Upon this occasion also several painters attached to the Mexican retinue made drawings upon white cotton of the most remarkable European objects they observed. Learning that these drawings were to be sent to the Emperor, Cortes decided to offer the artists still more interesting subjects that would be likely to make a deep impression upon Montezuma. He drew up his entire force in battle array and displayed before the astonished Mexicans a realistic picture of a battle conducted in the European manner. The spectators were so overcome with astonishment and awe that some of them fled, others in a dazed condition threw themselves upon the earth, while the rest fancied that what they saw and heard was a game for their diversion. The artists now had an opportunity to use their pencils in depicting the fearful and destructive effect of European warfare. They worked with trembling hands, and when their pictures were finished, they were sent with the other gifts by swift runners to the Emperor. In that country they had swift runners on all the principal roads leading from the most distant provinces to the capital, ready at any moment to convey intelligence of all that was transpiring at any place. In a few days the Emperor’s reply was received. As was expected, the interview was declined, but to mitigate the disagreeableness of the refusal, Montezuma accompanied it with gifts which were truly regal. Pilpatoe and Teutile had the unpleasant duty of presenting both. They wisely produced the gifts first, to prepare Cortes, if possible, for a favorable reception of the reply. The gifts were brought in by a hundred Indians and spread out on mats at Cortes’ feet. The Spaniards greedily gazed at these proofs of the richness of the empire. There were samples of cotton which resembled silk in its gloss and fineness, pictures of animals, trees, and other natural products skilfully wrought out in vari-colored feathers, and gorgeous necklaces, bracelets, rings, and other ornaments of gold. But as the sun eclipses all the other luminaries in the heavens, so were these objects eclipsed by two large circular disks, one of which was of solid gold, the other, of silver. The one represented the sun, the other the moon. As if for the purpose of still further exciting the cupidity of the Spaniards, several caskets filled with precious stones, pearls, and grains of gold from the streams and mines were presented.