Scarcely was this difficulty adjusted, when Cortes was menaced
with one more serious, in the jealousy springing up between his
soldiers and their Indian allies. Notwithstanding the demonstrations
of regard by Maxixca and his immediate followers, there were others of
the nation who looked with an evil eye on their guests, for the
calamities in which they had involved them; and they tauntingly asked,
if, in addition to this, they were now to be burdened by the
presence and maintenance of the strangers? The sallies of discontent
were not so secret as altogether to escape the ears of the
Spaniards, in whom they occasioned no little disquietude. They
proceeded, for the most part, it is true, from persons of little
consideration, since the four great chiefs of the republic appear to
have been steadily secured to the interests of Cortes. But they
derived some importance from the countenance of the warlike
Xicotencatl, in whose bosom still lingered the embers of that
implacable hostility which he had displayed so courageously on the
field of battle; and sparkles of this fiery temper occasionally
gleamed forth in the intimate intercourse into which he was now
reluctantly brought with his ancient opponents.
Cortes, who saw with alarm the growing feelings of estrangement,
which must sap the very foundations on which he was to rest the
lever for future operations, employed every argument which suggested
itself to restore the confidence of his own men.
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