The World's Greatest Books - Volume 12 Part 3

"Let every one of you take heart and go forward like a good soldier, nothing daunted by the smallness of your numbers. For in the greatest extremity G.o.d ever fights for His own; and doubt not He will humble the pride of the heathen, and bring him to the knowledge of the true faith, the great end and object of the Conquest." The enthusiasm of the troops was at once rekindled. "Lead on!" they shouted as he finished his address. "Lead on wherever you think best! We will follow with goodwill; and you shall see that we can do our duty in the cause of G.o.d and the king!"

They had need of all their daring. For when they had penetrated to Caxamalca they found the Inca encamped there at the head of a great host of his subjects, and knew that if his uncertain friendliness towards them should evaporate, they would be in a desperate case. Pizarro then determined to follow the example of Cortes, and gain possession of the sovereign's person. He achieved this by what can only be called an act of treachery; he invited the Inca to visit his quarters, and then, taking them unawares, killed a large number of his followers and took him prisoner. The effect was precisely what Pizarro had hoped for. The "Child of the Sun" once captured, the Indians, who had no law but his command, no confidence but in his leadership, fled in all directions, and the Spaniards remained masters of the situation.

They treated the Inca at first with respect, and while keeping him a prisoner, allowed him a measure of freedom, and free intercourse with his subjects. He soon saw a door of hope in the Spaniards' eagerness for gold, and offered an enormous ransom. The offer was accepted, and messengers were sent throughout the empire to collect it. At last it reached an amount, in gold, of the value of nearly three and a half million pounds sterling, besides a quant.i.ty of silver. But even this ransom did not suffice to free the Inca. Owing partly to the malevolence of an Indian interpreter, who bore the Inca ill-will, and partly to rumours of a general rising of the natives instigated by the Inca, the army began to demand his life as necessary to their safety. Pizarro appeared to be opposed to this demand, but to yield to his soldiers, and after a form of trial the Inca was executed. But Pizarro cannot be acquitted of responsibility for a deed which formed the climax of one of the darkest chapters in Spanish colonial history, and it is probable that the design coincided only too well with his aims.

_III.--Triumph of Pisarro; his a.s.sa.s.sination_

There was nothing now to hinder the victorious march of the Spaniards to Cuzco, the Peruvian capital. They now numbered nearly five hundred, having been reinforced by the arrival of Almagro from Panama.

In Cuzco they found great quant.i.ties of treasure, with the natural result that the prices of ordinary commodities rose enormously as the value of gold and silver declined, so that it was only those few who returned with their present gains to their native country who could be called wealthy.

All power was now in the hands of the Spaniards. Pizarro indeed placed upon the throne of the Incas the legitimate heir, Manco, but it was only in order that he might be the puppet of his own purposes. His next step was to found a new capital, which should be near enough to the sea-coast to meet the need of a commercial people. He determined upon the site of Lima on the festival of Epiphany, 1535, and named it "Ciudad de los Reyes," or City of the Kings, in honour of the day. But this name was before long superseded by that of Lima, which arose from the corruption of a Peruvian name.

Meanwhile Hernando Pizarro, the brother of Francisco, had sailed to Spain to report their success. He returned with royal letters confirming the previous grants to Francisco and his a.s.sociates, and bestowing upon Almagro a jurisdiction over a given tract of country, beginning from the southern limit of Pizarro's government. This grant became a fruitful source of dissension between Almagro and the Pizarros, each claiming as within his jurisdiction the rich city of Cuzco, a question which the uncertain knowledge of distances in the newly-explored country made it difficult to decide.

But the Spaniards had now for a time other occupation than the pursuit of their own quarrels. The Inca Manco, escaping from the captivity in which he had lain for a time, put himself at the head of a host of Indians, said to number two hundred thousand, and laid siege to Cuzco early in February, 1536. The siege was memorable as calling out the most heroic displays of Indian and European valour, and bringing the two races into deadlier conflict with each other than had yet occurred in the conquest of Peru. The Spaniards were hard pressed, for by means of burning arrows the Indians set the city on fire, and only their encampment in the midst of an open s.p.a.ce enabled the Spaniards to endure the conflagration around. They suffered severely, too, from famine. The relief from Lima for which they looked did not come, as Pizarro was in no position to send help, and from this they feared the worst as to the fate of their companions. Only the firm resolution of the Pizarro, brothers and the other leaders within the city kept the army from attempting to force a way out, which would have meant the abandoning of the city. At last they were rewarded by the sight of the great host around them melting away. Seedtime had come, and the Inca knew it would be fatal for his people to neglect their fields, and thus prepare starvation for themselves in the following year. Thus, though bodies of the enemy remained to watch the city, the siege was virtually raised, and the most pressing danger past.

While these events were pa.s.sing, Almagro was engaged upon a memorable expedition to Chili. His troops suffered great privations, and hearing no good tidings of the country further south, he was prevailed upon to return to Cuzco. Here, claiming the governorship, he captured Hernando and Gonzalo Pizarro, though refusing the counsel of his lieutenant that they should be put to death. Then, proceeding to the coast, he met Francisco Pizarro, and a treaty was concluded between them by which Almagro, pending instructions from Spain, was to retain Cuzco, and Hernando Pizarro was to be set free, on condition of sailing for Spain.

But Francis...o...b..oke the treaty as soon as made, and sent Hernando with an army against Almagro, warning the latter that unless he gave up Cuzco the responsibility of the consequences would be on his own head. The two armies met at Las Salinas, and Almagro was defeated and imprisoned in Cuzco. Before long Hernando brought him to trial and to death, thus ill requiting Almagro's treatment of him personally. Hernando, on his return to Spain, suffered twenty years' imprisonment for this deed, which outraged both public sentiment and sense of justice.

Francisco Pizarro, though affecting to be shocked at the death of Almagro, cannot be acquitted of all share in it. So, indeed, the followers of Almagro thought, and they were goaded to still further hatred of the Pizarros by the poverty and contempt in which they now lived, as the survivors of a discredited party. The house of Almagro's son in Lima formed a centre of disaffection, to whose menace Pizarro showed remarkable blindness. He paid dearly for this excessive confidence, for on Sunday, the 26th of June, 1541, he was attacked while sitting in his own house among his friends, and killed.

_IV.--Later Fortunes of the Conquerors_

The death of Pizarro did not prove in any sense a guarantee of peace among the Spaniards in Peru. At the time of his death, indeed, an envoy from the Spanish court was on his way to Peru, who from his integrity and wisdom might indeed have given rise to a hope that a happier day was about to dawn. He was endowed with powers to a.s.sume the governorship in the event of Pizarro's death, as well as instructions to bring about a more peaceful settlement of affairs. He arrived to find himself indeed the lawful governor, but had before him the task of enforcing his authority. This brought him into collision with the son of Almagro, at the head of a strong party of his father's followers. A b.l.o.o.d.y battle took place on the plains of Chupas, in which Vaca de Castro was victorious. Almagro was arrested at Cuzco and executed.

The history of the Spanish dominion now resolves itself into the history of warring factions, the chief hero of which was Gonzalo Pizzaro, one of the brothers of the great Pizarro. The Spaniards in Peru felt themselves deeply injured by the publication of regulations from Spain, by which a sudden check was put upon their spoliation and oppression of the natives, which had reached an extreme pitch of cruelty and destructiveness. They called upon Gonzalo to lead them in vindication of what they regarded as their privileges by right of conquest and of their service to the Spanish crown. His hands were strengthened by the rash and high-handed behaviour of, Blasco Nunez Vela, yet another official sent out from Spain to deal with this turbulent province. Pizarro himself was an able and daring leader, and, at least in his earlier years, of a chivalrous spirit which made him beloved of his soldiers. He had great personal courage, and, as says one who had often seen him, "when mounted on his favourite charger, made no more account of a squadron of Indians than of a swarm of flies." He was soon acclaimed as governor by the Spaniards, and was actually supreme in Peru. But in the following year, 1545, the Spanish government selected an envoy who was to bring the now ascendant star of Pizarro to eclipse. This was an ecclesiastic named Pedro de la Gasea, a man of great resolution, penetration, and knowledge of affairs. After varying fortunes, in which Pizarro for some time held his own, he was routed by the troops of Gasea, largely through the defection of a number of his own soldiers, who marched over to the enemy. Pizarro surrendered to an officer, and was carried before Gasea. Addressing him with severity, Gasea abruptly inquired, "Why had he thrown the country into such confusion; raising the banner of revolt; usurping the government; and obstinately refusing the offer of grace that had been repeatedly made to him?" Gonzalo defended himself as having been elected by the people. "It was my family," he said, "who conquered the country, and as their representative here, I felt I had a right to the government." To this Gasea replied, in a still severer tone, "Your brother did, indeed, conquer the land; and for this the emperor was pleased to raise both him and you from the dust. He lived and died a true and loyal subject; and it only makes your ingrat.i.tude to your sovereign the more heinous." A sentence of death followed, and thus pa.s.sed the last of Pizarro's name to rule in Peru.

Under the wise reforms inst.i.tuted by Gasea, Peru was somewhat relieved of the disastrous effects of the Spanish occupation, and under the mild yet determined policy inaugurated by him, the ancient distractions of the country were permanently healed. With peace, prosperity returned within the borders of Peru, and this much-tried land settled down at last to a considerable measure of tranquillity and content.

EDWARD HYDE

The History of the Rebellion

Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, who was born February 18, 1608; at Dinton, Wilts, and who died at Rouen, 1674, was son of a private gentleman and was educated at Oxford, afterwards studying law under Chief Justice Nicholas Hyde, his uncle.

Early in his career he became distinguished in political life in a stormy period, for, as a prominent member of the Long Parliament, he espoused the popular cause. The outbreak of the Civil War, however, threw his sympathies over to the other side, and in 1642 King Charles knighted him and appointed him Chancellor of the Exchequer. When Charles, Prince of Wales, afterwards King Charles II., fled to Jersey after the great defeat of his father at Naseby, he was accompanied by Hyde, who, in the island, commenced his great work, "The History of the Rebellion," and also issued a series of eloquently worded papers which appeared in the king's name as replies to the manifestoes of Parliament. After the Restoration he was appointed High Chancellor of England and enn.o.bled with the t.i.tle of Earl of Clarendon. But the ill success of the war with Holland brought the earl into popular disfavour, and his unpopularity was increased by the sale of Dunkirk to the French. Court intrigues led to the loss of his offices and he retreated to Calais. An apology which he sent to the Lords was ordered to be burnt by the common hangman. For six years, till his death in Rouen, he lived in exile, but he was honoured by burial in Westminster Abbey. His private character in a dissolute age was unimpeachable. Anne Hyde, daughter of the earl, became Queen of England, as wife of James II., and was mother of two queens, Anne and Mary. The "History of the Rebellion" is a n.o.ble and monumental work, invaluable as written by a contemporary.

King James, in the end of March, 1625, died, leaving his majesty that now is, engaged in a war with Spain, but unprovided with money to manage it, though it was undertaken by the consent and advice of Parliament; the people being naturally enough inclined to the war (having surfeited with the uninterrupted pleasures and plenty of 22 years of peace) and sufficiently inflamed against the Spaniard, but quickly weary of the charge of it. Therefore, after an unprosperous attempt by sea on Cadiz, and a still more unsuccessful one on France, at the Isle of Rhe (for some difference had also begotten a war with that country), a general peace was shortly concluded with both kingdoms.

The exchequer was exhausted by the debts of King James and the war, so that the known revenue was antic.i.p.ated and the king was driven into straits for his own support. Many ways were resorted to for supply, such as selling the crown lands, creating peers for money, and other particulars which no access of power or plenty could since repair.

Parliaments were summoned, and again dissolved: and that in the fourth year after the dissolution of the two former was determined with a declaration that no more a.s.semblies of that nature should be expected, and all men should be inhibited on the penalty of censure so much as to speak of a parliament. And here I cannot but let myself loose to say, that no man can show me a source from whence these waters of bitterness we now taste have probably flowed, than from these unseasonable, unskilful, and precipitate dissolutions of parliaments. And whoever considers the acts of power and injustice in the intervals between parliaments will not be much scandalised at the warmth and vivacity displayed in their meetings.

In the second parliament it was proposed to grant five subsidies, a proportion (how contemptible soever in respect of the pressures now every day imposed) never before heard of in Parliament. And that meeting being, upon very unpopular and implausible reasons immediately dissolved, those five subsidies were exacted throughout the whole kingdom with the same rigour as if in truth an act had pa.s.sed to that purpose. And very many gentlemen of prime quality, in all the counties, were for refusing to pay the same committed to prison.

The abrupt and ungracious breaking of the first two parliaments was wholly imputed to the Duke of Buckingham; and of the third, princ.i.p.ally to the Lord Weston, then high treasurer of England. And therefore the envy and hatred that attended them thereupon was insupportable, and was visibly the cause of the murder of the first (stabbed to the heart by the hand of an obscure villain).

The duke was a very extraordinary person. Never any man in any age, nor, I believe, in any nation, rose in so short a time to such greatness of honour, fame, and fortune, upon no other advantage or recommendation, than that of the beauty and gracefulness of his person. He was the younger son of George Villiers, of Brookesby, Leicestershire. After the death of his father he was sent by his mother to France, where he spent three years in attaining the language and in learning the exercises of riding and dancing; in the last of which he excelled most men, and returned to England at the age of twenty-one.

King James reigned at that time. He began to be weary of his favourite, the Earl of Somerset, who, by the instigation and wickedness of his wife, became at least privy to the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury. For this crime both he and his wife, after trial by their peers, were condemned to die, and many persons of quality were executed for the same.

While this was in agitation, Mr. Villiers appeared in court and drew the king's eyes upon him. In a few days he was made cupbearer to the king and so pleased him by his conversation that he mounted higher and was successively and speedily knighted, made a baron, a viscount, an earl, a marquis, lord high admiral, lord warden of the cinque ports, master of the horse, and entirely disposed of all the graces of the king, in conferring all the honours and all the offices of the kingdom, without a rival. He was created Duke of Buckingham during his absence in Spain as extraordinary amba.s.sador.

On the death of King James, Charles, Prince of Wales, succeeded to the crown, with the universal joy of the people. The duke continued in the same degree of favour with the son which he had enjoyed with the father.

But a parliament was necessary to be called, as at the entrance of all kings to the crown, for the continuance of supplies, and when it met votes and remonstrances pa.s.sed against the duke as an enemy to the public, greatly to his indignation.

New projects were every day set on foot for money, which served only to offend and incense the people, and brought little supply to the king's occasions. Many persons of the best quality were committed to prison for refusing to pay. In this fatal conjuncture the duke went on an emba.s.sy to France and brought triumphantly home with him the queen, to the joy of the nation, but his course was soon finished by the wicked means mentioned before. In the fourth year of the king, and the thirty-sixth of his own age, he was a.s.sa.s.sinated at Portsmouth by Felton, who had been a lieutenant in the army, to whom he had refused promotion.

Shortly after Buckingham's death the king promoted Dr. Laud, Bishop of Bath and Wells, to the archibishopric of Canterbury. Unjust modes of raising money were inst.i.tuted, which caused increasing discontent, especially the tax denominated ship-money. A writ was directed to the sheriff of every county to provide a ship for the king's service, but with the writ were sent instructions that, instead of a ship, he should levy upon his county a sum of money and send it to the treasurer of the navy for his majesty's use.

After the continued receipt of the ship-money for four years, upon the refusal of Mr. Hampden, a private gentleman, to pay thirty shillings as his share, the case was solemnly argued before all the judges of England in the exchequer-chamber and the tax was adjudged lawful; which judgment proved of more advantage and credit to the gentleman condemned than to the king's service.

For the better support of these extraordinary ways the council-table and star-chamber enlarged their jurisdictions to a vast extent, inflicting fines and imprisonment, whereby the crown and state sustained deserved reproach and infamy, and suffered damage and mischief that cannot be expressed.

The king now resolved to make a progress into the north, and to be solemnly crowned in his kingdom of Scotland, which he had never seen from the time he first left it at the age of two years. The journey was a progress of great splendour, with an excess of feasting never known before. But the king had deeply imbibed his father's notions that an Episcopal church was the most consistent with royal authority, and he committed to a select number of the bishops in Scotland the framing of a suitable liturgy for use there. But these prelates had little influence with the people, and had not even power to reform their own cathedrals.

In 1638 Scotland a.s.sumed an att.i.tude of determined resistance to the imposition of the liturgy and of Episcopal church government. All the kingdom flocked to Edinburgh, as in a general cause that concerned their salvation. A general a.s.sembly was called and a National Covenant was subscribed. Men were listed towards the raising of an army, Colonel Leslie being chosen general. The king thought it time to chastise the seditious by force, and in the end of the year 1638 declared his resolution to raise an army to suppress their rebellion.

This was the first alarm England received towards any trouble, after it had enjoyed for so many years the most uninterrupted prosperity, in a full and plentiful peace, that any nation could be blessed with. The army was soon mustered and the king went to the borders. But negotiations for peace took place, and civil war was averted by concessions on the part of the king, so that a treaty of pacification was entered upon. This event happened in the year 1639.

After for eleven years governing without a parliament, with Archbishop Laud and the Earl of Strafford as his advisers, King Charles was constrained, in 1640, to summon an English parliament, which, however, instead of at once complying with his demands, commenced by drawing up a list of grievances. Mr. Pym, a man of good reputation, but better known afterwards, led the remonstrances, observing that by the long intermission of parliaments many unwarrantable things had been practiced, notwithstanding the great virtue of his majesty. Disputes took place between the Lords and Commons, the latter claiming that the right of supply belonged solely to them.

The king speedily dissolved Parliament, and, the Scots having again invaded England, proceeded to raise an army to resist them. The Scots entered Newcastle, and the Earl of Strafford, weak after a sickness, was defeated and retreated to Durham. The king, with his army weakened and the treasury depleted, was in great straits. He was again constrained to call a parliament, which met on November 3, 1640. It had a sad and melancholic aspect. The king himself did not ride with his accustomed equipage to Westminster, but went privately in his barge to the parliament stairs. The king being informed that Sir Thomas Gardiner, not having been returned a member, could not be chosen to be Speaker, his majesty appointed Mr. Lenthall, a bencher of Lincoln's Inn. In this parliament also Mr. Pym began the recital of grievances, and other members followed with invectives against the Earl of Strafford, accusing him of high and imperious and tyrannical actions, and of abusing his power and credit with the king.

After many hours of bitter inveighing it was moved that the earl might be forthwith impeached of high treason; which was no sooner mentioned than it found a universal approbation and consent from the whole House.

With very little debate the peers in their turn, when the impeachment was sent up to them, resolved that he should be committed to the custody of the gentleman usher of the black-rod, and next by an accusation of high treason against him also the Archbishop of Canterbury was removed from the king's council.

The trial of the earl in Westminster Hall began on March 22, 1641, and lasted eighteen days. Both Houses pa.s.sed a bill of attainder. The king resolved never to give his consent to this measure, but a rabble of many thousands of people besieged Whitehall, crying out, "Justice, justice; we will have justice!" The privy council being called together pressed the king to pa.s.s the bill of attainder, saying there was no other way to preserve himself and his posterity than by so doing; and therefore he ought to be more tender of the safety of the kingdom than of any one person how innocent soever. No one counsellor interposed his opinion, to support his master's magnanimity and innocence.

The Archbishop of York, acting his part with prodigious boldness and impiety, told the king that there was a private and a public conscience; that his public conscience as a king might not only dispense with, but oblige him to do that which was against his private conscience as a man; and that the question was not whether he should save the earl, but whether he should perish with him. Thus in the end was extorted from the king a commission from some lords to sign the bill. This was as valid as if he had signed it himself, though they comforted him even with that circ.u.mstance, "that his own hand was not in it."

The earl was beheaded on May 12, on Tower Hill. Together with that of the attainder of this n.o.bleman, another bill was pa.s.sed by the king, of almost as fatal consequences to him and the kingdom as that was to the earl, "the act for perpetual parliament," as it is since called. Thus Parliament could not be adjourned, prorogued, or dissolved, without its consent.

Great offence was given to the Commons by the action of the king in appointing new bishops to certain vacant sees at the very time when they were debating an act for taking away bishops' votes. And here I cannot but with grief and wonder remember the virulence and animosity expressed on all occasions from many of good knowledge in the excellent and wise profession of the common law, towards the church and churchmen. All opportunities were taken uncharitably to improve mistakes into crimes.

Unfortunately the king sent to the House of Lords a remonstrance from the bishops against their constrained absence from the legislature. This led to violent scenes in the House of Commons, which might have been beneficial to him, had he not been misadvised by Lord Digby. At this time many of his own Council were adverse to him. Injudiciously, the king caused Lord Kimbolton and five members of the Commons to be accused of high treason, advised thereto by Lord Digby. The king's attorney, Herbert, delivered to Parliament a paper, whereby, besides Lord Kimbolton, Denzil Hollis, Sir Arthur Haslerig, Mr. Pym, Mr. Hampden, and Mr. Strode, stood accused of conspiring against the king and Parliament.