to expect success in this daring scheme when he saw what power he had already gained over Montezuma through his superstitious fears. The plot did not at first meet the approval of the Spanish officers—not because they felt it to be unjust to their kind and unsuspecting host, but because they were less daring than their leader. Yet he was not long in persuading them to yield to his will, especially when he explained that tidings from the garrison at Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz would furnish him with a good pretext for arresting Montezuma and holding him prisoner. Bernal Diaz tells us that "they were so anxious over this proposition that some of them prayed all night about it."
It seems that since the army had left Vera Cruz a tribe living to the north of that place had appealed to the garrison for help against Aztec oppression. They wished to ally themselves with the Spaniards as the Totonacs had done, and they declared that they would have sent tribute to Cortez while he was at Villa Rica but for fear of a hostile tribe whose lands they would be obliged to cross. However, such was the awe inspired by the white man that they would dare even to do this if the commandant would send them four Spaniards to protect them from their enemies on this dangerous journey. This request was granted, and the four soldiers immediately set out. It was not long before two of them came back with a terrible story of Indian cruelty. They were the victims of an Aztec plot. The tribe to whose assistance they had been sent were still loyal to their Aztec masters. By the orders of Quancapopoca, the revenue-officer in charge, the four Spaniards had been seized, and all would have been killed had not two escaped to tell the tale.
