Explore "The Spanish Pioneers" by Charles Fletcher Lummis on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Certainly no army ever marched in the face of more hopeless odds. Against the countless thousands of the Peruvians, Pizarro had one hundred and seventy-seven men. Only sixty-seven of these had horses. In the whole command there were but three guns; and only twenty men had even cross-bows; all the others were armed with sword, dagger, and lance. A pretty array, truly, to conquer what was an empire in size though not in organization!
Five days out from San Miguel, Pizarro paused to rest. Here he noticed that the seeds of discontent were among his followers; and he adopted a remedy characteristic of the man. Drawing up his company, he addressed them in friendly fashion. He said he wished San Miguel might be better guarded; its garrison was very small. If there were any now who would rather not proceed to the unknown dangers of the interior, they were at perfect liberty to return and help guard San Miguel, where they should have the same grants of land as the others, besides sharing in the final profits of the conquest.