vered a civil but none the less peremptory message requesting the
Spaniards to return whence they came. By this time Cortes had learned
that although the Aztecs were the greatest power in Anahuac, their
supremacy was not acknowledged by all the tribes; notably was it
contested by the Tlascalans and their allies the Otomies. The
Tlascalans were republicans having their home in the mountains almost
midway between Mexico and the coast. For fifty years or more they had
been at bitter enmity with the Aztecs, who again and again had vainly
attempted to subjugate them. To this people Cortes despatched an
embassy asking for a safe passage through their territories on his
road to Mexico, for his political insight told him that they might
prove valuable allies. No answer was returned by the Tlascalans who
when the Spaniards advanced attacked them furiously, only to be
defeated by Cortes in several engagements, till, discouraged and
believing the white men to be invincible, they sued for peace, and
from enemies were converted into firm allies. From Tlascala the
Spaniards proceeded to the neighboring city of Cholula where Marina
discovered a plot to put them to death. For this offence Cortes took a
terrible vengeance. Falling on the inhabitants of the city when they
were unprepared he butchered vast numbers of them, giving their houses
and temples to sack. Having thus established the terror of his name he
marched on to Mexico accompanied by a body of about five thousand
Tlascalan allies. Meanwhile the counsels of the Aztecs were darkened
with doubt. The Spaniards might easily have been kept out of Mexico by
force, but the arm of Montezuma was paralyzed by superstitious fears.
Prophecy foretold that the children of the white god Quetzalcoatl
should rise from the sea to possess the land, and in the Spaniards he
beheld the fate fulfilled. To him they were not mortal but divine and
when diplomacy had failed to keep them at a distance he feared to lift
a sword against them. Thus it came about that without a blow being
struck to drive them back Cortes and his little band of adventurers
found themselves established at the heart of the strange and rich
civilization that they had discovered, not as enemies, but as the
guests of the king. They were not slow to avail themselves of the
opportunities of their position in order to advance their ends which
were, first plunder, secondly conquest, and, thirdly the extension of
the authority of Spain