Page:Romance of History, Mexico.djvu/292

 Sometimes the Aztecs, who had their own code of chivalry, would cease their fearless but hopeless battling, while one of their warriors stood forth and challenged a Teule or Tlascalan to single combat. Then upon the azotea or roof of some building was waged a mortal duel, while the opposing armies watched and cheered on the combatants. One day a valiant Aztec, armed with Castilian sword and buckler, sprang upon a house-top and offered battle to any Teule who would meet him. A young page of Cortés, burning to win laurels, at once accepted the challenge. Small and slight he seemed as he faced the Aztec, but he was agile and skilled in the use of the weapons, which were to the Indian awkward and unwonted. A sharp struggle ended in victory for the boy, who ran his foe through the body and returned in triumph to his comrades.

Of no avail was Aztec valour to stay the work of ruin. Farther and farther into the city the destroyers made their way, and black was the trail they left behind them. "Go on!" shouted the Mexicans bitterly to the allies, "the more you destroy, the more you will have to build up again hereafter. If we conquer, you shall build for us, and if your white friends conquer, they will make you do as much for them!" A band of warriors fought till every man was slain to save from the spoilers their royal palace, the beauty and pride of all the land. Well might the doomed people cry with the prophet of old, "A fire devoureth before them, behind them a flame burneth; the land is as the garden of Eden before them, behind 252