Peru Author:William Hickling Prescott Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Normans to the ancient inhabitants of the British Isles. Clustering around the throne, they formed an invincible phalanx to shield it alike from secret conspirac... more »y and open insurrection. Though living chiefly in the capital, they were also distributed throughout the country in all its high stations and strong military posts, thus establishing lines of communication with the court, which enabled the sovereign to act simultaneously and with effect on the most distant quarters of his empire. They possessed, moreover, an intellectual pre-eminence, which, no less than their station, gave them authority with the people. Indeed, it may be said to have been the principal foundation of their authority. The crania of the Inca race show a decided superiority over the other races of the land in intellectual power ; and it cannot be denied that it was the fountain of that peculiar civilization and social polity which raised the Peruvian monarchy above every other state in South America. Whence this remarkable race came, and what was its early history, are among those mysteries that meet us so frequently in the annals of the New World, and which time and the antiquary have as yet done little to explain. CHAPTER II. Orders of the State.—Provisions for Justice.—Division of Lands.—Revenues and Registers.—Great Roads and Posts.—Military Tactics and Policy. If we are surprised at the peculiar and original features of what may be called the Peruvian aristocracy, we shall be still more so as we descend to the lower orders of the community and see the very artificial character of their institutions—as artificial as those of ancient Sparta, and, though in a different way, quite as repugnant to the essential principles of our nature. " Dr. Morton's valuable work contains several engravings of ...« less