14 



MONUMENTS OF ANCIENT PERU. 



of Cambyses could not prevent many inestimable remains of 

 Egyptian learning from being handed down to the present 

 times, so is the utter annihilation of the monuments of the 

 Yncas far from having been accomplished. Their ruins are every 

 where to be found ; and, in the midst of the ravages they have 

 suffered, offer sufficient materials to form an estimate of the 

 arts, sciences, and policy, of those by whom they were raised. 



The famous obelisks and statues of Tiahuanacu * ; together 

 with the mausolea of Chahapoyas-f- ; works destined to chal- 

 lenge 



tered in the air his respedtable ashes. Don Pedro de la Gasca, a virtuous Spaniard, 

 ■whose name ought to be engraven on all the public monuments of Peru, punished 

 this and the other crimes of the perfidious Pizarro, by causing him to be decapitated 

 beside the monument he had so scandalously outraged. The foreign writers who 

 dwell so pertinaciously on the horrors which attended the conquest of Peru, when 

 they exaggerate the miscondudi: of some of the early adventurers, ought not to forget 

 the heroism and virtues of this learned president, and of many others, who, by imi- 

 tating his example, have not only wiped away the national stains on this score, but 

 have also rendered the Spanish name illustrious by their valour and heroic deeds. 



* This town, situated on the confines of the city of la Paz, is unquestionably an- 

 terior to the monarchy of the Yncas, notwithstanding one of them bestowed on it its 

 present name, the origin of which is said to be as follows: the Ynca fell in there 

 with a messenger, whose dispatch in travelling was so great, that it might be com- 

 pared to the swiftness of the huanaco, an animal having some degree of resemblance 

 to the bouqueiln, or wild goat of the Alps. The Ynca, alluding to this circum- 

 stance, said to the messenger, when he was brought into his presence, Tia-Huanaco^ 

 be seated, huanaco. To perpetuate the remembrance of the celerity of the mes- 

 senger, and the condescension of the monarch, this name was substituted to the one 

 the place originally bore. The formidable pyramid it contains, and the colossal 

 statues of stone, together with a variety of human figures nicely cut out of the same 

 substance, althi u^h decayed by time, point out that this monument belonged to 

 -some gigantic nation. 



t The province of Chahapoyas contains buildings of stone, of a conical shape, 



supporting 



