The Virgin
of the Sun
A TALE OF THE CONQUEST
OF PERU
BY
George Griffith
AUTHOR OF
“The Angel of the Revolution,” “Valdar the Oft-Born,”
“Men who have Made the Empire,” &c., &c.
London
C. ARTHUR PEARSON LIMITED
HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.
1898
“On this side are ease and pleasure and safety; but yonder lies El-Dorado with its gold and silver and gems, the glory of conquest and the hope of dominion!”
[EPIGRAPH]
“Friends and comrades and cavaliers of Spain! On yonder side are toil and hunger, nakedness, the pitiless storm and the drenching rain, and it may be a grave in the unknown wilderness. On this side are ease, and pleasure, and safety; but yonder lies El-Dorado with its gold and silver and gems, the glory of conquest and the hope of dominion. Here is Panama, poverty and dishonour. Now choose each of you that which seems to you best becoming a brave Castilian. For my part I go south.”—Pizarro to his Companions.
INTRODUCTION
It is a somewhat curious fact, especially in these days when books are many and subjects hard to seek, that none of our great historical novelists on either side of the Atlantic should have done for the Conquest of Peru what Lew Wallace in America and Rider Haggard in England have done for the Conquest of Mexico.