The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo Vol. 2

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1/25/22, 8:50 PM The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo written by himself, containing a true an… Though Chamula had again submitted to our arms, the townships of Guegustitlan still obstinately held out, notwithstanding all our kind messages to the caziques; we had, therefore, no other resource left thanto march against them, and subdue them by force of arms. Each ofthese townships (for there were three) was strongly situated, and wetherefore left our allies, with the baggage, in the camp, our captainonly taking the most nimble and active of the Spanish troops with him,besides 300 warriors of Cinacatan. The distance to Guegustitlan was sixteen miles; but the enemy had everywhere cut down trees and constructedbarricades along the line of our march to obstruct the cavalry;however, with the assistance of our Indian friends, we soon clearedthese obstacles out of our way, and it was not long before we attackedone of the three townships. The place was well fortified and filledwith warriors fully equipped for war; we, nevertheless, stormed thetown, although it was even more difficult of access than Chamula. Theenemy had not waited to offer any resistance to our arms, and we foundthe town quite deserted by its inhabitants, who had also carried off alltheir store of provisions; but it was not long before our Indian friends brought in two of the inhabitants prisoners, whom our captain immediately liberated, desiring them to go and call their countrymen. Westaid one whole day in this place, during which time the inhabitants of all three townships submitted themselves as vassals to our emperor, andpresented us with a small quantity of gold and some quetzal feathers,which are of great value in this country. After we had returned to our camp we deliberated whether or not we should follow up Cortes' instructions, and lay the foundations of atown in this neighbourhood. Many of us were in favour of doing so,but others, who had lucrative possessions in Guacasualco, were quiteopposed to it, and said we should have no shoes for the horses; thatthe most of us were wounded, and we were altogether too small innumbers to think of settling in a country so thickly populated: besides that, all the townships were strongly situated among steep mountains, inaccessible to our cavalry. But those who objected most to our founding a colony here were Luis Marin himself and Diego de Godoy,a very blustering sort of a man, both of whom felt more inclination toreturn to Guacasualco. [Pg 192] I have above spoken of a certain Alonso de Grado, who was a veryturbulent fellow, though but a poor soldier. This man had managedto procure privately from Cortes a certain grant by which he was tohave half the gold we should find in Chiapa when we had subjectedthis township. Grado now produced this document and claimed half of the gold found in the temples of this place, and of that which wehad obtained from the inhabitants, altogether valued at about 15,000pesos; but our captain maintained that, out of this gold, the value of the horses was to be deducted which had been killed in our recent campaign.This, added to other circumstances, gave rise to high wordsbetween the two, and Grado frequently made use of unbecoming expressions during the dispute; and the secretary Godoy, to make mattersworse, now also put in his word, and things at length came tosuch a pass that Luis Marin lost all patience, and threw both thesegentlemen into chains. After they had been in prison for about eight days, our captain sent Grado on his parole to Mexico, and also released Godoy, who had shown full contrition for his past behaviour. This was very impolitic on the part of Luis Marin as far as regarded himself,for Grado and Godoy now concocted measures together, and thelatter wrote a letter to Cortes, in which he scandalized our captain inevery possible manner. Alonso de Grado also requested me to drawup a letter to Cortes, in which he wished me to exculpate him in thisaffair, for he had been assured by Godoy that Cortes would believe me.I willingly complied with his request, and drew up a faithful account of the whole matter, but stated that no blame could be attached to Luis Marin. With these letters Grado set out for Mexico, after our captainhad made him promise on oath to appear before Cortes within thespace of eight days; for the distance from this place to Mexico by theroad we had marched was 760 miles. Our next step was to march to Cimatan, in order to punish its inhabitants,who, it will be remembered, killed two Spaniards on the occasionwhen Francisco Martin and myself so https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32475/32475-h/32475-h.htm 130/282
1/25/22, 8:50 PM The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo written by himself, containing a true an… narrowly escaped. When wewere on our march thither, and had arrived at no great distance from Tapelola, we came to some large mountains, containing several dangerous passes, through which our march lay to this township; Luis Marin,therefore, sent to the caziques of this place, desiring them to clear theroads for us that our horses might pass along in greater safety. This they readily undertook to do; but even then it was with great difficulty our cavalry could pass through the defiles. From Tapelola we marched peaceably over the townships Silo, Suchiapa, and Coyumelapa, to Panguaxaya, and it was not until we approached the townships ofTecomayacatl and Ateapan, which then formed but one town, thatmatters began to assume a different aspect. These were the mostpopulous townships in the province, and formed part of my commendary.As the inhabitants of themselves were very numerous, and hadbesides called in the assistance of their neighbours, they mustered a very considerable body of troops, and attacked us as we were crossingthe deep river which flows through the midst of their town. SixSpaniards were wounded and three of our horses killed, the battle continuing very sharply for a length of time before we could reach the opposite shore and drive the enemy back, who set fire to the houses intheir flight, and then escaped to the mountains. Here we rested forfive days to cure our wounds, and we sent out frequent foraging parties who captured many a fine Indian female. We then forwarded a messageto the inhabitants, inviting them to return to obedience, with whichthey instantly complied, and their wives and children were again restoredto them. The secretary Godoy had indeed advised Luis Marinnot to return the prisoners, but to mark them with the iron and retain them as slaves, a punishment to which all those were subject who had once acknowledged themselves vassals of our emperor, and afterwards revolted without any apparent reason. These people, Godoy maintained,had commenced hostilities with us from sheer obstinacy, and we ought at least to demand a sufficient number of slaves as a compensationfor the loss of our three horses. For myself, I loudly protestedagainst this, and said it would be unjust to punish these people whohad freely submitted again to our arms. At length Godoy and myselfgot to high words about this matter, which ended in our drawingswords and wounding each other, when our friends interfered andbrought about a reconciliation between us. Luis Marin, who was, uponthe whole, a very kind-hearted man, was convinced of the justness of my observation, and ordered all the prisoners to be returned to thecaziques, and so we departed from them in perfect peace. [Pg 193] From this place we marched towards Cimatlan and Talatupan. At the entrance of this township the Indians had constructed, on the topof a hill, a species of rampart, with loopholes, beyond which lay amarsh of considerable extent. When we had arrived up to this outwork,the enemy suddenly showered their arrows upon us, woundingabove twenty of our men and killing two horses; and if we had notmade a hasty retreat our loss might have been very serious. [Pg 194] The Indians of this province excel as archers, and fly their arrowswith so much strength that they will pierce a jacket doubly quiltedwith cotton. After this momentary attack upon us, the Indians drew back to the marshes, and we remained two whole days in this place, during whichtime we despatched several messages to them; but as they obstinatelyrefused to submit, and were securely posted between the swamps, whereour horse could not manœuvre, nor would it have been an easy matterfor the foot to have got at them, and as we ourselves were quite tired of roving about, we unanimously determined to march back to Guacasualco. We took our route through the townships of Guimango,Nacaxu, Xuica, Teotitan-Copilco, and several others, all belonging tothe province of Chontalpa. We then crossed the rivers Ayagualulco,and Tonala, and we arrived safely in Guacasualco, when the owners ofthose horses which had been killed in this campaign were reimbursed for their loss from the gold collected in Chiapa and Chamula. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32475/32475-h/32475-h.htm 131/282
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The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo Vol. 2

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