_THE CAUSE ONCE MORE IN JEOPARDY._
A very singular and picturesque affair was the camp of the Spaniards,
when they paused, for rest or war, on the march to Mexico.
The gay-coloured cotton hangings of the Mexican manufactures had, in
many instances, taken the place of the Spaniards' own rough and ragged
tent coverings. All around were squatted groups of the slaves who had
accompanied the army from Cuba and the sea-coast--races far inferior to
those by whom they were now surrounded, and with very scant ideas as to
dress, or any of the other refinements of civilization.
Then there were the gentle-spirited, courteous Totonac allies,
evidencing their cultured tastes, and advanced instincts, by gathering
armfuls of the brilliant wild blossoms about them to adorn their
helmets and their shields; whilst regarding them, a short distance off,
stood companies of the more warlike, stern-spirited Tlascalans, looking
on at their neighbours' doings with a contempt they took no pains to
conceal. They were magnificent enough themselves in their warrior's
dress, as has been seen; but, under present circumstances, aught
having a festal or light-hearted appearance they fairly well judged to
betoken effeminacy as much as refinement.
For the rest, there was little love lost between the Cempoallans and
the poverty-stricken, hardy Republicans, and although united for the
time in one camp as allies of one commander, they took care mutually
not to have too much to do with each other.
As for the Spaniards themselves, who were now but as one to eight of
their Indian comrades, they were a lean-cheeked, sallow, hollow-eyed
set of tatterdemalions enough by this time. All of them had received
more or less wounds in their fierce battles with the Tlascalans, and
even Hernando Cortes was only kept up by his indomitable resolution,
for what with illness and his doctor, he had been brought to such a
state of weakness that he could hardly sit steady on his saddle. Fifty
of his poor, overdone soldiers had died since starting from Vera Cruz,
and the whole band had at last become more than half doubtful whether
any of them would reach Mexico alive.
"And really," grumbled Pedro de Alvarado dolefully one evening, "really
I don't much care if I do. I'd just as soon lay my bones out here to
bleach as within yon mythical city of gold."
"Mythical, as to the being built of gold, doubtless," returned Montoro
de Diego in a cheering tone. "But as to there being a fine city yonder,
that you surely do not doubt. Think how hopeful all of you were a
while since, when you saw the magnificence of its Emperor's gifts!"
"Ah, well!" sighed poor Pedro restlessly. "I would give him better
thanks now for an ounce of good health than for an hundredweight of
gold."
"Ay indeed, my Captain," groaned Father Juan Diaz. "There you have me
with you. I am but just come hither from shriving two poor wretches,
who have bid good-bye to this earthly purgatory to go to that which is
invisible, and methinks 'twill be not long before you join them there."
"Nay, croaker," exclaimed a voice between contempt and indignation.
"There is many an Indian now living will have cause to wish that thine
ill prophecy were a true one, before our friend Pedro rids him of his
troublesome body. But come thou with me. I would rather try my hand at
putting some spirit into thee, than leave thee to rob our comrades of
the measure that is theirs."
And so saying Cortes, who had come up at a somewhat opportune moment,
marched off the crestfallen, discontented priest to his own quarters to
receive a pretty sharp lecture, spite his reverend profession, before
he was released.
All the same, the priest's mischievous growls had already borne
fruit, and the following morning, before the tents were struck, the
Captain-General had to receive a deputation from the malcontents, who
were too numerous to be treated with anger or disdain.
"But you are so foolish!" exclaimed Hernando, indeed trembling at the
desperate state of the mighty cause he had in hand. "Ye speak as though
it were for my glory alone, to fill my pockets with gold only, that ye
have all thus fought and struggled and endured until now! Is it not
likewise for yourselves? If our achievements shall be so stupendous and
so glorious that they hand my name down to after-ages, will not your
names also gain the like renown?"
Cortes put the exclamation as a declared certainty, but his hearers
rather accepted it as a question, and a shrunken-limbed, white-lipped
soldier from amidst the group rejoined harshly--
"Nay, not so, Captain. Those who live through the battle win their
spurs, like enough; but those who die, e'en though it be on the eve of
victory, so it be before the battle is decided, think you their names
get handed down? Faith, no, then. Fame is like other riches, limited in
quantity, and so it is reserved, like many another thing, for those who
walk over their comrades' dead bodies to success."
As the man ended his speech he staggered from weakness, and would have
fallen forward to the ground on his face but that Montoro, who had been
standing beside the General to guard him in case of mutiny, saw the
poor fellow sinking, and sprang forward in time to catch him in his
arms.
Cortes had been hitherto standing fronting his discontented followers
with an air of proud resolve, every inch the commander, and the
indomitable discoverer and conqueror, but now his countenance suddenly
changed, softened, and his lips trembled. He was the man with a genial
temper and a warm heart once more--the very comrade indeed of the
meanest soldier in his company, who bore all that they had to bear,
eat the same food, and shared all the same privations and fatigues;
or rather, differed in this, that he took the lion's share of every
discomfort whenever it was possible.
As the exhausted man fell swooning into Montoro's ready arms, Cortes
stepped forward hastily, and carefully aided in carrying him to his
own tent, and there placed him in the clever care of Doña Marina, the
interpreter.
"Poor fellow!" he ejaculated on his return to the waiting deputation.
"Poor fellow! no wonder that he speaks down-heartedly, for I find that
he has been badly wounded, and has fever."
"So have we all been wounded," said another of the group, but more
calmly. "And for the fever, well, I may almost say, and so have we all
got fever. And do you wonder, General, that it is so?"
A rather weary smile passed over the General's countenance as he
replied,
"No, truly, I wonder not at all. I also have been wounded, as you know,
in our late engagements with these brave Tlascalans, and I also have
fever. But seeing that we all confess to having suffered so much to
reach the threshold, shall we not adventure the one more step to enter
the door?"
"If it were a step!" ejaculated the new spokesman. "But as it is, we
live a worse life than our very animals. When the saddles are off them
they can forget their troubles for a while, but for us! Ah! then, we
have no dog's life indeed, but one much worse. Fighting and watching
night and day, we have no rest till death steps up to put an end to
all."
The speaker's words were hard, but they were uttered so temperately and
firmly that Cortes replied to them in the like spirit--
"You are right, my brothers--no animal, no unreasoning beast of burden
could endure the life we have borne for these past months of desperate
adventure; neither could any animal be so buoyed up with lofty hopes,
neither could it have so glorious a rejoicing if success should be
the crown at last. Our God has helped us to bear and to overcome, as
the gods of the ancients never helped even the very greatest of their
heroes. None but Spaniards, my brothers, aided by the Spaniard's God
and St. Jago, could have struggled onwards, always conquerors as we
have been, a handful in the midst of myriads of foes. And remember--"
And as Cortes uttered that word he paused, and looked round upon his
followers ere he repeated impressively, "Remember, comrades, whatever
adversities we have suffered, whatever trials, we have still ever
advanced, we have made no step backwards from our undertaking. But you
are all free men. We will all stand here and watch the man who first
makes that step in retreat and he shall have no hindrance. I myself
will be the first to bid him the 'good speed' of farewell."
"Poor fellows!" murmured Father Olmedo with a half-smile to Montoro.
"Our General is indeed clever. Few would have found a way so well to
give a choice that is no choice. How can any of them now accept his
permission to be gone!"
Montoro's countenance reflected the half-smile of his companion. But at
the same time he shrugged his shoulders with the reply,
"Ah, well! as Hernando Cortes himself says, better death with honour
than life with disgrace."
Unconsciously he uttered the last sentence aloud, and once more he did
the General good service. The poor, hard-worn grumblers heard it, and
it clenched the argument already so cleverly managed by Cortes.
"Perhaps you have reason, my Señor," exclaimed one of the malcontents.
"If we get home alive with our boasted programme of conquest
unfulfilled we shall get nought but scorning, it is probable, till we
shall wish that verily we had died with our brethren out here. So for
my part, after all, I elect to stay."
"To advance, you mean," cried Cortes joyously, making a stride forward
to lay his hand, with a well-assumed air of gratitude and friendly
familiarity, on the shoulder of the recovered adherent. "There is
no 'staying' for us, my friends. We must continue to advance to our
appointed goal, or we must retreat. And I frankly tell you all this,
that it is my firm belief that our greatest safety, nay, still more,
our only safety, lies in progress."
"How so?" boldly demanded a voice in the crowd. "For honour--well, that
may be. But for safety!"
"Ay," replied Cortes. "And for safety too, I affirm. And were it not
that the experiment would be too costly I would soon prove my assertion
to be well-founded. Hitherto our course has been one of unbroken
advance, and victory over one petty state after another, and all have
become awed by our strange power. Let us make but one day's journey
backwards, as though disheartened or worn out, and the spell would
be broken; our enemies, forgetting their own petty squabbles for the
time, would unite for the destruction of the common enemy and invader,
and by the mere force of numbers we should be overwhelmed as with an
avalanche. But now we are once more united, my hands feel strong once
more, and I will most surely lead you on, my comrades, to a full and
final success."
"Meantime," remarked Juan de Cabrera, in a tone of as much satisfaction
as marked Cortes' own voice, "meantime, my very good friends and
brothers, I see yonder a party of these worthy redskin cooks advancing
in the very nick of time with our dinner. And I confess that, for my
part, I would fain for the present put by the questions of backwards or
forwards, and stay a while to help clear their dishes for them."
Apparently Don Juan's sentiments were remarkably similar at the moment
to those of the rest of his companions, and, after a good meal, Cortes
found his band once more ready with alacrity to follow whither he might
choose to lead.
Their first destination was the beautiful and sacred city of
Cholula--the Rome, as it were, of Mexico. The Tlascalans eagerly
warned the Spaniards against approaching it or entering its streets.
The Cholulans, they declared, were fair speaking but crafty, making
amends to themselves for cowardly weakness by cunning, and the most
unscrupulous treachery.
But Cortes was never a man to be easily turned aside from his purpose.
The Cholulans sent to invite him to enter their city, but entreated
that the hasty-tempered Tlascalan warriors might be kept without in the
camp, and Cortes accepted the invitation and granted the request.