he could read like an open book, Fray Fernando passed into the opposite
one, of considering him a hopeless enigma. And, indeed, José, or rather,
as the Spaniards would have called him—for they conceded the honours
of nobility to the Children of the Sun—Don José Viracocha Inca, was a
compound of so many heterogenous elements, that his character might
well be a perplexity. He was an American Indian, with nearly all the
peculiarities that distinguish the aborigines of the New World from the
natives of the Old fully and clearly developed. But races flower as well
as plants. The flower of the American race—and a strange, rare flower
it was—was surely that mysterious family, the self-styled Children of
the Sun. Their origin continues wrapt in obscurity, but their moral and
intellectual ascendancy has been written on the page of history, in the
peace, the order, and the prosperity they secured to millions of their
fellow-men. José was an Inca, and heir not only to the very peculiar
character, but to the traditions of the sons of Manco Capac. But upon
these had been grafted seven years of careful training in the white man’s
thoughts and habits, as well as in the white man’s learning and religion.
And, moreover, there was that within him for which neither race,
education, nor training could fully account. Had he lived fifty years
earlier, he would have been the foremost “haravec”[23] at the court of
his great kinsman, Huayna Capac. He would have made sweet “yaravis”[24]
for the Indian girls to sing, and more ambitious dramas to be acted
before the Inca and his court. But the faculties which would then have
found expression in song had now no exercise, save in the ever-recurring
wail over those former days, which indeed were better than these.
This preponderance of imagination in his character was the real cause
of his temporary repudiation of Christianity (or rather Catholicism),
and return to the faith of his fathers. But such a return could be only
temporary, if indeed it was more than fancied. What Huayna Capac, on whom
no gleam of the light of revelation ever shone, had been taught by the
light of reason to abandon, could scarcely be held seriously by a youth
instructed as José had been.
Fray Fernando saw with pleasure that his prejudices against Christianity
were melting away, and that he was anxious to resume his studies. Often
when they halted for the night he would eagerly take up the Breviary,
and try to translate the Latin psalms and prayers it contained. He would
frequently ask questions suggested by what he read; sometimes startling
ones enough, betraying an acquaintance with facts, or rumours of facts,
about the Old World, assuredly not learned from Fray Fernando. One day he
asked: “Patre, do not the Jews also build great ships, and sail over the
Mother Sea, even as far as this country?”
“Truly they are wanderers over the face of the earth, according to the
just judgments of God,” returned the monk; “but that they have come
hither have I never heard. Who told you of them?”
“No one,” answered José, who was caution itself in speaking of any
rumours current amongst his own people. “But is it not true that they
hate the Spaniards and the Catholic faith?”
“It is,” Fray Fernando responded briefly. “They are an accursed race.”
He did not know, until long years afterwards, that José was confounding
the Jews with the English!
During the past six months, José had found means to supplement
the well-remembered lessons of his childhood, and to complete his
acquaintance with the history, the customs, and the social polity of his
forefathers. He failed not to improve the various circumstances of their
journey into occasions for enlarging upon these topics to Fray Fernando.
One day, for instance, an Indian chasqui, or messenger, shot past them
like an arrow, his body bent forward, his burden on his shoulder, and his
staff in his hand. “See the speed of that fellow!” cried the monk.
“That’s nothing,” said José, smiling. “In the old times, the Inca supped
at sundown in Cuzco upon fish taken from the Mother Sea at Lurin the same
hour the day before.”
Fray Fernando knew the distance between Lurin and Cuzco—more than a
hundred leagues. He said, “That is too much even for _my_ faith, José.”
“The Children of the Sun speak truth,” returned José, a little offended.
“Our chasquis,” he continued, “were trained to the work from their
earliest childhood; and each had but a short way to run until he should
be relieved by another. He had plenty of rest, and plenty of good food
and chica; and he was stirred to do his utmost by the hope of reward,
and of praise—that was better than reward. Was not that chasqui a happy
man ever after, to whom the Inca once said with his own lips, ‘Sit
down, huanucu’?—The patre knows the huanucu is the swiftest of all
creatures.—But this I say,” added José with a sorrowful smile, “the
Spaniards will find no man to run so fast for them, even for fear of the
lash.”
On another occasion they passed a melancholy troop of Indians who were
being driven to their forced labour on a Spanish farm. José divided his
little store of coca amongst them, and then complained bitterly to Fray
Fernando of the hardship of their condition.
But the monk said it seemed not unfair that they should pay tribute in
the form of personal labour. “I thought they did so,” he added, “even
under your Incas.”
“True,” replied José, “they tilled the lands of the Sun and of the Inca.
But after this fashion: First, the lands of the Sun, as was meet and
right. Next, the lands of the widow and the orphan, of the sick man, and
the soldier who was fighting the battles of his country. Then each man
tilled his own tupu.[25] These tupus were given them according to their
need. If a man had a child born to him, he had a little piece added to
his share of land. And they were all taught to help each other in their
labour. Lastly, and not until all else was done, they tilled the Inca’s
land; such was the Inca’s law. The work was a happy festival: men,
women, and children, in their holiday dresses, thronged to the fields
together; and as they drew the plough, or sowed the maize and quinoa,
they chanted merry songs, or yaravis about the great deeds of the Incas.
Always they had abundance of good food and chica. Neither in the field,
nor in the workshop, nor yet in the mine, was any man’s health ever known
to suffer from the labour he did for his lords. And in all Tahuantin Suyu
there was no man that had not food enough, and clothing suited to the
climate in which he dwelt. The Spaniards know this.[26] Ask them, when
you go to Cuzco, and they—even they themselves—will bear witness that
never were a people more happy, more peaceful, more content with their
lot, more loyal to their lords, than were we when they came to us. Why
God, who governs all, let them come, He knows—I do not.”
Nor did Fray Fernando. Long did he ponder over the problem thus set
before him. For the first time in his life, a great grief and wrong,
with which he had personally no concern, was sinking into his heart. He
used to satisfy himself that the natives of the New World received a
full indemnity for their injuries and sufferings in the introduction of
Christianity, with its creed and its sacraments, by which their souls
might be saved from everlasting perdition. But this thought was losing
its power to content him. He was beginning to learn that wrong remains
wrong for ever, and cannot be changed into right by virtue of any
benefits, real or supposed, which may eventually accrue from it.
That night, as they rested together in a deserted tampu, he said to José,
“My son, it is not fit that I should conceal from you what I truly think.
I think my people are verily guilty concerning yours. May God forgive
us, and in His own time turn our evil into good.”
José made no answer, and almost immediately went out to gather sticks
for a fire. Yet never had Fray Fernando been so dear to him as at that
moment. Nor had any single act or speech ever done so much to bring their
hearts together as that one free and generous acknowledgment. So great is
the power of truth between man and man.
X.
The Dead Men who Fought against Spain.
“If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent
perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at
the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth;
and there be higher than they.”
ECCLES. v. 8.
Three hundred years have passed away since the men of the Old World
spoiled and conquered Tahuantin Suyu. Those who did and those who
suffered wrong have slept side by side for ages. The ancient Incas lie in
glory “with kings and counsellors of the earth, who have built desolate
places for themselves, or with princes that had gold, and filled their
houses with silver;” while their once happy subjects, doomed to toil in
the service of the cruel stranger, have found repose at last, where “the
prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. The
small and the great are there, and the servant is free from his master.”
And the men who robbed and tortured them, who made their fair land a
desolation, until the cry of it reached unto heaven, and those who were
left alive envied those whom the sword had devoured,—they also have gone
to render account of their deeds before Him who is the Judge of quick and
dead.
Do we still say with the Inca’s son, “Why God allowed these things to
be, we know not”? Not altogether. First, let it be said, once for all,
that beautiful—wonderfully beautiful—as the social polity of the Incas
undoubtedly was, it was no more perfect than any other scheme which man
has devised for making this earth the paradise it would have been if sin
had never entered. Two defects may be specially mentioned; since these
probably contained the seeds of dissolution for the whole magnificent
and extensive fabric. The royal and privileged race—the Children of the
Sun—stood too far above the people, and looked down on them from too
lofty an eminence, as beings of quite another and a lower order. Not only
had the Incas different ideas and traditions—it is said even a different
language—but they had actually _a different code of morality_ for
themselves to that which they imposed on their subjects. Great liberties
were allowed them: it is true that, in accordance with the beneficence
which formed their distinguishing characteristic, they seem to have used
them most mercifully,—yet still they used them. What were accounted vices
in the people, were none in them; and here, perhaps, may really be found
“the little speck within the garnered fruit” that, “rotting inwards,”
would by-and-by have slowly mouldered all.
Moreover, the idea of freedom was unknown to them. While the Inca gave
his subjects—and gave nobly, “as a king,” to friend and foe alike—every
other boon his hand could bestow, he never dreamed of giving them
the rights of free men. Properly speaking, they were _not_ men, they
were children; to be cared for kindly, even tenderly; to be fed, and
clothed, and housed; to have their work and their play, and plenty of
the latter, duly apportioned them; and, in one word, to be made good
and happy. It may be said, and truly, that in intelligence they _were_
children, incapable of self-control and self-government. Still, the
Inca’s ideal fell below the Christian one in this, that he neither
sought to raise them out of that condition, nor provided room for them
should they desire to raise themselves. Under his system there was no
growth, no freedom of choice; and there was to be none. Every man must be
harmless, well-behaved, industrious, or there would be no room for him
in Tahuantin Suyu. But a principle which should make a free man choose
the good and refuse the evil, was amongst the things not revealed to the
Children of the Sun.
But growth there must be, or decay will take its place. If the cruel
white men from beyond the sea had not overwhelmed Tahuantin Suyu with
swift destruction, it is still probable that the whole system would
have melted gradually away, like a palace of ice, grand and beautiful,
white and glistening with rainbow hues, but, from its very nature,
unenduring. And the bloody civil war, which preceded and facilitated
the conquest of the Spaniards, seems no doubtful indication of what
might have taken place. One such tyrant as Atahualpa[27] (who, it should
however be remembered, was not a legitimate Inca) had it in his power to
cause unspeakable confusion and misery, and to destroy the fruit of the
beneficent labours of a long line of honoured predecessors.
Perhaps, therefore, after all, it was not so dark and sad a fate for the
Empire of the Incas to fall at once and in a single day almost from the
very summit of prosperity, like a royal oak in the forest struck down by
the tempest. If it was ever true of any empire (which is doubtful) that
she “fell unwept, without a crime,” it was true of Tahuantin Suyu. She
and her children took, once for all, their place amongst the sufferers,
not the doers, of wrong; the oppressed, not the oppressors. There can be
no doubt which is the better place.
More to be desired was her doom, with all its anguish, than that of her
destroyer and desolater, Spain. Here God’s judgments are written on the
page of history in characters of fire: “Woe to thee that spoilest, and
thou wast not spoiled; and dealest treacherously, and they dealt not
treacherously with thee! When thou shalt cease to spoil, thou shalt be
spoiled; and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously, they
shall deal treacherously with thee.” As Spain did to others, so was it
done to her. From the foremost place amongst the nations of the earth,
she was cast into the depths of a degradation far worse, far lower than
that into which she plunged the Empire of the Incas. She robbed the
stores of an industrious people, destroyed their water-courses, deprived
them of the means of subsistence. And from that day, even to the present,
want, and scarcity, and cleanness of teeth in all her cities has been her
own portion. Her very nobles, amidst their pomp and pride, have hungered
and suffered thirst; the children of her chiefs and conquerors have pined
away, and their eyes have failed them for want of those common fruits of
the field of which, under the Inca’s beneficent sway, every poor man had
enough and to spare. Well have the Despoplados of Spain—bare, and brown,
and barren—avenged the fertile plains of Tahuantin Suyu, laid waste by
the cruel stranger.
The punishment sprang naturally out of the offence. The booty was a
weight round the neck of the robber that sank him to perdition. It
was the gold of Peru that ruined Spain. When she put forth her hand
and took it, she took the curse of God with it. To the proud and idle
Castilian, the lord of the New World, industry became the brand of
slavery; commerce, a degradation; trade, the appropriate work of Jews
and infidels. All those useful arts which make a people’s prosperity and
happiness were neglected or despised. And the treasure that undermined
the life and the energy of the nation, supplied at the same time fuel to
sustain the fire of that long conflict which was the passion and the doom
of the Spanish monarchy.
In the contest that followed the Reformation, Spain was the great
champion of Rome. Spain and England stand out before us during the last
half of the sixteenth century, representatives of the principles that
were contending for the world’s future; and sometimes the conflict seems
almost narrowed to a duel between them. Victory for Spain, meant victory
for Rome; meant kingly and priestly tyranny; the inquisition, the rack,
and the stake. Victory for England, meant an open Bible, free thought,
equal rights, liberty of conscience.
And the tide of battle ebbed and flowed; and flowed and ebbed again.
Sometimes it seemed as if the God of battles would declare for His own
cause; sometimes it looked as though He stood aloof, and did not heed
what men were doing on the earth.
But amidst the din and smoke of the fiercest conflict, the enemies of
Spain were joined by a vast and shadowy host. Their voices no man heard,
their faces no man saw, their footfalls were noiseless as the snow,
“their arrows drew no blood.” Yet were they valiant warriors, who did
good service in the cause of England, of truth, of freedom. The men of
the New World,—“the men thrust through with the sword,” the men slain
by famine, by torture, by excessive toil and cruel blows,—they it was
who “arose, every man in his place,” and fought against Spain. The tale
of their wrongs and sufferings flew like fire from heart to heart, from
lip to lip, and nerved the arm of the avenger. Both on the land and on
the wave the strength of the Englishman became “the strength of ten,” to
smite down the cruel Spaniard, and to keep the fair homes of his native
land from the men who conquered Tahuantin Suyu. Noble hearts, like that
of Raleigh, burned over the wrongs of the conquered race, and it was
their cherished dream, and his, to restore the Empire of the Incas.
But this work was not given to him, or to any man, to accomplish. In
God’s providence empires and dynasties pass away, and come not again.
“The old order changeth, giving place to new.” Yet not the less, from age
to age, He is above all, the God that giveth to every man, and to every
nation, “according to their works.”
Still we must allow that dread mysteries, as yet but partially
explained, underlie this and every other act in the great drama of human
history. Questions arise within us to which man _can_ give no answer, and
to which God _has_ given none—as yet. There are those amongst us who in
secret “weep much,” because the Book wherein are written the destinies of
their race is sealed with seven seals, and no man is found worthy to open
and to read it, neither to look thereon.
Let such accept the one thought of comfort that can avail to dry their
tears: “Weep not; behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of
David, hath prevailed to open the Book, and to loose the seven seals
thereof.” None ever loved man as He did—He who died for man. Yet He knows
_all_, from the beginning to the end. And He is satisfied.
Nay, more. He it is who shall be the Judge of man. Before His
judgment-seat shall be gathered all nations—sons of Europe, who have
known and dishonoured Him; dusky children of the East and West, who have
never heard His name. It is in His hand—the hand pierced for man—that
the destinies of man are lying. Is there any heart amongst us not
content to leave them there; not satisfied, to its inmost depths, by
His own assurance, “What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know
hereafter”?
XI.
Across the Apurimac.
An Inca king for Cuzco’s throne
In victor strength shall rise.
“Look, patre! We have but to cross yonder stream, and we shall have
entered the sacred land where the golden wand of my great father Manco
sank into the ground—the patrimony of the Children of the Sun. Let the
patre hasten.”
“I cannot hasten; I am weary.” And Fray Fernando seated himself, or
rather sank, upon a stone by the wayside.
The way was a steep, slippery descent, leading from the mountain’s height
to the
“Wide cane arch high flung o’er gulf profound,”
that spanned the rapid torrent of the Apurimac. José stopped, and looked
at him with concern.
“It is a hard way, patre,” he said; “but you shall soon rest. You see
there is a tampu at the other end of the bridge.”
“But for your help, José, I could never have come so far. To a stripling
like you these mountain-paths are easy; not so to—
“To an old man,” he would fain have said; but he knew that his age, if
reckoned by years, would give him no claim to the title: it was only in
sorrow he was old.
“Lend me your hand once more,” he added, rousing himself with an effort,
“and I will try to reach the tampu.”
José, who was agile as one of the vicuñas of the mountain, managed to
keep his own footing in the most slippery spots, while he guided the
steps of his companion to the safest places, and never failed to lend him
the aid of his steady hand.
“Look there, José!” said the monk suddenly, in a tone of dismay. “Before
us there is no path—no place for one; nothing but a sheer precipice. How,
in Heaven’s name, are we to reach the bridge? Your people must be birds,
to travel by such ways.”
“Our people trusted the Inca,” said José, with a quiet smile; “and they
knew that every way he made for them would bring them safely to the
Golden City. There is a hole in the rock, and we are to go through it.”
It was true. A tunnel, forty feet in length, cut zigzag through the solid
rock, and duly provided with steps, brought them safely and easily to
the bridge. Even the weary monk was fain to gaze with admiration on the
scene that met their view when they emerged from the darkness of the
tunnel. Full three hundred feet below them the Apurimac dashed over its
rocky bed between steep precipices; whilst the abyss was spanned by the
graceful bridge of sogas, or cords of maguey, so light and apparently so
frail that it vibrated in every gust of mountain wind, yet so strong that
armies had marched over it without fear and without danger.
Nor was Fray Fernando conscious of fear, though he felt it tremble
beneath his feet as he walked. He had crossed halfway when, in an
unlucky moment, he looked down on the roaring torrent beneath. A sudden
dizziness seized him; his limbs first lost their power, then shook with
a nervous tremor that he could not control. In vain he laid fast hold on
the rope of maguey, considerately hung breast-high over the bridge, and
attached to it with cords for the greater security of the traveller. He
could neither advance nor retreat; nor could he withdraw his eyes from
the abyss, over which he seemed suspended on a thread. The sight had a
fearful fascination for him. How many perplexities would be ended by just
one plunge; not so much—one little step from the spot where he stood!
The voice of the waters seemed to call him. But José seized his hand,
and with friendly violence drew him onwards. Dizzy, faint, and sick, he
reached the tampu at last.
He had been suffering all day from a severe pain in his head and neck,
and now it became really agonizing. He was quite unable to partake of the
roasted maize José had brought with him; and the tampu being as usual
deserted, José had no means of procuring him any of the comforts he
needed. He gathered, however, some of the ychu that grew near the place,
and, spreading his cloak over it, made a kind of couch, upon which Fray
Fernando was heartily glad to stretch his aching limbs.
“Just read the psalms for me,” said the weary monk; “then I will pray,
and try to sleep.”
It had now become the custom for José every evening to read the psalms
for the day aloud in Latin, and then, with the help of his teacher, to
translate them into Spanish. By means of this simple plan, he was making
fair progress in the language which he still believed to be that of the
ancient Jews, and of the English. On this occasion the first psalm for
the day happened to be the Seventy-first. He read it through without even
a thought of its meaning, being occupied with his apprehensions about
Fray Fernando. But the next—the Seventy-second—arrested his attention.
Glimmerings of its purport, which flashed on him through the veil of
the Latin words, deeply stirred his soul. It seemed to tell of a great
King—an Inca—who should rule in righteousness, befriend the poor, redress
wrongs everywhere. But just as he was eagerly proceeding to the task
of translation, the patre very effectually changed the current of his
thoughts by exclaiming,—
“If this pain in my head continues, I shall lose my reason.”
It was well that José’s impassive Indian countenance did not betray
the alarm he really felt. He had not the least idea what remedies he
ought to use; and even if he had, how was he to procure them in that
solitary, desolate place? He drew near, and put his hand on the monk’s
forehead. It was burning: so he took the cotton cloth in which he had
carried the maize, dipped it in cold water, and laid it on the throbbing
brow. The cool application gave temporary relief; and José, perceiving
this, renewed it at intervals. As the air was chilly, he collected with
considerable difficulty a supply of dry sticks (a few stunted bushes grew
near), and made a fire.
After what seemed a lengthened period of restless pain and distress, Fray
Fernando dropped into an uneasy slumber, which, however, grew gradually
quieter and heavier. It lasted so long that his devoted attendant began
to think he also might allow himself a little sleep; which he took,
stretched on the ground at the sick man’s feet.
The next morning was far advanced when Fray Fernando opened his heavy
eyes. José, who had no doubt that he would awaken refreshed and
strengthened, was greatly disappointed at the pain and weariness still
too visible in his countenance.
“Where am I?” he asked feebly.
“Only two days’ journey from the Golden City, patre,” José cheerfully
made answer.
“Many, _many_ days from the Golden City—never like to reach it,” Fray
Fernando moaned.