The worst point in the character of a dog, is that, in all the quarrels betwixt others of his species, he always takes part against the feebler. In this particular, he is sometimes aped by his master,--not, indeed, in an absolute conflict between man and man; for ninety in a hundred will, in such case, befriend the weaker party,--but in those combats which an individual wages with an evil destiny. Ill thoughts naturally follow upon ill luck; and it is the curse of misfortune to be followed by ungenerous suspicion and still more odious crimination. As the whole army were acquainted with the manner of Juan's flight, or rather captivity, they did not hesitate to believe him up in arms against them; and every repulse which they endured from the barbarians, they traced to the malignance and activity of the exile's treason. Fear and invention together clothed him with the vestments of a fallen angel; and if some savage, more gigantic and ferocious than the rest, distinguished himself in the front of battle, straightway a dozen voices invoked curses upon the head of the unhappy Lerma. There were few who did not forget his sorrows and wrongs, and speak of him only with execrations; and many had already begun to anticipate, as the chief triumph of victory, and the most delightful of all their hopes, the privilege of burning him alive on the temple-top, or even sacrificing him to their vengeance, after the equally horrific manner of the Mexicans. While Bernal Diaz was thus conversing with the outcast's only friend, there came from the distant gates of Xoloc, a suppressed hum, as of an army arising from its slumbers. This was soon followed by the sound of heavy bodies of men, approaching over the causeway; and it soon became evident, that the morn was to be ushered in with the usual horrors of contention. "Up, knaves!" cried the voice of the hunchback, "ye grumbling, growling, wallowing, swine, that call yourselves lions and tigers! up, and shake the clay from your cloaks, before it is trodden off by the hoofs of the horsemen!" As he spoke, a cavalier galloped up to the party, and drawing in his steed, while the men rose to their feet, he exclaimed, "_Halon_, Najara, man! where art thou? Dost thou talk thus in thy sleep?" "Ay, may it please your excellency," said the hunchback, recognizing the voice of Cortes; "for it is well, on such a post, that a soldier should have the faculty of issuing commands asleep, as well as waking." "Dost thou hear, Diaz?" muttered Gaspar in his companion's ear. "Wouldst thou think now to what the devil has tempted me, ever since I have seen clearly that of which I have spoken? I tell thee, man, I have sometimes thought it were but a turn of good friendship, to kill the man who has brought these things upon Juan Lerma!"