the part of the Peruvians, for they had force enough to
overwhelm Hernando and his men in the city, while they held Juan and
Gonzalo in play at Sacsahuaman, in which case all the Spaniards would
eventually have fallen into their hands.

As night fell Hernando left the city and came up to the hill. The
Spaniards busied themselves in making scaling-ladders, and in the
morning, with the aid of the ladders, the assault was resumed with
desperate fury. Wall after wall was carried, and finally the fighting
ranged around the citadel. The Inca had sent five thousand of his best
men to reenforce the defenders, but the Spaniards succeeded in
preventing their entrance to the fort which was now in a sorry plight.
The ammunition--arrows, spears, stone, _et cetera_--of the garrison was
almost spent. The Spanish attack was pressed as rigorously as at the
beginning. The High Priest--priests have ever been among the first to
incite people to war, and among the first to abandon the field of
battle--fled with a great majority of his followers, and escaped by
subterranean passages from the citadel, leaving but a few defenders to
do or die.

First among them was a chief, whose name, unfortunately, has not been
preserved. He was one of those, however, who had drunk of the cup and
pledged himself in the mountains of Yucay. Driven from wall to wall
and from tower to tower, he and his followers made a heroic defense.
The Spanish chroniclers say that when this hero, whose exploits recall
the half-mythical legends of the early Roman Republic, when men were as
demi-gods, saw one of his men falter, he {101} stabbed him and threw
his body upon the Spaniards. At last he stood alone upon the last
tower. The assailants offered him quarter, which he disdained.
Shouting his war-cry of defiance, he dashed his sole remaining weapon
in the faces of the escaladers and then hurled himself bodily upon them
to die on their sword-points. Let him be remembered as a soldier, a
patriot, and a gentleman.

The fortress was gained! Dismayed by the fearful loss that they had
sustained, the Peruvians, who had fought so valiantly, if so
unsuccessfully, withdrew temporarily. Hernando Pizarro was master of
the situation. He employed the few days of respite given him in
gathering supplies and strengthening his position. It was well that he
did so, for in a short time the Peruvians once more appeared around the
city, to which they laid a regular siege.

T