History of the Conquest of Peru Part 41

Naharro, Relacion Sumaria, Ms. - Conq. i Pob. del Piru, Ms. - Carta de Gutierrez, Ms. - Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Carta de Espinall, Ms.]

Having completed the process, (July 8th, 1538,) it was not difficult to obtain a verdict against the prisoner. The princ.i.p.al charges on which he was p.r.o.nounced guilty were those of levying war against the Crown, and thereby occasioning the death of many of his Majesty's subjects; of entering into conspiracy with the Inca; and finally, of dispossessing the royal governor of the city of Cuzco. On these charges he was condemned to suffer death as a traitor, by being publicly beheaded in the great square of the city. Who were the judges, or what was the tribunal that condemned him, we are not informed. Indeed, the whole trial was a mockery; if that can be called a trial, where the accused himself is not even aware of the accusation.

The sentence was communicated by a friar deputed for the purpose to Almagro. The unhappy man, who all the while had been unconsciously slumbering on the brink of a precipice, could not at first comprehend the nature of his situation. Recovering from the first shock, "It was impossible," he said, "that such wrong could be done him, - he would not believe it." He then besought Hernando Pizarro to grant him an interview. That cavalier, not unwilling, it would seem, to witness the agony of his captive, consented; and Almagro was so humbled by his misfortunes, that he condescended to beg for his life with the most piteous supplications. He reminded Hernando of his ancient relations with his brother, and the good offices he had rendered him and his family in the earlier part of their career. He touched on his acknowledged services to his country, and besought his enemy "to spare his gray hairs, and not to deprive him of the sh.o.r.e remnant of an existence from which he had now nothing more to fear." - To this the other coldly replied, that "he was surprised to see Almagro demean himself in a manner so unbecoming a brave cavalier; that his fate was no worse than had befallen many a soldier before him; and that, since G.o.d had given him the grace to be a Christian, he should employ his remaining moments in making up his account with Heaven!" *19 [Footnote 19: "I que pues tuvo tanta gracia de Dios, que le hico Christiano, ordenase su Alma, i temiese a Dios." Herrera, Hist.

General, dec. 6, lib. 5, cap. 1.]

But Almagro was not to be silenced. He urged the service he had rendered Hernando himself. "This was a hard requital," he said, "for having spared his life so recently under similar circ.u.mstances, and that, too, when he had been urged again and again by those around him to take it away." And he concluded by menacing his enemy with the vengeance of the emperor, who would never suffer this outrage on one who had rendered such signal services to the Crown to go unrequited. It was all in vain; and Hernando abruptly closed the conference by repeating, that "his doom was inevitable, and he must prepare to meet it." *20 [Footnote 20: Ibid., ubi supra.

The marshal appealed from the sentence of his judges to the Crown, supplicating his conqueror, (says the treasurer Espinall, in his letter to the emperor,) in terms that would have touched the heart of an infidel. "De la qual el dicho Adelantado apelo para ante V. M. i le rogo que por amor de Dios hincado de rodillas le otorgase el apelacion, diciendole que mirase sus canas e vejez e quanto havia servido a V. M. i qe el havia sido el primer escalon para que el 1 sus hermanos subiesen en el estado en que estavan, i diciendole otras muchas palabras de dolor e compasion que despues de muerto supe que dixo, que a qualquier hombre, aunque fuera infiel, moviera a piedad." Carta, Ms.]

Almagro, finding that no impression was to be made on his iron-hearted conqueror, now seriously addressed himself to the settlement of his affairs. By the terms of the royal grant he was empowered to name his successor. He accordingly devolved his office on his son, appointing Diego de Alvarado, on whose integrity he had great reliance, administrator of the province during his minority. All his property and possessions in Peru, of whatever kind, he devised to his master the emperor, a.s.suring him that a large balance was still due to him in his unsettled accounts with Pizarro. By this politic bequest, he hoped to secure the monarch's protection for his son, as well as a strict scrutiny into the affairs of his enemy.

The knowledge of Almagro's sentence produced a deep sensation in the community of Cuzco. All were amazed at the presumption with which one, armed with a little brief authority, ventured to sit in judgment on a person of Almagro's station. There were few who did not call to mind some generous or good-natured act of the unfortunate veteran. Even those who had furnished materials for the accusation, now startled by the tragic result to which it was to lead, were heard to denounce Hernando's conduct as that of a tyrant. Some of the princ.i.p.al cavaliers, and among them Diego de Alvarado, to whose intercession, as we have seen Hernando Pizarro, when a captive, had owed his own life, waited on that commander, and endeavoured to dissuade him from so high-handed and atrocious a proceeding. It was in vain. But it had the effect of changing the mode of execution, which, instead of the public square, was now to take place in prison. *21

[Footnote 21: Carta de Espinall, Ms. - Montesinos, Annales, Ms., ano 1538.

Bishop Valverde, as he a.s.sures the emperor, remonstrated with Francisco Pizarro in Lima, against allowing violence towards the marshal; urging it on him, as an imperative duty, to go himself at once to Cuzco, and set him at liberty. "It was too grave a matter," he rightly added, "to trust to a third party." (Carta al Emperador, Ms.) The treasurer Espinall, then in Cuzco, made a similar ineffectual attempt to turn Hernando from his purpose.]

On the day appointed, a strong corps of arquebusiers was drawn up in the plaza. The guards were doubled over the houses were dwelt the princ.i.p.al partisans of Almagro. The executioner, attended by a priest, stealthily entered his prison; and the unhappy man, after confessing and receiving the sacrament, submitted without resistance to the garrote. Thus obscurely, in the gloomy silence of a dungeon, perished the hero of a hundred battles! His corpse was removed to the great square of the city, where, in obedience to the sentence, the head was severed from the body. A herald proclaimed aloud the nature of the crimes for which he had suffered; and his remains, rolled in their b.l.o.o.d.y shroud, were borne to the house of his friend Hernan Ponce de Leon, and the next day laid with all due solemnity in the church of Our Lady of Mercy. The Pizarros appeared among the princ.i.p.al mourners. It was remarked, that their brother had paid similar honors to the memory of Atahuallpa. *22 [Footnote 22: Carta de Espinall, Ms. - Herrera, Hist. General, loc. cit. - Carta de Valverde al Emperador, Ms. - Carta de Gutierrez, Ms. - Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Montesinos, Annales, Ms., ano 1538.

The date of Almagro's execution is not given; a strange omission; but of little moment, as that event must have followed soon on the condemnation.]

Almagro, at the time of his death, was probably not far from seventy years of age. But this is somewhat uncertain; for Almagro was a foundling, and his early history is lost in obscurity. *23 He had many excellent qualities by nature; and his defects, which were not few, may reasonably be palliated by the circ.u.mstances of his situation. For what extenuation is not authorized by the position of a foundling, - without parents, or early friends, or teacher to direct him, - his little bark set adrift on the ocean of life, to take its chance among the rude billows and breakers, without one friendly hand stretched forth to steer or to save it! The name of "foundling" comprehends an apology for much, very much, that is wrong in after life. *24

[Footnote 23: Ante, vol. I. p. 207.]

[Footnote 24: Montesinos, for want of a better pedigree, says, - "He was the son of his own great deeds, and such has been the parentage of many a famous hero!" (Annales, Ms., ano 1538.) It would go hard with a Castilian, if he could not make out something like a genealogy, - however shadowy.]

He was a man of strong pa.s.sions, and not too well used to control them. *25 But he was neither vindictive nor habitually cruel. I have mentioned one atrocious outrage which he committed on the natives. But insensibility to the rights of the Indian he shared with many a better-instructed Spaniard. Yet the Indians, after his conviction, bore testimony to his general humanity, by declaring that they had no such friend among the white men. *26 Indeed, far from being vindictive, he was placable, and easily yielded to others. The facility with which he yielded, the result of good-natured credulity, made him too often the dupe of the crafty; and it showed, certainly, a want of that self-reliance which belongs to great strength of character. Yet his facility of temper, and the generosity of his nature, made him popular with his followers. No commander was ever more beloved by his soldiers. His generosity was often carried to prodigality. When he entered on the campaign of Chili, he lent a hundred thousand gold ducats to the poorer cavaliers to equip themselves, and afterwards gave them up the debt. *27 He was profuse to ostentation. But his extravagance did him no harm among the roving spirits of the camp, with whom prodigality is apt to gain more favor than a strict and well-regulated economy.

[Footnote 25: "Hera vn hombre muy profano, de muy mala lengua, que en enojandose tratava muy mal a todos los que con el andavan aunque fuesen cavalleros. "(Descub. y Conq., Ms.) It is the portrait drawn by an enemy.]

[Footnote 26: "Los Indios lloraban amargamente, diciendo, que de el nunca recibieron mal tratamiento." Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 5, cap. 1.]

[Footnote 27: If we may credit Herrera, he distributed a hundred and eighty roads of silver and twenty of gold among his followers! "Mando sacar de su Posada mas de ciento i ochenta cargas de Plata i veinte de Oro, i las repartio." (Dec. 5, lib.

7, cap. 9.) A load was what a man could easily carry. Such a statement taxes our credulity, but it is difficult to set the proper limits to one's credulity, in what relates to this land of gold.]

He was a good soldier, careful and judicious in his plans, patient and intrepid in their execution. His body was covered with the scars of his battles, till the natural plainness of his person was converted almost into deformity. He must not be judged by his closing campaign, when, depressed by disease, he yielded to the superior genius of his rival; but by his numerous expeditions by land and by water for the conquest of Peru and the remote Chili. Yet it may be doubted whether he possessed those uncommon qualities, either as a warrior or as a man, that, in ordinary circ.u.mstances, would have raised him to distinction. He was one of the three, or, to speak more strictly, of the two a.s.sociates, who had the good fortune and the glory to make one of the most splendid discoveries in the Western World. He shares largely in the credit of this with Pizarro; for, when he did not accompany that leader in his perilous expeditions, he contributed no less to their success by his exertions in the colonies.

Yet his connection with that chief can hardly be considered a fortunate circ.u.mstance in his career. A partnership between individuals for discovery and conquest is not likely to be very scrupulously observed, especially by men more accustomed to govern others than to govern themselves. If causes for discord do not arise before, they will be sure to spring up on division of the spoil. But this a.s.sociation was particularly ill-a.s.sorted. For the free, sanguine, and confiding temper of Almagro was no match for the cool and crafty policy of Pizarro; and he was invariably circ.u.mvented by his companion, whenever their respective interests came in collision.

Still the final ruin of Almagro may be fairly imputed to himself.

He made two capital blunders. The first was his appeal to arms by the seizure of Cuzco. The determination of a boundary-line was not to be settled by arms. It was a subject for arbitration; and, if arbitrators could not be trusted, it should have been referred to the decision of the Crown. But, having once appealed to arms, he should not then have resorted to negotiation, - above all, to negotiation with Pizarro. This was his second and greatest error. He had seen enough of Pizarro to know that he was not to be trusted. Almagro did trust him, and he paid for it with his life.

Chapter III

Pizarro Revisits Cuzco. - Hernando Returns To Castile. - His long Imprisonment. - Commissioner Sent To Peru. - Hostilities With The Inca. -Pizarro's Active Administration. - Gonzalo Pizarro.

1539-1540.

On the departure of his brother in pursuit of Almagro, the Marquess Francisco Pizarro, as we have seen, returned to Lima.

There he anxiously awaited the result of the campaign; and on receiving the welcome tidings of the victory of Las Salinas, he instantly made preparations for his march to Cuzco. At Xauxa, however, he was long detained by the distracted state of the country, and still longer, as it would seem, by a reluctance to enter the Peruvian capital while the trial of Almagro was pending.

He was met at Xauxa by the marshal's son Diego, who had been sent to the coast by Hernando Pizarro. The young man was filled with the most gloomy apprehensions respecting his father's fate, and he besought the governor not to allow his brother to do him any violence. Pizarro, who received Diego with much apparent kindness, bade him take heart, as no harm should come to his father; *1 adding, that he trusted their ancient friendship would soon be renewed. The youth, comforted by these a.s.surances, took his way to Lima, where, by Pizarro's orders, he was received into his house, and treated as a son.

[Footnote 1: "I dixo, que no tuviese ninguna pena, porque no consentiria, que su Padre fuese muerto." Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 6, cap. 3.]

The same a.s.surances respecting the marshal's safety were given by the governor to Bishop Valverde, and some of the princ.i.p.al cavaliers who interested themselves in behalf of the prisoner. *2 Still Pizarro delayed his march to the capital; and when he resumed it, he had advanced no farther than the Rio de Abancay when he received tidings of the death of his rival. He appeared greatly shocked by the intelligence, his whole frame was agitated, and he remained for some time with his eyes bent on the ground, showing signs of strong emotion. *3

[Footnote 2: "Que lo haria asi como lo decia, i que su de seo no era otro, sino ver el Reino en paz; i que en lo que tocaba al Adelantado, perdiese cuidado, que bolveria a tener el antigua amistad con el." Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 4, cap. 9.]

[Footnote 3: Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms.

He even shed many tears, derramo muchas lagrimas, according to Herrera, who evidently gives him small credit for them. Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 6, cap. 7. - Conf. lib 5 cap. 1.]

Such is the account given by his friends. A more probable version of the matter represents him to have been perfectly aware of the state of things at Cuzco. When the trial was concluded, it is said he received a message from Hernando, inquiring what was to be done with the prisoner. He answered in a few words: - "Deal with him so that he shall give us no more trouble." *4 It is also stated that Hernando, afterwards, when laboring under the obloquy caused by Almagro's death, shielded himself under instructions affirmed to have been received from the governor. *5 It is quite certain, that, during his long residence at Xauxa, the latter was in constant communication with Cuzco; and that had he, as Valverde repeatedly urged him, *6 quickened his march to that capital, he might easily have prevented the consummation of the tragedy. As commander-in-chief, Almagro's fate was in his hands; and, whatever his own partisans may affirm of his innocence, the impartial judgment of history must hold him equally accountable with Hernando for the death of his a.s.sociate.

[Footnote 4: "Respondio, que hiciese de manera, que el Adelantado no los pusiese en mas alborotos." (Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 6, cap.

7.) "De todo esto," says Espinall, "fue sabidor el dicho Governador Pizarro a lo que mi juicio i el de otros que en ello quisieron mirar alcanzo." Carta de Espinall, Ms.]

[Footnote 5: Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 5, cap. 1.

Herrera's testimony is little short of that of a contemporary, since it was derived, he tells us, from the correspondence of the Conquerors, and the accounts given him by their own sons. Lib.

6, cap. 7.]

[Footnote 6: Carta de Valverde al Emperador, Ms.]

Neither did his subsequent conduct show any remorse for these proceedings. He entered Cuzco, says one who was present there to witness it, amidst the flourish of clarions and trumpets, at the head of his martial cavalcade, and dressed in the rich suit presented him by Cortes, with the proud bearing and joyous mien of a conqueror. *7 When Diego de Alvarado applied to him for the government of the southern provinces, in the name of the young Almagro, whom his father, as we have seen, had consigned to his protection, Pizarro answered, that "the marshal, by his rebellion, had forfeited all claims to the government." And, when he was still further urged by the cavalier, he bluntly broke off the conversation by declaring that "his own territory covered all on this side of Flanders"! *8 - intimating, no doubt, by this magnificent vaunt, that he would endure no rival on this side of the water.

[Footnote 7: "En este medio tiempo vino a la dicha cibdad del Cuzco el Gobernador D. Franco Pizarro, el qual entro con tronpetas i chirimias vestido con ropa de martas que fue e luto con que entro." Carta de Espinall, Ms.]

[Footnote 8: Carta de Espinall, Ms.

"Mui asperamente le respondio el Governador, diciendo, que su Governacion no tenia Termino, i que llegaba hasta Flandes."

Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 6, cap. 7.]

In the same spirit, he had recently sent to supersede Benalcazar, the conqueror of Quito, who, he was informed, aspired to an independent government. Pizarro's emissary had orders to send the offending captain to Lima; but Benalcazar, after pushing his victorious career far into the north, had returned to Castile to solicit his guerdon from the emperor.

To the complaints of the injured natives, who invoked his protection, he showed himself strangely insensible, while the followers of Almagro he treated with undisguised contempt. The estates of the leaders were confiscated, and transferred without ceremony to his own partisans. Hernando had made attempts to conciliate some of the opposite faction by acts of liberality, but they had refused to accept any thing from the man whose hands were stained with the blood of their commander. *9 The governor held to them no such encouragement; and many were reduced to such abject poverty, that, too proud to expose their wretchedness to the eyes of their conquerors, they withdrew from the city, and sought a retreat among the neighbouring mountains. *10

[Footnote 9: "Avia querido hazer amigos de los princ.i.p.ales de Chile, y ofrecidoles daria rrepartimientos y no lo avian aceptado ni querido." Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms.]

[Footnote 10: "Viendolas oy en dia, muertos de ambre, fechos pedazos e adeudados, andando por los montes desesperados por no parecer ante gentes, porque no tienen otra cosa que se vestir sino ropa de los Indios, ni dineros con que lo comprar" Carta de Espinall, Ms.]

For his own brothers he provided by such ample repartimientos, as excited the murmurs of his adherents. He appointed Gonzalo to the command of a strong force destined to act against the natives of Charcas, a hardy people occupying the territory a.s.signed by the Crown to Almagro. Gonzalo met with a st.u.r.dy resistance, but, after some severe fighting, succeeded in reducing the province to obedience. He was recompensed, together with Hernando, who aided him in the conquest, by a large grant in the neighbourhood of Porco, the productive mines of which had been partially wrought under the Incas. The territory, thus situated, embraced part of those silver hills of Potosi which have since supplied Europe with such stores of the precious metals. Hernando comprehended the capabilities of the ground, and he began working the mines on a more extensive scale than that hitherto adopted, though it does not appear that any attempt was then made to penetrate the rich crust of Potosi. *11 A few years more were to elapse before the Spaniards were to bring to light the silver quarries that lay hidden in the bosom of its mountains. *12

[Footnote 11: "Con la quietud," writes Hernando Pizarro to the emperor, "questa tierra agora tiene han descubierto i descubren cada dia los vecinos muchas minas ricas de oro i plata, de que los quintos i rentas reales de V. M. cada dia se le ofrecen i hacer casa a todo el Mundo." Carta al Emperador, Ms., de Puerto Viejo, 6 de Julii, 1539.]

[Footnote 12: Carta de Carbajal al Emperador, Ms., del Cuzco, 3 de Nov. 1539. - Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Montesinos, Annales, Ms., ano 1539.

The story is well known of the manner in which the mines of Potosi were discovered by an Indian, who pulled a bush out of the ground to the fibres of which a quant.i.ty of silver globules was attached. The mine was not registered till 1545. The account is given by Acosta, lib. 4, cap. 6.]

It was now the great business of Hernando to collect a sufficient quant.i.ty of treasure to take with him to Castile. Nearly a year had elapsed since Almagro's death; and it was full time that he should return and present himself at court, where Diego de Alvarado and other friends of the marshal, who had long since left Peru, were industriously maintaining the claims of the younger Almagro, as well as demanding redress for the wrongs done to his father. But Hernando looked confidently to his gold to dispel the accusations against him.

Before his departure, he counselled his brother to beware of the "men of Chili," as Almagro's followers were called; desperate men, who would stick at nothing, he said, for revenge. He besought the governor not to allow them to consort together in any number within fifty miles of his person; if he did, it would be fatal to him. And he concluded by recommending a strong body-guard; "for I," he added, "shall not be here to watch over you." But the governor laughed at the idle fears, as he termed them, of his brother, bidding the latter take no thought of him, "as every hair in the heads of Almagro's followers was a guaranty for his safety." *13 He did not know the character of his enemies so well as Hernando.

[Footnote 13: Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 6, cap. 10. - Zarate, Conq. del Peru, lib. 3, cap. 12. - Gomara, Hist de las Ind., cap. 142.

"No consienta vuestra senoria que se junten diez juntos en cinquenta leguas alrrededor de adonde vuestra senoria estuviere, porque si los dexa juntar le an de matar. Si a Vuestra Senoria matan, yo negociare mal y de vuestra senoria no quedara memoria.

Estas palabras dixo Hernando Picarro altas que todos le oymos. Y abracando al marquez se partio y se fue." Pedro Pizarro, Descub.

y Conq., Ms.]