In this trying position the Spaniards were at no loss for an excuse for a line of conduct which might justify the measure on which their chief had resolved. In the face of their experience and of all probabilities, a general Peruvian rising was invented; and notwithstanding that the _Inca_ had paid a ransom estimated as equivalent to three million and a half pounds sterling, he was put upon his trial on charges the most absurd, and respecting which, as the circumstances stated had occurred before their arrival, the Spaniards had in any case no pretence of jurisdiction. These, however, had involved themselves so deeply that they had scarcely a choice but to wade on through crime to crime. The _Inca_ was condemned to death, and, to keep up the grim farce to the end, his sentence was finally commuted from being burnt alive to strangulation, on condition of his professing himself a Christian. The Dominican Valverde, who had consented to his execution, has the credit of this conversion. The death of the _Inca_ proved, as was to be expected, the signal for disorders throughout _Peru_. The late monarch had, indeed, by his own proceedings at the time of his victory over his brother, paved the way for such a result; for he had given orders to exterminate all members of the Imperial house. The Peruvian empire, with its civilization, which it had cost so much to build up, and which was perhaps equivalent to that of Japan, was now at an end. The provinces remote from _Cuzco_ lost no time in shaking off their allegiance. Early in September, Pizarro and his followers, by this time amounting to about five hundred men, set out for the Peruvian capital, taking with them a younger brother of Atahualpa, whom they set up as the nominal _Inca_. Their march was a severe one; and at _Xauxa_ they had to encounter the opposition of a numerous but impotent force. From this moment their progress was disputed; and it might have fared hardly with De Soto, who was sent on in advance, had he not, while encompassed by the Peruvians after a desperate engagement in the _Sierra_, received timely succour from Almagro. At _Xauxa_ Pizarro left a small garrison of forty men, who were to guard the treasure, which he did not think it prudent to take with him on the march. [Sidenote: 1533.]