CHAPTER II. CONQUEST OF GUATEMALA BY PEDRO DE ALVARADO.— FOUNDING OF THE TOWN OF GUATEMALA. INSTH NSTEAD of following Alvarado immediately to the fertile valleys of Guatemala, the reader must for a moment give his thoughts to the central region of Spain, and try to picture to himself what sort of a land it is. Let him bring before him a landscape of vast extent in Old or New Castile, unimpeded by landmarks any where, brown and stony on the heights, brown and dusty in the valleys, while the towns and villages are seen afar off in the clear air, with no pleasant trees around them, but brown like the rest of the landscape, and not divided from it. Here and there stands out a gnarled and riven olive-tree. It is a landscape, not soft or joyous, though equable and harmonious, when seen in the early dawn, fierce and glowing under the noontide sun, and grandly solemn and desolate in the shades of the declining day. To understand any people thoroughly, we must know something of the country in which they live, or, at least, of that part inhabited by the dominant race. The insects partake the color of the trees they dwell upon, and man is not less affected by the place of his habitation on the earth. Stern, arid, lofty, dignified, and isolated from the men of other nations, the Spaniard was probably the most remarkable European man in the sixteenth century. He had a clearness of conviction and a resoluteness of purpose which resembled the 244 Character of the Spaniards. sharp atmosphere in which he had lived, that left no undecided outlines; and as, in the landscape, all variety was amply compensated for by the vast extent of one solemn color, so, in the Spaniard's character, there were one or two deep tints of love, of loyalty, and of religion, which might render it fervid, bigoted, and ferocious, but never left it small, feeble, or unmeaning. A body, therefore, of two hundred and eighty menat-arms of this stamp, each of them having some individuality of character, and yet being inured to discipline, with obedient troops of Mexican Indians (auxiliaries by no means contemptible in war), contained the elements of force sufficient for subjugating a great part of Central America, and we must look upon them with somewhat of the respect which we should feel for a large and well-appointed army. An old chronicler has compared the advance of Alvarado to the darting of a flash of lightning. The first place the lightning fell upon was Soconusco, the territory in behalf of which the expedition had been sent out. A great battle, accompanied by much slaughter and great destruction (the traces of which were visible nearly a hundred years afterward), took place on the frontier of that province, in which battle the King of Zacapula was killed. Of the further advance of the army we possess an account written by the Conqueror himself, who states that he pushed on from Soconusco to Zacapula,* from thence to Quezaltenango, from thence to Utatlan, fighting, negotiating, and terrifying the Indians into submission. He had previously sent * The civilization of these parts must have been somewhat of the Mexican and Peruvian order; for Alvarado happens to remark the broad ways and paved streets in Zapotula (Zacapula). Advance of Alvarado's Army. 245 messengers into the country, requiring the inhabitants to submit themselves to the King of Spain, and threatening with slavery all those who should be taken in arms. No attention was paid to this requisition by the natives. He found the roads that led to Zacapula open and well constructed.* He did not enter the town, forming his camp in the vicinity, until he should understand the disposition of the people toward him. They soon made an attack upon him: he routed them, and pursued them into the market-place, where he pitched his camp. In two days' time he set off for Quezaltenango. On a precipitous rock, in a very dif * "Hallé todos los caminos abiertos, í muy anchos, así el Real, como los que atravesaban, í los caminos que iban á las Calles principales tapados.”—PEDRO DE ALVARADO, Relacion á Hernando Cortés. BARCIA, Historiadores, tom. i., p. 157. Dulee 246 Battle near Quezaltenango. ficult pass of the mountains, he found the bodies of a woman and a dog that had been sacrificed, which sacri fice, as he learned from an interpreter, was a mode of expressing defiance. Proceeding further, he found himself in front of thirty thousand enemies; and ill would it have gone with him that day if, as he says, it had not pleased God that there should be some plains near, on which his cavalry could act with effect. He succeeded, however, in "chastising" the enemy severely, and he notices that in this battle there died one of the four* lords of the city of Utatlan, who was captain general of the whole country.† The lord who had died in battle was no other than Tecum-Umam, the monarch, who had fought with great bravery, having been personally engaged, it is said, with Alvarado, and having wounded his horse. There was nothing now to prevent the march of the Spaniards to Quezaltenango. When the invading army arrived there they found the town quite deserted; but, after they had remained in it a few days to refresh themselves, there started up suddenly a multitude of Indians out of caves in and near the city. Alvarado sallied forth to give them battle. He was victorious, and his victory was accompanied by great slaughter. He himself says that he had already seen some of the fiercest battles in the Indies, and he emphatically de * This description coincides with the account we have already had of the mode of government in the kingdom of Quiché, and confirms that account the more, as we may be sure that at that early period Alvarado knew nothing minutely of the administration of the countries he was invading; and, indeed, his words leave it in doubt whether all these four lords had not equal power, which he probably thought, at that time, they had. "En esta murió uno de los quatro Señores de esta Ciudad de Utlatan, que venia por Capitan General de toda la Tierra."-Pedro de ALVARADO, Relacion á Hernando Cortés. BARCIA, tom. i., p. 158. Alvarado's Entrance into Utatlan. 247 scribes the slaughter in this rout by saying that his friendly Mexicans and his foot-soldiers made "the greatest destruction in the world.”* The chief men of Quiché, having lost their king, and their armies having been several times defeated, professed submission, and made no resistance to Alvarado's entering the town of Utatlan. On the contrary, they said they would come there and submit themselves to him. But when the Spanish commander had entered the town, and seen what sort of a place it was, with very narrow streets, and but two entrances, he resolved to quit it immediately for the plains below. Disregarding the remonstrances of the chiefs, who begged him to stay and refresh himself, he sent on men to secure the causeway, and sallied forth. He did not effect his retreat without some injury from a body of warlike Indians who were drawn up in large force round the town. Being quite convinced that the chiefs of Quiché had invited him into the town of Utatlan in order that they might destroy him in the narrow streets, he resolved to give a lesson of terror. First, however, he gave them a lesson in dissimulation; for, by gifts and various artifices, he allured them into his power, and then he says, "as I found out that they had such a bad disposition toward his majesty's service, and as it was also for the good and pacification of this country, I burnt them; and I commanded the city to be burnt and razed to the foundations, for it is so dangerous and so strong that it appears more like a robbers' hold than an inhabited town." This passage deserves * "Nuestros amigos, í los Peones hacian una destruicion, la maior del Mundo."-PEDRO DE ALVARADO, Relacion. BARCIA, Historiadores, tom. i., p. 158. + "E como conoscí de ellos tener tan mala voluntad á servicio de su Magestad; í para el bien, í sosiego de esta Tierra, Yo los quemé, í |