reat formality once more he bound
the Prince's Fringe about his brow. As he did this, he said these words:

"Soon, O Prince Kari, you must change this yellow circlet for that which
I wear, and take with it all the burden of empire, for know that as
quickly as may be I purpose to withdraw to my palace at Yucay, there to
make my peace with God before I am called hence to dwell in the Mansions
of the Sun."

When he had finished Kari did homage to his father, and in that quiet,
even voice of his, told his tale of the wrongs that he had suffered
at the hands of Urco his brother and of how he had escaped, living but
maddened, from his hate. He told also how he had wandered across the
sea, though of England he said nothing, and been saved from misery and
death by myself, a very great person in my own country. Still, since I
had suffered wrong there, as he, Kari, had in his, he had persuaded me
to accompany him back to his own land, that there my wisdom might shine
upon its darkness, and owing to my divine and magical gifts hither we
had come in safety. Lastly, he asked the assembled priests and lords if
they were content to accept him as the Inca to be, and to stand by him
in any war that Urco might wage against him.

To this they answered that they were content and would stand by him.

Then followed many other rites such as the informing of the dead
Incas, one by one, of this solemn declaration, through the mouth of the
high-priest, and the offering of many prayers to them and to the Sun
their father. So long were these prayers with the chants from choirs
hidden in side chapels by which they were interspersed, that the day
drew towards its close before all was done.

Thus it came about that the dusk was gathering when the Inca, followed
by Kari, myself, the priests, and all the congregation, left the temple
to present Kari as the heir to the throne to the vast crowd which waited
upon the open square outside its doors.

Here the ceremony went on. The Inca and most of us, for there was not
space for all, although we were packed as closely together as Hastings
herrings in a basket, took our stand upon a platform that was surrounded
by a marvellous cable made of links of solid gold which, it was said,
needed fifty men to lift it from the ground. Then Upanqui, whose
strength seemed restored to him, perhaps because of some drug that he
had eaten, or under the spur of this great event, stepped forward to the
edge of the low pl