Big Data Analytics and Machine Intelligence in Biomedical and Health Informatics Sunil Kuma Dhal Full Chapter PDF
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Big Data Analytics and Machine
Intelligence in Biomedical
and Health Informatics
Scrivener Publishing
100 Cummings Center, Suite 541J
Beverly, MA 01915-6106
Publishers at Scrivener
Martin Scrivener ([email protected])
Phillip Carmical ([email protected])
Big Data Analytics and Machine
Intelligence in Biomedical
and Health Informatics
Concepts, Methodologies,
Tools and Applications
Edited by
Sunil Kumar Dhal
Subhendu Kumar Pani
Srinivas Prasad
and
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other-
wise, except as permitted by law. Advice on how to obtain permission to reuse material from this title
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ucts visit us at www.wiley.com.
ISBN 978-1-119-79173-7
Set in size of 11pt and Minion Pro by Manila Typesetting Company, Makati, Philippines
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Preface xiii
1 An Introduction to Big Data Analytics Techniques in Healthcare 1
Anil Audumbar Pise
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Big Data in Healthcare 3
1.3 Areas of Big Data Analytics in Medicine 5
1.3.1 Genomics 6
1.3.2 Signal Processing 7
1.3.3 Image Processing 8
1.4 Healthcare as a Big Data Repository 9
1.5 Applications of Healthcare Big Data 10
1.5.1 Electronic Health Records (EHRs) 10
1.5.2 Telemedicine 11
1.5.3 NoSQL Database 12
1.5.4 Framework for Reconstructing Epidemiological
Dynamics (FRED) 12
1.5.5 Advanced Risk and Disease Management 13
1.5.6 Digital Epidemiology 13
1.5.7 Internet of Things (IoT) 13
1.5.7.1 IoT for Health Insurance Companies 14
1.5.7.2 IoT for Physicians 14
1.5.7.3 IoT for Hospitals 15
1.5.7.4 IoT for Patients 15
1.5.8 Improved Supply Chain Management 16
1.5.9 Developing New Therapies and Innovations 16
1.6 Challenges in Big Data Analytics 16
1.7 Big Data Privacy and Security 17
1.8 Conclusion 18
1.9 Future Work 18
References 18
v
vi Contents
Introduction
The novel applications of Big Data Analytics and machine intelligence in
biomedical and healthcare sector can be regarded as an emerging field in
computer science, medicine, biology application, natural environmental
engineering, and pattern recognition. The use of various Data Analytics
and intelligence techniques are nowadays successfully implemented in
many healthcare sectors. Biomedical and Health Informatics is a new era
that brings tremendous opportunities and challenges due to easily avail-
able plenty of biomedical data. Machine learning presenting tremendous
improvement in accuracy, robustness, and cross-language generalizabil-
ity over conventional approaches. The aim of healthcare informatics is to
ensure the high-quality, efficient healthcare, better treatment and quality
of life by efficiently analyzing the abundant biomedical, and healthcare
data. Earlier, it was common requirements to have a domain expert to
develop a model for biomedical or healthcare; but now the patterns are
learned automatically for prediction. Due to the rapid advances in intel-
ligent algorithms have established the growing significance in health-
care data analytics. The IoT focuses to the common idea of things that
is recognizable, readable, locatable, controllable, and addressable via the
Internet. Intelligent Learning aims to provide computational methods for
accumulating, updating and changing knowledge in the intelligent systems
and particularly learning mechanisms that help us to induce knowledge
from the data. It is helpful in cases where direct algorithmic solutions are
unavailable, there is lack of formal models, or the knowledge about the
application domain is inadequately defined. In Future Big data analytics
has the impending capability to change the way we work and live. With the
influence and the development of the Big Data, IoT concept, the need for
xiii
xiv Preface
eyes for observing the changes in Retinal Blood Vessels and Optic Disc &
Optic Cup to classify as healthy or diseased eyes.For validating all these
robust segmentation algorithms standard metrics are used in evaluating
the performance of segmentation models. Consequently, the experimen-
tal result and comparison analysis are presented to estimate the efficacy
of the proposed algorithm. As a result, standard metrics of the proposed
algorithm were compared with many other previous methods suggested by
various researchers and it is confirmed as to attain better efficacy values.
In Chapter 5, “Analysis of Healthcare Systems Using Computational
Approaches” Hemanta Kumar Bhuyan and Subhendu Kumar Pani high-
light recent contributions and efficiency of AI and ML in computer sys-
tems development for better healthcare and precision medicine. Despite
various traditional and AI-based solutions, current healthcare constraints
and challenges include uneven distribution of resources towards the future
of digital healthcare. Unmet clinical research and data analytics requires
the development of intelligent and secure systems to support the transfor-
mation of practices for the worldwide application of precision medicine.
Overarching goals include new multifunctional platforms that incorporate
heterogeneous clinical data from multiple platforms based on clinical, AI,
and technical premises. It must address possible challenges that continue
to slow the progress of this breakthrough approach.
In Chapter 6, “Expert Systems in Behavioral and Mental Healthcare:
Applications of AI in Decision-Making and Consultancy” Shrikaant
Kulkarni Present the latest technological advancements so as to showcase
futuristic challenges and a glance at potential innovations on the hori-
zon. The treatise enumerates the expert systems in behavioral and mental
healthcare areas. It also further discusses the benefits AI can offer to behav-
ioral and mental healthcare.
In Chapter 7, “A Mathematical-Based Epidemic Model to Prevent and
Control Outbreak of Corona Virus 2019 (COVID-19)” Shanmuk Srinivas
Amiripalli, Vishnu Vardhan Reddy Kollu, Ritika Prasad, Mukkamala
S.N.V. Jitendra provide a preliminary evolutionary graph theory based
mathematical model was designed for control and prevention of COVID-
19. In the proposed model, well known technique of social distancing with
different variations are implemented. Lockdown by many countries leads
to the decrease of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and increase in mental
problems in citizens. These two problems can be solved by the administra-
tion of antivirus in some form to the public as a counterpart to the virus.
This model works more effectively with high percolation of antiviral nodes
in a population and over a period of time. There should be an exponential
growth of antivirus nodes to heal the infected population.
Preface xvii
Concluding Remarks
The chapters of this book were written by eminent professors, researchers
and those involved in the industry from different countries. The chapters
were initially peer reviewed by the editorial board members, reviewers, and
those in the industry, who themselves span many countries. The chapters
are arranged to all have the basic introductory topics and advancements as
well as future research directions, which enable budding researchers and
engineers to pursue their work in this area.
Big Data Analytics and machine intelligence in biomedical and health
informatics is so diversified that it cannot be covered in a single book.
However, with the encouraging research contributed by the researchers
in this book, we (contributors), editorial board members, and reviewers
tried to sum up the latest research domains, developments in the data
analytics field, and applicable areas. First and foremost, we express our
heartfelt appreciation to all the authors. We thank them all for considering
Preface xix
and trusting this edited book as the platform for publishing their valuable
work. We also thank all the authors for their kind co-operation extended
during the various stages of processing of the manuscript. This edited
book will serve as a motivating factor for those researchers who have spent
years working as crime analysts, data analysts, statisticians, and budding
researchers.
Abstract
There is a notable rise in the amount of data being generated in the healthcare
industries. Trying to improve the health outcomes and cut the costs derived from
better utilization of healthcare data has been of great interest to healthcare provid-
ers (and the abundance of the data has brought that about big change), whereas the
nature of healthcare data presents specific problems when it comes to processing
and looking at big data, particularly, as well as analyzing the abundance of it. Some
new ideas about how to deal with these problems are discussed in this chapter.
According to this chapter, there are two ways in which advances in processing
healthcare data have been made in the last 10 years that may make generating bet-
ter predictions from the medical data feasible. Firstly by using advancing techno-
logical methods of analysis and secondly developing novel models that can handle
large quantities of data.
1.1 Introduction
Big Data has the potential to transform all sorts of business sectors, from
the wellness of individuals to the provision of healthcare. For the pur-
poses of most current day, Big Data is defined as “storing, arranging,
and processing, the current huge amounts of heterogeneous data, getting
results, and then reorganized and measured data is called Clean/Big Data”.
Email: [email protected]
Sunil Kumar Dhal, Subhendu Kumar Pani, Srinivas Prasad and Sudhir Kumar Mohapatra (eds.)
Big Data Analytics and Machine Intelligence in Biomedical and Health Informatics: Concepts,
Methodologies, Tools and Applications, (1–20) © 2022 Scrivener Publishing LLC
1
2 Big Data Analytics in Health Informatics
B
Reducing I Smart
Fraud G Staffing
Predictive Improved Strategic
Analytics D Planning
A
T
A
H
E
A
L
Improved T
Supply-chain H Telemedicine
EHRs C Medical
A Imaging
R
E
Veriety Veracity
1. Multifactor
2. Unstructured 1. Accountability
3. Structured 2. Authenticity
4. Probabilistic 3. Trustworthiness
4. Reputation
5 Vs of Big Data
1. Terabytes 1. Events
2. Arch/Records 2. Correlations
3. Transactions 3. Statistical
4. Files/Tables 4. Hypothetical
Velocity
Volume Value
1. Batch
2. Near/Real-Time
3. Streams
4. Processes
A B
1.3.1 Genomics
In [2] the author suggested that the estimated price of sequencing the
human DNA (the “combing cost” of) has dropped significantly in the
past few years [cost to combing the 30,000 to 35,000 gene map is now
inversely proportional to how many genes are found] on the grand scale,
and as it is to computational biology, developing genome-scale solutions
that are applied to the field of public health can have implications for cur-
rent and future public health policies and services. In 2013 [3] researcher
An Introduction to Big Data Analytics 7
to effectively collect, share, and use more comprehensive data [16]. This
creates an opportunity for big data analytics to play a more significant role
in assisting the exploration and discovery process. Improving care delivery,
assisting in the design and planning of healthcare policy, and providing a
means of comprehensively measuring and evaluating the complicated and
convoluted healthcare data. More importantly, the adoption of insights
gleaned from big data analytics has the potential to save lives, improve care
delivery, expand access to healthcare, align payment with performance,
and aid in containing the perplexing growth of healthcare costs.
doctors’ orders. While EHRs are an excellent idea, many countries have yet
to fully implement them. The United States has made significant strides,
with 94% of hospitals adopting EHRs, according to this HITECH research,
but the European Union continues to lag behind. However, an ambitious
directive being drafted by the European Commission is intended to alter
that situation.
Kaiser Permanente is setting the standard in the United States and may
serve as a model for the EU. They’ve fully implemented a system called
Health Connect, which allows data to be shared across all of their locations
and simplifies the use of EHRs. According to a McKinsey report on big
data healthcare, the integrated system has improved cardiovascular disease
outcomes and saved an estimated $1 billion through reduced office visits
and lab tests.
1.5.2 Telemedicine
Television conferences, smartphones, and other wireless devices, and
wearables being able to provide on-the-demand healthcare have recently
brought about a major advancements in medical field using “Telemedicine”.
A “Telemedicine” term is used to describe healthcare and treatment facil-
ity via electronic devices. Electronic or satellite technologies are used for
the delivery of clinical services that are not close to where patients are
located.
Physicians use it for primary consultations, for early detection, for the
development of disease, and for educating their colleagues, and as a tool
for remote monitoring. While some uses, like robotic surgery, tele-surgery,
allow them to operate at a quicker pace with high-resolution data feedback,
these do not require the doctor and patient to be in the same location;
others like ultrasonography allow for the use of wider applications like
fast-molecular imaging/live motion, still apply the principle of real-time
feedback.
Clinicians deliver highly personalized treatment plans as well as helping
to keep patients out of the hospital. Prior to this most healthcare orga-
nizations had used analytical techniques such as demographics, maps,
databases, and graphical presentations in conjunction with predictive ana-
lytics to investigate issues related to healthcare delivery system growth and
geographical issues. Additionally, by making early judgments on how the
patient will respond to changes in his or her condition, this helps clinicians
predict acute illnesses before they become worse.
By keeping patients away from hospitals, telemedicine helps greatly and
reduces the cost while improving service quality. Patients don’t have to wait
12 Big Data Analytics in Health Informatics
in line and doctors don’t make time wasting in line or dealing with unnec-
essary paperwork a priority. Telemedicine particularly improves access to
care, since monitoring of patients’ physical conditions is now possible no
matter where they are, at any time.
It’s good for simple data that is only read rarely, but has the potential
to expand to contain more data because of its expandability. It keeps vast
amounts of data in one column family; in other words, the column fam-
ily database stores huge numbers of individual columns all at once. The
semi-structured data contains vast amounts of information pertaining to
document formats, with regard to the documents in it, or data (opinions,
theories, opinions, or interpretations). The last thing on the graph is the
inversion of an N-to-M relationship, which is a Q-to-M relationship which
is recorded as an N-to-entry database.
enhanced security and strict access controls that give the end users/clients
the appropriate levels of protection, it must also have excellent governance
controls that make sure user privacy and control is maintained.
1.8 Conclusion
The use of big data analytics in medicine and healthcare is incredibly
powerful, productive, interesting, and diverse. It integrates heterogeneous
data like medical records, experimental, electronic health, and social data
in order to explore the relations among the different characteristics and
traces of data points like diagnoses and medication dosages, along with
information such as public chatter to derive conclusions about outcomes.
More diverse data needs to be combined into big data analysis, such as bio-
sciences, sensor informatics, medical informatics, bioinformatics, and
health computational biomedicine to get the truth out of its information.
References
1. Manogaran, G., Lopez, D., Thota, C., Abbas, K.M., Pyne, S., Sundarasekar, R., Big
data analytics in healthcare internet of things, in: Innovative healthcare systems
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2. Lander, E.S., Linton, L.M., Birren, B., Nusbaum, C., Zody, M.C., Baldwin, J.,
Devon, K., Dewar, K., Doyle, M., FitzHugh, W. et al., Initial sequencing and
analysis of the human genome, Nature, 409, 6822, 2001.
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3. Caulfield, T., Evans, J., McGuire, A., McCabe, C., Bubela, T., Cook-Deegan,
R., Fishman, J., Hogarth, S., Miller, F.A., Ravitsky, V. et al., Reflections on
the cost of “low-cost” whole genome sequencing: framing the health policy
debate. PloS Biol., 11, 11, e1001699, 2013.
4. Hood, L. and Friend, S.H., Predictive, personalized, preventive, participatory
(p4) cancer medicine. Nat. Rev. Clin. Oncol., 8, 3, 184–187, 2011.
5. Chen, R., Mias, G.I., Li-Pook-Than, J., Jiang, L., Lam, H.Y.K., Chen, R.,
Miriami, E., Karczewski, K.J., Hariharan, M., Dewey, F.E. et al., Personal
omics profiling reveals dynamic molecular and medical phenotypes. Cell,
148, 1293–1307, 2012.
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8. Drew, B.J., Harris, P., Z`egre-Hemsey, J.K., Mammone, T., Schindler, D.,
Salas-Boni, R., Bai, Y., Tinoco, A., Ding, Q. and Hu, X., Insights into the
problem of alarm fatigue with physiologic monitor devices: A comprehen-
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2
Identify Determinants of Infant and
Child Mortality Based Using Machine
Learning: Case Study on Ethiopia
Sudhir Kumar Mohapatra1*, Srinivas Prasad2, Getachew Mekuria Habtemariam3
and Mohammed Siddique4
2
GITAM University, Vishakapatnam, India
3
Addis Ababa Science and Technology University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
4
Department of Mathematics, Centurion University of Technology and Management,
Odisha, India
Abstract
The Ethiopian government doing for the past two decades for attaining millen-
nium development goals agenda for preventing childhood mortality by improving
the child health’s to change the country image to the rest of the world in reduction
of childhood mortality. This study contributes some values in the improvement
of childhood health by analyzing the determinants infant and child mortality by
using machine learning techniques. Different reports indicate that the distribution
of childhood mortality differs in the world. According to the United Nations Inter-
Agency Group, 2017 noted the nationwide young child fatality ratio dropped into
56 percentages starting from 1990 to 2016. In 1990 the deaths per 1,000 live births
were 93 percent as well as in 2016 counted 41 percent. Ethiopian demographic and
health survey 2016 report of 2017 indicates that for the previous 5 years review, the
young child fatality ratio was 67 deaths per 1,000 live births, beside this, the neo-
nate mortality ratio was 48 deaths per 1,000 live births. The purposes of research
aimed to identify factors and developed predictive models using four supervised
machine learning techniques using the 2016 EDHS dataset of 10,641 records.
Keywords: Child mortality, EDHS, SVM, RF, C5.0, Naïve Bayes models,
sampling techniques
Sunil Kumar Dhal, Subhendu Kumar Pani, Srinivas Prasad and Sudhir Kumar Mohapatra (eds.)
Big Data Analytics and Machine Intelligence in Biomedical and Health Informatics: Concepts,
Methodologies, Tools and Applications, (21–46) © 2022 Scrivener Publishing LLC
21
22 Big Data Analytics in Health Informatics
2.1 Introduction
Ethiopia is one of the developing countries and working on different policies
to reach and join a developed country. One of these policies is the improve-
ment of infant and child health’s and reducing child mortality rate. For the
past two decades the Ethiopian government has been trying to attain mil-
lennium development goals agenda for preventing childhood mortality by
improving children’s health. This improvement of children’s health by the
government helps for the achievement of the government policy and a good
image of the country to the rest of the world. This chapter contributes some
values in the improvement of childhood health by analyzing the determi-
nants of infant and child mortality by using machine learning techniques.
Different reports indicate that the distribution of childhood mortality dif-
fers in the world. Infant and child mortality is defined according to Ethiopia
Demographic and Health surveys as the death of babies between births to
the fifth birthday and mortality rate (MR) was ration of total number of
infant and child deaths per 1,000 live births in a stipulated period of time [1].
When we look at the distribution of childhood mortality, different reports
indicated that there was still a big issue in the case of infant and child mor-
tality. Globally, an estimated 6.6 million children under five died in 2012,
where 18,000 children under five were dying every day. From this 3.2 mil-
lion of the children did not reach their fifth birthday in 2012 which most
died as a result of easily preventable infectious diseases in Africa continent’s
[2]. According to the United Nations Inter-Agency Group’s 2017 report [3]
the global under-five mortality rate declined by 56% starting from 1990 to
2016. In 1990 the deaths per 1,000 live births were 93% and in 2016 counted
41%. The burden of under-five deaths remains unevenly distributed. About
80% of under-five deaths occur in two regions, sub-Saharan Africa and
Southern Asia. Six countries account for half of the worldwide under-five
deaths, namely, India, Nigeria, Pakistan, Congo, Ethiopia, and China. The
report indicates child mortality still remains one of the great wrongs of our
modern world. According to the 2017 status report on Maternal Newborn
Child and Adolescent Health [4] in 2015, 79 countries globally have an
under-five mortality rate above 25, and 47 of them did not meet the pro-
posed sustainable development goal (SDG) target of 25 deaths per 1,000 live
births by 2030 if they continue their current trends in reducing under-five
mortality. The report indicates that in 2015 under-five mortality rate for
the continent was 76 deaths per 1,000 live births, which is 67% above the
recommended SDG target of 25 deaths per 1,000.
Ethiopian Infant and Child Mortality Using ML 23
FOOTNOTES
[490] They had now been four days in Mexico, without going farther than the
palace, says Bernal Diaz. A page named Orteguilla, who had already acquired a
smattering of Aztec, was sent with the interpreters to ask this favor. Hist. Verdad.,
69.
[491] Soldiers who had been in Rome and Constantinople declared that never had
they seen so large and orderly a market, with so large an attendance. Bernal Diaz
indicates the site of the plaza to have been where the church of Santiago de
Tlatelulco was erected, and this still remains under the same name, over a mile
north-west-by-north of the central plaza of Mexico. Hist. Verdad., 70-1. The old
maps of Mexico already spoken of give the same site, and Alaman’s investigations
point out correctly the street which led and leads to it, although he has failed to
notice the above authorities, which give the very site. Disert., ii. 282-5.
[492] It has been generally accepted that the temple in the centre of the city was
visited, but Bernal Diaz, who is the only narrator of this excursion, states distinctly,
in several places, that the pyramid ascended was situated in the Tlatelulco
market-place, ‘adonde está aora señor Santiago, que se dize el Tlatelulco.’ Hist.
Verdad., 70-1. The description of the temple court and interior is somewhat
confused, and evidently combines points which belong to the central temple.
[494] Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 70-1. Sigüenza y Góngora, the well-known
Mexican scholar of the seventeenth century, follows Bernal Diaz. Anotaciones
Crit., MS., 1-2.
[496] He refers to this promise in the second letter to the king, saying, ‘porque
certifiqué á V. A. que lo habria preso ó muerto ó súbdito.’ Cortés, Cartas, 52.
[497] ‘En la verdad era así é lo tinien acordado,’ affirms Tapia, Rel., in Icazbalceta,
Col. Doc., ii. 579. ‘Estas nueuas, falsas, o verdaderas,’ is the non-committing
phrase of Gomara. Hist. Mex., 123. Ixtlilxochitl takes firmer ground. ‘According to
an original letter in my possession, signed by the three heads of New Spain, and
written to his Majesty the emperor, our master, they exculpate Motecuhzoma and
the Mexicans of this and other charges, declaring them inventions of the
Tlascaltecs and of some Spaniards who feared that they would never see the hour
when they might leave the city and place in security the riches they had obtained.’
Hist. Chich., 296. Clavigero adopts the view that Cortés called for such testimony
from certain chiefs among his allies, whose dislike of the Mexicans would be sure
to prompt it. ‘Per giustificar vieppiù il suo attentato, e muovere i suoi Spagnuoli ad
eseguirlo, fece chiamar parecchie persone principali de’ suoi alleati (la cui
informazione dovrebbe sempre essergli sospettosa).’ Storia Mess., iii. 90-1.
Vetancurt has a story that, a drought prevailing at the time, the Spaniards induced
the heavens by means of masses and prayers to send rain. This made the priests
and idols jealous, and the emperor was prevailed on to rid himself of the
Spaniards. The Tlascaltecs learned of the plot and reported it. Teatro, pt. iii. 130.
[498] According to Bernal Diaz the members of this council suggested not only the
seizure but the reasons for it. Cortés responded that he had not been oblivious of
the danger, but saw not how the seizure could be effected. The captains proposed
to beguile the prince to their quarter and detain him. If Cortés hesitated they were
willing to undertake the task. The old soldier is evidently misled, as he was in the
scuttling affair, to assume too much credit for himself and his fellow-soldiers.
Cortés had no doubt adopted his common tactics, so frequently admitted by
Bernal Diaz himself, of inspiring his comrades to suggest what he had resolved
on. This is proved by the promise made to the emperor in his first letter, four
months before, to capture Montezuma.
[499] Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 73, followed by a number of other writers, states
that the letter was received at Mexico the morning after this meeting, but it has
been shown that he must be wrong. He mentions as one of the statements in the
letter that the Totonacs were in revolt, and it is probable that Cortés may have said
so to show the soldiers that retreat was cut off, and that seizure was the only
recourse.
[501] The neglect of this less speedy plan does indicate that the rumors of danger
were credited to a great extent at least.
[502] Hist. Verdad., 74. Cortés in his quiet way writes to the king that, after
passing six days in the great city, and finding that for various reasons ‘it suited the
royal interest and our safety to have this lord in my power, and not wholly at liberty,
lest he change in the proposal and desire manifested to serve Y. H.... I resolved to
seize and place him in the quarter where I was.’ Cartas, 88-9.
[503] ‘Mandó que su gente dos á dos ó cuatro á cuatro se fuesen tras él ... é con
él entramos hasta treinta españoles é los demas quedaban á la puerta de la casa,
é en un patio della,’ says Tapia, who appears to have been one of those who
entered. Rel., in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., ii. 579.
[504] ‘Cõ armas secretas,’ says Gomara, Hist. Mex., 123, and probably they did
bear extra weapons beneath their cloaks.
[505] ‘Y otras hijas de señores á algunos de mi compañía.’ Cortés, Cartas, 89. But
the customary mark of favor was to give them from his harem. See Native Races,
ii.
[506] ‘Per non dar disgusto al Re, e per avere occasione di farla Cristiana,’ is
Clavigero’s excuse for the acceptance. Storia Mess., iii. 93. Brasseur de
Bourbourg, and some other writers, assume that Cortés declined; but the original
authorities all say or intimate that he accepted. Even Cortés himself writes in his
letter to the emperor, ‘despues ... de haberme él dado algunas joyas de oro y una
hija suya,’ etc. Cartas, 89. ‘Le persuadió,’ says Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., 290.
Gomara is even more explicit, and Herrera says that Montezuma insisted, ‘porque
queria tener nietos de hombre tan valeroso.’ dec. ii. lib. viii. cap. ii. The affair is
perhaps less important in itself than as index to the character of Cortés, who could
accept so intimate an offer with one hand while he prepared a blow with the other.
It might also be made to indicate that Montezuma could have had no base designs
against him when he made the uncalled-for offer of intrusting a daughter (if such
she was) to his keeping. Still the imperial character would not have suffered had it
been shown that this was but an artifice to lull his intended victim into a false
security.
[507] Some authors, like Herrera and Torquemada, say that he denied all
knowledge of the occurrence, calling it an invention of enemies.
[508] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., 297. ‘Q̄ tenia la figura de Vitzilopuchtli,’ Gomara,
123; and so says Bernal Diaz. Tapia states that Montezuma told Cortés to send
two Spaniards with the messengers; but he doubtless declined to risk two lives on
such a trip. Rel., in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., ii. 583-4.
[509] ‘Ingrato rey!’ exclaims Gallo, in commenting upon this surrender of a devoted
officer. Hombres Ilust. Mex., i. 318.
[510] Bernal Diaz makes Cortés accuse the emperor of perfidy, and of having
instigated the Cholula massacre. Hist. Verdad., 74. But this he would hardly do,
since his purpose was clearly to persuade, not to arouse anger.
[511] ‘No querria començar guerra, ni destruir aquesta Ciudad ... que si alboroto, ò
vozes daua, que luego sereis muerto de aquestos mis Capitanes, que no los
traigo para otro efeto,’ is Bernal Diaz’ blunt version. Hist. Verdad., 74.
[512] ‘Auia tenido platica de su idolo Huichilobos ... que convenia para su salud, y
guardar su vida, estar con nosotros.’ Id., 75.
[513] ‘Estuuieron mas de media hora en estas platicas.’ Id., 74. Tapia and others
say four hours, which is unlikely.
[514] ‘Porque mas vale que desta vez asseguremos nuestras vidas, ò las
perdamos.’ Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 75.
[515] ‘Era, ó muy falto de ánimo, ó pusilánime, ó muy prudente.’ Oviedo, iii. 289.
‘En él se cumplió lo que de él se decia, que todo hombre cruel es cobarde,
aunque á la verdad, era ya llegada la voluntad de Dios.’ Ixtlilxochitl, Rel., 411.
[516] Bernal Diaz intimates clearly enough that no demonstration was made till
after his arrival. Hist. Verdad., 75. And so does Cortés. ‘Llorando lo tomaron en
ella [the litter] con mucho silencio, y así nos fuimos hasta el aposento donde
estaba, sin haber alboroto en la ciudad, aunque se comenzó á mover. Pero sabido
por el dicho Muteczuma, envió a mandar que no lo hubiese; y así, hubo toda
quietud.’ Cartas, 90. Ixtlilxochitl, however, allows Montezuma to stay long enough
in his palace, after ordering the litter, to enable the lords and nobles to come and
offer their services. A delay like this, which the Spaniards certainly never could
have permitted, might have given time for the tumultuous gathering which he
describes. Hist. Chich., 297. Prescott, in following this version, makes the emperor
so far overstep his usual dignity as to ‘call out’ to the people to disperse. ‘Tambien
detuvieron consigo á Itcuauhtzin, gobernador del Tlatilulco,’ says Sahagun, while
the leading nobles ‘cuando fue preso Mocthecuzoma le desampararon y se
escondieron.’ Hist. Conq., 25.
The seizure has, like the equally prominent episodes of the massacre at
Cholula, and the scuttling of the fleet, aroused no little comment in justification or
condemnation. ‘Now that I am old,’ says Bernal Diaz, ‘I stop to consider the heroic
deeds then performed, and I do say that our achievements were not effected by
ourselves, but were all brought about by God; for what men have existed in the
world who, less than 450 soldiers in number, dared to enter into so strong a city as
Mexico, larger than Venice, and so remote from Castile, to seize so great a lord?’
Hist. Verdad., 76. ‘Never Greek or Roman, nor of other nation, since kings exist,
performed a like deed, only Fernando Cortés, to seize Motecçuma, a king most
powerful, in his own house, in a place most strong, amid an infinity of people,
while possessing but 450 companions.’ Gomara, Hist. Mex., 124. Commenting on
this, Torquemada adds that ‘it was indeed a deed for daring never seen, and must
be attributed to God rather than to human heart.’ i. 458. Solis of course fails not to
extol the genius and daring of his hero, whose deed ‘appears rather in the light of
a fable’ than in consonance with simple history. Hist. Mex., i. 448. ‘A deed which
makes one tremble even to conceive, and much more to carry out. But God had
so determined it.’ Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., 296. ‘History contains nothing parallel to
this event, either with respect to the temerity of the attempt, or the success of the
execution,’ etc. Robertson’s Hist. Am., ii. 60. ‘An expedient, which none but the
most daring spirit, in the most desperate extremity, would have conceived.’
Prescott’s Mex., ii. 159. ‘An unparalleled transaction. There is nothing like it, I
believe, in the annals of the world.’ Helps’ Cortés, ii. 351. Clavigero is less carried
away by the incident, for he sees therein the hand of God. Nevertheless, he
sympathizes with Montezuma. Storia Mess., iii. 95, etc. Pizarro y Orellana finds
the deed eclipsed by the similar achievement, with a smaller force, under his
namesake Pizarro. Varones Ilvstres, 89-90. And later Mexican writers, like
Bustamante, see, naturally enough, nothing but what is detestable in the incident,
for according to the native records which form their gospel, Montezuma was
guiltless of any base intents. Unfortunately for them, these very records paint him
a blood-thirsty despot who punishes the slightest offence against himself, even
when merely suspected, with the most atrocious cruelty; one who is continually
seeking his aggrandizement at the expense of inoffensive, peace-loving tribes,
who oppresses not only conquered peoples, but his own subjects, with
extortionate taxes and levies to satisfy his inordinate appetite for pomp and for
new conquests. These records also admit that he had repeatedly sent sorcerers, if
not armies, to entrap and destroy the Spaniards. He who looked calmly on
hecatombs of his own subjects, slaughtered before his very eyes, would not
hesitate to condemn strangers for plotting against the throne which was dearer to
him than life itself. The Spaniards may have anticipated events considerably, but
there is no doubt that numerous personages, from Cuitlahuatzin downward, were
bitterly opposed to their enforced guests, and they would sooner or later have
realized the rumors which the allies began to circulate. Placed as he was, Cortés’
duty to himself, to the men intrusted to him, to his king, and to the cause of
religion, as then regarded, required him to give heed to such rumors, and, after
weighing their probability, to take the precautionary measure of seizing the
monarch, since retreat not only appeared fraught with disaster and dishonor, but
would be regarded as a neglect of opportunity and of duty. With Cortés, naught but
the first steps in assuming the conquest, and in usurping certain credit and means,
can be regarded as crimes, and the former of these was forced upon him by
circumstances of his age and surroundings. Every project, then, conceived by him
for the advancement of his great undertaking must redound to his genius as
soldier and leader. Of course, among these projects appear many which did not
advance the great object, and which must be condemned. But where do we find
greatness wholly free from stain?
CHAPTER XVIII.
DOUBLY REFINED DEALINGS.
1519-1520.