The following day the allied forces apportioned to Alvarado and Olid were ordered to march in advance, for greater convenience, to the border of Tezcuco province and there await the Spaniards. Not many hours after their departure a messenger appeared with the announcement that Xicotencatl, the companion general of Chichimecatl, had disappeared. Inquiries revealed that shortly before his cousin Piltecuhtli had been severely and wantonly struck by a soldier during a quarrel over some carriers. In order to save the soldier from the wrath of Cortés, Ojeda, the Spanish inspecting officer over the allied forces, smoothed the matter and sent the injured nobleman home. It was claimed by some that this outrage had so wounded Xicotencatl that he followed his cousin. Others assumed that both chiefs were in love with the same woman, and that Xicotencatl could not bear to leave his rival alone in the field. But the true reason lay no doubt in his dislike to fight for the Spaniards, whom he had never ceased to oppose, openly and in secret, as invaders bent on the enslavement of the whole country. This idea, if faint at first, had become more fixed with every fresh blow against his personal ambition, such as the first series of defeats which plucked from him his just renown; the equal or perhaps superior position assigned in the native army to Chichimecatl, of whom he appears to have been deeply
Andrés de Monjaraz, the latter an agreeable, bright-faced fellow of about 32 years, always suffering from a Lotharian disease which prevented him from doing anything. The three captains under Olid were Andrés de Tápia, a growing favorite of Cortés', Francisco Verdugo, the unconscious fellow-conspirator of Villafañe, and Francisco de Lugo, the natural son of a prominent estate-holder at Medina del Campo. Sandoval had but two captains, the insinuating Pedro de Ircio, and Luis Marin of San Lúcar, a muscular and dashing fellow, of Monjaraz' age, with an open blonde face, somewhat pitted, and possessed of a voluble tongue. Hist. Verdad., 139, 240, 246. Ixtlilxochitl gives a longer list, which is clearly wrong in many respects, and he adds some names of native leaders. Alvarado kept the Tlascaltecs of Tizatlan and Tepeticpac; Olid those of Ocotelulco and Quiahuiztlan. Hist. Chich., 313-14. He further states that his namesake joined Cortés' fleet with 10,000 canoes, containing 50,000 Tezcucans, of whom 8000 were nobles. Hor. Crueldades, 21. Brasseur de Bourbourg follows this author in many respects, improving somewhat on the names. Herrera names five of the sub-captains, among them Hernando de Lerma of Galicia. dec. iii. lib. i. cap. xii.
