since he promises unimagined wealth to those who are true to him, and by a curious flash of prescience prophesies immortal renown to their enterprise. On February 10, 1519, he sailed to the conquest of Mexico, accompanied by some six hundred and fifty white men and a few Indians. Cortes was in his thirty-fourth year when he entered on this the greatest of his enterprises. He was pale faced and dark eyed, somewhat slender in build, but of an iron strength and constitution. In temper he was patient though liable to fits of passion, and in disposition frank, merry, and generous, but most determined. He dressed richly and was constant in his religious exercises. Such was the great captain, a man suited by circumstances and nature to the desperate undertaking which it was his destiny to bring to a successful issue. Having touched at the island of Cozumel on the coast of Yucatan, Cortes sailed up the Tabasco River and began his work of conquest by attacking a great army of Indians in the neighborhood of that town. For a while the natives held their own notwithstanding their dismay at the sound and effects of fire-arms; but the appearance of the horsemen, whom they took to be strange animals, caused them to flee in terror leaving many hundreds of their warriors dead upon the field. On the morrow they made their submission, bringing women and other gifts as a peace-offering. Among these women was one named Malinche, or by the Spaniards Marina, whom Cortes took as a mistress and who is described by Camargo as having been "beautiful as a goddess." It was this lady, born to be the evil genius of her country, who instructed her lord and master in the habits, traditions, and history of the Aztecs, and of the land of Anahuac which they inhabited together with other tribes. She was Cortes' interpreter and confidante, whose business it was to gain information from the Indians, which he could use, and whose wit and devotion more than once saved him from disaster. So invaluable were her services to Cortes that it is doubtful if without her aid he would have succeeded in conquering Mexico, and it was from her that he acquired the name of Malinche by which he was known among the Indian races. Her reward, when she had served his purpose and he was weary of her, was to be given by him in marriage to another man.