Part 40 (2/2)
The shock was terrible; and it was hailed by the swarms of Indian spectators on the surrounding heights with a fiendisn yell of triumph, that rose far above the din of battle, till it was lost in distant echoes among the mountains. *10 [Footnote 10: Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 4, cap. 6. - Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Carta de Espinall, Ms. - Zarate, Conq. del Peru, lib. 3, cap. 11.
Every thing relating to this battle, - the disposition of the forces, the character of the ground, the mode of attack, are told as variously and confusedly, as if it had been a contest between two great armies, instead of a handful of men on either side. It would seem that truth is nowhere so difficult to come at, as on the battle-field.]
The struggle was desperate. For it was not that of the white man against the defenceless Indian, but of Spaniard against Spaniard; both parties cheering on their comrades with their battle-cries of ”El Rey y Almagro,” or ”El Rey y Pizarro,” - while they fought with a hate, to which national antipathy was as nothing; a hate strong in proportion to the strength of the ties that had been rent asunder.
In this b.l.o.o.d.y field well did Orgonez do his duty, fighting like one to whom battle was the natural element. Singling out a cavalier, whom, from the color of the sobre-vest on his armour, he erroneously supposed to be Hernando Pizarro, he charged him in full career, and overthrew him with his lance. Another he ran through in like manner, and a third he struck down with his sword, as he was prematurely shouting ”Victory!” But while thus doing the deeds of a paladin of romance, he was. .h.i.t by a chain-shot from an arquebuse, which, penetrating the bars of his visor, grazed his forehead, and deprived him for a moment of reason. Before he had fully recovered, his horse was killed under him, and though the fallen cavalier succeeded in extricating himself from the stirrups, he was surrounded, and soon overpowered by numbers. Still refusing to deliver up his sword, he asked ”if there was no knight to whom he could surrender.” One Fuentes, a menial of Pizarro, presenting himself as such, Orgonez gave his sword into his hands, - and the dastard, drawing his dagger, stabbed his defenceless prisoner to the heart! His head, then struck off, was stuck on a pike, and displayed, a b.l.o.o.d.y trophy, in the great square of Cuzco, as the head of a traitor. *11 Thus perished as loyal a cavalier, as decided in council, and as bold in action, as ever crossed to the sh.o.r.es of America.
[Footnote 11: Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Herrera Hist. General, ubi supra. - Zarate, Conq. del Peru, ubi supra.]
The fight had now lasted more than an hour, and the fortune of the day was turning against the followers of Almagro. Orgonez being down, their confusion increased. The infantry, unable to endure the fire of the arquebusiers, scattered and took refuge behind the stone-walls, that here and there straggled across the country. Pedro de Lerma, vainly striving to rally the cavalry, spurred his horse against Hernando Pizarro, with whom he had a personal feud. Pizarro did not shrink from the encounter. The lances of both the knights took effect. That of Hernando penetrated the thigh of his opponent, while Lerma's weapon, glancing by his adversary's saddle-bow, struck him with such force above the groin, that it pierced the joints of his mail, slightly wounding the cavalier, and forcing his horse back on his haunches. But the press of the fight soon parted the combatants, and, in the turmoil that ensued, Lerma was unhorsed, and left on the field covered with wounds. *12
[Footnote 12: Herrera, Hist. General, ubi supra. - Garcila.s.so, Com. Real., Parte 2, lib. 2, cap. 36.
Hernando Pizarro wore a surcoat of orange-colored velvet over his armour, according to Garcila.s.so, and before the battle sent notice of it to Orgonez, that the latter might distinguish him in the melee. But a knight in Hernando's suite also wore the same colors, it appears, which led Orgonez into error.]
There was no longer order, and scarcely resistance, among the followers of Almagro. They fled, making the best of their way to Cuzco, and happy was the man who obtained quarter when he asked it. Almagro himself, too feeble to sit so long on his horse, reclined on a litter, and from a neighbouring eminence surveyed the battle, watching its fluctuations with all the interest of one who felt that honor, fortune, life itself, hung on the issue.
With agony not to be described, he had seen his faithful followers, after their hard struggle, borne down by their opponents, till, convinced that all was lost, he succeeded in mounting a mule, and rode off for a temporary refuge to the fortress of Cuzco. Thither he was speedily followed, taken, and brought in triumph to the capital, where, ill as he was, he was thrown into irons, and confined in the same in the same apartment of the stone building in which he had imprisoned the Pizarros.
The action lasted not quite two hours. The number of killed, variously stated, was probably not less than a hundred and fifty, - one of the combatants calls it two hundred, *13 - a great number, considering the shortness of the time, and the small amount of forces engaged. No account is given of the wounded.
Wounds were the portion of the cavalier. Pedro de Lerma is said to have received seventeen, and yet was taken alive from the field! The loss fell chiefly on the followers of Almagro But the slaughter was not confined to the heat of the action. Such was the deadly animosity of the parties, that several were murdered in cold blood, like Orgonez, after they had surrendered. Pedro de Lerma himself, while lying on his sick couch in the quarters of a friend in Cuzco, was visited by a soldier, named Samaniego, whom he had once struck for an act of disobedience. This person entered the solitary chamber of the wounded man, took his place by his bed-side, and then, upbraiding him for the insult, told him that he had come to wash it away in his blood! Lerma in vain a.s.sured him, that, when restored to health, he would give him the satisfaction he desired. The miscreant, exclaiming ”Now is the hour!” plunged his sword into his bosom. He lived several years to vaunt this atrocious exploit, which he proclaimed as a reparation to his honor. It is some satisfaction to know that the insolence of this vaunt cost him his life. *14 - Such anecdotes, revolting as they are, ill.u.s.trate not merely the spirit of the times, but that peculiarly ferocious spirit which is engendered by civil wars, - the most unforgiving in their character of any, but wars of religion.
[Footnote 13: ”Murieron en esta Batalla de las Salinas casi dozientos hombres de vna parte y de otra.” (Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms.) Most authorities rate the loss at less.
The treasurer Espinall, a partisan of Almagro, says they ma.s.sacred a hundred and fifty after the fight, in cold blood.
”Siguiecon el alcanze la mas cruelmente que en el mundo se ha visto, porque matavan a los hombres rendidos e desarmados, e por les quitar las armas los mataban si presto no se las quitaban, e trayendo a las ancas de un caballo a un Ruy Diaz viniendo rendido e desarmado le mataron, i desta manera mataron mas de ciento e cinquenta hombres” Carta, Ms.]
[Footnote 14: Carta de Espinall, Ms. - Garcila.s.so, Com. Real., Parte 2, lib. 2, cap. 38.
He was hanged for this very crime by the governor of Puerto Viejo, about five years after this time, having outraged the feelings of that officer and the community by the insolent and open manner in which he boasted of his atrocious exploit.]
In the hurry of the flight of one party, and the pursuit by the other, all pouring towards Cuzco, the field of battle had been deserted. But it soon swarmed with plunderers, as the Indians, descending like vultures from the mountains, took possession of the b.l.o.o.d.y ground, and, despoiling the dead, even to the minutest article of dress, left their corpses naked on the plain. *15 It has been thought strange that the natives should not have availed themselves of their superior numbers to fall on the victors after they had been exhausted by the battle. But the scattered bodies of the Peruvians were without a leader; they were broken in spirits, moreover, by recent reverses, and the Castilians, although weakened for the moment by the struggle, were in far greater strength in Cuzco than they had ever been before.
[Footnote 15: ”Los Indios viendo la Batalla fenescida, ellos tambien se dejaron de la suia, iendo los vnos i los otros a desnudar los Espanoles muertos, i aun algunos vivos, que por sus heridas no se podian defender, porque como paso el tropel de la Gente, siguiendo la Victoria, no huvo quien se lo impidiese; de manera que dexaron en cueros a todos los caidos.” Zarate, Conq.
del Peru, lib. 3, cap. 11]
Indeed, the number of troops now a.s.sembled within its walls, amounting to full thirteen hundred, composed, as they were, of the most discordant materials, gave great uneasiness to Hernando Pizarro. For there were enemies glaring on each other and on him with deadly though smothered rancor, and friends, if not so dangerous, not the less troublesome from their craving and unreasonable demands. He had given the capital up to pillage, and his followers found good booty in the quarters of Almagro's officers. But this did not suffice the more ambitious cavaliers; and they clamorously urged their services, and demanded to be placed in charge of some expedition, nothing doubting that it must prove a golden one. All were in quest of an El Dorado.
Hernando Pizarro acquiesced as far as possible in these desires, most willing to relieve himself of such importunate creditors.
The expeditions, it is true, usually ended in disaster; but the country was explored by them. It was the lottery of adventure; the prizes were few, but they were splendid; and in the excitement of the game, few Spaniards paused to calculate the chances of success.
Among those who left the capital was Diego, the son of Almagro.
Hernando was mindful to send him, with a careful escort, to his brother the governor, desirous to remove him at this crisis from the neighbourhood of his father. Meanwhile the marshal himself was pining away in prison under the combined influence of bodily illness and distress of mind. Before the battle of Salinas, it had been told to Hernando Pizarro that Almagro was like to die.
”Heaven forbid,” he exclaimed, ”that this should come to pa.s.s before he falls into my hands!” *16 Yet the G.o.ds seemed now disposed to grant but half of this pious prayer, since his captive seemed about to escape him just as he had come into his power. To console the unfortunate chief, Hernando paid him a visit in his prison, and cheered him with the a.s.surance that he only waited for the governor's arrival to set him at liberty; adding, 'that, if Pizarro did not come soon to the capital, he himself would a.s.sume the responsibility of releasing him, and would furnish him with a conveyance to his brother's quarters.”
At the same time, with considerate attention to his comfort, he inquired of the marshal ”what mode of conveyance would be best suited to his state of health.” After this he continued to send him delicacies from his own table to revive his faded appet.i.te.
Almagro, cheered by these kind attentions, and by the speedy prospect of freedom, gradually mended in health and spirits. *17
[Footnote 16: ”Respondia Hernando Pizarro, que no le haria Dios tan gran mal, que le dexase morir, sin que le huviese a las manos.” Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6 lib. 4, cap. 5.]
[Footnote 17: Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 4, cap. 9.]
He little dreamed that all this while a process was industriously preparing against him. It had been inst.i.tuted immediately on his capture, and every one, however humble, who had any cause of complaint against the unfortunate prisoner, was invited to present it. The summons was readily answered; and many an enemy now appeared in the hour of his fallen fortunes, like the base reptiles crawling into light amidst the ruins of some n.o.ble edifice; and more than one, who had received benefits from his hands, were willing to court the favor of his enemy by turning on their benefactor. From these loath some sources a ma.s.s of accusations was collected which spread over four thousand folio pages! Yet Almagro was the idol of his soldiers! *18 [Footnote 18: ”De tal manera que los Escrivanos no se davan manos, i ia tenian oscritas mas de dos mil hojas.” Ibid., dec. 6, lib. 4, cap. 7.
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