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their foe.

Confident as the Spaniard was in the overwhelming power of his cavalry
and artillery, he preferred rather to make good his retreat, while he
could, than to show his prowess in these perilous circumstances. The
hoarse distant murmurs which fell upon their ears at every street as
they passed, indicated too plainly the mustering of a mighty host, which
soon came rushing in upon them from all quarters, like the swelling
surges of a stormy sea, each higher and more terrible than that which
preceded. They fell upon the flying foe with the ferocity of tigers,
about to be disappointed of their prey. From every lane and alley, and
from the roof of every house, they pelted them with ceaseless vollies of
stones. They grappled with them, man to man, reckless of life or limb,
so that they could maim or destroy an enemy.

Alvarado, with a portion of the cavalry, brought up the rear of the
retreating army, in order to repel, with an occasional charge upon the
enemy's ranks, those furious onsets which might have overwhelmed the
small body of Spanish infantry, or the unmailed and lightly armed
Tlascalan allies. The cavalier and his horse, encased in armor of proof,
could better cope with the weapons and missiles of their assailants,
while they often turned upon them, with a fierce and irresistible
charge, trampling hundreds in the dust, and mowing down whole ranks on
this side and that, with their trenchant broadswords.

In this manner the fugitives defiled through the great southern avenue,
and came out upon the grand causeway, by which they had twice entered
the city. Here they were met by new and fresh squadrons of the enemy,
thronging the sides of the dike in their light canoes, and showering
down arrows thick as hail upon the advancing column. Sometimes keeping
upon the causeway, they would grapple each with his man, and drag him
off into the water, to be picked up by those in the canoes, and hurried
off to a terrible and certain fate, on the great altar of their War-god.
Their numbers increased every moment, till the lake was literally alive
with them.

At length the advancing column was brought to stand; while a cry of
despair from the van revealed the fearful position in which they stood
in the midst of their implacable foes. The bridges which intersected the
dike had been removed by order of the Emperor. They had now reached the
first opening thus made in the causeway. A sudden shout from the myriads
of Aztec