If the reader will turn to the pages of this conscientious historian, of De Solis, or of Clavigero, he will be made acquainted with the stirring exploits of the eight or nine weeks that followed after the arrest of Juan Lerma. In this time, the Captain-General, at the head of all the Spaniards, save those who were left in garrison at Tezcuco, and the few sailors and shipwrights who remained in the dock-yards, to preside over Indian artificers, compelled to work at the brigantines—in this time, we say, and at the head of this force, assisted by many thousand Tlascalans, Cortes commenced and completed the circuit of the whole valley, storming and burning cities and towns without number, resisted valiantly in all that were not disaffected, and sometimes, as at the city of Tacuba, repulsed with great loss and no little dishonour. The whole campaign abounds with singular and exciting incidents, of which, however, it does not suit our purpose to mention any but one, and that almost in a word. At the city of Xochimilco, or the Garden of Flowers, (for this is the signification of the word,) where the resistance was sanguinary and noble, though, in the end, ineffectual, Cortes was wounded, surrounded, struck down from his horse, which was killed, and he himself, for a moment, a prisoner; and he owed his life and liberty only to the extraordinary valour of Gaspar Olea of the Red Beard, who, with the help of a few resolute Tlascalans, succeeded in bringing him off. The aid thus rendered by Olea was the more remarkable, since, from the moment of Juan's arrest, he had become sullen, morose, and was sometimes even charged to be mutinous. In this last imputation, however, as far as it implied any treasonable thoughts or practices, the rude Gaspar was wronged. His dissatisfaction was caused solely by the fall and anticipated fate of his young captain. The heinousness of Juan's crime—the drawing his sword upon an officer in the execution of his duty, as Guzman had been, and, worse yet, the aiming of that at the breast of the General—had left it, apparently, impossible to be forgiven. It was universally expected that Juan would expiate the crime with his life; and the only wonder was, that he had not been immediately tried, condemned, and executed. His destiny was therefore anticipated with more curiosity than doubt, and apparently with less pity than either. Gaspar did not attempt to deny Juan's guilt; but when he remembered the sufferings and perils they had shared together, his heart burned with fury, to think how soon the brave and well-beloved youth should die the death of a caitiff. His dissatisfaction expended itself in anger towards the Captain-General; and hence the surprise of his comrades at his act of daring and generosity. But Gaspar had his own ends in view, when he saved the life of Cortes.
It was now many weeks since his arrest, and Juan yet lay in imprisonment, ignorant not so much of his fate, as of the causes which delayed it. On the fourth day of his captivity, he was apprized, by the sound of trumpets and artillery, the cries of men, and the neighing of horses, and, in general, by the prodigious bustle which accompanies the setting-out of an army from a populous city, that some enterprise was meditated and begun; but of its character he was kept wholly ignorant. The custody of his person seemed to be committed to Villafana and the hunchback Najara, conjointly; but it was observable, that, although Najara frequently entered his den alone, Villafana never made his appearance without being accompanied by the Corcobado.
From Najara he gained not a word of intelligence, the hunchback ever replying to his questions with scowls, or with pithy sarcasms in allusion to the crimes of treason and mutiny. From Villafana, attended, and, as it seemed to Juan, watched, by the jealous Najara, he obtained nothing but unmeaning nods of the head, and sometimes looks, too significant to be doubted, and yet too oraculous to be understood.
After the first fortnight, Villafana failed to visit him altogether, and he saw not the face of a human being, except once each morning, when Najara was accustomed to make his appearance, followed by an Indian slave, bearing food and a jar of water. With this latter being, a decrepit old man, on whose naked shoulder was imprinted the horrible letter G, (for guerra, indicating that he was a prisoner of war,—in other words, a branded bondman,) he endeavoured to speak, using all the native dialects with which he was acquainted; but, though Najara made no offer to prevent such conversation, the barbarian replied only by touching his ear and then his breast, signifying thereby that, though he heard the words, he did not understand them. Though Najara permitted these little attempts at speech, with contemptuous indifference, Juan perceived that he ever kept his eyes fastened upon the Indian, as if to prevent any effort at communication of another sort. Thus, if any benevolent friend had endeavoured to convey a message by letter or otherwise, it was apparent that Najara took the best steps to insure its miscarriage.
Foiled thus in every attempt to exchange thoughts with a fellow-being, and reduced to commune only with his own, the unhappy prisoner ceased, at last, to make any effort; and, yielding gradually to a despair that was not the less consuming for being entirely without complaint, he began, in the end, to be indifferent even to the coming and presence of his jailer, neither rising to meet him, nor even lifting his eyes from the floor, on which they were fixed with a lethargic dejection.
He became also indifferent to his food; and once, when Najara entered, he perceived that the water-jar, the dish of tortillas, or maize-cakes, the savoury wild-fowl, and the fragrant chocolatl, (for in regard to food, he was liberally supplied,) stood upon the little table, where they had been placed the day before, untasted and even untouched. He cast his eyes upon the youth, and, for the first time, began to feel a sentiment of pity for his condition. Indeed, the noble figure of the young man was beginning to waste away; his cheeks were hollow, his neglected beard was springing uncouthly over his lips, and his sunken eyes drooped upon the earth, as if never more to gleam with the light of hope and pleasure. The hunchback hesitated for a moment, and then growled out a few words,—the first he had uttered for a week. But these, though commiseration prompted them, he succeeded in making expressive only of scorn or anger.
"Hark you, señor Juan Lerma," he said, "do you mean to starve?"
At the sound of his voice, so unusual and so unexpected, the young man raised his eyes, but with a vague, wo-begone look, and answered nothing.
"I say, señor," continued Najara, somewhat more blandly, "is it your will to die by starvation rather than in any other way?"
"Ah, Najara! is it thou?" said Juan, rising feebly, or indolently, to his feet. "Heaven give you a good-morrow."