ousy, I drew from
him all his forces and joined them to my own, showing myself as superior
to all other Spaniards as I was to the Indians?

_Penn_.--I know very well that thou wast as fierce as a lion and as
subtle as a serpent. The devil perhaps may place thee as high in his
black list of heroes as Alexander or Caesar. It is not my business to
interfere with him in settling thy rank. But hark thee, friend Cortez.
What right hadst thou, or had the King of Spain himself, to the Mexican
Empire? Answer me that, if thou canst.

_Cortez_.--The Pope gave it to my master.

_Penn_.--The devil offered to give our Lord all the kingdoms of the
earth, and I suppose the Pope, as his vicar, gave thy master this; in
return for which he fell down and worshipped him, like an idolater as he
was. But suppose the high priest of Mexico had taken it into his head to
give Spain to Montezuma, would his grant have been good?

_Cortez_.--These are questions of casuistry which it is not the business
of a soldier to decide. We leave that to gownsmen. But pray, Mr. Penn,
what right had you to the province you settled?

_Penn_.--An honest right of fair purchase. We gave the native savages
some things they wanted, and they in return gave us lands they did not
want. All was amicably agreed on, not a drop of blood shed to stain our
acquisition.

_Cortez_.--I am afraid there was a little fraud in the purchase. Thy
followers, William Penn, are said to think cheating in a quiet and sober
way no mortal sin.

_Penn_.--The saints are always calumniated by the ungodly. But it was a
sight which an angel might contemplate with delight to behold the colony
I settled! To see us living with the Indians like innocent lambs, and
taming the ferocity of their barbarous manners by the gentleness of ours!
To see the whole country, which before was an uncultivated wilderness,
rendered as fertile and fair as the garden of God! O Fernando Cortez,
Fernando Cortez! didst thou leave the great empire of Mexico in that
state? No, thou hadst turned those delightful and populous regions into
a desert--a desert flooded with blood. Dost thou not remember that most
infernal scene when the noble Emperor Guatimozin was stretched out by thy
soldiers upon hot burning coals to make him discover into what part of
the lake of Mexico he had thrown the royal treasures? Are not his groans
ever sounding in the ears of thy conscience? Do not they rend thy hard
heart, an