The Mastering of Mexico/Chapter 17
CHAPTER XVII
How we retreated from Mexico; our night of sorrows; the days following the sorrowful night; our punitive expeditions, and how various towns begged Cortes to stop Mexican violence; why we laughed at Olid's expedition and how arrival of ships increased our forces.
With direst threats and yells sounding in our ears, our food and water beginning to fail, our powder fast diminishing, the bridges on the causeways raised—in short with death staring us in the face, we agreed in our council of war to leave the city at night when the Mexicans were most off their guard. To mislead them as to our time, we sent, that very afternoon, one of our prisoners, a papa, to say that they should let us in peace march out of the city within eight days.
First and most important of preparations for our retreat was a movable bridge of strong beams that we could carry and use where the former bridges had been broken. Four hundred Tlaxcalans and one hundred and fifty of our men were to have charge of this bridge and fix it in position when the need came. Two hundred and fifty Tlaxcalans and fifty of our men were told off for the heavy guns. Sandoval and one hundred of our most active soldiers were to form a vanguard and clear the streets. Cortes should go in the middle and support the part most needing help. In the rear were to go the main body of cavalry, the baggage, our prisoners, and Donna Marina, all guarded by three hundred Tlaxcalans and thirty Spaniards.
Night was fast approaching, when our captain told his steward to see that his domestics brought the gold, silver and jewels together in the hall. Then Cortes named two officers to take charge of our king's portion and load as heavily as possible eight of the wounded horses and eighty Tlaxcalans with it. For the most part it was in broad bars of gold. To his secretary and the king's notaries Cortes further said, "Put down in writing for witness that I have done all I could to save this treasure of over seven hundred thousand dollars in gold. You see the Indian porters and the horses can carry no more. I now permit any soldier to take what he can carry, otherwise it may fall into the hands of these dogs of Mexicans."
As soon as they heard this, the soldiers of Narvaez and many of our men stowed away as much of the metal as they could. I have never had the failing of coveting gold, but I took four chalchihuite stones out of a small box and quickly put them under my cuirass. It was a deed well done, for later on they served to buy me food and get help to cure my wounds.
That night a thin mist hung over the town and a gentle rain was falling, when, before midnight, we fixed the bridge in a gap the Mexicans had made and Cortes and the soldiers with him, and also many horsemen, passed over. Just then the yells, trumpets and whistles of the Mexicans suddenly burst forth calling to the people, "Up! Up! Out with your canoes for the teules are leaving!" Straightway so vast bodies of the enemy bore down upon us, and the lake at once became so crowded with canoes, that we were unable to move further.
We now had a most obstinate conflict to get possession of the bridge, and, as mischances never come singly, two of the horses slipped on the wet planks and fell into the lake. When I and others saw this we got to the other side of the bridge, and so many warriors charged us that though we fought desperately, the bridge turned by overbalance. Still, those in the rear kept continually pushing forward, and soon the opening was filled with dead horses, Indian men and women servants, baggage and many of our men, some of whom were drowned and others drawn into canoes by Indians as prisoners. The scene was heartrending. And to hear the pitiful cries! "Help! Help! I am sinking!" cried one here. "Help! they are killing me!" screamed another there. Here one reached the water-edge and implored us to lift him out, while further off another clambered over dead bodies only to meet dense crowds of the foe. Could any one believe a man of us observed the order of retreat? He were a fool.
Cortes with some of the officers and soldiers had passed, as I said, and had spurred along the causeway to reach the main land. If we had waited, horseman and soldiers, one for another, what would it have availed? Groups of thirty or forty would have been cut to pieces; not one of us would have been left alive, for on one side the causeway was the lake swarming with canoes to carry us off prisoners, and on the other hosts of warriors on the flat house-roofs pelting us with lances and stones and cutting us with our own swords—which the enemy had taken and fixed to their lances. Our muskets and crossbows were useless because of the rain, and the darkness made every movement uncertain. We should have fared even worse had it been day. By the grace of God only did we escape.
So we drove ahead to get to the town of Tacuba, where our vanguard had arrived. Finally we heard voices saying to Cortes, "Captain, we are safe here, but they say we are fleeing and leaving men behind to die. Let us go back and bring them help." Cortes answered that it was a miracle that one of us escaped, and he promptly turned back with some of our officers and soldiers who were unhurt. They did not go far. Alvarado, on foot, for he had lost his brown mare, and with him a few soldiers and Tlaxcalans, all dripping with blood, met them. The eyes of Cortes were wet with tears when he saw their woeful plight and learned that Leon and many other gentlemen lay dead, and that these few men had crossed the opening in the causeway upon dead bodies of men and the horses and the boxes with which it was choked.
Now that we, or the remnant of us, were at Tacuba we were not escaping attack, and we sought to quit the terrible neighborhood. Although the Mexicans continually harassed us with arrows, darts and slings, we marched by a bye-road, of which our Tlaxcalan friends knew, to a temple built like a fort. Here we halted and lighted fires and eased our sore bodies. Grievous it was to see our aching wounds, swollen by the cold, as we bound them with cloths. But what was more grievous was the loss of our brave companions. I do not name them. It would take long, so great was the number missing. Most of the men of Narvaez met death at the bridge because of the weight of gold which they had taken when Cortes offered the treasure.
Only twenty three horses escaped. We had not a grain of powder and our cannon were lost. We at once might make arrows, but our crossbows were few. More pressing than all, however, was the question, what would be the disposition of our Indian friends towards us? We determined to go forward with Tlaxcalans in advance as guides, our severely wounded in the centre and those too lame to walk bound upon horses unfit for fighting. But our enemy, the Mexicans, were day and night close at our heels, yelling and shouting at us and hurling stones, arrows and darts.
On we marched through plantations and hamlets, the Mexicans always in pursuit and striving to lock us in some narrow place and slay us. One night we quartered ourselves in some houses and supped off a horse they had killed. The next morning as we advanced, our scouts brought word that countless Mexican warriors filled the fields ahead. Here, however, our courage did not flag, and when our horsemen dashed over the level ground in full gallop on the enemy, our foot soldiers seemed to put double strength and spirit in their sword thrusts. It was a terrific battle. And to see Cortes! and Alvarado, who had borrowed a horse! And to hear the valiant Sandoval, all covered with wounds, encourage us, "Now, gentlemen, this is the day for victory. Our trust is in God. We shall not lose." The battle was hot. The Mexican chief fell and his warriors gave way and fled. But at this moment, indeed, we felt neither hunger, nor thirst, nor the pain of wounds, nor memory of disaster, as we followed up our victory, pursuing, wounding, killing. Our Tlaxcalan friends proved themselves very lions. Our horsemen at last returned from pursuit, and we gave thanks to God for our escape from so powerful an enemy, for never before in the Indies had the Spaniards fought so great a number of warriors, the very flower of the joint armies of Mexico and Its allies. That day we supped off gourds, marching as we ate, and at the approach of evening came to a temple where we fortified ourselves, dressed our wounds, and the hurts of our horses, and got some rest.
And now we were soon to be as delighted as though we saw our native land, for we were to come in sight of the hills of Tlaxcala. Yet who could tell how the people there would feel towards us to-day? And, too, what had happened to those of us at Vera Cruz? Were they still alive? Of our great numbers only four hundred and forty survived, with twenty horses and twelve crossbowmen and seven musketeers. Each of us was weak and covered with wounds. Very clearly, said Cortes, we could see how it had pleased God to save us in a miraculous rescue, and we should give thanks. But our troops were now the same in number as when we first entered Mexico, and It behooved us to offer the Tlaxcalans no cause for offence, and trust to find them faithful and true. If it should turn out that they were not, then we must carry still further our strong arm and oak heart.
When we reached the boundary walls between the Tlaxcalan and Mexican lands, we halted to wash ourselves at a spring on a hillside and to eat. Refreshed in measure, we again set out and under the escort of many caciques and people who met us at a smaller town, we finally entered Tlaxcala, patiently to await the cure of our wounds. In that town we rested twenty-two days. Then Cortes determined on making punitive excursions into the province of Tepeaca, where the people had slain several of our soldiers on their way to Mexico.
It had become clear that the soldiers of Narvaez were not used to fighting. Those who survived the carnage at the bridge of sorrows and the great battle we fought in the fields, cursed Cortes and his conquest, and could hardly await their return to Cuba. Then, too, they cursed the gold he had given them and which they had for the most part lost. Content to have escaped with their lives, they wanted no more fighting, but rather to go back to their homes. Our captain, thinking he could bend them to his purpose, answered in quiet, kindly talk. But when they saw their complaints had no effect on Cortes, they went before a notary and drew up a formal protest demanding that he abandon war and go at once to Vera Cruz, giving reasons that we had neither horses, muskets, powder, crossbows nor thread to make bow strings—in short, that we had none of the necessities of war and out of our company only four hundred and forty men survived. Moreover, they protested, Mexican warriors held every pass and stronghold, and if we longer delayed ship-worms would eat our vessels as they lay in the harbor.
This protest our captain answered by far more weighty contradictions, and when we of his old troop begged him most earnestly not to permit followers of Narvaez to go, for it would hurt the cause of God and the interests of our emperor, and when they saw their efforts were fruitless, they finally consented to join us in the campaign, provided Cortes would permit them, when opportunity came, to return to Cuba. Still, their murmurs did not end, but day by day they complained—how dearly they had paid for Cortes' conquest in giving up the peace and security of comfortable homes.
Our captain had wished the caciques of Tlaxcala to furnish him with five thousand warriors on his march to Tepeaca and its towns, some twenty-eight miles away, against which we aimed to carry our arms. If our wish to take vengeance for the death of Spaniards was great, that of the caciques of Tlaxcala, because of the robbing of farms, was greater, and they sent four thousand warriors to join us who numbered now seventeen horses, six crossbowmen and four hundred and twenty soldiers. We took merely a single day's food, for the country we were invading was thickly peopled and supplied with maize, fowls and dogs. Keeping a few scouts in advance, we camped for the first night about twelve miles from Tepeaca.
The people there were quite prepared for our coming, for they knew we had found a kindly shelter at Tlaxcala, and they took it for granted that as soon as we felt our strength restored we would overrun their territories. Mexican troops therefore kept guard all along the boundaries, and Tepeaca itself they strongly garrisoned. To this town Cortes, who in all such matters aimed at strict justice and order, sent some prisoners we had taken to ask who and how many were concerned in the murder of the sixteen Spaniards on their way to Mexico; why the Tepeacans had attacked and robbed the farms of the Tlaxcalans; for what reasons such vast numbers of Mexican troops bore them company; and he begged the Tepeacans to come at once and make friends with us and turn the Mexicans out, and if they did not, we should look on them as rebels, murderers and robbers, and, first desolating their country with fire and sword, give them into slavery.
The prisoners faithfully carried our message. If we, however, had sent a threatening summons, the answer the enemy sent back was still fiercer, for, puffed up with their late victory, the Mexicans spoke with terrible assurance, and finally after our repeated offers of peace, declared that we should not advance further; if we did advance, they would fall on us and have a bigger feast from Spanish flesh than they had had after the night of sorrows and the battle of the fields.
We now had a council of war in which it was agreed and taken down in writing by a notary, that all the allies of Mexico who had killed Spaniards should be turned into slaves, on the ground that after swearing allegiance to our king, they had rebelled and slain more than eight hundred of our people and over fifty of our horses. This decision Cortes sent to our enemy and again asked for peace. They replied that if we did not at once quit the province they would come out and kill us. Next day we met the vaunters in a severe battle. A ground of maize and maguey plantations proved favorable to our horsemen and the enemy's bravely availed them little. To see the spirit of our Tlaxcalan allies!—how valiant they were!—and how they pursued the enemy! When the Tepeacans became convinced that the Mexicans were no protection, they sent messengers suing for peace and they then took the oath of allegiance to our king.
Because it was on the road to Vera Cruz, and because the town was one among many and the land about it produced plenty of maize, and we had allies, the Tlaxcalans, to guard the frontier, we founded a town at Tepeaca and set up a regular government. We scoured the neighboring territory, and at one town where fifteen Spaniards had been killed, we turned many into slaves. We cast an iron to brand those we took for slaves, and its mark was the letter G, which means guerra, war. Within forty days we had all the towns punished and thoroughly at peace.
The successor of Montezuma, he who had driven us out of Mexico, about this time died of smallpox. Another now came to the headship, a near relative of Montezuma, about twenty-five years old, for an Indian very well-bred and more inclined to white than to the copper-brown of his race. The new monarch was valiant, moreover, and soon made himself so feared among his people that, in his presence, they trembled. His wife, one of Montezuma's daughters, passed for a beauty among her country-women.
When this new ruler learned that we had defeated the Mexicans at Tepeaca, and that the people of the town had given their fealty to our king, he feared that we would overrun his other provinces and reduce them to our service, and he therefore sent messengers to every town with commands that they be ready for action. To some of the town caciques he sent presents of gold, and others he freed from tribute. But above all he sent out companies of warriors with the command that they fight us fiercely and prevent us from entering his territory.
This new monarch, Guatemoc, had thrown especially strong garrisons, as I said, into towns that lay on the boundaries, in particular into Guacachula and Izucar. In these cities, about twelve miles from each other, his Mexican warriors were such a host, and they so felt their strength, that they took liberties and went so far as to do acts of violence—as robbing people of their mantles, their maize, their fowls, their gold, and even of their daughters and wives, if the women were pretty. So when the Guacachulans considered how the town of Cholula had enjoyed peace ever since the day it had rid itself of Mexican garrisons, and how again it was the same at Tepeaca and other towns, they secretly despatched four chieftains to Cortes and asked him to send his teules with their horses to stop the robberies and assaults; and they added that all the people of the town and neighborhood would aid us in slaying the Mexicans.
This call for aid appealed to Cortes and he determined to send out Cristobal de Olid in command of nearly all the horsemen and soldiers and a large force of Tlaxcalans—for the booty the Tlaxcalans had carried off from Tepeaca had induced many more to join us. Now among Olid's three hundred soldiers were several followers of Narvaez, and as they went on their way some Indians told these Narvaez men that all the fields and houses in the country to which they were marching were filled with Mexican warriors—this and other hugger-mugger stories.
These men of Narvaez had from the beginning no liking for this new expedition, or again to taste fighting; rather they bent all their thoughts on getting back to Cuba. Their memories of the perilous flight from Mexico, and of their terrific battle in the fields, urged them so that they begged Olid to turn back, for this expedition would fail and every man of them perish. In vain the leader expostulated, Cortes' own soldiers standing behind all he said and agreeing there must be no retreat. The others refused to advance another step; and at last they so confused the mind of Olid that he turned back, and wrote Cortes the state of things.
The letter greatly angered Cortes and he sent two crossbowmen with a letter marvelling that an officer of Olid's strength and courage should fail to do what he had been ordered. When Olid read what Cortes had written, he shouted with chagrin, and bitterly reproached those who had led him into disobedience of commands. At once he issued orders for all to 
The vexation of the whole matter turned Olid into a fierce lion, and shortly after, when he met the enemy in the field, he led his men to a triumphant victory. The Mexican garrisons retreated and fortified themselves in another large town where there was another great body of warriors posted in a fort. To this place again Olid, and those who would follow him, marched and fell so furiously upon their foes that they routed them completely.
When this force of Olid's returned from the expedition, Cortes and the rest of us went out to meet them; and we had much laughter about the discontented having persuaded Cristobal de Olid to turn back. And Olid even laughed at it himself and said that some of his soldiers had thought more of their mines in Cuba than of their soldiers' arms; and he vowed that never again would he go on an expedition with any of the rich followers of Narvaez, but would take with him only a few of the poor soldiers of Cortes. In these days Sandoval also led an expedition against other towns where Spaniards had been attacked and made way with, and came back to where we lay at Tepeaca, bringing clothes, arms and two saddles which they had found in a temple offered before idols. His force also brought back great numbers of Indian women and boys who were branded with the iron as slaves.
Perfect tranquillity now reigned. Both during our expeditions, and while we were lying at Tepeaca, several ships came to port. One, fitted out in Cuba, brought letters In which Diego Velasquez, believing that Narvaez had now conquered New Spain, sent word that if Narvaez had not already killed Cortes, he should at once send him alive, with all his chief officers, to Cuba, that he, Velasquez, might ship them to Spain;—indeed, such were the orders of the bishop of Burgos, who was also archbishop of Rosano and president of the council of the Indies. When our admiral, Cavallero, had received the new comers with careful courtesy, and had got them ashore, he then said, "Surrender! in the name of our captain general, Cortes!" They were dumbfounded. But they submitted and removed sails, rudder and compass from the ship, and afterwards the captain of the ship, Barba, with thirteen soldiers and two horses, marched on to our quarters. Great was our joy at their coming, for they brought us aid at the very minute we needed it. Only eight days after Cavallero captured another ship, and in the same manner, that is, by welcoming the new arrivals and not letting them know that Narvaez had failed till they were landed and in his power; and all the forces on board, eight soldiers, a mare, six crossbows and twine for bowstrings, he forwarded. Our pleasure at the coming of the new guests was greater even than at those of a few days before, and Cortes paid them much honor and gave each man something to do.
We thanked God most heartily for this strengthening of our forces with soldiers, crossbows and horses. But still more aid arrived; for ships which Francisco de Garay had sent to form a settlement on the river Panuco came to harbor, the first bearing sixty soldiers. They had fortunately escaped, re-embarked and come to our port after Indians had massacred the settlers on the Panuco and set fire to the ships. These sixty soldiers were all of them ill and got to our camp very slowly, for they had been so weakened by hunger they could scarcely walk. When Cortes saw them so swollen in body he knew they were no material for fighting men, and that we should hardly be able to cure them, but he gave them to our care and did them every possible kindness. Many of them died.
The next ship to come to our port had also been sent by Garay to succor his Panuco colony, but when the captain ran up the Panuco and found no trace of the settlers, and also learned from Indians that they had been slain, he hoisted sail and made for Vera Cruz. There he at once disembarked his soldiers, who numbered more than fifty, with seven horses, and started for the place where we were stationed.
Again a few days after another ship arrived at our port, likewise despatched by Garay to protect and succor his Panuco forces, which he thought safe and well. This ship brought over forty men, ten horses, crossbows and other arms. Thus it was that Francisco de Garay sent off one ship after another to the aid of his colony and each served him in no way and only went to increase the advantages of Cortes and ourselves, for they finally arrived at Vera Cruz and brought us most welcome help. The men from the last of these two ships were so hearty and fat when they came in that we called them "strong-backs," and those from the third, "pack-saddles," because they wore heavy cotton cuirasses, so thick that no arrow could penetrate them.