But the pyramid, crowned with altars and censers, the innumerable temples erected in honour of nameless deities at its foot, and the strange and most hideous Coatepantli, were not the only objects which excited the abhorrence of the cavalier. Without the wall, and a few paces in advance of the great gate which it covered as a curtain, rose a rampart of earth or stone, oblong and pyramidal, but truncated, twenty-five fathoms in length at the base, and perhaps thirty feet in height. At either end of this tumulus, was a tower of goodly altitude, built, as it seemed at a distance and in the dim light, of some singularly rude and uncouth material; and between them, occupying the whole remaining space of the terrace, was a sort of frame-work or cage of slender poles, on all of which were strung thickly together, certain little globes, the character of which Don Amador could not penetrate, until fully abreast of them. Then, indeed, he perceived, with horror, that these globes were the skulls of human beings, the trophies of ages of superstition; and beheld, in like manner, that the towers which crowned the Golgotha, (or _Huitzompan_, as it was called in the Mexican tongue,) were constructed of the same dreadful materials, cemented together with lime. The malediction which he invoked upon the builders of the ghastly temple, was unheard; for the spectacle froze his blood and paralyzed his tongue.
It was not yet dark, when, having left these haunts of idolatry, Don Amador found himself entering into the court-yard of a vast, and yet not a very lofty, building,--the palace of Axajacatl; wherein, with drums beating, and trumpets answering joyously to the salute of their friends, stood those individuals of the garrison who had remained to watch over their prisoners and treasures. The weary and the curious, thronging together impatiently at the gate, mingling with the garrison and some two thousand faithful Tlascalans, who had been left by Cortes as their allies, and who now rushed forward to salute the viceroy of their gods, as some had denominated Don Hernan, made such a scene of confusion, that, for a moment, the neophyte was unable to ride into the yard. In that moment, and while struggling both to appease the unquiet of Fogoso, and to drive away the feathered herd that obstructed him, his arm was touched, and, looking down, he beheld Jacinto at his side, greatly agitated, and seemingly striving to disengage himself from the throng.