Page:Young Folks History Of Mexico.pdf/231

Rh first families of the place, ornamented with gold collars and earrings and attended by female slaves. These, Cortez said he would accept if they would renounce their old religion and be baptized into that of the Spaniards. He went further even than this, and proposed to the cacique the entire destruction of his gods. The cacique and the priests objected and finally attempted to resist; but the Spaniards collected their forces, and about fifty of them rushed up the steps of the temple and hurled down the hideous idols contained therein. Then the priests, who had charge of the temple, were shorn of their long and blood-matted hair, and a cross and an image of the virgin being set up in place of the other idols, they were instructed in the new faith by the Reverend Father Olmedo. An old soldier, lame from wounds, was appointed to reside in the temple as a hermit; the priests were taught how to make wax candles, to be brought before the new image, and thus this people brought out from the darkness of idolatry into the light of a new religion. They were now firm allies of Cortez, for they had imprisoned the officers of Montezuma, and insulted his gods; the power of the strangers alone could prevent them from being exterminated.

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