Quickly we ran to where the street from the great square opens on to
the causeway, and there even through the darkness and rain we caught the
gleam of armour. Then I cried aloud in a great voice, 'To arms! To arms!
The Teules escape by the causeway of Tlacopan.'
Instantly my words were caught up by the sentries and passed from post
to post till the city rang with them. They were cried in every street
and canal, they echoed from the roofs of houses, and among the summits
of a hundred temples. The city awoke with a murmur, from the lake came
the sound of water beaten by ten thousand oars, as though myriads of
wild-fowl had sprung suddenly from their reedy beds. Here, there, and
everywhere torches flashed out like falling stars, wild notes were blown
on horns and shells, and above all arose the booming of the snakeskin
drum which the priests upon the teocalli beat furiously.
Presently the murmur grew to a roar, and from this direction and from
that, armed men poured towards the causeway of Tlacopan. Some came on
foot, but the most of them were in canoes which covered the waters
of the lake further than the ear could hear. Now the Spaniards to
the number of fifteen hundred or so, accompanied by some six or eight
thousand Tlascalans, were emerging on the causeway in a long thin line.
Guatemoc and I rushed before them, collecting men as we went, till we
came to the first canal, where canoes were already gathering by scores.
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