When the Inca ceased there was silence for a space, and he and all about him remained motionless on their knees. Then he rose and stood alone erect amidst the vast kneeling throng, raising his two hands with the Llautu poised between them high above his head. Then he brought it down slowly until the scarlet fringe rested upon his brow, and then, spreading out his arms with the palms of his hands out-turned towards the sun, he said in a loud voice-- “Thus, O Lord and Father of thy chosen people, do I crown myself in accordance with the precept of the Divine Manco, and in obedience to the will of my father and thy servant, who now sees me from the abodes of the Divine Ones, Inca and ruler supreme of thy children and my people throughout this land. “May the glory of my reign be a reflection of thine! May thy strength be in my heart and thy light in my soul, and, even as thy blessings flow from thee to the earth and make it bright and beautiful and fruitful, so may the blessings of my just rule make the homes of my people glad and their lives full of peace and comfort!” When he ceased there was silence again for a space, and those who were standing behind him parted to right and left, and then, from out of the great door of the palace, there came a procession of bearers in two rows, twenty on each side, carrying between them suspended on silver rods the golden throne from which Huayna-Capac had given laws and dispensed justice to his people of the North. Every one of the bearers was a prince of the royal house, for none other than princely hands might touch the throne sanctified by contact with the sacred person of the Inca. They stopped just behind Atahuallpa, who remained standing facing the sun as though unconscious of any mortal presence near him. Then three of the oldest and noblest of the bearers came on each side of him and put their hands under his armpits and loins and feet, and, with no seeming effort, the body of the Inca rose in the air and was borne backwards till it rested in a sitting posture on the throne. At the same instant a great shout of joy and acclamation rose up from hundreds of thousands of throats. It was thrice repeated, and then as it died away the priests and virgins raised the Song of Homage, chanting alternately in strophe and antistrophe the glories of the Inca’s ancestors and his own valiant deeds achieved in the wars of his father. This ended, the Inca sat for a little while, as though absorbed in thought, in the midst of a perfect silence, and then he rose to his feet, and, standing on a broad, massive plate of burnished silver which formed the first step of the throne-seat, he raised his voice and addressed the assembled thousands for the first time as their crowned lord and absolute master.