How the captain Gonzalo Pizarro arrived at the city of Cuzco, accompanied by some followers, but had not laid aside his rebellious design of occupying the Realm; and of what else happened.

THE captain Gonzalo Pizarro travelled to Cuzco accompanied by a few comrades who had come out of the Canela country with him, and others who now joined him, who, by always talking of things of the past without considering the serious trouble that must overtake them in the future, incited him to no good purpose, but to a course which might do much harm. This is the great sorrow I feel—that many princes and great lords, if vain words had not been poured into their ears by the voices of youths and flatterers, would not have involved themselves and their neighbours in so many calamities and disasters. It has been the same in these Indies, where the men living in them are alike astute and malicious, as well as so much addicted to uproars that the governors and captains who wish to live peaceably get no chance of doing so. Some to avenge themselves on others, some to obtain commands and dignities, some to secure favours and riches, incite the poorer sort to live at enmity with their equals. They rise for certain objects, and, forced by necessity, have to carry their opinions forward, while those who thus commit them slip out of the mess when they see a time for it. So it was with the ill-fated captain Gonzalo Pizarro who, besides being ambitious to command, was so stirred up by his followers that, after having served his Majesty loyally and well, he entered upon bad and ugly courses, ¹ as we are 312told on a stone memorial which is set up in the city of Cuzco, forever branding him as a traitor.