History of the Conquest of Peru: With a Preliminary View of the Civilization of the Incas, Volumen 1

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Richard Bentley, 1847 - 650 páginas
 

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Página 38 - It was built of heavy flags of freestone, and in some parts, at least, covered with a bituminous cement, which time has made harder than the stone itself. In some places, where the ravines had been filled up with masonry, the mountain torrents, wearing on it for ages, have gradually eaten a way through the base, and left the superincumbent mass — such is the cohesion of the materials — still spanning the valley like an arch.
Página 253 - ... charm which might have held the Peruvians together was dissolved. Every man thought only of his own safety. Even the soldiery encamped on the adjacent fields took the alarm, and, learning the fatal tidings, were seen flying in every direction before their pursuers, who in the heat of triumph showed no touch of mercy. At length night, more pitiful than man, threw her friendly mantle over the fugitives, and the scattered troops of Pizarro rallied once more at the sound of the trumpet in the bloody...
Página 230 - Rocks rich in gems, and mountains big with mines, That on the high equator ridgy rise...
Página 252 - ... he can do nothing to avert his fate. At length, weary with the work of destruction, the Spaniards, as the shades of evening grew deeper, felt afraid that the royal prize might, after all, elude them ; and some of the cavaliers made a desperate attempt to end the affray at once by taking Atahuallpa's life.
Página 251 - Yet they still continued to force back the cavaliers, clinging to their horses with dying grasp, and, as one was cut down, another taking the place of his fallen comrade with a loyalty truly affecting. The Indian monarch, stunned and bewildered, saw his faithful subjects falling round him without fully comprehending his situation.
Página 58 - The figure was engraved on a massive plate of gold of enormous dimensions, thickly powdered with emeralds and precious stones. It was so situated in front of the great eastern portal that the rays of the morning sun fell directly upon it at its rising, lighting up the whole apartment with an effulgence that seemed more than natural, and which was reflected back from the golden ornaments with which the walls and ceiling were everywhere incrusted. Gold, in the figurative language of the people, was...
Página 250 - Pizarro saw that the hour had come. He waved a white scarf in the air — the appointed signal. The fatal gun was fired from the fortress. Then, springing into the square, the Spanish captain and his followers shouted the old war-cry of " St. Jago and at them !" It was answered by the battle-cry of every Spaniard in the city, as rushing from the avenues of the...
Página 312 - In a cavern near the city they found a number of vases of pure gold, richly embossed with the figures of serpents, locusts and other animals. Among the spoil were four golden llamas and ten or twelve statues of women, some of gold, others of silver, ' which merely to see,' says one of the conquerors with some naivete, ' was truly a great satisfaction.
Página 250 - It was answered by the battle-cry of every Spaniard in the city, as rushing from the avenues of the great halls in which they were concealed, they poured into the plaza, horse and foot, each in his own dark column, and threw themselves into the midst of the Indian crowd.
Página 38 - ... of the maguey, or of the osier of the country, which has an extraordinary degree of tenacity and strength. These osiers were woven into cables of the thickness of a man's body. The huge ropes, then stretched across the water, were conducted through rings or holes cut in immense buttresses of stone raised on the opposite banks of the river, and there secured to heavy pieces of timber. Several...

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