He reminded them of
the good services they had uniformly received from the great body of
the nation. They had a sufficient pledge of the future constancy of
the Tlascalans in their long cherished hatred of the Aztecs, which the
recent disasters they had suffered from the same quarter could serve
only to sharpen. And he urged with much force, that, if any evil
designs had been meditated by them against the Spaniards, the
Tlascalans would doubtless have taken advantage of their late disabled
condition, and not waited till they had recovered their strength and
means of resistance.
While Cortes was thus endeavouring, with somewhat doubtful
success, to stifle his own apprehensions, as well as those in the
bosoms of his followers, an event occurred which happily brought the
affair to an issue, and permanently settled the relations in which the
two parties were to stand to each other. This will make it necessary
to notice some events which had occurred in Mexico since the expulsion
of the Spaniards.
On Montezuma's death, his brother Cuitlahua, lord of
Iztapalapan, conformably to the usage regulating the descent of the
Aztec crown, was chosen to succeed him. He was an active prince, of
large experience in military affairs, and, by the strength of his
character, was well fitted to sustain the tottering fortunes of the
monarchy. He appears, morever, to have been a man of liberal, and what
may be called enlightened taste, to judge from the beautiful gardens
which he had filled with rare exotics, and which so much attracted the
admiration of the Spaniards in his city of Iztapalapan.
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