Facilities for Pizarro's Enterprize. 465 Ch. 2. hearing this, when he sent the vessels back, wrote B. XVI. to Almagro, begging him to change his project, and stating how much the service of God and of His Majesty would suffer from the establishment of a new colony, as tending to frustrate the main design of the enterprize. He was right in thus strongly expressing his objection, for two colonies under rival governors would not have been able to subsist in an unconquered country, and would speedily have ensured each other's destruction. for the It may here be observed how greatly the enterprize of Pizarro was facilitated by the esta- Facilities blishment of the Spaniards at Panamá. Twice, enterprize at least, in the short time that had elapsed since of Pizarro. Pizarro's departure from the Isthmus had he received assistance from his friends and associates at Panamá. How differently situated was he from the earlier discoverers, and from the masters under whom he had served: from Columbus, left isolated in his great enterprizes; from Vasco Nuñez, and from Cortes, who had much to dread upon the arrival of any Spanish vessels; and even from the minor personages, such as Ojeda, Enciso, and Nicuesa. One other difference, also, between the fortunes of these latter captains and that of Pizarro was, that he had not to contend against any tribes of Indians who made use of poisoned arrows. This alone was as good for him as if his armament had been quadrupled in number. While Pizarro was at his new town, where he remained for several months, he learned some Ch. 2. First rumours 466 Rumours of the State of Peru. B. XVI. thing of the country which he was about to conquer. He heard that, on the road to places called Chincha and Cusco, there were populous of the state towns, very large and very rich; and that a of Peru. journey of twelve or fifteen days from San Miguel would bring him to a well-peopled valley, called Cassamarca, where Atahuallpa, the greatest monarch of those parts, was stationed. The account which Pizarro's secretary gives of this Prince is probably the exact account of what was known to Pizarro at the time the secretary was writing. "This Prince," he says, "had come as a conqueror from a far-off land, his country, and having arrived at the province of Cassamarca ('Cassa,' hail, and 'marca,' a province), he had fixed himself there because he had found it very rich and very pleasant, and from thence he was about to extend his conquests." Pizarro must soon have learnt a little more about Atahuallpa, as Fernando Pizarro, in an interesting letter which he afterwards wrote to the Audiencia of St. Domingo, giving an account of the early proceedings in his brother's enterprize, states thus his brother's knowledge at that time of the affairs of the Peruvian kingdom:"He heard that there was there (at Cassamarca), Atahuallpa, son of old Cusco, and brother of him who at that time was Lord of the country. Between the two brothers there had been a very bloody war, and this Atahuallpa had gone on conquering the country as far as Cassamarca."* Pizarro hears of Ata huallpa. The ignorance of the Spaniards as regards the kingdom they were about to conquer, may be See the Appendix to QUINTANA's Life of Pizarro. Ignorance of the Spaniards about Peru. 467 seen in their use of the word Cusco for the name B. XVI. Spaniards of the reigning sovereign and that of his prede- Ch. 2. cessor, which is much the same thing as if an The invading army of barbarians, entering England, know were to speak of the deceased and the reigning monarch as old and young London. nothing about the Peruvians, of the The ignorance, however, of the Spaniards Nor the about Peru was more than equalled by the igno- Peruvians rance of the Peruvians about the Spaniards. Spaniards. Indeed, the two great centres of American civilization were entirely dissociated. Nothing was known in Mexico of Peru: nothing in Peru of Mexico. The fall of the great city of Anahuac spread dismay far and wide in Central America, but not a rumour reached the golden chambers of the reigning Inca. Yet a small and narrow strip of territory was all that intervened to check communication between the two great empires. In the same parallel of latitude where dwelt some Nahuals,* an offset of the early Mexican race, were to be found those Indians who gave Vasco Nuñez that information which led the Spaniards to undertake the discovery of Peru. Had "old Cusco" or "young Cusco" been aware of the proceedings of the Spaniards either in Darien or at Mexico, a very different reception would have awaited them in Peru; but the conquest of America was commenced at a period when nations had been formed in that continent, but when international relations had been hardly at all developed. * On the Balsam coast, and near the Gulf of Nicoya. See SQUIER'S Central America, chap. 16. B. XVI. Ch. 3. Origin CHAPTER III. THE HISTORY, LAWS, RELIGION, AND CUSTOMS OF BEFOR We EFORE narrating the events which occurred in Pizarro's march onwards, I must explain who "young Cusco" and "old Cusco" were, and who was this Atahuallpa, the great monarch whom Pizarro was now about to encounter. need not enter minutely into the many and much-vexed questions relating to the origin and the duration of the dynasty of the Peruvian Incas. Whether they were of the race of Manco Capac, a great legislator who came from the lake of Titicaca, and of his sister Mama Oello; or whether they were indigenous princes, who by slow degrees had founded a great monarchy; or whether they were the heads of some small and warlike tribe who came from a distance, are questions for the antiquary. If they were the descendants of legislators and reformers, their story will be best illustrated and explained by the extraordinary narrative of Cabeça de Vaca and his companions, who were taken for gods in Florida, and who might easily have founded a * See the chapter on Religions, vol. 2, p. 128. Origin of the Peruvian Dynasty. 469 Ch. 3. arisen. great dynasty. If, on the other hand, they were B. XVI. the chiefs of some valiant and invading tribe, then, what we know of the Araucans, from the How the remarkable poem* of a Spanish soldier who fought the Incas dynasty of against them, may aid us in discerning how the may have wise and dexterous chieftains, whom he describes as ruling over four or five thousand devoted clansmen, might invade, conquer, civilize, convert, and form into one empire a scattered people living after the fashion of the ancient patriarchs. Again, whether the dynasty of the Incas was comparatively recent, or whether, according to the learned Montesinos,† it was a dynasty primeros : Gobiernan estos tres tres mil * In the gathering of the | Que quieren ser en todo los Araucan chiefs to fight the Spanish Governor, Valdivia, whom they afterwards conquered, some of them are described in the two following stanzas :— La Araucana de DoN ALONSO ERCILLA Y ZÚÑIGA, tom. I, canto 2. † See his Memoriales, translated by M. Ternaux Compans, vol. 7. There is something singularly melancholy in reading such works as those of Montesinos and Balboa, made out from collections of dim records which will not admit of being arranged with any certainty, and yet which cannot be altogether neglected. The reader just discerns that a great many people Tres mil diestros soldados se- suffered much; that there were ñorea: No léjos Lemolemo dél venia, pelea. Mareguano, Gualemo, y Lebopía Se dan priesa á llegar, porque se vea, many battles and many rebel- |