Quito. These were naked like savages, and so emaciated with famine, or worn out with fatigue, that they had more the appearance of spectres than of men.

SLXVI. But, instead of returning to enjoy the repose which his condition required, Pizarro, on entering Quito, received accounts of a fatal event that threatened calamities more dreadful to him than those through which he had passed. From the time that his brother made that partial division of his conquests which has been mentioned, the adherents of Almagro, considering themselves as proscribed by the party in power, no longer entertained any hope of bettering their condition. Great numbers in despair resorted to Lima, where the house of young Almagro was always open to them, and the slender portion of his father's fortune, which the governor allowed him to enjoy, was spent in affording them subsistence. The warm attachment with which every person who had served under the elder Almagro devoted himself to his interests, was quickly transferred to his son, who was now grown up to the age of manhood, and possessed of all the qualities which captivate the affections of soldiers. Of a graceful appearance; dexterous at all martial exercises, bold, open, generous, he seemed to be formed for command; and as his father, conscious of his own inferiority, from the total want of education, had been extremely attentive to have him instructed in every science becoming a gentleman, the accomplishments which he had acquired heightened the respect of his followers, as they gave him distinction and eminence among illiterate adventurers. In this young man the Almagrians found a point of union which they wanted, and looking up to him as their head, were ready to undertake any thing for his advancement. Nor was affection for Almagro their only incitement; they were urged on by their own distresses. Many of them, destitute of common necessaries, and weary of loitering away life, a burden to their chief, or to such of their associates as had saved some remnant of their fortune from pillage and confiscation, longed impatiently for an occasion to exert their activity and courage, and began to deliberate how they might be avenged on the author of all their misery. Their frequent ca bals did not pass unobserved; and the governor was warned to be on his guard against men who meditated some desperate deed, and had resolution to execute it. But either from the native intrepidity of his mind, or from contempt of persons whose poverty seemed to render machinations of little consequence, he disregarded the admonitions of his friends. "Be in no pain," said he carelessly, "about my life; it is perfectly safe, as long as every man in Peru knows that I can in a moment cut off any head which dares to harbour a thought against it." This security gave the Almagrians full leisure to digest and ripen every part of their scheme; and Juan de Herrada, an officer of great abilities, who had the charge of Almagro's education, took the direction of their consultations, with all the zeal which this connexion inspired; and with all the authority which the ascendant that he was known to have over the mind of his pupil gave him.

On Sunday, the twenty sixth of June, at midday, the season of tranquillity and repose in all sultry climates, Herrada, at the bead

See Note XXIII.

of eighteen of the most determined conspirators, sallied out of Almagro's house in complete armour; and, drawing their swords, as they advanced hastily towards the governor's palace, cried out, "Long live the king, but let the tyrant die!" Their associates, warned of their motions by a signal, were in arms at different stations ready to support them. Though Pizarro was usually surrounded by such a numerous train of attendants as suited the magnificence of the most opulent subject of the age in which he lived, yet as he was just risen from table, and most of his domestics had retired to their own apartments, the conspirators passed through the two outer courts of the palace unobserved. They were at the bottom of the stair case, before a page in waiting could give the alarm to his master, who was conversing with a few friends in a large hall. The governor, whose steady mind no form of danger could appal, starting up, called for arms, and commanded Francisco de Chaves to make fast the door. But that officer, who did not retain so much presence of mind as to obey this prudent order, running to the top of the staircase, wildly asked the conspirators what they meant, and whither they were going? Instead of answering, they stabbed him to the heart, and burst into the hall. Some of the persons who were there threw themselves from the windows; others attempted to fly; and a few drawing their swords, followed their leader into an inner apartment. The conspirators, animated with having the object of their vengeance now in view, rushed forward after them. Pizarro, with no other arms than his sword and buckler, defended the entry, and supported by his half-brother Alcantara, and his little knot of friends, he maintained the unequal contest with intrepidity worthy of his past exploits, and with the vigour of a youthful combatant. "Courage," cried he, "companions, we are yet enow to make those traitors repent of their audacity." But the armour of the conspirators protected them, while every thrust they made took effect. Alcantara fell dead at his brother's feet; his other defenders were mortally wounded. The governor, so weary that he could hardly wield his sword, and no longer able to parry the many weapons furiously aimed at him, received a deadly thrust full in his throat, sunk to the ground, and expired.

§ LXVII. As soon as he was slain, the assassins ran out into the streets, and waving their bloody swords, proclaimed the death of the tyrant. Above two hundred of their associates having joined them, they conducted young Almagro in solemn procession through the city, and assembling the magistrates and principal citizens, compelled them to acknowledge him as lawful successor to his father in his government. The palace of Pizarro, together with the houses of several of his adherents, were pillaged by the soldiers, who had the satisfaction at once of being avenged on their enemies, and of enriching themselves by the spoils of those through whose hands all the wealth of Peru had passed.

§ LXVIII. The boldness and success of the conspiracy, as well as the name and popular qualities of Almagro, drew many soldiers to his standard. Every adventurer of desperate fortune, all who were dissatisfied with Pizarro, and from the rapaciousness of his government in the latter years of his life, the number of malcontents was considerable, declared without hesitation in favour of Almagro, and he was soon at the head of eight hundred of the most

gallant veterans in Peru. As his youth and inexperience disqualified him from taking the command of them himself, he appointed Herrada to act as general. But though Almagro speedily collected such a respectable force, the acquiescence in his government was far from being general. Pizarro had left many friends to whom bis memory was dear; the barbarous assassination of a man to whom his country was so highly indebted, filled every impartial person with horror. The ignominious birth of Almagro, as well as the doubtful title on which he founded his pretensions, led others to consider him as an usurper. The officers who commanded in some provinces refused to recognise his authority, until it was confirmed by the emperor. In others, particularly, at Cuzco, the royal standard was ereeted, and preparations were begun in order to revenge the murder of their ancient leader.

§ LXIX. Those seeds of discord, which could not have lain long dormant, acquired great vigour and activity, when the arrival of Vaca de Castro was known. After a long and disastrous voyage, he was driven by stress of weather into a small harbour in the province of Popayan; and proceeding from thence by land, after a journey no Jess tedious than difficult, he reached Quito. In his way he received accounts of Pizarro's death, and of the events which followed upon it. He immediately produced the royal commission appointing him governor of Peru, with the same privileges and authority; and his jurisdiction was acknowledged without hesitation by Benalcazar, adelantado or lieutenant-general for the emperor in Popayan, and by Pedro de Puelles, who, in the absence of Gonzalo Pizarro, had the command of the troops left in Quito. Vaca de Castro not only assumed the supreme authority, but shewed that he possessed the talents which the exercise of it at that juncture required. By his influence and address he soon assembled such a body of troops, as not only set him above all fear of being exposed to any insult from the adverse party, but enabled him to advance from Quito with the dignity that became his character. By despatching persons of confidence to the different settlements in Peru, with a formal noti fication of his arrival and of his commission, he communicated to his countrymen the royal pleasure with respect to the government of the country. By private emissaries, he excited such officers as had discovered their disapprobation of Almagro's proceedings, to manifest their duty to their sovereign by supporting the person honoured with his commission. Those measures were productive of great effects. Encouraged by the approach of the new governor, or prepared by his machinations, the loyal were confirmed in their principles, and avowed them with greater boldness; the timid ventured to declare their sentiments; the neutral and wavering, finding it necessary to choose a side, began to lean to that which now appeared to be the safest, as well as the most just.

§ LXX. Almagro observed the rapid progress of this spirit of disaffection to his cause, and in order to give an effectual check to it before the arrival of Vaca de Castro, he set out at the head of his troops for Cuzco, where the most considerable body of opponents bad erected the royal standard, under the command of Pedro Alvarez Holguin. During his march thither, Herrada, the skilful guide of his youth and of his counsels, died; and from that time his measures were conspicuous for their violence, but concerted with

little sagacity, and executed with no address. Holguin, who, with forces far inferior to those of the opposite party, was descending towards the coast at the very time that Almagro was on his way to Cuzco, deceived his unexperienced adversary by a very simple stratagem, avoided an engagement, and effected a junction with Alvarado, an officer of note, who had been the first to declare against Almagro as an usurper.

SLXXI. Soon after, Vaca de Castro entered their camp with the troops which he brought from Quito, and erecting the royal standard before his own tent, he declared, that as governor, he would discharge in person all the functions of general of their combined forces.Though formed by the tenor of his past life to the habits of a sedentary and pacific profession, he at once assumed the activity, and discovered the decision of an officer long accustomed to command.Knowing his strength to be now far superior to that of the enemy, he was impatient to terminate the contest by a battle. Nor did the followers of Almagro, who had no hopes of obtaining a pardon for a crime so atrocious as the murder of the governor, decline that mode of decision. They met at Chupaz, about two hundred miles from Cuzco, and fought with all the fierce animosity inspired by the violence of civil rage, the rancour of private enmity, the eagerness of revenge, and the last efforts of despair. Victory, after remaining long doubtful, declared at last for Vaca de Castro. The superior number of his troops, his own intrepidity, and the martial talents of Francisco de Carvajal, a veteran officer formed under the great captain in the wars of Italy, and who on that day laid the foundation of his future fame in Peru, triumphed over the bravery of his opponents, though led on by young Almagro with a gallant spirit, worthy of a better cause, and deserving another fate. The carnage was great in proportion to the number of the combatants. Many of the vanquished, especially such as were conscious that they might be charged with being accessary to the assassination of Pizarro, rushing on the swords of the enemy, chose to fall like soldiers, rather than wait an ignominious doom. Of fourteen hundred men, the total amount of combatants on both sides, five hundred lay dead on the field, and the number of the wounded was still greater.

§ LXXII. If the military talents displayed by Vaca de Castro, both in the council and in the field, surprised the adventurers in Peru, they were still more astonished at his conduct after the victory. As he was by nature a rigid dispenser of justice, and persuaded that it required examples of extraordinary severity to restrain the licentious spirit of soldiers so far removed from the seat of government, he proceeded directly to try his prisoners as rebels. Forty were condemned to suffer the death of traitors, others were banished from Peru. Their leader, who had made his escape from the battle, being betrayed by some of his officers, was publicly beheaded in Cuzco; and in him the name of Almagro, and the spirit of the party, was extinct.

SLXXIII. During those violent convulsions in Peru, the emperor and his ministers were intently employed in preparing regulations, by which they hoped not only to re-establish tranquillity there, but to introduce a more perfect system of internal policy into all their settlements in the New World. It is manifest from all the events recorded in the history of America, that rapid and extensive as the VOL. II.

10

Spanish conquests there had been, they were not carried on by any regular exertion of the national force, but by the occasional efforts of private adventurers. After fitting out a few of the first armaments for discovering new regions, the courts of Spain, during the busy reigns of Ferdinand and of Charles V. the former the most intriguing prince of the age, and the latter the most ambitious, was encumbered with such a multiplicity of schemes, and involved in war with so many nations of Europe, that he had not leisure to attend to distant and less interesting objects. The care of prosecuting dis covery, or of attempting conquest, was abandoned to individuals; and with such ardour did men push forward in this new career, on which novelty, the spirit of adventure, avarice, ambition, and the hope of meriting heaven, prompted them with combined influence to enter, that in less than half a century almost the whole of that extensive empire which Spain now possesses in the New World, was subjected to its dominion. As the Spanish court contributed nothing towards the various expeditions undertaken in America, it was not entitled to claim much from their success. The sovereignty of the conquered provinces, with the fifth of the gold and silver, was reserved for the crown; every thing else was seized by the associates in each expedi tion as their own right. The plunder of the countries which they invaded served to indemnify them for what they had expended in equipping themselves for the service, and the conquered territory was divided among them, according to the rules which custom had introduced, as permanent establishments which their successful valour merited. In the infancy of those settlements, when their extent as well as their value were unknown, many irregularities escaped observation, and it was found necessary to connive at many excesses. The conquered people were frequently pillaged with destructive rapacity, and their country parcelled out among its new masters in exorbitant shares, far exceeding the highest recompense due to their services. The rude conquerors of America, incapable of forming their establishments upon any general or extensive plan of policy, attentive only to private interest, unwilling to forego present gain from the prospect of remote and public benefit, seem to have had no object but to amass sudden wealth, without regarding what might be the consequences of the means by which they acquired it. But when time at length discovered to the Spanish court the importance of its American possessions, the necessity of new modelling their whole frame became obvious, and in place of the maxims and practices among the military adventurers, it was found requisite to substitute the institutions of regular government

One evil in particular called for an immediate remedy. The conquerors of Mexico and Peru imitated the fatal example of their Countrymen settled in the islands, and employed themselves in searching for gold and silver with the same inconsiderate eagerness. Similar effects followed. The natives employed in this labour by masters, who in imposing tasks had no regard either to what they felt or to what they were able to perform, pined away and perished so fast, that there was reason to apprehend that Spain, instead of possessing countries peopled to such a degree as to be susceptible of progressive improvement, would soon remain proprietor only of a

vast uninhabited desert.

§ LXXIV. The emperor and his ministers were so sensible of