recorded. For many months, with his famishing followers, he struggled through the wilderness, entangled in swamps, toiling over barren mountains, and bridging almost innumerable rivers. On one occasion he was compelled to construct a floating bridge, composed of a thousand pieces of timber, each sixty feet in length.

On this expedition, Cortes, by the murder of his captive, the hapless Gautemozin, loaded his name with eternal infamy. That unhappy sovereign, whom, with an unsleeping jealousy, he always carried on his journeys, was made the victim of a false and frivolous accusation of a conspiracy. His conqueror, eager to rid himself of one who was a constant source of anxiety, after the mere mockery of an investigation, ordered his immediate execution. The ill-fated prince, with his habitual composure, said, at the fatal tree: "Malinche! here your false words and promises have ended-in my death. I should have fallen by my own hand, in my city of Mexico, rather than have trusted myself to you. Why do you unjustly take my life? May God demand of you this innocent blood." His cousin, the chief of Tacuba, who shared his fate, said, simply, with touching loyalty, "I am happy to die by the side of my true sovereign." They were hanged, with other caciques, from the branches of a huge Ceiba-tree; "and thus," says honest Diaz, who was present, "ended the lives of these two great men, and I must say, like good Christians, and, for Indians, most piously. * * * And I also declare, that they suffered their deaths most undeservingly, and so it appeared to us all, among whom there was but one opinion upon the subject— that it was a most unjust and cruel sentence."

So died the last of the Aztecs-for with the death of this brave defender of his country ends their national history. No one arose after him to rescue his toiling countrymen from the yoke of slavery, or to lift an arm against the triumphant invader. But Nemesis, in the shape of an avenging conscience, was already busy with his destroyer, of whom one of his own companions remarks, "thenceforth, nothing prospered

with him, and it was ascribed to the curses he was loaded with." After the death of his victim, he became, says our old chronicler, "very ill-tempered and sad," and "was so distracted with these thoughts, that he could not rest in his bed at night, and would get up in the dark to walk about as a relief from his anxieties." While thus restlessly pacing by night in one of the Indian temples, he fell from a considerable height, and received severe injuries-which, however, with his wonted endurance, he kept to himself, acting as his own chirurgeon, and striving to conceal the circumstance.

On arriving, after this terrible passage, at the place of his destination, Cortes learned that a counter-insurrection had already restored his authority, and that the unfortunate Olid had been beheaded in the market-place of Naco. Undismayed by his recent sufferings and losses, the indomitable chief, without delay, commenced fresh enterprises. He made an arduous tour of exploration, and was meditating vast schemes of discovery and conquest, when evil tidings recalled him to Mexico. The temporary rulers of that province had received a vague report that, with his whole army, he had perished in the marshes of Chiapas; and with all the insolence of suddenly-acquired authority, had commenced a reign of plunder and usurpation. His property had been seized in the name of the state, or, more probably, for the use of his self-appointed administrators-nor was the Holy Church without her share; for, (says Diaz, subsequently,) "a great part of it had been appropriated to the expenses of celebrating his funeral service, and to the saying Masses for his soul, and ours, to give credit to the report; and these perpetual Masses, which had been so purchased out of the property of Cortes upon the supposition of his death, and for the good of his soul, were now, that he was found to be alive, and no longer in need of them, purchased by one Juan de Caceres, for the benefit of his own soul, whenever he was to die; so that Cortes was farther off from getting back his property than ever." The factor, having solemnly erected a monument to him, "then proclaimed him

self governor and captain-general of New Spain, with the sound of kettle-drums and trumpets, and issued out an order that all women who had any regard for their souls, and whose husbands had gone with Cortes, should consider them dead in law, and marry again forthwith.”

On receipt of these unwelcome tidings, Cortes embarked in the Gulf, but was twice driven back by tempests, and became so disheartened and worn out, that all the solicitations of his friends were needed to induce him to persevere. It was not until June, 1526, after an absence of nearly two years, that he rëentered Mexico. His journey thither was a perfect triumphal procession; and his enemies, crushed to the earth, only owed their lives to his forbearance.

This triumph was soon overshadowed by the jealousy of the court. A thousand slanderous reports filled the ears of the emperor. It was insisted that Cortes (who had always been fanatically loyal) intended to throw off the royal authority. A commissioner was sent out to investigate the affairs of the province. He died soon after his arrival, and his successor speedily followed him to the grave. Slander, the most unfounded, ascribed their end to Cortes; and a most ridicu lous story was trumped up that he had attempted to take off the new comers and their suite with a treat of custards and cheese-cakes. These dainties, says our old chronicler, refuting the story, "were so much approved of, and some of the company eat of them in such quantities, that they made them sick; but those who eat of them in moderation were not at all affected. However, this prior, Fray Tomas Ortiz, asserted that they had been poisoned with arsenic, and that he had not eaten of them from a suspicion that they were so; but others who were present declared that he stuffed himself heartily with them, and said that they were the best he had ever tasted."

The third commissioner, a personal enemy of Cortes, gave him such annoyance, that he resolved to return to Spain, and plead his cause in person. He took with him a vast amount of treasure and jewels, with many natural curiosities, and a

number of native jugglers, as a part of his present for the Pope. ("These Indians," we are afterwards told, "danced before his Holiness and the cardinals, who expressed their high satisfaction at their performances." A plenteous shower of absolutions rewarded this "delicate attention" to the Church!) In May, 1528, he arrived at the little port of Palos, the same whence Columbus had departed thirty-six years before, on the eventful voyage which terminated in the discovery of a world.

Here, at the memorable convent of La Rabida, the Conqueror of Mexico, his task achieved, fell in with Francisco Pizarro, the destined conqueror of Peru, then busy in providing means for his gigantic undertaking. The meeting of these famous men, in the ancient home of the great discoverer, has been charmingly described by a distinguished poet:

"Much of a Southern Sea they spake,
And of that glorious City won
Near the setting of the Sun,

Throned in a silver lake;

Of Seven Kings in chains of gold,*
And deeds of death by tongue untold,

Deeds such as breathed in secret there
Had shaken the Confession Chair!"

Here too, at the age of thirty-one, died Sandoval, next to Cortes undoubtedly the greatest captain in New Spain. His life, like that of his chief, had been one of constant excitement, of wonderful valor and enterprise, as well as of repeated cruelty and carnage. Leaving this, the most faithful and devoted of his followers, in the lonely cemetery of Rabida, Cortes set out for Toledo, where the court then lay. His journey, like that of Columbus, was a continued triumph. The whispers of envy were instantly silenced before the presence of the man who, with his unaided hand, had added such brilliant jewels

* By a royal edict, Cortes was authorized to bear in his coat of arms the heads of Seven Princes, who had fallen before his arms-being those of Montezuma, Gautemozin, and the princes of Tezeuco, Iztapalapan, Cujoacan, Tacuba, and Matalzingo.

to the Spanish crown. He received the title of "Marquess of Oaxarca," with an immense grant of land and more than twenty thousand slaves, in that beautiful portion of Mexico. A marriage into one of the noblest families in Spain was another reward of his achievements and a sufficient refutation of the slanders which had attended the death of his first wife.

But royal jealousy, as in the case of Columbus, proved too strong to admit his receiving the full requital of his services. He could not procure a reinstatement in his office of governor, and was compelled to content himself with that of captaingeneral-the court being still willing to use his genius and valor in effecting further conquests. He was also empowered to make fresh discoveries and to found colonies in the southern ocean. With these partial acknowledgments of his merits, in the spring of 1530, he rëembarked for Mexico.

CHAPTER XIX.

ENTERPRISE of cortes-HIS SECOND return tO SPAIN-CAMPAIGN AGAINST ALGIERS-DISAPPOINTMENTS AT COURT-HIS DEATHHIS CHARACTER-FATE OF THE COnquerors.

THE late governor was received in the capital which he destroyed and built, with such enthusiasm, (both by the Spanish and Indian population) as to prove that his administration had been, on the whole, both just and popular; but the jealous annoyance of the new government finally caused him to retire, and take up his abode in his beautiful city of Cuernavaca. Here he devoted himself to the improvement of his extensive estates and to the fitting out of expeditions of discovery. In one of these, the peninsula of California was discovered; and Cortes himself, while making fresh exploration in the same region, encountered the greatest hardships and perils, but without any adequate result. In 1539, he dispatched three vessels, under Ulloa, which passed through the entire length