Page:The Mastering of Mexico.djvu/279

Rh would happen, his pride turned to moroseness and anger. So it came about that when Montezuma sent two caciques to say he wished to see and talk with our captain, Cortes said, "Go to, for a hound, who will not keep an open market nor permit food to be given us!" When Leon and other chief officers heard this, they cried, "Moderate your anger, captain, recall the kindness and honor this monarch has shown us. But for him, the Mexicans would long ago have feasted on our bodies." At this seeming reproof, Cortes became still more angry and burst out with, "Why should I stand on further ceremony with this hound who secretly united with Narvaez and now refuses us food?" "To our minds," answered the officers, "he acts prudently and does nothing but what the situation prompts."

Cortes, however, relied on the strength of his troops, and he spoke angrily again to the chieftains, telling them to say to their master that he must at once order the market reopened. The caciques had understood the speech reviling their master, and also our officers' reproof. They went back and told the monarch what they had heard. Scarcely a quarter of an hour later one of our men came in badly wounded. He had been to Tacuba, a town close by Mexico, to fetch some Indian women belonging to Cortes' household, and he told how he found the city and the roads filled with warriors, and, if he had