THE SON OF ASTORPILCO. 259 



from political motives, caused the body to be buried at 

 Quito, with solemn obsequies. 



Humboldt found descendants of the monarch, the 

 family of the Indian Cacique Astorpilco, dwelling in 

 Caxamarca, among the melancholy ruins of ancient 

 departed splendour, and living in great poverty and pri- 

 vation ; but patient and uncomplaining. The son of 

 Cacique Astorpilco, a pleasing and friendly youth of 

 seventeen, who accompanied Humboldt over the ruins of 

 the palace of his ancestor, while living in extreme 

 poverty, had filled his imagination with images of buried 

 splendour and golden treasures hidden beneath the 

 masses of rubbish upon which they trod. He related to 

 the traveller that one of his more immediate forefathers 

 had bound his wife's eyes, and then conducted her 

 through many labyrinths cut in the rock into the subter- 

 ranean garden of the Incas. There she saw, skilfully 

 and elaborately imitated, and formed of the purest gold, 

 artificial trees, with leaves and fruit, and birds sitting on 

 the branches; and there too was the much sought for 

 golden travelling chair of Atahuallpa. The man com- 

 manded his wife not to touch any of these enchanted 

 riches, because the long foretold period of the restoration 

 of the empire had not yet arrived, and that whoever 

 should attempt before that time to appropriate any of 

 them would die that very night. These golden dreams 

 and fancies of the youth were founded on recollections 

 and traditions of former days. These artificial golden 

 gardens were often described by actual eye-witnesses, 

 Cieza de Leon Sarmiento, Garcilaso, and other early his- 

 torians of the Conquest. They were found beneath the 

 Temple of the Sun at Cuzco, in Caxamarca, and in the 



