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Updated: May 2, 2025
Tizoc saw at a glance the hopelessness of trying to rally a rout like this until the terrified creatures, fleeing like sheep from a pack of wolves, had been given rest for a while in some safe place where their courage might return to them.
As for Tizoc, his disposition towards us obviously was most soft and friendly; and as his mind slowly absorbed the fact that, somehow or another, the Priest Captain had made a fool of him with a miracle that was not really a miracle at all, his choler rose in a manner most favorable to our purposes.
Perceiving that we regarded with surprise this curious system of fortification, Tizoc explained: "These are the barriers set up against the Tlahuicos, who, heeding not the order given of old by our lord Chaltzantzin, have striven many times to break forth from the valley for among these men there are many of perverse natures and evil minds."
In response to a call from Tizoc, some men-servants came out from one of the rooms and received his order to prepare food for us; and he then led us to a large room in a corner of the court that was arranged very delightfully as a bath.
At the moment that the bow of the boat showed outside the opening he raised his hand, as though signalling to Young and Tizoc behind him; and in that same instant we heard the shrieking of the windlass and the quick clanking of the unwinding chains, and saw the metal grating rushing down the face of the wall.
This time we did not stop in front of the great idol, but went on beyond it towards a portal in the rear of the building that opened on an inner court; on the farther side of which court, as we knew from the description of the place that Tizoc had given us, was the Treasure-house, in which was stored not only the treasure placed there in long past ages by King Chaltzantzin, but also the treasure belonging to the State and to the temple that had been accumulated in later times.
"By G d!" he cried, "they meant us to do just what we've done, and we've walked into their trap like so many d n fools!" Tizoc, I was glad to see, had his men well under his command, as was shown by the orderly manner in which they waited, despite their eager impatience to be off, until he gave the command to march.
Only water was served with the meal, but at the end of it a small jar of some sort of potent liquor was brought, very cool, and with an excellent spicy taste, that Tizoc warned us must be taken but sparingly; and truly he was right, as I found from the warm and mellow feeling of benevolent friendliness that but half a cup of it infused into me.
After all, no harm came of this absurd performance, but rather good; for the secretary exhibited the photograph to Tizoc, and both of them, and the two warriors also, were lost in wonder at its marvellous likeness to the original, and evidently held us in increasingly great respect because we were the possessors of such an extraordinary work of art.
But this was not a time when resentment could be safely manifested, and I hurriedly explained to Young that these pictures, no doubt, were to be transmitted as a part of the report that Tizoc was about to make to the King concerning us, and that he must find no fault with them. "He's goin' t' send that thing t' th' King an' say it's me, is he? No, he's not not by a jugful!
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