with white men. On turning again to beseech the god he was gone.[1]
Montezuma was in consultation with his advisers when this report was brought. As if pierced by death's dart, the monarch bowed low his head and moaned: "We are lost! We are lost![2] Less impressed with superstitious fear by an incident which he regarded as concocted by the sorcerers, Cuitlahuatzin vividly presented the danger of admitting such determined and powerful intruders within the city, and he boldly urged that they be forbidden to enter, by force of arms if need be. Cacama remonstrated that after inviting them such a course would savor of fear. The emperor owed it to his exalted station and power to receive envoys. If they proved objectionable, the city should become their tomb. Surely his nobles and his armies were able to overcome so small a number, assisted by the strategic advantages of the place in its approaches and resources. To the affrighted monarch anything was acceptable that would stay prompt action, and consequently defer the ruin which he feared. He at once inclined to Cacama's advice, stipulating, however, that he, king as he was, should condescend to meet the Spaniards and sound their intentions. "May the
- ↑ Sahagun, Hist. Conq., 20-1; Acosta, Hist. Ind., 519-20; Torquemada, i. 447. Solis, the 'penetrating historian,' repeats and improves upon this as an account taken from 'autores fidedignos.' Hist. Mex., i. 353. And with a similar belief it has been given a prominent place in West-vnnd Ost-Indischer Lustgart, 131. Gaspar Ens L., the author, was one of the editors of the famous set of De Bry, from which he like so many others borrowed text, if not cngravings. The narrator of several individual European travels, he also issaed the Indiæ Occidentalis Historia, Coloniæ, 1612. The German version, published at Cöllen in 1618 in a small quarto form, under the above title, has for its guiding principle the appropriate maxim of Horace, Omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci. The first part, relating to America in general, is divided into three sections, for physical and natural geography and Indian customs, followed by discovery, voyages, and conquests, and concluding with a review of political history, and an appendix on missionary progress. This arrangement, however, is nominal rather than real, and the confusion, extending into chapters as well as sections, is increased by the incomplete and undigested form of the material, enlivened, however, by an admixture of the quaint and wonderful.
- ↑ Ya estamos para perdernos .... mexicanos somos, ponernos hemos á lo que viniese por la honra de la generacion .... Nacidos somos, venga lo que viniere.' Sahagun, Hist. Cong., 21.
