deliverance from a near and terrible danger. There were many private as
well as public causes of rejoicing. The gentle heart of Lilias was very
glad, since her three brave brothers, Harry, George, and James, were safe
and well, and honoured for signal gallantry in the hour of danger. Nor
was Fray Fernando without his interest in the great event, though he did
not allude to it until, the pleasant social meal and the family worship
that succeeded it being over, all had retired to their places of rest,
except himself and Walter Grey.
As they sat together by the fire, Walter addressed his friend in Spanish.
“We are determined to keep possession of you this time,” he said; “I hope
you are prepared.”
Fray Fernando shook his head, and answered in the same language. “But for
your letter, and the pressing message sent me through your good uncle, I
should not have left London at all. Those crowds of miserable soldiers
and seamen, my poor unhappy countrymen, who are now in the city, waiting
for the means of transport beyond the seas, need all, and more than all,
that one man can do for them.”
“You must own, at all events,” said Walter, “that our gracious Queen
is behaving with a large-hearted generosity that beseems her well, in
sending these her enemies, who came to destroy her and her people, freely
to their homes again.”
“True,” said Fray Fernando. “And your uncle and others contribute in a
noble and Christian spirit to the relief and comfort of the prisoners;
thus returning good for evil. Nor am I without hope that some of these
poor captives may take home with them, instead of the English spoils
they thought to gain, a treasure of which they never dreamed,—even the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
God grant it! He only knows how my heart yearns over those my brethren
according to the flesh.”
“I have some thoughts,” Walter answered, “of going back with you, and
helping for a season in your good work; that is, if I can provide for
my duties here.” And then he talked a little of his own parish with its
cares and interests, of Lilias, and of the children.
“You have not yet told me,” Fray Fernando said, “what name you have
chosen for my god-son.”
“We are all agreed,” Walter replied with a smile, “in giving him the
English form of a dear friend’s honoured name—Ferdinand.”
“Nay, my friend, not so,” returned Fray Fernando. “Do not choose _that_
name.”
“And why not, my friend and father?”
“For many reasons. In the first place, it is no name of mine. My true
baptismal name, unused for half a lifetime, would be strange to your
ears, and indeed to my own now. But if, indeed, you list to please the
wayward fancy of a lonely man, then call your boy for me by the name of
the patriarch’s best loved son—the separate from his brethren, upon whom
the blessing came—‘Joseph is a fruitful bough, a fruitful bough by a
well, whose branches run over the wall. The archers have sorely grieved
him, and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength, and
the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of
Jacob.’”
“So be it then, with all my heart,” said Walter Grey; “and God add his
blessing to the child. It is a name that I too have cause to remember
with grateful love.” After a pause, he asked rather suddenly, “Father, do
you ever revisit in dreams that far-distant land where you and I first
saw each other’s faces?”
“Indeed, Walter,” Fray Fernando answered, with a smile half bright, half
sorrowful, “I dream of little else. Night after night I seem to gaze upon
the snowy line of the Andes as we used to see them from Callao, or the
grand peaks of crystal that pierce the sky of Cerro Blanco; or perchance
I look down from the height on the lovely vale of Nasca winding far
beneath. Sometimes I wander through those marvellous tropical forests,
pushing my way amongst the thick shrubs and the tangled lianas, and
gathering great white and purple flowers—dream-flowers, yet not more
wonderful than those I have actually seen and touched. Anon we are
floating over crystal seas, with the mild light of the Southern Cross
shining in the far heavens above us. All is so real, so present, that I
cannot choose but take it for a pledge that these eyes shall yet behold
again that new, familiar world beyond the western wave. Yes, Walter,
when the King comes, and this beautiful ruined earth is cleansed and
renovated, and made fit for His throne and habitation, I dare to cherish
a hope that my foot shall press those shores once more—that I shall walk
there with—with—” But here his voice failed,—died away into that silence
which is more eloquent than many words, and often like a fragrant balm
preserves and consecrates our dearest names.
After a pause of sympathy, Walter resumed—“There is much for the King to
do when He comes.”
“There is much for us to do while we wait and watch for His coming,”
Fray Fernando answered with cheerful earnestness. “We have to hasten
that coming by our holy conversation and godliness, our prayers and
our efforts to spread abroad the knowledge of His name. And amidst all
the sin and all the sorrow that we see around us, we have to keep fast
hold of our faith in Him, and to rejoice in sure and steadfast hope of
that blessed day when the kingdoms of this world shall have become the
kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and
ever. And ‘the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of
the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.’”
“Amen!” said Walter Grey. “THY KINGDOM COME.”
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES
[1] Sweet bread.
[2] No sound corresponding to the letter D is found in Quichua. Its place
is supplied by T.
[3] Empress.
[4] Alas!
[5] Tribe, descendants.
[6] Yahuar-Huaccuc.
[7] Prince.
[8] The same word serves for both in Quichua.
[9] This is given as a specimen of the Inca legends and traditions.
[10] Tunic.
[11] The anecdote told above is related, by different historians, of
several of the Incas. Other remarkable acknowledgments of the One True
Invisible God are attributed to these heathen princes.
[12] Flowery meadow.
[13] Luna.
[14] The Deluge, of which most of the American nations preserved
traditions.
[15] From a Quichua cradle-song.
[16] Trenches.
[17] The Moon.
[18] It is a Spaniard who tells us this—Don Marcio Serra de Leguisano,
in his “Last Will and Testament”—a very noble testimony to the conquered
race.
[19] Factories.
[20] Slaves.
[21] All the details given above are, of course, strictly true. The most
harrowing instances of cruelty and oppression are, however, purposely
omitted.
[22] Sweet-william.
[23] Poet.
[24] Songs.
[25] Allotment of land.
[26] “What is most wonderful is that all the labour and toil they used
for their kings was their greatest delight and recreation; and such was
the good rule and order observed in it that no labour was tedious, but
rather of contentment and satisfaction.”—JOSEPH DE ACOSTA. (Other Spanish
testimonies might be quoted, to the same effect.)
[27] Atahualpa, nevertheless, had some redeeming features of character:
and it is almost certain that his cruelties were greatly exaggerated.
[28] This riot actually took place, and from the cause assigned in the
text.
[29] This hereditary guild of doctors still exists among the Peruvian
Indians, and they still pursue their calling as described in the text.
[30] The ease with which the Spaniards made their vast conquests in the
New World was owing, in great measure, to the awe and terror inspired by
their horses, animals entirely unknown to the aborigines; it has been
even said that it was the horse, not the man, that conquered America.
[31] The “last of the Incas,” Tupac Amaru, who died as above related in
1571, must not be confounded with a far more remarkable character, the
heroic and unfortunate Inca chieftain, José Gabriel Condercanqui, who
assumed the name of Tupac Amaru, and led his people in their last gallant
struggle for independence towards the close of the eighteenth century.
[32] Literally, _you shall count_; but used to mean virtuous, excellent.
[33] In Quichua, Coyllur means a star; Sumac, beautiful.
[34] Temple of the Sun.
[35] The Peruvians were as successful as the ancient Egyptians in the
art of embalming the dead. The bodies of all the Incas, from Manco Capac
downwards, were placed in the great Temple of the Sun at Cuzco. There
each sat in state, in his royal robes, the llautu on his head and the
sceptre in his hand; his Coya being seated opposite. At the approach of
the conquerors the natives removed and concealed them; but the bodies of
the three greatest Incas—Viracocha, Yupanqui, and Huayna Capac—with those
of their Coyas, were afterwards found, and honourably interred, even the
haughty conquerors baring their heads in silent reverence as they were
borne past.
[36] Slave.
[37] The Peruvians paid extreme regard to omens, and were very
superstitious about them.
[38] Sarmiento.
[39] Garçilasso de la Vega.
[40] Lily.
[41] Yes, yes.
[42] Humboldt.
[43] Officer whose duty it was to preserve and interpret the Quipus.
[44] Narrative of Job Hortop, in “Hakluyt’s Voyages.”
[45] The Spaniards called all the Indian princesses Pallas, though the
title properly belonged only to the married ones amongst them.
[46] This fidelity of the Peruvians to any master to whom they had once
yielded themselves, is described in very striking terms by Garçilasso de
la Vega.
[47] The precious metals were very plentiful in those regions, and
prices, of course, proportionably high.
[48] A hundred such stories could easily be gathered out of the
blood-stained records of the Spanish conquests in America.
[49] The Incas believed that “Pacha-camac had appointed the same care to
be taken of the wild as of the tame flocks;” for this reason they would
not hurt or destroy them, except so far as was necessary for the food,
the clothing, or the safety of man.
[50] See “Ollantā, an Ancient Ynca Drama, Translated from the Original
Quichua by Clements R. Markham. C.B.”
[51] Out of thirty-six persons who were thus banished at one time, no
less than thirty-five died within the space of two years.
[52] The arms granted by Charles V. to the Inca family.
[53] Garçilasso de la Vega.
[54] Alluding to a graceful custom of his royal forefathers. When they
desired to honour any man, they would send him a cup exactly the same as
that from which they drank themselves with the message.—“The Inca drinks
with thee in this cup.”
[55] Humboldt.
[56] Sir Walter Raleigh.