Las Casas also reckons the number of natives who
fell victims to Spanish cruelty in America at forty millions. This wild
estimate has been often quoted. Mr. Wilson, instead of "vindicating" it,
as he was bound to do, triumphantly refutes it. "There never probably
existed," he most justly remarks, "more than forty millions of savage
races at one time on our globe."
It is not merely the arithmetic of his authorities that Mr. Wilson
undertakes to rectify. When they describe a pitched battle, he asserts
that it was a mere skirmish. When they speak of a large town, he tells
us it was a rude hamlet. When they portray the magnificence of the city
of Mexico, he says that they are "painting wild _figments_"--whatever
that may mean,--and that Montezuma's capital was a mere collection of
huts. Cortes tells us, that, in his retreat, he lost a great portion
of his treasure. Mr. Wilson writes, "The _Conquistador_ was too good a
soldier to hazard his gold; it was _therefore_, in the advance, and came
safely off." Cortes states, that, in a certain battle, he retired from
the front in order to make a new disposition of his rear. Mr.
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