la Sal, and a road was opened leading from Palca to Chanchamayo, where a
fort was built; but at the expiration of five years the government
destroyed it, as continued irruptions of the Chunchos could not be
checked. In 1784, the governor of Tarma, Don Juan Maria de Galvas,
supported by the Superior of Ocopa, Fray Manuel Sobreviela, visited the
valley of Vitoc, which had been abandoned since the Indian insurrection.
The new village of San Teodoro de Pucara was founded, and the destroyed
fort, Santa Ana de Colla, was rebuilt. The Montana was soon peopled, and
in a short time it contained upwards of forty haciendas and large
chacras. The village of Sorriano, scarcely two leagues from Colla, was
then inhabited by Chunchos, who showed a willingness to maintain
friendly intercourse with the occupants of Vitoc, from whom they took
meat, tools, and other things, which they repaid by agricultural labor.
Unfortunately, the plantation owners soon began to take an undue
advantage of this friendly intercourse, and to charge exorbitant prices
for the articles required by the Indians. For a pin or a needle they
demanded two days' work, for a fishing-hook four, and for a wretched
knife, eight, ten, or more. A rupture was the consequence. The Chunchos
burned their own village, and returned again to Chanchamayo. Still,
however, they continued on a sort of amicable footing with the Cholos,
until one of the latter wantonly shot a Chuncho at a festival. The tribe
then mustered in thousands to avenge the murder. They destroyed the
Christian villages, and massacred all the inhabitants who were not able
to fly. Thus was Vitoc once more depopulated: Cardenas, the military
governor of Tarma, made a fresh endeavor to restore the cultivation of
this fine valley. He made the road again passable, laid out the large
plantation Chuntabamba, built and garrisoned the Colla fort. The site of
the former Chuncho village, Sorriano, was converted into a _cocal_ (or
coca field), and the Montana began once more to assume a flourishing
aspect. Still, however, the Chunchos continued to harass their
neighbors, particularly during the time of the coca harvest, which could
not be gathered without military protection. During one of the harvests
a laborer was shot by the wild Indians, which so terrified the Cholos,
that they all fled to Sorriano. Soon after, Cardenas died, and the coca
plantation being neglected, became a waste. A few years afterwards the
hacienda of