Charles Kingsley says there were "cruelties and miseries unexampled
in the history of Christendom, or perhaps on earth, save in the
conquests of Sennacherib and Zinghis-Khan." Millions perished at the
forced labor of the mines, The Incan Empire had, it is calculated, a
population of twenty millions at the arrival of the Spaniards, In two
centuries the population fell to four millions.
When the groans of these beasts of burden reached the ears of the
good (?) Queen Isabel of Spain, she enacted a law that throughout her
new dominions no Indian, man or woman, should be compelled to carry
more than three hundred pounds' weight at one load! Is it cause for
wonder that the poor, down-trodden natives, seeing the flaunting flag
of Spain, with its stripe of yellow between stripes of red, should
regard it as representing a river of gold between two rivers of
blood?
"Not infrequently," said a reliable witness, "I have seen the
Spaniards, long after the Conquest, amuse themselves by hunting down
the natives with blood hounds, for mere sport, or in order to train
their dogs to the game. The most unbounded scope was given to
licentiousness. The young maiden was torn remorselessly from the arms
of her family to gratify the passion of her brutal conqueror. The
sacred houses of the Virgins of the Sun were broken open and
violated, and the cavalier swelled his harem with a troop of Indian
girls, making it seem that the crescent would have been a more
fitting emblem for his banner than the immaculate cross."
With the inexorable conqueror came the more inexorable priest.
"Attendance at Roman Catholic worship was made compulsory. Men and
women with small children were compelled to journey as much as
thirty-six miles to attend mass. Absentees were punished, therefore
the Indian feared to disobey." [Footnote: Neely, "Spanish America."]
As is well known, the ancient inhabitants worshipped the sun and the
moon. The Spanish priest, in order to gain proselytes with greater
facility, did not forbid this worship, but placed the crucifix
between the two. Where the Inca suns and moons were of solid gold and
silver, they were soon replaced by painted wooden ones. The crucifix,
with sun and moon images on each side, is common all over Bolivia
to-day.
Now, four hundred years later, see the Indian under priestly rule.
The following is taken from an official report of the Governor of
Chimborazo: "The religious festivals that the Indians celebrate - not
of their own will, but by the inexorable will of the priest - are,
through the manner in which they are kept, worse than those described
to us of the times of Paganism, and of monstrous consequences to
morality and the national welfare ... they may be reckoned as a
barbarous mixture of idolatry and superstition, sustained by infamous
avarice.
