nor his people, nor did he wish to know any thing of them—that he would come to Tenochtitlan indeed, but with his sword in his hand, to rescue the emperor and the Aztec gods from slavery." But while preparing to fulfil this patriotic threat, he was treacherously entrapped, and, with his principal confederates, carried in chains to Mexico.

Cortes, now feeling secure in his position, proceeded rapidly with the work of survey and colonization-his task being aided by a map, admirably delineated, of an hundred and forty leagues of the coast, presented to him by Montezuma. He next exacted from that sovereign a formal recognition of the authority of the Spanish crown. The caciques, summoned from all parts of the empire, with surprise and regret, heard their emperor require that their allegiance should be transferred to these strangers-the same, he informed them, whose coming had so long been foretold. "I now beseech you," he said, "to give them some token of submission; they require it of me; let no one refuse. For eighteen years that I have reigned, I have been a kind monarch to you, you have been faithful subjects to me; since my gods will have it so, indulge me with this one instance of your obedience." Tears fell from his eyes, and the caciques, also weeping bitterly, assured him that his will had always been their law, and should be at once complied with. All took the required oath, in presence of many officers and soldiers, "not one of whom," says a witness, "could refrain from weeping, on beholding the agitation and distress of the great and generous Montezuma." With excessive rapacity and impudence, Cortes now suggested that a splendid present be prepared for his master, the king of Spain, and accordingly couriers were dispatched for the collection of treasure to all parts of the kingdom.

In addition to the tribute thus obtained, the emperor bestowed upon his gaoler a great hoard of jewels and gold, wrought with masterly skill, which had been amassed by Axayacatl, and the existence of which, in a private room at their quarters, the Spaniards had discovered. "Take this gold," he said, "which is all that could be collected on so short a notice, and also the treasure which I derive from my ancestors, and which you have seen. And this which I now give," he added, with touching truth, laying a few splendid remains of his regalia with the rest, "is the last of the treasure which has remained with me." The whole amounted to the value of six or seven millions of dollars at the present day, but the common soldiers hardly received a thousand dollars a-piece, the lion's

share being reserved for the crown, for Velasquez, and for Cortes and his favourites. All the eloquence and all the promises of the general could hardly reconcile these rough spirits to their palpable defraudment, and induce their acceptance of the paltry share allotted to them; but with the true national passion for gambling, they made cards from their drum-heads, and passed day and night in staking all that they possessed.

CHAPTER VIII.

RELIGIOUS ZEAL OF CORTES.

-DISCONTENT OF THE MEXICANS -DANGEROUS POSITION OF THE SPANIARDS.-TRANSACTIONS AT THE COURT OF SPAIN.-VELASQUEZ DISPATCHES AN EXPEDITION AGAINST CORTES. CORTES MARCHES

AGAINST NARVAEZ.-DEFEATS AND TAKES HIM
PRISONER. HIS POLITIC CONDUCT AFTER VIC-

TORY. -HIS FORCES GREATLY AUGMENTED

AMID these miserable reverses and spoliations, the emperor, de throned in all but name, preserved, for the most part, a truly royal yet affable demeanour. "It is impossible," says Diaz, "to describe how noble he was in every thing he did, nor the respect in which he was held by every one around him." On the point of religion, however, he stood firm, and all the arguments and persuasions of the friars, as well as of Cortes himself, who daily introduced the subject, were of no effect either on his heart or understanding. "The Devil," argues De Solis, "had got such an Ascendant over his Mind that no Arguments were of force enough to touch his obdurate IIeart. It was not known whether he had a Communication from the Devil, or if he continued to appear to him, as usual, after the Spaniards arrived at Mexico; on the contrary, it was believed as certain, that from the first appearance of the Cross of Christ in that City, all those infernal Invocations lost their Force, and the Oracles became silent." It may be imagined, then, how every feeling of religion, of association, and of superstition, was shocked when Cortes proposed that the great eocalli, the most venerated structure in all Anahuac, should be yielded up for the use of the Christian worship. "Why, oh Malin

che," he said, "will you urge matters to an extremity that must surely bring down the vengeance of our gods, and stir up an insurrection among the people?" But, after a conference with his priests, "with much agitation and the appearance of deep sorrow, he heavily consented" that the Christians should occupy one of the sanctuaries on its summit. Accordingly, an image of the Virgin was set up, and the Mass and other Catholic rites were now solemnly performed, day by day, hard by the blood-stained dwellings of Huitzilopochtli and Tezeatepuca.

Thus far the people, with extraordinary patience, and unable to divorce in their minds the ancient authority of the emperor from its usurpation by the Spaniards, had meekly submitted to every exaction and encroachment. But mankind will far more readily put up with any other species of grievance and oppression than with the least affront to old hereditary faith or superstition. Ominous indications of an approaching storm were soon visible. The caciques and nobles held long and gloomy conferences with their sovereign, and the latter finally announced to Cortes (by direct information from Satan, says a Spanish historian) that the Aztec deities, their shrines profaned, were preparing the destruction of the invaders. For their own sake, he counselled the Spaniards to leave the city at once, before a general rising of the people should cut off all chance of escape. To allay the public excitement, the general now promised to leave the country as soon as vessels could be procured; and, to give confidence to his words, ordered the construction of several on the coast. His real object, it is probable, was to gain time for the arrival of expected reinforcements.

Meanwhile, the Spanish camp was filled with gloom and apprehension, and the strictest vigilance was used to prevent a surprise. The horses stood night and day ready caparisoned for service, and the soldiers slept on their arms, as if in the very presence of battle. While thus harassed by constant fear and suspicion, their condition was rendered still more precarious by the arrival of startling tidings from the coast.

The vessel dispatched to Spain by Cortes with tidings of his first achievements, after touching at Cuba, contrary to orders, had held her way to Europe, and in October, 1519, had arrived at the port of San Lucar. The news which she brought, and the magnificent dis

* This was the native appellation of Marina, the mistress of Cortes, a name soon generally applied to himself by the whole population of Mexico.

play of treasure, (the early gifts of Montezuma,) now, for the first time, realizing the golden visions of Western ambition, threw all Spain into a fever of excitement; but owing to the adverse influence of Bishop Fonseca and others, the agents of Cortes were unable to effect any thing in his favour with the emperor, Charles V.; and in May, 1520, allured by schemes of European aggrandizement, that sovereign left his kingdom without attempting to settle the command of Mexico, or to further the daring and ill-supplied enterprise for its conquest. As for Velasquez, from the moment he learned the value of the invaded province, and the defection of his general, he set to work with indescribable fury and energy to wrest back the authority which he had so incautiously bestowed, and to achieve an adequate revenge upon his treacherous ally and revolted vassal. By extraordinary exertions, he fitted out a fleet of eighteen sail, well provided with artillery and other munitions of war, and manned by nine hundred men, eager to share in the anticipated spoil of the wealthiest kingdom in the Indies. Pamphilo de Narvaez, the governor's favourite officer-a bold, rash, and arrogant man-was placed in command, and the fleet, sailing in March, 1520, arrived at San Juan de Ulua in the latter part of April.

The rage of Narvaez, on learning of the independence and the extraordinary success of Cortes, was extreme. He proclaimed him a traitor, and sent a priest and a notary to demand the surrender of the fortress of Vera Cruz. But Sandoval, the youthful commander of that post, one of the bravest and fiercest leaders of the conquest, was a devoted adherent of Cortes. He set up a gallows, avowing that he would suspend from it any who might show a sign of disaffection; and, on the arrival of his legal and clerical visitors, bound them hand and foot, and sent them post haste ("like so many damned souls," says the narrative) on the backs of Indian porters, to Mexico. Relays, as usual, were waiting to receive them every few miles, and thus they were transferred from back to back, and hurried, 'bewildered by their strange conveyance, in a wonderfully-short time, to the capital. Accurate pictures, as usual, of the fleet and the strangers had been dispatched to Montezuma by his officials, and though most of the soldiers exulted in the supposed reinforcement, Cortes shrewdly suspected the real nature of the expedition, and resolved, at every hazard, to hold fast to the brilliant prize which he had won.

On the arrival of the alarmed and bewildered messengers, he

treated them in the most gracious manner, "said so many civil things to them, and anointed their fingers so well with gold, that in a few days he sent back, as tractable as lambs, those who had set out against him like roaring lions." By their hands he dispatched a conciliatory message to Narvaez, tendering submission, if the latter were provided with a royal commission, well knowing that he had none. He also sent the worthy Father Olmedo, an ecclesiastic popular from his wit and good-humour, as well as formidable from his powers of policy and intrigue, with a liberal supply of gold, to make a party in his favour among the new comers. He next resolved on

a step of extraordinary boldness and hazard. It was nothing less than to fling himself boldly into the enemy's camp, and trust to his own popularity, and the tried valour of his soldiers, to gain the entire command of Mexico.

Leaving an hundred and forty men, under charge of Pedro de Alvarado, to hold the city and the captive emperor, he set forth in the middle of May, with only seventy men, on his way to the coast. Reinforced at Cholula by Velasquez de Leon, whom, with an hundred and twenty, he had lately dispatched to found a certain colony, he marched to Tlascala, and was soon joined by sixty more, being the late garrison of Vera Cruz, under command of the devoted Sandoval. As he approached Cempoalla, where the force of Narvaez was quartered, he sent forward Velasquez de Leon, a relation of the governor, but a staunch adherent to his own faction, on a fresh errand of insinuation among the hostile forces.

On a dark and stormy night, he arrived before the city, and harangued his troops in a strain of rude and forcible eloquence. He recounted their perils, their losses, their wonderful achievements; "and now, gentlemen," he continued, "Narvaez comes, and immediately upon landing proclaims war against us, with fire, sword, and rope, as if we were infidel Moors." So fired were the soldiers with this rough but stirring address, that all cried out that they were resolved to conquer or die, and that if he again spoke of dividing the country with his rival, they would plunge their swords into his body. Meanwhile the cacique of Cempoalla vainly remonstrated with Narvaez on his supineness. "What are you doing?" he cried, "and how careless are you! Do you think Malinche and his Teules* are so? I tell you that when you least expect it, he will come upon you and put you all to death." But that commander, confiding in * Spirits or supernatural beings-dæmons.