you
not, because even the wisdom of Chaltzantzin was powerless against the
will of the gods. Yet the gods desired not to destroy your brethren, but
to punish them; and their punishment now is at an end. Once more are
they free, and once more is their ruler a wise and valiant man of their
own race. Therefore, the news which we bring you is not sorrowful, but
glad."

While I was thus speaking, the ringing cries which at the first alarm
had sounded over all the valley grew louder and stronger; but as yet we
saw only the two men who at the first had confronted us--for we were in
a deep recess in the mountain, whence the ground dropped away in front,
so that the immediate foreground was hid from us, and we saw only some
distant meadows, and then a broad lake, and over this more meadows and a
sweep of heavy timber, and back of all great mountains rising against
the clear blue sky.

But as my speech ended, and before those to whom it was addressed at all
had digested the wonder of it, and so hesitated in their reply, a
half-dozen men and a woman or two came in sight in the narrow way before
us, panting after their rapid ascent of the acclivity; and the calls of
others pressing up the slope behind them sounded loudly, and in a very
little while a crowd of a hundred or more pressed about us, all gazing
at us and questioning us with a most eager surprise. For the most part
these seemed to be laborers from the near-by fields; for many of them
carried agricultural implements, and their bare legs and arms were
splashed with mud and were grimy of the soil. As for the look of them,
save that the flowing garments of cotton cloth which the women wore were
embroidered in a fanciful fashion, I could not have distinguished these
people from the tallest and strongest of the Indians dwelling in the hot
lands of the coast about Vera Cruz. The men, who wore only a cloth
twisted about their loins, were as magnificent fellows as I ever saw.
Every one of them was tall and straight, with broad shoulders and
narrow hips, and the muscles of their arms and legs stood out like
cords. From Pablo, who was an unusually tall and well-formed lad, they
differed only in the color of their skins--which were decidedly darker
than his, as was to be expected in the case of men dwelling in this
tropical region at the level of the sea.

Towards Pablo these people manifested a familiar curiosity quite unlike
their reverential manner towards the rest of us, who s