although several of them had eminently contributed to the conquest. This proceeding irritated the minds of the Almagrians against the governor, and excited them to revenge. Almagro had left a son, a young man of a noble and generous disposition, to whom the whole party looked up as a leader. A conspiracy was soon formed under his auspices; and Juan de Herrada, an officer of distinguished abilities, had the charge of its execution. On the 26th of June, 1541, Herrada, with eighteen of the most determined conspirators, clothed in complete armour, rushed at mid-day into the palace of Lima, and attacked the governor, with several of his adherents. Pizarro, although without any other arms than bis sword and his buckler, defended himself with a courage worthy of his former exploits; but his few companions being all killed, or mortally wounded, he was overpowered by numbers, and fell under the strokes of the conspirators in the 74th or 75th year of his age. The assassins immediately rushed out of the palace, and waving their bloody swords, proclaimed the death of the tyrant. Being joined by about 200 of their party, they carried young Almagro in procession through the streets, and declared him lawful successor to the government. This election, however, was not agreeable to all; and although numbers of desperate adventurers, and of persons disaffected to Pizarro's government, flocked to his standard, many of the officers at a distance from Lima refused to recognise his authority. While things were in this unsettled state, Vaca de Castro arrived from Spain with full powers to assume the government, and speedily assembled a body of troops. The Almagrians having no hopes of obtaining pardon for so heinous a crime as the murder of the governor, marched against him, and both sides were eager to bring the affair to the speedy decision of the sword. A battle was fought with all the animosity that could be inspired by the rancour of private enmity, and the last efforts of despair. Victory, after remaining long doubtful, declared at last for Vaca de Castro. The carnage was great in proportion to the number of combatants. Of 1400, the whole amount of the troops on both sides, 500 were left dead on the field, and a much greater number were wounded. Of the prisoners that were taken, forty were condemned to death, and

the rest banished from Peru. The young Almagro, who had displayed great courage in this engagement, made his escape but being betrayed by some of his officers, he was taken and beheaded at Cuzco.

. During these transactions in Peru, the court of Spain had formed a variety of new regulations for the better government of the colonies. Vaca de Castro was superseded; and Biasco Nugnez Vela was appointed governor of Peru, with the title of viceroy. The new laws, however, occasioned a great fer. ment in many of the colonies, but especially in Peru; and Gonzalo Pizarro, brother of the conqueror, put himself at the head of the malcontents. A bloody engagement took place between him and the viceroy, in which the latter, after displaying in an eminent degree the abilities of a commander, and the courage of a soldier, fell covered with wounds. By Gonzalo's command, his head was cut off and placed on the public gibbet in Quito. All Peru now submitted to Gonzalo, who immediately assumed the title of viceroy. Francis Carjaval, one of the boldest and most daring of the Spanish adventurers, and who, although near fourscore years of age, possessed all the animation and enterprising spirit of youth, advised him totally to reject the authority of Spain, and to assume the rank of an independent sovereign. But Gonzalo considering this as too bold an undertaking, chose rather to rule Peru in subordination to Spain, and aspired no higher than to obtain his confirmation in the office of viceroy. His proceedings, however, became a subject of serious consideration at the court of Charles V.; and it was found necessary to send over some person of consummate prudence to quell this formidable revolt. Pedro de la Gasca, an ecclesiastic, a man of mild and engaging man. ners, but of an extraordinary firmness and intrepidity, was chosen for this important undertaking. From the power which Pizarro had acquired, and the distance of Peru from Spain, it was considered as a difficult task to reduce him to subjection by force, and it was deemed the most expedient to offer a general pardon to him and his adherents, on condition of resigning his authority, and submitting to a viceroy appointed by the crown. Gasca, however, was invested with full powers for peace or war, although he was sent out without any military

force, as Spain was at that time too much exhausted by the continental wars of Charies V, to fit out an armament of sufficient force to reduce the rebellious colony of Peru. Gasca, however, being arrived at Panama, and hearing that Pizarro was preparing for war, found means to assemble a body of men, and proceeding to Peru, endeavoured to compromise matters by treaty. But Pizarro refused to listen to any terms of accommodation, and refused to resign his vice-royalty, and declared Gasca a traitor and an enemy to the colony. There were at that time above 6000 Spaniards settled in Peru, all of them men who were accustomed to daring and desperate enterprises; and as he did not doubt of their union in his cause, he thought himself able to set every effort of Spain at defiance. Gasca, however, by his address, detached numbers of them from his party, and the royal army was constantly augmented, while the forces of Pizarro gradually diminished. Observing this decrease of his influence, he resolved to bring matters to a decision. Both armies were drawn up in the field ready for an engagement, when Pizarro, being abandoned by his whole army, except a few faithful adherents, was made prisoner. He was beheaded the next day; and Carjaval, with some others of the most distinguished leaders, suffered the same punishment. The execution of Gonzalo Pizarro, which happened in 1548, put an end to the civil wars of Peru, in which the greatest part of those ferocious and desperate adventurers, who conquered that rich country, fell by one another's hands in the field, or on the scaffold. It is somewhat remarkable, that among all the adventurers who conquered Mexico and Peru, none were soldiers employed by the crown, nor any of them mercenaries serving for pay, although many of them were extremely indigent, and had money advanced for their equipment by the principal leaders in those expeditions. Every adventurer considered himself as a conqueror, entitled to share according to his rank, not only in the spoils, but also in the lands of the conquered country. The conquerors of Peru, however, acquired fortunes much sooner than those of Mexico, as may readily be perceived from this sketch of their history. In Peru, the shares which fell to each man at the division of Atahualpa's ransom, and at the capture of Cuzco, were sufficient to enrich the first invaders. It is also a sin

gular event in the history of Spain, and her colonies, that those rich and extensive countries were subjected to her empire by private individuals at their own expense and risque. The crown furnished them only with commissions, without assisting them with a shilling from the treasury; and the hardships which these Spanish desperadoes suffered, as well as the intrepidity and perseverance which they displayed in prosecuting their enterprises, surpass every thing recorded in the history of human adventure.

RELIGION, GOVERNMENT, AND CIVILIZATION OF THE

THE religion of the Peruvians was of a very different nature from that of the Mexicans: it was mild and benevolent; and no human sacrifices were offered in the temples of the sun. Some detached customs, however, indicate a spirit less humane. On the death of an Inca, or other eminent persons, a great number of their attendants were put to death and interred round their sepulchres, so that they might appear in the next world in a manner suitable to their dignity. This, however, does not appear to have been considered as an act of 'cruelty, as the persons thus put to death were supposed to hold the same offices under their former masters as they did in this world. Their government was, as a mild despotism, intimately connected with their religion. They worshipped the sun, and venerated the Inca as his descendant and minister. In the arts of refinement, the Peruvians were superior to all the other Americans. They had the art of smelting silver, and making utensils of that metal, as well as of gold, and the Spaniards found a much greater quantity of those metals in Peru than in Mexico. The buildings of the Peruvians were far more substantial, as well as more elegant than those of the Mexicans, but their cities were fewer in number, and less populous. Cuzco was in magnitude far inferior to Mexico; and there was no other place in Peru that deserved the name of a city. The Peruvians, in fine, seem to have possessed a greater genius for the arts of peace than the Mexicans, but they were far inferior to them in war, and were much more easily conquered.

Present State, political and moral.....Religion.....Government......Laws...se.

Army.....Navy....Revenues....Commerce....Manufactures....Population....

Political importance....Language....Literature.... Polite Arts.....Manners and Customs.....National Character.

Religion.-IT is scarcely necessary to say that the religion of those countries is the Roman Catholic, which is professed by the natives, who are subjects of Spain, as well as by the Spaniards. The churches and monasteries are numerous, and many of them exceedingly rich,

Government.]-The Spanish territories are divided with great precision into vice-royalties, audiences, provinces, governments, partidos, and missions, or parishes. The three vice-royalties are those of New Granada in the north; Peru, including Chili, in the middle; and Buenos Ayres in the south. The capital of the first is Santa Fe de Bogata; of the second, Lima; and of the third, Buenos Ayres, The most striking characteristic of the politics of Spain, in regard to her American empire, is an extreme caution, which always keeps one main object in view, that of retaining the colonies in the most abject state of dependence on the parent coun try. For this purpose every method is practised that can have any tendency to counteract the aspiring views of ambition, and render the colonists insensible to public concerns, This jealous policy excludes every native of America, although born of Spanish parents, from offices of honour, emolument, and trust. The viceroys, and other great officers, civil and military are all natives of Spain; and their appointment is only for a short time. Their power being extensive, and its scene at a great distance, the shortness of its duration is considered as the surest means of securing their dependence, The chief