would have lost his life but for the eagerness of the enemy to take him prisoner. Many of the Spaniards saved their lives in consequence of this passion for living victims. Cortes sought in vain next day for his gallant Tlascalan preserver, and supposing him dead, attributed his salvation to his good patron, Saint Peter. A conspiracy among his men, chiefly confined to the old troops of Narvaez, was happily discovered, and the leader promptly hanged from the windows of his own quarters. The Tlascalan chief, Xicotencatl, deserted the Spaniards in such a manner as to occasion great fears from the effects of his well-known animosity to them, and Cortes sent to the Tlascalan senate to demand his arrest, stating that the Spanish law punished desertion with death. They replied that their law was the same, and the royal captive was delivered to the Spaniards to be executed in the presence of, and as a warning to, his more faithful countrymen. During these operations, two hundred men, eighty horses, and a supply of ammunition, arrived in three ships at Vera Cruz, probably the ones sent to Jamaica by Cortes for reinforcements while he was at Tlascala. HIS welcome addition to his means of offence soon reached his camp. The brigantines were launched, twelve of the thirteen proving fit for service, and, though necessarily rude and imperfect, they gained at the outset a decisive victory over the canoes of the natives, and secured to the Spaniards the command of the lake. The operations in the neighbouring states, while they secured to Cortes the ability to turn his whole attention to the reduction of the city without fear of annoyance from without, greatly increased the number of the defenders of the capital, as each successive hostile army when defeated, marched thither for refuge, and to partake in the final struggle for its defence. Their very numbers, however, proved a disadvantage from the impossibility of sustaining them for any length of time, and contributed materially to hasten the fall of the city. Provisions were carried into the city, for a time, however, in great quantities, and even when the brigantines caused the open transportation by canoes to cease, the natiyes still contrived to administer to the necessities of the garrison by night. But this state of things changed when the great vassals in the vicinity found that Guatemozin was becoming more and more straightened in the capital, and of course less able to support and protect them. They revolted one by one, espoused the cause of Cortes, and sent SIEGE OF THE CAPITAL. 117 their warriors in such numbers to aid him in the siege, that he became in turn seriously distressed for the means of feeding all his host. The siege was regularly commenced on the 10th of May, 1521. The army was divided into three bodies, nearly equal in numbers. One, under Alvarado, was posted at Tlacopan, to operate on the western causeway; another, under Christoval de Olid, commanded one of the branches of the southern causeway at Cojohuacan, and the third, under the intrepid Sandoval, pushed on the attack from the other branch of the same causeway at Iztapalapan. HE flotilla was under the command of Cortes himself, who assisted the operations of his lieutenants whenever his presence was necessary. Alvarado occasioned great distress in the capital by a successful attempt, made as soon as his post was assigned him, to cut off the aqueducts which supplied the city with water. During the rest of the siege the Mexicans were forced to drink the salt water of the lake, or depend upon the precarious supply introduced from without in canoes. For a month after the siege had been commenced, Cortes adhered to a plan by which he hoped to effect its reduction without destroying the city, which he destined to become his capital, and a monument of his glory. He pushed on the attack from all the three stations with vigour, but the Aztecs met him with valour only inferior to that of the Spaniards. When his troops had spent the day carrying barricades, filling up trenches and canals, and advancing their purpose, and had retired to their quarters for the night, the indefatigable foe sallied forth and repaired their works anew for the conflict on the morrow. Thus the toil and danger of the Spaniards were continually renewed, yet they struggled on in the hope of gaining some decisive advantage, which might force the enemy to surrender, and terminate the war. But they found that they greatly underrated the heroism of their foes. On land and on water, by night and by day, one furious conflict succeeded another, and though the Spaniards had completed the occupation of the causeways, and the city was in a state of blockade, they seemed but little nearer their object than at first. Under this state of things, Cortes yielded to the solicitations of his officers to hazard an assault upon the city in the hope of getting possession of the great market of Tlatelolco, whose spacious porticoes would fur nish accommodations for a numerous host, and by which an easy communication would be opened between the camps of Alvarado and Sandoval. The royal treasurer, Alderete, advocated this measure, and Cortes gave him the command of one body of his own division. Jorge de Alvarado Andres de Tapia and Jorge de Alvarado, a younger brother of Pedro, led the second body, and the third was under the direction of Cortes himself. These three bodies were to advance along the three parallel streets which led from the suburbs into the square of Tlatelolco. Cortes gave very strict orders not to advance without filling up all the ditches and openings in the causeway, in order to secure a retreat. In the ardour of battle this was neglected by Alderete, whose accounts of the success he met with filled the mind of Cortes with misgivings. He quitted his own body and followed in the track of the rash leader. Soon he came to a breach in the causeway, the sides of which gave evidence of their having very recently been trimmed off. It was twelve paces wide, and filled with water two fathoms deep. Scarcely any attempt had been made to fill it up, and Cortes saw that his rash officer had rushed into the snare laid for him. He set about filling up the chasm, when the great gong of Guatemozin was sounded, and in a moment the flying Aztecs turned on their pursuers with a fury that threw them into a panic. From every lane thousands of warriors poured upon their flanks, seizing the fugitives, and bearing them away alive to grace the altars of their gods. Missiles were poured upon their heads from the housetops, and they were unable, in the confusion, to distinguish their Indian allies from their foes. Cortes stood in the water at the breach, labouring with the most praiseworthy devotion to assist the poor fugitives to reach the further side of the breach, his well-known person, and his position, causing the darts, stones, and arrows from thousands of enemies, to be poured upon him. At length, with a cry of Malinche, six able-bodied warriors seized him suddenly, and attempted to drag him into their canoe. In the fight he was severely wounded in the leg, and his escape seemed hopeless, when a gallant warrior, Cristoval de Olea, came to his aid, cut off at a blow the arm of one savage, and ran another through the body with his sword. His own life was SIEGE OF THE CAPITAL. 19 forfeited for his general; but a Tlascalan and another Spaniard were enabled by this time to come up, and they despatched three others of the general's captors. His horse was now brought to him, and he was assisted to mount him, but his chamberlain, Guzman, was snatched away by the enemy as he held the bridle, and carried off a captive. T HE general at length collected the remnant of the division at an opening where he had stationed a reserve with two guns, and the fire of the artillery served to check the advance of the enemy, while an orderly retreat was effected. Meanwhile the forces of Pedro de Alvarado and Sandoval had entered the city from the other causeway, and gained many advantages, but the gong which sounded for the assault on the troops of Alderete, produced an increase in the fury of their opponents, while the heads of their countrymen, which the enemy exhibited to them with cries, implying that Cortes was slain, satisfied them that the day had been lost by the other division, and they retreated. Cortes was also presented with the heads of his fallen warriors during the battle, and the enemy impressed him with the belief that both Alvarado and Sandoval were slain. The reunion between them was on this account extremely joyful, although their hearts were greatly cast down by the events of the day. Besides those who had fallen in fighting and the wounded, they had lost in prisoners sixty-two Spaniards and a multitude of allies, all of whom would certainly be sacrificed. In the evening, as the declining sun lit up the top of the teocalli, they saw several of their countrymen, whose white skins identified them as they were driven up the winding ascent of the temple, sacrificed in the usual mode. After their hearts were torn out, their bodies were tumbled off the top to make a feast for the cannibals below. This sight made the Spaniards sick at heart, while it inspired their enemies with resolution sufficient to make them vow that all their enemies should share the same fate, and attempted to fulfil it by a fearful assault upon the intrenchments. They paid dearly, however, for their temerity. They were nevertheless so elated by their great victory, that the priests ventured to predict that in eight days all the Spaniards should be slain, for so their gods had decreed. The allies of the Spaniards became terrified at this prediction, and nearly all withdrew to a distance to await in fear the event. Many of the caciques, however, remained in the camp, and Cortes kept his men quiet in their intrenchments until after the eight days had expired. came back joyfully, in greater numbers than before. days had greatly weakened the starving defenders of the city, who were now rapidly circumscribed in their limits. Then the allies The Spaniards advanced gradually, but steadily, the allies filled up the ditches behind them and levelled with the ground every conquered edifice, and though the indomitable Guatemozin disputed every inch of ground, his resistance became daily weaker. Pestilence, the natural result of famine, and the number of unburied bodies which were lying in the streets filled up the measure of their woes. Still did the dauntless Guatemozin refuse to capitulate. The daring Alvarado carried by assault the great teocalli, in the northern part of the city, on which they had seen so many of their countrymen sacrificed. He devoted the warriors and priests who defended it to the manes of his murdered countrymen, and announced his success to the other divisions of the army by burning the war-god and his sanctuary, and planting in triumph on the ruins the standard of Castile. The divisions of the beseigers now united in the city, seven-eighths of which was in ruins. Two murderous assaults were made on the 12th and 13th of August. On the 12th, by the aid of the allies, who totally disregarded the orders of Cortes to spare, the unresisting forty thousand of the Mexicans were slaughtered, and on |