As Garcilaso de la Vega advanced toward maturity, he became his father’s agent in superintending his estates and acquired much information about Peru through journeys. After his father’s death he determined to go to Spain. Here he was received with kindness by his father’s relatives, and such generosity by others as might be accorded to one born in America. He entered the army of Philip II as a captain, and took part in the campaign against the Moriscos under Don Juan de Austria. On his retirement from active military service, he became a resident of Córdoba, where he was compelled by his poverty to adopt a very modest style of living. He was not only in debt when he left the army, but under a certain cloud of public disfavour by reason of his father’s connexion with Pizarro’s rebellion. It is quite possible that his consciousness of this prejudice deepened his piety for his native land and the kingly race from which he was descended and persuaded him to set forth their virtues and the nobler qualities of their rule, and not to omit the wrongs they had suffered at the hands of the Spaniards. [Sidenote: _Los comentarios reales_] Garcilaso de la Vega’s principal work is _Los comentarios reales_. This was based not only on information acquired during his early life at Cuzco, but also on later contributions made by his former associates in Peru; for as soon as he decided to write this history, he communicated with his old schoolfellows and asked them to help him by sending accounts of the particular conquests which the Incas had made in the provinces of their families. They took up his project and caused to be brought out from the archives the accounts which their relatives possessed, and sent them to him; it was thus, he said, “that I obtained the records of the deeds and conquests of each Inca.”[35] The first part of _Los comentarios reales del Perú_ was published at Lisbon in 1609, and the second part was first published at Córdoba in 1617. The author died in 1617 and was buried in the cathedral of Córdoba. A second edition was published at Madrid in 1723, and a third edition at the same place in 1829.[36] [Sidenote: _La Florida del Inca_] An earlier work by Garcilaso de la Vega, _La Florida del Inca, historia del adelantado Hernando de Soto, gobernador y capitán-general del reino de la Florida, y de otros heroicos caballeros españoles e indios_, was published in Lisbon in 1605. Written in an agreeable style, it was received with great favour, and for it the writer would have been accorded distinction, even if he had not later produced a more important book. Much of the consideration enjoyed by Garcilaso and the popularity of his writings were due to the fact that he revealed to Europeans of his day a hitherto unknown kingdom, and set it before them idealized by the piety and patriotic emotions of an exile.[37] [Sidenote: Markham on Garcilaso] [Sidenote: Garcilaso’s accuracy]