Montezuma

“ Tearing off the bandages from his wounds, “leave me alone,” he cried, “I have already outlived my honor and the affection and confidence of my people. Why should I look again upon the sun or the earth. The one has no light, the other no flowers for me. Let me die here. I feel indeed that the gods have smitten me, when I fall by the hand of one of my own people.”
In this disconsolate mood, the spirit of Montezuma took its flight. In vain did the Castilian general endeavor to suppress, for a time, the tidings of his death. ”

“ Montezuma’s occasional appearance in public, and the assertion that he remained with the Spaniards of his free-will, and because the gods desired it, had for a time satisfied the nobles; but the hard irons on his limbs and the cruel burning of patriotic men had opened their eyes somewhat to the true state of affairs. No one knew when his turn might come. Life was insecure enough subject to the caprice of their own sovereign, but the dark uncertain ways of these emissaries of evil were past finding out. ”

“ Only Otomie spoke: “You Christians are a gentle people,” she said with a bitter laugh; “it is thus that you repay our hospitality. Now I trust that Montezuma, my father, is pleased with his guests. Ah! were I he, every man of them should lie on the stone of sacrifice. If our gods are devils as you say, what are those who worship yours?”
Then at length Guatemoc said, “Only one thing remains to us, and that is vengeance. Montezuma has become a woman, and I heed him no more, nay, if it were needful, I would kill him with my own hand. ”

“ Thus the struggle went on day after day, till thousands of the Aztecs were dead, and the Spaniards were well nigh worn out with hunger, war, and wounds, for they could not rest a single hour. At length one morning, when the assault was at its hottest, Montezuma himself appeared upon the central tower of the palace, clad in splendid robes and wearing the diadem. Before him stood heralds bearing golden wands, and about him were the nobles who attended him in his captivity, and a guard of Spaniards. ”

“ The place is now a tangled wilderness of wild shrubs, where the myrtle mingles its dark, glossy leaves with the red berries and delicate foliage of the pepper-tree. Surely there is no spot better suited to awaken meditation on the past; none where the traveller, as he sits under those stately cypresses grey with the moss of ages, can so fitly ponder on the sad destinies of the Indian races and the monarch who once held his courtly revels under the shadow of their branches.
The domestic establishment of Montezuma was on the same scale of barbaric splendour as everything else about him. ”

“ They carried the litter in which the unfortunate monarch was borne away from his own people, a prisoner under Spanish guard. Hardly was his removal known in the city before the streets were filled with crowds. Some shrieked, others wept, others threw themselves upon the ground as if in their last despairing agony. But Montezuma tried to calm them. He appeared with a smiling countenance, motioned to them with his hand, and assured them he was not a prisoner. ”

“ Great Montezuma! king, of earthly kings!
The heart of Tlalocan is bruised and broke
To hear the words his monarch has vouchsafed
Such sacrilege belongeth not to kings;
Great Huitzilopotchli must, indeed, be strayed,
Or, he will shake his thunders on the earth,
And, strike the Aztecs from the face of him.
War is the wastage of all human flesh,
And whether man be stricken on the field,
Or, with the sacred itztli, offered up,
The measure must be met with human blood. ”

“ In history's cloister; Egypt and Aztlan
Strike palms upon the bridges of the years;
But Spain denies the privilege to man,
And fills the vacuum with a nation's tears.
O Monarch of the fading, mighty past!
Great Montezuma! we are wed to thee.
Back of thy name the ocean is so vast
That we can only write—Eternity,
And leave the secret in thy broken breast.
We would that we could taken thy warm palm,
Held out in welcome from the mellow West,
And poured upon thy stricken life the balm
Of real enlightenment; and point thee back,
Over the ridges of the years, to God ”

“ Everywhere was evidence of a crowded and thriving population and a high civilisation. At the walls of the city they were met by Montezuma himself. Amid a crowd of Indian nobles, preceded by officers of state bearing golden wands, was the royal palanquin blazing with burnished gold. It was borne on the shoulders of the nobles, who, barefooted, walked slowly with eyes cast to the ground. Descending from his litter, Montezuma then advanced under a canopy of gaudy featherwork powdered with jewels and fringed with silver. ”

“ MONTEZUMA WELCOMES THE CONQUERORS TO TENOCHTITLAN
As the white conquerors descended by easy stages into this marvellous valley, making frequent pauses to admire the fertility of its fields, or the beauty of its white-walled villages nestled in green nooks, they were everywhere hailed by the people of the country as deliverers from the harsh tyranny of Montezuma. These received the all-powerful strangers with shouts and songs of rejoicing, at the same time showering upon them gifts of food and flowers. ”

“ Montezuma's eyes were now open to the true character of the invaders. Gods of the air no longer were they now to him. Intelligence must have reached him by this time of their cruel acts in Tabasco, of their insatiable lust, of their low-born manners and total lack of all generous feelings. These were not the attributes of gods, that they displayed!
Some of the Spanish writers would have us believe that Montezuma consulted his gods, making sacrifices to them of tender children, and they commanded him to repel the invaders. ”

“ Half-conquered provinces, groaning under heavy taxation, had yet the remembrance of their former freedom, and were ready to cast off the yoke. It is still more remarkable that the superstition to which Montezuma had surrendered himself as the devoutest votary, which had led him to crowd the altars with human sacrifices in unprecedented numbers, and to ally himself by the strongest ties with the bloody priesthood, now, as it were, turned against him, and prostrated his spirit before the imagined divinity, or at least the predicted success of the stranger. ”

“ Now the Indians have taken back their secret, and though many may search, none will lift the graven stone that seals it, nor shall the light of day shine again upon the golden head of Montezuma. So be it! The wealth which Cortes wept over, and his Spaniards sinned and died for, is for ever hidden yonder by the shores of the bitter lake whose waters gave up to you that ancient horror, the veritable and sleepless god of Sacrifice, of whom I would not rob you—and, for my part, I do not regret the loss. ”

“ All that night the city murmured like a swarm of wasps, and next day at dawn, so far as the eye could reach, the streets and market place were filled with tens of thousands of armed warriors. They threw themselves like a wave upon the walls of the palace of Axa, and like a wave from a rock they were driven back again by the fire of the guns. Thrice they attacked, and thrice they were repulsed. Then Montezuma, the woman king, appeared upon the walls, praying them to desist because, forsooth, did they succeed, he himself might perish. ”

“ At this, Montezuma became enraged, collected the tribes around him, and set about the construction of a house which should reach heaven. The builders had already completed several apartments, lined with gold and silver and precious stones, and progressed to a point which encouraged all to believe that their defiant purpose would be accomplished, when the Great Spirit smote it to the earth amid the crash of his thunder. ”

“ Then with the utmost composure and indifference of manner he turned to Montezuma and replied that there was nothing he wished more heartily than to return to his fatherland, but, as all his vessels were destroyed, he must build others and would have to request the necessary assistance. Montezuma could not conceal his delight. He embraced Cortes, overwhelmed him with caresses, and assured him that his declaration would satisfy his priests and his subjects, both of whom were desirous the strangers should leave. ”

“ Montezuma gazed upon her with sorrow, and upon his other children; then looking coldly to Don Hernan, he said, with a tranquil voice, while Doña Marina rapidly interpreted his expressions,—
"What will the Teuctli have? He commands a captive to shield him from the darts of free warriors: Montezuma is a prisoner. He calls upon me to quiet a raging people: Montezuma has no people. He commands me to regain my liberty: the Mexican that hath been once a slave, can be a freeman no more. ”

“ The landscape is not disfigured here, as in many other quarters, by the white and barren patches, so offensive to the sight; but the eye wanders over an unbroken expanse of meadows and cultivated fields, waving with rich harvests of European grain. Montezuma’s gardens stretched for miles around the base of the hill. Two statues of that monarch and his father, cut in bas-relief in the porphyry, were spared till the middle of the last century; [338] and the grounds are still shaded by gigantic cypresses, more than fifty feet in circumference, which were centuries old at the time of the Conquest. ”

“ But to these people, and more especially to Montezuma, whose mind was filled already with rumours of the coming of a strange white race, which, as it was truly prophesied, would bring his empire to nothingness, the omens seemed very evil. Indeed, if they had any doubt as to their meaning, it was soon to be dispelled, in their minds at least. For as we stood wonder-struck, a messenger, panting and soiled with travel, arrived among us and prostrating himself before the majesty of the emperor, he drew a painted scroll from his robe and handed it to an attendant noble. ”

“ Montezuma could not have failed to recognize the insecurity of the bonds which held it, and influenced by the predictions of its downfall he readily fell beneath the spell of the superior intellects which were to assume control. It was his misfortune to have lost the sanguine energy of his youth, which might have enabled him to rise above the weaknesses of himself and his age. Duty and honor were overcome by superstition and absorbing love of power, of life, and he reaped the natural fruit of puerile and misdirected efforts by losing both. ”

“ He then sent a message to Montezuma, representing the disgrace into which he had fallen, by joining himself with wizards and magicians, and declared his resolution to destroy us all. Montezuma was much offended by the proud independence assumed by his nephew, whom he now resolved to circumvent and make prisoner. For this purpose he entrusted his signet to six of his captains, whom he commanded to shew it to certain other leaders among his subjects, who were not well affected to the prince, and to communicate to them his orders to seize Cacamatzin and bring him prisoner to Mexico. ”

“ The great Montezuma never ceased his good will towards us and did as we wished in every way save that he never stopped the sacrifice of human beings. Day after day the abomination went on. No protest could induce him to end it. The difficulty for us was to use some means which would not impel the people and the papas to arms. At last Cortes, accompanied by seven officers and soldiers, went to Montezuma and said, "Great monarch, I have already many times begged you not to sacrifice humans to those false gods who are deluding you, and yet the horrors continue every day. ”

“ He had declared, on his departure, that he or his descendants would again visit them and resume his empire. The wonderful deeds of the Spaniards, their fair complexions, and the quarter whence they came, all showed they were his descendants. If Montezuma had resisted their visit to his capital, it was because he had heard such accounts of their cruelties,—that they sent the lightning to consume his people, or crushed them to pieces under the hard feet of the ferocious animals on which they rode. ”

“ It is little wonder indeed that Montezuma rent the bandages from his wounds and would not suffer them to tend his hurts. For the real hurt was in his soul; there the iron had entered deeply, and no leech could cure it except one called Death. And yet the fault was not all his, the devils whom he worshipped as gods were revenged upon him, for they had filled him with the superstitions of their wicked faith, and because of these the gods and their high priest must sink into a common ruin. ”

“ Though baser metals pass for golden coins,
Only earth's charity can make brave Cortez great.
But Montezuma conquers all our thought—
Tenochtitlan and old Chapultepec.
No greener shrine for memory can be sought ”

“ It only frets us into hotter flame,
And beggars all the litany of thought.
I do not claim that Cortez was not brave;
Nor would I tear one laurel from his brow.
I only claim he stole the devil's glaive;
He held it then, and let him hold it now.
The issues of their lives are both with God,
The brown-eyed Monarch and the dark-eyed Knight.
[131] The flowers of charity should strew the sod
Above them both; yet, Cosmos! was it right?
O world of human hearts and human lives!
Was Montezuma worthy of this fate?
O world of husbands! world of tender wives! ”