He found the Spanish garrison hemmed in, and reduced to extremities, by a people who, stimulated by superstition and maddened by a fresh and atrocious outrage, seemed suddenly to have exchanged timidity for desperation. The return of Cortez with his formidable reinforcement did not abate their ferocity. Even the person of Montezuma, who was exposed on the Spanish rampart, ceased to command respect, and he received three wounds from stones and arrows, from the effects of which, aggravated by rage and a deep sense of his degradation, he expired. The Mexicans now sought to blockade their enemies and reduce them by hunger; and, as Cortez had not the command of the lake, he found it necessary immediately to evacuate the city. But he was taken at disadvantage in traversing by night (July 1, 1520) one of the long causeways which connect the city with the shores of the lake in which it stands; and on mustering those who reached the mainland, he found his small battalion of Europeans reduced by one-half, with the loss of all the horses, baggage, artillery, and most of the treasure which had been amassed by individual soldiers. The anniversary of this calamity was long, and may be still, distinguished in New Spain by the appellation of Noche Triste, the sad night. By a circuitous route, and not without cutting their way through an immense army assembled to intercept them, the Spaniards returned to the friendly Indians of Tlascala, among whom Cortez meant to recruit his exhausted companions, and to wait until fresh supplies of men and stores could be obtained from the West India islands. Some vessels which put into the harbour of Vera Cruz afforded an unexpected reinforcement of 180 men; and on the 28th of December Cortez began to retrace his march towards Mexico. At Tezeuco, the second city of the empire, situated on the banks of the lake, about twenty miles from the capital, he established his head-quarters for four months, during which the timbers of twelve small vessels, cut out in the mountains of Tlascala, were put together. This force ensured the command of the lake, for the Mexicans had nothing larger than canoes; and just before their completion, a reinforcement of 200 men, with arms and stores, arrived from Hispaniola. At the beginning of May, 1521, with about 800 Europeans, Cortez commenced the siege of Mexico itself.