But this was only the prelude to the disasters that were to befall the Spaniards.  The Mexicans made desperate assaults upon the Spanish quarters, in which both sides suffered severely.  At last Montezuma, at the request of Cortes, tried to interpose.  But his subjects, in fury at what they considered his desertion of them, gave him a wound of which he died.  The position became untenable, and Cortes decided on retreat.  This was carried out at night, and owing to the failure of a plan for laying a portable bridge across those gaps in the causeway left by the drawbridges, the Spaniards were exposed to a fierce attack from the natives which proved most disastrous.  Caught on the narrow space of the causeway, and forced to make their way as best they could across the gaps, they were almost overwhelmed by the throngs of their enemies.  Cortes who, with some of the vanguard, had reached comparative safety, dashed back into the thickest of the fight where some of his comrades were making a last stand, and brought them out with him, so that at last all the survivors, a sadly stricken company, reached the mainland.

The story of the reconstruction by Cortes of his shattered and discouraged army is one of the most astonishing chapters in the whole history of the Conquest.  Wounded, impoverished, greatly reduced in numbers and broken in spirit by the terrible experience through which they had passed, they demanded that the expedition should be abandoned and themselves conveyed back to Cuba.  Before long, the practical wisdom and personal influence of Cortes had recovered them, reanimated their spirits, and inspired them with fresh zeal for conquest, and now for revenge.  He added to their numbers the very men sent against him by Velasquez at this juncture, whom he persuaded to join him; and had the same success with the members of another rival expedition from Jamaica.  Eventually he set out once more for Mexico, with a force of nearly six hundred Spaniards, and a number of allies from Tlascala.

IV.—­The Siege and Capture of Mexico

The siege of Mexico is one of the most memorable and most disastrous sieges of history.  Cortes disposed his troops so as to occupy the three great causeways leading from the shore of the lake to the city, and thus cut off the enemy from their sources of supply.  He was strong in the possession of twelve brigantines, built by his orders, which swept the lake with their guns and frequently defeated the manoeuvres of the enemy, to whom a sailing ship was as new and as terrible a phenomenon as were firearms and cavalry.  But the Aztecs were strong in numbers, and in their deadly hatred of the invader, the young emperor, Guatemozin, opposed to the Spaniards a spirit as dauntless as that of Cortes himself.  Again and again, by fierce attack, by stratagem, and by their indefatigable labours, the Aztecs inflicted checks, and sometimes even disaster, upon the Spaniards.  Many of these, and of their