A few minutes later the war cry of the Comanches was heard, strident and terrible; and the redskin warriors bounded like jaguars on the Apaches, swinging their clubs and long lances. At first the Black Bear fancied assistance had arrived for him, and that the colony was in the power of the allies but this hope did not endure a second. Then demoralisation seized on the Apaches; they hesitated, and suddenly turned their backs, rushing into the river, and leaving on the battlefield more than two-thirds of their comrades.
The colonists contented themselves with firing a few rounds of canister at the fugitives, feeling certain they woould not escape the ambuscade prepared for them. In fact, the musket shots of the peons could soon be heard mingled with the war-cry of the Comanches. In this unfortunate expedition the Black Bear lost in an hour the most renowed warriors of his nation. The chief, covered with wounds, and only accompanied by a dozen men, escaped with great difficulty from the carnage. The victory of the French was complete. For a lont time the colony, through his glorious achievement, was protected from the attacks of the redskins.
When the combat was ended, people sought in vain in every direction for Don Sylva and his daughter: both had disappeared, and no one knew how. This mysterious and inexplicable event struck the inhabitants of the colony with consternation, and changed the joy of the triumph into mourning, for the same idea suddenly occurred to all:--
"Don Sylva and his daughter have been carried off by the Black Bear!"
When the count, after repeated researches, was compelled to allow that the hacendero and his daughter had really disappeared without leaving the slightest trace, he gave way to all the violence of his character, vowed a terrible hatred against the Apaches, and swore to pursue them, without truce or mercy, until he found her whom he considered his wife, and whose loss destroyed at one blow the brilliant future he had dreamed of.
At the remote period when the Aztecs, guided by the finger of God, marched forth, without knowing it, to conquer the plateau of Ahanuac, of which they eventually made the powerful kingdom of Mexico, although their eyes were constantly turned toward this unknown land, the permanent object of their greed, they frequently stopped their during migration, as if fatigue had suddenly overpowered them, and the hope of ever arriving had failed them.