Complete Works of Edmund Burke

by Edmund Burke

  CHAP. XII.

  AS soon as the Mexicans were apprized of the death of their emperor, they set about the election of a successor. They immediately cast their eyes upon Guatimozin, nephew and son-in-law of Montezuma, a man fit to command at such a time; of a person graceful, a body strong and robust, and of a soul full of the most undaunted courage. Though no more than twenty-four years old, the reputation of his early exploits procured him the authority of age, and a penetrating genius served him for experience. He was no sooner called to this unsteady throne, than he took measures to prevent the Mexicans from their disorderly and casual attacks, and to make them act with design and uniformity. He examined thoroughly into the cause of their former miscarriages; and considering every thing, he found that the Indians in their present condition, could never hope for any success in open fight; he resolved therefore to spare his men as much as possible, until his own invention and time might teach them better methods of fighting. On these ideas he caused all assaults to cease; then he cut off the causeways which joined the city to the continent, and at the same time strongly barricaded the streets, resolving to starve an enemy which seemed unconquerable by any other means; a measure, which though it has with us no extraordinary appearance, shewed no small sagacity in Guatimozin, because it was what had never been before practised amongst the military stratagems of this people, and invention is the characteristic of genius.

  From henceforward the whole method of the war was changed, the Spaniards grew every day more and more streightened for provisions, and whenever they sallied out, though they slew great numbers of their opponents, the many canals of the city, and barricado behind barricado, after some successful progress, obliged them, vanquished by mere weariness, to return without effect to their quarters. The Spaniards, invincible by the Indian arms, were not proof against famine. Cortes saw that nothing was left for his security, but as speedy a retreat as possible; and though this must necessarily lose them the most considerable part of the treasure they had amassed, it was what least afflicted him. He encouraged his troops, by chearfully relinquishing his own part, not to attempt burthening themselves with a treasure which they might consider as lying at an advantageous interest, until they should, as they certainly would, be enabled to return with a sufficient force to reclaim it. The resolution of retreating being now taken, and all things disposed for it, a question arose, whether it were better made by day or in the night. On this the council of war was divided; and their reasons seeming pretty equal, a person amongst them, a sort of astrologer, who passed for a prophet, and as such was much respected by the greater part of the army, promised them certain success if they retreated by night. Certain it is, that when measures are dubious, superstitious determinations have great use; for as reason cannot easily determine the right way, that method which superstition fixes upon, is by the weight it has from thence, pursued with the greater chearfulness and effect.

  The general was guided by the prophet, and he disposed every thing for his retreat with great judgment. He caused the usual fires to be lighted in every part of his quarters. Some of his boldest and most active men led the van. The prisoners, artillery, and heavy baggage were in the center. He himself, with one hundred of his choicest troops, formed the rear. With wonderful order and silence, and without any interruption, did the Spaniards march until they came to the first breach in the causeway. Here a portable wooden-bridge which Cortes had prepared, was laid over; but when the artillery and horses had passed, it was wedged so closely into the stones that bordered the causeway, that it could not be removed, and there was yet another breach. But they were soon called from attending to this by a more pressing danger; for as nothing could elude the vigilance of the new emperor, he found out their intention of retreating, and disposed all along the sides of the causeway an infinite multitude of canoes, with orders to preserve the greatest silence, and not to attempt any thing until a signal was given. The darkness of the night favoured the scheme. And now perceiving that the Spaniards were under some embarrassment, they took this advantage, and all at once, with great order, poured in their arrows; raising at the same time a most tremendous shout, swelled with the barbarous sound of all their martial instruments of music. The Spaniards were not wanting to themselves, but behaved with signal bravery. It were needless, and almost impossible to relate all the destruction of that horrid night. The Indians at first attacked in good order, but the first ranks being repulsed, and the distant canoes pressing on to action, the whole attack was thrown into confusion, the Indians drowned or slaughtered one another: however, they still pressed on with untameable fury. Thousands, impatient of the delay their remote situation caused them, leapt from their canoes, and climbing up the causeway in front where it was interrupted, broke in upon the Spaniards in this quarter, with a torrent hardly resistible. In vain this naked multitude was hacked to pieces by the Spanish swords, in vain were they tumbled upon one another by hundreds into the lake; new warriors succeeded those that were killed, and the Spaniards, actually wearied out, were in danger of being wholly cut off; when making one vigorous effort in the front, they happily cleared that post, and by a beam which they casually met, they passed over one by one, or, as some say, filling the intervals with the dead bodies of their enemies, they gained the main land. Cortes came over with the first, for in the confusion of the night, their former order was in a good measure lost, and took care as fast as his men got over to form them, to secure the passage for the rest. Then returning to those who were behind, by his presence and example, he animated them to renew the fight, and drawing up a part of his men on both sides of the causeway, he ordered the rest to file off from the center. In this manner the first light saw the Spaniards clear out of the city. Cortes halted at a small distance, that those whom the confusion and the night had dispersed, might have an opportunity of rejoining the rest of the army.

  Happily they were not pursued, for as soon as the dawning light unveiled the field of battle to the Mexicans, the possession of which they bought by such a profusion of their own blood, they perceived among the slain two sons of Montezuma, who were with the prisoners, and pierced through by the arrows of the Mexicans in the promiscuous and undistinguished carnage of the preceding night. For some time they were confounded and struck dumb with horror at this sight; their sentiments of loyalty returned; their monarch, almost their god▪ lately profaned by their own violence! now their hands imbrued in the blood of his children! A general deadness and consternation ensued. They must not add to their impiety by neglecting the obsequies due to the de+ceased. In the mean time the Spaniard• pursued their retreat without molestation; bu• this breathing lasted but a short time: all th• allies of the Mexicans already in arms, an• divided into several flying parties, hung over the army of Cortes, and harrassed it without intermission; they attacked him in front, in rear, in flank, by open force, by ambuscade, by surprize. Provision grew extremely scarce on his march; and now it was that Cortes shewed a firmness under his losses, a vigilance against incessant attacks, so various in time and manner, and a courage which enabled him to repulse them, which have been exceeded by nothing in history.

  The principal army of the Mexicans, whilst he contended with such difficulties from the flying parties, took another rout, and pouring in three columns into a plain, where their number should be of most avail, they covered the whole of an extended valley, which lay directly in his road to Tlascala, and this was called the valley of Otumba. They concealed their purposes with all imaginable care. To blind the Spaniards, they ordered several villages to give them a friendly reception. But Cortes did not suffer this to relax his vigilance, not allowing himself to be deceived by any appearances of friendship shewn by men, whose interest it was not to be his friends, Convinced as he was, that a surprize of all things was indeed very destructive to the affairs of a general, but that it was mortal to his reputation. He drew indications of their sentiments towards him, from the manners, the gestures, and the countenances of those he treated with
in his march; and perceiving that many shewed unusual signs of content and exultation, he judged not without reason that it could not be favourable to him. He therefore disposed every thing in such a manner as that his troops were neither disordered, nor his courage abated, when from an eminence they discovered the extended plains of Otumba, darkened as far as the eye could reach with the myriads of their enemies. The Spaniards, animated by their superiority in arms, and their former victories, and the Tlascalans, by the presence of such allies, and their hatred of the Mexican name, behaved with great bravery and success; neither were the Mexicans inferior in animosity and courage. But it was Cortes himself who determined the fortune of the day. Nothing he ever heard was either forgot, or suffered to be an useless burthen upon his memory. He remembered to have heard from the Mexicans, that the fortune of the field with them ever followed that of the royal standard. This was a net o• gold, elevated on a gilded staff, and splendid with plumes of a thousand colours. Grea• exigencies alone brought it into the field, and it was entrusted to none but the care of th• general, who sat on a chair sumptuousl• adorned, and supported on men’s shoulders i• the center of the armies to view the whol• battle, to be a witness of the behaviour of all his troops, and to give orders as the occasion required. Cortes pretending to make his principal effort in a quarter remote from the standard, employed all his foot in that service; but heading the horse himself, with some of his bravest officers, informing them of his design, and animating them with the hopes of a speedy decision, he flung himself with fury against the part that seemed least distant from the center. After dispersing and overturning whole battalions, they penetrated to the chosen body of nobles, who guarded the general and standard. Here the resistance was greater, but it was soon overcome, and Cortes’s own lance met the general, who was overthrown, and the standard taken. All the other standards were struck directly, and the Mexicans fled every way which their fear and confusion hurried them. They lost twenty thousand men in this battle, and a spoil infinite. This victory gave Cortes an undisturbed passage to Tlascala, and a welcome reception amongst his allies there.

  CHAP. XIII.

  LET us now turn our eyes to Mexico. No sooner were the Spaniards departed, than Guatimozin ordered the city to be fortified in such a manner as to secure himself against their entrance a third time. He found that a thousand Tlascalans were killed in this retreat, upwards of two hundred Spaniards, (the greatest loss they had yet in America,) and a great number of horses. He cut off the heads of the Spaniards, and of their horses, no less dreaded, and sent them to all the neighbouring nations, as an infallible token of his victory; as a sure proof that he was resolved to keep no measures with the enemy, and to stir them up to their utter destruction; and he succeeded so well, that numberless petty nations, well inclined to the Spaniards, fell off, and many that were wavering were confirmed in the Mexican interest. By this means several adventurers, that from the fame of Cortes had landed to join him, were cut to pieces before they gained his army. But the negotiation to which Guatimozin bent all his force, was that with Tlascala, because this was Cortes’s chief strength. He sent large presents, and ambassadors of ability, and excellent instructions, to detach them from the Spanish interest▪ who acted so well, that they caused a grea• division in their favour in the councils of that republic. But Cortes making his military exploits subservient to his negotiations, and his skill in negotiation assistant to his exploits, baffled them at length with great address, but not without great difficulty, and the Tlascalans were confirmed in his friendship.

  Whilst a general has an obedient and well united army, he has an engine in proper order to work in his designs, and he can then execute them with ease; but the greatest trial of his capacity is to defend himself against a foreign enemy, and wrestle with a domestic sedition at the same time. The soldiers of Narvaez, since Cortes’s return from Mexico, where they were obliged to leave so considerable a part of their booty, now hopeless of the expedition, began to mutiny, and demanded to be sent home directly to Cuba; nor were his other troops free from some part of the infection. Whatever could be done by preserving them in action, without too great a fatigue; whatever a seasonable yielding, without forfeiting authority, in short, whatever an able commander could do in such circumstances, was done by Cortes, without any other effect than that of palliating the disease; the indisposition still continued.

  Whilst he struggled with these difficulties, which nearly overpowered him, his old enemy, James Velasquez, looking on the success of Narvaez’s expedition as a thing certain, sent a ship to get intelligence of his proceedings, and about thirty men to reinforce him. The person who commanded at the port for Cortes, no sooner saw the ship in the offing, than he went on board her, and upon the captain’s enquiry after Narvaez, he assured him he was well, and as successful as he could wish. Not doubting this, the captain and his men landed, and were immediately made prisoners. Finding how affairs were really circumstanced, they admired the conqueror, commended the stratagem, and chearfully joined the army.

  Much about the same time the governor of Jamaica, and he too a determined enemy of Cortes, sent three ships with a small body of troops, in hopes of tearing from him some part of his conquests. These ships were dispersed in a storm, and were involved in many difficulties; but what is singular, they all, though separated, came to one and the same resolution, which was to revolt from the commander, and join Cortes the moment they came on shore: so that the enemies of Cortes now no less than three times relieved him, by the very methods which they took to distress his affairs. These advantages, though improved to the utmost by Cortes, were certainly not at all the result of his contrivance. There is a species of a splendid good fortune necessary to form an hero, to give a lustre to his wisdom and courage, and to create that confidence and superiority in him that nothing else can give, but which always makes a principal part of an heroic character. Without this, it is impossible for any man, however qualified, to emerge. Cortes was not only fortunate, by being freed from the most terrible embarrassment by the arrival of these succours, which were never intended as such; but much about the same time ships arrived from Spain, bringing, on the account of some private persons, a reinforcement of men and military stores; and from the court an authentic approbration of his conduct, and a confirmation of his command.

  Fortified with these, he yielded to the mutinous importunities of such of his soldiers as were earnest to depart; and though he diminished his numbers considerably by this step, he judged it better to have a well-disciplined army than a great one, and knew that little could be expected from men who were dragged unwillingly to action; at the same time that their cowardice or sedition would infect the rest. After the departure of the mutineers, he found he had still above nine hundred Spanish foot, and eighty-six horse, and eighteen pieces of cannon. With these, and with the assistance of a vast body of Tlascalans, and allies of various nations, whom admiration and fear of Cortes, or hatred to the Mexicans, had brought under his banner, he once more prepared to attack Mexico, which was the grand object of his undertakings. The city was so advantageously situated, and he knew at this time so well fortified, that nothing could be done without a force on the lake. To cut off their supplies, he ordered the materials of twelve brigantines to be got ready, in such a manner as only to need being put together when they should arrive at Mexico. These were carried upon the shoulders of his Indian allies. His rout to Mexico cannot be so much considered in the light of a march, as a continued train of ambuscades and battles, ‘ some of which were fought with the most numerous armies, and with circumstances not suited to the brevity of my purpose to relate. In all these he was successful, though his enemies may be said, with little exaggeration, to have disputed with him every foot of ground between Tlascala and Mexico.

  At last that city shewed itself, rising from the midst of a noble lake, surrounded with a number of most populous cities, as her attendants upon every side, and all subject to her power. The Spaniards now looking o
n this as their goal, revived their courage, and forgot the difficulties of their march; and the Tlascalans, in a perfect fury of military delight, wanted the steady hand of Cortes to restrain a courage, which he commended and kept alive by his example and words, whilst he moderated it’s ardor. Before he began the attack of Mexico, he spent some time in reducing all the neighbouring cities from which it might derive any succour. He cut off the aqueducts which supplied Mexico with water, that of the lake being brackish, and he got ready his brigantines with all imaginable diligence to cut off all relief from the lake.

  Whilst his attention was wholly employed in the prosecution of the war, an old Spaniard, who had long served, discovered to him a conspiracy of the most dangerous nature. Antonio de Vilesana, a private soldier, but a man bold and desperate in any bad purpose, and subtle in contriving it, had formed a conspiracy with several others to kill Cortes, and the principal persons upon whom he relied, and then to return to Vera Cruz, from whence they might easily pass to Cuba, and secure their pardon by the merit they should make of this action with James Velasquez. They were urged to this resolution by the fatigue of those innumerable dangers and difficulties, they had passed, and by the despair of overcoming those which yet lay before them; without considering that by this wicked action, they should rather produce new difficulties than overcome the old. Others of more consequence were drawn in, and the conspiracy had been so far formed, that the time and manner of killing him was settled, and the person fixed, upon whom they intended to devolve the command. When Cortes was apprised of this conspiracy, without any hurry that might give notice that he had discovered it, yet, without losing a moment to take advantage of the discovery, with four or five of his principal captains, he went directly to the quarters of Vilesana, who, astonished at seeing him, made half his confession by the fear he discovered. Cortes had him thrown immediately into irons, and then ordering every body to retire, he examined himself into all the particulars of the affair, and the names of the persons concerned. Vilesana made a full confession, and ended it by producing a paper in vindication of their proceeding, which had been signed with the names of all the conspirators. Cortes was not a little surprised to see amongst them, the names of persons upon whom he had great reliance. However, he dissembled his concern, and ordered Vilesana to be immediately executed. He was shewn to all the army hanging at his tent door. Cortes informed none of the friends he most trusted with the paper he had received; but summoning the army, he gave them an account of the horrid conspiracy that had been formed against his life; that he had punished the person principally concerned, but that it was with satisfaction he was left ignorant of his accomplices, by the care the criminal took in destroying a paper, which he believed might have made great discoveries. For his part, as he had punished, and was resolved severely to punish any flagitious attempt against his life or authority, so he was determined to order both in such a manner as to give just cause of complaint to no man; and if by any accident he had done so, he was ready to give him all reasonable satisfaction. Proceeding thus, Cortes had the advantage of knowing who they were that wished him ill; at the same time that they remained unapprised of the discovery he had made, and endeavoured to prevent it by a more diligent performance of their duty: he now appointed a guard upon his person.