No one was so much interested in the result of the
expedition. It was for the government, indeed, that discoveries
were to be made, that the country was to be conquered. The
government alone was competent to provide the requisite means,
and was likely to take a much broader and more liberal view of
the matter than a petty colonial officer.
But who was there qualified to take charge of this delicate
mission? Luque was chained by his professional duties to Panama;
and his associates, unlettered soldiers, were much better fitted
for the business of the camp than of the court. Almagro, blunt,
though somewhat swelling and ostentatious in his address, with a
diminutive stature and a countenance naturally plain, now much
disfigured by the loss of an eye, was not so well qualified for
the mission as his companion in arms, who, possessing a good
person and altogether a commanding presence, was plausible, and,
with all his defects of education, could, where deeply
interested, be even eloquent in discourse. The ecclesiastic,
however, suggested that the negotiation should be committed to
the Licentiate Corral, a respectable functionary, then about to
return on some public business to the mother country. But to
this Almagro strongly objected. No one, he said, could conduct
the affair so well as the party interested in it. He had a high
opinion of Pizarro's prudence, his discernment of character, and
his cool, deliberate policy. *27 He knew enough of his comrade to
have confidence that his presence of mind would not desert him,
even in the new, and therefore embarrassing, circumstances in
which he would be placed at court.
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