THE SPANISH CONQUEST
During the long campaigns by which his general, Quizquiz, had conquered
Peru, Atahuallpa had never left the North. He received the news of the
crowning victory and the capture of Huascar, in his palace at Tumibamba
on the Cuencan plain, and started at once for Cajamarca, the first great
town on the plateau south of the Ecuador border, accompanied by only a
small army. While waiting near Cajamarca, Atahuallpa heard the wonderful
news that two hundred strangers had landed on the coast at Tumbez--a
port on the southern side of the Gulf of Guayaquil. They were white and
their faces were covered with hair; they had garments and arms different
from any his informants had seen; and most extraordinary of all they
were accompanied by outlandish gigantic beasts who carried them over the
ground with a terrifying speed.
The effect of this intelligence upon Atahuallpa and his advisers can
only be conjectured. It was remembered that four years before a ship
carrying a score or more of these same foreigners had sailed along the
coast of Ecuador and northern Peru, landing at various places to beg
provisions and ask questions. Two had been left behind, and were taken
to the interior, where their fate is unknown. It is, however, probable
that these unfortunate Spaniards had given to Atahuallpa's officers much
information about the resources and intentions of their countrymen. The
Inca emperor seems to have realised that the importance and power of the
foreigners was out of all proportion to their numbers. The newcomers
protested that their purposes were amicable, and sent friendly messages
to Atahuallpa, who resolved to act cautiously and avoid offending them
unnecessarily. He despatched his own brother as an ambassador with
assurances of good-will and a polite inquiry as to their wishes and
intentions. But unfortunately for himself and his country the Inca was
dealing with a man whose profound and deceitful diplomacy was as much
superior to his as a musket is to a cross-bow. The Spanish leader
returned word that he appreciated the kind expressions of the emperor
and would at once proceed to Cajamarca to pay his respects in person.
This was Francisco Pizarro, one of the greatest practical geniuses whom
modern Europe has produced. Born out of wedlock at Trujillo, a town in
Estremadura, the province which during centuries was the great fighting
ground of Castilian and Moor, he passed his youth as a swine-herd in the
most abject poverty and illiteracy. Enlisting as a private soldier, he
spent his young manhood in fighting under Gonzalo de Cordoba, in those
campaigns which carried the renown of the Spanish infantry to the
farthest confines of Europe. An admirable soldier, conscious that he
possessed powers of the highest order, hopelessly handicapped in old
Europe by his base birth and illiteracy, the discovery of the New World
opened up a field for his talents. He eagerly embraced the opportunity,
embarking in 1509 with Alonso de Ojeda for the Darien gold mines. Four
years later he accompanied Balboa in that memorable journey across the
Isthmus which resulted in the discovery of the Pacific Ocean. To the
city of Panama, looking out over the mysterious sea, adventurers flocked
like a pack of wolves eager for a share in the spoils of its unknown
shores, and Pizarro was among them. The news of Cortes's conquest of
Mexico brought to America a horde of soldiers of fortune. Recklessly
brave, experienced in the most scientific warfare of the time,
arrogantly proud of their nationality, utterly careless of odds, ready
to risk their lives on the chance of sudden fortune, a set of men better
qualified for the work which fate threw in their way could not be
conceived.
Panama had hardly been founded when rumours of the existence of a
wealthy and civilised empire lying far to the south reached the ears of
the Spaniards. In 1522, Pascual de Andagoya, a gentleman of
distinguished family who occupied a high office at Panama, made an
expedition for a short distance along the coast and obtained valuable
confirmation of the vague reports. Obliged to abandon the enterprise by
his own illness, he turned it over to a partnership formed for the
purpose by Pizarro, Almagro, and a priest named Luque. The first enjoyed
a great reputation for good judgment and fertility of resource, gained
in expeditions along the Caribbean coast, and by mere force of his
talents had come to be regarded as one of the ablest and luckiest
captains on the Isthmus. The active command was to be his, while
Almagro, a soldier of more advanced age and hardly inferior reputation,
backed him up and sent supplies and reinforcements. Luque was the
moneyed man of the concern. They bought a small vessel at Panama which
Balboa himself had built eight years before, and in 1524 Pizarro started
down the coast. But his supply of provisions was inadequate, it was
impossible to obtain more from the savage natives of the forested shores
of Colombia, and the first effort ended in failure.
Nothing discouraged, Pizarro and his partners persevered. They had great
difficulty in raising money to fit out properly the next expedition, but
happily they succeeded in interesting the mayor of Panama. Eighteen
months later Pizarro sailed once more with a better equipment and one
hundred and sixty men. For five hundred miles he found nothing except
the hot and swampy seashore of Colombia, inhabited by miserable naked
tribes, and his companions had begun to believe that the empire they
were seeking was a myth, when the pilot who had been sent on ahead came
back with word that he had penetrated south of the equator, and there
had met a sort of large sea-going raft coming from the south manned by
a clothed and civilised crew and laden with cloth, silver work, metal
mirrors, vases, and various other goods.
These Indians said they came from Tumbez, a city in a fertile valley on
a dry and penetrable coast which lay not more than two hundred miles
farther south. They were traders bringing up a stock to sell to the
shore peoples of Ecuador--tribes who had long been compelled to
acknowledge the suzerainty of the Incas, but who still lived in virtual
independence under their own chiefs. The men on the raft told the
Spaniards that the whole interior and the southern coast were inhabited
by civilised peoples, subjects of an emperor whose capital was a great
city in the mountains hundreds of leagues to the south. Having received
this confirmation of their most extravagant hopes, Pizarro and his men
pushed on until they nearly reached the northern boundary of Ecuador,
not far from the limits of the Inca empire. It was clear, however, that
their small force would never be able to cope with the armies of such a
power. Almagro went back to Panama for reinforcements, while the
indomitable Pizarro landed his already disheartened adventurers on a
swampy island where their clothes rotted in the steaming, tropical heat
and never-ceasing rain; fevers decimated them, mosquitoes tortured them,
and eatable provisions were impossible to obtain. When Almagro reached
Panama, the governor flew into a rage on hearing that Pizarro was
holding his men against their will, and sent a ship to bring back all
who wished. Nine-tenths of the band deserted Pizarro, but he was
indomitable and thirteen heroes stood by him in his determination to
reach Peru or perish. For weary months he waited for provisions, but the
moment they arrived he set off for the south. Within twenty days he and
his little band of adventurers reached the Gulf of Guayaquil, four
hundred miles farther on, and immediately landed at Tumbez. With their
own eyes they saw full confirmation of what the Indians of the raft had
told them. Irrigated fields, green with beautiful crops, lined the river
bank; eighty thousand people, all comfortably housed, lived in the
valley; commerce was flourishing; large temples profusely ornamented
with gold and silver testified to wealth and culture; the government was
well-ordered and stable; and the people received the visitors with
open-handed hospitality.
After refreshing his followers, Pizarro continued his explorations down
the coast for a couple of hundred miles, finding a succession of fertile
valleys interrupting the monotonous desert, each filled with villages
and farms and a thriving, civilised, and prosperous population. In the
fall of 1527 he returned to Panama, full of the idea of leading an
expedition to conquer the great empire about which he had obtained such
minute and exact information. He wisely resolved himself to go to Spain
and secure the direct patronage and countenance of the government at
Madrid. Taking with him natives brought from Tumbez and specimens of
products, he set off, and on his arrival was granted an audience by
Charles V. The Emperor was greatly impressed by the story which the
adventurer told. Naturally of a noble and commanding presence, the
conscious dignity of Pizarro's manners corresponded to the high
ambitions which filled his mind. In the doing of great things he had
dropped all evidences of his base origin, and contact with men and the
habit of command had given him an ease of address and clearness of
thought which made his hearers forget the deficiencies of his early
education. The concession he prayed for was granted. He himself was
legitimatised and ennobled and received the title of "adelantado," while
the gallant followers who had refused to abandon him on the Colombian
island were made gentlemen of coat-armour. Pizarro and his partners were
formally authorised to conquer and settle Peru in the name of the
Castilian sovereign and received a grant of money for the purchase of
arms, agreeing to remit to the royal treasury one-fifth of all the gold
that they should find.
Pizarro knew just the kind of men needed to assist in this hazardous
enterprise, and he took every precaution to select only those of whose
valour and capacity he was well assured. His mother had bred up a family
of lions in the little old Estremadura town, and his four brothers were
hardly his inferiors in valour and audacity. Hernando, the oldest and
only legitimate son of Francisco's father, agreed to go. So did Juan and
Gonzalo, two illegitimate brothers who were younger, and also Francisco
Alcantara, a half-brother on the mother's side. Hernando Cortes, the
noble conqueror of Mexico, exerted himself to help Pizarro fill up his
ranks with soldiers of the most approved courage, and the latter
finally sailed for the Isthmus with a small body picked from the very
flower of the fighting men of the Peninsula.
Pizarro believed that a few hundreds of good men, well provided with
artillery and horses, would be as effective as thousands in striking
terror to masses of Indians armed only with spears and swords. Arrived
at Panama, it was arranged that he should proceed to Peru at once, while
Almagro would follow later with reinforcements recruited among the
unemployed adventurers in Nicaragua. All sorts of good fortune favoured
the daring enterprise. For once the fitful winds which usually baffle
sailing ships in the Gulf of Panama were kind, and Pizarro's clumsy,
little caravels traversed in thirteen days the seven hundred miles of
inhospitable coast which lay between the Isthmus and the first Inca
provinces. Landing among the half-civilised tribes of Ecuador, he had
the good luck to find a store of gold and emeralds. This he sent back,
as an encouragement to Almagro, and marching down the Ecuador coast, he
reached the Gulf of Guayaquil, on whose southern shore began the
populous and civilised portions of the empire. He crossed to the island
of Puna, overcame its fierce inhabitants with great slaughter, and there
was joined by a large and welcome reinforcement of men and horses under
the command of Hernando de Soto, afterwards so famous as the discoverer
of the Mississippi, who had come on his own motion to get his share in
the spoils.
So far, Pizarro's operations had been among outlying provinces owning
only nominal allegiance to the Incas, but he now felt strong enough to
cross over to Tumbez and establish a footing in their real domain. From
Tumbez he marched south to Paita, where he determined to establish his
base. The quick eye of the master general appreciated the strategical
advantages of this valley. At this point the great military road coming
down from the plateau of Ecuador debouched on the coast plain.
Communication to the south was easy by a road which connected all the
coast valleys with branches climbing to the plateaux. An anchorage at
the valley's mouth afforded a sure means of keeping open that
communication with Panama which was so essential to success;
reinforcements could reach him in whatever part of Peru he might
venture, and a garrison left at Paita would command the main route
connecting Quito and Cuzco, cutting the Peruvian empire in two.
On receiving Pizarro's answer to his friendly message, Atahuallpa
resolved to await the promised visit, apparently suspecting no evil. The
audacious Spaniard had, however, conceived the design of capturing the
victorious claimant of the throne of the Incas, well knowing that in its
actual distracted condition the country would be left without a centre
about which it could rally. Open war, no matter how overwhelming his
first victory might be, could hardly be ultimately successful.
Atahuallpa once safe at Cuzco or Quito and surrounded by the disciplined
soldiers who had overthrown Huascar, a defensive campaign might be
undertaken in which Pizarro would find every step toward either capital
bitterly disputed. Hundreds of thousands of Peruvians pouring up from
the numberless provinces of the empire would be thrown in a
never-ceasing succession of armies against his little band of Spaniards,
and the latter would infallibly be driven back to the coast by
starvation and fatigue if not by defeat in the field.
Apparently foolhardy, in fact Pizarro's plan offered the only chance of
success. Never dreaming that such a step was in contemplation,
Atahuallpa took no precautions. Leaving fifty-five men at the little
post of San Miguel in the Paita valley to secure his retreat, Pizarro
marched south with one hundred and two foot soldiers, sixty-two horses,
and two small cannon two hundred miles along the coast plain to a point
opposite Cajamarca, and ascended along an Inca military road, meeting a
friendly reception from the wondering natives, and being supplied with
provisions by Atahuallpa's orders.
On the 15th of November, 1532, Pizarro entered Cajamarca. He found an
open square in the middle of the town surrounded by walls and solid
stone buildings, which he received permission to occupy as quarters.
From his camp outside, Atahuallpa sent word that the following day he
would enter the town in state and receive the Spaniards. Marvellous good
fortune favoured Pizarro's treacherous designs. The Indians had
furnished a trap already made, and now Atahuallpa deliberately walked
into it. On the morning of the 16th the Indian army broke camp and
marched to Cajamarca, followed by the Emperor, who was borne in a litter
and surrounded by his personal attendants, the great chiefs, and the
nobles belonging to his own lineage. At sunset he entered the square,
accompanied only by these unarmed attendants, and found Pizarro and a
few Spaniards awaiting him. The rest were hidden in the houses around
the square with their horses saddled, their breast-plates on, and
musketry and cannon ready charged.
From among the group which surrounded Pizarro stepped forward Friar
Valverde and approached the Inca monarch, who, reclining in a litter
raised high above the crowd on the shoulders of his attendants, waited
with dignity to hear what those strangers had to say. The priest
advanced with a cross in one hand and a Bible in the other and began a
harangue which, clumsily translated by an Indian boy, the Inca hardly
understood. But in a few moments he realised that this uncouth jargon
was meant to convey an arrogant demand that he acknowledge himself a
vassal of Charles V. and submit to baptism. With haughty surprise he
threw down the book which Valverde tried to force into his hand--the
priest shouted, "Fall on, Castilians--I absolve you," and into the
helpless crowd burst a murderous fire from the doors of the houses all
around. Aghast and bewildered by this display of powers which to them
seemed necromantic, the survivors nevertheless manfully stood to the
attack of the mail-clad horsemen who rode into the huddled mass
ferociously slashing and slaughtering. The Indians strove desperately to
drag the Spaniards from the horses with their naked hands, and
interposed a living wall of human flesh between the murderers and their
beloved sovereign. At length Pizarro's own hands snatched Atahuallpa
from the litter. The Indian soldiers outside, hearing the firearms and
the noise of the struggle, tried to force their way into the square, but
the Spanish musketry and cannon mowed them down by hundreds, and they
fled before the charges of the cavalry, dispersing in the twilight.
Pizarro took every precaution to prevent the escape or rescue of his
prisoner, and for the first few weeks treated him kindly. The Spaniard
was playing a profound diplomatic game. He well knew that Atahuallpa's
generals would fear to endanger the latter's life by undertaking any
aggressive measures, and that Huascar's partisans would take advantage
of this providential opportunity to reorganise their forces. He
conversed much with the captive emperor and at length began to hint to
him the advisability of arbitration with Huascar. But the Inca took
alarm and secretly sent off orders for his brother's execution. Seeing
that the Indian was not to be cajoled, the Spaniard adopted a sterner
attitude, pretended the greatest indignation at the fratricide, and soon
had Atahuallpa willing to offer anything for his release. Shrewdly
guessing that for gold the Spaniards would run any risk, the Inca
negotiated for his ransom, saying: "I will fill this room with gold as
high as I can reach if only you will liberate me." Pizarro agreed,
insisting, however, that the ransom be delivered in advance at
Cajamarca. A formal contract was drawn up and executed before a notary,
and the deluded emperor ordered all preparations for war on the
Spaniards to be interrupted and that the temples be stripped of their
gold ornaments to supply the enormous amount he had promised. Under
protection of this truce Pizarro sent out expeditions to explore the
country and to expedite the process of gathering the treasure, and while
this was going on Almagro arrived with reinforcements which doubled the
Spanish forces. Finally the agreed sum was all in Cajamarca. It amounted
to four million five hundred sterling in modern money. One-fifth was
sent to the royal treasury and the remainder divided, making even the
private soldiers rich for life.
Nevertheless, Atahuallpa was not released. Large bodies of his troops
were known to be on their way from Cuzco, and Pizarro realised that,
once at the head of his forces, the Inca would wage an unrelenting
warfare to expel the last Spaniard from Peru. If kept a prisoner his
partisans would no longer hesitate to fight to release him, appreciating
now the uselessness of relying on Spanish promises. He must be got rid
of, and so after a mock trial in which he was charged with Huascar's
murder and with conspiring against the Spaniards, the Inca emperor was
strangled to death in the public square at Cajamarca. Pizarro knew
better than to allow the Indians time to settle the disputed succession.
With masterful sagacity he resolved to strike at Cuzco during the
confusion. He suddenly evacuated Cajamarca and rapidly marched along the
northern plateau, and over the Cerro de Pasco into the fertile valley
of Jauja. From this point a short road led down the Cordillera to the
sea, making it an admirable base for a campaign against Cuzco.
[Illustration: OBSEQUIES OF ATAHUALLPA.
[From a painting by the Peruvian artist, Monteros.]]
Leaving a garrison to protect his retreat to the ocean, Pizarro advanced
by forced marches along the great central plateau toward Cuzco. Quizquiz
and the army, which had defeated and captured Huascar two years before,
tried to oppose his progress, but all the calculations of the Indian
general were overthrown by the incredible speed of the Spanish cavalry.
The horsemen reached the neighbourhood of Cuzco without encountering any
considerable force of the enemy. Here the advance guard was surprised,
lost a fourth of its number, and was on the point of being overwhelmed,
when the opportune arrival of the main body dispersed the Indians.
Though only a small part of Quizquiz's army had taken part, this defeat
badly demoralised his soldiers; it seemed impossible to make any headway
against these strangers clothed in steel, mounted on great beasts, and
armed with weapons which slew their opponents before the latter could
got in a blow. Moreover, Quizquiz was in a hostile country, where
sympathies were all with the Huascar party and where the executioners of
Atahuallpa were regarded as deliverers.
Manco Capac, Huascar's brother and legitimate successor, went in person
to the Spanish camp to propose a formal alliance and a joint war of
extermination against the Atahuallpa faction, Pizarro received him with
every mark of honour and respect and renewed his assurances that the
sole object of his march from Cajamarca was to crush the enemies of the
rightful emperor. Quizquiz tried hard to get his forces into shape for
resistance, but his position near Cuzco was untenable, and after a
slight skirmish he was obliged to leave the way open to the capital.
Just a year from the day he had reached Cajamarca, Pizarro entered Cuzco
by the side of the legitimate emperor amid the acclamations of the
people. Manco's inauguration was splendidly celebrated with all the
ancient rites, but among the procession of rejoicing Incas rode an
ominous cavalcade--the Spanish soldiers, who now numbered nearly five
hundred.
The new emperor gathered an army, and, assisted by some Spaniards, set
off in pursuit of Quizquiz, whom he defeated a short distance north of
Cuzco. The old northern general, still indefatigable, made a rapid march
on Jauja to surprise the Spanish garrison, but was repulsed in this
well-considered effort to cut Pizarro's communications with the coast,
and had to make his way, the best he could, back towards Quito. The
central portion of the empire would now have been content to settle back
into quiet allegiance to Manco. But the latter soon found that his
allies regarded the country as their own. Under the pressure of
necessity for help against Quizquiz he had acknowledged, as a matter of
form, the titular supremacy of the Spanish king, and he was now required
to carry out his obligation to the letter. A municipal council, framed
on the Spanish model, was installed as the governing body of the ancient
capital; the great temples were turned into churches and monasteries;
other public edifices were seized to be used as residences or barracks
for the Spaniards; tombs, temples, and private residences were searched
for gold; and the authorities were required to furnish troops and
carriers for the expeditions which their oppressors planned against the
remoter parts of the empire. With the resignation characteristic of the
race, the Indians submitted to these exactions, and Manco hesitated long
before deciding to put himself at the head of a revolt.
The transcendant military and diplomatic qualities Pizarro had displayed
were equalled by the energy and foresight which he now showed as an
administrator. Realising that his capital should be on the coast in
order to secure direct communication with Panama, he made a careful
examination of routes and possible sites and selected the valley of the
Rimac, just below Jauja, where he founded Lima. From this point the
military road by which the Incas had kept up communication from Cuzco
with the coast and the northern provinces ascended to the plateau. Lima
and Jauja were the strategical keys to central and southern Peru; San
Miguel gave easy access to Quito, and Pizarro insured the region
extending from Cerro de Pasco to the Ecuador border by establishing the
city of Trujillo half-way up the coast.
Their original agreement provided that Pizarro should have the northern
half of the countries they might conquer, and Almagro the southern.
Accordingly, about two years after Cuzco was occupied, Almagro started
for Bolivia and Chile, accompanied by five hundred Spaniards and two
brothers of the Inca emperor, leading a large native army. In Bolivia,
where the Inca power had been established for centuries, he encountered
no opposition, and crossed the bleak plateaux of the Puna, descended the
Andes, and finally reached the fertile valleys of northern Chile. But so
little gold was found that Almagro determined to return and set up a
claim to Cuzco.
[Illustration: STONE BRIDGE OVER THE RIMAC RIVER, LIMA, PERU.]
In the meantime the Incas of central Peru had awakened from the dream of
a continuance of the ancient dynasty under Spanish protection. Pizarro
himself seems to have been guilty of few acts of wanton cruelty, but he
neither wished nor tried to restrain his followers from reducing the
Indians to vassalage. The natives were fast crowded to the wall, and the
Spaniards divided the fairest parts of the country into estates,
treating the Indians as tenants from whom tribute was due. The
sovereignty of the emperor soon became a mere fiction. In 1536 Manco
escaped from Cuzco and raised the standard of rebellion. The moment
appeared favourable. The Spanish forces were scattered; Pizarro was at
Lima, and Almagro in the wilds of Chile, but as a matter of fact the
Incas laboured under almost hopeless disadvantages. Their cities,
fortresses, and roads were all in the hands of the Spaniards, and the
kingdom of Quito, the most warlike part of the empire, had meanwhile
been reduced by a Spanish expedition from San Miguel.
The rebellion was confined at first to the tribes who lived in the
neighbourhood of Cuzco. These rose _en masse_ and besieged the two
hundred Spaniards, who, under the command of Hernando Pizarro and his
two younger brothers, Juan and Gonzalo, occupied the capital. The
Indians captured the citadel overlooking the town, and poured an
incessant rain of stones and burning darts on their enemies. The
Spaniards soon ran out of provisions, and were forced to try to
recapture the citadel or perish miserably by fire and starvation. Juan
Pizarro led a desperate assault, ably assisted by Hernando and Gonzalo,
and all three proved themselves worthy of the name they bore. Juan fell
mortally wounded in the moment of victory, but the Incas fled in
confusion, giving the surviving Spaniards an opportunity to procure
supplies of maize from the neighbouring farms. This defeat disheartened
the Indians. Numbers and bravery seemed useless against the horses and
firearms of these strangers, whose reckless courage was only equalled by
their cruelty. The Incas kept up the siege for several months, but
without artillery their swords and spears could make little headway
against men provided with firearms and protected behind solid stone
walls. While the Spaniards in Cuzco were thus fighting for their lives,
the Incas near Jauja rose and descended on Lima, but Francisco Pizarro
with his dreaded cavalry waited for them in ambush, and the Indians were
surprised and cut to pieces.
In spite of this success the governor's position remained most grave. He
sent for help to Panama, Guatemala, and Mexico, but meanwhile had no
means of relieving Cuzco. Its fall meant not only the death of his
beloved brothers, but would almost certainly be followed by a general
insurrection and the loss of all the advantages gained in three years of
fighting and scheming. He hurried forward two hundred and fifty
men,--all he could possibly spare,--but had little prospect of success
until news came that Almagro and his five hundred followers had arrived
at Arequipa on their way back from Chile. From Arequipa there is a pass
to the north end of Lake Titicaca, and thence to Cuzco the way was easy.
Manco would be caught between Pizarro's army coming up from Lima and
Almagro's descending from the south. The Inca gave up hope and with a
few devoted followers retired into the wild region of Vilcabamba, lying
north of Cuzco near the Amazonian plain. In those rugged and forested
defiles he was safe from Spanish pursuit, but his retirement ended all
hope of organised and general resistance. The Inca empire had fallen
never to rise again. With stoical resignation the Indians made the best
of their sad situation, while the conquerors were left free to fight
among themselves over the division of the magnificent spoils which had
so miraculously fallen into their hands.