The Best of the Bureau/The_Best_of_the_Bureau_Bureau_Development_Inc._1992.iso/dp/0072/00720.txt

Text File | 1992-08-07 | 33KB | 514 lines

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$Title{History Of The Conquest Of Peru
Chapter II}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Prescott, William H.}
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$Subject{de
inca
atahuallpa
cap
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empire
footnote
capac
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$Date{1864}
$Log{}
Title:       History Of The Conquest Of Peru
Book:        Book III: Conquest Of Peru
Author:      Prescott, William H.
Date:        1864

Chapter II

Peru At The Time Of The Conquest. - Reign Of Huayna Capac. - The Inca
Brothers. - Contest For The Empire. - Triumph And Cruelties Of Atahuallpa.

     Before accompanying the march of Pizarro and his followers into the
country of the Incas, it is necessary to make the reader acquainted with the
critical situation of the kingdom at that time.  For the Spaniards arrived
just at the consummation of an important revolution, - at a crisis most
favorable to their views of conquest, and but for which, indeed, the conquest,
with such a handful of soldiers, could never have been achieved.

     In the latter part of the fifteenth century died Tupac Inca Yupanqui, one
of the most renowned of the "Children of the Sun," who, carrying the Peruvian
arms across the burning sands of Atacama, penetrated to the remote borders of
Chili, while in the opposite direction he enlarged the limits of the empire by
the acquisition of the southern provinces of Quito.  The war in this quarter
was conducted by his son Huayna Capac, who succeeded his father on the throne,
and fully equalled him in military daring and in capacity for government.

     Under this prince, the whole of the powerful state of Quito, which
rivalled that of Peru itself in wealth and refinement, was brought under the
sceptre of the Incas; whose empire received, by this conquest, the most
important accession yet made to it since the foundation of the dynasty of
Manco Capac.  The remaining days of the victorious monarch were passed in
reducing the independent tribes on the remote limits of his territory, and,
still more, in cementing his conquests by the introduction of the Peruvian
polity.  He was actively engaged in completing the great works of his father,
especially the high-roads which led from Quito to the capital.  He perfected
the establishment of posts, took great pains to introduce the Quichua dialect
throughout the empire, promoted a better system of agriculture, and in fine,
encouraged the different branches of domestic industry and the various
enlightened plans of his predecessors for the improvement of his people. Under
his sway, the Peruvian monarchy reached its most palmy state; and under both
him and his illustrious father it was advancing with such rapid strides in the
march of civilization as would soon have carried it to a level with the more
refined despotisms of Asia, furnishing the world, perhaps, with higher
evidence of the capabilities of the American Indian than is elsewhere to be
found on the great western continent. - But other and gloomier destinies were
in reserve for the Indian races.

     The first arrival of the white men on the South American shores of the
Pacific was about ten years before the death of Huayna Capac, when Balboa
crossed the Gulf of St. Michael, and obtained the first clear report of the
empire of the Incas.  Whether tidings of these adventurers reached the Indian
monarch's ears is doubtful.  There is no doubt, however, that he obtained the
news of the first expedition under Pizarro and Almagro, when the latter
commander penetrated as far as the Rio de San Juan, about the fourth degree
north.  The accounts which he received made a strong impression on the mind of
Huayna Capac.  He discerned in the formidable prowess and weapons of the
invaders proofs of a civilization far superior to that of his own people. He
intimated his apprehension that they would return, and that at some day, not
far distant, perhaps, the throne of the Incas might be shaken by these
strangers, endowed with such incomprehensible powers. ^1 To the vulgar eye, it
was a little speck on the verge of the horizon; but that of the sagacious
monarch seemed to descry in it the dark thunder-cloud, that was to spread
wider and wider till it burst in fury on his nation!

[Footnote 1: Sarmiento, an honest authority, tells us he had this from some of
the Inca lords who heard it, Relacion, Ms., cap. 65.]

     There is some ground for believing thus much.  But other accounts, which
have obtained a popular currency, not content with this, connect the first
tidings of the white men with predictions long extant in the country, and
with supernatural appearances, which filled the hearts of the whole nation
with dismay.  Comets were seen flaming athwart the heavens.  Earthquakes
shook the land; the moon was girdled with rings of fire of many colors; a
thunderbolt fell on one of the royal palaces and consumed it to ashes; and
an eagle, chased by several hawks, was seen, screaming in the air, to hover
above the great square of Cuzco, when, pierced by the talons of his
tormentors, the king of birds fell lifeless in the presence of many of the
Inca nobles, who read in this an augury of their own destruction!  Huayna
Capac himself, calling his great officers around him, as he found he was
drawing near his end, announced the subversion of his empire by the race of
white and bearded strangers, as the consummation predicted by the oracles
after the reign of the twelfth Inca, and he enjoined it on his vassals not
to resist the decrees of Heaven, but to yield obedience to its messengers. ^2

[Footnote 2: A minute relation of these supernatural occurrences is given by
the Inca Garcilasso de la Vega, (Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 9, cap. 14,) whose
situation opened to him the very best sources of information, which is more
than counterbalanced by the defects in his own character as an historian, -
his childish credulity, and his desire to magnify and mystify every thing
relating to his own order, and, indeed, his nation.  His work is the source
of most of the facts - and the falsehoods - that have obtained circulation
in respect to the ancient Peruvians.  Unfortunately, at this distance of
time, it is not always easy to distinguish the one from the other.]

     Such is the report of the impressions made by the appearance of the
Spaniards in the country, reminding one of the similar feelings of
superstitious terror occasioned by their appearance in Mexico.  But the
traditions of the latter land rest on much higher authority than those of the
Peruvians, which, unsupported by contemporary testimony, rest almost wholly
on the naked assertion of one of their own nation, who thought to find,
doubtless, in the inevitable decrees of Heaven, the best apology for the
supineness of his countrymen.

     It is not improbable that rumors of the advent of a strange and
mysterious race should have spread gradually among the Indian tribes along
the great table-land of the Cordilleras, and should have shaken the hearts
of the stoutest warriors with feelings of undefined dread, as of some
impending calamity.  In this state of mind, it was natural that physical
convulsions, to which that volcanic country is peculiarly subject, should
have made an unwonted impression on their minds; and that the phenomena,
which might have been regarded only as extraordinary, in the usual seasons
of political security, should now be interpreted by the superstitious
soothsayer as the handwriting on the heavens, by which the God of the Incas
proclaimed the approaching downfall of their empire.

     Huayna Capac had, as usual with the Peruvian princes, a multitude of
concubines, by whom he left a numerous posterity.  The heir to the crown, the
son of his lawful wife and sister, was named Huascar. ^3 At the period of the
history at which we are now arrived, he was about thirty years of age.  Next
to the heir-apparent, by another wife, a cousin of the monarch's, came Manco
Capac, a young prince who will occupy an important place in our subsequent
story.  But the best-beloved of the Inca's children was Atahuallpa.  His
mother was the daugh