more than just; it was
forbearing, friendly, and magnanimous to a degree. He now sent Almagro
assurance of his friendship, and generously welcomed him to share the
golden field which had been won with very little help from him. Almagro
reached Caxamarca in February, 1533, and was cordially received by his
old companion-in-arms.

The vast ransom--a treasure to which there is no parallel in
history--was now divided. This division in itself was a labor involving
no small prudence and skill. The ransom was not in coin or ingots, but
in plates, vessels, images, and trinkets varying greatly in weight and
in purity. It had to be reduced to something like a common standard.
Some of the most remarkable specimens were saved to send to Spain; the
rest was melted down to ingots by the Indian smiths, who were busy a
month with the task. The result was almost fabulous. There were
1,326,539 _pesos de oro_, commercially worth, in those days, some five
times their weight,--that is, about $6,632,695. Besides this vast sum of
gold there were 51,610 marks of silver, equivalent by the same standard
to $1,135,420 now.

The Spaniards were assembled in the public square of Caxamarca. Pizarro
prayed that God would help him to divide the treasure justly, and the
apportionment began. First, a fifth of the whole great golden heap was
weighed out for the king of Spain, as Pizarro had promised in the
_capitulacion_. Then the conquerors took their shares in the order of
their rank. Pizarro received 57,222 _pesos de oro_, and 2,350 marks of
silver, besides the golden chair of Atahualpa, which weighed $25,000.
Hernando his brother got 31,080 _pesos de oro_, and 2,350 marks of
silver. De Soto had 17,749 _pesos de oro_, and 724 marks of silver.
There were sixty cavalrymen, and most of them received 8,880 _pesos de
oro_, and 362 marks of silver. Of the one hundred and five infantry,
part got half as much as the cavalry each, and part one fourth less.
Nearly $100,000 worth of gold was set aside to endow the first church in
Peru,--that of St. Francis. Shares were also given Almagro and his
followers, and the men who had stayed behind at San Miguel. That Pizarro
succeeded in making an equitable division is best evidenced by the
absence of any complaints,--and his associates were not in the habit of
keeping quiet under even a fancied injustice. Even his defamers have
never been able to impute dishonesty to the gallant conqueror of Peru.

To put in more gra