examination was conducted by some of the oldest and most illustrious
Incas. The candidates were required to show their prowess in the athletic
exercises of the warrior; in wrestling and boxing, in running such long
courses as fully tried their agility and strength, in severe fasts of several
days' duration, and in mimic combats, which, although the weapons were
blunted, were always attended with wounds, and sometimes with death.
During this trial, which lasted thirty days, the royal neophyte fared no
better than his comrades, sleeping on the bare ground, going unshod, and
wearing a mean attire,--a mode of life, it was supposed, which might tend
to inspire him with more sympathy with the destitute. With all this show
of impartiality, however, it will probably be doing no injustice to the
judges to suppose that a politic discretion may have somewhat quickened
their perceptions of the real merits of the heir-apparent.

At the end of the appointed time, the candidates selected as worthy of the
honors of their barbaric chivalry were presented to the sovereign, who
condescended to take a principal part in the ceremony of inauguration.
He began with a brief discourse, in which, after congratulating the young
aspirants on the proficiency they had shown in martial exercises, he
reminded them of the responsibilities attached to their birth and station;
and, addressing them affectionately as "children of the Sun," he exhorted
them to imitate their great progenitor in his glorious career of beneficence
to mankind. The novices then drew near, and, kneeling one by one before
the Inca, he pierced their ears with a golden bodkin; and this was suffered
to remain there till an opening had been made large enough for the
enormous pendants which were peculiar to their order, and which gave
them, with the Spaniards, the name of orejones.29 This ornament was so
massy in the ears of the sovereign, that the cartilage was distended by it
nearly to the shoulder, producing what seemed a monstrous deformity in
the eyes of the Europeans, though, under the magical influence of fashion,