Yet it was at least one good result of such loss, that
it left fewer to provide for. But the whole number of the
besieged was so small, that any loss greatly increased the
difficulties of defence by the remainder.
[Footnote 25: Garcilasso, Com. Real., Parte 2, lib. 2, cap. 24]
As months passed away without bringing any tidings of their
countrymen, their minds were haunted with still gloomier
apprehensions as to their fate. They well knew that the governor
would make every effort to rescue them from their desperate
condition. That he had not succeeded in this made it probable,
that his own situation was no better than theirs, or, perhaps, he
and his followers had already fallen victims to the fury of the
insurgents. It was a dismal thought, that they alone were left in
the land, far from all human succour, to perish miserably by the
hands of the barbarians among the mountains.
Yet the actual state of things, though gloomy in the extreme, was
not quite so desperate as their imaginations had painted it. The
insurrection, it is rue, had been general throughout the country,
a east that portion of it occupied by the Spaniards It had been
so well concerted, that it broke out almost simultaneously, and
the Conquerors, who were living in careless security on their
estates, had been massacred to the number of several hundreds An
Indian force had sat down before Xauxa, and a considerable army
had occupied the valley of Rimac and laid siege to Lima.
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