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Prescott, William Hickling, 1796-1859

"History of the Conquest of Peru; with a preliminary view of the civilization of the Incas"

*6
[Footnote 4: "Muchos Espanoles han muerto i matan increible
cantidad de ovejas por comer solo los sesos, hacer pasteles del
tuetano i candelas de la grasa. De ai hambre general." Ibid.,
Ms.]
[Footnote 5: "Se puede afirmar que hicieron mas dano los
Espanoles en solos quatro anos que el Inga en quatrocientos."
Ondegardo, Rel. Seg., Ms.]
[Footnote 6: "Ahora no tienen que comer ni donde sembrar, i asi
van a hurtallo como solian, delito por que han aorcado a muchos."
Rel. del Provisor Morales, Ms.
This, and some of the preceding citations, as the reader will
see, have been taken from the Ms. of the Bachelor Luis de
Morales, who lived eighteen or twenty years in Cuzco; and, in
1541, about the time of Vaca de Castro's coming to Peru, prepared
a Memorial for the government, embracing a hundred and nine
chapters. It treats of the condition of the country, and the
remedies which suggested themselves to the benevolent mind of its
author. The emperor's notes on the margin show that it received
attention at court. There is no reason, as far as I am aware, to
distrust the testimony of the writer, and Munoz has made some
sensible extracts from it for his inestimable collection.]
It is true, there were good men, missionaries, faithful to their
calling, who wrought hard in the spiritual conversion of the
native, and who, touched by his misfortunes, would gladly have
interposed their arm to shield him from his oppressors. *7 But
too often the ecclesiastic became infected by the general spirit
of licentiousness; and the religious fraternities, who led a life
of easy indulgence on the lands cultivated by their Indian
slaves, were apt to think less of the salvation of their souls
than of profiting by the labor of their bodies.


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