When I had done, he spoke and said: 'Why do they come here to Anahuac ?' 'I fear, O king, that they come to take the land, or at the least to rob it of all its treasure, and to destroy its faiths.' 'What then is your counsel, Teule?
How can I defend myself against these mighty men, who are clothed in metal, and ride upon fierce wild beasts, who have instruments that make a noise like thunder, at the sound of which their adversaries fall dead by hundreds, and who bear weapons of shining silver in their hands?
Alas! there is no defence possible, for they are the children of Quetzal come back to take the land.

From my childhood I have known that this evil overshadowed me, and now it is at my door.' 'If I, who am only a god, may venture to speak to the lord of the earth,' I answered, 'I say that the reply is easy.

Meet force by force.
The Teules are few and you can muster a thousand soldiers for every one of theirs.

Fall on them at once, do not hesitate till their prowess finds them friends, but crush them.' 'Such is the counsel of one whose mother was a Teule;' the emperor answered, with sarcasm and bitter meaning.

'Tell me now, counsellor, how am I to know that in fighting against them I shall not be fighting against the gods; how even am I to learn the true wishes and purposes of men or gods who cannot speak my tongue and whose tongue I cannot speak ?' 'It is easy, O Montezuma,' I answered.