This day we lost
ten or twelve men, and none of us escaped without a wound. We passed the
night in deliberations and in preparing for another attack. We now
resolved that after the lapse of two days as many of us as were healthy
should sally out with two moving towers. These we had strongly put
together of wood, and were so constructed, that under each of them
twenty-five of our men could stand to move them along. These towers
contained loopholes, from which our heavy guns could be fired; besides
that there was space enough for a number of musketeers and crossbow-men.
At the side of these towers marched a strong body of musketeers and
crossbow-men, as also the whole of our horse, who were from time to time
to charge the enemy at full gallop. The construction of these towers
and the repairing of several small breaches which the enemy had made in
our quarters, occupied us the whole of the following day, so that we
could not sally out till the next.

The enemy, however, continued their attacks upon our quarters, not
merely from ten or twelve, but from twenty different points at once; so
that what with the constructing of the towers, repairing the breaches,
and beating off our assailants who had fixed ladders to our quarters, we
had enough to do. The whole of us, they cried out, were to be sacrificed
to their gods, our hearts were to be torn from our bodies, the blood was
to be drawn from our veins, and our arms and legs were to be eaten up at
their festivals. The remaining parts of our bodies would be thrown to
the tigers, lions and serpents, which they kept in cages; these had not
been fed for these two days, in order that they might devour our flesh
the more greedily. Our gold and other things would be their booty, and
they told the Tlascallans they should be locked up in cages where they
fattened people for their sacrifices. Only deliver us up our monarch
Motecusuma,--added they with great vehemence; while their noise and
their attacks continued through the whole night.

As soon as day had fully broken forth, we commended ourselves to the
Almighty, and sallied out with our war-towers. This time again we killed
a great number of the enemy; but with all our fighting we could not
force them to yield ground, and if they had fought courageously the two
previous days, they stood the more firm this time, and fought
desperately. We however determined, if it were even to cost us all our
lives, to push forward to the great templ