ews of how affairs were going, and that cacique remained
marvellously satisfied, as did also those who had come with him. And he
[Manco] replied: "Henceforth I shall give you exact information
concerning all that they of Quito do in order that they may not
inconvenience you." And in this manner he took leave of the Governor,
saying: "I am going to fish because I know that tomorrow the Christians
do not eat flesh, and I shall encounter this messenger who tells me that
Quizquiz is going with his men to burn Cuzco and that he is now near at
hand, and I have wished to warn you of it in order that you may fix upon
a remedy." The Governor at once placed all the soldiers upon the alert,
and, although it was already noon, when he knew the needs of the
situation, he did not wish to delay even to eat, but journeyed with all
the Spaniards straight toward Cuzco, which was four leagues from that
place, with the intention of establishing his camp near the city so as
to enter it early the next day. And when he had travelled two leagues,
he saw rise up in the distance a great smoke, and when he asked some
Indians the cause of it, they told him that a squadron of the men of
Quizquiz had come down a mountain and set fire [word missing]. Two
captains went ahead with some forty horsemen to see if they could catch
up with this squadron, which speedily joined with the men of Quizquiz
and the other captains who were on a slope a league in front of Cuzco
waiting for the Christians in a pass close to the road. Seen by the
captains and Spaniards, they [the Indians] could not avoid an encounter
with them, although the Governor had them made to understand that they
[the Spaniards] would wait for the rest to join them, which they would
have done, were it not for the fact that the Indians incited each other
with much spirit to encounter them. And before they [the Spaniards]
could be attacked, they fell upon them on the skirt of a hill, and in a
short time they routed them, forcing them to flee to the mountain and
killing two hundred of them. Another squad of cavalry crossed over
another slope of the mountain where were two or three thousand Indians
who, not having the pluck to wait for them, threw down their lances in
order to be able to run the better, and fled headlong. And after those
first two squads broke and fled, they [the Spaniards] made them flee to
the heights; and [at the same time] two Spanish light horsemen saw
certain Indians return down