Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 1.djvu/171

Rh interpreters that we desired no war, but peace and love with them, they did not bother to answer us with words, but let fly a thick volley of arrows at us. While those in the fore were fighting with the Indians, two captains of the rear-guard came up, and, after two hours of fighting, the Captain Fernando Cortes arrived with the horsemen, coming out from the woods at the point where the Indians were surrounding the Spaniards on all sides; and so he kept up the fight with the Indians for an hour, and such was their multitude that neither those who were fighting the Spanish foot-soldiers could see the horsemen, nor know where they were, nor could the horsemen, advancing and retreating amongst the Indians, see each other. As soon, however, as the Spaniards realised that the horsemen had come up, they charged quickly upon the Indians, who immediately began to fly, and pursued them for half a league. The Captain, seeing that the Indians were in full flight, and that nothing remained to be done, and that his troops were very fatigued, gave the order that all should collect in some farmhouses near by; and, when they were assembled, twenty were found to be wounded, of whom no one died, nor did anyone who had been wounded the day before. Thus assembled, and the wounded cared for, we returned to our camp, carrying with us two Indians whom we had captured, whom the Captain ordered to be liberated,'and sent letters by them to the caciques, telling them that, if they would come to him, he would pardon them the offence which they had committed, and they would be his friends.

That same afternoon two who seemed to be principal Indians came, saying that they were very sorry  Results of the Hos- tilities at Tabasco for the past, and that those caciques besought him to pardon them, and not to do any further injury nor kill any more of their people, for