Page:Vol 1 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/620

500 baggage department, and again the cavalry formed, this time in more compact order. But the enemy, ever relieved by fresh men, maintained the firmness with which they had begun the charge, and both horsemen and foot-soldiers found the pressure becoming greater and the fight hotter. Thus the battle continued during the greater part of the forenoon, the natives evidently as fresh as ever, and the Spaniards visibly failing. "We thought surely that this was to be our last day," writes Cortés, "in view of the great strength of the Indians and the little resistance they could find in us, tired as we were, and nearly all wounded, and faint with hunger."

A feeling of suffocation and deathly despair comes over the Spaniards as the dusky host fold them in closer and yet fiercer embrace. Hot falls the blood-reeking breath upon their faces, as, flushed with success and sure of their victims, the foe lay hold of the Spaniards to drag them away to the sacrifice. Rare offerings to the gods, indeed, are these magnificent men! And such they will surely become if Mary, Santiago, or the ready genius of Cortés appears not quickly to the rescue! But how shall there be rescue? What rescue is there to the sinking ship alone in mid-ocean? Can this Cortés for the release of his comrades baffle death like Hercules for the release of Alcestis?

So it would seem. Behold yonder grand personage, borne aloft in open litter, high over the others, with plumed head-dress, and above it the gold-net standard, the tlahuizmatlaxopilli, set with precious feathers, and secured to his back by a staff, according to custom.