The South American Republics, Part 2 of 2

by Thomas Cleland Dawson

In the meantime Charles V. had been succeeded by Philip II. The Marquis of Cañete's liberal and enlightened policy did not wring money from the unhappy country fast enough to suit the greedy despot. He listened to the slanders against the "good viceroy" brought home by disappointed Spaniards, and Cañete's reward for five years of brilliant service was a recall. Only his death saved him from hearing with his own ears the reproaches of his ungrateful sovereign.

Several years elapsed before Philip found a man who possessed the courage, capacity, mercilessness, and obstinacy to devise and apply a system which would make Peru a mere machine to produce gold and silver for the Spanish Crown. Such a one was Don Francisco de Toledo, a member of the same ancient house to which the Duke of Alva belonged. To him belongs the distinction of founding the infamous colonial system—the origin of the misery and disorder from which Spanish South America has suffered ever since, and a potent if not the principal cause of the decline of Spain herself and the loss of her magnificent colonial empire. Toledo reached Lima 1569, leaving Spain just after the news had been received that William the Silent and his Hollanders had risen in revolt against the cruelties of Alva and gained the victory of Gröningen.

PROMENADE OF THE ALAMEDA, LIMA.

The new viceroy first devoted himself to the destruction of the native dynasty. Sayri Tupac's younger brothers, Titu Yupanqui and Tupac Amaru, still roamed free in the forests of Vilcabamba. The Spaniards had hitherto not interfered with the Indians' celebrating their national festivals with the ancient solemnities, and Toledo came to Cuzco to be present at one which he had determined should be the last. As soon as it was over he sent for Titu to come in and take the oath of allegiance. Titu died of an illness, but the chiefs swore fealty to the boy Tupac Amaru, and refused to put him in the power of the Spaniards. The exasperated viceroy sent a force which captured the young emperor. Brought to Cuzco, Toledo ordered him to be decapitated, and the head was stuck upon a pike and set up beside the scaffold. One moonlight night a Spaniard went to the window of his bed-chamber, which overlooked the great square, and saw the whole vast space packed with a crowd of kneeling, silent people, their faces all turned to the Inca's grisly head; it was the Indians devoutly worshipping the last relic of their beloved and unfortunate sovereign. But there was no spirit left in them for rebellion—and no centre for them to rally around. Toledo's executions exterminated the leading Incas and half-castes; the celebration of Indian rites was forbidden, and everything which might remind the people of the fallen régime destroyed or removed.

Toledo's "Libro de Tasas," or code of regulations, is the basis of the system under which the Spanish colonies were governed for more than two centuries. The Spaniards were practically recognised as belonging to a privileged and governing caste. The country was divided into about fifty districts, called "corregimentos," each under the rule of a corregidor. This official was substantially absolute so far as the Indians were concerned, although an effort was made to keep up parts of the ancient Inca organisation, and in practice the hereditary village chiefs administered justice and exercised considerable power.

Every male Indian between the ages of eighteen and fifty was compelled to pay a certain tribute or poll-tax, for whose collection their chiefs were responsible. About one-sixth of the Indians belonged to estates already granted, and these paid their tribute to the proprietors, the Crown deducting one-fifth. The other five-sixths paid directly to the representatives of the government. In consideration of this tribute, general and indiscriminate personal service was declared to be abolished, but the commutation was not in full. One-seventh of the Indians were required to work for their masters, and the wretched victims of this "mitta" were sent by their caciques to the nearest Spanish town, where they could be engaged by any one who required their services. But these were not all the burdens. The natives of the provinces near the mines were compelled to furnish the labour necessary to work them, and the poor creatures to whose lot it fell to go might never hope to return. Oppressive as was the letter of these laws, their practical application was made infinitely worse by evasions practised with the connivance of the corregidors. Hundreds of Indians were hunted down and carried away to work on farms and in factories under the pretext that the "mitta" returns had not been honestly made, and though the population decreased, the survivors were required to furnish the same number of victims every year.

In spite of the slaughter during the civil wars, the Peruvian Indians numbered eight millions in 1575. Including the outlying provinces, the population of the Inca empire must have reached twenty millions in the heyday of its prosperity. Horrible as had been the decrease of the first forty years of Spanish domination, it was a trifle to that which followed the establishment of Toledo's system. In 1573 the impressment for the Potosí mines produced eleven thousand labourers; one hundred years later only sixteen hundred could be found. In the non-mining provinces the destruction was not so stupendous, but some encomiendas, originally containing a thousand adults, were reduced to a hundred within a century, and the miserable survivors were compelled to pay the same sum as had been assessed to their ancestors. The total population of Peru proper had fallen to less than a million and a half within two centuries and that of the whole empire to not more than four millions. So great had been the mortality among the feebler inhabitants of the warm coast valleys that they had practically died out, and their places were taken by negro slaves whose importation began shortly after the conquest.

The Indians were the worst but not the only sufferers. The Creole descendants of the early Spanish settlers, though they nominally enjoyed the same rights as the later arrivals, in reality had small chance to participate in the offices and fat concessions. Each new viceroy brought a new swarm of needy noblemen, who regarded the Creoles with lofty disdain. Commerce except with Spain was forbidden, and even that was burdened with almost intolerable burdens. As time went on new taxes were devised until it seemed the deliberate purpose of the Spanish government to transfer all the gold and silver in Peru's mountains to the royal treasury. Not only were both imports and exports taxed, but also every pound of provisions sold in the markets and shops. One-fifth of the products of the mines and one-tenth of the crops went directly to the Crown. All kinds of businesses had to pay licences; quicksilver and tobacco were monopolies; and offices were regularly sold to the highest bidder.

Nevertheless the Spanish occupation brought many incontestable benefits to South America. To say nothing of the civilised system of jurisprudence, the letters and the religion which have made the peoples of the continent members of the great western European family, the introduction of new and valuable animals, grains, and fruits raised the level of average well-being among the surviving inhabitants. Horses, asses, cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens, pigeons, wheat, barley, oats, rice, olives, grapes, oranges, sugar-cane, apples, peaches and related fruits, and even the banana and the cocoa palm were introduced by the Spaniards. In return Europe owes to Peru maize, potatoes, chocolate, tobacco, cassava, ipecacuanha, and quinine.