easily content himself. We are reminded of other great men;-of Scipio, and Cincinnatus, and Washington. The list might be extended. In this very flexibility-in this singular capacity to subdue and keep back, until the coming of the proper season, this resolute forbearance of all vain and immature endeavor,-we behold the essential proofs of greatness. He was able to wait the most difficult duty of the ambitious. He was able to conceal his true desires-without which capacity, few succeed in their development, surrounded as they are by a world of rivals. Very like, there was no will of our hero in this forbearance. This passiveness was none of his own. His moods were in abeyance, under the control of influences, moral and social, to which he was ready to submit, and which he might not seek to fathom. It will not lessen the merits of a great man, to believe that he is patient under the direction of a destiny, which can better determine than himself the true modes and periods for the application of his powers. To submit, while in the full consciousness of his powers, is, in itself, no small proof of superiority.

But agriculture, however successfully conducted, did not furnish the necessary employment for his genius. His will was shaping out another course. He embarked in commerce, and prospered as he had done in planting. He was a man to prosper. He carried into trade the same keen vigilance, fixed resolve, persevering endeavor, watchful forethought. This field afforded him occasions for enterprize— brought him extensively known among the men whom he was to guide, increased greatly the resources of money and credit, without which, at that time and in that community, the opportunity for great adventure was not easily to be found. He became a man of substance, a capitalist, and was called and considered, accordingly, as he would be now, a very reputable person. So his neighbors thought him. He every where secured their confidence,-his word became an authority, his word had a significance. He, somehow, compelled their regard and veneration, and his judgment swayed that of older men. That they knew the audacious character of his mood, we may also infer, as we find them choosing him as their representative when a great danger was to be incurred. He did not shrink from their trust, offended Velasquez, the Governor of Cuba, and was honored with imprisonment in consequence.

From this imprisonment he was soon set free. He was not a man to remain long in any meshes. But this governor of Cuba, who was of a temper equally mean, jealous and vindictive, was of capricious humors, which constantly found cause of annoyance in the character of Cortés. One of these provocations sprang from a cause equally natural and annoying. The constitutional infirmity of our hero-his passion for the sex-does not seem to have suffered much abatement in his farmer and merchant life. An intrigue with Dona Catalina Xuarez de Pacheco, a lady of noble blood-a sister of whom had been married by Velasquez-was revealed to this suspicious dignitary. The governor "was something more than wroth," and the storm which ensued was only hushed by the marriage of Cortés with the lady. This union, which he seems to have been reluctant to approach, he had no reason to regret. Dona Catalina made him a good wife, and followed him to Mexico, where she died some years after the conquest. He was wont to say that he prized her as highly as if she had been the daughter of a Duke.

Though not yet a conqueror, Cortés, as we have seen, has not been living entirely in vain. His career, though comparatively humble, has yet been honorable. It is worthy of remark, that, in all this period-a space of nearly eight years since his arrival in America,-he has not only achieved no military enterprizes, but has shown no disposition for arms; a fact sufficiently striking, when his previous aspirations are remembered, doubly so, now that his after career is known, and particularly surprising when we consider how frequent were the examples of military adventure, shown daily by the daring hidalgos of Cuba and Hispaniola. The singular avidity with which, in that day, Spaniards of all classes embarked in schemes, however wild and visionary, which involved peril, stimulated avarice, and gave provocation to valor, might well, we may suppose, awaken that impatient temper, which we have seen breaking away from academic walks in eager desire for fields of war,-scaling walls in obedience to the working passions of youth--and altogether, betraying that forward impetuosity of character, which seldom desires weightier suggestion to action than what springs from its own inner tendencies. It would be idle, at this late moment, to seek to account for this remarkable forbearance, or to endeavor to reconcile those seeming caprices of temper, which, were we more familiar with the moral influences

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acting on his moods, might show them all, however apparently in contradiction, to be working harmoniously togethIt is the superficial judgment that finds inconsistencies in character, simply because it never looks below the surface. The restraints on the mind of Cortés, arising from his duties, his interests, or, it may be, and probably was, from a real conviction of his own temporary deficiencies,-compelling patience, must naturally have brought him wisdom. He saw, from the numerous failures and baffling defeats of the cavaliers around him, that the day had not yet arrived, that the fruit was not ripe,-that there was an accepted season of action, for which courage must be patient. To know "when," is quite as important to achievement as to know "how." Every day sent forth its novel armament from Hispaniola and Cuba. Brave preparations distinguished each adventure,-worthy and valiant cavaliers led the enterprize,—yet how few attained the goal,-how many perished in sad defeat,-how many more came back, with ruined health, fame and fortune. The keen, vigilant eye of Cortés, took counsel of strength for the future, as he beheld the weakness of those who went before him. He saw that the hour was yet to come, they had shown that they were not the men for the hour. May we not suppose, knowing, as we do, his career, that, at such moments, with such reflections, a fond but secret emotion in his soul informed him, that the hour and the man were destined to co-operate hereafter in his own patiently-abiding self!

It is said by some of the historians, that his greatness, in spite of the generosity which he showed, or seemed to show, to his companions, was tainted by the miserable vice of avarice, perhaps the meanest and least manly of all vices. To this passion, they allege, are we to ascribe his persevering devotion to his agricultural and commercial pursuits. His liberality to his companions, say they, was only a superior sort of policy, by which he attached them to his person, making them the subservient creatures of his ambition. But the statement involves many contradictions, and assumes for Cortés a variety of passions, all earnest and in action, such as we rarely discover in any person, and which, if in possession of the mind of any man, would be apt to leave him unperforming, a constant victim to the most momentary capriAmbition and avarice seldom work together. We are not satisfied that there is not some great mistake in the usu

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ally received biography of Marlborough, who is on record for a rare union of these natures, so at conflict, the one soaring to the summit, the other grovelling at the base of all human appetites and aims. The passions are foes, not twins. There is no affinity between them. The frank, impulsive nature of that sort of ambition which seeks for renown through the medium of arms, is hardly capable of that cold consideration of small gains,-that petty, slavish, matter-ofdetail spirit, which is for realizing the pounds by a constant concern for the pence. Ambition is a thing of large generalization, which usually scorns details, and shrinks, with a sort of disgust, from all servile literalnesses. It looks upward, and not, as Mammon, that "least exalted spirit of heaven," upon the gold of the pavement beneath his feet. If its glance is ever cast below, it is only because, perched like the eagle on some sky-uplifting eminence, there is nothing farther to be sought or seen above.

It would be more easy to believe, in the case of Cortés, that he was not understood by his neighbors. As nobody at this period suspected the great military and statesman-like genius which he possessed, so no one could reasonably determine upon those proceedings in his career, the objects of which were latent, and only determinable by the grand results. It is not easy to look back, after the grand march of a conqueror, and sit in just judgment on his first beginnings. It would not, perhaps, be easy for himself to do so, and determine accurately upon his own motives. We are all so much the creatures of circumstances,-so much led by our own instincts, that we seem motiveless in a thousand movements, when, in fact, we have been impelled by a secret nature, superior to mere worldly deliberation,-a nature which operates like an instinct, with all the energies, and, seemingly, with all the prescience of a god. Doubtless, Cortés worked under some such influences, without well knowing why he worked, and wondering sometimes at his own passivity. Supposing that he conjectured something of his future career, it is natural he should seek the acquisition of fortune,-nay, that he should hoard and secure it with all prudential care, in contemplation of the wondrous enterprizes which lay before him. We find him, when the time for these enterprizes arrived, frankly embarking all of his fortune in their prosecution. Keeping this fact in mind, there will be no difficulty in accounting for the two-fold desire.

which he showed, at once to accumulate money, and by the generous use of it at times, to attach his companions to his arms. There is yet another consideration, which needs only to be entertained for an instant, to make it doubtful whether he is justly liable, at any time, to the charge of withholding his resources, or betraying any uncommon or close regard to acquisition. Liberality of mood, like most objects of moral analysis, is a thing of relative respect. Among one set of people, a person shall be held selfish whom another class will esteem as generous in a high degree. Cortés, differing largely from the usual profligacy of Spanish cavaliers, men reckless equally of past, present and to come,might naturally enough suffer from their denunciations, yet deserve no reproach of avarice in any justly-minded community. He certainly differed from themselves, he was no profligate, he respected laws which they despised,—he was prudent when they were profligate,-sober when they were intoxicated,-firm when they were wild,-and, consequently, triumphant when they failed.

The circumstance that strikes us, over all, and as wonderfully significant of his character, is the calm, unchanging quiet of his life, during the long period of—as we must regard it-his probation. Believing, as we do, that every great mind has not only some partial knowledge of its own endowments, but some strong presentiments of what are to be its future performances, we are half disposed to ascribe this seeming lethargy, in his career, to a deliberate purpose of self-training and self-preparation, for the work which was before him. No great mind is entirely without a knowledge of its deficiencies. The greatest minds are those who first and most fully discover them. Cortés felt his infirmities of temper. His nature was originally too fierce and intractable. His blood needed schooling. His impetuosity-and this was the disease of Spanish heroism-would have been the greatest impediment to his conquest of Tenochtitlan. It was only by restraining and subjecting his own, that he could hope to subdue the minds of others to his will. Will is not yielded in the attainment of patience. It is strengthened-made consistent, and doubly intense from its habitual compression. If there were no secret suggestions of his own nature, counselling him to this result, the observant thought of Cortés would have received the lesson from instances hourly before his eyes. It was in consequence of this deficient train