"Or, as our Diego yonder would say," returned the other, "to hold them open until we walk out again." "Bah! for the walking out again," was the impatient reply. "Unless, forsooth, it be to leave but bare walls behind us. As the Lord's people of old had command to spoil the Egyptians, so I believe are we now ordained to spoil the heathen savages who imbrue their land with human sacrifices." "Well," murmured Pedro de Alvarado thoughtfully, "I know not. But it is true, these hateful sacrifices have made even Diego himself grow somewhat cooler, methinks, in his desire to keep our fingers away from this Mexican pie." At this point in the short conversation the Spanish expedition was met by a splendid cortege of several hundred Aztec chiefs, sent forward by their monarch, who had at length so far overcome his unwillingness to receive the dreaded strangers as to send these messengers with words of welcome to them, and to announce his own approach. Having spent a somewhat tedious hour in ceremonious greetings, the route was continued over a drawbridge, accompanied by their brilliantly attired escort, each member of which evidently had studied the art of setting himself off to the best advantage, as well as any dainty Spanish cavalier at the Court of Madrid. At length there came in sight the glittering retinue of the Emperor, wending its stately course along the great, wide, central street towards the foreigners. Amidst a crowd of Indian nobles, preceded by three officers of state bearing golden wands, was borne the royal palanquin, blazing with burnished gold, and canopied with brilliant feather work, powdered with jewels and fringed with silver. Having advanced to within a few yards of the Spanish General, the palanquin was lowered, the intervening ground was spread with cotton carpetings; nobles, bare-footed, and with faces bent to the earth, lined the way, and the great monarch Montezuma, clothed with the girdle and ample national cloak of the finest embroidered cotton, stepped forth. "Behold them!" softly ejaculated Cabrera, as the Emperor stepped to the ground, and the Spaniard's eyes were dazzled by the passing flash of the sandals' golden soles, and the glisten of emeralds and pearls with which their fastenings were beautified. Montezuma, this monarch who had taught both friends and foes to tremble at his frown, was at this time about forty years of age, tall and slender. His hair, which was black and straight, and of a due length to become his rank, was crowned with a plume of feathers of the royal green, which waved above features marked by a considerable degree of thoughtful intelligence. He moved with dignity, and his whole bearing, tempered by an expression of benignity not to have been anticipated, from the reports of him that had hitherto reached the Spaniards' ears, proclaimed a great and worthy ruler among men.[11] [Footnote 11: 'Hist. Conquest of Mexico,' vol. ii.--Prescott.]