[In the following excerpt from a review of John Lockhart's translation of Díaz's Memoirs, the critic condemns Cortés 's cruelty, but finds honesty and eloquence in Díaz's account of the conquest.]

Mr. Lockhart's translation [of Díaz's history] is one of those works for which we are indebted to that new and spreading interest awakened by the labors of Humboldt and his successors, in the field of Mexican antiquity. The magnificent remains of an extinct civilization brought to light, in various parts of the great American continent, have conferred an additional value on such descriptions of the ancient Aztec splendor as record the impressions of credible witnesses, when first it rose upon their astonished senses, like a bewildering dream. From the more polished pictures, and philosophic estimates, of historians like Robertson and Prescott, … it will interest many to turn to such direct testimonies as are furnished by the despatches of the Conquistador leader, Cortes, … or the quaint simple chronicling of this old soldier, a conquistador himself, and perhaps the most trustworthy amongst the narrators of the events of that conquest, so far as he had the capacity for discerning them. The strange, wild incidents of that extraordinary tale come out in all their freshness, in the curious details of Bernal Díaz; and the scenes of social magnificence, amid which they are laid, tell wonderfully in the rude sketching and unpremeditated cumulation of his pen. It is true, that the march itself, and the scenes through which it passed, have alike a different aspect to the reader of this day, from that which they wore to Bernal Díaz; but it is one of the strongest testimonies to the honesty of the old chronicler and the value of his chronicle, that the materials for this improved judgment are all, unconsciously, furnished by himself. The upright and earnest narrator had no wish either to suppress or color; and motives and meanings are avowed with a simplicity which is not the least amusing quality of his volumes. There is no concealing, for instance, that this extraordinary conquest originated in a mere vulgar desire for plunder; and was pursued (through dangers, and by deeds that make of the conquistadores a band of heroes, if men can be heroes who do great things from little motives) under the influence of the meanest of all passions—the love of gold. As gold, then, was the impelling spirit, so gold was the measure of the magnificence which they found. All things which appealed to their judgment was seen in its yellow atmosphere. The book of Bernal Díaz reads like "a golden legend"—the stream of his narrative flows on, like another Pactolus, amid all the varieties of its current, gold being ever at the bottom of the movement. The reader is in a perpetual El Dorado, where the spirit of gold is as active as at the marriage of Miss Kilmansegg. For gold, these heroes in the field became petty pilferers in quarters—from all around them and from each other. The only way to blind them was to throw gold "dust in their eyes." For the moral and political elements, which, in our day, are understood to be involved in the question of civilization, they had no apprehension—gold was their standard of value:—for the qualities of kindness, generosity, and forbearance which made the best part of Montezuma's greatness they had no discernment—their spirits, like their bodies, hung in chains of gold. The Mexican emperor was a great monarch, because his coffers were exhaustless,—and Mexico was a mighty empire, because its rivers ran gold.

As with the scenery of the narrative, so, also, with its incidents,—the spirit that reads them is a new one from that in which Bernal Díaz wrote. It is amusing to see the sort of undoubting faith with which Cortes and his companions are represented as wielding "the sword of the Lord and of Gideon,"—the easy unconsciousness with which the transparent mask of a religious purpose was worn, and the daring villanies that were perpetrated under its cover. In theology, certainly, Cortes was not strong. The sword of Gideon, in his hands, was far from being a sharp argument; and it was generally found that the aid of a more trenchant weapon was necessary to enforce its logic. The "stones and slings" of reasoning, wielded by him, rarely carried to their mark in the forehead of his opponent—whereupon he resorted to the more carnal instrument, which grew to be "like a weaver's beam." It was Cortes' easy and simple way, in township or in city, to enter into the high places of their immemorial gods—places surrounded by the sanctities of a superstition which was a part of their very natures,—and informing them, "o' the sudden," that their idols were impostors, to present them with an image of the Virgin Mary, which he requested might instantly take their place. For this they could rarely, at first, see any good reason; and we, in our day, are not greatly surprised at their dulness; but the conquistador was "seated on his horse;" the Spaniard would explain, to an assembled people, as propositions of the utmost simplicity, that he had come from a far country to oblige them, by the substitution of a prince called Don Carlos for their monarch Montezuma, and depose the gods Huitzilopochtli and Tetzcatlipuca, in favor of the Virgin. "We have already a master, and cannot help feeling astonished that you, who have but just arrived and know nothing of us, should, this instant, wish to impose a master on us;"—and "How can you ask us to abandon our gods, whom we have adored for so many years, and prayed and sacrificed to them?" were answers reasonably to be expected, "till further advice." The ordinary rejoinder, however, in such cases, was, that "a great number of these people were put to the sword, and some were burnt alive, to prove the deceitfulness of their false gods," and the sovereign rights of Don Carlos. Then, when the argument was complete, the conqueror would take tribute, in gold and women, from his gratified converts. The former of these articles, the opimia spolia, by an inherent virtue in itself, needed no form of purification, but passed at once from the coffers of the idolators into the pockets of the conquistadors, as a thing sacred enough for the sacra fames which it fed—but never satisfied. But the women Cortes in no case omitted to regenerate, by the rite of baptism, ere he distributed them, as concubines, among his soldiers!

All these things are, as we have said, set down by the quaint old soldier with the most delicious unreserve, in language picturesque from its very plainness, and in a manner as instructive as it is amusing. Much of the false after-philosophy with which the subject of the conquest has been surrounded, fades away in the inartificial page of the early chronicler. The lights of the theme are here tempered by all their shadows. The fancy which the later Spanish writers took captive with the swords of the conquistadores is here set free, and on the very field of their prowess. The weapon of honest Bernal Díaz struck on one side of the question only, but his pen shows both. It is Mr. Lockhart's opinion—and, for the translator of Bernal Díaz's book, a very strange one—that "the Spaniards were not the cruel monsters they have been generally described during those times. As far as the conquest of New Spain is concerned, they were more humane than otherwise; and if at times they used severity, we find that it was caused by the horrible and revolting abominations which were practised by the natives. We can scarcely imagine kinder-hearted beings than the first priests and monks who went out to New Spain." In so far as the translator makes a special application of this latter observation to the Father Olmedo, who went out with Cortes, we agree with him. The reader of Bernal Díaz's narrative yields an unresisting belief to all it tells; and there is proof of great prudence and moderation on the part of this father, for a priest following in the wake of a conquering and propagandist army. It is apparent that he often kept Cortes, over whom he had great influence, in check; but to Mr. Lockhart's view of the humanities exercised by the Spaniards generally in New Spain, we demur. We gather from Bernal Díaz that the conquest of that country was begun in cupidity, and pursued by a treachery so profligate, a hypocrisy so detestable, a butchery so cold-blooded and systematic, an ingratitude so foul and monstrous, that the more ferocious doings of Pizzaro, in Peru, were needed to redeem it from being, amid all its brilliancy, one of the most disgraceful pages in the world's history. With all his religious professions, however, and all his superstition, there is a shrewdness about this old writer which makes it very doubtful how far he suspected the worthlessness of some of the spells with which he and his friends were conjuring. The spirit uppermost throughout his book, after the desire to tell the truth, is the wish to take so much of the entire fame of the conquest from Cortes as properly belongs to his brothers in arms; and the wounded feeling of the soldier, acting on a candid nature, helps him to a very clear appreciation of the qualities of his great leader….

The honest annalist has told all—and told it well; and his narrative is made picturesque by many a figure, which gives it life and reality, … and many an allusion and self-reference which makes it touching. "Alas!" says Bernal Díaz, "now even, while I am writing this, the figure and powerful build of Christobal de Oli comes fresh to my memory, and my heart feels sore with grief." The amusing vanity of the old soldier, too, being never offensive, and based upon a long series of gallant services and sufferings, gives great piquancy to his gossip; and there is something genial about the man, which confers a pleasant flavor on all he says. Though wounded, both in his feelings and interests, by the neglect of Cortes, and eager to claim his share of that fame as a conquistador, which the latter sought to monopolize, he will let no man depreciate his chief. He loves to exhibit the conqueror as always foremost in action and readiest in resource. Through life, he never failed his illustrious leader; and, in this memoir, he becomes his apologist and panegyrist—though not an uncompromising one. "May the Almighty pardon his sins," he concludes, after a long summing up in his favor, "and mine also; and may he, also, grant me a happy death, for this is of more importance than all our conquests and victories over the Indians!"

Our summing up will be different from that of Bernal Díaz, because the figures that go to the account have another value in our day. If it were permitted us to praise evil, for the good it had done, then might the conqueror of Mexico be allowed to take his place among the truly great. It is impossible to read of the wholesale human sacrifices, and other abominations practised in New Spain, when Cortes found it, without feeling that, by whatever door it came in, the introduction of the improved civilization of the European world was a final gain and blessing. But the actor is not to be measured by this act—apart from his motives and his means. All are not great men who have done great things. It has been the long habit of history, while a poet or partisan, to deal much in hero-worship,—and history, become a philosopher, has much to rectify. It will have something to take from the fame of Cortes; and will find the testimony of Bernal Díaz useful for the purpose—far beyond what the chronicler intended.