Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 1.djvu/219

gold, but would not give it unless Montezuma commanded him to do so, but that, if the latter did so order, then he would give the gold, and his person, and all that he possessed. In order not to scandalise him, nor to hinder my designs and progress, I dissembled with him the best I could, saying that very soon Montezuma would order him to give the gold and everything he had.

The two other chiefs who had lands in this valley came to see me here, one of whom lived four leagues below, and the other two leagues above, and they gave me certain collars of gold of little weight or value, and seven or eight female slaves.

After stopping four or five days there, I left them very contented, and went to the city of the other chief, two leagues, as I said, up the valley which place is called Yztacmastitan.^[1] This lordship has an extension of three or four leagues, one house after another along the valley, and on the banks of a small river which flows through it. The house of the chief stands on a very high hill, protected by a better fort than can be found in half Spain, well surrounded with walls, and barbicans, and moats, and, on the top of this hill, there is a town of about five or six thousand inhabitants, with very large houses, whose people are somewhat richer than those of the lower valley. Here I was also very well received, and its chief told me that he likewise was a vassal of Montezuma. I stayed in his house three days, not only for the purpose of resting the people from the hardship they had endured in the desert, but also to wait for four messengers, natives of Cempoal, who had come with me, and whom I had sent from Caltanmi to a very large province called Tascalteca,^[2]

1. Ixtacmaxtitlan, in the present state of Puebla. For convenience' sake the town was removed from the hill-top in 1601 and built on its present site lower down.
2. Tlascala was a republic composed of four federated states, each ruled by its chief, while federal affairs and legislation were undertaken by the Senate, which was composed of the nobles of all four states,