*8
[Footnote 7: "Loca y luciferina soberuia," as Fernandez
characterizes the aspiring temper of Gonzalo. Hist. del Peru,
Parte 1, lib. 2, cap. 15.]
[Footnote 8: Ms. de Caravantes.
According to Garcilasso, Paniagua was furnished with secret
instructions by the president, empowering him, in case he judged
it necessary to the preservation of the royal authority, to
confirm Pizarro in the government, "it being little matter if the
Devil ruled there, provided the country remained to the Crown!"
The fact was so reported by Paniagua, who continued in Peru after
these events. (Com. Real., Parte 2, lib. 5, cap. 5.) This is
possible. But it is more probable that a credulous gossip, like
Garcilasso, should be in error, than that Charles the Fifth
should have been prepared to make such an acknowledgment of his
imbecility, or that the man selected for Gasca's confidence
should have so indiscreetly betrayed his trust.]
It was not long after the departure of Paniagua, that Pizarro
received tidings of the defection of Aldana and Hinojosa, and of
the surrender of the fleet, on which he had expended an immense
sum, as the chief bulwark of his power. This unwelcome
intelligence was followed by accounts of the further defection of
some of the principal towns in the north, and of the
assassination of Puelles, the faithful lieutenant to whom he had
confided the government of Quito. It was not very long, also,
before he found his authority assailed in the opposite quarter at
Cuzco; for Centeno, the loyal chieftain who, as the reader may
remember, had been driven by Carbajal to take refuge in a cave
near Arequipa, had issued from his concealment after remaining
there a year, and, on learning the arrival of Gasca, had again
raised the royal standard.
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