license was refused, but the subjugation of the northern savages by peaceful means was ordered.
Oñate and other officers seem to have made several attempts in that direction, but the first one definitely recorded was that of Juan de Tolosa, twenty-six years after the fall of the city of Mexico. On the 8th of September 1546, Tolosa came to the sierra of Zacatecas with a few Spaniards, four Franciscan friars,[1] and a band of Juchipila Indians, and pitched his tent at the foot of the Bufa mountain. By kind treatment the natives were gradually conciliated, and for over a year Tolosa and his companions labored earnestly and successfully to pacify and convert them. In return the Spaniards were told of the existence of rich silver lodes in that vicinity and they determined to investigate. In January 1548 Tolosa was joined by his friends Cristóbal de Oñate, Diego de Ibarra, and Baltasar Treviño de Bañuelos, all Spanish officers of rank; and on March 21st the quaternion started on an exploring expedition.[2] No particulars are known of these adventures; but it seems that during the year the Spaniards were rewarded by the discovery of the rich mines of San Bernabé, Alvarado de San Benito on the Veta Grande, and Tajos de Pánuco; discoveries so brilliant as to make these four enterprising men at the time the wealthiest in America, as the chroniclers assure us. The town of Nuestra Señora de Zacatecas[3] was founded during this first flush of pros-
- ↑ Fray Gerónimo de Mendoza, a nephew of the viceroy, was one of them; the names of the rest are unknown. Morfi, in Doc. Hist. Mex., série iii. tom. iv. 329-30. Beaumont, Crón. Mich., v. 77, says the names are lost through the destruction of the Zacatecas convent by fire. See, also, Arlegui, Crón. Zac., 12.
- ↑ Juan de Tolosa was married to Leonor Cortés de Montezuma, daughter of the conqueror and granddaughter of the Aztec monarch. On the lives of these pioneers of Zacatecas see Arlegui, Crón, Zac., 58, 134-5; Bernardez, Zac., 28-32; Frejes, Hist. Breve, 178-9.
- ↑ The name of Zacatecas comes from the Aztec zacate, meaning grass. A writer in the Museo Mex., iv. 115, derives the name from a Spanish general who preceded Chirinos in the country! The town was first founded between the mines and the present site. Arlegui, Crón. Zac., 16. For historical and descriptive account of the city, and a plan, see Bernardez, Descrip. Zac., 1-90. Brief notices on various towns and mining districts appear in Soc. Mex. Geog., Boletin, viii. 21-4; x. 114-17.
