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We may reasonably conclude that there existed in the country a race advanced in civilization before the time of the Incas; and, in conformity with nearly every teaching in natural life. He may have invented a fable with sagacity and astuteness, that he might be respected; saying that he and his wife were children of the Sun, who had come from Heaven, and that their Father had sent them to teach and do good to the people. . . . The belief in the fable of the Ynca's origin would be confirmed by the benefits and privileges he conferred on the Indians, until they at last firmly believed that he was the Child of the Sun, come from Heaven." (Markham's trans., i. 94.) Mr. Markham pronounces "all this sensible enough," and it at least indicates the true spirit, if not the right method, of investigation. But a wider comparison of popular traditions has led to a general rejection, in such cases as the present, of the idea of conscious invention-whether as idle fable or designed imposture-to account for their origin. The only question in regard to such a story is whether it is to be considered as purely mythical or as the mythical adaptation or development of an historical fact. In this instance Dr. Brinton takes the latter view, asserting that Manco Capac was "a real character," "first of the historical Incas," "the Rudolph of Hapsburg of their reigning family," who "flourished about the eleventh century," and to whom "tradition has transferred a portion of the story of Viracocha," the Peruvian deity. (Myths of the New World, 179.) Mr. Tylor, on the other hand, after noticing the legend of the Muyscas, a neighboring people, in which Bochica and Huythaca are evident personifications of the sun and moon, says, 'Like to this in meaning, though different in fancy, is the civilizationmyth of the Incas. . . . In after-ages the Sun and Moon were still represented in rule and religion by the Inca and his sister-wife, continuing the mighty race of Manco Capac and Mama Oello. But the two great ancestors returned when their earthly work was done, to become, what we may see they had never ceased to be, the sun and moon themselves." (Primitive Culture, i. 319.) It would not be inconsistent with a full acceptance of this theory to consider all such myths as veiling the real existence of men of superior endowments, to whom civilization must everywhere have owed its earliest developments, but to link them with the actual history of these personages would require very different evidence from what exists in the present or any similar case.-ED.]

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tradition, we may derive this race from the neighborhood of Lake Titicaca; a conclusion strongly confirmed by the imposing architectural remains which still endure, after the lapse of so many years, on its borders. Who this race were, and whence they came, may afford a tempting theme for inquiry to the speculative antiquarian. But it is a land of darkness that lies far beyond the domain of history."5

14 Among other authorities for this tradition, see Sarmiento, Relacion, MS., cap. 3, 4,-Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 5, lib. 3, cap. 6,-Conq. i Pob. del Piru, MS.,-Zarate, Historia del Descubrimiento y de la Conquista del Peru, lib. 1, cap. 10, ap. Barcia, Historiadores primitivos de las Indias occidentales (Madrid, 1749), tom. 3.—In most, not all, of the traditions, Manco Capac is recognized as the name of the founder of the Peruvian monarchy, though his history and character are related with sufficient discrepancy.

15 Mr. Ranking,

"Who can deep mysteries unriddle
As easily as thread a needle,"

finds it "highly probable that the first Inca of Peru was a son of the Grand Khan Kublai"! (Historical Researches on the Conquest of Peru, etc., by the Moguls (London, 1827), p. 170.) The coincidences are curious, though we shall hardly jump at the conclusion of the adventurous author. Every scholar will agree with Humboldt in the wish that "some learned traveller would visit the borders of the lake of Titicaca, the district of Callao, and the high plains of Tiahuanaco, the theatre of the ancient American civilization." (Vues des Cordillères, p. 199.) And yet the architectural monuments of the aborigines, hitherto brought to light, have furnished few materials for a bridge of communication across the dark gulf that still separates the Old World from the New.*

* [The regions mentioned by Humboldt were visited in 1847 by a French savant, M. Angrand, who brought away carefully-prepared plans of many of the ruins, of which a description is given by Desjardins (Le Pérou avant la Conquête espagnole), tending to confirm the conclusions drawn from previous sources of information, that a civili

The same mists that hang round the origin of the Incas continue to settle on their subsequent annals; and so imperfect were the records employed by the Peruvians, and so confused and contradictory their traditions, that the historian finds no firm footing on which to stand till within a century of the Spanish conquest.16 At first, the progress of the Peruvians.

16 A good deal within a century, to say truth. Garcilasso and Sarmiento, for example, the two ancient authorities in highest repute, have scarcely a point of contact in their accounts of the earlier Peruvian princes; the former representing the sceptre as gliding down in peaceful succession from hand to hand through an unbroken dynasty while the latter garnishes his tale with as many conspiracies, deposi

zation, superior to that of the Incas, had passed away long before the period of the Spanish conquest. A work announced as in the press, by Mr. Hutchinson, formerly English consul in Peru, may be expected to give the fruits of more recent explorations. But it may be safely predicted that no discoveries that may be made will ever establish the fact of a communication at some remote period between the two hemispheres. It may be' doubted, indeed, whether the whole inquiry, so persistently pursued, has not sprung from an illusion. Had the Eastern Continent been discovered by a voyager from the Western, it would perhaps have been assumed that the latter had furnished those swarms which afterwards passed through Asia into Europe, and that here was the original seat of the human family and the spot where culture had first begun to dawn. Mr. James S. Wilson's discovery, on the coast of Ecuador, of articles of pottery and of gold, "in a stratum of mould beneath the sea-level, and covered by several feet of clay," proves, according to Murchison, that "within the human period the lands on the west coast of equatorial America were depressed and submerged; and that after the accumulation of marine clays above the terrestrial relics the whole coast was elevated to its present position." If, then, the existence not only of the human race, but of human art, in America, antedates the present conformation of the continent, how futile must be every attempt to connect its early history with that of Egypt or of India !—ED.]

seems to have been slow, and almost imperceptible. By their wise and temperate policy they gradually won over the neighboring tribes to their dominion, as these latter became more and more convinced of the benefits of a just and well-regulated government. As they grew stronger, they were enabled to rely more directly on force; but, still advancing under cover of the same beneficent pretexts employed by their predecessors, they proclaimed peace and civilization at the point of the sword. The rude nations of the country, without any principle of cohesion among themselves, fell one after another before the victorious arm of the Incas. Yet it was not till the middle of the fifteenth century that the famous Topa Inca Yupanqui, grandfather of the monarch who occupied the throne at the coming of the Spaniards, led his armies across the terrible desert of Atacama, and, penetrating to the southern region of Chili, fixed the permanent boundary of his dominions at the river Maule. His son, Huayna Capac, possessed of ambition and military talent fully equal to his father's, marched along the Cordillera towards the north, and, pushing his conquests across the equator, added the powerful kingdom of Quito to the empire of Peru."7

tions, and revolutions as belong to most barbarous and, unhappily, most civilized communities. When to these two are added the various writers, contemporary and of the succeeding age, who have treated of the Peruvian annals, we shall find ourselves in such a conflict of traditions that criticism is lost in conjecture. Yet this uncertainty as to historical events fortunately does not extend to the history of arts and institutions which were in existence on the arrival of the Spaniards. * Sarmiento, Relacion, MS., cap. 57, 64.-Conq. i Pob. del Piru, MS.-Velasco, Hist. de Quito, p. 59.-Dec. de la Aud. Real., MS.

The ancient city of Cuzco, meanwhile, had been gradually advancing in wealth and population, till it had become the worthy metropolis of a great and flourishing monarchy. It stood in a beautiful valley on an elevated region of the plateau, which among the Alps would have been buried in eternal snows, but which within the tropics enjoyed a genial and salubrious temperature. Towards the north it was defended by a lofty eminence, a spur of the great Cordillera; and the city was traversed by a river, or rather a small stream, over which bridges of timber, covered with heavy slabs of stone, furnished an easy means of communication with the opposite banks. The streets were long and narrow, the houses low, and those of the poorer sort built of clay and reeds. But Cuzco was the royal residence, and was adorned with the ample dwellings of the great nobility; and the massy fragments still incorporated in many of the modern edifices bear testimony to the size and solidity of the ancient."

18

Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 7, cap. 18, 19; lib. 8, cap. 5-8.The last historian, and, indeed, some others, refer the conquest of Chili to Yupanqui, the father of Topa Inca. The exploits of the two monarchs are so blended together by the different annalists as in a manner to confound their personal identity.

18 Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 1, lib. 7, cap. 8-11.-Cieza de Leon, Cronica, cap. 92.-" El Cuzco tuuo gran manera y calidad, deuio ser fundada por gente de gran ser. Auia grandes calles, saluo q era angostas, y las casas hechas de piedra pura cō tan lindas junturas, q illustra el antiguedad del edificio, pues estauan piedras tan grādes muy bien assentadas." (Ibid., ubi supra.) Compare with this Miller's account of the city as existing at the present day: "The walls of many of the houses have remained unaltered for centuries. The great size of the stones, the variety of their shapes, and the inimitable

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