[89] “Y como asomó á la vista de la Ciudad de México, parecióle que estaba toda yerma, y que no parecia persona por todos los caminos, ni casas, ni plazas, ni nadie le salió á recibir, ni de los suyos, ni de los enemigos; y fué esto señal de indignación y enemistad por lo que habia pasado.” Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, MS., lib. 12, cap. 19.
[90] “Pontes ligneos qui tractim lapideos intersecant, sublatos, ac vias aggeribus munitas reperit.” P. Martyr, De Orbe Novo, dec. 5, cap. 5.
[91] Probanza á pedimento de Juan de Lexalde, MS.—Rel. Seg. de Cortés, ap. Lorenzana, p. 133.—“Esto causó gran admiracion en todos los que venian, pero no dejáron de marchar, hasta entrar donde estaban los Españoles acorralados. Venian todos muy cansados y muy fatigados y con mucho deseo de llegar á donde estaban sus hermanos; los de dentro cuando los viéron, recibiéron singular consolacion y esfuerzo y recibiéronlos con la artillería que tenian, saludándolos, y dándolos el parabien de su venida.” Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, MS., lib. 12, cap. 22.
[92] “E así los Indios, todos Señores, mas de 600 desnudos é con muchas joyas de oro é hermosos penachos, é muchas piedras preciosas, é como mas aderezados é gentiles hombres se pudiéron é supiéron aderezar, é sin arma alguna defensiva ni ofensiva bailaban é cantaban é hacian su areito é fiesta segun su costumbre.” (Oviedo, Hist. de las Ind., MS., lib. 33, cap. 54.) Some writers carry the number as high as eight hundred or even one thousand. Las Casas, with a more modest exaggeration than usual, swells it only to two thousand. Brevíssima Relatione, p. 48.
[93] “Sin duelo ni piedad Christiana los acuchilló, i mató.” Gomara, Crónica, cap. 104.
[94] “Fué tan grande el derramamiento de Sangre, que corrian arroyos de ella por el Patio, como agua cuando mucho llueve.” Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, MS., lib. 12, cap. 20.
[95] [In the process instituted against Alvarado this massacre forms one of the most important charges. He is there accused of having killed four hundred of the principal nobles and a great number of the common people, of whom more than three thousand, it is stated, were assembled to celebrate the festival in honor of their war-god. “Ynbio al patyo donde todos baylaban y syn cabsa ni razon alguna dieron sobrellos y mataron todos los mas de los señores que estavan presos con el dicho Motenzuma y mataron cuatro cientos señores e prencipales que con el estavan e mataron mucho numero de yndios que estavan baylando en mas cantydad de tres mill personas.” (Procesos de Residencia, instruidos contra Pedro de Alvarado y Nuño de Guzman, p. 53.) The public are under great obligations to the licentiate Don Ignacio Rayon for bringing into light this important document, which for more than three centuries had lain hid in the General Archives of Mexico. We have hardly less reason to thank him for placing the manuscript in the hands of so competent a scholar as Don José Fernando Ramirez, to enrich it with the stores of his critical erudition. The publication of the process did not take place till some years after that of my own history of the Conquest of Mexico. But, as it contains a minute specification of the various charges against Alvarado, and his own defence, it furnishes me with the means of correcting any errors into which I have fallen in reference to that commander, while it corroborates, I may add, the general tenor of the statements I have derived from contemporary chroniclers.]
[96] “Y de aquí á que se acabe el mundo, ó ellos del todo se acaben, no dexarán de lamentar, y cantar en sus areytos, y bayles, como en romances, que acá dezimos, aquella calamidad, y perdida de la sucession de toda su nobleza, de que se preciauan de tantos años atras.” Las Casas, Brevíssima Relatione, p. 49.
[97] See Alvarado’s reply to queries of Cortés, as reported by Diaz (Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 125), with some additional particulars in Torquemada (Monarch. Ind., lib. 4, cap. 66), Solís (Conquista, lib. 4, cap. 12), and Herrera (Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 10, cap. 8) who all seem content to endorse Alvarado’s version of the matter. I find no other authority, of any weight, in the same charitable vein.
[98] Oviedo mentions a conversation which he had some years after this tragedy with a noble Spaniard, Don Thoan Cano, who came over in the train of Narvaez and was present at all the subsequent operations of the army. He married a daughter of Montezuma, and settled in Mexico after the Conquest. Oviedo describes him as a man of sense and integrity. In answer to the historian’s queries respecting the cause of the rising, he said that Alvarado had wantonly perpetrated the massacre from pure avarice; and the Aztecs, enraged at such unprovoked and unmerited cruelty, rose, as they well might, to avenge it. (Hist. de las Ind., MS., lib. 33, cap. 54.) See the original dialogue in Appendix, Part 2, No. 11.