Page:Vol 1 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/306

186 "To Mexico!" was now the cry, and preparations for the march were at once made. Escalante, whose character and services had endeared him to Cortés,burned by secret agents of Cortés. ''Nat. Hist.,'' 76. Solis, ever zealous for his hero, objects to Bernal Diaz' attempt to pluck any of the glory, and scouts the idea that fears of pecuniary liability could have influenced Cortés to gain the approval of others for his act. 'Tuvo á destreza de historiador el penetrar lo interior de las acciones,' is the complacent tribute to his own skill in penetrating the question. ''Hist. Mex.,'' i. 214-15. The view of the foundering fleet, appended to some editions of his work, has been extensively copied. One is given in the Antwerp edition of 1704, 141. A still finer view, with the men busy on shore, and the sinking vessels in the distance, is to be found in the Madrid issue of 1783, i. 213. The destruction of the fleet has been lauded in extravagant terms by almost every authority, from Gomara and Solis to Robertson and Prescott, as an unparalleled deed. Of previous examples there are enough, however, even though the motives and the means differ. We may go back to Æneas, to whose fleet the wives of the party applied the torch, tired of roaming; or we may point to Agathocles, who first fired his soldiers with a resolution to conquer or to die, and then compelled them to keep their word by firing the vessels. Julian offered a tamer instance during his campaign on the Tigris; but the deed of the terrible Barbarossa in the Mediterranean, only a few years before the Mexican campaign, was marked by reckless determination. Still examples little affect the greatness of an act; motives, means, and results afford the criteria. 'Pocos exemplos destos ay, y aquellos son de grandes hombres.' ''Gomara, Hist. Mex.,'' 65. 'Una de las acciones en que mas se reconoce la grandeza de su ánimo. ... Y no sabemos si de su género se hallará mayor alguna en todo el campo de las Historias.' ''Solis, Hist. Mex.,'' i. 213. 'An effort of magnanimity, to which there is nothing parallel in history.' ''Robertson, Hist. Am.,'' ii. 34. 'Un' impresa, che da per se sola basterebbe a far conoscere la sua magnanimità, e ad immortalare il suo nome.' Clavigero, Storia Mess., iii. 35; Prescott, Mex., i. 375-6, is equally carried away, and he finds more words for his admiration. He is wrong in supposing that one of the vessels in the harbor was left intact; the exempt ship referred to by a chronicler was the one carrying the messengers to Spain.

Antonio de Solis y Ribadeneyra is remarkable as the first Spanish historian of the conquest. It appears to us strange that an episode so glorious to the fame of Castilians should have been allowed to lie so long neglected in the musty pages of their chroniclers. True, these were worthy, zealous men, who conscientiously narrated every occurrence of any note, but their standard for historic truth and dignity caused them to clothe facts, however striking, in a garb of dreary gravity, dryness of detail, and ambiguous confusion, which discouraged even the student. It required the dramatic eye of the composer and the imagination of the poet to appreciate the picturesque sketches of a strange people now fading into oblivion, the grandeur of a semi-savage pageantry, the romantic exploits that recalled the achievements of the Cid. This faculty was innate in Solis, developed besides by a long and successful career in letters. He had profited also by the advantages opened to him as the secretary of Conde de Oropesa, Viceroy of Navarre and of Valencia, who Mæcenas-like fostered the talents and aided in the promotion of the promising savant, for as such he already ranked. Cradled in the famous college town of Alcalá de Henares, he had given early evidence of talent, and at Salamanca university he had signalized himself in his seventeenth year by producing a comedy of considerable merit. While pursuing with energy the study of law and moral philosophy, he cultivated with hardly less ardor the muses, to which end he was no doubt impelled also by his intimacy with the illustrious