Part 44 (1/2)
1541.
When Gonzalo Pizarro reached Quito, he received tidings of an event which showed that his expedition to the Amazon had been even more fatal to his interests than he had imagined. A revolution had taken place during his absence, which had changed the whole condition of things in Peru.
In a preceding chapter we have seen, that, when Hernando Pizarro returned to Spain, his brother the marquess repaired to Lima, where he continued to occupy himself with building up his infant capital, and watching over the general interests of the country.
While thus employed, he gave little heed to a danger that hourly beset his path, and this, too, in despite of repeated warnings from more circ.u.mspect friends.
After the execution of Almagro, his followers, to the number of several hundred, remained scattered through the country; but, however scattered, still united by a common sentiment of indignation against the Pizarros, the murderers, as they regarded them, of their leader. The governor was less the object of these feelings than his brother Hernando, as having been less instrumental in the perpetration of the deed. Under these circ.u.mstances, it was clearly Pizarro's policy to do one of two things; to treat the opposite faction either as friends, or as open enemies. He might conciliate the most factious by acts of kindness, efface the remembrance of past injury, if he could, by present benefits; in short, prove to them that his quarrel had been with their leader, not with themselves, and that it was plainly for their interest to come again under his banner. This would have been the most politic, as well as the most magnanimous course; and, by augmenting the number of his adherents, would have greatly strengthened his power in the land. But, unhappily, he had not the magnanimity to pursue it. It was not in the nature of a Pizarro to forgive an injury, or the man whom he had injured. As he would not, therefore, try to conciliate Almagro's adherents, it was clearly the governor's policy to regard them as enemies, - not the less so for being in disguise, - and to take such measures as should disqualify them for doing mischief. He should have followed the counsel of his more prudent brother Hernando, and distributed them in different quarters, taking care that no great number should a.s.semble at any one point, or, above all, in the neighbourhood of his own residence.
But the governor despised the broken followers of Almagro too heartily to stoop to precautionary measures. He suffered the son of his rival to remain in Lima, where his quarters soon became the resort of the disaffected cavaliers. The young man was well known to most of Almagro's soldiers, having been trained along with them in the camp under his father's eye, and, now that his parent was removed, they naturally transferred their allegiance to the son who survived him.
That the young Almagro, however, might be less able to maintain this retinue of unprofitable followers, he was deprived by Pizarro of a great part of his Indians and lands, while he was excluded from the government of New Toledo, which had been settled on him by his father's testament. *1 Stripped of all means of support, without office or employment of any kind, the men of Chili, for so Almagro's adherents continued to be called, were reduced to the utmost distress. So poor were they, as is the story of the time, that twelve cavaliers, who lodged in the same house, could muster only one cloak among them all; and, with the usual feeling of pride that belongs to the poor hidalgo, unwilling to expose their poverty, they wore this cloak by turns, those who had no right to it remaining at home. *2 Whether true or not, the anecdote well ill.u.s.trates the extremity to which Almagro's faction was reduced. And this distress was rendered yet more galling by the effrontery of their enemies, who, enriched by their forfeitures, displayed before their eyes all the insolent bravery of equipage and apparel that could annoy their feelings.
[Footnote 1: Carta de Almagro, Ms.]
[Footnote 2: Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 8, cap. 6.]
Men thus goaded by insult and injury were too dangerous to be lightly regarded. But, although Pizarro received various intimations intended to put him on his guard, he gave no heed to them. ”Poor devils!” he would exclaim, speaking with contemptuous pity of the men of Chili; ”they have had bad luck enough. We will not trouble them further.” *3 And so little did he consider them, that he went freely about, as usual, riding without attendants to all parts of the town and to its immediate environs. *4
[Footnote 3: Gomara, Hist. de las Ind., cap. 144.]
[Footnote 4: Garcila.s.so, Com Real., Parte 2, lib. 3, cap. 6.]
News now reached the colony of the appointment of a judge by the Crown to take cognizance of the affairs of Peru. Pizarro, although alarmed by the intelligence, sent orders to have him well entertained on his landing, and suitable accommodations prepared for him on the route. The spirits of Almagro's followers were greatly raised by the tidings. They confidently looked to this high functionary for the redress of their wrongs; and two of their body, clad in suits of mourning, were chosen to go to the north, where the judge was expected to land, and to lay their grievances before him.
But months elapsed, and no tidings came of his arrival, till, at length, a vessel, coming into port, announced that most of the squadron had foundered in the heavy storms on the coast, and that the commissioner had probably perished with them. This was disheartening intelligence to the men of Chili, whose ”miseries,”
to use the words of their young leader, ”had become too grievous to be borne.” *5 Symptoms of disaffection had already begun openly to manifest themselves. The haughty cavaliers did not always doff their bonnets, on meeting the governor in the street; and on one occasion, three ropes were found suspended from the public gallows, with labels attached to them, bearing the names of Pizarro, Velasquez the judge, and Picado the governor's secretary. *6 This last functionary was peculiarly odious to Almagro and his followers. As his master knew neither how to read nor write, all his communications pa.s.sed through Picado's hands; and, as the latter was of a hard and arrogant nature, greatly elated by the consequence which his position gave him, he exercised a mischievous influence on the governor's measures.
Almagro's poverty-stricken followers were the objects of his open ridicule, and he revenged the insult now offered him by riding before their young leader's residence, displaying a tawdry magnificence in his dress, sparkling with gold and silver, and with the inscription, ”For the Men of Chili,” set in his bonnet.
It was a foolish taunt; but the poor cavaliers who were the object of it, made morbidly sensitive by their sufferings, had not the philosophy to despise it. *7
[Footnote 5: ”My sufferings,” says Almagro, in his letter to the Royal Audience of Panama, ”were enough to unsettle my reason.”
See his Letter in the original, Appendix, No. 12.]
[Footnote 6: ”Hizo Picado el secreptario del Marquez mucho dano a muchos, porque el marquez don Francisco Picarro como no savia ler ni escrivir fiavase del y no hacia mas de lo que el le aconsejava y ansi hizo este mucho mal en estos rreinos, porque el que no andava a su voluntad sirviendole aunque tuviese meritos le destruya y este Picado fue causa de que los de Chile tomasen mas odio al marquez por donde le mataron. Porque queria este que todos lo reverenciasen, y los de chile no hazian caso del, y por esta causa los perseguia este mucho, y ansi vinieron a hazer lo que hizieron los de Chile.” Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Also Zarate, Conq. del Peru, lib. 4, cap. 6.]
[Footnote 7: Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Garcila.s.so, Com. Real., Parte 2, lib. 3, cap. 6. - Herrera, Hist. General, dec. 6, lib. 10, cap. 2.]
At length, disheartened by the long protracted coming of Vaca de Castro, and still more by the recent reports of his loss, Almagro's faction, despairing of redress from a legitimate authority, determined to take it into their own hands. They came to the desperate resolution of a.s.sa.s.sinating Pizarro. The day named for this was Sunday, the twenty-sixth of June, 1541. The conspirators, eighteen or twenty in number, were to a.s.semble in Almagro's house, which stood in the great square next to the cathedral, and, when the governor was returning from ma.s.s, they were to issue forth and fall on him in the street. A white flag, unfurled at the same time from an upper window in the house, was to be the signal for the rest of their comrades to move to the support of those immediately engaged in the execution of the deed. *8 [Footnote 8: Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms. - Montesinos, Annales, Ms., ano 1541. - Zarate, Conq. del Peru, lib. 4, cap.
6.]
These arrangements could hardly have been concealed from Almagro, since his own quarters were to be the place of rendezvous. Yet there is no good evidence of his having taken part in the conspiracy. *9 He was, indeed, too young to make it probable that he took a leading part in it. He is represented by contemporary writers to have given promise of many good qualities, though, unhappily, he was not placed in a situation favorable for their development. He was the son of an Indian woman of Panama; but from early years had followed the troubled fortunes of his father, to whom he bore much resemblance in his free and generous nature, as well as in the violence of his pa.s.sions. His youth and inexperience disqualified him from taking the lead in the perplexing circ.u.mstances in which he was placed, and made him little more than a puppet in the hands of others. *10
[Footnote 9: Yet this would seem to be contradicted by Almagro's own letter to the audience of Panama, in which he states, that, galled by intolerable injuries, he and his followers had resolved to take the remedy into their own hands, by entering the governor's house and seizing his person. (See the original in Appendix, No. 12.) It is certain, however, that in the full accounts we have of the affair by writers who had the best means of information, we do not find Almagro's name mentioned as one who took an active part in the tragic drama. His own letter merely expresses that it was his purpose to have taken part in it with the further declaration, that it was simply to seize, not to slay, Pizarro; - a declaration that no one who reads the history of the transaction will be very ready to credit.]
[Footnote 10: ”Mancebo virtuoso, i de grande Animo, i bien ensenado: i especialmente se havia exercitado mucho en cavalgar a Caballo, de ambas sillas, lo qual hacia con mucha gracia, i destreca, i tambien en escrevir, i leer, lo qual hacia mas liberalmente, i mejor de lo que requeria su Profesion. De este tenia cargo, como Aio, Juan de Herrada.” Zarate, Conq. del Peru, lib. 4, cap. 6.]
The most conspicuous of his advisers was Juan de Herrada, or Rada, as his name is more usually spelt, - a cavalier of respectable family, but who, having early enlisted as a common soldier, had gradually risen to the highest posts in the army by his military talents. At this time he was well advanced in years; but the fires of youth were not quenched in his bosom, and he burned with desire to avenge the wrongs done to his ancient commander. The attachment which he had ever felt for the elder Almagro he seems to have transferred in full measure to his son; and it was apparently with reference to him, even more than to himself, that he devised this audacious plot, and prepared to take the lead in the execution of it.
There was one, however, in the band of conspirators who felt some compunctions of conscience at the part he was acting, and who relieved his bosom by revealing the whole plot to his confessor.
The latter lost no time in reporting it to Picado, by whom in turn it was communicated to Pizarro. But, strange to say, it made little more impression on the governor's mind than the vague warnings he had so frequently received. ”It is a device of the priest,” said he; ”he wants a mitre.” *11 Yet he repeated the story to the judge Velasquez, who, instead of ordering the conspirators to be seized, and the proper steps taken for learning the truth of the accusation, seemed to be possessed with the same infatuation as Pizarro; and he bade the governor be under no apprehension, ”for no harm should come to him, while the rod of justice,” not a metaphorical badge of authority in Castile, ”was in his hands.” *12 Still, to obviate every possibility of danger, it was deemed prudent for Pizarro to abstain from going to ma.s.s on Sunday, and to remain at home on pretence of illness.
[Footnote 11: ”Pues un dia antes un sacerdote clerigo llamado Benao fue de noche y avisso a Picado el secreptario y dixole manana Domingo quando el marquez saliere a misa tienen concertado los de Chile de matar al marquez y a vos y a sus amigos. Esto me a dicho vno en confision para que os venga a avisar. Pues savido esto Picado se fue luego y lo conto al marquez y el le rrespondio. Ese clerigo obispado quiere.” Pedro Pizarro, Descub.
y Conq., Ms.]
[Footnote 12: ”El Juan Velazquez le dixo. No tema vuestra senoria que mientras yo tuviere esta vara en la mano nadie se atrevera.” Pedro Pizarro, Descub, y Conq., Ms.]