in Heaven--
Throw their _love_ and _your_ pride in the balance;
And another whose innocent glances
Should burn all the dross from your nature,
Your child is a witness against you;
God has sent him a pledge of my wifehood,
To nail the black lie of denying.

"Though no priest gave the mystical signet,
Surely God heard the vows that were spoken
When our hearts took their place at the wedding;
And who shall say nay to a union,
When Love gives our souls to each other?
God is Love, and no higher can speak it.
O, Hernando! be father and husband,
Be angel and saint to Malinche!
She kneels, as she would at God's altar,
To plead for the heart you have broken.
O, turn from your pride, and but touch it,
And it will bloom over with blessing,
And will hallow the hand that shall heal it!"

All in vain did she plead with the Chieftain;
His pride was the bane of his footsteps.
The angel of Love would have held him,
But the blood of old Spain was too purple,
And smothered her tender endeavor.
The grip of his purpose still held him,
And Malinche, now passive with anguish,
Was given to Don Xamarillo
With all the sanction of marriage.
He was kind, indulgent and loving,
And she was made wealthy by Cortez
Giving back the estate of her mother
And much of the wealth of the province,
As if he would purchase appeasement.
The Chieftain made lavish atonement,
As far as the world could atone her;
But her heart was impossible healing.

Though her charities gave her some solace,
And she strove with the earnest of pathos
To lose in the anguish of others
The shadow of self and of sorrow,
Yet she wended her way, broken-hearted;
And, as if like the spirit of Aztlan,
With the mark of perpetual sadness,
With the head bending over and brooding--
As groping her way to the sunset,
Peering out for the light that was passing
For ever and aye with the shadows--
She fell asleep with her people,
And an angel was born in Heaven.

And a guardian angel descende