rushed after him. Now they were beneath the wall of the palace, and the
assault began. The Aztecs fought furiously. Time upon time they strove
to climb the wall, piling up the bodies of the dead to serve them as
ladders, and time upon time they were repulsed with cruel loss. Failing
in this, they set themselves to battering it down with heavy beams, but
when the breach was made and they clustered in it like herded sheep, the
cannon opened fire on them, tearing long lanes through their mass and
leaving them dead by scores. Then they took to the shooting of flaming
arrows, and by this means fired the outworks, but the palace was of
stone and would not burn. Thus for twelve long hours the struggle raged
unceasingly, till the sudden fall of darkness put an end to it, and
the only sight to be seen was the flare of countless torches carried by
those who sought out the dead, and the only sounds to be heard were the
voice of women lamenting, and the groans of the dying.

On the morrow the fight broke out again at dawn, when Cortes sallied
forth with the greater part of his soldiers, and some thousands of
his Tlascalan allies. At first I thought that he aimed his attack at
Montezuma's palace, and a breath of hope went through me, since then it
might become possible for me to escape in the confusion. But this was
not so, his object being to set fire to the houses, from the flat roofs
of which numberless missiles were hailed hourly upon his followers.
The charge was desperate and it succeeded, for the Indians could not
withstand the shock of horsemen any more than their naked skins could
turn the Spaniards' steel. Presently scores of houses were in flames,
and thick columns of smoke rolled up like those that float from the
mouth of Popo. But many of those who rode and ran from the gates of
Axa did not come back thither, for the Aztecs clung to the legs of
the horses and dragged their riders away living. That very day these
captives were sacrificed on the altar of Huitzel, and in the sight of