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Updated: June 1, 2025
He sent four ships to Hispaniola to enrol volunteers and purchase powder and ammunition, and meanwhile he caused trees to be cut down in the mountains of Tlascala, and with the wood thus obtained twelve brigantines were constructed, which were to be carried in pieces to the Lake of Mexico, to be launched there at the moment when needed.
He said that he was allowing them to maintain their existence and remain a republic because everything else in the vicinity had been conquered; and as there was no field for the young warriors of the Aztec nation to obtain that military training which it was always best to learn by actual experience, he kept Tlascala in a state of enmity because it furnished him a place where he could get the human beings for sacrifices to his gods that he required and at the same time train his young soldiery.
That by my policy I ranged under my banners the powerful commonwealth of Tlascala, and brought them to assist me in subduing the Mexicans, though with the loss of their own beloved independence? and that, to consummate my glory, when the Governor of Cuba, Velasquez, would have taken my command from me and sacrificed me to his envy and jealousy, 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?
In other words, Tlascala was regarded as a sort of game preserve from a religious point of view. Doubtless, Tlascala did not acknowledge the justice, the propriety and the correctness of this attitude of scorn and contempt on the part of the Aztecs.
Some were in favor of returning at once to the friendly city of Tlascala. Others voted for still advancing, but by the northerly route their allies had recommended. But the majority agreed, with their general, that their only chance of safety was in taking a bold course; for that retreat would raise the whole country against them, and ensure their destruction.
These brigantines were built at Tlascala under the supervision of the sailors of the expedition. The rigging of the ships, which had been destroyed, was useful in fitting them out. They were built in pieces and arrangements were made to carry them over the mountains and put them together at the lake when the campaign began. Guns and provisions were also amassed.
"I had a narrow escape, last night, for some of the Aztec soldiers would have seized me and taken me a prisoner to Mexico; but the cazique aided me to escape, and gave me this follower of his, as a guide. He is the same man who accompanied me in my flight from Tezcuco, and brought me to join you at Tlascala." "I am right glad that you have escaped, Sancho.
But the next morning, before the troops were well under arms, came an embassy bearing a golden flag, and a gift for Cortés, and imploring him to spare Coanaco's territories, and to take up his quarters in his capital. Cortés first sternly demanded an account of the Spaniards who, while convoying treasure to the coast, had been slain by Coanaco just when Cortés himself was retreating to Tlascala.
Disloyalty among the Totonacs, treachery that only waited an opportunity in Texcoco, an ancient tradition of hate in Tlascala, and the superstition that obscured the judgment and paralyzed the action of the despotic ruler these were the materials from which the astute invader evolved the machinery for his conquest." Montezuma was in a pitiable state of superstitious indecision.
The fugitives did not delay at Tacuba, and by accident they took the road to Tlascala, where they did not know what reception might await them. Ever harassed by the Mexicans, the Spaniards were again obliged to give battle upon the plains of Otumba to a number of warriors, whom some historians reckon at two hundred thousand.
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