A moral epidemic nerved the arm of the invaders, another paralyzed the strength of the invaded. Superstition covered the Spaniard with armour stronger than his iron mail, and left the Mexican naked and defenceless; and, in addition, the disease of disaffection, creeping from the extremities to the centre of the empire, added its weight to the lethargy of religious fear. When Hernan Cortes set out on his march, the second time, against Tenochtitlan, believing that God had chosen him to be a scourge to the misbeliever, he knew well that thousands and tens of thousands of malecontents were burning to join his standard. Mexico was the Rome of the New World,--a compound of hostile elements, an union of tribes and states subdued and conjoined by the ambition of a single city, but not yet so closely cemented as to defy the shocks of a Gothic irruption. What might have been the condition of the empire of Montezuma, if the divine ray which conducted the Genoese pilot over the Atlantic, had been reserved for an adventurer of the present day, it is impossible to determine; but, it is quite clear, its condition was such at the time of the invasion, that, had not the indecision of its monarch, founded on such a conjuncture of coincidences as might have confounded a more enlightened prince, entirely repressed its powers of resistance, no armies, raised by the Spanish colonists, or even by their European master, could have penetrated beyond the shores; and the destiny of Cortes would have been written in letters as few and as obscure as those which have recorded the fate of Valdivia among the less refined, but better united Araucanians of Chili. The heart of the leader was bold, the spirits of his confederates full of resolution and hope; and notwithstanding the evil intelligence that their victims were wakening to a knowledge of their strength, and confirming their audacity in the blood they had already shed, the united followers of Narvaez and Hernan Cortes began their march over the mountains with alacrity and joy.