after, his successor Ancanamon thought proper to
inquire into the reality of the pacific proposals, and directed the
ulmen Carampangui to converse with Valdivia, that his offers might be
laid before a general assembly of the ulmens. Accordingly, on the
invitation of Carampangui, Valdivia repaired to Nancu in the province of
Catiray, where, in an assembly of fifty Araucanian chiefs, he made known
the substance of the proposed pacific negociations, read and expounded
the royal letter to the Araucanian confederacy, and made a long oration
on the motives of his interference and on the important concerns of
their immortal souls. The assembly thanked him for his exertions, and
promised to make a favourable report to the toqui. On his return to
Conception, Valdivia was accompanied by Carampangui, where he was
honourably received by the governor; who dispatched Pedro Melendez one
of his ensigns, under the safeguard of the ulmen, on a message to the
toqui, carrying with him the letter of the king of Spain, and a request
that Ancanamon would meet him at Paicavi, a place near the frontiers,
that they might confer together upon the preliminaries of peace.

The toqui soon afterwards came to the place appointed, with a small
guard of forty soldiers, and accompanied by several ulmens, bringing
likewise along with him a number of Spanish prisoners of the first
families, whom he set at liberty. The governor, with Valdivia and the
principal officers of the government, received Ancanamon with every
demonstration of respect, and conducted him to the lodgings appointed
for his reception amid the repeated discharges of artillery. The
governor then proposed, as preliminary articles of peace, that the river
Biobio should serve hereafter as the common boundary between the
Spanish and Araucanian nations, beyond which neither should be permitted
to pass with an army: That all deserters should in future be mutually
returned: And that missionaries should be allowed to preach the
doctrines of Christianity in the Araucanian territories. Ancanamon
required as a preliminary, that the forts of Paicavi and Arauco, which
had been lately erected upon the sea coast to the south of the Biobio,
should be evacuated. The governor immediately abandoned Paicavi, and
agreed to give up the other immediately after the conclusion of peace.
Being so far agreed, and as the consent of the four toquis of the
uthalmapus was requisite to ratify the treaty, Ancanamon propose