glad to take shelter on the broad summit of the teocalli. Cortes and his companions were close behind them, and the two parties soon found themselves face to face upon this strange battle-field, engaged in mortal combat in the presence of the whole city, while even the troops in the courtyard ceased hostilities, as if by mutual consent, and watched with breathless interest the issue of the struggle. The Spaniards and Mexicans closed with the desperate fury of men who have no hope but in victory. Quarter was neither asked nor given, and to fly was impossible. The edge of the platform was unprotected by parapet or battlement, and many of the combatants, as they struggled together, were seen to roll over the edge of the precipice, locked in a death-grip. Cortes himself but narrowly escaped this frightful fate. Two powerful warriors had seized upon him, and were dragging him violently towards the side of the pyramid, when, by sheer strength, he tore himself from their grasp and hurled one of them over the brink with his own arm. [Illustration] The battle raged unceasingly for three hours. The number of the Mexicans was double that of the Spaniards, but the armour of the latter and their skill as swordsmen outweighed the odds against them. Resistance grew fainter and fainter on the side of the Aztecs. The priests, who had run to and fro among them with streaming hair and wild gestures, encouraging and urging them on, were all slain or captured. One by one the warriors fell dead upon the blood-drenched pavement, or were hurled from the dizzy height, until at last the wild struggle ceased, and the Spaniards stood alone upon the field of battle. Their victory had cost them dear, for forty-five of their comrades lay dead, and nearly all the remainder were more or less seriously wounded; but there was no time for regrets. The victorious cavaliers rushed to the sanctuaries to find that the cross and the image of the Virgin had disappeared from the one they had appropriated, and that in the other, before the grim figure of Huitzilopochtli, lay the usual offering of human hearts, possibly those of their own countrymen! With shouts of triumph the Spaniards tore the hideous idol from its niche, and in the sight of the horror-stricken Aztecs hurled it down the steps of the teocalli, and, after having set fire to the sanctuaries, descended joyfully into the courtyard.