CHAPTER VII. AMBUSCADE OF THE SPANIARDS-VISIT OF ATAHUALLPA-IMPUDENT SPEECH OF THE FRIAR VALVERDE-ANSWER OF THE INCA-SEIZURE OF HIS PERSON-MASSACRE OF HIS ATTENDANTS-PLUNDER OF HIS CAMP AGREEMENT FOR HIS RANSOM-HIS DEMEANOR-EXPEDITION TO PACHACAMAC-HORSES SHOD WITH SILVER. EVERY precaution to insure success to his iniquitous scheme was now taken by the Spanish general. It was resolved to post the soldiers in the numerous halls and passages which opened on the great square; at a given signal, all were to rush forward, and fall sword in hand upon the Peruvians, and seize the person of their monarch. All the arrangements being most carefully completed, "the reverend fathers busied themselves the whole night in prayer, begging that God would award due success to his most sacred service, the exaltation of the faith, and the salvation of such a number of souls-spilling much blood as well as tears in the discipline they underwent "—all, evidently, half frightened out of their wits! Pizarro then cheered the soldiers "with a right Christian harangue which he made them,” and all uplifted their voices in the pious chant, แ 'Exsurge, Domine, et judica causam tuam.” "One might have supposed them," says Mr. Prescott, "a company of martyrs, about to lay down their lives in defence of their faith, instead of a licentious band of adventurers, meditating one of the most atrocious acts of perfidy on the record of history!" At noon on the following day the Inca took up his march for the city. Before him went a multitude of attendants, sweeping every particle of dust from the causeway; and the crowd of nobles on whose shoulders he was borne, and who marched by the side of his litter, "shone like the sun," with the blaze of their golden ornaments. The Spaniards, panting with fear and impatience, had been waiting all day at their arms, when the unwelcome news arrived that the Inca would delay his entrance into the town until the following morning. At this change of purpose, all was consternation; but Pizarro, with remarkable presence of mind, sent a message, entreating Atahuallpa to enter, as he had prepared an entertainment, "and all was in readiness to receive him." The cumbrous procession again moved forward, and Atahuallpa sent orders that a palace, called "The House of the Serpent," should be prepared for his reception. As a token of his confidence and good faith, he ordered his nobles and attendants to lay aside their arms, and thus, without the shadow of hostility or even defence, approached the city. A little before sunset, he entered the great square, borne on a splendid throne of massive gold, overshadowed with the plumes of the gay birds of the tropics. Before him went four hundred menials, clearing the way, and singing their national chants, "which in our ears," says one of the Spaniards, "sounded like the Songs of Hell." From his lofty position, the Inca calmly surveyed the mul titude of his followers, who formed around him in courtly order. When about six thousand of them had entered the square, he looked around inquiringly, and said, "Where are the strangers?" At this word came forward the reverend Father Valverde, Pizarro's chaplain, with a crucifix in one hand and a breviary in the other, and made a long harangue, commencing with the creation, and thence proceeding through the fall of Adam, the incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection, the appointment of St. Peter as God's Vicar on Earth, the apostolical succession of Popes, the bull in favor of Castile, and ending logically with a formal demand that the Inca should submit his spiritual guidance to the Pope, and his temporal allegiance to the king of Spain. All this was duly translated by the interpreter, Felipillo, who, by way of expounding the doctrine of the Trinity, explained to his royal auditor that "The Christians had Three Gods and One God, making Four in all." "To the which words," says a by-stander, "and much besides that the reverend father said, he remained silent without returning a reply. He then said that he would see what God had commanded, as he was told, in the book; so he took the book, and opened it, and looked it over, examining its form and arrangement; and rather admiring the writing, it seemed to me, than what was therein written." He next held it to his ear, and saying, contemptuously, "This tells me nothing," flung it angrily away. Then, with a countenance flushed with emotion, he made answer to such portions of the address as he had been able to understand. He would be no man's tributary, he said, and as for the great priest beyond the waters, he must be mad to talk of giving away countries he had never Nor would he change his faith. The God of the Christians, according to their own account, had been slain by his own creatures, but the eternal Sun, the great deity of Peru, still shone on his glorious and beneficent course through the firmament. Excited by the insults he had received, he declared that the Spaniards should render a strict account of their doings in his territories. seen. The discomfited friar, seeing the ill success of his eloquence, picked up the book, bowed his head, and hastened to Pizarro. "Did you see what passed?" he cried,-"while we waste time in fooleries and arguments with this dog, full of pride, the square is filling with Indians. Set on them at once! I absolve you." The fatal gun, the signal of slaughter, was fired, and the Spaniards, horse and foot, rushed furiously from their lurking-places. Taken by surprise, utterly unarmed, and bewildered by the unwonted discharge of artillery and fire-arms, the unhappy victims were slaughtered without the slightest means of resistance. The nobles, with affecting devotion, flung themselves before their master, to receive the blows of the murderers, and, by clinging to the legs of their horses, and striving to pull the riders from their saddles, for some time kept back the press from his person. But they died by hundreds around him, and Pizarro, darting through the throng, seized his captive with his own hand. A most wanton and merciless slaughter was still kept up, and did not cease till the shades of night blinded the assassins, and |