[Illustration: A VIEW OF PAITA FROM THE _MIROIR OOST & WEST INDICAL_, 1621.] the Indians, the sea-rovers buried large amounts of gorgeous plunder in the mysterious islands of the Pacific. Even to this day, syndicates with steam-dredges and suction-pumps are following up the faded charts on which are indicated the spots where piles of doubloons and ducats and pieces-of-eight are stowed away. CHAPTER VII BACKGROUNDS I Here lay Lima under a tropical sun, sparkling with treasure, a wilderness of rich carvings and paintings, whose piles of gold and silver shone through the thick perfume of exotic blossoms. Long caravans, loaded with the wealth of the provinces as well as the produce of sales in the remote interior, filed into Lima, where countless gold-and silver-smiths were awaiting their arrival. Weavers of silks, velvets, and brocades, embroiderers, leather and metal workers, sculptors, artists, makers of glass and porcelain bells--all the most skilled workmen flocked to the capital of New Andalusia, the continent’s center, for there they found no lack of rich materials. Their fancy might fashion uncontrolled, with assurance of eager purchasers. In Lima voyages of discovery to the Isles of Solomon were planned. From Lima pilgrimages were made in search of El Dorado, that luxurious ruler who bathed himself in sweet-smelling gums and then rolled in gold dust. There is no more romantic chapter in the history of Peru than these pilgrimages in search of El Dorado. Southey says they cost Spain more than all the treasure received from her South American possessions. In Lima lived the viceroys who ruled all of South America from Guayaquil to Buenos Aires, “as by the divine right of kings.” The viceroy was served only by titled Spaniards. He was drawn about by six horses, with sounding of trumpets, and a personal guard of two hundred Spaniards, “for the safety of his person and to support the dignity of his office.” The royal seal, his insignia, rode under a royal flag upon a horse saddled with black velvet and a gold tissue foot-cloth, and was received with deep bows. The viceroy was allowed three thousand _pesos_ to go to Callao, five miles away, and sixty thousand ducats a year for personal expenses. Greeted with a jewel sent to meet him half-way, the viceroy reaches the bay of Callao. Throughout Lima, the City of the Kings,--founded “with God, for God, and in His name,"--the streets are hung with rugs and tapestry and adorned with green boughs and triumphal arches. (On the arrival of the Duque de la Plata, in 1682, eighty million _piasters_ were spent to pave the streets with bars of silver.)