On his return to St Jago, the seat of government, Valdivia received a considerable body of recruits to his army from Peru, together with 350 horses; on which he dispatched Francisco de Aguirre with two hundred men, to reduce the provinces of Tucuman and Cajo on the eastern side of the Andes; not considering how inadequate was even his whole undiminished military force to retain so large an extent of country as that he had now occupied, and a so numerous and warlike people under subjection.  Indefatigable in the execution of his extensive plans of conquest, Valdivia returned into Araucania, where he founded in the province of Encol, a city to which he gave the name of La Frontera, being the seventh and last of his foundation.  This name, from events which could not then have been in the consideration of Valdivia, has become strictly applicable to its present situation, as its ruins are actually situated on the southern confines of the Spanish settlements in Chili.  Though long ago destroyed, it is still mentioned by geographers as an existing city under the name of Angol, by which native denomination it was long known to the Spaniards.  It was situated in a fertile district, excellently adapted for the cultivation of vines, and for some time was in a rich and flourishing condition, principally owing to its wines, which were in great repute at Buenos Ayres, to which place they were transported by a road across the Andes and through the plains of La Plata.

After making suitable regulations for the security of this new colony, Valdivia returned to his favourite city of Conception, where he instituted three principal military officers for commanding the royal army of Chili, consisting of a quartermaster-general, a serjeant-major, and a commissary.  In the present times only two of these subsist, the quarter-master-general and the serjeant-major; which latter office is now divided into two, one for the cavalry, and the other for the infantry; while the office of commissary is only now known in the militia.  At this time he sent Alderte into Spain, with a large sum of money, and a particular relation of his transactions and conquests; and commissioned him to employ his utmost exertions to obtain for him the perpetual government of the country which he had conquered, together with the title of Marquis of Aranco.  He dispatched likewise Francisco de Ulloa by sea, with directions to explore the Straits of Magellan, by means of which he hoped to open a direct communication with Spain, without being obliged to depend upon Peru for supplies.

While occupied in the contemplation of these extensive plans for the amelioration of the extensive kingdom which he had subdued, and the advancement of his own rank and fortune, Valdivia had no suspicion of an extensive and determined system of warfare which was planning among the Araucanians, and which soon burst forth with irresistible violence, to the ultimate destruction of all the Spanish conquests beyond the