[Montezuma’s Daughter by H. Rider Haggard]@TWC D-Link bookMontezuma’s Daughter CHAPTER XXXV 4/20
And so they went, though what became of them I do not know. That night we spent in the courtyard of the teocalli, but before it was light I caused the women and children who remained with us, perhaps some six hundred in all, for very few of the former who were unmarried, or who being married were still young and comely, had chosen to desert our refuge, to ascend the pyramid, guessing that the Spaniards would attack us at dawn.
I stayed, however, with the three hundred fighting men that were left to me, a hundred or more having thrown themselves upon the mercy of the Spaniards, with the refugees, to await the Spanish onset under shelter of the walls of the courtyard.
At dawn it began, and by midday, do what we could to stay it, the wall was stormed, and leaving nearly a hundred dead and wounded behind me, I was driven to the winding way that led to the summit of the pyramid.
Here they assaulted us again, but the road was steep and narrow, and their numbers gave them no great advantage on it, so that the end of it was that we beat them back with loss, and there was no more fighting that day. The night which followed we spent upon the summit of the pyramid, and for my part I was so weary that after I had eaten I never slept more soundly.
Next morning the struggle began anew; and this time with better success to the Spaniards.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|