Flight having been resolved upon, and the city having been devoted to destruction, as the most effectual annoyance to the Spaniards, no preparations were made to resist such a movement as this. The unarmed fugitives returned to their homes, in great numbers, and the city, with all its abandoned palaces and temples, offered ample accommodations to the invaders. The person of the chief was not secured, he having effected his escape, with the principal part of his nobles, and all his army, to the capital. Cortez, assuming to act in the name of the king of Castile, for whom he claimed the sovereignty of all these lands, immediately deposed the reigning chief, absolving the people from all further allegiance to him, and installed his brother, who was favorable to the cause of the Spaniards, in his place. Thus secured in such commanding quarters, the haughty Castilian surveyed the field around him, and prepared himself, with great diligence and deliberation, to regain possession of it. The most liberal and conciliating overtures were made to the Emperor, if he would peaceably acknowledge the sovereignty of Castile, and admit him, as the representative of that crown, to the capital. These overtures were promptly and scornfully rejected, and every avenue to amicable negotiation effectually closed. The people of the country were sternly forbidden, on pain of death, from holding any intercourse with the strangers, or from administering, in any manner, to their wants. Large rewards were offered for captives, and every inducement held out to encourage the natives in a resistance, that should admit of no quarter, and terminate only in the utter extermination of one of the parties. Guatimozin was a man every way adapted to a crisis like this. Of a firm indomitable spirit, patient of suffering and of toil, and skilful in all the strategy of war and defence, and possessed of the entire confidence and affection of his own people, he applied himself to the work of self-preservation, with an energy and fertility of resource, which scarcely ever, in a righteous cause, fails to ensure success. That he was suffered to fail, is one of those inscrutable providences which stand frequently out on the page of history, to confound the short-sighted sagacity of man, and restrain his too inquisitive desire to fathom the counsels and purposes of heaven.