glance, as it were, embrace the whole results of the national industry, and
see how far they corresponded with the requisitions of government.36

Such are some of the most remarkable features of the Peruvian
institutions relating to property, as delineated by writers who, however
contradictory in the details, have a general conformity of outline. These
institutions are certainly so remarkable, that it is hardly credible they
should ever have been enforced throughout a great empire, and for a long
period of years. Yet we have the most unequivocal testimony to the fact
from the Spaniards, who landed in Peru in time to witness their
operation; some of whom, men of high judicial station and character,
were commissioned by the government to make investigations into the
state of the country under its ancient rulers.

The impositions on the Peruvian people seem to have been sufficiently
heavy. On them rested the whole burden of maintaining, not only their
own order, but every other order in the state. The members of the royal
house, the great nobles, even the public functionaries, and the numerous
body of the priesthood, were all exempt from taxation.37 The whole
duty of defraying the expenses of the government belonged to the
people. Yet this was not materially different from the condition of things
formerly existing in most parts of Europe, where the various privileged
classes claimed exemption--not always with success, indeed--from
bearing part of the public burdens. The great hardship in the case of the
Peruvian was, that he could not better his condition. His labors were for
others, rather than for himself. However industrious, he could not add a
rood to his own possessions, nor advance himself one hair's breadth in
the social scale. The great and universal motive to honest industry, that
of bettering one's lot, was lost upon him. The great law of human
progress was not for him. As he was born, so he was to die. Even his