A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 04 - Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time by Robert Kerr
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to be severely punished, as a warning to other places. It was accordingly
resolved to inflict condign punishment on the Cholulans within the courts where we were quartered, which were surrounded by high walls, but in the meantime, to continue our preparations for resuming the march, in order to conceal our intentions. We then informed the Mexican ambassadors, that we had discovered the treacherous intentions of the Cholulans, who pretended that they acted by orders of Montezuma, which we were convinced was a false aspersion. They solemnly declared their ignorance of these transactions; but Cortes ordered them to have no farther intercourse with the inhabitants of the city, and sent them to his own quarters under a strong guard for the night, during the whole of which we lay upon our arms, ready to act at a moments warning. During this anxious night, the wife of one of the caciques, who had taken a great liking to Donna Marina, came secretly to visit that lady, informing her of the plot, invited her to take refuge in her house from the danger which was about to overwhelm us, and proposed to give her for a husband the brother of a boy who was along with her. Donna Marina, with her usual presence of mind, agreed to every thing proposed with a profusion of thanks, and said she only wanted some one to take charge of her effects before leaving the Spanish quarters. In course of this conversation, Marina acquired particular information of every part of this mysterious affair, which the old woman told her had been communicated to her three days before by her husband, who was chief of one of the divisions of the city, and was now with his warriors, giving directions for their co-operation with the Mexican troops, and who had lately received a gold drum from Mexico, as an ensign of command. Donna Marina desired the old woman and her son to remain in her apartment till she went in search of her valuables; but went immediately to Cortes, to whom she communicated all the information she had received, adding that her |
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