The Last Inca (Volume 1); Or, the Story of Tupac Amaru (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1874. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... THE LAST INCA; STORY OF TUPAC AMARU. CHAPTER THE FIRST. "Alas, poor country Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot Be called our mother, but our grave: where nothing, But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile; Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks that rend the air, Are made, not mark'd; where silent sorrow seems A modern ecstacy: the dead man's knell Is there scarce ask'd, for who; and good men's lives Expire before the flowers in their caps, Dying or ere they sicken."--Macbeth, act iv., sc. 3. DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF TELLING THE STORY -- THE CITY OF LIMA -- A NOBLE MARCHIONESS --HER HUSBAND -- HIS SECRET MISSION, AND HIS VIOLENT DEATH --A GARDEN FOR A GRAVE -- WITH A FEW SOBER FACTS CONCERNING TREES WHICH SEEM LIKE FICTION. F we journey in the land of the Pyramids we need no guide or dragoman, for the Pyramids are their own best storytellers. We travel Vol. 1. 1 through all the land of Egypt and are at home, although we speak neither Italian nor the language of the Copt. Every town and city, village and ruin, has its story written on its face more plainly than it has ever been printed in type. But we had heard its outlines before--maybe, in childhood -- and we stand before those hoary monuments like one who stands beside his friend who is in the act of recovering his life from the grasp of death. If we journey in the land of the Incas, with its mountains reaching to a far higher sky than ever spanned the land of the Pharaohs; where nature is so stupendous that man has not dared to call her by any familiar names; where the hills have no mist, no known history, and no character, except that of size to distinguish them from each other; where the rivers are as deso DEGREES late as deserts, and the desert is part of the highway--there a guide becomes a friend, and ...