Andes, and they vanish like shadows, to reappear a few days later like a swarm of locusts.”
“My sister exaggerates a little,” said the Marquis, smiling. “They are not so very dangerous, after all.”
“But you yourself are worried, Christobal. You have just said so.”
“Only because there might be some rioting....”
“Have they got it in them?” asked Mr. Montgomery. “They seem so nerveless....”
“They are not all like that.... Yes, we have had one or two native rebellions, but it was never anything very serious.”
“How many of them are there in the country?” put in Dick.
“About two-thirds of the population,” answered Maria-Teresa. “But they are no more capable of really rebelling than they are of working properly. It is the Garcia business that has unsettled them, coming after a long period of quiet.” She turned to her father. “What does the President think of it all?”
“He does not seem to worry a great deal. This Indian unrest recurs every ten years.”
“Why every ten years?” demanded Uncle Francis.
“Because of the Sun Festival,” said old Irene. “The Quichuas hold it every ten years.”
“Where?” Dick took a sudden interest. “Nobody knows,” replied Aunt Agnes, in a nervously strangled voice. “There are sacrifices… and the ashes of the victims are thrown into rivers and streams… to carry away the sins of the nation, the Indians believe.”
“That is really very interesting!” exclaimed Uncle Francis.
“Some of the sacrifices are human,” half groaned the old lady, dropping her head to her plate.
“Human sacrifices!”
“Oh, Auntie!” laughed Maria-Teresa.
“Curious,” remarked the savant. “And there may be some truth in it. I know that they were customary at the Festival of the Sun among the Incas. And Prescott makes it clear that the Quichuas have kept not only the language of their ancestors, but also many of the ancient customs.”
“Yes, but they became Christians when the Spaniards conquered their country,” suggested Dick.
“Not that that affects them much,” commented the Marquis. “It gives them two religions instead of one, and they have mixed up the rites and beliefs of the two in a most amazing fashion.”
“What do they want to do, then? Re-build the Empire of the Incas?”
“They don’t know what they want,” replied Maria-Teresa. “In the days of the Incas every living being in the Empire had to work, were practically the slaves of the Sons of Sun. When that iron discipline was removed they gradually learned to do nothing but sleep. Of course, that meant poverty and misery, which they attribute, not to their laziness, but to the fact that they are no longer ruled by the descendants of Mono-Capac! From what Huascar told me, they still hope for a return of the old kings.”
“And they still go in for human sacrifice?” asked Dick.
“Of course not! What absolute nonsense!” Aunt Agnes and Irene both turned to Uncle Francis.
“Maria-Teresa was brought up abroad, and does not know.... She cannot know.... But she is wrong to laugh at what she calls ‘all these old stories.’… There is plenty of proof, and we are sure of it.... Every ten years—all great events were decennial among the Incas—every ten years, the Quichua Indians offer a bride to the Sun.”
“A bride to the Sun?” exclaimed Uncle Francis, half horrified, half incredulous.
“Yes… they sacrifice a young girl in one of those horrible Inca temples of theirs, where no stranger has ever gone!… It is terrible, but it is true.”
“Really… it is so difficult to believe.... Do you mean to say that they kill her?”
“They do… as a sacrifice to the Sun.”
“But how? By fire?”
“No, it is even more horrible than that. Death by fire is only for far more unimportant ceremonies. At the Interaymi, they wall up their victim alive.... And it is always a Spanish girl.... They kidnap one, as beautiful and of as good family as possible. It is vengeance against the race that destroyed theirs.”
Maria-Teresa was frankly laughing at her aunt’s intense seriousness, only equaled by gravity with which Uncle Francis listened. The savant looked at her smiling face half disapprovingly, and brought his scientific knowledge to the defense of the old ladies. Everything they said corresponded perfectly with what well-known writers and explorers had been able to discover about the Virgins of the Sun. There was no doubt that human sacrifice had been rife among the Incas, both in honor of the Sun and for the King himself, many of the victim» going to the altar of their own free will. This was particularly the case when an Inca died—it was like Suttee of the East.
“Prescott and Wiener, the greatest authorities on the subject, are agreed,” said Uncle Francis. “Prescott tells us that at one royal burial, more than a thousand people, wives, maids and servants of the Inca, were sacrificed on his tomb.”
Aunt Agnes shuddered, while Irene, bending her head, made the sign of the Cross.
“All this is very true, my dear sir,” said Don Christobal, carrying on the conversation, “and I see that our Geographical Society here will be able to give you very little that is new to you. Would it interest you to visit our latest excavations at Ancon to-morrow? There is ample proof there that Suttee was practised among the Incas.”
“What exactly were these Virgins of the Sun?” asked Dick, turning to his uncle, who, delighted to be able to show his erudition, at once launched into an explanation.
“The Virgins of the Sun, or the ‘elected ones,’ as they were called, were young girls, vowed to the service of the divinity. They were taken from their families as children, and put into convents where they were placed under the care of women called mammaconas,—girls who had grown old in these monasteries. Under the guidance of these venerable matrons, the virgins were taught their religious duties, weaving and embroidery were their chief occupations, and it was they who made the fine vicuna wool for the hangings of the temples and the Inca’s home and attire.”
“Yes,” said gray-haired Irene, “but their chief duty was to guard the sacred fire acquired anew by the temple at each Raymi festival.”
“That is so,” replied the savant. “They lived absolutely alone. From the moment they entered the home, they were entirely cut off from their families and friends. The Inca alone, and his queen, the Coya, were allowed within the sacred precincts. The most rigid discipline and supervision were exercised over them.”
“And woe to the girl who transgressed,” added Aunt Irene. “By Inca law she was buried alive, while the town or village from which she came was razed to the ground and ‘sown with stones,’ so that all memory of it should be lost.”
“You are perfectly right, madam,” agreed Uncle Francis.
“Sweet country!” Dick exclaimed.
“What an amazing civilization they must have possessed,”
