Page:About Mexico - Past and Present.djvu/208

200 gave orders to have the apartments he wished to occupy made ready for his use. This being done, many nobles came to him stripped of their robes, which they carried hanging on their arms, and barefooted, bringing a litter, on which, with tears in their eyes, they placed him in deep silence; and in this manner we proceeded to the quarters which I occupied."

Meanwhile, news of this strange visit began to circulate, and the people might have raised a disturbance had not Montezuma quietly bade them disperse. He said that he was only going on a visit to his friends and no one need be anxious for his safety. True to his promise, the soldiers of Cortez served the captive chief with great deference. His people came freely to see him, and the council held its meetings in the Spanish quarters. The chief's spirit had been thoroughly subdued. He was gentle and patient, very grateful for favors and generous to a fault to his grasping jailers.

The distinguished visitor had time to be fairly settled among the Spaniards when courtiers announced the arrival of the deputy Quancapopoca with a large retinue. He was brought, as became his rank, in an elegant litter, in which he had been carried over the mountains a distance of more than one hundred and eighty miles. He was immediately delivered to Cortez, who put him and his men under a strong guard. At first the whole party denied that what they had done was by the order of Montezuma, but on further questioning they accused him as the author of the plot. The confession, however, did not save them from death. Cortez ordered them to be taken to one of the large public squares of the city, bound to the stake and burned to ashes. Aztec