[Illustration: FRAY FERNANDO AND JOSÉ AT THE HOLE IN THE ROCK.
_Page 91._]
UNDER THE
SOUTHERN CROSS.
A Tale of the New World.
_By the Author of
“THE CZAR: A TALE OF THE FIRST NAPOLEON.”
&c. &c._
“THY KINGDOM COME.”
London:
T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW.
EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK.
1900
CONTENTS.
I. FRAY FERNANDO’S MISSION, 9
II. CERRO BLANCO, 14
III. ST. JOSEPH’S TOOTH, 22
IV. VIRACOCHA, 31
V. VIRACOCHA’S FATHERS, 36
VI. VIRACOCHA VISITS HIS BRETHREN, 48
VII. VIRACOCHA COMES BACK, 55
VIII. VINDICATED, 68
IX. THE JOURNEY, 74
X. THE DEAD MEN WHO FOUGHT AGAINST STAIN, 84
XI. ACROSS THE APURIMAC, 90
XII. WHAT THEY DID BEYOND THE MOTHER SEA, 100
XIII. THE DOCTORS, 112
XIV. THE LAST INCA, 118
XV. THE GOLDEN CITY, 124
XVI. A STAR, 134
XVII. IN THE CONVENT PARLOUR, 141
XVIII. AT HOME, 152
XIX. THE STAR SHINES, 160
XX. THE STAR SETS, 165
XXI. OLD ENGLAND, 173
XXII. HIS OWN WAY, 182
XXIII. WHERE IT LED, 192
XXIV. AT THE OAR, 199
XXV. THE FRIEND OF THE POOR, 204
XXVI. THE FRUITS OF THE WEST, 212
XXVII. THE MATADOR, 220
XXVIII. THE KING OF THE EAST, 225
XXIX. AFTER MANY DAYS, 238
XXX. THE MAGIC STONE, 246
XXXI. THE YEARS THAT THE CANKER WORM HATH EATEN, 254
XXXII. WALTER GREY’S ADVICE, 261
XXXIII. THE KING FOUND, 267
XXXIV. THE KING FOLLOWED, 274
XXXV. EASTER-DAY, 281
XXXVI. JOSÉ’S MISTAKE, 286
XXXVII. A DISAPPOINTED MAN, 294
XXXVIII. FRAY FERNANDO’S WORDS, 303
XXXIX. JOSÉ’S WORDS, 310
XL. JOSÉ’S WORDS AGAIN, 318
XLI. JOSÉ IS AVENGED OF HIS ENEMIES, 325
XLII. JOYFUL MEETINGS, 335
XLIII. FOAM OF THE SEA, 344
XLIV. OLD ENGLAND AGAIN, 352
UNDER THE SOUTHERN CROSS
I.
Fray Fernando’s Mission.
“Cœlum, non animum mutant, qui trans mare currunt.”
On a burning autumn afternoon,—in the Sixteenth Century, which had
then passed its meridian by rather more than ten years,—Don Fray Tomas
de San Martin, the stately prior of the great Franciscan monastery of
Ciudad de los Reyes, now called Lima, was sitting alone in his private
apartment. Meaner and idler men were dozing the sultry hours away; but it
was not in the nature of Fray Tomas to seek repose while the duties of
his calling, the interests of his Order, or the concerns of any of his
numerous friends required his attention. In spite of physical languor
and exhaustion, an expression of satisfaction lit up his countenance as
he finished his second careful perusal of a letter he held in his hand.
Then he laid the document on the table before him, pausing, however, to
glance, with a slight smile, at the pompous armorial bearings inscribed
on the seals with which the floss silk that bound it had been secured.
The prior was not a man given to soliloquy; but if we might translate
his unspoken thoughts, they would run somewhat after this fashion:
“Sixteen quarterings for honest Marcio Serra de Leguisano, the tailor’s
son! Where, in heaven’s name, have they all come from? Truly saith the
Preacher in the Book of Ecclesiastes, ‘I have seen servants riding upon
horses.’ He might have added,—and there be none such headlong riders.
_Pues_, every man to his taste. These little weaknesses of Marcio Serra’s
may well be borne with, after all. For amongst the conquistadors there
is many a worse man, and not one better. Would that all, like him, broke
off their sins by righteousness, and their iniquities by showing mercy
to the poor. Certainly, it behoves us to aid him to the utmost of our
power.”—And, stretching out his hand, he rang a little silver bell that
lay near him on the table.
But the attendant, whose duty it was to answer it, was lying on a mat in
the ante-chamber, fast asleep,—and not until the prior had more than once
raised his voice and called loudly, “Antonio!” did he make his appearance.
“Send me hither Fray Fernando immediately, and then go finish thy
siesta,” said the prior, cutting short his apologies with contemptuous
good-nature.
Fray Fernando, who was not asleep, came in a few moments; and having made
the accustomed reverence, stood silently before the chair of his superior.
Fray Tomas was an able man and a good ruler. Both within the walls of
his monastery and beyond them he was thoroughly respected. Yet few could
have looked on the two who now stood face to face without the thought
that they ought to have changed places,—that Fray Fernando ought to have
commanded and Fray Tomas to have obeyed. Everything about the younger
monk, from the broad white forehead to the nervous taper fingers, bespoke
the refinement and sensitiveness of high breeding. Yet he did not look
like a man of the schools and the cloister. Power and determination
gleamed from his dark, deep-set eye, and showed themselves in every
movement of his vigorous though attenuated frame. You would have said
that he ought to have worn the plumed casque instead of the tonsure, and
have shouted, “St. Jago for Spain!” instead of telling Ave Marias on the
rosary that hung from his belt.
The prior addressed him with great urbanity. “We do justice, brother,”
he said, “to that singular zeal for our holy Faith which animates your
breast.”
Fray Fernando bowed, but a look of pain passed over his face.
The prior blandly continued: “Therefore it is that, an opportunity being
afforded to some brother of our honourable Order to undertake a work of
peculiar toil and self-sacrifice for the glory of God and the salvation
of souls, our thoughts turn to thee, as to one who will cheerfully, nay
joyfully, embrace such a mission.”
“I am ready to go whithersoever my lord the prior shall command,” said
Fray Fernando.
The prior laid his hand on the letter. “This have I just received from
the most noble knight and conquistador, Don Marcio Serra de Leguisano.
Doubtless he is known to you by reputation?”
“My lord remembers I am a comparative stranger here.”
The prior had too much good sense to retail idle stories: such as that
the good knight’s parentage was said to be of the humblest; that on the
division of the spoils of Cuzco the massive golden sun of the great
temple had fallen to his share; and that, with the recklessness of a
_parvenu_, he had gambled most of it away at primero in a single night,
complaining pathetically, the next morning, that he had “lost a good
piece of the sun.” He merely explained: “Don Marcio Serra hath received,
in _encomienda_ from our lord the king, a noble estate, rich in gold
and silver, as well as in the ordinary productions of the soil. It
embraces a very fertile valley, called Nasca; and stretches upwards, even
to the land of mist and snow, where the mighty Andes raise their giant
heads. High up, in that rarely-trodden region, at the summit of a bleak
mountain, called Cerro Blanco, gold was discovered a few years since. A
shaft was sunk, and the mine was worked, as usual, by the forced labour
of the Indians. But these unhappy people died so quickly, that at last
Don Marcio, having the fear of God before his eyes, and being mindful
of his soul’s salvation, began to take thought of their miserable case.
Possibly he was the more disposed to compassionate them, because he hath
taken to wife an Indian princess, one of the Children of the Sun, as
they call them, after their vain heathenish fashion. Therefore he hath
purchased a sufficient band of negro slaves, both men and women, which he
hath been at great charges to transport from the coast to the heights of
Cerro Blanco. And there he hath set them to work under competent Spanish
overseers.”
Both the churchmen accepted this substitution of black labourers for
copper-coloured ones as an effort of the most sincere and enlightened
philanthropy. Nor were they, perhaps, as much mistaken as might be
supposed.
“But,” continued Fray Tomas, “as the good knight’s piety is fully equal
to his humanity, he is now desirous to extend to these benighted savages
the inestimable blessings of our holy Faith. He therefore entreats me
to send him some brother of our Order, who may be found willing, for
the love of God and the good of souls, to banish himself to a dreary
inhospitable region, where the frozen earth brings forth little more than
a few blades of stunted grass; and where, from one year’s end to the
other, scarce a face will greet the exile’s eyes save those of the negro
slaves.”
Had the picture he was limning been intended for any other eye than that
of Fray Fernando, Fray Tomas might have softened its lines, and have
interspersed here and there a few lighter touches. But now he did just
the contrary; because he had taken the measurement of the man he was
addressing. When he ceased speaking, there was a moment’s silence; then
Fray Fernando said quietly, “I willingly undertake the mission.”
“May God and our Lady recompense thy zeal and piety!” was the prior’s
benign reply. He then proceeded, with equal affability and good sense, to
discuss the details of the lengthened journey which it would be necessary
for Fray Fernando to undertake.
The younger monk seemed not only willing, but actually eager to occupy
the post assigned to him. Not during his whole novitiate (which had but
recently terminated) had he appeared so cheerful, not to say so animated.
It was currently reported that nothing gave Fray Fernando pleasure except
self-mortifications and austerities; which he carried to a greater length
than any monk who had been in the monastery since its foundation.
“I have found the very man for your excellency’s affair,” wrote the prior
that evening to Don Marcio. “He is a brother of our house; exceeding
pious; and so consumed with zeal for the Faith, that he desires nothing
so much as martyrdom. The more difficult and painful an enterprise,
the less of worldly honour or profit it is like to bring, the more
attractions it hath in the eyes of our holy Fray Fernando.”
Such were the reflections of good Fray Tomas de San Martin; who was as
much, and as little, able to penetrate the mystery that veils every human
soul as any other shrewd man who fondly imagines that he can read the
hearts of his neighbours at a glance.
II.
Cerro Blanco.
“I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
Who feed, and hoard, and sleep, and know not me.”
TENNYSON.
Fray Fernando has been nearly a year in his new home. But it seems a
mockery to call it by that sacred name: since not to any living thing was
Cerro Blanco a home in the true sense of the word. Yet between forty and
fifty miners, with their families, ate, drank, and slept in the cluster
of cabins that nestled, almost literally, in a cleft of the rock, for
protection against the stormy winds of the Andes. These cabins were
built of adobes, or mud-bricks dried in the sun; and were thatched, very
neatly and carefully, with the strong grass called _ychu_. All this work
had been done, before the arrival of the negroes, by the Indians of the
valley, as part of the labour required from them by way of tribute to
their lord. They were also obliged to provide the little colony with the
necessaries of life. At stated intervals they might be seen treading the
steep and winding mountain-paths in long procession, bearing on their
heads or their shoulders large baskets of maize, of potatoes, or of
quinoa—the rice of the country—as food for the negroes. Nor would they
fail to bring also a couple of alpacas, and a good supply of chica, or
native beer, to suit the more luxurious tastes of the Spanish intendant
of the mine, and his servants. For in that elevated situation few things
would grow (at least, without very careful cultivation), except stunted
grass and little mountain-flowers, mostly blue and yellow.
Still higher than the village—indeed, on the very summit of the
mountain—was the mine, which was worked in rude and primitive fashion.
The ore extracted from the earth by the labour of the negroes was
smelted, after the manner of the Indians, in a large oven made of clay,
and placed in such a situation that the strong mountain-winds seldom
failed effectually to fan the furnace. The gold thus obtained was
transmitted twice a year to the intendant of Nasca, who accounted for it
to his lord, Don Marcio Serra de Leguisano.
Some strong motive was certainly necessary to make a lengthened residence
in such a spot tolerable to a free man, who could go elsewhere if he
would. The intendant, Diego Rascar, his four Spanish and two Creole
servants, were bound to their post by the strong cords of avarice. But
Fray Fernando had no such tie. His life was very empty; there was neither
the love of gold, nor, to speak truth, the love of souls, to fill it.
He did his duty, so far as he understood it, to his dusky flock. He
baptized the infants; he married the young men and maidens; he buried
the dead. He even tried to repress gross crimes amongst the negroes, and
to prevent gross cruelties on the part of the Spaniards: he sought to
keep the latter from lapsing into utter heathenism, and he taught the
former to hasten to the little chapel at the sound of the bell, and to
fall on their knees at the elevation of the host. It did not occur to him
that he ought to teach them anything more, or that it would be possible
to do so. The negro slaves were savages, but one grade removed from
the lowest type; a type differing very greatly and very sadly from the
imaginary picture of the “noble and virtuous savage” which a sickly and
sentimental civilization has amused itself by delineating.
With these degraded beings—whom, in his pride, he accounted scarcely
human—Fray Fernando had nothing in common; and he felt nothing towards
them save contempt and disgust, sometimes mingled with pity, stirred by
their sufferings. How could it have been otherwise? With deep truth has
it been said, “There is but one Mediator between man and man, as well
as between God and man—the man Christ Jesus.” But Fray Fernando knew
the man Christ Jesus not at all as Mediator; he only knew him as Judge.
He could not therefore say, with the noble Las Casas, “I have left in
the Indies Jesus Christ our Lord, suffering stripes and afflictions and
crucifixions, not once, but thousands of times, at the hands of the
Spaniards.” The love that embraces all men for the sake of Him who took
man’s nature upon Him, and delighted to call Himself the Son of man, was
as far above Fray Fernando’s comprehension as the brilliant stars of the
Southern Cross were above his head. And thus it was that in that barren
lonely place no love, human or divine, came to soothe and soften his
heart, and to efface the deep, jagged characters graven there by the iron
pen of pain.
Could the beauties of Nature have taken the place of human interests,
Fray Fernando need not have felt forlorn, even on the summit of Cerro
Blanco. He had but to ascend the height where the miners’ shaft had been
sunk, to command a view sublime and glorious as the imagination could
conceive. Far above, the magnificent snow-clad peaks of the Andes pierced
the cloudless sky; while as far beneath, the rich and cultivated vale of
Nasca wound like a variegated thread from the mountain’s base through
the sandy desert to the distant ocean. It is true that often, while the
mountain-peaks glistened in sunshine, a thick veil of mist obscured all
that lay beneath; yet even then the scene had a wild, weird grandeur of
its own.
Will it be believed that Fray Fernando’s steps but seldom led him to the
spot that commanded such a prospect? Not that he was unimpressed by its
sublimity; rather otherwise,—he felt it too keenly. The everlasting hills
shadowed and oppressed his spirit with the sense of a Power and Presence
too awful and too near for his peace. “Surely God is in this place!” was
the language of his heart; and, unhappily, God was a terror to him. He
desired nothing so much as to forget Him; or, if that had been possible,
to hide himself in secret places where He could not see him.
From part of the pathway between the mine and the galpon, or square—as
the miners’ village was called—might be seen the mountain-pass by which
travellers sometimes made their way from the valleys of the coast into
the interior of the country. Such travellers, if Spaniards, were usually
glad to accept shelter and hospitality from the little mining colony; and
it need not be said that the intelligence they brought with them from the
civilized world was considered ample payment by the exiles. But if the
wayfarers were of Indian race, their fleet footsteps only grew all the
fleeter until the lair of the hated and dreaded Spaniards was well out of
sight.
It became a habit with Fray Fernando to walk to the spot whence the pass
could be seen. Why he did this it is not easy to say. Perhaps, in spite
of himself, he clung to the shadow of the social life now shut out from
him; or perhaps he dreaded visitors rather than hoped for them. However
this may have been, a restless impulse seemed to drive him thither two or
three times in the day, and sometimes even late at night. But this might
have been because he slept little.
One bright, cold, moonlight night he was taking this walk as usual, when
the sound of a wild, peculiar chant, somewhat mellowed by distance,
broke upon his ear. Startled, but not greatly surprised, he paused
and listened. “Yes,” thought he, “it must be so!—Those five civilized
Spaniards, who are lords and masters here, and bound to show these
negroes an example of Christian living, have made themselves drunk with
new chica,—and the most active and daring of the slaves have managed to
elude their vigilance, and to steal out of their quarters for the purpose
of enacting some forbidden and detestable heathen rite.”
Guided by his ear, Fray Fernando bent his steps towards the spot whence
the sounds proceeded. On a little grassy plateau amongst the rocks,
some dozen negroes were engaged in performing a wild mystic dance. Hand
in hand they moved; now keeping time to some barbarous tune led by one
of their number—now setting time and tune at defiance, and leaping,
shouting, screaming like hideous maniacs. But the unexpected appearance
of the monk’s gray cowl and mantle brought the weird ceremony to a hasty
close.
“Shame, shame on you!” he cried, as the dusky group scattered in all
directions. “Shame on you!” he repeated once again, advancing to the
centre, and raising his arm in a threatening attitude. “You—Christian
men, _neofitos_, _reducidos_!—_you_ to return to these vile heathen
abominations—to worship the devil!—you who have been taught to know the
one living and true God, who made heaven and earth, and all that in them
is! Are you not afraid lest He strike you dead, and cast you into the
fire that burneth for ever and ever?”
The negroes were far from comprehending every word in this address, yet
they well understood its general import, and were duly impressed by the
solemn tone and threatening gestures of the speaker. They were thoroughly
cognisant also of the fact that the Spaniards were the masters and they
the slaves. They fled in all directions with the activity of fear; some
clambering up the rocks, some running down them, and others hiding in
their crevices. Few stayed to hear the cogent and thoroughly intelligible
peroration with which the friar concluded his harangue:—
“If there be a man among you not found within his quarters ere the moon
has passed from beneath yonder cloud, Señor Diego shall reckon with him
in the morning.”
One only of the negroes—a stalwart ebony giant, recently brought from the
wilds of Africa, where he had been a petty chieftain—stood his ground
fearlessly, and looked Fray Fernando boldly in the face.
“_You_, Pepe!” said the monk. “I expected better things from you.”
The African threw out his great bare arms with a gesture of despairing
sorrow.
“What would you?” said he, in broken Spanish.—“If we worship the Zombi,
the Spaniards scourge us, and we die;—if we worship not the Zombi, he
sends the small-pox, and we die.—Either way, we die.”
“Not so, Pepe,” the monk answered more gently. “The Zombi is an evil
spirit, a devil: he cannot harm you if you trust in God, for God is
stronger than he. Put your confidence in God and in our Lady, and no evil
can befall you.”
“Look, padre,” said the negro: “I said to our Lady the prayer you taught
me; yet all the same, Señor Diego—”
But, not waiting to finish his sentence, he turned quickly, first his
head, then his whole body—and bounding or scrambling over whatever rocky
impediments lay before him, he began a headlong career down the hill
towards the pass that wound beneath it. His senses, sharpened by the
exigencies of his previous savage life, told him correctly that a party
of travellers halted there, and were calling for guidance or help of
some kind, aware that the mining village was at hand. He knew well that
his services in bringing them safely thither would be rewarded with a
holiday, plenty of sora, or spirits, and certain other indulgences which
he highly valued.
Soon as Fray Fernando understood the matter, he too hastened to the
nearest point whence the pass could be seen. In the struggling moonlight
he discerned a little band of Spaniards on horseback, with glittering
casques, and a long file of attendant Indians with burdens on their
shoulders. He saw the leader engaged in an earnest parley with Pepe; and
soon became aware that the party had put themselves under his guidance,
and would reach the galpon in a few minutes.
Rather ashamed of the state of things they were likely to find there, the
monk quickened his steps, that he might give warning of their approach.
Diego and his servants were aroused, with difficulty, from their heavy
slumbers, and soon every soul in the galpon was astir. Fortunately, food
was plentiful,—the Indians of the valley having brought their tribute
recently. The flesh of the alpaca was prepared as speedily as possible
by the negro women, and set before the Spaniards with cakes of maize and
skins of chica. Nor were the Indians forgotten. Fray Fernando pitied
these poor people, who seemed exhausted with fatigue, and benumbed by
the cold of the mountains, to which they were unaccustomed. He gave
them maize and chica, and found room for them to sleep in the huts of
the negroes. While busied in these kindly duties, he noticed amongst
them, with awakened feelings of warmer compassion, a boy about ten years
old, beautiful in form and feature, and distinguished from the rest
by his peculiar costume. Unlike these, whose clothing was coarse and
scanty, this child wore a pretty tunic of fine white cotton, fastened on
each shoulder by some precious stone. He was bound to one of his adult
companions, as a prisoner whose safe keeping was considered an object of
importance. Fray Fernando gave him some fruit, which the boy took with a
look half shy, half confiding, in his dark eyes, large and soft as those
of the mountain antelope. But almost immediately the little hands dropped
their burden, and the weary child sank down at the feet of his companion
in a profound sleep.
After he had seen the Indians comfortably accommodated, Fray Fernando
repaired to Diego’s “house” (so called by way of eminence), to sup with
the Spaniards, and to hear the news from the civilized world. But they
had none. Their leader, calling himself Don Ramon de Virves, was on his
return from an expedition along the coast, undertaken to “reduce” some
of the still independent Indians under the dominion of the King of Spain
and the Pope of Rome. So he styled it, in high-sounding Castilian; but
in plain rough English, it was a marauding expedition. He had amassed
in its course considerable treasures in gold and silver, a few valuable
specimens of emerald and turquoise, and some other things not deserving
particular enumeration. He seemed pleased to find a churchman in that
remote solitude; and said he should be glad to confess and hear mass
before going on his way next morning.
Fray Fernando guessed the reason for this request. Men did not usually
come back from such excursions as Don Ramon’s with clean hands. He
naturally would find it easier to pour the tale of his sins into the ears
of a stranger whose face he might never see again, than to lay it bare
for the inspection of one whose accusing eye might meet his too often,
and with too much meaning for his peace. The monk granted his desire,
all the more readily because the morrow happened to be a saint’s day—the
festival of St. Joseph. The matter settled, Fray Fernando speedily
quitted a scene of coarse revelry that had no charms for him.
Late as it now was, he could not sleep. But sleeplessness was no new
thing with him; in broken rest he was growing continually worse. Too
often did he spend the long silent hours of the night in living over
the past—a record not to be dwelt on without keen and bitter anguish.
At times, when sleep overcame him, he would start in terror at hideous
forms and faces that seemed to stand before him. _One_ especially, a face
familiar and loved in early youth; but pale, distorted, and with strange
fear and horror in dilated eyes. In truth, of late, since his coming to
Cerro Blanco, a change had passed over him that cost him many a cold and
secret shudder. Sometimes these visions haunted him when _not_ asleep.
Sometimes, while sitting with eyes open, and senses all awake, they drew
near—they seemed to come within his grasp—and then would vanish—how and
whither he could not tell. Even in the solitary mud-cabin called his cell
from habit, he never felt alone, and least of all at night.
In order to banish these “temptations of the evil one” (as he called
them), he tried fasting. This only aggravated the symptoms of his malady.
He tried prayer—still they came. But his prayer was not real prayer; it
was merely the repetition of a form,—a shadow, a lifeless thing.
And yet, sometimes, prayer and fasting gave relief—relief that almost
grew to ecstacy. He dreamed that other visions might one day come—visions
of glory, not of terror. Sinful as he was, such grace might be given
him—and on some blessed day the white wings of angels might suddenly
descend, and sweep away the demon host that pursued and tortured him.
Fray Fernando now stood at a place where two ways met. One of two
destinies awaited him: either to become a saint, after Rome’s most
approved pattern, or—to become insane.
III.
St. Joseph’s Tooth.
“Light for the forest child!
An outcast though he be
From the haunts where the sun of his childhood smiled,
And the country of the free.
Pour the hope of heaven o’er his desert wild;
For what home on earth hath he?”
SIGOURNEY.
Soon after daybreak next morning, Fray Fernando repaired to the little
church—which was only a hut, larger and loftier than the rest, and
adorned with a bell. He was in the habit of leaving the door open day and
night; so he passed in without any delay, and walked quickly to the rough
wooden box which he had caused to be erected by way of a confessional.
But on attempting to enter it, he stumbled over something that lay
beneath. In a moment, the Indian boy noticed on the preceding night
sprang up and stood before him, with frame quivering, and cheek crimsoned
beneath its olive hue. There was an evident struggle in the child’s mind.
Should he turn and flee, or should he dare to stay, and cast himself on
the mercy of the tall dark man in gray?
Fray Fernando ended his hesitation. He did not know his language, it is
true, but he knew a much more ancient language, that of nature. At least,
he had known it once, and had not quite forgotten it. He drew the child
towards him, and sought to reassure him by gentle and caressing gestures,
patting his shoulder and stroking his long glossy black hair. And he had
well-nigh succeeded in soothing him, when suddenly the boy’s expression
changed to one of intense and irrepressible terror; and he tried with all
his might to break away from the monk. Don Ramon’s figure darkened the
doorway.
“Good morning, padre!” said the soldier of fortune. “Santa Maria! what
wind has blown that unlucky boy here? No doubt he has been trying to run
away again. Little plague! But it shall be kill or cure with him this
time.”
The monk had thrown his arm round the boy’s waist, partly to hold him
fast, partly to keep him safe. And after a moment the child ceased to
struggle, either because that grasp was so strong, or more probably
because it was so gentle. But a thought flashed through Fray Fernando’s
mind, giving instant birth to a purpose. “The boy has placed himself,
though unconsciously, under the protection of Holy Church, and it shall
not fail him.” He said aloud, “But what can you want with such a child,
señor? He is too young to be worth much to you.”
“True. But I promised to send a present of a little Indian, for a page,
to a lady in the Old Country, whom I hold in great esteem. And this boy,
whom fortune has placed in my power, is just fit for the purpose, with
his handsome face and his bright intelligent ways. You heard me tell last
night the story of his capture? No? I forgot—you retired early. _Pues_,
with your good leave, holy father, I have another story to tell now. But
let me first call one of my men to take that child away.”
“Nay, rather permit me to keep him here for the present,” said Fray
Fernando, who shrank from seeing the child used with harshness, and,
moreover, had further thoughts which he did not care to divulge just yet.
He tried to make the boy understand by signs that he must remain
where he was. Nor was this difficult; for the Indian seemed already
to associate some idea of protection with his presence. He lay down
tranquilly behind the confessional, choosing a spot whence he could
see his new friend the monk, but not his enemy Don Ramon. And then the
business of the morning proceeded.
We are not going to unveil the mysteries of confession, or to violate
that secrecy which the Church of Rome requires her minister to guard even
at the cost of life. Nor was there anything peculiar or exceptional in
the tale that Don Ramon poured into the ears of Fray Fernando. It was
only the story of a young man of great energy and strong passions, sent
early to seek his fortune beyond the seas, removed from every restraining
influence, and with the untold riches of the New World spread out before
him; all that could gratify the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eye
to be had for the taking.
And yet the tale of wrong and robbery impressed Fray Fernando painfully.
The monk was not hard by nature; though he might have been called a man
hardened by the circumstances of his life. He had human sympathy; but it
was like the drop of water sometimes found embedded in a stone. It was
difficult to reach. Unknown to himself, however, a softening power was at
work with him that morning. He imposed upon Don Ramon as severe a penance
as he dared, for the unprovoked and treacherous slaughter of a little
settlement of independent Indians, surprised in one of the oases of the
great desert he had been traversing. It could not, indeed, have been much
more severe, had the penitent insulted a friar, destroyed an image of our
Lady, or maintained one of Luther’s heretical opinions. And he told him
plainly that unless he changed his present course of life, he would one
day find himself face to face with certain just judgments of God against
them that do such things, which neither priestly absolution, prayers,
penances, nor sacraments could avert.
When the rite was over, it wanted some time yet to the hour appointed
for mass. Fray Fernando turned, pointed to the little captive, and said
boldly, “You will gain neither honour nor profit by a prisoner taken as
you took that child, Don Ramon.”
“St. Jago! after all you have said, I am nearly of the same mind myself.
But what can a man do? When a fair lady breathes a wish to a loyal
caballero and her devoted slave, it behoves him to go even through blood
and fire to fulfil it.”
“Not through the blood of women and babes, and the fire of their burning
homes,” said Fray Fernando, perhaps a little too boldly.
Don Ramon was somewhat chafed. “I am not worse than others, holy father,”
he said. “I do wrong to no christened man; and I am always careful to
give the Church her due. Even now, I intend to consecrate to our Lady of
Atocha gold enough out of my spoils to make a pair of candlesticks for
her altar.”
“In the compassionate eyes of our Lady, mercy and pity are more precious
than gold,” returned the monk. “And believe me, Señor Don Ramon,” he
continued with increasing earnestness, “your suit with the fair lady you
speak of will prosper all the better if you consult the will of God and
the health of your own soul in the disposition of your captives. That boy
seems so much attached to his freedom, that he will either succeed in
escaping you, in spite of all your precautions, or you will have to use
such harsh measures to restrain him, that he may escape you in another
way.”
“Yet ’twere pity to lose him. He is the handsomest of his race that I
have seen.”
“True. And I do not care to hide from you that my heart is drawn to the
child. I would gladly keep him myself, and bring him up.”
Don Ramon laughed. “Commend me to the holy fathers, the sons of
St. Francis,” he said. “They know how to order their affairs with
discretion. You have taken a fancy to my captive, padre, and you want him
yourself. So you try to persuade me that I will mightily serve my soul’s
interests by giving him up to you. But you forget his propensities for
running away.”
“I do not. But I shall make a Christian of him; then if he goes, I cannot
help it; if he stays, I shall instruct him carefully in the verities of
our holy Faith, that he may instruct his brethren.”
“A course of action like to prove very beneficial—suppose you persevere
in it—to the Indians, and perhaps to your own soul also. But I know not
how it is to benefit me, who have had all the toil and the fighting, not
to speak of an arrow in my left leg, which might have been poisoned, for
aught I knew to the contrary.”
“I have not forgotten your interests in the matter, nor am I so
unreasonable as to ask you to give me your prisoner for nothing. I
have something to offer you in exchange worth a dozen Indian captives.
Moreover, I do not insist, though I might, upon the fact that you will be
doing a good work, very useful to yourself, in giving up the child to me
for the purpose I have named.”
“Well, well, holy father, let us hear what you have to offer.
Nevertheless, the good work is the main thing. A man ought to think of
his soul’s salvation.”
The monk drew from beneath his robe a little box of amber, with hinges
and rims of gold, and with much reverence and solemnity of manner showed
it to the soldier.
“A holy relic?” inquired the latter, with bowed head and voice decorously
lowered, as in the presence of majesty.
“A tooth of the blessed St. Joseph, whose festival we celebrate to-day,”
said Fray Fernando reverently.
A pause followed this solemn and impressive announcement. Then the monk
opened the little box, and displayed the relic to the admiring gaze of
Don Ramon. “It is of most undoubted authenticity, and of very powerful
virtue,” he said. “And the motive which could induce me to part with it
must needs be a strong one. I have kept it for many years—indeed, since
my early childhood. It was given me by—” But here he broke off hastily,
leaving his sentence incomplete. His eyes turned from the little amber
box to the eager face of the Indian boy, who was watching them with an
evident suspicion that their conversation concerned himself.
“Such a thing as that would do a man no harm in a fight or a shipwreck?”
said Don Ramon. And the assertion, as he put it, was indisputable.
“It will do you good and not harm wherever you are; in the field or in
the house, in the land or on the sea,” returned Fray Fernando. “Always
supposing”—common sense and candour obliged him to add—“that you are not
engaged in any business of which the holy saint would disapprove.”
“I intend to pay more regard to these considerations in future,” said Don
Ramon. “Well then, holy father, since such is your pleasure, take the
boy, and I take the relic. Perhaps you would have no objection to throw
me a mass or two into the bargain? Ours is a wild life—though we do good
service to holy Church in fighting the infidels. And as we take care of
her interests, it may not be too much to hope that she will look to ours.”
Fray Fernando satisfied him on the subject of the masses; and as Pepe,
who acted the part of acolyte, had by this time begun to ring the
bell, he led the little Indian boy to his own cell, where he took the
precaution of shutting him up, having first supplied him with food.
After mass, Don Ramon and his companions partook of a liberal breakfast,
and then resumed their journey. Just before his departure, however, the
soldier of fortune drew the monk aside. “Here,” he said with the air
of one conferring no inconsiderable favour—“here is a golden ornament
which belonged to the mother of that child. I may as well give it you;
perhaps it may serve hereafter to identify him. At all events, you
will favour me by accepting it as an acknowledgment of your valuable
spiritual ministrations. I took it, with my own hands, from her mantle,
when I found her lying dead the morning after we made her and the boy our
prisoners.”
Something about robbery for burnt-offering flashed through Fray
Fernando’s mind, but he took the jewel without any other comment than a
brief “Thank you.” It was a large golden pin, somewhat resembling a spoon
in shape, and with figures ingeniously cut all over its surface.
Shortly afterwards, Fray Fernando visited his little prisoner. The child
was looking out of the window of the cell when he entered; but he turned
quickly round, took a mat from the floor, rolled it up to resemble a
burden, placed it on his head, and then walking gravely towards his new
master, deposited it at his feet.
Fray Fernando could not imagine what he meant by this pantomime; but
anxious to soothe him and to reconcile him to his situation, he drew his
arm round him, and began to stroke and caress him, as he had done in
the morning. Then recollecting one of the very few phrases he happened
to know of the child’s native tongue, the Quichua, he asked, “_Yma
sutinque?_” (“What is your name?”)
The boy, disengaging himself gently from his caressing arm, stood before
him, with head erect, and dark eyes kindling with evident pride, as he
answered, “_Viracocha Yntip Churi_.”
“God and our Lady bless thee, poor heathen child. Thou shalt have a
better name than that, a _Christian_ name, ere this sun goes down,” said
Fray Fernando.
That very day, accordingly, he baptized the child in the presence of the
whole colony. He gave him the name of José, which he thought singularly
appropriate, both because the boy was baptized on St. Joseph’s day, and
because his freedom was purchased with a relic of that saint.
Both the Spaniards and the negroes were edified by the evident
willingness with which the little heathen submitted to the rite. It was
not until long afterwards that Fray Fernando discovered that the neophyte
had put a meaning of his own upon what was otherwise meaningless to him.
He imagined that this was a ceremony by which his kind protector was
publicly asserting his claim to him.
But that claim had already been asserted, and confirmed by a pledge
stronger than many ceremonies—by love given and returned. And it was
allowed in the child’s heart.
IV.
Viracocha.
“A child in whom childhood’s life was dead,
Its sweet light marred and dim.”
MRS. STUART MENTEITH.
Fray Fernando soon became aware that he had taken upon himself a
troublesome charge. The little Indian was gentle and docile, and he did
not show the slightest inclination to run away. But his attachment to
his benefactor took a turn that was both inconvenient and embarrassing.
Fray Fernando of course intended to instruct him; but supposed that when
his short daily lesson was over, he would be content to run about the
galpon and to play with the negro children. But he soon found that the
dusky Indian looked on the black Africans with contempt and aversion.
Whenever Fray Fernando gave him dried fruit or _huminta_,[1] he called
the little negroes about him, and shared his treasures very liberally;
but that done, he walked quietly away from them, and established himself
on his mat at the feet of his protector. Often he sat or lay there for
hours, perfectly quiet and silent. But sometimes he talked to himself,
or sang very sweet and mournful songs in his native tongue; and two or
three times he positively frightened Fray Fernando by sudden bursts of
passionate weeping. On these occasions he would throw himself on the
ground, wailing and sobbing without restraint, and often repeating, in
tones of the most heart-rending sorrow, “_Ay, mamallay! ay, mamallay!_”
And by that cry Fray Fernando knew that the orphan child was in
bitterness, mourning for his mother. But as soon as the paroxysm was
over, he would resume the grave and mournful silence that seemed so
unnatural in a child. Fray Fernando began to fear that he might pine away
and die; and was but partially reassured by Diego, who knew something of
the Indians, and told him that grave silent ways were characteristic of
the race.
José, as he was now called, could by no means be induced to sleep
anywhere except in his patron’s cell. Sometimes Fray Fernando, to whom
the practice was not at all agreeable, positively refused him admittance,
having first provided another resting-place for him. But in the morning
he was sure to find him, no matter how great the cold might be (and he
was very sensitive to cold), lying crouched at his door. Except in this
one matter, he was always obedient to his protector. He learned quickly
to understand what was said to him in Spanish, but was slow in attempting
to speak it; whether from want of ability or want of inclination his
instructor could not tell. From certain observances that he practised
occasionally—such as kissing the air and looking towards the sun, at
the time of its rising and setting—Fray Fernando gathered that he had
been taught to worship that luminary. By way of antidote, he brought
him regularly to chapel, and instructed him carefully in the ceremonies
proper to the place.
The first question volunteered by his little pupil gave the monk as keen
a sensation of pleasure as the sight of the first flower of spring after
the rains and frosts of winter. One day he brought the boy, who had
now been several months under his care, to see the mine. He looked at
everything, in his quiet, grave, intelligent way, as if he understood it
perfectly. But as they were returning he asked suddenly, “Patre” (so he
always pronounced padre, the first Spanish word he learned)[2]—“patre,
how did the gold get so far down into the ground?”
“God made it there, my son,” said Fray Fernando.
“Yachani—I know. Pacha-camac made everything,” the child returned, bowing
low at the mention of the great Name, then slowly raising his open hands
to Heaven, in token of adoration. “But the gold is the tears of Ynty.”
“Who is Ynty?” asked the monk.
With a reverent gesture the child pointed upwards to the object of his
race’s homage, the glorious Sun.
“God made Ynty, and he is His servant,” said Fray Fernando, not unwisely,
in reply.
“Yachani—I know,” José answered quietly.
Some time after this little incident, the Indians from the valley came
as usual with their tribute. On these occasions José’s faculty of speech
never failed to return to him; he chattered Quichua with his brethren as
long as they might be permitted to remain together. Fray Fernando liked
to see him awakened, even for a time, from his unchildlike languor and
listlessness; he therefore rather encouraged his intercourse with the
other Indians.
Bitterly did he regret this indulgence afterwards. A virulent fever was
laying waste the valleys, counting its victims by thousands amongst a
people healthy and long-lived under favourable conditions, but deficient
in strength, and with constitutions easily shattered by disease or
hardship. Ere the next morning’s dawn José was tossing on his mat,
freezing and burning, speaking strange words in Quichua, and moaning
piteously for his mother.
Fray Fernando was greatly distressed for the child. Moreover, he was
alarmed, not without cause, for the health of the rest of the colony.
He determined to attend the sick boy himself, and to allow no one else
to approach him. Even setting aside the danger of infection, he could
not trust him to the care of the negro women, who, though kind-hearted
enough, were very ignorant and stupid.
His knowledge of medicine was very limited, and he had little at command.
The Indians were indeed well acquainted with the healing virtues of many
of their plants, and used them with considerable skill and intelligence;
but Fray Fernando had no means of communication with them. All that
common sense and tender kindness could suggest, he did for his patient;
the rest he was obliged to leave to nature.
Soon it appeared as though the little life, watched with such interest
for well-nigh a whole year, was ebbing fast away. This did not surprise,
though it grieved him. The child had been pining ever since he came to
him. The slightest strain would suffice to break the slender thread.
And as he sat and watched beside him through the long dark hours of the
night (in that equatorial region nearly equal to the day), he thought
within himself how much he should miss and mourn him. Truly the orphan
had given back sevenfold the benefit received. He had made his days less
dreary, less miserable, and his nights far less terrible. Whither now
had vanished those visions of horror that were wont to haunt him through
the sleepless hours of darkness? José’s presence had dispelled them, as
the sun dispels the shadows of the night. Fray Fernando, as yet, did
not fully understand from _what_ he had thus been saved; but he felt
as though the mists of a dark dread which had overhung his life were
gradually clearing away—he hoped for ever.
But now it seemed as if he must part with his treasure, and return to
his former lonely, desolate state. The fever having run its course, the
little patient lay, weak and helpless, with the look of one whose life is
fading. Hoping against hope, he administered, continually and in smallest
quantities, the strongest stimulant, the sora of the Indians. Anxious
hours passed away with little change, yet with no visible decrease
of strength. A long, weary night followed, during which Fray Fernando
found it hard to tell whether José slept or waked, or lay in stupor,
unconscious of all around.
At length day appeared. The sun rose suddenly, as it does in those
tropical lands. José moved, looked at Fray Fernando, and smiled. He drank
the cordial held to his lips, then feebly whispered something. Fray
Fernando bent over him to listen. “I want to see my Father’s face,” he
repeated more distinctly.
Fray Fernando feared the mind was wandering still. “My poor child,” he
said, “your father is dead—long since.”
“_My_ Father never dies,” the child responded, with a look half of
surprise, half of reproach. “Don’t you know him?—Ynty the Glorious!” he
added, speaking with more energy than Fray Fernando thought him capable
of showing.
“When my child is better,” he replied evasively, “he shall go forth and
see the sunshine.”
But José was not satisfied; and again, after a little pause, he pleaded,
“Let me see my Father’s face, good patre.”
Fray Fernando, with new and suddenly awakened interest, now ventured to
put a question to his child. “Does my little José then claim kindred with
the princes of his people—the Incas—the Children of the Sun?” For even
the haughty Spanish conquerors could not withhold the tribute of their
reverence from the truly royal line they had so cruelly despoiled.
“I am Viracocha Yntip Churi, in Spanish talk, Viracocha—Child of the
Sun,” the boy replied.
Then Fray Fernando wrapped him gently in the soft warm skins of the
vicuña, carried him tenderly out, and laid him in the sunshine.
When brought back to his couch again, the tired child whispered, “My
Father kissed me;” and fell into the soundest and most natural sleep he
had had since his illness.
V
Viracocha’s Fathers.
“The warrior kings, whose banners
Flew far as eagles fly;
They are gone where swords avail them not
From the feast of victory.”
HEMANS.