Page:The Mastering of Mexico.djvu/322

282 kept on. Rolling and tearing boulders soon killed two more. Then in a few moments another brave soldier fell, crushed to death. Most of us were wounded by pieces split off the rocks by the tumbling masses. Only a miracle saved all of us from death.

I was an active young fellow in those days, and I kept on following the standard bearer, Corral, and after we got under some projecting rocks we clambered from hollow to hollow. Finally sheltering himself behind a bunch of thorn trees, his face covered with blood, his banner torn to rags, Corral called out, "Oh, Bernal Diaz, it is impossible to go further. There is place for neither hand nor foot. Keep in the shelter of the rock, and watch that none of these boulders hit you." He then shouted to the soldiers that they should pass on the word to Cortes. Even on the level, where our captain stood, the hurtling rocks had killed two or three soldiers. But from the winding of the hill Cortes had not seen that nearly all of us who started to climb were wounded or dead. He now signed by shouts and musket shots that we should retreat, and, each of us striving to help his neighbor, we finally got to the plain, our heads covered with wounds and blood, our banners rent and eight men slain.

Large bodies of Mexicans lay in wait for us further on, stationed there in case the troops on the high hill should need their assistance. Retreating