ils. Nor did
I spare myself in his service, but laboured by day and night in the work
of preparing the city for siege, and in the marshalling of the troops,
and more especially of that army of Otomies, who came, as they had
promised, to the number of twenty thousand. The work was hard indeed,
for these Indian tribes lacked discipline and powers of unity, without
which their thousands were of little avail in a war with white men.
Also there were great jealousies between their leaders which must be
overcome, and I was myself an object of jealousy. Moreover, many tribes
took this occasion of the trouble of the Aztecs to throw off their
allegiance or vassalage, and even if they did not join the Spaniards, to
remain neutral watching for the event of the war. Still we laboured
on, dividing the armies into regiments after the fashion of Europe, and
stationing each in its own quarter drilling them to the better use of
arms, provisioning the city for a siege, and weeding out as many useless
mouths as we might; and there was but one man in Tenoctitlan who toiled
at these tasks more heavily than I, and that was Guatemoc the emperor,
who did not rest day or night. I tried even to make powder with sulphur
which was brought from the throat of the volcan Popo, but, having no
knowledge of that art, I failed. Indeed, it would have availed us little
had I succeeded, for having neither arquebusses nor cannons, and no
skill to cast them, we could only have used it in mining roads and
gateways, and, perhaps, in grenades to be thrown with the hand.

And so the months went on, till at length spies came in with the tidings
that the Spaniards were advancing in numbers, and with them countless
hosts of allies.

Now I would have sent Otomie to seek safety among her own people, but
she laughed me to scorn, and said:

'Where you are, there I will be, husband. What, shall it be suffered
that you face death, perhaps to find him, when I am not at your side to
die with you? If that is the fashion of white women, I leave it to them,
beloved, and here with you I stay.'

CHAPTER XXVII

THE FALL OF TENOCTITLAN

Now shortly after Christmas, having marched from the coast with a great
array of Spaniards, for many had joined his banner from over sea, and
tens of thousands of native allies, Cortes took up his head quarters at
Tezcuco in the valley of Mexico. This town is situated near the borders
of the lake, at a distance of several leagues from T