Part 3 — ANAHUAC.[D]

The Star looked down at the Mountain; And the Mountain looked down at the Sea; And there was no malice in either one's breast, Each was called by the Deity To fill its place in the region of space Of the fathomless Yet-to-be. The Star didn't fall on the Mountain, Nor the Mountain smite the sea; But each gave cheer in the other's ear, And they dwelt in harmony. Why didn't the Mountain say to the Star: "Begone, with your impudent stare!" Or the Sea to the Mountain: "How dare you intrude, You presumptuous imp of the air?" Why didn't they? they were not human; They couldn't talk, as we talk; They were not born of a woman; They never had learned to walk. They had learned the language of patience; They had learned to bear, and be dumb; They had learned to hold, through heat and cold, Their load, till the Master should come. O infinite language of silence! O eloquent, voiceless speech! Help us to bear the ills that are, And fetter us each to each, Till all our envy goes out with the Sea, And our malice goes out with the star, And we silently bear what is to be— Like the Mountain—gazing afar To the infinite depths of an endless world, Where eternity spreads its zone, Where planets, countless as grains of sand, Gaze out on the "great white throne." The pale-faced prophet Quetzalcoatl[G] Had gone to the rising sun; In his wizard boat he was seen to float, To where the day was begun, Without a sail on the wings of the gale, For the land of Tlappalan[H] He waved back his followers from the sea, Saying he would certainly come again, In the golden future, yet to be, And the gods should dwell on the earth as men. They had made him a god, because he was good— Not always the case in the mystic love— They had carved his image in stone and wood, And his shrines were built on the pyramid's floor. They called him the god of the earth and air, And his legends were many, and often told; And the priests, with sacrifice and prayer, Reaped a heavy harvest of fruit and gold. And oft were their faces turned to the East, To claim his promise, who was to come; And they watched the surge of the gulf's green yeast, And yet the years had continued dumb.

Nezahualcoyotl sleeps with his fathers,[I] And his son now reigns in his stead; His goodness succeeds to the living, But his wisdom goes out with the dead, For both in the Lord of Tezcuco Had been richly and happily wed. Two nations, strike hands o'er the waters, Tezcuco and Aztlan are one, By the league that their fathers had plighted, Since they entered this land of the sun. So, the King of their neighbor, Tezcuco, Has come to the Aztec Court, To assist them in crowning the Monarch, A Prince of much goodly report. He is found on the steps of the temple; He has served, both as warrior and Priest; He has brought many victims to slaughter— The realm has been greatly increased By the sturdy sway of his conquering arm. And now, he is called to reign, The last of his race, to fill the place, Whose honor shall prove but a life-long pain. Montezuma[J] was young, but his sword was old, And the war-god was glutted with victims and gold. A pledge of his prowess: a promise to fate, That the nation would prosper, the King prove great. Some men are great in sorrow—there be tears That crystalize to diamonds at the last. They need the weight of carbonizing years; Yet, how they glitter after these have past! Life needs the tempering at such a forge, Or it would brittle at the lightest touch; But when the burden is but one vast gorge, The weary soul must cry, "It is too much."

Nezahualpilli[K] places the crown on his head, And the victims bleed, and the altars burn; The words of admonishment all are said, And the buoyant crowd to their homes return. "The King is dead!" "Long live the King!" "Hail!" and "farewell!" how closely tread The steps of the living upon the dead! How are both touched with a single spring! Nezahualpilli soon passes away, And the rival King, he so lately crowned, Divides his Kingdom, and makes a prey, A figment, with empire's empty sound. And Montezuma outleaps the King; But is lord of an empire reaching the sea; And many nations their tribute bring, And some of the weak to the southward flee, To pass the reach of his powerful arm, And lift new prodigies to the sky, To meet Earth's sunshine, shadow, and storm, To finish the race, to falter and die.

He gathers his treasures from myriad mines. The cotton and aloe are wove into cloth. The banana and maize and wild forest vines, While they load to repletion, are proof against sloth. His palace is burnished with every hue Of the rainbow tints of his fabulous land, Where Nature entravails on every hand To bring new beauties of life to view. There are drapes of feather-cloth deftly made, There were plumes and plushes of richest craft, There were broidered robes where the colors played, Like the hands that made them, dainty and daft. His harem equaled his Ottoman peer, There was beauty of every hue and mold— The shy and the gay, the demure and bold— That his provinces furnished from far and near. As fine a collection of beauty and grace, Of the flashing eye and the beaming face, As is seen on the gates of the Euxine sea At the present day, where the "powers that be," With the Union Jack floating above the rest, Secures to that ill-omened bird its nest. Their Teocallas[L] rose on every hand, And half a hundred gods their worship claim; Their priestcraft is a strong and haughty band; Their Beckets and their Woolseys are the same As those that cling upon the neck of time Through all the feudal ages; we may choose The leeches of the Christian Church as best— They sucked the blood the State could not refuse, And so did these bedizzened, of the West. These led their victims to the altars black, Those wasted theirs by torturing and pain, The fatal "itztli," gave the parting shock To Aztec's victims; but a blacker stain Rests on thy skirts, thou bloody-mantled Spain! Thou the avenger of a human wrong? As well might Lucifer enrobe as saint, An earthquake key the carol of a song, Or old Caligula[M] bring a complaint! "They slew their thousands!" yes; and what did'st thou? Thy thousands in the shadow of the cross; They took not on their perjured lips thy vow; Thy gold they did not mingle with their dross. Through all the dark of ages did they grope; Through all the light of empire did'st thou graze; They pinioned superstition to their hope; The monody of hell was mingled with thy praise. Go back! and scour the oxyd from the gem Thy lips have turned to ebony, and paint Humiliation on thy doorsteps. Stem! Stem the black pool of Styx! and find a saint Whose blood shall gain forgiveness for thy past; But count no beads upon the path of time— Earth's execration is too justly cast— Thy very name, a synonym of crime!

They had their courts where justice was dispensed With what would shame the Janus-faced machine We call our jurisprudence. They commenced What Christian polity was left to glean, To her advantage in the after time. We write "anathema" above the gates Of what we choose to call "barbaric clime;" And yet, the blinded goddess often waits To gather wisdom at her bare, black feet Which, bruised and blistered, tread the narrow way To where the graces uninspired meet And superstition's night breaks into day. They held the bond of family and home As firmly as more favored nations hold; Their homes were castles, where no man could come Without the potent ses-a-me of gold. The wealthy pluralized the name of wife (As many Bible patriarchs once did), Their virtue was the average of life— There were excrescences not easy hid. Yet woman was more near her half of earth Than she had reached in most of Christendom. She held her value and could claim her worth; Not bartered with the readiness of some Self-styled enlightened. Much is to be learned In corners of the earth that we call "dark," Where jewels are for centuries inurned That torches of enlightenment may tarnish with a spark. We lay rude hands on temples not our own, Nor little heed the human souls enshrined; The sacred crevice of each hard-marked stone But coldly cover with the virdict, "blind." God help us, that we point a hand more pure, And raise the casement with a grander trust; The hands that lift it must indeed be clean, Or comes the humbling challenge, "Is it just?" One "great white throne" shall judge us, one and all; One great white Hand shall hold the scales of fate, Or clothed in light, or covered with a pall, We tread the way through one eternal gate. God grant the temples we so rudely spoil, May not accuse us when we stand alone! But hearts are human things, and they do coil The infinite in blindness. Not a groan Escapes the index of the Father Son. A child in blindness still is but a child, And held with greater yearning to be won. Our cold, hard hands cannot be reconciled To one warm Heart that throbs for all mankind, And covers, with a common love, the race; And leads, with greater tenderness, the blind, That they more closely feel His clasp, who cannot see His face. The arts of husbandry were well advanced: They sowed and reaped unstinted from the soil; The sun, with ripening fervor, on them glanced, And gave them back, a hundred fold, their toil. They had not lost their ancient faith in him, Though other gods their scattered homage claim His breast was their Elysian; never dim The ancient hope that hung upon his name. Their maize and maguey shone upon the plain, Their chocolate gave nourishment and zest, The corn gave recompense for sugar-cane, Their banquets were provided with the best; Fish from the ocean, fruits from every clime, So diverse, yet within such easy reach; The tropics and the temperates enchime With all their plumaged babblings of speech; And they interpreted the varied whims That Nature holds embryoed in her breast. They climbed the boughs and shook her heaviest limbs, Too burdened for the garner to be missed. This ancient mother never yet has failed Her children in their earnest search for food; She may be panoplied and heavy mailed, Yet does her larder furnish all when fully understood. Take all in all, and measure by the test— The stern, hard test of history—and we find That Aztlan, very far from being best, Still was a prodigy. That she was blind In her religious ethics, none deny; That she had faults, no champion gainsays; She lifted bloody hands against the sky; She filled the avenging measure of her days. But God is God, and man is always man; And earthly judgment is at best a snare. And never, since the human race began, Has turned to Heaven more piteous despair Than her sad eyes, burnt out with agony; Moaning above her nation, and her name, The bitter monody of "Not to be," The deep humiliation, and the shame That sent her crouching at the foot of Spain; (The fairest daughter of the wilderness) Without a hand to solace in her pain, Or ray of hope to lighten her distress. Could she been gently led, and tenderly, To higher life and holier resolve, Had charity bent forth her noble sway, The Christian graces that with Earth revolve Without the wasting friction, paid their suit To win her back to wakefulness from sin— How would she compensate the victor's hand, And kiss the rod that smote with its regard! But to be "drawn and quartered" like the brute, And made the sport of passion; to begin A life of vassalage, with such a slave Yclept as master, claiming from above The license that Jehovah never gave Except the iron hand was woven o'er with love— It is too much! God's justice is not lame. Hypocrisy may steal and wear the cloak, And don the ermine, with its fair, false claim; With crucifix and litany may croak; But Time o'ertakes it and it falls to earth Like Judas on its immolating sword, And it must learn to curse its hour of birth. It is the pledge of destiny—the stern, unwritten word.

The Courier[N], new laden from the coast, Has hastened to the council of the King With most portentious tidings: picture-prints That tell of boats that float upon the wing; And pale-faced warriors, clad in shining scales. The monarch hears with trembling; he has long Looked for the coming of great Quetzalcoatl, And, though he felt his nation to be strong, Yet had he feared his reign would be the last. The oracles had read him overcast, With some impending destiny—the ruse Which priests have always found to compass their abuse.

The chiefs of church and state are all convened To canvas, and compare their theories, And much of wisdom surely can be gleaned From these firm-visaged counsellors of his; And Montezuma[O] is the first to speak— His dark, sad eyes are beautifully bright; He was not philosophic like the Greek, And yet his words made glitter of the night: "We swing upon the hinges of our fate, Most reverend priests and worthy counsellors, And it is well we counsel and conform Our future to the fashion of events. The rising sun has sent inquiring rays For many years, to greet our coming god, And lo! he now turns back from Tlapalan; "And what must we, but welcome his advance? Ye long have held me kindred of the gods; Yet I deny me what your partial eyes Have kenned upon my unassuming face. I am as other men, though more advanced; And if great Quetzalcoatl takes back my crown, I bow in humble vassalage to him. For what am I, to question his advance? A moth, upon the torches' fervent ray; An anthill, at the foot of 'Catapetl.

And I have sometimes thought most worthy priests, That we have drawn the lightning from the cloud By a mistaken worship of the gods. No one will question my religious zeal, For I brought many victims to the block; But human blood doth have a subtile voice That reaches ears our eyes have never seen; And though the itztli opens to the heart, Some heart may beat far out in open space That whispers its avengement on the air. Our gods have brought us victory, 'tis true; And yet, great Nezahualcoyotl did spurn The shedding of all human blood, to gods; And when great Quetzalcoatl was on the earth, Our gods were satisfied with other blood. The angels of the mighty past cry out Against the damning practice. Why not now, "For once and all, wash off our bloody hands? These human cries pierce farther than we know; These human souls may ride into the sun; We cannot claim his broad, uncumbered breast, To the exclusion of the rest of earth. The god of earth and air may come to judge At this dark moment for this very sin; Then let us look him boldly in the face, And if we have offended, make amends; If our mistaken zeal has overdone, Surely his heart will cover up our faults, And we may thus propitiate his wrath." Then rose the ancient High Priest, Tlalocan,[P] And in his sternest manner, thus he spake: "Great Montezuma! king, of earthly kings! The heart of Tlalocan is bruised and broke To hear the words his monarch has vouchsafed Such sacrilege belongeth not to kings; Great Huitzilopotchli must, indeed, be strayed, Or, he will shake his thunders on the earth, And, strike the Aztecs from the face of him. War is the wastage of all human flesh, And whether man be stricken on the field, Or, with the sacred itztli, offered up, The measure must be met with human blood.

"Thy empire has been purchased at this price, And cannot otherwise perpetuate. The earth and heaven, both have set their mark Upon the bosom of the placid lake; And by the coming of those fiery stars, That flashed their baleful faces in the sky, All omenous that anger brooded o'er, The gods have read the purpose of your soul; And thus forwarn you that you must retract. They cry for victims and must be appeased; They gave you conquest without stay or stint, When you did furnish, full to their desire; But there are few within the shambles now, And they must be replenished, or the doom, That has forshadowed on the Eastern sky, Will flash and fall upon your naked head. Great Quetzalcoatl will come and strike you down, And grind you into ashes in his wrath." Then spoke the sturdy Counselor Teuhtlile[Q]: "Tlalocan holds the nearest place to heaven, And in his zeal, doth sound the ready key That rhythms with your empire. We must suit Our action with his words, or we are lost. These pale-faced warriors must be met with alms; The gods must be appeased with fresh supplies.

"Let me, myself, go down upon the coast, And with our ready painters bring you back A full account of what we look upon. And if, perchance, these be the van of him Whose coming we have watched these many years, Then will we counsel further the emprise, And in the watch and wake of all events, Be not o'ertaken, but forestall the time." "Your counsel has the sanction it desires; I would not measure lances with the gods," The monarch answered: "In the dust I bend, And plead the weakness of a human heart. The South shall furnish victims for the block; And Teuhtlile shall repair him to the coast; The dread monition of the flaming stars May be evaded with our ready zest. Our gold and precious stones, with lavish hand, Shall be poured out to coy them from our track; For what are all the earth's indulgences, Against the smiling favor of the gods?" "Repair thou to the coast, my good Teuhtlile, With plenteous retinue, and goodly stores; With cotton fabrics of the latest cast; With shields and cuirasses inlaid with gold; The burnished mirror of the fervent sun; The silver shining circlet of the moon; "With robes of feather-cloth made rich with pearls; And other trophies that your tact shall find. Receive them kindly, as becomes their state; And let thy wisdom gather in the full, Their purpose and intent upon our land; It may fall out they are as other men, Unsanctioned at the chambers of the gods, Yet must our moderation pave the way, Till we have fully compassed their intent." So said, so done; the embassy went forth To meet the wily Spaniard on the coast; They little dreamed of what a forest fox They had to meet; they little knew the boast That hung upon the challenge of their fate. Their superstitions made them ready prey; They opened wide their hospitable gate, And gave the jewel of their life away. It mattered little how they forced it back, And tried to parley with their destiny; The hungry lion was upon their track, And they were lost forever and for aye. Done in the name of Christ? Oh, spare the word! Let not the Nazarene be buffeted; Gold was the souvenir; the pitying Lord Was, with this nation, just as deeply bled. Their superstitions were the ready springs The Spaniards played upon to break their hearts; Deceit, as damnable as serpents' stings, Barbed with its cruel spines their poisoned darts. The embassy returned, and others went; Still could they not force back this coming cloud— The steady purpose and the black intent, That wove with cunning fingers at their shroud. Had Spain come as the Pilgrims at Cape Cod, Or Penn upon the Delaware, to lead The Aztec back to fatherhood and God, And let their sturdy manhood for them plead, How ready could their faces been upturned, And hearts been melted into Christian mold!— The brand of hell was on their bare backs burned, And they were ground to ashes for their gold! Did Christ e'er suffer such supreme disgrace? Or on the cross; or in Gethsemane? Did heavier drops of blood stand on his face Than there were forced by this foul treachery? Oh! how the patient Nazarene must bend And break beneath fresh crosses every day— Fresh Judases betraying him as friend, And scorpions to sting him in the way! Thank God! the time is coming when, as Judge, The Man of Sorrows, ermined and supreme, No longer as a packhorse or a drudge, Shall hold the scales and watch the balance beam! How heavy did he make the widow's mite; How do the tears of men bend down the scale; How ponderous is a pennyweight of right; How do the little things of life prevail! The Spanish Conquest, sometime, will be tried Against the heart Malinche[R] threw away, And Aztec's tears be placed against your pride. O Hispagniola! you will rue the day— A feather and a mountain to be weighed— How shall the beam fly up at your disgrace, How shall your curse, a hundred fold, be paid, And what a glory light up Aztlan's face! You came, like tender shepherds to the fold, Yet, like a wolf, you tore the frighted flock; You kissed but to decoy them from their gold; Your seeming calm was but the earthquake's shock. Your empty babble of the cross and Christ, Was but the mask to cover your deceit; Your hearts were canker, but your words enticed, And never did a fouler scheme make conquest more complete. Not Aztlan, with her bare and bleeding breast, Alone, hath felt thy treachery too late; Columbus, in his chains and sorely pressed, Bends to thy penalty for being great. A thousand white-robed saints with bony palms Shake their accusing fingers in thy face; Their bodies burned, their souls changed into psalms. To chant in mournful cadence thy disgrace.

November comes as Autumn's requiem, To sigh and sough the harvest, and the field, The winged ecstatics mourn, and then are dumb, And life and growth in full submission yield. Mexitli is not altogether clad In nature's winding sheet of yellow leaves; And yet her year is getting old and sad, And youth and fruitage at his bedside grieves. As on the lingering footsteps of the year— A stranger and the Winter, hand in hand, Both on the threshold as two ghosts appear. One strikes the orbit with its wasting sand, The other coils around the nation's throat; The nation and the year together die; Both on the waste of time are set afloat, And sound alike death's mighty mystery. In all the glitter at his vast command, Went Montezuma to receive his guests; If gold be great, then was it truly grand. The royal plume upon his forehead rests; His feet pressed soles of heavy beaten gold; His cloak and anklets sprinkled o'er with pearls, And only noble hands are left to hold The blazing palanquin. Like titled Earls, They guard the skirts of royalty from stain Against the common people; all the same As in our ripened age. 'Tis hard to gain Much on the sodden march of royalty, Where accident supplants all other claim. The monarch in the easy prime of life, But lightly bronzed. The glowing, mellow hue That lit his cheek, seemed borrowed from the sun, And shadowing a heart that beat as true To God and country as he knew their names,— As any monarch that e'er wore a crown. His open-hearted welcome, like himself, Was, as the hardy yeoman, bare and brown. He felt that he was meeting destiny, Yet, to its solving, he would bend the knee With dignity and grace; not turn away, But face it with a ready, cheerful glance, And meeting night, surcharge it with the day; And grasping, break, if possible, the lance That he felt sure was leveled at his breast. He did not know the Inquisition stood, With rack and torture at his very gate; That it had traveled half the world for blood To whet its throat for St. Bartholomew And came with ravening appetite for him. Those wary messengers he little knew, Or those brown eyes would suddenly grown dim, And the warm heart would furnaced up its heat; And he would grappled at its very throat; And man to man, and blood to blood, would meet, And not a plume above one corselet float To bear the story back of it to Spain. They were not schooled in all the arts of war, Nor were they wise in all the world's deceit; Yet would they fought beneath their fated star, And challenged every stubborn step, though it had proven vain. But in this fleecy covering, the wolf So hid its teeth that it was at the door Before they dreamed of treachery. The gulf Lay many leagues behind their foes; its shore And all the distance had been gained by stealth. Tlascala had been humbled on the march, And promised spoils from Montezuma's wealth; But they had reached the keystone of the arch, At superstition's beck. The Aztec's gods Had chained their valor, or their greater odds Would crushed the viper, as it should have been, And left it to a purer age, to seek a common kin. The Monarch gave them hostelry and cheer, Food of the rarest and the sparkling pulque, And quarters for their troopers, all quite near To his own palace gates. The very bulk Of his well-laden markets was thrown down To their repletion, for their loaded board. They fared as princes favored of the crown, Of all the best the Kingdom could afford. The fair Malinche was interpreter, And Montezuma spoke to them through her. He told them of the mighty Quetzalcoatl, And how he recognized them as his kin; He thought he had their history, the whole Vast riddle of their ancient origin. "I rule a mighty nation," quoth the King. "All Anahuac is subject to my sway; And yet, I recognize that you have come From the strong palace of a mightier lord, To whom I bend as subject; and with you We now will sway the scepter of his will. We long have watched his coming from the East, And now that he has sent his messengers, Our hearts are ready for his wise commands. We would have urged your coming on before, But that we heard of tales of cruelty, Which, haply we may now believe as false, We welcome you with all our open hearts, "And hope you may enjoy our humble fare. We are not wise, as you are, for our lives Have not caught wisdom from the fountain head, And hung upon the lips of Quetzalcoatl; Yet are we cousins in the faded past, And welcome you as brothers and as friends." How caught the Spanish Chieftain at the words! How did he gloat upon this artifice! How useless hung their heavy-hilted swords That they should win a nation at this price! With what a care he turned the dusty past, To cover up the semblance of disguise; And fix their superstition still more fast, That he might clutch and carry home the prize. "There is grandeur in the tented field; The bivouac and the smoldering camp-fires." The human soul unconsciously must yield To its supremest charm, where man aspires To meet his fellow-man at one great bar; And "valor speaks to valor" of its claim, In all the panoply of stubborn war, And drops the gauntlet in a nation's name. It may be terrible, but it is grand To see the banners flaunting in the breeze; To hear the bugle blare and stern command; And see opposing forces strive to seize From Nature's stern arbitrament of force The laurel that shall deck the victor's brow; And turn the stream of nations from its course. The cutting of new sod by such a plow May tear up all the tender ties of life; And hearts be turned to ashes in its path; These are the ponderous incidents of strife, And made legitimate when wrath meets wrath; But when the assassin creeps into our hearts, And draws around him all their sanctities, And he becomes a parcel of our parts, And all we have or claim are made as his, What human brush can paint the upraised hand That smites our confidence at such an hour? What simile can human tongue command? It is, indeed, beyond our mortal power. We talk of devil, but the word is tame; It cannot reach the climax we have sought; It only frets us into hotter flame, And beggars all the litany of thought. I do not claim that Cortez was not brave; Nor would I tear one laurel from his brow. I only claim he stole the devil's glaive; He held it then, and let him hold it now. The issues of their lives are both with God, The brown-eyed Monarch and the dark-eyed Knight. The flowers of charity should strew the sod Above them both; yet, Cosmos! was it right? O world of human hearts and human lives! Was Montezuma worthy of this fate? O world of husbands! world of tender wives! Behold your Aztlan! bleeding, desolate, And say, if all their multiple of sins, Though they be blacker than the blackest night, Were worthy of the end that now begins To grind them down to powder? Was it right For Spain to steal the scepter from the hand That held it out in welcome to their doors, And poured their treasures out as free as sand, And oped with lavish all their loaded stores; To steal the key of superstition's gate, And break the lock upon their hard-earned gold, And, fattening at their table, steal their plate, And feasting on their lambs to steal their fold; To make a prison of the room he gave In which to hold the Monarch as a slave? O pitying God! thy thunderbolts were scarce. Why crushed they not this hell-begotten farce? And when the Aztecs, goaded to the quick By the proud insolence of such a horde, Could bear no longer parley, but were sick Of such a visitor at such a board, And rose en masse to crush the viper's fang, They bring the Monarch out to face the crowd, And plead for their immunity; the pang That wrung his breast (for he, indeed, was proud) Was like an arrow in his royal heart; And yet he prayed for their forgiveness then, And like a martyr bravely bore their part— Search history; and find out greater men, And they are less forgiving. There he stood, His nation thronged before him, in its wrath; Yet did he plead, before this multitude, To spare the serpent, now across their path; He could not name a promise not unbroke, He could not offer one excuse for time, He could not tell them why to hold their stroke, He plead for hands scarred over with their crime. Did ever charity reach loftier height? Can Christian Spain outshine this sad, brown face? How many souls in Christiandom, as white, Would faced his countrymen, from such a place? Great Montezuma! where shall we find room! When Spain has such a multitude of saints To save your enemies, you courted doom, Yet would not kiss the cross with your complaints; Therefore, anathema!—It will not do, To pass a heretic at Heaven's gate; You held no mumbled crusifix to view— The Infallible has said it, you must wait. Wait for a riper age to touch the chord That quivers, all unconsciously, your praise; When justice, only, draws the tardy sword, And Earth's abhorrence covers those old days With its repentant ashes, then my King May rest his memory upon stubborn facts Nor minstrels falter when they fain would sing Their elegies implanted with his acts. The Holy Inquisition, from old Spain, And St. Bartholomew, from "Ma belle France," The hissing fagots of sweet Mary's reign— These million martyrs, with their melting glance, Look at his agony, across the sea, Who, blind in superstition, groped his way O'er harmless victims and much misery To where the rays were slanting into day. In Europe's face the star of Bethlehem, With its benignant splendor, shed its light; These but the groping nomads of old Shem, Lost in the meshes, of a rayless night. Those, neath the palm of Earth's philosophy; These on the torchless desert, not a star To guide them through life's potent mystery; Those bringing all the wisdom from afar, Though Montezuma's sins had cried to Heaven In a far greater stress; yet what were they, Paling his cruelties, and still forgiven, To pour out greater vials the next day? O Spain! you lent the sanction of your name, To cover up the foulest deed of time; Upon your skirt is fastened this great shame, And nation never wore the brand of a more causeless crime.

One sad, sad task, awaits my faltering pen, And I have done. One flower upon his grave, Who in his dying could, alas! not save His country from the vulturous maw of men. They played upon the monarch with their arts, Till he became a captive in their hands; It was consistent with their Christian hearts That their good host should follow their commands. They said their Christian lord across the sea Must have his treasure for their Christian use. All this was bitter, yet, he did agree, And bent a patient knee to their abuse. They struck their temples, and the red, right hand Of Aztlan rose upon them. They could bear To see their monarch littled, and their land Made tribute to a stranger; but, beware Stern warriors of Castile! touch not their gods. The hearts of Aztlan are but human hearts, And at some shrine the whole creation nods; Invade the sanctum, and the whole man starts. Las Casas[S] would have won them with his love— The potent key that opens every gate. Let not deceit claim sanction from above; It may assist upon the wheels of fate, But what Spain offered through such legatees Was worse than powder on the bated flame. To gather fruit from such ill-freighted trees, Was worse than stealing nightmare from a dream. In Christ's good name they stole the monarch's gold; They changed the name of Christ to treachery; They gathered all the spoils their hands could hold, And pointed to their Master on the tree. Their Master? No! since Lucifer was hurled Down from the shining chambers of the just To vent his spleen upon a new-made world, He never had a worthier task in trust, Than that he gave to Spain's inglorious knights, To rob this people of their vested rights.

The people gather at the palace gates, And vengeance writes itself upon each face; Their generosity no longer waits, They spit upon, and spurn the outraged place. It harbors those who wrote themselves as knaves Upon the pliant tablets of their lives, And now the incensed nation only craves Deliverance for their children and their wives. They know the belching cannon of the knights Will make sad havoc in their stately host; They know that Spain and Fate to-day unite; They know, if fortune fails them, all is lost; But they can bear no longer to be torn, And swear by all the gods to pluck this thorn. The Spaniards see their perfidy, too late; And call great Montezuma to the gate. "Why are my people here to-day in arms? These stranger friends are still my welcome guests; They soon will turn them backward to their homes. Shall we raise hands against great Quetzalcoatl? We fight against the gods? Lay down your arms! Go to your homes, and all shall yet be well, And peace shall reign in all Tenochtitlan[T]!" They bent before him reverently at first. It was a moment—then their anger burst: "Base Aztec! woman! coward! sneaking slave! The whites have made a puppet of your name! Talk not of fighting 'gainst our honored gods; We soil their sacred robes if we submit!" A cloud of stones and arrows flew the air; And Montezuma fell a victim of their rage and his despair. His heart had broke when he beheld the throng, For he was burning with his country's wrong; And when the missiles smote his fevered crest, His very soul was reaching out for rest. They only helped to roll the burden off, So long imprinted on his saddened face— It was too much to hear his people scoff— He fell; and they removed him from the place. He never rose again, nor wished to rise; He made no effort to outlive his land; He felt his weakness, and he heard her cries; He saw her sinking with his wasting sand. He knew his enemies had stole the garb Of gods to fasten on him their deceit; That they had stung the nation with their barb, And he would not survive its sore defeat. He felt their scoffings were deserved of him, For he should gathered wisdom with his years; He saw his weakness when his sight was dim, And poured his wasting moments out in tears.

They called the Priest to shrive him for his death— The worthy Monk Olmedo[U] takes his palms; It is in vain; his very latest breath Repulses all their uninvited alms. He dies an Aztec—honor to his name! And spurns the symbols that have crushed him down. What mockery when he is all aflame With their abuses! Give him back his crown, His country's honor, and its hard-earned gold. But force no wormwood to his fevered lips; His hand is pulseless, and will soon be cold; His life was shadow; and his death—eclipse.

Great are the consolations of the cross— The Father-Son of Calvary, and time. Their glory compensates a kingdom's loss; But piety must not be wed to crime. Did all the roses blossom from the cross, And all the thorns grow out upon the waste? Then were the metal guarded from the dross, And every crust be suited to our taste; But bitter-sweet is all the book of life, And thorns and roses crowd the tangled way; And good and evil, always, are at strife— Night always dogs the footsteps of the day. Yet "figs cannot be gathered from the thorn," Nor "grapes from thistles," says the patient Lord— One great, good life, like a new angel born, Is the most potent sermon ever heard. The hands that smote the Monarch in the face Did honor to his ashes, cold and dead. Their anger was rubbed out, and not a trace Was left, as with their slow and measured tread They bore his sacred ashes to the tomb Within the walls of old Chapultepec, Where stately trees, and flowers perennial bloom, And, all the pulses of their lives in check, Bow down to kiss the shrine of memory. The sacred hush of death comes none too oft To still the fevered brain and make us free— It is a gentle hand, and moves so soft That it compensates all our misery By chaining all the lions of our life And placing durance on the throbbing drum That marshals us to earth's unpitying strife. How should we reverence the hand that strikes our passions dumb! Cortez and Montezuma; Aztlan, Spain— The very mingling of these words is pain. The one, bold, cold, unscrupulous and brave, And making of each obstacle a slave; Seeking his glory in the name of Christ, To gain his ends unfaithful to each tryst.— The fault is with the ethics of his race, Which justify the means for any end, And leave the moral aspect without place, And to the foulest acts their ready sanction lend. The thought of holding man to his account, And throwing merit against circumstance, Of cleansing souls at one great common fount, Of holding out to man an equal chance— These things were not considered in the least. The glory of himself and Spain were first; All the excesses pardoned by the Priest Weaned the poor soul from any moral thirst. A golden apple trembled on the limb, And he must pluck it, at whatever cost. What matter whose?—it should belong to him; It was too tempting, and must not be lost: The wall that lay before it must be scaled, The owner of the field must be destroyed, And if his prowess, in the effort failed, Deceit and treachery must be employed. The unbridled passions of the human soul Linked with the crucifix in his emprise. The lion, loosened and in full control— The semblance of the Lamb to Aztlan's eyes: A faithful offspring of the Papish loins, The features of the Church in duplicate, Though baser metals pass for golden coins, Only earth's charity can make brave Cortez great. But Montezuma conquers all our thought— Tenochtitlan and old Chapultepec. No greener shrine for memory can be sought; The heart and conscience both alike bedeck The unfading spectre of a soul sincere, Who tugged at destiny against the dark— The hand, unconscious, drops its laurels here. His brown hands could not helm the fateful bark Against the baleful breakers of old Spain; Yet, who is proof against the foils of men. His life is but a psalmody of pain. What soul unmoved can touch it with the pen? The link that bound the old world with the new, With pure and patient hands, might been upturned, And every missing chapter brought to view By Clio gathered, and again inurned In history's cloister; Egypt and Aztlan Strike palms upon the bridges of the years; But Spain denies the privilege to man, And fills the vacuum with a nation's tears. O Monarch of the fading, mighty past! Great Montezuma! we are wed to thee. Back of thy name the ocean is so vast That we can only write—Eternity, And leave the secret in thy broken breast. We would that we could taken thy warm palm, Held out in welcome from the mellow West, And poured upon thy stricken life the balm Of real enlightenment; and point thee back, Over the ridges of the years, to God; To where your people lost the beaten track, And ever afterward were left to plod. Those great sad eyes, once filled with light from Heaven, Would shone like diamonds when they found the way, And every fibre of thy nature striven To turn thy nation's darkness into day. Alas! 'tis vain! we beat the empty air. Our tears are mingled with thy wasting breath; We all are torn with thy warm heart's despair, And mourn with Aztlan at thy fateful death.

From sire to son the stern bequeathment falls Of some misguided action in the past, And, though our nature with the victim calls And we are smitten with his overcast, Still are we weak against the wheels of fate, Which leaves the pensioner thus desolate. The by-ways of the father must turn back Sometime upon the highway that he left; Though dark and sinuous may be the track, And life of all its luster be bereft, Still hangs the heavy impulse on the soul, Unsatisfied, till it shall reach its goal. The destiny was hard that brought proud Spain Upon the fading summerland of gold; Its retribution is no less a pain; The grip of fate, so pulseless and so cold, Brings back the shudder to the human heart; Humanity is wounded with each part That feels the puncture of her cruel blade. Nor is the censure less upon the hand That strikes so hard to force the debt thus paid. The tender conquest of some heathen land The brightest jewel is, of any crown— God never licensed human hand to strike a foe when down. When Spain's recruited army turned them back To glut their ire on Guatamozin's head, There never was a deeper furrowed track, More thickly cindered with the myriad dead; And when at last his bloody sceptre fell, Tenochtitlan was likest to a hell. The brave barbarian was put to rack To force divulgence of his scattered gold.— Is there a garment of a deeper black, To cover up the fingers that could hold Such hellish orgies after all the past? The palm is thine, O Spain! and hold it to the last! Yet one more turn upon the screw of time: Thy red, right hand must slay this waif of fate; And thou must put the climax to the crime, And crush the heart thou has made desolate. Enough! thou art the acme of the earth— May God's great pity ever spare thy duplicated birth! No, no, not Spain! her better angel waits, And has been waiting all these weary years For Castellar to open wide her gates, That she may wash her garments with her tears; But priestcraft, Rome, or demon, all the same— That makes a desert of her rich champaign; And sends her forth through history, so tame. It is, her evil genius; but it is not Spain.

As Kohen prophesied, their race was run— Their error cleaved upon them as a curse; The fading phalanx of the Summer sun Has crossed the borders of the universe. We only catch the shadow of their flight; They pass out with the sunset into night.