with a rope.'

Then he answered Cortes, saying nothing of me, but bidding him and all
the Spaniards prepare for death:

'Many of us have perished,' he said; 'you also must perish, Teules. You
shall perish of hunger and thirst, you shall perish on the altars of the
gods. There is no escape for you Teules; the bridges are broken.'

And all the multitude took up the words and thundered out, 'There is no
escape for you Teules; the bridges are broken!'

Then the shooting of arrows began, and I sought the palace to tell
Otomie my wife what I had gathered of the state of her father Montezuma,
who the Spaniards said still lay dying, and of her two sisters who were
hostages in their quarters. Also I told her how my surrender had been
sought, and she kissed me, and said smiling, that though my life was now
burdened with her, still it was better so than that I should fall into
the hands of the Spaniards.

Two days later came the news that Montezuma was dead, and shortly after
it his body, which the Spaniards handed over to the Aztecs for burial,
attired in the gorgeous robes of royalty. They laid it in the hall of
the palace, whence it was hurried secretly and at night to Chapoltepec,
and there hidden away with small ceremony, for it was feared that the
people might rend it limb from limb in their rage. With Otomie weeping
at my side, I looked for the last time on the face of that most unhappy
king, whose reign so glorious in its beginning had ended thus. And while
I looked I wondered what suffering could have equalled his, as fallen
from his estate and hated by the subjects whom he had betrayed, he lay