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

More documents

Recommendations

Info

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… under their commander Chichimeclatecl and other officers, but discovered that their commander-in-chief, the younger Xicotencatl, had remained behind. After considerable inquiries, it was found that he had secretly returned to Tlascalla on the previous night to take forcible possession of the caziquedom and territory of Chichimeclatecl. It appears, according to the accounts of the Tlascallans, that he wished to avail himself of this favorableopportunity of raising himself to supreme power in his own country,which the absence of Chichimeclatecl offered to him, who, in his opinion,was the only person that stood in his way since the death of Maxixcatzin,as he did not fear any opposition from his old blind father. This Xicotencatl, the Tlascallans further added, had never felt any real inclinationto join us in the war against Mexico, but had frequently assuredthem it would terminate in the destruction of us all. [21] When Chichimeclatecl received information of this, he instantly returned to Tezcuco in order to apprize Cortes of it. Our general, on hearing this, despatched five distinguished personages of Tezcuco, and two Tlascallans, who were his particular friends, after Xicotencatl, torequest his immediate return to his troops, in Cortes' name. Theywere to remind him that his father Lorenzo de Vargas would certainly have marched out against Mexico in person, if blindness and old agehad not prevented him; that the whole population of Tlascalla continuedloyal to his majesty, and that the revolt he wished to excite would throw dishonour on his own country. These representations Cortes desired should be accompanied by large promises, to induce him toreturn to obedience. Xicotencatl, however, haughtily replied, that hewas determined to abide by his resolve, and our dominion in this countrywould not have continued thus long if his father and Maxixcatzin hadfollowed his advice. [Pg 62] Upon this our general ordered an alguacil to repair in all haste withfour of our horse and five distinguished men of Tezcuco to Xicotencatl'sabode, to take him prisoner, and hang him without any further ceremony."All kindness," added Cortes, "is thrown away upon this cazique. His whole time is spent in devising plots and creating mischief.I cannot suffer this to continue any longer; the matter has nowcome to a crisis." As soon as Alvarado received information of these commands, heurgently begged of Cortes to pardon Xicotencatl. Our general replied that he would consider about it, though he secretly gave the alguacil peremptory orders to put him to death, which was accordingly done.Xicotencatl was hung in a town subject to Tezcuco, and thus an endwas put to all his plottings. Many Tlascallans assured us that the elder Xicotencatl himself had cautioned Cortes against his son, [22] andhad advised him to put him to death. This affair delayed our departure from Tezcuco for one day; andthus it was not till the 13th of May, 1521, that we commenced ourmarch. As our road lay for a considerable distance in the same direction,our division under Alvarado and that under Oli marched out atthe same time. The first night we encamped in the township ofAlcuman, to which place Oli had despatched some men in advance toprepare quarters for his troops, and had ordered that the houses whichthey took possession of should, by way of distinction, be decoratedwith green boughs. When we arrived with Alvarado, we found, to oursurprise, that every house had been taken, and the two divisions werejust about to settle the matter, sword in hand, when the officers steppedin between, and thereby put a stop to the dispute. But the insultwhich had thus been offered to us was not so easily to be forgotten; when, therefore, this circumstance became known to Cortes, he sent offfather Melgarejo and Luis Marin to us, with letters to every officer and soldier, in which he reproached us for quarrelling, and admonished usto keep peace with each other. From this moment Alvarado and Oliwere never upon such friendly terms as formerly. [Pg 63] The following morning the two divisions continued their march, andwe encamped for the night in a town subject to Mexico, but which wasquite deserted by its inhabitants. This was https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32475/32475-h/32475-h.htm 48/282
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… likewise the case inQuauhtitlan, where we took up our quarters the next night. Tenayucan and Escapuzalco, through which we marched the dayfollowing, were also quite deserted. Our Tlascallan friends spreadthemselves all through these townships, and entered into every houseduring the fore part of the evening, from which they brought in quantities of provisions. We adopted every military precaution for thenight, as we were not far distant from Mexico, and could plainly hear the Mexicans, who were lying in crowds in their canoes on the lakeand along the causeways, hooting and yelling fearfully throughout the whole of the night, and challenging us to the combat. Their object,was to induce us to fall upon them in the dark, when they would have had a great advantage over us. We had, however, received a sufficient warning by our former misfortune, and very wisely kept ourselves asquietly as possible until next morning, which was a Sunday. After father Juan Diaz had said mass, we commended ourselves to the protection of the Almighty, and both divisions marched forward to cut off the aqueduct of Chapultepec, which lies about two miles from Tlacupa, and supplies Mexico with water. On our way thither, we fellin with several bodies of Mexicans, who had received intelligence thatthis was to be the commencement of our operations against Mexico.The enemy had in every way the advantage ground over us, and attacked us vigorously with lances, arrows, and stones, by which three of ourmen were wounded; but we soon put them to flight, and they were soclosely pursued by the Tlascallans that they lost twenty killed, andseven or eight were taken prisoners. We were now able to destroy the aqueduct without any further opposition, and the city of Mexico wasdeprived of this source of obtaining water during the whole of thesiege. As soon as we had destroyed this aqueduct, our officers determined to make an attempt upon one of the bridges on the causeway leadingfrom Tlacupa. We had scarcely begun to move along the causeway when numbers of canoes, filled with troops, advanced swiftly from both sides, while other large bodies of the enemy came marching up the causeway against us, so that we were quite astounded at the very sight.In the first encounter thirty of our men were wounded and three killed.Notwithstanding all this, we fought our way up to the first bridge.According to what we afterwards heard, it was the wish of the Mexicans that we should pass over the bridge; for we had no sooner done sothan we were assailed by such terrific crowds, as to be unable to move. What indeed could we do on a causeway which was no more than eight paces in breadth, where we were attacked on all sides at once? Our crossbow-men and musketeers certainly kept up a continuedfire on the canoes, but the enemy received but a trifling loss thisway, for they had raised boards alongside of their canoes, by which their troops were sheltered from our fire. Those of the enemy's troopswhich attacked us on the causeway itself we certainly drove back eachtime into the water, but fresh troops kept pouring in too fast for usto gain much advantage this way. Here our cavalry was of no mannerof use to us, while the horses were greatly exposed to the attacks ofthe enemy on each side of the causeway, and many were consequentlywounded. If our cavalry attempted to pursue the enemy into thewater, the latter had provided against this by palisades, behind which they retired, and stretched out against them their long lances, to which they had fastened the swords we unfortunately lost on our retreat from Mexico. [Pg 64] In this way the battle continued for upwards of an hour, the enemyeach time returning to the attack with such excessive fury that, at length,we could stand our ground no longer: nor was this all, for we now sawanother large fleet of canoes approaching with a fresh body of men,who were ordered to fall upon our rear. We therefore determined toretreat back along the causeway, for which purpose we ordered theTlascallans to move off first, that we might effect our retreat in perfectgood order. Here the Tlascallans had greatly embarrassed us in ourmovements, who, it is well known, never can fight standing in thewater. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32475/32475-h/32475-h.htm 49/282
Page 1 and 2: 1/25/22, 8:50 PM The Project Gutenb
Page 47: 1/25/22, 8:50 PM The Project Gutenb
Page 99 and 100:
1/25/22, 8:50 PM The Project Gutenb
Page 101 and 102:
Page 103 and 104:
Page 105 and 106:
Page 107 and 108:
Page 109 and 110:
Page 111 and 112:
Page 113 and 114:
Page 115 and 116:
Page 117 and 118:
Page 119 and 120:
Page 121 and 122:
Page 123 and 124:
Page 125 and 126:
Page 127 and 128:
Page 129 and 130:
Page 131 and 132:
Page 133 and 134:
Page 135 and 136:
Page 137 and 138:
Page 139 and 140:
Page 141 and 142:
Page 143 and 144:
Page 145 and 146:
Page 147 and 148:
Page 149 and 150:
Page 151 and 152:
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
Page 169 and 170:
Page 171 and 172:
Page 173 and 174:
Page 175 and 176:
Page 177 and 178:
Page 179 and 180:
Page 181 and 182:
Page 183 and 184:
Page 185 and 186:
Page 187 and 188:
Page 189 and 190:
Page 191 and 192:
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
Page 197 and 198:
Page 199 and 200:
Page 201 and 202:
Page 203 and 204:
Page 205 and 206:
Page 207 and 208:
Page 209 and 210:
Page 211 and 212:
Page 213 and 214:
Page 215 and 216:
Page 217 and 218:
Page 219 and 220:
Page 221 and 222:
Page 223 and 224:
Page 225 and 226:
Page 227 and 228:
Page 229 and 230:
Page 231 and 232:
Page 233 and 234:
Page 235 and 236:
Page 237 and 238:
Page 239 and 240:
Page 241 and 242:
Page 243 and 244:
Page 245 and 246:
Page 247 and 248:
Page 249 and 250:
Page 251 and 252:
Page 253 and 254:
Page 255 and 256:
Page 257 and 258:
Page 259 and 260:
Page 261 and 262:
Page 263 and 264:
Page 265 and 266:
Page 267 and 268:
Page 269 and 270:
Page 271 and 272:
Page 273 and 274:
Page 275 and 276:
Page 277 and 278:
Page 279 and 280:
Page 281 and 282:
show all

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

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?