Page:The Story of Mexico.djvu/242

time, because in the following year, 1533, he was attacked with the pneumonia which caused his death. This was accompanied by very particular circumstances. A few days before he fell ill, with a few brief words, being in Amecameca, he manifested to his companion that now had arrived the term of his life; and he not having understood this, very soon believed it by seeing the calentura of the servant of God. As the illness increased he was forced to conduct him to the convent of Tlalmanalco, where the evil having declared itself, the holy sacraments were administered. The holy man seeing this case, resolved to bear him to the infirmary of Mexico; and, in fact, upon shoulders of Indians, with much toil, they bore him to the shore at Ayotzinco, two leagues from the pueblo, and laid him in a canoa to carry him by the lake. Scarcely had he entered it when, feeling his hour arriving, he begged them to bring him to land. Yielding to his entreaties, they disembarked, although he was in a dying state, and putting himself upon his knees and causing them to recommend his soul to God, his spirit joined the Lord, falling into the arms of his companion, St. Antonio Ortiz, verifying the prophecy he had made many years before, in Spain, that he was to die in his arms in the middle of a field. As soon as the monks had notice of his death they took his corpse, and with millions of tears of their own and the Indians, gave it sepulture in the church in bare ground, without any precaution to preserve relics so precious. After some time the custodian learned this, and hastening to Tlalmanalco, had him ex-