to Peru is fuller and more complete than that which relates to Mexico; so
that there is scarcely a nook or corner so obscure, in the path of the
adventurer, that some light has not been thrown on it by the written
correspondence of the period. The historian has rather had occasion to
complain of the embarras des richesses; for, in the multiplicity of
contradictory testimony, it is not always easy to detect the truth, as the
multiplicity of cross-lights is apt to dazzle and bewilder the eye of the
spectator.

The present History has been conducted on the same general plan with
that of the Conquest of Mexico. In an Introductory Book, I have
endeavored to portray the institutions of the Incas, that the reader may be
acquainted with the character and condition of that extraordinary race,
before he enters on the story of their subjugation. The remaining books
are occupied with the narrative of the Conquest. And here, the subject, it
must be allowed, notwithstanding the opportunities it presents for the
display of character, strange, romantic incident, and picturesque scenery,
does not afford so obvious advantages to the historian, as the Conquest
of Mexico. Indeed, few subjects can present a parallel with that, for the
purposes either of the historian or the poet. The natural development of
the story, there, is precisely what would be prescribed by the severest
rules of art. The conquest of the country is the great end always in the
view of the reader. From the first landing of the Spaniards on the soil,
their subsequent adventures, their battles and negotiations, their ruinous
retreat, their rally and final siege, all tend to this grand result, till the
long series is closed by the downfall of the capital. In the march of
events, all moves steadily forward to this consummation. It is a
magnificent epic, in which the unity of interest is complete.

In the "Conquest of Peru," the action, so far as it is founded on the