Hubert Howe Bancroft

“ On the 13th of August 1546 Gasca makes his entrance into Panamá, and is received with much ceremony by the commander-in-chief, the governor, and magistrates of the city. Hinojosa with all his keen penetrating common-sense, his practical experience, and his thorough knowledge of the world, is no more proof against the seeming candor and mild winning deportment of the unpretending priest than was Mejía. A downright foe is his delight. He will match his wit or skill in military or political affairs against those of any man in the Indies. ”

“ REDUCTION OF COPAN.
The day was at last decided by the desperate courage of a cavalry soldier, one Juan Vazquez de Osuña, who, enraged at the repulse of his comrades, plunged the spurs into his horse and rode him straight at the ditch. The steed cleared the fosse, striking the barricade with his barbed chest. The works could not withstand the shock: palisades and earth gave way; the frightened horse, urged on by his impetuous rider, struggled through the debris and plunged amidst the mass of warriors, scattering them in every direction. Other horsemen came to Osuña's support. ”

“ When Tafur landed and told the men to get on board the ships, Pizarro cried "Stop!" Drawing his 8 sword he marked a line from west to east. Then pointing toward the south he said: "Countrymen and comrades! Yonder lurk hunger, hardships, and death; but for those who win, fame and wealth untold. This way is Panamá, with ease, poverty, and disgrace. Let each man choose for himself. ”

“ We wonder how men could so believe; but greater still is our wonder how men so believing could so behave. The guns fill the place with reverberating noise and smoke; with shrill blast of trumpets and jingling of bells the horsemen ride upon the panic-stricken crowd; the infantry with clang of arms appear and all unite in quick succession in sheathing their sharp swords in the unprotected bodies of the natives. At first they turn to fly, but at every point they are met by a blood-thirsty foe. ”

“ At length from the terraced heights above Caxamalca, through the openings of the foliage, the white tents of the Peruvian host are seen stretching for miles along the fertile valley. It is a sight at which the heart of the stoutest cavalier might beat despondingly, and that without prejudice. But these audacious Spaniards halt only to don their brightest armor, and unfurling their banner they march down the mountain. Next day, the 15th of November, Pizarro divides his force into three companies and enters the town about the hour of vespers. ”

“ Yet another phase of life and restless human endeavor on the Panamá Isthmus here presents itself. Great Britain is seized by an idea, born of greed and nurtured by injustice; and this conception expands until it covers the earth, and until the good people of England and Scotland are in imagination masters of the whole world, which possession is acquired not through any honest means, but after the too frequent vile indirections of the day and the nation ”

“ Guards were kept busy holding back the eager aspirants who, hungry for death, pressed forward in throngs, stretching out their arms to their departing countrymen and clamoring to be taken on board. Stowaways when ordered on shore clung madly to rope and mast, pleading in vain to be allowed to serve without pay on board the fleet. Women sobbed and gasped for breath; men stood uncovered, and with choked utterance and downcast head invoked the blessing of the Almighty. ”

“ Under this same influence Cortés and other captains of a generous, lordly nature might wade through horrors to a determined goal, while appalling tragedies and blood-reeking treacheries were not what their souls delighted in. But incarnate vulgarity was Francisco Pizarro, and a devouring sea of iniquity, beside whom beasts were heavenly beings; for when man sinks to his lowest, we must enter the domain of hideous fancy to find his prototype. ”

“ The Spaniards then continued their course toward Tumbez by land; and burdened as they were by weapons and armor, marching over hot sands under an equatorial sun, the journey soon became painful in the extreme. To add to their torments, an ulcerous epidemic broke out among them, from which many died, with curses on their commander. But their hearts were gladdened one day by the approach of a ship from Panamá having on board the royal officers appointed to accompany the expedition, whom Pizarro in his haste had left in Spain, and soon they were joined by thirty men under Captain Benalcázar. ”

“ The church and convent of Santo Domingo was one of the finest and most important establishments, not only in Panamá, the city of churches, but in the New World. The main building, a hundred feet in length by fifty in breadth, with massive walls perforated by numerous arched windows, was separated from the porch by a strong brick arch about twenty feet high and with a span of forty feet; the radius at the key-stone being not more than two feet. The edifice remains to day apparently as firm as ever, a monument of the architectural skill of the Spaniards in the seventeenth century. ”

“ No greater monument of blind adulation is found in Spanish-American history than the Varones Ilvstres del Nvevo Mvndo, Madrid, 1639, of Pizarro y Orellana, a descendant of one of the great Pizarros. Not only the brutal Francisco Pizarro is made a saint, but the accounts of the eight heroes of the conquest, which occupy the greater part of a folio volume, are little else than a covering of defects by so-called glorious deeds, which serve besides the purposes of fame as a special plea for the confirmation of grants conferred upon the conqueror. ”

“ No sooner had Alvarado sailed for Peru than the natives in many portions of the province rose once more in revolt. Bands of Cakchiquels, thirsting for the blood of their oppressors, roamed over the central sierra; in the districts of Sacapulas and Uspantan seven Spaniards and numbers of their slaves and servants were murdered; the Indians on the southern seaboard both of Guatemala and Salvador were in open rebellion ”

“ About the middle of the sixteenth century the isthmus of Darien had become the gate-way between the two seas, and Panamá the most important city of America. Situated upon the world's highway and in the very centre of the Spanish colonial possessions, through its portals must flow the treasures of Peru from the south, the products of Mexico, Nicaragua, and Guatemala from the north, and the trans-oceanic traffic of the Spice Islands from the west. Thus Panamá became not only the metropolis of the two Americas, but the half-way house and toll-gate between western Europe and eastern Asia. ”

“ No hope for the Spaniards now, unless they could cut their way through this dense throng of warriors. Provisions and baggage were cast aside and each soldier, grasping his weapons, prepared for the conflict which was to determine his destiny. The fight was obstinate and bloody, but sword and arquebuse prevailed as usual against the rude arms of the natives, and at length the Spaniards rested unopposed on the opposite side of the range, the survivors finally reaching Utatlan, haggard and gaunt with famine. ”

“ But when with one more bound the horse would be upon the monarch, the rider reins back the animal to a dead stop. Not the twitching of a muscle is discernible in the features of the inca; though for their cowardice in the presence of strangers, we are told that the nobles next day suffered death. The cavaliers decline food, saying that they, too, are holding a fast; but chicha, or wine of maize, being offered 25 them in golden goblets by dark-eyed beauties, and Atahualpa brooking no refusal, the Spaniards without dismounting drink it off, and then slowly ride back to Caxamalca. ”

“ In issuing to his officers their instructions for the day, which are nothing less than to seize the inca and murder his attendants, Pizarro says: "The project is more feasible than at first glance one might imagine. To administer to us the rites of hospitality, the Indians will not come arrayed in hostile humor. No more can be admitted to the plaza than may be easily vanquished; and with the inca, whom his soldiers worship as a god, within our grasp, we may dictate terms to the empire. ”

“ The natives found it less burdensome to perform the little labor necessary to the support of themselves and their masters than to endure the penalties of opposition. Between the poor kings of Spain and the pirates of England, France, and Holland, the wealth of the people was far from secure; there was no great incentive to enterprise in any direction, and had there been it is not certain that men would have exerted themselves. Simple existence satisfied them; high development and limitless wealth could do no more. ”

“ Remesal was a fearless writer. Perhaps he had some leaning to the descendants of the conquerors, yet he does not hesitate to denounce the acts of the first colonists, to deal with Alvarado in a manner severely condemning him, and to endorse Las Casas with regard to the cruel oppression of the Indians. But his statements are to be accepted with caution, especially where Las Casas or the Dominican order is concerned. No effort is spared to hold them up to the gaze of an admiring posterity, and to expose the errors and perverseness of their enemies. ”

“ Though few in comparison with his entire army, the attendants of Atahualpa numbered several thousands, as just before sunset, slowly and with measured tread, they march up the main avenue toward the plaza keeping step to the sonorous music of the singers and with the dancers who amble before the royal litter. Nearest the person of the monarch are the orejones, as the Spaniards styled the Peruvian noblemen, richly attired with armor and crowns of gold and silver, some walking, others in litters, according to their several ranks. ”

“ So costly were the works that the council in Spain when auditing the accounts wrote to inquire whether the fortifications of Panamá, were of silver or gold. A deep moat divided the city from the mainland, the entrances being through three massive gates. Seaward the city was protected by coral reefs, extending for more than half a mile into the bay. Even at high tide vessels of heavy draught could barely approach within cannon shot and an invading 518 force would be compelled to land from boats which would be exposed to the fire of the garrison. ”

“ How happy was Pizarro as he went to prove the golden report of good Ruiz! A storm which drove him under the lee of Gallo Island, and obliged him to repair at San Mateo Bay, only made the populous cities and cultivated fields of maize and cacao the more beautiful to behold. ”

“ As with heavy tread the Spaniards march through 22 the silent streets in which no living thing is visible save a few knots of ancient, witch-like crones who predict in low mournful regrets the destruction of the strangers, the adventure at this point assumes ghostly shape, like the confused manœuvrings of a dream and Caxamalca a phantom city. Quartering his troops in the plaza, Pizarro sends Hernando de Soto with fifteen horsemen, [I‐6] and the interpreter Felipillo, to ask the inca the time and place of the approaching interview ”

“ GASCA IN ARMS. On the day after Bermejo's departure Gasca and the governor arrived at the mouth of the Chagre, and here were met by a party of armed men from Nombre de Dios, with news that Panamá was in possession of a ruffian horde, though who they were or whence they came none could yet determine. Thus after crushing the rebellion in Peru, and bringing these vast stores of wealth in safety to the shore of the North Sea, the licentiate found himself in danger, at the last moment, of losing not only the king's treasure but his own reputation as an able and trustworthy servant of the emperor. ”

“ On the eastern coast of Nicaragua and Honduras there lived in the seventeenth century a people known among themselves as Misskitos, and called by the Spaniard Mosquitos, or more frequently sambos, the offspring probably of cimarrones and native women. They were ruled by an hereditary king, whose territory, when buccaneers first visited his domain, was of very limited extent, though the Mosquito language, which was identical with the one spoken by those of similar origin in the West Indies, spread in after years from Cape Honduras to the Desaguadero, and as far inland as Black River. ”

“ Six hundred of the Spaniards lay dead on the plains; the cavalry were almost annihilated, and the infantry threw away their arms and scattered into small parties, many of them hiding among the bushes by the sea-shore where they were afterward discovered and butchered. A party of Franciscan friars, who had remained with the army to offer the last consolations of religion to the dying, were captured and shot without mercy. Orders were at first given that no quarter should be granted, as the buccaneers were too much crippled to encumber themselves with prisoners. ”

“ Scorning to yield themselves as slaves, the entire population of the town rushed to the verge of a cliff, which overhung the Mazapan, and thence husbands and wives, parents and children, locked in close embrace, hurled themselves headlong, thousands of them, upon the rocks below or into the swift-running river. The Spaniards attempted to interfere, but of all the multitude only two thousand could be saved. [XIII‐37] These were removed to a plain a league down the river, and from this settlement sprung the town of Chiapas de los Indios, which became in time a populous city. ”

“ In the breast of Cortés beat an affectionate heart, stern though it was, and he seldom failed to win the true regard of his followers. The conqueror of Guatemala was void of affection even for women, and his choice of wife or mistress was inspired by ambition or lust. To govern by fear was his delight. Cortés was cautious and far-sighted; Alvarado impetuous, never anticipating other than favorable results. In versatility, as well as in mental and moral qualities, Cortés was far superior to the adelantado—instance the mutiny at Patinamit. ”

“ He who should be the first to force his way into a Spanish castle, or to haul down the Spanish colors and plant the English standard on the walls, was to receive 50 pesos; he who should take a prisoner from whom serviceable news could be obtained, 100 pesos; he who should throw hand-grenades among the enemy, 5 pesos for each one thrown; and he who in action should capture an officer of rank, risking his life thereby, was to be rewarded according to the degree of his valor. All rewards and extra allowances were to be paid over before a general division should be made of the booty. ”

“ The carnage is fearful. And above all the din of slaughter is heard the shrill voice of the man of God crying to the soldiers, "Thrust! thrust! thrust with the point of your swords, lest by striking you break your weapons." [I‐17] 30 When the first fierce charge is made, Pizarro, who with twenty chosen men had assumed the task of capturing the inca, rushes for the royal litter, but quick as are their movements the devoted followers of Atahualpa are before him, and crowding round their imperilled sovereign, struggle to shield his person. As one drops dead another hastens to take his place. ”