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236 alone, but the Indians knew no pity, and, although for three days after they reached the heart of the City of Mexico no regular fighting was done, a merciless carnage went on. The people and many of the chiefs would have yielded, but Guatemozin and his adherents seemed bent on making the difference between Montezuma and themselves as striking as possible; Guatemozin would die rather than surrender. A captured Aztec chief sent back to him to treat for peace was killed, and the message was returned, with a shower of arrows, that "death was all they wanted now."

The truce was concluded, and hostilities began again. The story of the dreadful days which followed can never be fully told—how these miserable, starving people were hunted out of their hiding-places to be shot down in the streets or driven into the water. One of the stratagems used was to collect into one great basin all the canoes that could be found, so that when the houses were attacked the helpless inmates had no means of escape across the canals, but were stabbed and drowned. At last one of the brigantines on duty in the lake—a large basin in the city—broke through a fleet of canoes which had gathered there, giving chase to one in which was evidently some important personage. The Spaniards were about to fire upon the party, when some one signaled to them that the "chief-of-men" was there. The master of the brigantines bore down upon them instantly, and Guatemozin, with his companions, was soon led into the presence of Cortez, who was on one of the housetops near the market-place. "I made him sit down," said the conqueror, "and treated him with confidence; but the young man put his hand on the poignard I wore at my side and entreated me to kill him, because, since he had done all his