew that once he decided to continue downstream, there would be no turning back. He also knew how his actions would be perceived: as insubordination at the very least, as mutiny or treason at the worst. The man he would be disobeying was the brother of the richest and most powerful man in the viceroyalty of Peru, perhaps—it could be argued—among the most powerful and influential men in the world. Gonzalo Pizarro’s reputation for violence, cruelty, and harsh punitive measures was legendary—he was known to have stolen the imprisoned Manca Inca’s wife for his own sexual pleasure, and he indiscriminately tortured ruler and peasant alike. There was no benefit to being on the wrong side of the Pizarros, and Orellana fully comprehended that the Spanish penalty for treason was death. Depending on how the ruthless Gonzalo Pizarro interpreted his second-in-command’s actions, Orellana risked finding himself at the receiving end of a garrote or a sword blade.

  But great leaders must make difficult decisions. Orellana made up his mind, though he told no one of his exact plans just yet. They would not attempt to go back upstream, but would rather remain in Imara for a time, to see if Gonzalo or any of his men or messengers arrived from Christmas Camp. In the meantime, Orellana called forth a few of his trusted men and, under the thrum of the forest canopy, gave them their new orders: some were to gather the remaining horseshoes stored in the holds of the San Pedro; others he dispatched to the interior to begin felling trees. While they waited for any news from Pizarro—news that both Orellana and his men suspected would never come—they were going to build a forge and a nail-making factory right there in the middle of the Amazonian jungle. The men turned resolutely to their work, and every one among them knew exactly what this meant.

  They were building another boat.

  * One reason for this wide dispersal of settlements was the result of intertribal warfare. On this stretch of Amazonia, tribes lived great distances from each other, periodically going on raiding excursions during which they would take women and children as captives. “On capturing a village they would take the women, also the children whom they enslaved, and would slaughter the men, or drive them into the jungle. The village would then be burnt, and its fields swallowed by the jungle.” J. M. Cohen, Journeys Down the Amazon, 35–36.

  * Carvajal reports a distance of some 620 miles, which is a considerable exaggeration—but at any rate they were a tremendous distance downstream.

  CHAPTER 6

  The Plight of Gonzalo Pizarro

  AFTER GONZALO PIZARRO AND HIS MEN—SOME TWO hundred of them—had waved good-bye to Orellana and the San Pedro back on Boxing Day at Christmas Camp on the Middle Napo, they had waited a few days, mired in hunger and inactivity. Pizarro knew that men of action grew depressed when sedentary, and at any rate the agreement with Orellana had been for Pizarro to begin making his way downstream on land, thereby shortening the distance Orellana would be forced to return. A place of potential rendezvous—roughly, for this had never been formally worked out and none of them had ever been there—was the confluence of the Napo with what Chief Delicola had described as a very large river, the Aguarico, as it is known today. So Pizarro rallied his men and what horses remained and prepared them for a series of difficult day marches.

  Just as it had been from El Barco to Christmas Camp, the jungle trekking was slow and arduous, with the fittest men breaking trail, hacking and swinging with machetes and swords through the sultry days, the muscles in their shoulders and forearms burning with every passing hour and every excruciating mile. According to Cieza de León, “There was not even any track to follow. To enable them to proceed and bring along the horses, the strongest men went ahead, opening a road with axes and wood knives, never ceasing to cut through that dense wild in such a way that all the camp could pass and journey eastward.” Moving on foot and leading the horses through these jungle and rain forest landscapes, the Spaniards averaged no more than three miles a day, forging and scything their way down the tangled banks of the Napo, scrambling over slimy downed ceiba trees or crawling through the tangled roots of strangler figs, the roots and branches seething with spiders the size of a man’s hand. During the long, dreadful nights, they shared the ground with hordes of army ants and the dreaded conga ants, whose sting is among the most painful in the world, causing hallucinations in some victims and reducing even the toughest men to agonized writhing.

  To make conditions even worse, according to Cieza de León, “the heavens poured down water from their clouds in such quantities that for many days, including nights, the rains never ceased.” After a few days of such toil, including wading and swimming across deep tributaries and marshy areas, Pizarro and his men halted and looked out across a giant swamp, with a huge island far in the distance. It appeared to be, on first observation, impassable. Assessing the predicament, Pizarro sent out a few scouting parties, some to forage for food and others to assess any alternatives for crossing the swamp from an inland route.

  The food scavenging did not yield much, mostly fruits and plants utterly foreign to the Spaniards, but there was one significant stroke of luck, which Gonzalo Pizarro described as “a miracle,” in which he “personally captured … five canoes from the Indians.”* Because no skirmishes or encounters with Indians were recorded, it seems likely that Pizarro had happened across canoes abandoned by Indians who had vacated the area. Regardless, the windfall provided Pizarro with at least one option: he would send Captain Alonso de Mercadillo across the swamp and down the river “with a dozen Spaniards … to see if there was any sign of Francisco de Orellana, and to seek for some fruit or roots by which the Spaniards might be sustained.”

  Mercadillo’s party left immediately. Pizarro kept the remaining men occupied with periodic food forays, though by now he must have understood what a mistake it had been not to learn about edible forest foods from his native captives when he had had the chance. The tribes throughout Amazonia are expert in living off the land, and millennia of coexistence in the tropical jungles taught them how to differentiate safe plants from poisonous ones, how to collect and drink rainwater with palm leaves, and even ways to extract salt from specific types of plant buds. This last would have been vitally useful, as all the men suffered from salt depletion by then. As it stood, the Spaniards bided their time, catching and eating lizards and snakes and even some grubs and insects, deciding to hold their remaining horses and dogs in reserve in case thi
ngs got even worse. Said Pizarro, “We were forced to eat the little buds of a plant, like a vine stalk.”

  After eight days, Mercadillo and the small scouting force returned bearing bad news: they had found nothing. No food, no villages, no sign of Orellana. Pizarro was beginning to wonder what might have befallen Orellana and whether he would ever see his captain again. Had they been attacked by Indians farther downstream, killed in some godforsaken place along this unmapped river? Was Orellana lost up some circuitous tributary? Or—and this thought was perhaps the most repugnant and vile of all, almost unthinkable—could Orellana have intentionally deserted them? Reduced now to eating nothing but “wild herbs and coarse fruits never before seen or known” (at least not to them), Pizarro cast his gaze out at the great swamp and the island looming like a mirage beyond, and pondered the idea of building another boat.

  Gonzalo Pizarro consulted with his captains, and while they agreed that a boat would be a tremendous help—indeed, might even save their lives—there were problems with the plan. Building the San Pedro had taken a Herculean effort, and the men were now even weaker, if such a thing were possible, than they had been then. What was more, Orellana had with him most of the tools and the salvaged iron horseshoes, iron necessary for making the nails to hold a boat together. Right now, Pizarro conceded, building a boat would be too difficult. Food was the essential thing.

  Gonzalo Pizarro called forth his trusted countryman Gonzalo Díaz de Pineda, the battle-hardened veteran who just a few years earlier had led the initial expedition from Quito over the Andes in search of the Land of Cinnamon. Now Pineda’s services, skills, tenacity, and spirit came to the fore, for Pizarro counted on him to succeed where Mercadillo had failed. He must descend the river far enough to find Orellana, and failing that, he absolutely must return with food. These were essentially his only options, lest they all perish here on this river of darkness and death.