CHAPTER III
CIVIL WARS AMONG THE CONQUERORS
The edict of Charles V. conceded to Pizarro the territory for two hundred and seventy leagues south of the river on the Ecuador coast where the conquest had begun, and to Almagro the next two hundred leagues. In his heart Almagro was dissatisfied with this award, and, even if he accepted the division, there was wide room for misunderstandings and disputes. No one knew the exact latitude of the river whence the measurement was to be made, nor had any one surveyed the distances along the winding roads. Almagro contended that Cuzco and Arequipa lay within his province, but this Pizarro vigorously and, as it turned out, correctly denied.
Almagro's personal followers were disgusted with the rude poverty they had found in Chile, and saw little chance of valuable spoil unless their leader should secure the fertile plateaux of Titicaca, Cuzco, and Arequipa. They urged him to seize by force what he believed to belong to him. After the flight of Manco his army reached Cuzco before the force which Pizarro was sending up had penetrated nearer than a hundred miles. Hernando Pizarro had two hundred men at Cuzco, but they were exhausted with long months of fighting against the Indian besiegers and could offer no effective resistance to the night attack by which Almagro surprised them. Hernando and his brother Gonzalo were captured and imprisoned, and Almagro advanced against the army from Lima and defeated it. "This," exclaimed Pizarro, when he heard the news, "is Almagro's return to me, after losing a beloved and gallant brother, and spending all I possess in pacifying the country. I mourn for the danger of my brothers, but still more that two friends in their old age should plunge into a civil war to the injury alike of the King's service and of Peru." From this moment all the powers of his great mind and the resources of his profound cunning were devoted to securing his brothers' safety first, and afterwards revenge upon Almagro. Willing to agree to anything rather than leave them in the hands of enemies whom he knew to be as coldly cruel as himself and far more bloodthirsty, he sent ambassadors to treat for the liberation of Hernando and Gonzalo. But Almagro thought he held the whip hand, and marched his victorious army across the Cordillera opposite Cuzco and up the coast nearly to Lima, declaring his intention of founding a capital for his government in the valley of Chincha, and announcing that he would be satisfied with nothing less than the cession of all Peru from Lima south. To obtain Hernando's release the governor was forced to consent that Almagro should remain in possession of the disputed territory pending the decision of the King, but Hernando was no sooner safe at Lima than Pizarro repudiated his promise. He declared war; his army, under the leadership of Hernando and Valdivia—afterwards famous as the conqueror of Chile—advanced down the coast. Futilely raging at Pizarro's treachery, the old man retreated, making his way toward Cuzco over one of the southern passes. His pursuers by a rapid march over a difficult and little used pass reached the neighbourhood of the Inca capital without resistance. Almagro was compelled to accept battle, or to shut himself up in Cuzco and let his enemies bring up artillery and batter him out at their leisure. His men outnumbered Pizarro's, and were assisted by a large contingent of natives, though inferior in discipline and arms. He chose the speedier alternative, but the flank attacks of his native auxiliaries made no impression on Hernando's carefully disposed infantry and his Spaniards fell into confusion when the main bodies met in the shock of battle. With a flank cavalry charge the rout became general; Hernando Pizarro dashed in, conspicuous with white plume and orange-coloured doublet; the most desperate partisans were slaughtered, bravely fighting, and the old man fled. He was soon captured and brought back to the very prison where he had so long confined Hernando. After languishing for a few months, orders were given that he be strangled. Francisco made no sign to save the life of his old comrade, and the sentence was inflicted.
For the second time Pizarro entered Cuzco in triumph, wearing now an ermine robe presented to him by Hernando Cortes, and once more he devoted himself to organising his vast dominions and extending the Spanish power over the distant provinces. Gonzalo Pizarro went to Quito to make that expedition into the Amazon country in search of the Eldorado which so miserably failed in its immediate object, but resulted in Orellana's discovery of the great river. Hernando Pizarro proceeded to Bolivia to develop the mining industry—a labour soon to be rewarded by the finding of Potosí. Valdivia undertook the conquest of Chile, and Alvarado that of the mountains of northern Peru. The governor travelled himself over most of his dominions, founding cities at strategic points in the more populous and fertile valleys. He visited Charcas—now Sucré—the old Indian capital of southern Bolivia; he founded one city at Arequipa, commanding the greatest valley of the southern coast, and another at Guamanga in a fertile plateau half-way between Jauja and Cuzco. The better parts of the country were divided into great feudal estates and distributed among his favourites and faithful followers, while the partisans of Almagro made their way as best they could out of Peru or hung around in helpless poverty, gnashing their teeth as they saw their luckier comrades rapidly enriching themselves by Indian tribute and mining.
RUE MERCADERES, PROCESSION DAY, LIMA.
Almagro's friends quickly carried the news of his illegal execution to Spain, crying for justice against the Pizarros. The Spanish government was not unwilling to secure a selfish advantage from the disputes among the original conquerors, and sent out Vaca de Castro to investigate and report.
When the royal commissioner arrived at Panama early in 1541, the latest news from Peru was tranquillising. Pizarro was busily engaged in enlarging and beautifying Lima, in regulating the revenue and the administration, in distributing "encomiendas," and in restraining the rapacity of his Spaniards. However, Lima was full of the "men of Chile"—as Almagro's adherents were called—all bitter enemies of the governor. They passed him in the street without saluting, and their attitude was so menacing that Pizarro received repeated warnings and was urged to banish them. Absolutely incapable of personal fear, magnanimous when his passions had not been aroused, he only replied, "Poor fellows; they have had trouble enough. We will not molest them." He even sent for Juan de la Rada, the guide, counsellor, and guardian of the young half-breed who was Almagro's heir, and condescended to try to argue him into a better frame of mind, saying at parting, "Ask me frankly what you desire." But the iron had entered too deeply into Rada's soul; he had already organised a conspiracy to assassinate Pizarro.
At noon on Sunday, the 26th of June, 1541, Pizarro was sitting at dinner in his house with twenty gentlemen, among them his half-brother, Francisco Alcantara, and several of the most illustrious knights who had taken part in the conquest. The great door into the public square was lying wide open. The conspirators, to the number of a score, had assembled in a house opposite. All of a sudden they rushed into the square fully armed and carrying their swords naked in their hands. A young page standing in front of the governor's house saw them and ran back shouting: "To arms! all the men of Chile are coming to kill the Marquis, our lord." The guests rose in alarm from the table and all but half a dozen fled to the windows and dropped into the garden. Pizarro threw off his gown and snatched up a sword, while the valiant Francisco Chaves stepped forward through the ante-room to dispute the passage at the staircase. The ferocious crowd of murderers rushed up and laid him dead on the stairs. Alcantara checked them for a few moments with his single sword, but was soon forced back into the dining-room and fell pierced with many thrusts. The old lion shouted from the inside, "What shameful thing is this! why do you wish to kill me?" and with a cloak wrapped round one arm and his sword grasped in the other hand, he rushed forward to meet his assassins and strike a blow to avenge his brother before he himself should fall. Only two faithful young pages remained at his side. Though over seventy years of age, his practised sword laid two of the crowd dead before he was surrounded. The two boys were butchered and in the mêlée Pizarro received a mortal wound in the throat, and falling to the floor, made the sign of the cross on the boards and kissed it. One of the ruffians had snatched up an earthen water jar and with this pounded out the old man's brains as he lay prostrate, disdaining to ask for mercy and murmuring "Jesus" just as the fatal blow fell.
Thus perished by the sword this great man of blood. The measure he had meted out to Atahuallpa and Almagro was measured to him again. He who had shamelessly broken his oath times without number to gain his own high ends was slain by treacherous, cowardly assault. But his great vices should not blind us to his greater virtues. Courageous, indomitable, far-sighted, patriotic, large-minded, public-spirited, possessing a God-given instinct for seeing straight to the centre of a problem and the energy to strike at the psychological moment, he was equally great as an explorer, a soldier, a general, a diplomatist, and an administrator. Even his shocking moral delinquencies lose something of their turpitude when we consider the greatness of his aims and the baseness of his origin. A bastard, a common soldier, a penniless adventurer, a man who had to fight his way up by his own wits, courage and parts, in the worst of schools, it was not to be expected that he would be scrupulous. But that his real nature was magnanimous, generous, and truthful is proven by the many instances in which he forgave his enemies and kept his word to his serious loss, and that his ambition was not sordid is shown by his self-sacrificing devotion to the public good during the later years of his life. Formed in nature's grandest mould, circumstances and environment had much deformed his character, but the original lineaments are plain.
The news of the murder threw Peru into confusion. In Lima the governor's friends hid themselves or fled; a hundred sympathisers joined the assassins; the rudders and sails of the ships in port were taken away so that no word could be sent to Panama; and all the treasure in the city was plundered. Young Almagro assumed the title of governor of Peru, but he and Rada soon realised that the vast majority at Lima regarded them with execration, while threatening messages came from the commanders in other towns. Rada and the boy usurper started up the road for Jauja and Cuzco. At the former place Rada died, but his protégé, though only twenty-two years old, now showed unexpected ability and resource. Suppressing with bloody severity a quarrel among his captains, he took the road to Cuzco, where his father's party was strongest.
In the meantime the royal commissioner, now become legal governor of Peru, had sailed from Panama. Shipwrecked off the coast of southern Colombia, he resolved to proceed by land, and disembarking at Buenaventura, made his way with infinite difficulty through the tangled forests and steep defiles of the Maritime Cordillera to the valley of the Cauca River. Thence to Quito over the highlands of Popayán and Pasto was easier. As soon as the news of Pizarro's murder reached him he hastened south, receiving many offers of help from the friends of the dead governor. At Jauja he found a considerable army ready to his orders, so he proceeded promptly to Guamanga, to which point Almagro was advancing from Cuzco. The soldiers of the young half-breed knew that they were fighting with halters round their necks, and the battle was the bloodiest since the Spaniards had landed in Peru. Of the twelve hundred white men who went into the fight only five hundred escaped unwounded. The rebels were practically annihilated. Two days after the battle Pizarro's murderers were executed in the great square at Guamanga. Young Almagro managed to escape to Cuzco, but he was quickly captured and relentlessly put to death.
Upon the death of Francisco Pizarro the right to nominate a governor reverted to the Spanish Crown. Though some disappointment was felt that Gonzalo Pizarro had not been appointed, Vaca de Castro succeeded without opposition. Gonzalo's selection would not have suited the new policy of the Spanish government. Las Casas had written his famous book exposing the unspeakable iniquities of the earlier conquerors toward the West Indian natives. It produced a tremendous effect on public opinion, and the authorities at Madrid decided to root up Indian slavery, and gradually abolish the existing "encomiendas." Manifestly, such a step would excite bitter dissatisfaction among the adventurers in Peru, and it seemed best to name a viceroy, who would be ipso facto vested with absolute power, and not subject to the influence of the "conquistadores."
This dangerous post was entrusted to Blasco Nuñez de Vela, an old bureaucrat of the Escurial, whose integrity, piety, and rigid obedience to orders had pushed him into high positions. Arriving in Peru early in 1544, he was received with outward courtesy and respect, thinly veiling real alarm and distrust. The "New Laws" abolished personal service by Indians; the grandees of estates must hereafter be content with a moderate tribute from their tenants; encomiendas might not be sold nor even descend by inheritance; and—worst of all—public officials and all Spaniards who had taken part in the wars between Almagro and Pizarro were to be deprived. The provisions were drastic and rumour exaggerated them. In his journey down the coast the viceroy had sternly ordered that no Indian be forced to carry a burden against his will. To the Spaniards this seemed an outrageous violation of the natural order of things. The whole fabric of their fortunes rested upon forced Indian labour. Without it they could not work their mines, farm their estates, or transport their goods, and these "New Laws" enforced by a conscientious and stubborn old bureaucrat, would virtually rob them of all that their swords had won.
Dismayed "encomienderos" wrote to Gonzalo Pizarro, urging him to espouse their cause; his own vast estates would infallibly be wrenched away by the viceroy, and he was told that his head was to be cut off as soon as Nuñez Vela could lay hands on him. With the Pizarro instinct of running to meet a danger, he hastened from southern Bolivia to Cuzco, where he was proclaimed "procurator general" of Peru; soldiers flocked to his camp; he seized the artillery and stores at Cuzco, and soon was at the head of four hundred desperate men, well armed and provided. Many, however, shrank from open rebellion against the representative of the Castilian king, and the Pizarros had enemies. The result was still doubtful, when the viceroy himself turned the scale by his own violent measures. He imprisoned Vaca de Castro on suspicion of favouring the revolt; quarrelled with the judges of the royal court; and finally in an altercation with the popular factor of Lima, stabbed his opponent with his own hand, and then attempted to conceal the murder. Frightened at the burst of public indignation, he fled to Trujillo, while the royal judges took the direction of affairs into their own hands. They ordered the arrest and deportation of the viceroy, and sent a conciliatory message to Gonzalo. But he knew better than to rely upon the unauthorised promises of the judges. His answer was to send a detachment to Lima, which seized three deserters and hanged them on trees outside the town. The judges having no troops upon whom they could rely, were forced to recognise Pizarro as governor. A few days later he made his triumphal entry, riding at the head of twelve hundred men. There was no mistaking the sincerity of the acclamations with which the Spaniards welcomed the devoted champion of their privileges. Nevertheless in the minds of most there lurked an uneasy consciousness that all this was in fact flat treason against the lawful sovereign, and that no government could in the long run prevail without recognition from Madrid.
The sea-captains to whose custody the blundering old viceroy had been entrusted did not know what to do with their embarrassing prisoner, and set him ashore at Tumbez, whence he proceeded to Quito to get help from the anti-Pizarro faction. The governor of southern Colombia joined him and he soon had five hundred men under his orders. Gonzalo flew to the point of danger; the viceroy retreated to Popayán, but being joined by more recruits, rashly returned to the neighbourhood of Quito to offer battle. He was defeated and killed; Pizarro went back to Lima, while his lieutenant, Carbajal, hunted down and put to death every loyalist who remained under arms in southern Peru.
Gonzalo's administration lasted three years' and they were golden ones for the Spanish adventurers. The marvellous silver mines of Potosí and the gold washings of southern Ecuador were discovered. Encomiendas were lavishly granted; the Indians went back to their fields; the mining industry began that marvellous development which soon made Peru the treasure box of the world and Potosí a synonym for limitless wealth. But the dazzling sunlight of prosperity was dimmed by the shadow of Pizarro's scaffold slowly creeping across the Atlantic and down the coast. His chief lieutenants, knowing they had sinned past forgiveness, urged him to declare himself king of Peru, but he was at once too proud and too patriotic to fling away his right to die a loyal Spaniard.
Philip, the leaden-eyed, close-mouthed despot, was regent of Spain. Bitterly chagrined that the stream of Peruvian gold had ceased to flow into the royal treasury, his vindictive heart held no mercy for the gallant soldier whose sword had helped win the riches now temporarily diverted. He selected a man after his own heart—Pedro de la Gasca, an ugly, deformed little priest, hypocritically humble, though astute and untiring, whose success as an inquisitor was a guarantee that he would be as pitilessly cruel as even Philip could wish. Gasca landed at Panama in the character of a modest ecclesiastic, a humble man of peace who had been commissioned to investigate the sad situation of Peru and re-establish peace. He said he would recommend the repeal of the obnoxious New Laws, and had authority to suspend them. Gonzalo refused to put his head into the noose and demanded substantial assurances. But many Peruvians were more easily beguiled, and welcomed the excuse to renew their allegiance to lawful authority. While Gasca remained at Panama, gathering troops from the neighbouring provinces, Pizarro's fleet deserted, leaving the coast open to attack. An advance guard came sailing down the coast, sending letters ashore at every port promising amnesty and rewards. Desertions were so numerous that Gonzalo was forced to give up the hope of defending Lima and retreated toward Arequipa. Gasca ascended to Jauja, while Pizarro's old enemies in the Titicacan region rose, gathered a thousand men, and sent word to Gasca that they could overwhelm without help the five hundred soldiers who remained faithful. But a Pizarro never waited to be attacked. By forced marches he crossed the dizzy pass where the Mollendo and Puno Railway now runs, and fell upon his enemies near the southern end of Lake Titicaca. Though outnumbered two to one, the superior discipline of his men, his admirable dispositions, Carbajal's skilful handling of the artillery, and his own cool and intrepid leadership of the cavalry charges, gave him a decisive though dearly bought victory.
LITTLE "INFERNILLO" BRIDGE ON THE OROYA RAILWAY.
ALTITUDE 10,924 FEET.
Meanwhile Gasca was coming up the road from Jauja to Cuzco, his army increasing by accessions from every direction until it numbered over two thousand. The wisest of Gonzalo's counsellors advised him to retire to southern Bolivia and make a defensive campaign in that remote region, but he preferred bold methods. For once, however, he could not inspire his men with his own confidence. They followed with heavy hearts his eager march against Gasca's overwhelming army. He drew them up for the attack and the battle was about to begin when, to his despair, he saw several captains desert to the enemy and his soldiers surrendering without a blow. Knowing that all was over, he turned to Juan Acosta, who rode at his side, saying, "What shall we do, brother Juan?" "Sir, let us charge them and die like Romans." "Better to die like Christians," replied Pizarro, and he rode across the plain and gave himself up. The exulting priest grossly insulted the fallen warrior, and called a court-martial to condemn him and his captains to immediate execution. Though only forty-one years old when he went to the scaffold, Gonzalo had for sixteen years taken a leading part in nearly every one of the battles and expeditions of Peru, and is justly regarded as the best fighting man among the "conquistadores."
The property of Pizarro's friends was confiscated; the prisons filled with wretched victims; many were put to death; many more mutilated or flogged; even the staunchest loyalists were not safe. Gasca evaded and delayed as long as possible the distribution of land-grants among those who had earned and been promised such rewards, and when he had to announce the list he sneaked to Lima by an unfrequented route in cowardly fear of his miserable life. He never dared to try to put the New Laws into effect, and when a peremptory order came from Spain that enforced Indian labour must cease, he kept it secret until he could resign the government to the royal judges, leaving instructions that it should be published immediately he was at sea.
Peru was left in confusion. The prohibition of Indian slavery added to the dissatisfaction felt over Gasca's awards. The ad interim governments could make little progress in securing its enforcement. Rebellion after rebellion broke out, and civil war continued to desolate Peru, with a few intervals of quiescence during which the government allowed the proprietors to do as they pleased, until the arrival of the Marquis of Cañete, the "good viceroy," on the 29th of June, 1556.
