And ex presses by couriers. Cuzco-the military centre. The Incathe Lord of made of osiers or maguey fibres. Some of these cables are said to have been as thick as a man, and two hundred feet long. Where such bridges could not be thrown across, and a stream flowed in the bottom of the mountain valley, the passage was made by ferry-boats or rafts. As to the road itself, it was about twenty feet in breadth, faced with flags covered with bitumen, and had mile-stones. Our admiration at this splendid engineering is enhanced when we remember that it was accomplished without iron and gunpowder. The shore-road was built on an embankment, with a clay parapet and shade-trees on each side; where circumstances called for it, piles were used. Every five miles there was a post-house. The public couriers, as in Mexico, could make, if necessary, two hundred miles a day. Of these roads, Humboldt says that they were among the most useful and most stupendous ever executed by the hand of man. The reader need scarcely be told that there were no such triumphs of skill in Spain. From the circumstance that there were no swift animals as the horse or dromedary, the width of these roads was sufficient, since they were necessarily used for foot-passage alone. In Cuzco, the metropolis, was the imperial residence of the Inca and the Temple of the Sun. It contained edifices which excited the amazement of the Spanish filibusters themselves, -streets, squares, bridges, fortresses surrounded by turreted walls, subterranean galleries by which the garrison could reach important parts of the town. Indeed, the great roads we have spoken of might be regarded as portions of an immense system of military works spread all over the country, and having their centre at Cuzco. The imperial dignity was hereditary, descending from father the Empire. to son. As in Egypt, the monarch not unfrequently had his sisters for wives. His diadem consisted of a scarlet tasselled fringe round his brow, adorned with two feathers. He wore earrings of great weight. His dress of lama-wool was dyed scarlet, inwoven with gold and studded with gems. Whoever approached him bore a light burden on the shoulder as a badge of servitude, and was barefoot. The Inca was not only the representative of the temporal, but also of the spiritual tional power. He was more than supreme pontiff, for he was a descendant of the Sun, the god of the nation. He made laws, imposed taxes, raised armies, appointed or removed judges at his pleasure. He travelled in a sedan ornamented with gold and emeralds; the roads were swept before him, strewn with flowers, and perfumed. His palace at Yucay was described by The nathe Spaniards as a fairy scene. It was filled with works of palace. Indian art; images of animals and plants decorated the niches of its wall; it had an endless labyrinth of gorgeous chambers, and here and there shady crypts for quiet retirement. Its baths were great golden bowls. It was embosomed in artificial forests. The imperial ladies and concubines spent their time in beautifully furnished chambers, or in gardens, with cascades and fountains, grottoes and bowers. It was in what few countries can boast of, a temperate region in the torrid zone. Peru, its ments and The Peruvian religion ostensibly consisted of a worship of Religion of the Sun, but the higher classes had already become emanci- establish pated from such a material association, and recognized the ex- ceremonial. istence of one almighty, invisible God. They expected the resurrection of the body and the continuance of the soul in a future life. It was their belief that in the world to come our occupations will resemble those we have followed here. Like the Egyptians, who had arrived at similar ideas, the Peruvians practised embalming, the mummies of their Incas being placed in the Temple of the Sun at Cuzco, the kings on the right, the queens on the left, clad in their robes of state, and with their hands crossed on their bosoms, seated in golden chairs, waiting for the day when the soul will return to reanimate the body. The mummies of distinguished personages were buried in a sitting posture under tumuli of earth. To the Supreme Being but one temple was dedicated. It was in a sacred valley, to which pilgrimages were made. In the Peruvian mythology, heaven was above the sky, hell in the interior of the earthit was the realm of an evil spirit called Cupay. The general resemblance of these to Egyptian doctrines may forcibly impress upon us that they are ideas with which the human mind necessarily occupies itself in its process of intellectual developeAs in all other countries, the educated classes were ment. VOL. II. N Social system-the nobility, greatly in advance of the common people, who were only just As to their social system, polygamy was permitted, but practically it was confined to the higher classes. Social subthe people. ordination was thoroughly understood. The Inca Tupac Yu panqui says, “Knowledge was never intended for the people, but only for those of generous blood." The nobility were of two orders-the polygamic descendants of the Incas, who were the main support of the state, and the adopted nobles of nations that had been conquered. As to the people, nowhere else in the whole world was such an extraordinary policy of supervision practised. They were divided into groups of ten, fifty, one hundred, five hundred, one thousand, ten thousand, and over the last an Inca noble was placed. Through this system a rigid centralization was ensured, the Inca being the pivot upon tion of which all the national affairs turned. It was an absolutism worthy of the admiration of many existing European nations. The entire territory was divided into three parts: one belonged Organizato the Sun, one to the Inca, one to the people. As a matter labour. of form, the subdivision was annually made; in practice, however, as perhaps must always be the result of such agrarianism, the allotments were continually renewed. All the land was cultivated by the people, and in the following order:—first, that of the Sun, then that of the destitute and infirm, then that of the people, and lastly that of the Inca. The Sun and the Inca owned all the sheep, which were shared, and their wool distributed to the people, or cotton furnished in its stead. The Inca's officers saw that it was all woven, and that no one was idle. An annual survey of the country, its farming and mineral products, was made, the inventory being transmitted to the government. A register was kept of births and deaths; periodically, a general census was taken. The Inca, at once emperor and pope, was enabled, in that double capacity, to exert a rigorous patriarchal rule over his people, who were treated like mere children,-not suffered to be oppressed, but compelled to be occupied; for, with a worldly wisdom which no other nation presents, labour was here acknowledged not only as a means, but also as an end. In Peru a man could not improve his social state; by these refinements of legislation he was brought into an absolutely stationary condition. He could become neither richer nor poorer; but it was the boast of the system that every one lived exempt from social suffering,that all enjoyed competence. system; The army consisted of 200,000 men. Their weapons were Military bows, lances, slings, battle-axes, swords; their means of de- warlike fence, shields, bucklers, helmets, and coats of quilted cotton. resources. Each regiment had its own banner, but the imperial standard, the national emblem, was a rainbow, the offspring of the Sun. The swords and many of the domestic implements were of bronze; the arrows were tipped with quartz or bone, or points of gold and silver. A strict discipline was maintained on marching, granaries and depôts being established at suitable distances on the roads. With a policy inflexibly persisted in, the gods Peruvian literature 180 Peruvian Literature, Agriculture, of conquered countries were transported to Cuzco, and the vanquished compelled to worship the Sun; their children were obliged to learn the Peruvian language, the government providing them teachers for that purpose. As an incitement, this knowledge was absolutely required as a condition for public office. To amalgamate the conquered districts thoroughly, their inhabitants were taken away by ten thousand, transported to distant parts of the empire-not, as in the Old World, to be worked to death as slaves, but to be made into Peruvians; an equal number of natives were sent in their stead, to whom, as a recompense for their removal, extraordinary privileges were given. It was an immemorial policy of the empire to maintain a profound tranquillity in the interior, and perpetual war on the frontiers. The philosophical advancement of the Peruvians was much the quipus. retarded by their imperfect method of writing, a method greatly inferior to that of Egypt. A cord of coloured threads, called quipus, was only indifferently suited to the purposes of enumeration, and by no means equal to hieroglyphics as a method of expressing general facts. But it was their only system. Notwithstanding this drawback, they had a literature consisting of poetry, dramatic compositions, and the like. Their scientific attainments were inferior to the Mexican. Their year was divided into months, their months into weeks. They had gnomons to indicate the solstices. One in the form of an obelisk, in the centre of a circle, on which was marked an east and west line, indicated the equinox. These gnomons were destroyed by the Spaniards, in the belief that they were for idolatrous purposes; for, on the national festivals, it was customary to decorate them with leaves and flowers. As the national religion consisted in the worship of the Sun, it was not without reason that Quito was regarded as a holy place, from its position upon the equator. carried to Agriculture In their extraordinary provisions for agriculture, the national perfection. pursuit, the skill of the Peruvians is well seen. A rapid elevation from the sea-level to the heights of the mountains gave them, in a small compass, every variety of climate, and they availed themselves of it. They terraced the mountain-sides, |