With another glance at his ragged and disreputable garments,
Harry smilingly admitted the desirability of the change, and followed
Tiahuana into the chamber where Arima, now formally confirmed in his
rank and position of chief valet and body servant of the new Inca,
awaited his master. Ten minutes later, attired in white skin-tight
pantaloons which were also stockings; a shirt of white wool, of so
marvellously fine a texture that it was thin, soft, and light as silk; a
fine white wool sleeveless tunic, the material of which was stiff and
almost completely hidden by an elaborately embroidered pattern in heavy
gold thread, and which was confined to the waist by a broad white
leather belt, also heavily embroidered in gold and fastened by a massive
and exquisitely chased gold clasp; with soft, white, gold-embroidered
boots on his feet, reaching halfway up to the knee; with the royal
borla, or tasselled fringe of scarlet adorned with two feathers from the
coraquenque bound round his temples, and the emerald collar of Manco
Capac--which he had fished up from the mud of Lake Chinchaycocha--round
his neck and hanging down over the breast of his tunic, young Escombe
was led by Tiahuana into the largest room in the house. Here, seated
upon an extemporised throne, and with his feet resting upon a footstool
of solid gold, massively chiselled in an elaborate and particularly
graceful scroll-work pattern, hastily brought in from the imperial
litter, he presently received not only Umu, the captain of the royal
bodyguard, but also some half-dozen other nobles who had come from the
City of the Sun to pay their homage to their re-incarnated Lord and
Sovereign, Manco Capac.

These individuals were introduced, one by one, by Tiahuana, who, as each
person presented himself in the doorway, loudly proclaimed the rank and
titles of the visitor, who then, barefooted, and carrying a light burden
upon his shoulders as an act of humility in the presence of his
sovereign, slowly advanced, with head and body humbly bent, until he
reached the footstool, when he knelt down on the bare stone floor and
kissed, first the hands and then the feet of the young Inca; after
which, still kneeling, he murmured a few words expressive of joy,
gratitude, and devotion at the condescension of the great Manco in
deigning to return to earth for the purpose of regenerating the ancient
Peruvian nation. Then he rose to his feet and, with more bows, retired
to make w