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The army was well supplied with excellent powder; and Gonzalo gave orders that every soldier should have either a horse or a mule to ride upon during a march. In the equipment of this army, Gonzalo expended above half a million of crowns.
He sought to overcome these difficulties; but the process was a slow one, and in the course of it, spurred also by increased proofs of his lieutenant's perfidy, Ferdinand lost patience, and determined the case having grown urgent to go to Naples in person to deal with Gonzalo. Plainly, Cesare's good fortune, which once had been proverbial, had now utterly deserted him.
On his arrival at Arequipa, Gonzalo found that city entirely deserted, as most of the inhabitants had gone to join Diego Centeno after that officer got possession of Cuzco.
Through his father Gonzalo d'Albuquerque, the Lord of Villaverde, he was descended, but illegitimately, from King Diniz; and through his mother from the Menezez, the great explorers. Brought up at the court of Alphonzo V., he there received as liberal and thorough an education as was possible at the period.
"That captain was lodged with his brother Gonzalo in one of the large halls built by the Incas for public diversions, with immense doors of entrance that opened on the plaza. It was garrisoned by about twenty soldiers, who, as the gates were burst open, stood stoutly to the defence of their leader.
He asserted that no person in Peru could take upon him to determine whether the audience had acted right or otherwise in conferring the government on Gonzalo; and that it was the duty of all to support him in that office, till they received the ulterior orders of the sovereign.
Gonzalo was so much convinced by these arguments, that he countermanded the order given to the licentiate Carvajal, and sent off Juan d'Acosta on the expedition to Caxamarca, with a force of two hundred and eighty men.
Gonzalo Pizarro had not hitherto carried his pretensions so high, having only insisted for the departure of the viceroy from Peru, and the suspension of the obnoxious regulations, and the judges were much at a loss how to conduct themselves under this new and unexpected demand.
These two captains found, already settled on the table-land of Cundirumarca, the famous Adelantado Gonzalo Ximenez de Queseda, one of whose descendants I saw near Zipaquira, with bare feet, attending cattle. The fortuitous meeting of the three conquistadores, one of the most extraordinary and dramatic events of the history of the conquest, took place in 1538.
It was on his arm that Gonzalo most leaned in the hour of danger; and well had it been for him, if he had profiled by his counsels at an earlier period. It gives one some idea of the luxurious accommodations of Pizarro's forces, that he endeavored to provide each of his musketeers with a horse. The expenses incurred by him were enormous.
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