SECTION IV.

Continuation of the Troubles in Peru, to the Viceroyalty of the Marquis de Cannete.

On the 13th of November 1553, a splendid wedding was celebrated at Cuzco, between Alonzo de Loyasa, one of the richest inhabitants of the city, and Donna Maria de Castilla, at which all the citizens and their wives attended in their best apparel.  After dinner an entertainment was made in the street, in which horsemen threw balls of clay at each other, which I saw from the top of a wall opposite the house of Alonzo de Loyasa; and I remember to have seen Francisco Hernandez Giron sitting on a chair in the hall, with his arms folded on his breast and his eyes cast down, the very picture of melancholy, being then probably contemplating the transactions in which he was to engage that night.  In the evening, when the sports were over, the company sat down to supper in a lower hall, where at the least sixty gentlemen were at table, the ladies being by themselves in an inner room, and from a small court-yard between these apartments, the dishes were served to both tables.  Don Balthazar de Castillo, uncle to the bride, acted as usher of the hall at this entertainment.  I came to the house towards the end of supper, to attend my father and stepmother home at night.  I went to the upper end of the hall, where the governor sat, who was pleased to make me sit down on the chair beside him, and reached me some comfits and sweet drink, with which boys are best pleased, I being then fourteen years of age.

At this instant some once knocked at the door, saying that Francisco Hernandez Giron was there; on which Don Balthazar de Castillo, who was near the door ordered the door to be opened.  Giron immediately rushed in, having a drawn sword in his right hand, and a buckler on his left arm; accompanied by a companion on each side armed with partizans.  The guests rose in great terror at this unexpected interruption, and Giron addressed them in these words:  “Gentlemen be not afraid, nor stir from your places, as we are all engaged in the present enterprize.”  The governor, Gil Ramirez, immediately retired into the apartment of the ladies, by a door on the left hand.  Another door led from the hall to the kitchen and other offices; and by these two doors a considerable number of the guests made their escape.  Juan Alonzo Palomino, who was obnoxious to Giron for having opposed him in a late mutiny, was slain by Diego de Alvarado the lawyer.  Juan de Morales, a rich merchant and very honest man, was slain while endeavouring to put out the candles.  My father and a number of others, to the number in all of thirty-six, made their escape by means of a ladder from the court-yard of Loyasa into that of the adjoining house, in which I accompanied them, but the governor could not be persuaded to follow them, and was made prisoner by the rebels.  My father and all the companions of his flight agreed to leave the town that night, and endeavour to escape to Lima.