The emperor leaned pensively on his hand, seemingly oppressed with some superstitious melancholy forebodings. Perhaps the shadow of that mysterious prophecy, which betokened the extinction of the Aztec dynasty, and the consequent ruin of his house, was passing athwart the troubled sky of his mind, veiling the always doubtful future in mists of tenfold dimness. Whatever it was that disturbed his royal serenity, his reverie was soon broken by the sound of an approaching footstep. For a moment, nothing was heard but the measured tread of the trembling messenger, pacing with unwilling step the long corridor, that led to the royal presence. With his head bowed upon his breast, his eyes fixed upon the pavement, his person veiled in the coarse _nequen_,[A] and his feet bare, he stood before the monarch, dumb as a statue. "What response bring you," eagerly enquired the emperor, "from the burning oracles of heaven? How reads the destiny of my new-born infant?" "The response be to the enemies of the great Montezuma," replied the messenger, without lifting his eyes from the floor, "and the destiny it foreshadows to the children of them that hate him." "Speak," exclaimed the monarch, "What message do you bring from the priest of the stars?" "Alas! my royal master, my message is full of wo--my heart faints, and my tongue refuses its office to give it utterance. The old prophet bade me say, that the celestial influences are all unpropitious; that the destiny of the infant princess is a life of sorrow, with a gleam of more than earthly brightness in its evening horizon. And then, prostrating himself upon the great altar, he groaned out one long, deep, heart-rending wail for the imperial House of Tenochtitlan, and the golden realm of Anahuac." A deeper shade came over the brow of Montezuma, and heaving a sigh from the very depths of a soul that had long been agitated by melancholy forebodings of coming evil, he raised his eyes to heaven, and said, "the will of the gods be done." Then, waving his hand to his attendants, they bowed their heads, and retired in silence from the apartment. "It has come at last," inwardly groaned the monarch, as soon as he found himself alone--"it has come at last--that fearful prophecy, that has so long hung, like the shadow of a great cloud, over my devoted house, is now to be fulfilled. The fates have willed it, and there is no escape from their dread decrees. I must make ready for the sacrifice." Nerved by the stern influence of this dark fatalism, Montezuma brushed a tear from his eye, and putting a royal restraint upon the turbulent sorrows and fears of his paternal heart, hastened to the apartments of the queen, to break to her, with all the gentleness and caution which her delicate and precarious circumstances required, the mournful issue of their inquiries at the court of heaven, into the future destiny and prospects of their new-born babe.