ied thus with a great voice, Cuitlahua fell back upon the
cushions, and before the frightened leech who tended him could lift his
head, he had passed beyond the troubles of this earth. But the words
which he had spoken remained fixed in the hearts of those who heard
them, though they were told to none except to Guatemoc.

Thus then in my presence and in that of Otomie died Cuitlahua, emperor
of the Aztecs, when he had reigned but fifteen weeks. Once more the
nation mourned its king, the chief of many a thousand of its children
whom the pestilence swept with him to the 'Mansions of the Sun,' or
perchance to the 'darkness behind the Stars.'

But the mourning was not for long, for in the urgency of the times it
was necessary that a new emperor should be crowned to take command of
the armies and rule the nation. Therefore on the morrow of the burial of
Cuitlahua the council of the four electors was convened, and with them
lesser nobles and princes to the number of three hundred, and I among
them in the right of my rank as general, and as husband of the princess
Otomie. There was no great need of deliberation, indeed, for though the
names of several were mentioned, the princes knew that there was but one
man who by birth, by courage, and nobility of mind, was fitted to cope
with the troubles of the nation. That man was Guatemoc, my friend and
blood brother, the nephew of the two last emperors and the husband of
my wife's sister, Montezuma's daughter, Tecuichpo. All knew it, I say,
except, strangely enough, Guatemoc himself, for as we passed into the
council he named two other princes, saying that without doubt the choice
lay between them.

It was a splendid and a solemn sight, that gathering of the four great
lords, the electors, dressed in their magnificent robes, and of the
lesser council of confirmation of three hundred lords and princes, who
sat without the circle but in hearing of all that passed. Very solemn
also was the prayer of the high priest, who, clad in his robes of sable,
seemed like a blot of ink dropped on a glitter of gold. Thus he prayed:

'O god, thou who art everywhere and seest all, knowest that Cuitlahua
our king is gathered to thee. Thou hast set him beneath thy footstool
and there he rests in his rest. He has travelled that road which we must
travel every one, he has reached the royal inhabitations of our dead,
the home of everlasting shadows. There where none shall trouble him he
is sunk in slee