The little troop went southward in the best practicable order. They soon came to cultivated fields, in which natives were working. The Uaupés explained they were slaves, cultivating and taking care of the plantations of the Omaguas. They offered no resistance, and the white men hurried forward to surprise the “city” which was supposed to be in the vicinity. Looking down from the top of a hill, they observed a settlement of considerable extent, regularly laid out, with large dwellings, and a high structure amidst them. The view was a surprise. Convinced by it that this was the long-sought city and that the high building was the “palace” of the gilded chieftain, the Spaniards rode full speed down the hill; simultaneously the war drum sounded from out the village, and armed soldiers rushed into the streets and opposed the assailants with wild cries, letting fly a shower of missiles against them. Von Hutten at once saw that he could not accept battle on this ground. He therefore withdrew in good order to a level spot, hoping that he might find there compensation for his inferiority in numbers in the superior weight of his cavalry. Although pursued, he reached the position he sought without great difficulty. The sun had set, and the Omaguas remained quiet during the night. On the next morning they appeared again in great masses--fifteen thousand strong, Fray Pedro Simon asserts, and after him Gumilla; and their attack was so fierce as to occasion the most serious apprehensions. The contest was too unequal. One cavalry attack after another was repulsed, and Pedro de Limpias, who was in the lead everywhere, was wounded. At length the little troop struggled no longer for victory, but for life. With unexampled bravery a few leaders finally succeeded in forcing their way through, and with the remnant of their men reaching the settlements of the Uaupés, when the pursuit by the Omaguas ceased.
Although the unfortunate ending of the campaign against the Omaguas made further progress impracticable, the leaders of the expedition still believed they had obtained an important result. Their excited fancy discerned a great city in the large village of the Omaguas, and in the communal house that occupied the middle of the town the castle or palace of a powerful prince. Such illusions have often occurred in America, and the mere introduction of a European terminology into the domain of the ethnology of the new continent has occasioned a serious confusion which can only be gradually cleared up. In the eyes of Von Hutten and his companions that great settlement could only be the kingdom of the gilded chieftain, and they comforted themselves for their disaster in the fancy that they had at last found the seat of the long-sought _dorado_.