123 



its first eruption, ejected far off a stony mass ; 

 which, like the cap of a dome, covered the enor- 

 mous cavity, that contains the subterraneous fire. 

 Some pretend, that this extraordinary catas- 

 trophe took place a short time after the invasion 

 of the kingdom of Quito by the Inca Tupac 

 Yupanqui ; and that the rock, which is sketched 

 in the tenth plate to the left of the volcano, is 

 called the head of the Inca, because its fall was 

 the ominous presage of the death of the con- 

 queror. Others, still more credulous, affirm, 

 that this mass of porphyry with basis of pitch- 

 stone* was displaced in an explosion, that 

 happened at the very moment when the Inca 

 Atahualpa was strangled by the Spaniards at 

 Caxamarca. It seems indeed certain, that an 

 eruption of Cotopaxi took place when the army 

 of Pedro Alvarado marched from Puerto Viejo to 

 the elevated plains of Quito ; although Piedro 

 de Cieca *f and Garcilasso de la Vega^ do not 

 name the mountain, that threw out ashes, the 

 sudden fail of which affrighted the Spaniards. 

 But to adopt the* opinion, that at this epocha, 

 for the first time, the rock called the Cabeza del 

 Inca took its present place, we must suppose, 

 that Cotopaxi had no former eruptions ; a sup- 



* Pechstein-porphyr, Werner. 



% Chronica del Peru, 1554, ch. 41, fo!. 109. 



% Comeritarios Reales, lib. 2, ch. 2, vol. 2, p. 69. 



