melancholy was increased when he saw in the sky a meteor, similar to one which, he exclaimed, "had been seen in the skies a short time before the death of his father, Huayna Capac." The arrival of so great an addition to their force made the men under Pizarro wish to leave their present quarters, and march at once towards the capital, where they expected to meet with much more gold than they had hitherto seen.

The remainder of the history of Atahuallpa is a very melancholy one. On pretence that he had instigated his people to take up arms against the white men, though as yet they had shown no signs of insurrection, Pizarro's men demanded his death, and their commander either could not, or would not, interfere in his behalf. He was therefore subjected to a mock trial, for certain crimes alleged against him-the principal of which were that he had usurped the crown and assassinated his brother Huascar, and had attempted to excite a rebellion against the Spaniards.

In vain did the Inca plead that his life should be spared; either Pizarro had no power to save him when the army voted his death, or he willingly sacrificed him to his ambition. The barbarous deed was done, and on the 29th August, 1533, perished the last of the Incas. Before his execution he was diligently attended by Valverde, the priest, who at his last hour conjured him to renounce his own religion and receive Baptism, holding out to him as an inducement, a milder form of punishment than that to which he had been condemned. He was baptized by the name of Juan de Atahuallpa, and afterwards strangled in the great square, instead of being burnt to death, as had been previously arranged.

When Hernando de Soto returned from visiting the neighbouring country, where it was reported that the people were rising (the Inca was put to death in the absence of his best friend), he told his countrymen how quietly and peaceably disposed he had found all the natives; and yet the Chief had

been condemned on the charge of having incited them to insurrection!

Pizarro assumed the title of general, and retained all the real power in his own hands, but gave to the young Prince Manco, who was brother to the unfortunate Huascar who had been murdered, the title of Inca, hoping, by means of the veneration with which the Peruvians regarded their rulers, to keep them in quiet submission to his usurpations. He soon after proceeded with the new Inca to Cuzco, the capital, where the ceremonies of his coronation were solemnly observed.

Manco was at first a mere tool in Pizarro's hands, and was long kept in confinement. When he contrived at last to effect his escape, he became a troublesome adversary to the Spaniards, for he instigated his subjects to a rebellion, and for a time it was doubtful whether he would not succeed in overthrowing the Spanish dominion in Peru.

He blockaded the Spaniards in his capital, Cuzco, which soon after became the scene of a terrible conflagration, the work of the Indians themselves. They contrived, by means of red-hot stones and burning arrows, to set the roofs of the houses on fire, and the conflagration soon spread to all parts of the city. Long and fiercely the flames raged, and the unfortunate Spaniards remained cooped up in the open space of the Plaza, but almost suffocated by the intense heat, and the clouds of smoke in which they were enveloped. In the battle which subsequently ensued between the Peruvians and Spaniards, Pizarro's brother Juan lost his life while leading on his men to the recovery of an important fortress above the city of Cuzco. But with the siege of Cuzco terminated the reign of the Inca Manco; for though he continued for some time after a dreaded foe of the Spaniards, from the security in which he lived among the mountain fastnesses, whence he often made desperate attacks upon them in unguarded moments, he was a wanderer in the land of his fathers, and at last was massacred by a party of Spaniards.

The remaining years of Pizarro's life were passed in continual war and fighting. These were civil wars, where Spaniard fought against Spaniard; and the men who had together shared so much peril and suffering in reaching that land, were the first to excite contentions among their followers. Almagro and Pizarro had never been quite friendly since the latter went to Spain with their petition to the Emperor, and their animosity increased when they found a subject ripe for dispute. This was the possession of what remained of Cuzco after the fire, and it was by turns the stronghold of the rival conquerors. In the end, Almagro was taken prisoner by Hernando Pizarro when he was reduced to a very feeble state by illness. His fate was soon decided, for he was already condemned by the Pizarros, and shortly after his capture he was strangled in prison.

His cruel death was not forgotten by his followers, the "Men of Chili" (as they were afterwards called, from a successful expedition they had made into the part of the country which was thus distinguished); Francisco Pizarro was the object of their revenge, and they entered into a conspiracy to murder him one day as he returned from church. He had not been well, and consequently remained at home, instead of attending the service as it was expected he would do. The conspirators gained admission to his house, and attacked him as he sat with a few friends after dinner. In the hour of danger his friends deserted him, and he alone, with his half-brother, Martinez de Alcantara, resisted the blows of the conspirators; but being overcome by superior force, Pizarro received a wound which proved his last. He was buried secretly, and remained in an obscure corner till some years after, when tranquillity was restored to his country, his remains were placed in a sumptuous coffin, and, in 1607, were removed to the new cathedral.

After his death his brothers continued to rule in Peru; but endless were the wars between them and the opposing Spanish

factions. Subsequently viceroys were sent from Spain to quell the tumults, and restore peace to the empire. The efforts of one of these were particularly successful, and the name of Gasca was long held in reverence by both Peruvians and Spaniards.

CHAPTER VI.

ADMIRAL LORD COLLINGWOOD.

AMONG the many distinguished characters whose actions are chronicled in the annals of our Naval History, there are none more eminent, none whose virtues and talents have shed a more brilliant lustre on their country, than Admiral Lord Collingwood.

His ancestors are said to have been celebrated for the active part they took in the border wars, and to have suffered greatly at different times, from the indulgence of their martial spirit. During the reign of Queen Elizabeth, one of them was, with other knights and nobles, taken prisoner by the Scotch, and the Admiral's great-grandfather and name-sake, Cuthbert Collingwood, took up arms in the cause of Charles the First, which was the means of his losing large estates in the county of Durham. In later times, George Collingwood, at that period the head of the family, actuated by the same devotion to the house of Stuart, engaged in the Rebellion of 1715, and being taken prisoner, was put to death, and his lands forfeited to the crown. From these, and other circumstances by which the remaining possessions of the family had passed to a younger branch, the father of the subject of this memoir inherited but a very moderate fortune.

Cuthbert Collingwood, was born on the 26th of September, 1750, at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and was sent to a school in that town, under the superintendence of the Rev. Hugh

Moises. Here he met, among other boys natives of the same place, Lord Stowell and the Earl of Eldon, who afterwards spoke of remembering Collingwood as a pretty and gentle boy.

When only eleven years old, he entered the royal navy under the care of his cousin, Captain (afterwards Admiral) Brathwaite. He used to relate that when he first went to sea, he was overcome with grief at the separation from his home and friends; and that as he was sitting weeping and unnoticed, the first-lieutenant observed him, pitied his sorrow, and, interested by his extreme youth, spoke to him in terms of great kindness and encouragement. "This so won my heart," says Collingwood, "that, taking the good-natured officer to my box, I offered him a large piece of plumcake which my mother had given me, as a token of my gratitude."

He continued for many years with Captain Brathwaite, to whom he expresses himself as being under great obligations, both for his kind protection and care, and also for the pains he took to improve him in nautical knowledge. He afterwards served under Admiral Roddam, then with Admiral Graves, who made him a lieutenant on the day of the battle at Bunker's Hill, where he, with a party of seamen, was engaged in supplying the army with various necessaries. In 1776, he went to Jamaica as lieutenant of the sloop Hornet, and soon after, the Lowestoffe, of which Lord Nelson was at that time lieutenant, came to the station where he was.

Collingwood had long been on terms of intimate friendship with this great man; and it happened here, that Admiral Parker, the Commander-in-Chief, being a friend of both these young men, whenever Nelson gained a step in rank, Collingwood succeeded him, first in the Lowestoffe, then in the Badger, of which ship he became Commander; and afterwards in the Hinchinbroke, a twenty-eight-gun frigate, which made them both Post-captains. This last vessel was, in the spring of 1780, employed in an expedition undertaken with the view