Page:About Mexico - Past and Present.djvu/149

Rh next morning the natives came in several boats to this spot, bringing as a gift fowls, fruit and vegetables, with a request from the chiefs that the visitors would "take these things and go away, never to trouble their country any more."

"It is shameful in you to leave us to perish with hunger and thirst," said Aguilar.

"You are strangers to us," replied the Indian spokesman; "your faces and your voices are frightful to us. We do not want any of you in our houses. If you need water, dip it up out of the river, or dig wells as we do." "Tell them," said Cortez to Aguilar, "that we shall never go away without seeing their town. I have been sent here by the greatest lord in the world, and I cannot return without a full account of this country. If they do not receive me as a friend, I shall commend myself to God and fight them."

"You had better not boast in a country which does not belong to you," retorted the chief. "As to entering our town, we shall never permit it; we will kill you all first."

Both parties now prepared for battle. The Indians came out with defiant yells. Although evidently terrified at the roar of the guns and the sight of "four-footed, two-headed beasts" (as they called the horses and their riders), they fought bravely until they were attacked on the land-side of the town, when they fled. Cortez and his men slept that night in the spacious temple.

After another attempt to dislodge the invaders, the Indians came bringing a tribute of provisions, gold and a number of victims for sacrifice, in token that they had given up the contest. While they were in the camp some of the horses stabled near by began to neigh. The