Aztec - Jennings Gary - Страница 245
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Naturally, Motecuzoma had foreseen that the invaders might still resist dissuasion, so he had provided his Snake Woman with one more squirm.
"In that case," said Tlacotzin, "it would please our Revered Speaker to have the Captain-General no longer delay his arrival." Meaning that Motecuzoma did not want him wandering at will among the malcontent tributary peoples, and probably enlisting them. "The Revered Speaker suggests that in these uncomfortable and primitive outer provinces you can get the impression only that our people are barbarous and uncivilized. He is desirous that you see his capital city's splendor and magnificence, so you may realize our people's real worth and ability. He urges that you come now and directly to Tenochtitlan. I will guide you there, my lord. And since I am Tlacotzin, second to the ruler of the Mexica, my presence will be proof against any other people's trickery or ambush."
Cortes swept his arm in a gesture encompassing the troops ranked and waiting all about Chololan. "I do not fret overmuch about trickery and ambush, friend Tlacotzin," he said pointedly. "But I accept your lord's invitation to the capital, and your kind offer to guide. We are ready to march when you are."
It was true that Cortes had little to fear from either open or sneak attack, or that he had any real need to continue collecting new warriors. Our mice estimated that, when he departed Chololan, his combined forces numbered about twenty thousand, and there were in addition some eight thousand porters carrying the army's equipment and provisions. The company stretched over two one-long-runs in length, and required a quarter of a day to march past any given point. Incidentally, by then, every warrior and porter wore an insigne that proclaimed him a man of Cortes's army. Since the Spaniards still complained that they "could not tell the damned Indians apart," and could not in the confusion of battle distinguish friend from enemy, Cortes had ordered all his native troops to adopt a uniform style of headdress: a high crown of mazatla grass. When that army of twenty and eight thousand advanced toward Tenochtitlan, said the mice, it resembled from a distance a great, undulating, grass-grown field magically on the move.
Motecuzoma had probably considered telling his Snake Woman to lead Cortes aimlessly around and about the mountain country until the invaders were either desperately fatigued or hopelessly lost, and could be abandoned there; but of course there were many men among the Acolhua and Texcalteca and other accompanying troops who would soon have divined that trick. However, Motecuzoma apparently did instruct Tlacotzin to make it no easy journey, no doubt still wistfully hoping that Cortes would give up the expedition in discouragement. At any rate, Tlacotzin brought them westward along none of the easier trade routes through the lower valleys; he led them up and over the high pass between the volcanoes Ixtacciuatl and Popocatepetl.
As I have said, there is snow on those heights even in the hottest days of summer. By the time that company came across, the winter was beginning. If anything was likely to dishearten the white men, it would have been the numbing chill and fierce winds and great drifts of snow they had to make their way through. To this day, I do not know what the climate of your native Spain is like, but Cortes and his soldiers had all spent years in Cuba, which I understand is as torrid and humid as any of our coastal Hot Lands. So the white men, like their allies the Totonaca, were unprepared and unclothed to withstand the piercing cold of the frozen route Tlacotzin chose. He later reported with satisfaction that the white men had suffered terribly.
Yes, they suffered and they complained, and four white men died, and so did two of their horses and several of their staghounds, and so did perhaps a hundred of their Totonaca, but the remainder of the train persevered. In fact, ten of the Spaniards, to show off their stamina and prowess, briefly digressed from the route of march, with the declared intention of climbing all the way to the top of Popocatepetl to look down into his incense-smoking crater. They did not get that far; but then, not many of our own people have ever done so, or have cared to try. The climbers rejoined their company, blue and stiff with cold, and some of them later had a number of their fingers and toes fall off. But they were much admired by their comrades for having made the attempt, and even the Snake Woman grudgingly had to admit that the white men, however foolhardy, were men of dauntless courage and energy.
Tlacotzin also reported to us the white men's very human expressions of astonishment and awe and gladness when at last they came out from the western end of the pass, and they stood on the mountain slopes overlooking the immense lake basin, and the falling snow briefly parted its curtain to give them an unimpeded view. Below and beyond them lay the interconnected and varicolored bodies of water, set in their vast bowl of luxuriant foliage and tidy towns and straight roads between. So suddenly seen, after the unappealing heights they had just crossed, the sweep of land below would have appeared like a garden: pleasant and green, all shades of green, thick green forests and neat green orchards and variously green chinampa and farm plots. They could have seen, though only in miniature, the numerous cities and towns bordering the several lakes, and the lesser island communities set in the very waters. They were then still at least twenty one-long-runs from Tenochtitlan, but the silvery-white city would have shone like a star. They had journeyed for months, from the featureless seacoast beaches, over and around numberless mountains, through rocky ravines and rough valleys, meanwhile seeing only towns and villages of no particular distinction, finally breasting the formidably bleak pass between the volcanoes. Then, suddenly, the travelers looked down on a scene that—they said it themselves—"seemed like a dream... like a marvel from the old books of fables...."
Coming down from the volcanoes, the travelers of course entered the domains of The Triple Alliance by way of the Acolhua lands, where they were met and greeted by the Uey-Tlatoani Cacamatzin, come out from Texcoco with an impressive assembly of his lords and nobles and courtiers and guards. Though Cacama, as instructed by his uncle, made a warm speech of welcome to the newcomers, I daresay he must have felt uneasy, being glared at by his dethroned half brother Black Flower, who at that moment stood before him with a powerful force of disaffected Acolhua warriors at his command. The confrontation between those two might have erupted into battle right there, except that both Motecuzoma and Cortes had strictly forbidden any strife that might mar their own momentous meeting. So, for the time being, all was outwardly amicable, and Cacama led the whole train into Texcoco for lodging and refreshment and entertainment before it continued on to Tenochtitlan.
However, there is no doubt that Cacama was embarrassed and enraged when his own subjects crowded the streets of Texcoco to receive the returning Black Flower with cheers of rejoicing. That was insult enough, but it was not long before Cacama had to endure the even worse insult of mass desertion. During the day or two that the travelers spent in that city, perhaps two thousand of the men of Texcoco dug out their long unused battle armor and weapons, and when the visitors moved on, those men marched with them as volunteer additions to Black Flower's troop. From that day on, the Acolhua nation was disastrously divided. Half of its population remained submissive to Cacama, who was their Revered Speaker and was so recognized by his fellow rulers of The Triple Alliance. The other half gave their loyalty to the Black Flower who should have been their Revered Speaker, however much they may have deplored his having cast his lot with the alien whites.
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