ad always a good stock by us. With this work our crossbow-men were
occupied the whole of the night, and Pedro Barba, captain of that
company, never left them for a moment; Cortes himself looking in from
time to time to see how they were getting on.

When daylight appeared, our camp was assailed by the whole of the
Mexican troops from different points at once; but as we were never
unprepared for an attack, our cavalry rushed out towards the land side,
and we others, with the Tlascallans, towards the lake, and fell so
vigorously on the Mexicans that we soon killed three of their chiefs,
and numbers of their troops died of their wounds the day following. The
Tlascallans behaved with uncommon bravery, and took five Mexican chiefs
whom they brought in prisoners, from whom we learnt the exact number of
troops which Quauhtemoctzin had ordered against us.

On our side we had only one killed, but a great number of wounded.

This battle, however, had not yet terminated; for our cavalry, in
pursuing the enemy, came up with the 10,000 warriors whom Quauhtemoctzin
had despatched to the assistance of the others. Several of the officers
who commanded these troops wore our Spanish swords, of which they were
not a little vain; and they said it was by our own swords we were to be
vanquished.

Our few horse durst not encounter so large a body of the enemy, and
therefore drew off to one side, until they should be joined by Cortes
with the rest of the troops. When our general was informed of their
critical position, he instantly sallied out, with the rest of our
cavalry, who had remained in the courtyard on account of their wounds,
and all our foot, with the Tlascallan troops. A most terrible and
obstinate conflict now ensued; but at length, by dint of heavy blows and
thrusts, we repulsed the enemy, with considerable loss. On this occasion
eight distinguished Mexicans fell into our hands, from whom we learnt
that Quauhtemoctzin had despatched against us another considerable fleet
of canoes, and other large bodies of his troops by land. These troops he
had sent off with the perfect assurance that, coming suddenly upon us,
they would complete the victory, after we had been fatigued by such
constant fighting, and weakened by loss of men and the number of our
wounded.

When we heard this we were doubly on our guard, and our general
determined to abandon the town on the following morning, and not wait
for any further attacks. We therefore m