"Si les auteurs
dont je viens de parler sietaient trouves dans les memes
circonstances qu'Atahuallpa et avaient eprouve autant d'offenses
graves et de trahisons, je ne croirai jamais qu'ils eussent agi
autrement"! Hist. de Quito, tom. I p. 253.]
The news of the great victory was borne on the wings of the wind
to Caxamalca; and loud and long was the rejoicing, not only in
the camp of Atahuallpa, but in the town and surrounding country;
for all now came in, eager to offer their congratulations to the
victor, and do him homage. The prince of Quito no longer
hesitated to assume the scarlet borla, the diadem of the Incas.
His triumph was complete. He had beaten his enemies on their own
ground; had taken their capital; had set his foot on the neck of
his rival, and won for himself the ancient sceptre of the
Children of the Sun. But the hour of triumph was destined to be
that of his deepest humiliation. Atahuallpa was not one of those
to whom, in the language of the Grecian bard, "the Gods are
willing to reveal themselves." *17 He had not read the
handwriting on the heavens. The small speck, which the
clear-sighted eye of his father had discerned on the distant
verge of the horizon, though little noticed by Atahuallpa, intent
on the deadly strife with his brother, had now risen high towards
the zenith, spreading wider and wider, till it wrapped the skies
in darkness, and was ready to burst in thunders on the devoted
nation.
[Footnote 17: v.
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