The Infidel; or, the Fall of Mexico. Vol. II.

The fiery spirit of the Captain-General became incensed with impatience and hope. He rose upon his stirrups, and exalting his voice, always of vast and thrilling power, exclaimed,

"This time, brothers! we will seize the bridges before the pagans have leisure to destroy them. Footmen! see that ye follow after the horse, with all your speed. Cavaliers! put your lances in rest, and be ready. What, trumpeter! speak thy signal to the pioneers; and, brave hearts! fear not the gap, for it is strong enough to support you. – Sound, trumpeter, sound!"

The trumpeter winded a peculiar blast, and the Tlascalans, dividing asunder, flung themselves, from either side of the causeway, into the lake, – a feat often before practised, – and thus left the whole space up to the ditch vacant for the horsemen. At a second blast of the instrument, the cavaliers spurred up to the chasm, and crossing it as they could, and clambering over the rampart, dashed down at once upon the disordered infidels. The footmen followed, running with all their strength, and returning the cheers, with which those in the ships beheld the exploit of the cavalry.

Meanwhile, the Mexicans, seized with unusual consternation, fled with great haste towards the city, pursued so closely by the cavaliers, that they made no attempt at a stand, even at the second ditch; nor did they pause a moment, according to their usual tactics, to destroy the bridge that spanned it. It was indeed a narrow chasm, with an unfinished breastwork, and could not have been maintained for an hour. Another, equally narrow and indefensible, occurred at a distance of less than two hundred paces; and at such intervals, it appeared that the dike was perforated, as far as it extended, even within the limits of the island.

The ardour of the cavaliers, aided by that incentive to valour, the back of the foe, carried them over three several bridges, before they bethought them of the propriety of drawing up their horses a little, and waiting for the footmen.

"Halon! halt! and God give us better heads to our helmets, or better helms to our heads!" cried Juan of Salamanca, a valiant young hidalgo, who had won immortal renown upon the field of Otumba: "Does your excellency intend that we twenty Paladins of Spain shall sack this city with our lances and bucklers? In my mind, we should divide a moiety of the honour with those who will share a full half of the profit."

"Ay," said another, an ancient hidalgo, as all checked their steeds at the sudden call of the young man: "We should be wise, lest we fall into an ambush. Let us wait here for the footmen."

"And have the bridges torn up before our eyes!" cried Cortes; with ungovernable fire. "Heaven fights for us to-day; the infidels are seized with a panic, and they are but few in number."

"Say not so, señor," exclaimed Salamanca, pointing in front, where they could see the fugitives checked by what seemed a flood of armed men, pouring out from the city. "They are in no panic; but we took them too early. Their drum has not yet been beaten upon the temple-top; but we shall hear it now, soon enough. – What ho! ye lame ducks with swords and lances! ye lagging footmen! come on like men, and be fleeter."

"Let us pass on, at least, slowly," said Cortes. "The footmen are nigh, and we may yet gain two or three bridges. Do you not see, we are almost upon the island? – Hark! I hear the trumpet of Alvarado! – He will win the race to the pyramid! – Press on, gallant cavaliers, press on!"

They were indeed within but a short distance from the island, surrounded by the ruins of the water suburb; and it seemed yet easy to secure, at least, two more bridges, over which the fugitives had fled without pausing, and which could be gained before the causeway should be obstructed by the advance of the dense column from the city. Calling out therefore to the infantry to hasten, and finding themselves already joined by two or three of the fleetest of foot, of whom the Barba-Roxa was one, they again dashed onwards, and secured the desired passes.

They now found themselves so near to the island, as to be within reach of annoyance from the adjoining housetops; and this circumstance, together with the unexpected conduct of the Mexicans, produced such alarm in the bosom of the cavalier who had seconded Salamanca's caution before, that he exclaimed,

"Señor mio, and good brothers, let us think a little what we do, before proceeding further. Let us beware of an ambuscado. The knaves yielded us the rampart, almost without a blow; and they leave the ditches bridged behind them. This is not the way Mexicans fight, when they fight honestly. Lo you, now, yonder is a herd of twenty thousand men, with flags and banners, and they stop at sight of us, as if in dismay! What does this mean, if not some decoy for a stratagem?"

"It means," said Cortes, "that they are in a perplexity, because their priests have not yet given them the signal to fall on: and of this perplexity it should be our wisdom to take advantage. See, now, the dogs are in confusion! – Nay, by my conscience! 'tis the confusion of attack, and they come against us! Couch your lances, and at them! for it is better they should feel the weight of our horses, than we the shock of their stormy bodies. On, footmen, on! spur, cavaliers, spur! Santiago and Spain! and down with the paynim scum!"

At these words of exhortation, the horsemen closed their ranks, shouted their war-cries, and dashed with fearless audacity upon the advancing warriors. They swept the causeway, like a moving wall, and however insignificant their numbers, it did not seem possible for the enemy to withstand the violence of their onset; indeed, before a drop of blood was shed, they manifested such symptoms of hesitation and wavering, as greatly exalted the courage of the assailants. They plied their slings and arrows, indeed, they darted their javelins, brandished their spears, and added their discordant shrieks and wild whistling to the shouts of the Spaniards; but still it was in a kind of confusion and disorder, that showed them to be, from some cause or other, not yet prepared for combat. Nay, some were seen, as the galloping squadron approached, to cast themselves into the lake, as if in fear, and swim to the nearest ruins for protection.

This degree of disrelish for battle was a phenomenon, so unusual in the character of barbarians brave not only to folly, but to madness, that a wary commander would have laid it to heart, and pondered over it with suspicion. But not so the Captain-General. He remembered, with Salamanca, that the sound of the enormous drum on the temple of Mexitli, with which, each morning, the Mexican emperor gave the signal for battle, had not yet been heard; and as there seemed to be as close, and almost as fanatical, a connexion between the thunder of this instrument and the courage of the pagans, as he had found, in former days, in the case of the sacred horn, he did not doubt that their present timidity was caused entirely by the failure of the signal. Perhaps he thought it increased also by their sense of weakness; for, now that he was nigh, it became obvious that their numbers were much less considerable than they had appeared at a distance. At all events, they were in fear, and they wavered; which was enough to give his valour the upperhand of his prudence. – It is with martial ardour as with a pestilence; – it ravens most furiously among the ranks of fear.

Fierce, therefore, was the zeal of his cavaliers, and their hearts flamed at the thought of blood. They raised their voices in a cry of victory, and bounded like thunderbolts among their opponents. The shock was decisive; in a moment, the whole mass of pagans was put to rout. They flung down their arms, and betook themselves to flight. Those who could, fled down along the dike into the city; others flung themselves into the water, and swam to the island, or to the neighbouring ruins. The only ones who made resistance, were those whose hearts were transfixed by Spanish lances, before they could turn to retreat. Such men uttered the yell of battle, and, in their dying agonies, thrust with their own hands, the spears further through their vitals, that they might be nearer to the foe, and strike the macana once more for Tenochtitlan.

"On, ye men of the foot!" cried the Captain-General. "Let the Tlascalans fire the houses behind me; for now we are again upon the island. Charge, cavaliers, charge! The saints open a path for us. Charge, my brothers, charge! and viva for Spain and our honour!"

CHAPTER XV

The horsemen pursued along the dike, spearing, or tumbling into the water, the few who had the heart to resist; and so great was, or seemed, the terror of the barbarians, that the victors penetrated even within the limits of the island, until the turrets of houses, from which they were separated only by the lateral canals, darkened them with their shadows. Upon these were clustered many pagans, who shot at them both arrows and darts, but with so little energy, that it seemed as if despondence or fatuity had robbed them of their usual vigour. Hence, the excited cavaliers gave them but little attention, not doubting that they would be soon dislodged by the infantry. They were even regardless of circumstances still more menacing; and if a lethargy beset the infidel that day, it is equally certain that a species of distraction overwhelmed the brains of the Spaniards. It seemed as if the great object of their ambition depended more upon their following the fugitives to the temple-square than upon any other feat; and to this they encouraged one another with vivas and invocations to the saints. They could already behold the huge bulk of the pyramid, rising up at the distance of a mile, as if it shut up the street; and its terraced sides, thronged with multitudes of men, seemed to prove to them, that the frighted Mexicans were running to their gods for protection. It is true, they perceived vast bodies of infidels blocking up the avenue afar, as if to dispute their passage beyond the canalled portion of the island; but they regarded them with scorn.

They rushed onwards, occasionally arrested by some flying group, but only for a moment.

There was a place, not far within the limits of the island, where they found the causeway, for the space of at least sixty paces, so delved and pared away on either side, that it scarce afforded a passage for two horsemen abreast. The device was of recent execution, for they beheld the mattocks of labourers still sticking in the earth, as if that moment abandoned. This circumstance, so strange, so novel, and so ominous, it might be supposed, would have aroused them to suspicion. The passage, as it was, so contracted, broken, and rugged, looked prodigiously like the Al-Sirat, or bridge to paradise of the Mussulmans, – that arch, narrow as the thread of a famished spider, over which it is so much easier to be precipitated than to pass with safety. Yet grim and threatening as it was, there was but one among the cavaliers who raised a voice of warning. As the Captain-General, without a moment's hesitation, pushed his horse forward, to lead the way, and without a single expression of surprise, the ancient hidalgo, who had twice before sounded a note of alarm, now exclaimed, —

"For the love of heaven, pause, señor! This is a trap that will destroy us."

"Art thou afraid, Alderete?" cried Cortes, looking back to him, grimly. "This is no place for a King's Treasurer," (such was Alderete, the royal Contador.) – "Get thee back, then, to the first ditch, and fill it up to thy liking. This will be charge enough for a volunteer."

"I will fight where thou wilt, when thou wilt, and as boldly as thou wilt," said the indignant cavalier; "but here play the madman no longer."

"I will take thy counsel, – rest where I am, – and, in an hour's time, see myself shut out from the city by a ditch, sixty yards wide! God's benison upon thy long beard! and mayst thou be wiser. Forward, friends! Do you not see? the knaves are running amain to check us, and recover their unfinished gap! On! courage, and on! Santiago and at them!"

It was indeed as Cortes said. The infidels, who blocked up the streets afar, were now seen running towards them, with the most terrific yells, as if to seize, before it was too late, a pass so easily maintained. The cavaliers, animated by the words of their leader, were quite as resolute to disappoint them, and therefore rode across as rapidly as they could. The pass was not only narrow, but tortuous and irregular; which increased the difficulties of surmounting it; so that the Mexicans, running with the most frantic speed, were within a bowshot, before Cortes had spurred his steed upon the broader portion of the dike. But, as if there were something dreadful to the infidels, in the spectacle of the great Teuctli of the East, thus again in their stronghold, they came to a sudden halt, and testified their valour only by yelling, and waving their spears and banners.

"Courage, friends, and quick!" cried Cortes. "The dogs are beset with fear, and will not face us. Ye shall hear other yells in a moment. Haste, valiant cavaliers! haste, men of Spain! and make room for the footmen, who are behind you."

The screams of the barbarians were loud and incessant; but in the midst of the din, as he turned to cheer his cavaliers over the broken passage, Don Hernan's ears were struck by the sound of a Christian voice, calling from the midst of the pagans, with thrilling vehemence,

"Beware! beware! Back to the causey! Beware!"

"Hark!" cried Alderete, who had already passed; "Our Saint calls to us! Let us return!"

"It is a trick of the fiend!" exclaimed Cortes, in evident perturbation of mind. "Come on, good friends, and let us seize vantage-ground; or the dogs will drive us, singly, into the ditches."

"Back! back!" shouted the cavaliers behind – "We are ambushed! We are surrounded!"

Their further exclamations were lost in a tempest of discordant shrieks, coming from the front and the rear, from the heavens above, and, as they almost fancied, from the earth beneath. They looked northward, towards the pyramid, – the whole broad street was filled with barbarians, rushing towards them with screams of anticipated triumph; they looked back to the lake, – the causeway was swarming with armed men, who seemed to have sprung from the waters; to either side, and beheld the canals of the intersecting streets lashed into foam by myriads of paddles; while, at the same moment, the few pagans, who had annoyed them from the housetops, appeared transformed, by the same spell of enchantment, into hosts innumerable, with spirits all of fury and flame.

"What says the king of Castile? What says the king of Castile now?" roared the exulting infidels.

"Santiago! and God be with us!" exclaimed Cortes, waving his hand, with a signal for retreat, that came too late: "Cross but this devil-trap again, and – "

Before he could conclude the vain and useless order, the drum of the emperor sounded upon the pyramid. It was an instrument of gigantic size and horrible note, and was held in no little fear, especially after the events of this day, by the Spaniards, who fabled that it was covered with the skins of serpents. It was a fit companion for the horn of Mexitli; which latter, however, being a sacred instrument, was sounded only on the most urgent and solemn occasions.

The first tap, – or rather peal, for the sound came from the temple more like the roll of thunder than of a drum, – was succeeded by yells still more stunning; and while the cavaliers, retreating, struggled, one by one, to recross the narrow pass, they were set upon with such fury as left them but little hope of escape.

If the rashness of Cortes had brought his friends into this fatal difficulty, he now seemed resolved to atone his fault, by securing their retreat, even although at the expense of his life. It was in vain that those few cavaliers who had succeeded in reaching him, before the onslaught began, besought him to take his chance among them, and recross, leaving them to cover his rear.

"Get ye over yourselves," he cried, with grim smiles, smiting away the headmost of the assailants from the street: "If I have brought ye among coals of fire, heaven forbid I should not broil a little in mine own person. Quick, fools! over and hasten! over and quick! and by and by I will follow you."

For a moment, it seemed as if the terror of his single arm would have kept the barbarians at bay. But, waxing bolder, as they saw his attendants dropping one by one away, they began to close upon him, and his situation became exceedingly critical. He looked over his shoulder, and perceived that his followers threaded their way along the broken dike with less difficulty than he at first feared. The very narrowness of the passage left but little foothold for the enemy; and their attacks, being made principally from canoes, were not such as wholly to dishearten a cavalier, whose steed was as strongly defended by mail as his own body. Encouraged by this assurance, the Captain-General still maintained his post, rushing ever and anon upon the closing herds, and mowing right and left with his trusty blade, while his gallant charger pawed down opposition with his hoofs. Thus he fought, with the mad valour that made his enemies so often deem him almost a demigod, until satisfied that his own attempt to cross the pass could no longer embarrass the efforts of his followers. Then, charging once more upon the pagans, and even with greater fury than before, he wheeled round with unexpected rapidity, and uttering his famous cry, "Santiago and at them!" dashed boldly at the passage.

Seven pagans sprang upon the path. They were armed like princes, and the red fillets of the House of Darts waved among their sable locks.

"The Teuctli shall have the tribute of Mexico!" shouted one, flourishing a battle-axe that seemed of weight sufficient, in his brawny arm, to dash out the charger's brains at a blow. The words were not understood by Cortes; but he recognized at once the visage of the Lord of Death.

"I have thee, pagan!" he cried, striking at the bold barbarian. The blow failed; for one of the others, springing at the charger's head with unexampled audacity, seized him by the bridle, so that he reared backwards, and thus foiled the aim of his rider. The next moment, the Spanish steel fell upon the neck of the daring infidel, killing him on the spot; yet not so instantaneously as to avert a disaster, which it seemed the object of his fury to produce. His convulsive struggles, as he clung, dying, to the rein, drove the steed off the narrow ledge; and thus losing his foothold, the noble animal rolled over into the deep canal, burying the Captain-General in the flood.

"The general! save the general!" shrieked the only Christian, who, in this horrible melée, (for the battle was now universal,) beheld the condition of Cortes, and who, although on foot, and bristling with arrows that had stuck fast in his cotton-armour, and resisted by other weapons at every step, had yet the courage to run to the rescue. It was Gaspar Olea. His visage was yet wan, and expressive of the unusual horror preying upon his mind; yet he rushed forward, as if he had never known a fear. He exalted his voice, while crying for assistance, until it was heard far back upon the causeway; yet he reached the place of Don Hernan's mischance alone. The scene was dreadful: the nobles had flung themselves into the flood, and were dragging the stunned and strangling hero from the steed, which lay upon its side on the rugged and shelving edge of the dike, unable to rise, and perishing with the most fearful struggles; while, all the time, the elated infidels expressed their triumph with shouts of frantic joy.

"Courage, captain! be of good heart, señor!" exclaimed the Barba-Roxa, striking down one of the captors at a single blow: "Courage! for we have good help nigh," he continued, attacking a second with the same success: "Courage, señor, courage!"

No Mexican helm of dried skins, and no breast-plate of copper, could resist the machete of a man like Gaspar. Yet his first success was caused rather by the Mexicans being so intently occupied with their captive, that they thought of nothing else, than by any miraculous exertion of skill and prowess. He slew two, before they dreamed of attack, and he mortally wounded a third, ere the others could turn to drive him back. A fourth rushed upon him, before he could again lift up his weapon, and grasping him in his arms, with the embrace of a mountain bear, leaped with him into the canal.

There were now but two left in possession of Cortes; yet his resistance even against these was ineffectual. His sword had dropped from his hand; a violent blow had burst his helmet, and confounded his brain; and he had been lifted from the water, already half suffocated. Yet he struggled as he could, and catching one of his foes by the throat, he succeeded in overturning him into the water, and there grappled with him among the shallows. The remaining barbarian, yelling for assistance, flung himself upon the pair; and though twenty Spaniards, headed by Bernal Diaz and the hunchback, were now within half as many paces, Cortes would have perished where he lay, had not assistance arose from an unexpected quarter.

Among the vast numbers who came crowding from the city over the broken passage, were several who knew, by the cry of the seventh noble, that Malintzin was in his hands; and they rushed forward, to insure his capture. The foremost and fleetest of these was distinguished from the rest by a frame of towering height; and, had there been a Spaniard by to notice him, would have been still more remarkable from the fact, that he uttered all his cries in good, expressive Castilian. He bore a Spanish weapon, too, and his first act, as he flung himself into the ditch where Cortes was drowning, was to strike it through the neck of the uppermost noble. His next was to spurn the other from the breast of the general, whom he raised to his feet, murmuring in his ear,

"Be of good heart, señor! for you are saved."