Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
The Siege of Mexico
By Abiel Holmes (17631837)T
Various acts of mutual and bloody hostility succeeded by land and on the Mexican lake. Quauhtemotzin, the king of Mexico, though reduced to the greatest distress, still obstinately refused to surrender, on repeated proposals of terms more honorable and indulgent than in such an extremity he might perhaps have possibly expected. In addition to the daily loss of incredible numbers in action, famine began to consume the Mexicans within the city. The brigantines, having the entire command of the lake, rendered it almost impossible to convey to the besieged any provisions by water. By means of the vast number of Indian auxiliaries, Cortes had shut up the avenues to the city by land. The stores, laid up by Quauhtemotzin, were exhausted. The complicated sufferings of this devoted people brought on infectious and mortal distempers, “the last calamity that visits besieged cities, and which filled up the measure of their woes.” Cortes, now determining upon an assault, began with most of his forces to attack some ditches and intrenchments; and Sandoval with another division attacked the city in the quarter of the north. Terrible was the havoc made this day among the Mexicans, more than 40,000 of whom, it is affirmed, were slain. The stench of the unburied carcasses obliged the besiegers to withdraw from the city, three-fourths of which were already laid in ruins; but the next day they returned, to make the last assault on that district of it which was yet in possession of the Mexicans. All the three divisions of the troops, having penetrated into the great square in the centre of the city, made the attack at once, and pressed so hard on the feeble, exhausted citizens, that, finding no place of refuge, many threw themselves into the water, and some surrendered themselves to the conquerors. The Mexicans having previously prepared vessels, to save themselves by flight from the fury of the enemy, one of them, carrying the royal personages, escaped; but it was soon overtaken by a Spanish brigantine, and surrendered. “I am your prisoner,” said Quauhtemotzin, the Mexican king, to the Spanish captain; “I have no favor to ask, but that you will show the queen my wife, and her attendants, the respect due to their sex and rank.” When conducted to Cortes, he appeared neither with the sullen fierceness of a barbarian, nor with the dejection of a suppliant. “I have done what became a monarch. I have defended my people to the last extremity. Nothing now remains but to die. Take this dagger,” continued he, laying his hand on one which Cortes wore at his side, “plant it in my breast, and put an end to a life which can no longer be of use.” Cortes now ordered that all the Mexicans should leave the city without arms or baggage; and for three days and three nights all the three roads, leading from the city, were seen “full of men, women, and children, feeble, emaciated, and dirty, who went to recover in other parts” of the Mexican territory. The fate of the capital decided the fate of the empire, which was soon after entirely reduced under the dominion of Spain.