Page:The Mastering of Mexico.djvu/150

118 men, the greater part wounded and knocked up with fatigue;—four hundred men, I say, knowing their foe had marched out to battle with the determination to leave none alive save those they would sacrifice to their idols.

What a shower of arrows and stones they poured upon us! The ground was literally covered with javelins, double-edged and sharp enough to pierce any armor. They fought like very furies, but we used our heavy guns, muskets and crossbows with such effect, and our cavalry in particular bore themselves so valiantly, that they, next the Almighty, were our bulwark. The enemy were themselves so many and so closely crowded, and also part of their forces so divided by quarrels, that at last they lost courage and retreated. Our horsemen followed them but a short distance, for from fatigue they could not sit upon their horses.

When at last we found ourselves free from attack we gave fervent thanks to God. We had lost one soldier killed, but sixty were wounded, as well as all the horses. They gave me two wounds, one on the head with a stone, and one by an arrow piercing my ankle, but neither disabled me for duty and fighting till the end.

Oh! the distress we suffered! We had neither oil nor salt for our wounds. And we had no clothes to shelter us from the sharp winds that blew from the