Chapter I
ANCIENT MEXICO- ITS CLIMATE AND ITS PRODUCTS- ITS PRIMITIVE RACES- AZTEC
EMPIRE
The country of the ancient Mexicans, or Aztecs as they were called,
formed but a very small part of the extensive territories comprehended
in the modern republic of Mexico. Its boundaries cannot be defined with
certainty. They were much enlarged in the latter days of the empire,
when they may be considered as reaching from about the eighteenth degree
north to the twenty-first on the Atlantic; and from the fourteenth to
the nineteenth, including a very narrow strip, on the Pacific. In its
greatest breadth, it could not exceed five degrees and a half,
dwindling, as it approached its south-eastern limits, to less than two.
It covered, probably, less than sixteen thousand square leagues. Yet,
such is the remarkable formation of this country, that though not more
than twice as large as New England, it presented every variety of
climate, and was capable of yielding nearly every fruit found between
the equator and. the Arctic circle. All along the Atlantic the country
is bordered by a broad tract, called the tierra caliente, or hot region,
which has the usual high temperature of equinoctial lands. Parched and
sandy plains are intermingled with others of exuberant fertility, almost
impervious from thickets of aromatic shrubs and wild flowers, in the
midst of which tower up trees of that magnificent growth which is found
only within the tropics. In this wilderness of sweets lurks the fatal
malaria, engendered, probably, by the decomposition of rank vegetable
substances in a hot and humid soil. The season of the bilious fever,-
vomito, as it is called,- which scourges these coasts, continues from
the spring to the autumnal equinox, when it is checked by the cold winds
that descend from Hudson's Bay. These winds in the winter season
frequently freshen into tempests, and, sweeping down the Atlantic coast
and the winding Gulf of Mexico, burst with the fury of a hurricane on
its unprotected shores, and on the neighbouring West India islands. Such
are the mighty spells with which Nature has surrounded this land of
enchantment, as if to guard the golden treasures locked up within its
bosom. The genius and enterprise of man have proved more potent than her
spells. After passing some twenty leagues across this burning region,
the traveller finds himself rising into a purer atmosphere. His limbs
recover their elasticity. He breathes more freely, for his senses are
not now oppressed by the sultry heats and intoxicating perfumes of the
valley. The aspect of nature, too, has changed, and his eye no longer
revels among the gay variety of colours with which the landscape was
painted there. The vanilla, the indigo, and the flowering cocoa-groves
disappear as he advances. The sugar-cane and the glossy-leaved banana
still accompany him; and, when he has ascended about four thousand feet,
he sees in the unchanging verdure, and the rich foliage of the
liquid-amber tree, that he has reached the height where clouds and mists
settle, in their passage from the Mexican Gulf. This is the region of
perpetual humidity; but he welcomes it with pleasure, as announcing his
escape from the influence of the deadly vomito. He has entered the
tierra templada, or temperate region, whose character resembles that of
the temperate zone of the globe. The features of the scenery become
grand, and even terrible. His road sweeps along the base of mighty
mountains, once gleaming with volcanic fires, and still resplendent in
their mantles of snow, which serve as beacons to the mariner, for many a
league at sea. All around he beholds traces of their ancient
combustion, as his road passes along vast tracts of lava, bristling in
the innumerable fantastic forms into which the fiery torrent has been
thrown by the obstacles in its career. Perhaps, at the same moment, as
he casts his eye down some steep slope, or almost unfathomable ravine,
on the margin of the road, he sees their depths glowing with the rich
blooms and enamelled vegetation of the tropics. Such are the singular
contrasts presented, at the same time, to the senses, in this
picturesque region! Still pressing upwards, the traveller mounts into
other climates favourable to other kinds of cultivation. The yellow
maize, or Indian corn, as we usually call it, has continued to follow
him up from the lowest level; but he now first sees fields of wheat, and
the other European grains, brought into the country by the conquerors.
Mingled with them he views the plantations of the aloe or maguey (agave
Americana), applied to such various and important uses by the Aztecs.
The oaks now acquire a sturdier growth, and the dark forests of pine
announce that he has entered the tierra fria, or cold region, the third
and last of the great natural terraces into which the country is
divided. When he has climbed to the height of between seven and eight
thousand feet, the weary traveller sets his foot on the summit of the
Cordillera of the Andes,- the colossal range that, after traversing
South America and the Isthmus of Darien, spreads out, as it enters
Mexico, into that vast sheet of tableland which maintains an elevation
of more than six thousand feet, for the distance of nearly two hundred
leagues, until it gradually declines in the higher latitudes of the
north. Across this mountain rampart a chain of volcanic hills stretches,
in a westerly direction, of still more stupendous dimensions, forming,
indeed, some of the highest land on the globe. Their peaks, entering the
limits of perpetual snow, diffuse a grateful coolness over the elevated
plateaus below; for these last, though termed "cold," enjoy a climate,
the mean temperature of which is not lower than that of the central
parts of Italy. The air is exceedingly dry; the soil, though naturally
good, is rarely clothed with the luxuriant vegetation of the lower
regions. It frequently, indeed, has a parched and barren aspect, owing
partly to the greater evaporation which takes place on these lofty
plains, through the diminished pressure of the atmosphere; and partly,
no doubt, to the want of trees to shelter the soil from the fierce
influence of the summer sun. In the time of the Aztecs, the tableland
was thickly covered with larch, oak, cypress, and other forest trees,
the extraordinary dimensions of some of which, remaining to the present
day, show that the curse of barrenness in later times is chargeable more
on man than on nature. Indeed the early Spaniards made as
indiscriminate war on the forests as did our Puritan ancestors, though
with much less reason. After once conquering the country, they had no
lurking ambush to fear from the submissive semi-civilised Indian, and
were not, like our forefathers, obliged to keep watch and ward for a
century. This spoliation of the ground, however, is said to have been
pleasing to their imaginations, as it reminded them of the plains of
their own Castile,- the tableland of Europe; where the nakedness of the
landscape forms the burden of every traveller's lament, who visits that
country. Midway across the continent, somewhat nearer the Pacific than
the Atlantic ocean, at an elevation of nearly seven thousand five
hundred feet, is the celebrated Valley of Mexico. It is of an oval form,
about sixty-seven leagues in circumference, and is encompassed by a
towering rampart of porphyritic rock, which nature seems to have
provided, though ineffectually, to protect it from invasion. The soil,
once carpeted with a beautiful verdure and thickly sprinkled with
stately trees, is often bare, and, in many places, white with the
incrustation of salts, caused by the draining of the waters. Five lakes
are spread over the Valley, occupying one tenth of its surface. On the
opposite borders of the largest of these basins, much shrunk in its
dimensions since the days of the Aztecs, stood the cities of Mexico and
Tezcoco, the capitals of the two most potent and flourishing states of
Anahuac, whose history, with that of the mysterious races that preceded
them in the country, exhibits some of the nearest approaches to
civilisation to be met with anciently on the North American continent.
Of these races the most conspicuous were the Toltecs. Advancing from a
northerly direction, but from what region is uncertain, they entered the
territory of Anahuac, probably before the close of the seventh century.
Of course, little can be gleaned, with certainty, respecting a people
whose written records have perished, and who are known to us only
through the traditional legends of the nations that succeeded them. By
the general agreement of these, however, the Toltecs were well
instructed in agriculture, and many of the most useful mechanic arts;
were nice workers of metals; invented the complex arrangement of time
adopted by the Aztecs; and, in short, were the true fountains of the
civilisation which distinguished this part of the continent in later
times. They established their capital at Tula, north of the Mexican
Valley, and the remains of extensive buildings were to be discerned
there at the time of the Conquest. The noble ruins of religious and
other edifices, still to be seen in various parts of New Spain, are
referred to this people, whose name, Toltec, has passed into a synonym
for architect. Their shadowy history reminds us of those primitive
races, who preceded the ancient Egyptians in the march of civilisation;
fragments of whose monuments, as they are seen at this day, incorporated
with the buildings of the Egyptians themselves, give to these latter
the appearance of almost modern constructions. After a period of four
centuries, the Toltecs, who had extended their sway over the remotest
borders of Anahuac, having been greatly reduced, it is said, by famine,
pestilence, and unsuccessful wars, disappeared from the land as silently
and mysteriously as they had entered it. A few of them still lingered
behind, but much the greater number, probably, spread over the region of
Central America and the neighbouring isles; and the traveller now
speculates on the majestic ruins of Mitla and Palenque as possibly the
work of this extraordinary people. After the lapse of another hundred
years, a numerous and rude tribe, called the Chichimecas, entered the
deserted country from the regions of the far North-west. They were
speedily followed by other races, of higher civilisation, perhaps of the
same family with the Toltecs, whose language they appear to have
spoken. The most noted of these were the Aztecs, or Mexicans, and the
Acolhuans. The latter, better known in later times by the name of
Tezcocans, from their capital, Tezcoco, on the eastern border of the
Mexican lake, were peculiarly fitted, by their comparatively mild
religion and manners, for receiving the tincture of civilisation which
could be derived from the few Toltecs that still remained in the
country. This, in their turn, they communicated to the barbarous
Chichemees, a large portion of whom became amalgamated with the new
settlers as one nation. Availing themselves of the strength derived, not
only from the increase of numbers, but from their own superior
refinement, the Acolhuans gradually stretched their empire over the
ruder tribes in the north; while their capital was filled with a
numerous population, busily employed in many of the more useful and even
elegant arts of a civilised community. In this palmy state, they were
suddenly assaulted by a warlike neighbour, the Tepanecs, their own
kindred, and inhabitants of the same valley as themselves. Their
provinces were overrun, their armies beaten, their king assassinated,
and the flourishing city of Tezcoco became the prize of the victor. From
this abject condition the uncommon abilities of the young prince
Nezahualcoyotl, the rightful heir to the crown, backed by the efficient
aid of his Mexican allies, at length redeemed the state, and opened to
it a new career of prosperity, even more brilliant than the former. The
Mexicans, with whom our history is principally concerned, came also, as
we have seen, from the remote regions of the north,- the populous hive
of nations in the New World, as it has been in the Old. They arrived on
the borders of Anahuac towards the beginning of the thirteenth century,
some time after the occupation of the land by the kindred races. For a
long time they did not establish themselves in any permanent residence;
but continued shifting their quarters to different parts of the Mexican
Valley, enduring all the casualties and hardships of a migratory life.
On one occasion, they were enslaved by a more powerful tribe; but their
ferocity soon made them formidable to their masters. After a series of
wanderings and adventures, which need not shrink from comparison with
the most extravagant legends of the heroic ages of antiquity, they at
length halted on the south-western borders of the principal lake, in the
year 1325. They there beheld, perched on the stem of a prickly pear,
which shot out from the crevice of a rock that was washed by the waves, a
royal eagle of extraordinary size and beauty, with a serpent in his
talons, and his broad wings open to the rising sun. They hailed the
auspicious omen, announced by an oracle as indicating the site of their
future city, and laid its foundations by sinking piles into the
shallows; for the low marshes were half buried under water. On these
they erected their light fabrics of reeds and rushes; and sought a
precarious subsistence from fishing, and from the wild fowl which
frequented the waters, as well as from the cultivation of such simple
vegetables as they could raise on their floating gardens. The place was
called Tenochtitlan, though only known to Europeans by its other name of
Mexico, derived from their war-god, Mexitli. The legend of its
foundation is still further commemorated by the device of the eagle and
the cactus, which form the arms of the modern Mexican republic. Such
were the humble beginnings of the Venice of the Western World. The
forlorn condition of the new settlers was made still worse by domestic
feuds. A part of the citizens seceded from the main body, and formed a
separate community on the neighbouring marshes. Thus divided, it was
long before they could aspire to the acquisition of territory on the
main land. They gradually increased, however, in numbers, and
strengthened themselves yet more by various improvements in their polity
and military discipline, while they established a reputation for
courage as well as cruelty in war, which made their name terrible
throughout the Valley. In the early part of the fifteenth century,
nearly a hundred years from the foundation of the city, an event took
place which created an entire revolution in the circumstances, and, to
some extent, in the character of the Aztecs. This was the subversion of
the Tezcocan monarchy by the Tepanecs, already noticed. When the
oppressive conduct of the victors had at length aroused a spirit of
resistance, its prince, Nezahualcoyotl, succeeded, after incredible
perils and escapes, in mustering such a force, as, with the aid of the
Mexicans, placed him on a level with his enemies. In two successive
battles these were defeated with great slaughter, their chief slain, and
their territory, by one of those sudden reverses which characterise the
wars of petty states, passed into the hands of the conquerors. It was
awarded to Mexico, in return for its important services. Then was formed
that remarkable league, which, indeed, has no parallel in history. It
was agreed between the states of Mexico, Tezcoco, and the neighbouring
little kingdom of Tlacopan, that they should mutually support each other
in their wars, offensive and defensive, and that, in the distribution
of the spoil, one fifth should be assigned to Tlacopan, and the
remainder be divided, in what proportions is uncertain, between the
other powers. The Tezcocan writers claim an equal share for their nation
with the Aztecs. But this does not seem to be warranted by the immense
increase of territory subsequently appropriated by the latter. And we
may account for any advantage conceded to them by the treaty, on the
supposition, that however inferior they may have been originally, they
were, at the time of making it, in a more prosperous condition than
their allies, broken and dispirited by long oppression. What is more
extraordinary than the treaty itself, however, is the fidelity with
which it was maintained. During a century of uninterrupted warfare that
ensued, no instance occurred where the parties quarrelled over the
division of the spoil, which so often makes shipwreck of similar
confederacies among civilised states. The allies for some time found
sufficient occupation for their arms in their own valley; but they soon
overleaped its rocky ramparts, and by the middle of the fifteenth
century, under the first Montezuma, had spread down the sides of the
tableland to the borders of the Gulf of Mexico. Tenochtitlan, the Aztec
capital, gave evidence of the public prosperity. Its frail tenements
were supplanted by solid structures of stone and lime. Its population
rapidly increased. Its old feuds were healed. The citizens who had
seceded were again brought under a common government with the body, and
the quarter they occupied was permanently connected with the parent
city; the dimensions of which, covering the same ground, were much
larger than those of the modern capital. Fortunately, the throne was
filled by a succession of able princes, who knew how to profit by their
enlarged resources and by the martial enthusiasm of the nation. Year
after year saw them return, loaded with the spoils of conquered cities,
and with throngs of devoted captives, to their capital. No state was
able long to resist the accumulated strength of the confederates. At the
beginning of the sixteenth century, just before the arrival of the
Spaniard, the Aztec dominion reached across the continent from the
Atlantic to the Pacific; and, under the bold and bloody Ahuitzotl, its
arms had been carried far over the limits already noticed as defining
its permanent territory, into the farthest corners of Guatemala and
Nicaragua. This extent of empire, however limited in comparison with
that of many other states, is truly wonderful, considering it as the
acquisition of a people whose whole population and resources had so
recently been comprised within the walls of their own petty city; and
considering, moreover, that the conquered territory was thickly settled
by various races, bred to arms like the Mexicans, and little inferior to
them in social organisation. The history of the Aztecs suggests some
strong points of resemblance to that of the ancient Romans, not only in
their military successes, but in the policy which led to them.
Chapter II
SUCCESSION TO THE CROWN- AZTEC NOBILITY- JUDICIAL SYSTEM- LAWS AND
REVENUES- MILITARY INSTITUTIONS
THE form of government differed in the different states of Anahuac.
With the Aztecs and Tezcocans it was monarchical and nearly absolute. I
shall direct my inquiries to the Mexican polity, borrowing an
illustration occasionally from that of the rival kingdom. The government
was an elective monarchy. Four of the principal nobles, who had been
chosen by their own body in the preceding reign, filled the office of
electors, to whom were added, with merely an honorary rank, however, the
two royal allies of Tezcoco and Tlacopan. The sovereign was selected
from the brothers of the deceased prince, or, in default of them, from
his nephews. Thus the election was always restricted to the same family.
The candidate preferred must have distinguished himself in war, though,
as in the case of the last Montezuma, he were a member of the
priesthood. This singular mode of supplying the throne had some
advantages. The candidates received an education which fitted them for
the royal dignity, while the age at which they were chosen not only
secured the nation against the evils of minority, but afforded ample
means for estimating their qualifications for the office. The result, at
all events, was favourable; since the throne, as already noticed, was
filled by a succession of able princes, well qualified to rule over a
warlike and ambitious people. The scheme of election, however defective,
argues a more refined and calculating policy than was to have been
expected from a barbarous nation. The new monarch was installed in his
regal dignity with much parade of religious ceremony; but not until, by a
victorious campaign, he had obtained a sufficient number of captives to
grace his triumphal entry into the capital, and to furnish victims for
the dark and bloody rites which stained the Aztec superstition. Amidst
this pomp of human sacrifice he was crowned. The crown, resembling a
mitre in its form, and curiously ornamented with gold, gems, and
feathers, was placed on his head by the lord of Tezcoco, the most
powerful of his royal allies. The title of King, by which the earlier
Aztec princes are distinguished by Spanish writers, is supplanted by
that of Emperor in the later reigns, intimating, perhaps, his
superiority over the monarchies of Tlacopan and Tezcoco. The Aztec
princes, especially towards the close of the dynasty, lived in a
barbaric pomp, truly Oriental. Their spacious palaces were provided with
halls for the different councils, who aided the monarch in the
transaction of business. The chief of these was a sort of privy council,
composed in part, probably, of the four electors chosen by the nobles
after the accession, whose places, when made vacant by death, were
immediately supplied as before. It was the business of this body, so far
as can be gathered from the very loose accounts given of it, to advise
the king in respect to the government of the provinces, the
administration of the revenues, and, indeed, on all great matters of
public interest. In the royal buildings were accommodations, also, for a
numerous body-guard of the sovereign, made up of the chief nobility. It
is not easy to determine with precision, in these barbarian
governments, the limits of the several orders. It is certain there was a
distinct class of nobles, with large landed possessions, who held the
most important offices near the person of the prince, and engrossed the
administration of the provinces and cities. Many of these could trace
their descent from the founders of the Aztec monarchy. According to some
writers of authority, there were thirty great caciques, who had their
residence, at least a part of the year, in the capital, and who could
muster a hundred thousand vassals each on their estates. Without relying
on such wild statements, it is clear, from the testimony of the
conquerors, that the country was occupied by numerous powerful
chieftains, who lived like independent princes on their domains. It be
true that the kings encouraged, or indeed exacted, the residence of
these nobles in the capital, and required hostages in their absence, it
is evident that their power must have been very formidable. Their
estates appear to have been held by various tenures, and to have been
subject to different restrictions. Some of them, earned by their own
good swords or received as the recompense of public services, were held
without any limitation, except that the possessors could not dispose of
them to a plebeian. Others were entailed on the eldest male issue, and,
in default of such, reverted to the crown. Most of them seem to have
been burdened with the obligation of military service. The principal
chiefs of Tezcoco, according to its chronicler, were expressly obliged
to support their prince with their armed vassals, to attend his court,
and aid him in the counsel. Some, instead of these services, were to
provide for the repairs of his buildings, and to keep the royal demesnes
in order, with an annual offering, by way of homage, of fruits and
flowers. It was usual for a new king, on his accession, to confirm the
investiture of estates derived from the crown. It cannot be denied that
we recognise in all this several features of the feudal system, which,
no doubt, lose nothing of their effect, under the hands of the Spanish
writers, who are fond of tracing analogies to European institutions. But
such analogies lead sometimes to very erroneous conclusions. The
obligation of military service, for instance, the most essential
principle of a fief, seems to be naturally demanded by every government
from its subjects. As to minor points of resemblance, they fall far
short of that harmonious system of reciprocal service and protection
which embraced, in nice gradation, every order of a feudal monarchy. The
kingdoms of Anahuac were, in their nature, despotic, attended, indeed,
with many mitigating circumstances unknown to the despotisms of the
East; but it is chimerical to look for much in common- beyond a few
accidental forms and ceremonies- with those aristocratic institutions of
the Middle Ages, which made the court of every petty baron the precise
image in miniature of that of his sovereign. The legislative power, both
in Mexico and Tezcoco, resided wholly with the monarch. This feature of
despotism, however, was in some measure counteracted by the
constitution of the judicial tribunals- of more importance, among a rude
people, than the legislative, since it is easier to make good laws for
such a community than to enforce them, and the best laws, badly
administered, are but a mockery. Over each of the principal cities, with
its dependent territories, was placed a supreme judge, appointed by the
crown, with original and final jurisdiction in both civil and criminal
cases. There was no appeal from his sentence to any other tribunal, nor
even to the king. He held his office during life; and any one who
usurped his ensigns was punished with death. Below this magistrate was a
court, established in each province, and consisting of three members.
It held concurrent jurisdiction with the supreme judge in civil suits,
but in criminal an appeal lay to his tribunal. Besides these courts,
there was a body of inferior magistrates distributed through the
country, chosen by the people themselves in their several districts.
Their authority was limited to smaller causes, while the more important
were carried up to the higher courts. There was still another class of
subordinate officers, appointed also by the people, each of whom was to
watch over the conduct of a certain number of families, and report any
disorder or breach of the laws to the higher authorities. In Tezcoco the
judicial arrangements were of a more refined character; and a gradation
of tribunals finally terminated in a general meeting or parliament,
consisting of all the judges, great and petty, throughout the kingdom,
held every eighty days in the capital, over which the king presided in
person. This body determined all suits, which, from their importance, or
difficulty, had been reserved for its consideration by the lower
tribunals. It served, moreover, as a council of state, to assist the
monarch in the transaction of public business. Such are the vague and
imperfect notices that can be gleaned respecting the Aztec tribunals,
from the hieroglyphical paintings still preserved, and from the most
accredited Spanish writers. These, being usually ecclesiastics, have
taken much less interest in this subject than in matters connected with
religion. They find some apology, certainly, in the early destruction of
most of the Indian paintings, from which their information was, in
part, to be gathered. On the whole, however, it must be inferred, that
the Aztecs were sufficiently civilised to evince a solicitude for the
rights both of property and of persons. The law, authorising an appeal
to the highest judicature in criminal matters only, shows an attention
to personal security, rendered the more obligatory by the extreme
severity of their penal code, which would naturally have made them more
cautious of a wrong conviction. The existence of a number of co-ordinate
tribunals, without a central one of supreme authority to control the
whole, must have given rise to very discordant interpretations of the
law in different districts, an evil which they shared in common with
most of the nations of Europe. The provision for making the superior
judges wholly independent of the crown was worthy of an enlightened
people. It presented the strongest barrier, that a mere constitution
could afford, against tyranny. It is not, indeed, to be supposed that,
in a government otherwise so despotic, means could not be found for
influencing the magistrate. But it was a great step to fence round his
authority with the sanction of the law; and no one of the Aztec monarch,
as far as I know, is accused of an attempt to violate it. To receive
presents or a bribe, to be guilty of collusion in any way with a suitor,
was punished, in a judge, with death. Who, or what tribunal, decided as
to his guilt, does not appear. In Tezcoco this was done by the rest of
the court. But the king presided over that body. The Tezcocan prince,
Nezahualpilli, who rarely tempered justice with mercy, put one judge to
death for taking a bribe, and another for determining suits in his own
house,- a capital offence, also, by law. The judges of the higher
tribunals were maintained from the produce of a part of the crown lands,
reserved for this purpose. They, as well as the supreme judge, held
their offices for life. The proceedings in the courts were conducted
with decency and order. The judges wore an appropriate dress, and
attended to business both parts of the day, dining always, for the sake
of despatch, in an apartment of the same building where they held their
session; a method of proceeding much commended by the Spanish
chroniclers, to whom despatch was not very familiar in their own
tribunals. Officers attended to preserve order, and others summoned the
parties, and produced them in court. No counsel was employed; the
parties stated their own case, and supported it by their witnesses. The
oath of the accused was also admitted in evidence. The statement of the
case, the testimony, and the proceedings of the trial, were all set
forth by a clerk, in hieroglyphical paintings, and handed over to the
court. The paintings were executed with so much accuracy, that, in all
suits respecting real property, they were allowed to be produced as good
authority in the Spanish tribunals, very long after the Conquest. A
capital sentence was indicated by a line traced with an arrow across the
portrait of the accused. In Tezcoco, where the king presided in the
court, this, according to the national chronicler, was done with
extraordinary parade. His description, which is of rather a poetical
cast, I give in his own words: "In the royal palace of Tezcoco was a
courtyard, on the opposite sides of which were two halls of justice. In
the principal one, called the 'tribunal of God,' was a throne of pure
gold inlaid with turquoises and other precious stones. On a stool in
front, was placed a human skull, crowned with an immense emerald, of a
pyramidal form, and surmounted by an aigrette of brilliant plumes and
precious stones. The skull was laid on a heap of military weapons,
shields, quivers, bows, and arrows. The walls were hung with tapestry,
made of the hair of different wild animals, of rich and various colours,
festooned by gold rings, and embroidered with figures of birds and
flowers. Above the throne was a canopy of variegated plumage, from the
centre of which shot forth resplendent rays of gold and jewels. The
other tribunal, called 'the king's,' was also surmounted by a gorgeous
canopy of feathers, on which were emblazoned the royal arms. Here the
sovereign gave public audience, and communicated his despatches. But,
when he decided important causes, or confirmed a capital sentence, he
passed to 'the tribunal of God,' attended by the fourteen great lords of
the realm, marshalled according to their rank. Then, putting on his
mitred crown, incrusted with precious stones, and holding a golden
arrow, by way of sceptre, in his left hand, he laid his right upon the
skull, and pronounced judgment." All this looks rather fine for a court
of justice, it must be owned. But it is certain, that the Tezcocans, as
we shall see hereafter, possessed both the materials and the skill
requisite to work them up in this manner. Had they been a little further
advanced in refinement, one might well doubt their having the bad taste
to do so. The laws of the Aztecs were registered, and exhibited to the
people in their hieroglyphical paintings. Much the larger part of them,
as in every nation imperfectly civilised, relates rather to the security
of persons than of property. The great crimes against society were all
made capital. Even the murder of a slave was punished with death.
Adulterers, as among the Jews, were stoned to death. Thieving, according
to the degree of the offence, was punished by slavery or death. Yet the
Mexicans could have been under no great apprehension of this crime,
since the entrances to their dwellings were not secured by bolts, or
fastenings of any kind. It was a capital offence to remove the
boundaries of another's lands; to alter the established measures; and
for a guardian not to be able to give a good account of his ward's
property. These regulations evince a regard for equity in dealings, and
for private rights, which argues a considerable progress in
civilisation. Prodigals, who squandered their patrimony, were punished
in like manner; a severe sentence, since the crime brought its adequate
punishment along with it. Intemperance, which was the burden, moreover,
of their religious homilies, was visited with the severest penalties; as
if they had foreseen in it the consuming canker of their own, as well
as of the other Indian races in later times. It was punished in the
young with death, and in older persons with loss of rank and
confiscation of property. Yet a decent conviviality was not meant to be
proscribed at their festivals, and they possessed the means of indulging
it, in a mild fermented liquor, called pulque. The rites of marriage
were celebrated with as much formality as in any Christian country; and
the institution was held in such reverence, that a tribunal was
instituted for the sole purpose of determining questions relating to it.
Divorces could not be obtained, until authorised by a sentence of this
court, after a patient hearing of the parties. But the most remarkable
part of the Aztec code was that relating to slavery. There were several
descriptions of slaves: prisoners taken in war, who were almost always
reserved for the dreadful doom of sacrifice; criminals, public debtors,
persons who, from extreme poverty, voluntarily resigned their freedom,
and children who were sold by their own parents. In the last instance,
usually occasioned also by poverty, it was common for the parents, with
the master's consent, to substitute others of their children
successively, as they grew up: thus distributing the burden, as equally
as possible, among the different members of the family. The willingness
of freemen to incur the penalties of this condition is explained by the
mild form in which it existed. The contract of sale was executed in the
presence of at least four witnesses. The services to be exacted were
limited with great precision. The slave was allowed to have his own
family, to hold property, and even other slaves. His children were free.
No one could be born to slavery in Mexico, an honourable distinction,
not known, I believe, in any civilised community where slavery has been
sanctioned. Slaves were not sold by their masters, unless when these
were driven to it by poverty. They were often liberated by them at their
death, and sometimes, as there was no natural repugnance founded on
difference of blood and race, were married to them. Yet a refractory or
vicious slave might be led into the market, with a collar round his
neck, which intimated his bad character, and there be publicly sold,
and, on a second sale, reserved for sacrifice. The royal revenues were
derived from various sources. The crown lands, which appear to have been
extensive, made their returns in kind. The places in the neighbourhood
of the capital were bound to supply workmen and materials for building
the king's palaces, and keeping them in repair. They were also to
furnish fuel, provisions, and whatever was necessary for his ordinary
domestic expenditure, which was certainly on no stinted scale. The
principal cities, which had numerous villages and a large territory
dependent on them, were distributed into districts, with each a share of
the lands allotted to it, for its support. The inhabitants paid a
stipulated part of the produce to the crown. The vassals of the great
chiefs, also, paid a portion of their earnings into the public treasury;
an arrangement not at all in the spirit of the feudal institutions. In
addition to this tax on all the agricultural produce of the kingdom,
there was another on its manufactures. The nature and the variety of the
tributes will be best shown by an enumeration of some of the principal
articles. These were cotton dresses, and mantles of feather-work,
exquisitely made; ornamented armour; vases and plates of gold;
gold-dust, bands and bracelets; crystal, gilt, and varnished jars and
goblets; bells, arms, and utensils of copper; reams of paper; grain,
fruits, copal, amber, cochineal, cocoa, wild animals and birds, timber,
lime, mats, etc. In this curious medley of the most homely commodities,
and the elegant superfluities of luxury, it is singular that no mention
should be made of silver, the great staple of the country in later
times, and the use of which was certainly known to the Aztecs. Garrisons
were established in the larger cities,- probably those at a distance,
and recently conquered,- to keep down revolt, and to enforce the payment
of the tribute. Tax-gatherers were also distributed throughout the
kingdom, who were recognised by their official badges, and dreaded from
the merciless rigour of their exactions. By a stern law, every defaulter
was liable to be taken and sold as a slave. In the capital were
spacious granaries and warehouses for the reception of the tributes. A
receiver-general was quartered in the palace, who rendered in an exact
account of the various contributions, and watched over the conduct of
the inferior agents, in whom the least malversation was summarily
punished. This functionary was furnished with a map of the whole empire,
with a minute specification of the imposts assessed on every part of
it. These imposts, moderate under the reigns of the early princes,
became so burdensome under those of the close of the dynasty, being
rendered still more oppressive by the manner of collection, that they
bred disaffection throughout the land, and prepared the way for its
conquest by the Spaniards. Communication was maintained with the
remotest parts of the country by means of couriers. Post-houses were
established on the great roads, about two leagues distant from each
other. The courier, bearing his despatches in the form of a
hieroglyphical painting, ran with them to the first station, where they
were taken by another messenger, and carried forward to the next, and so
on till they reached the capital. These couriers, trained from
childhood, travelled with incredible swiftness; not four or five leagues
an hour, as an old chronicler would make us believe, but with such
speed that despatches were carried from one to two hundred miles a day.
Fresh fish was frequently served at Montezuma's table in twenty-four
hours from the time it had been taken in the Gulf of Mexico, two hundred
miles from the capital. In this way intelligence of the movements of
the royal armies was rapidly brought to court; and the dress of the
courier, denoting by its colour that of his tidings, spread joy or
consternation in the towns through which he passed. But the great aim of
the Aztec institutions to which private discipline and public honours
were alike directed, was the profession of arms. In Mexico, as in Egypt,
the soldier shared with the priest the highest consideration. The king,
as we have seen, must be an experienced warrior. The tutelary deity of
the Aztecs was the god of war. A great object of their military
expeditions was, to gather hecatombs of captives for his altars. The
soldier, who fell in battle, was transported at once to the region of
ineffable bliss in the bright mansions of the Sun. Every war, therefore,
became a crusade; and the warrior, animated by a religious enthusiasm,
like that of the early Saracen, or the Christian crusader, was not only
raised to a contempt of danger, but courted it, for the imperishable
crown of martyrdom. Thus we find the same impulse acting in the most
opposite quarters of the globe, and the Asiatic, the European, and the
American, each earnestly invoking the holy name of religion in the
perpetration of human butchery. The question of war was discussed in a
council of the king and his chief nobles. Ambassadors were sent,
previously to its declaration, to require the hostile state to receive
the Mexican gods, and to pay the customary tribute. The persons of
ambassadors were held sacred throughout Anahuac. They were lodged and
entertained in the great towns at the public charge, and were everywhere
received with courtesy, so long as they did not deviate from the
high-roads on their route. When they did, they forfeited their
privileges. If the embassy proved unsuccessful, a defiance, or open
declaration of war, was sent; quotas were drawn from the conquered
provinces, which Were always subjected to military service, as well as
the payment of taxes; and the royal army, usually with the monarch at
its head, began its march. The Aztec princes made use of the incentive
employed by European monarchs to excite the ambition of their followers.
They established various military orders, each having its privileges
and peculiar insignia. There seems, also, to have existed a sort of
knighthood, of inferior degree. It was the cheapest reward of martial
prowess, and whoever had not reached it was excluded from using
ornaments on his arms or his person, and obliged to wear a coarse white
stuff, made from the threads of the aloe, called nequen. Even the
members of the royal family were not excepted from this law, which
reminds one of the occasional practice of Christian knights, to wear
plain armour, or shields without device, till they had achieved some
doughty feat of chivalry. Although the military orders were thrown open
to all, it is probable that they were chiefly filled with persons of
rank, who, by their previous training and connections, were able to come
into the field under peculiar advantages. The dress of the higher
warriors was picturesque, and often magnificent. Their bodies were
covered with a close vest of quilted cotton, so thick as to be
impenetrable to the light missiles of Indian warfare. This garment was
so light and serviceable that it was adopted by the Spaniards. The
wealthier chiefs sometimes wore, instead of this cotton mail, a cuirass
made of thin plates of gold, or silver. Over it was thrown a surcoat of
the gorgeous feather-work in which they excelled. Their helmets were
sometimes of wood, fashioned like the heads of wild animals, and
sometimes of silver, on the top of which waved a panache of variegated
feathers, sprinkled with precious stones and ornaments of gold. They
wore also collars, bracelets, and earrings, of the same rich materials.
Their armies were divided into bodies of eight thousand men; and these,
again, into companies of three or four hundred, each with its own
commander. The national standard, which has been compared to the ancient
Roman, displayed, in its embroidery of gold and feather-work, the
armorial ensigns of the state. These were significant of its name,
which, as the names of both persons and places were borrowed from some
material object, was easily expressed by hieroglyphical symbols. The
companies and the great chiefs had also their appropriate banners and
devices, and the gaudy hues of their many-coloured plumes gave a
dazzling splendour to the spectacle. Their tactics were such as belong
to a nation with whom war, though a trade, is not elevated to the rank
of a science. They advanced singing, and shouting their war-cries,
briskly charging the enemy, as rapidly retreating, and making use of
ambuscades, sudden surprises, and the light skirmish of guerrilla
warfare. Yet their discipline was such as to draw forth the encomiums of
the Spanish conquerors. "A beautiful sight it was," says one of them,
"to see them set out on their march, all moving forward so gaily, and in
so admirable order!" In battle, they did not seek to kill their
enemies, so much as to take them prisoners; and they never scalped, like
other North American tribes. The valour of a warrior was estimated by
the number of his prisoners; and no ransom was large enough to save the
devoted captive. Their military code bore the same stern features as
their other laws. Disobedience of orders was punished with death. It was
death, also, for a soldier to leave his colours to attack the enemy
before the signal was given, or to plunder another's booty or prisoners.
One of the last Tezcocan princes, in the spirit of an ancient Roman,
put two sons to death,- after having cured their wounds,- for violating
the last-mentioned law. I must not omit to notice here an institution,
the introduction of which, in the Old World, is ranked among the
beneficent fruits of Christianity. Hospitals were established in the
principal cities for the cure of the sick, and the permanent refuge of
the disabled soldier; and surgeons were placed over them, "who were so
far better than those in Europe," says an old chronicler, "that they did
not protract the cure, in order to increase the pay." Such is the brief
outline of the civil and military polity of the ancient Mexicans; less
perfect than could be desired, in regard to the former, from the
imperfection of the sources whence it is drawn. Whoever has had occasion
to explore the early history of modern Europe has found how vague and
unsatisfactory is the political information which can be gleaned from
the gossip of monkish annalists. How much is the difficulty increased in
the present instance, where this information, first recorded in the
dubious language of hieroglyphics, was interpreted in another language,
with which the Spanish chroniclers were imperfectly acquainted, while it
related to institutions of which their past experience enabled them to
form no adequate conception! Amidst such uncertain lights, it is in vain
to expect nice accuracy of detail. All that can be done is, to attempt
an outline of the more prominent features, that a correct impression, so
far as it goes, may be produced on the mind of the reader. Enough has
been said, however, to show that the Aztec and Tezcocan races were
advanced in civilisation very far beyond the wandering tribes of North
America. The degree of civilisation which they had reached, as inferred
by their political institutions, may be considered, perhaps, not much
short of that enjoyed by our Saxon ancestors, under Alfred. In respect
to the nature of it, they may be better compared with the Egyptians; and
the examination of their social relations and culture may suggest still
stronger points of resemblance to that ancient people.
Chapter III
MEXICAN MYTHOLOGY- THE SACERDOTAL ORDER- THE TEMPLES- HUMAN SACRIFICES
THE CIVIL polity of the Aztecs is so closely blended with their
religion, that, without understanding the latter, it is impossible to
form correct ideas of their government or their social institutions. I
shall pass over, for the present, some remarkable traditions, bearing a
singular resemblance to those found in the Scriptures, and endeavour to
give a brief sketch of their mythology, and their careful provisions for
maintaining a national worship. In contemplating the religious system
of the Aztecs, one is struck with its apparent incongruity, as if some
portion of it had emanated from a comparatively refined people, open to
gentle influences, while the rest breathes a spirit of unmitigated
ferocity. It naturally suggests the idea of two distinct sources, and
authorises the belief that the Aztecs had inherited from their
predecessors a milder faith, on which was afterwards engrafted their own
mythology. The latter soon became dominant, and gave its dark colouring
to the creeds of the conquered nations,- which the Mexicans, like the
ancient Romans, seem willingly to have incorporated into their own,-
until the same funereal superstition settled over the farthest borders
of Anahuac. The Aztecs recognised the existence of a supreme Creator and
Lord of the universe. They addressed him, in their prayers, as "the God
by whom we live," "omnipresent, that knoweth all thoughts, and giveth
all gifts," "without whom man is as nothing," "invisible, incorporeal,
one God, of perfect perfection and purity," "under whose wings we find
repose and a sure defence." These sublime attributes infer no inadequate
conception of the true God. But the idea of unity- of a being, with
whom volition is action, who has no need of inferior ministers to
execute his purposes- was too simple, or too vast, for their
understandings; and they sought relief, as usual, in the plurality of
deities, who presided over the elements, the changes of the seasons, and
the various occupations of man. Of these, there were thirteen principal
deities, and more than two hundred inferior; to each of whom some
special day, or appropriate festival, was consecrated. At the head of
all stood the terrible Huitzilopochtli, the Mexican Mars; although it is
doing injustice to the heroic war-god of antiquity to identify him with
this sanguinary monster. This was the patron deity of the nation. His
fantastic image was loaded with costly ornaments. His temples were the
most stately and august of the public edifices; and his altars reeked
with the blood of human hecatombs in every city of the empire.
Disastrous, indeed, must have been the influence of such a superstition
on the character of the people. A far more interesting personage in
their mythology, was Quetzalcoatl, god of the air, a divinity who,
during his residence on earth, instructed the natives in the use of
metals, in agriculture, and in the arts of government. He was one of
those benefactors of their species, doubtless, who have been deified, by
the gratitude of posterity. Under him, the earth teemed with fruits and
flowers, without the pains of culture. An ear of Indian corn was as
much as a single man could carry. The cotton, as it grew, took, of its
own accord, the rich dyes of human art. The air was filled with
intoxicating perfumes and the sweet melody of birds. In short, these
were the halcyon days, which find a place in the mythic systems of so
many nations in the Old World. It was the golden age of Anahuac. From
some cause, not explained, Quetzalcoatl incurred the wrath of one of the
principal gods, and was compelled to abandon the country. On his way,
he stopped at the city of Cholula, where a temple was dedicated to his
worship, the massy ruins of which still form one of the most interesting
relics of antiquity in Mexico. When he reached the shores of the
Mexican Gulf, he took leave of his followers, promising that he and his
descendants would revisit them hereafter, and then entering his wizard
skill, made of serpents' skins, embarked on the great ocean for the
fabled land of Tlapallan. He was said to have been tall in stature, with
a white skin, long, dark hair, and a flowing beard. The Mexicans looked
confidently to the return of the benevolent deity; and this remarkable
tradition, deeply cherished in their hearts, prepared the way, as we
shall see hereafter, for the future success of the Spaniards. We have
not space for further details respecting the Mexican divinities, the
attributes of many of whom were carefully defined, as they descended in
regular gradation, to the penates or household gods, whose little images
were to be found in the humblest dwelling. The Aztecs felt the
curiosity, common to man in almost every stage of civilisation, to lift
the veil which covers the mysterious past, and the more awful future.
They sought relief, like the nations of the Old Continent, from the
oppressive idea of eternity, by breaking it up into distinct cycles, or
periods of time, each of several thousand years' duration. There were
four of these cycles, and at the end of each, by the agency of one of
the elements, the human family was swept from the earth, and the sun
blotted out from the heavens, to be again rekindled. They imagined three
separate states of existence in the future life. The wicked,
comprehending the great part of mankind, were to expiate their sins in a
place of everlasting darkness. Another class, with no other merit than
that of having died of certain diseases, capriciously selected, were to
enjoy a negative existence of indolent contentment. The highest place
was reserved, as in most warlike nations, for the heroes who fell in
battle, or in sacrifice. They passed, at once, into the presence of the
Sun, whom they accompanied with songs and choral dances, in his bright
progress through the heavens; and, after some years, their spirits went
to animate the clouds and singing birds of beautiful plumage, and to
revel amidst the rich blossoms and odours of the gardens of paradise.
Such was the heaven of the Aztecs; more refined in its character than
that of the more polished pagan, whose elysium reflected only the
martial sports, or sensual gratifications, of this life. In the destiny
they assigned to the wicked, we discern similar traces of refinement;
since the absence of all physical torture forms a striking contrast to
the schemes of suffering so ingeniously devised by the fancies of the
most enlightened nations.- In all this, so contrary to the natural
suggestions of the ferocious Aztec, we see the evidences of a higher
civilisation, inherited from their predecessors in the land. Our limits
will allow only a brief allusion to one or two of their most interesting
ceremonies. On the death of a person, his corpse was dressed in the
peculiar habiliments of his tutelar deity. It was strewed with pieces of
paper, which operated as charms, against the dangers of the dark road
he was to travel. A throng of slaves, if he were rich, was sacrificed at
his obsequies. His body was burned, and the ashes, collected in a vase,
were preserved in one of the apartments of his house. Here we have
successively the usages of the Roman Catholic, the Mussulman, the
Tartar, and the ancient Greek and Roman, curious coincidences, which may
show how cautious we should be in adopting conclusions founded on
analogy. A more extraordinary coincidence may be traced with Christian
rites, in the ceremony of naming their children. The lips and bosom of
the infant were sprinkled with water, and "the Lord was implored to
permit the holy drops to wash away the sin that was given to it before
the foundation of the world; so that the child might be born anew." We
are reminded of Christian morals, in more than one of their prayers, in
which they use regular forms. "Wilt thou blot us out, O Lord, for ever?
Is this punishment intended, not for our reformation, but for our
destruction?" Again, "Impart to us, out of thy great mercy, thy gifts
which we are not worthy to receive through our own merits." "Keep peace
with all," says another petition; "bear injuries with humility; God, who
sees, will avenge you." But the most striking parallel with Scripture
is in the remarkable declaration, that "he who looks too curiously on a
woman, commits adultery with his eyes." These pure and elevated maxims,
it is true, are mixed up with others of a puerile, and even brutal
character, arguing that confusion of the moral perceptions, which is
natural in the twilight of civilisation. One would not expect, however,
to meet, in such a state of society, with doctrines as sublime as any
inculcated by the enlightened codes of ancient philosophy. But, although
the Aztec mythology gathered nothing from the beautiful inventions of
the poet, nor from the refinements of philosophy, it was much indebted,
as I have noticed, to the priests, who endeavoured to dazzle the
imagination of the people by the most formal and pompous ceremonial. The
influence of the priesthood must be greatest in an imperfect state of
civilisation, where it engrosses all the scanty science of the time in
its own body. This is particularly the case, when the science is of that
spurious kind which is less occupied with the real phenomena of nature,
than with the fanciful chimeras of human superstition. Such are the
sciences of astrology and divination, in which the Aztec priests were
well initiated; and while they seemed to hold the keys of the future in
their own hands, they impressed the ignorant people with sentiments of
superstitious awe, beyond that which has probably existed in any other
country,- even in Ancient Egypt. The sacerdotal order was very numerous;
as may be inferred from the statement that five thousand priests were,
in some way or other, attached to the principal temple in the capital.
The various ranks and functions of this multitudinous body were
discriminated with great exactness. Those best instructed in music took
the management of the choirs. Others arranged the festivals conformably
to the calendar. Some superintended the education of youth, and others
had charge of the hieroglyphical paintings and oral traditions; while
the dismal rites of sacrifice were reserved for the chief dignitaries of
the order. At the head of the whole establishment were two
high-priests, elected from the order, as it would seem, by the king and
principal nobles, without reference to birth, but solely for their
qualifications, as shown by their previous conduct in a subordinate
station. They were equal in dignity, and inferior only to the sovereign,
who rarely acted without their advice in weighty matters of public
concern. The priests were each devoted to the service of some particular
deity, and had quarters provided within the spacious precincts of their
temple; at least, while engaged in immediate attendance there,- for
they were allowed to marry and have families of their own. In this
monastic residence they lived in all the stern severity of conventual
discipline. Thrice during the day, and once at night, they were called
to prayers. They were frequent in their ablutions and vigils, and
mortified the flesh by fasting and cruel penance,- drawing blood from
their bodies by flagellation, or by piercing them with the thorns of the
aloe. The great cities were divided into districts, placed under the
charge of a sort of parochial clergy, who regulated every act of
religion within their precincts. It is remarkable that they administered
the rites of confession and absolution. The secrets of the confessional
were held inviolable, and penances were imposed of much the same kind
as those enjoined in the Roman Catholic Church. There were two
remarkable peculiarities in the Aztec ceremony. The first was, that, as
the repetition of an offence, once atoned for, was deemed inexpiable,
confession was made but once in a man's life, and was usually deferred
to a late period of it, the penitent unburdened his conscience, and
settled, at once, the long arrears of iniquity. Another peculiarity was,
that priestly absolution was received in Place of the legal punishment
of offences, and authorised an acquittal in case of arrest. Long after
the Conquest, the simple natives, when they came under the arm of the
law, sought to escape by producing the certificate of their confession.
One of the most important duties of the priesthood was that of
education, to which certain buildings were appropriated within the
enclosure of the principal temple. Here the youth of both sexes, of the
higher and middling orders, were placed at a very tender age. The girls
were intrusted to the care of priestesses; for women were allowed to
exercise sacerdotal functions, except those of sacrifice. In these
institutions the boys were drilled in the routine of monastic
discipline; they decorated the shrines of the gods with flowers, fed the
sacred fires, and took part in the religious chants and festivals.
Those in the higher school,- the Calmecac, as it was called,- were
initiated in their traditional lore, the mysteries of hieroglyphics, the
principles of government, and such branches of astronomical and natural
science as were within the compass of the priesthood. The girls learned
various feminine employments, especially to weave and embroider rich
coverings for the altars of the gods. Great attention was paid to the
moral discipline of both sexes. The most perfect decorum prevailed; and
offences were punished with extreme rigour, in some instances with death
itself. Terror, not love, was the spring of education with the Aztecs.
At a suitable age for marrying, or for entering into the world, the
pupils were dismissed, with much ceremony, from the convent, and the
recommendation of the principal often introduced those most competent to
responsible situations in public life. Such was the crafty policy of
the Mexican priests, who, by reserving to themselves the business of
instruction, were enabled to mould the young and plastic mind according
to their own wills, and to train it early to implicit reverence for
religion and its ministers; a reverence which still maintained its hold
on the iron nature of the warrior, long after every other vestige of
education had been effaced by the rough trade to which he was devoted.
To each of the principal temples lands were annexed for the maintenance
of the priests. These estates were augmented by the policy of devotion
of successive princes, until, under the last Montezuma, they had swollen
to an enormous extent, and covered every district of the empire. The
priests took the management of their property into their own hands; and
they seem to have treated their tenants with the liberality and
indulgence characteristic of monastic corporations. Besides the large
supplies drawn from this source, the religious order was enriched with
the first-fruits, and such other offerings as piety or superstition
dictated. The surplus beyond what was required for the support of the
national worship was distributed in alms among the poor; a duty
strenuously prescribed by their moral code. Thus we find the same
religion inculcating lessons of pure philanthropy, on the one hand, and
of merciless extermination, as we shall soon see, on the other. The
Mexican temples- teocallis, "houses of God," as they were called- were
very numerous. There were several hundreds in each of the principal
cities, many of them, doubtless, very humble edifices. They were solid
masses of earth, cased with brick or stone, and in their form somewhat
resembled the pyramidal structures of ancient Egypt. The bases of many
of them were more than a hundred feet square, and they towered to a
still greater height. They were distributed into four or five stories,
each of smaller dimensions than that below. The ascent was by a flight
of steps, at an angle of the pyramid, on the outside. This led to a sort
of terrace or gallery, at the base of the second story, which passed
quite round the building to another flight of stairs, commencing also at
the same angle as the preceding and directly over it, and leading to a
similar terrace; so that one had to make the circuit of the temple
several times, before reaching the summit. In some instances the
stairway led directly up the centre of the western face of the building.
The top was a broad area, on which were erected one or two towers,
forty or fifty feet high, the sanctuaries in which stood the sacred
images of the presiding deities. Before these towers stood the dreadful
stone of sacrifice, and two lofty altars, on which fires were kept, as
inextinguishable as those in the temple of Vesta. There were said to be
six hundred of these altars on smaller buildings within the inclosure of
the great temple of Mexico, which, with those on the sacred edifices in
other parts of the city, shed a brilliant illumination over its
streets, through the darkest night. From the construction of their
temples, all religious services were public. The long processions of
priests, winding round their massive sides, as they rose higher and
higher towards the summit, and the dismal rites of sacrifice performed
there, were all visible from the remotest corners of the capital,
impressing on the spectator's mind a superstitious veneration for the
mysteries of his religion, and for the dread ministers by whom they were
interpreted. This impression was kept in full force by their numerous
festivals. Every month was consecrated to some protecting deity; and
every week- nay, almost every day, was set down in their calendar for
some appropriate celebration; so that it is difficult to understand how
the ordinary business of life could have been compatible with the
exactions of religion. Many of their ceremonies were of a light and
cheerful complexion, consisting of the national songs and dances, in
which both sexes joined. Processions were made of women and children
crowned with garlands and bearing offerings of fruits, the ripened
maize, or the sweet incense of copal and other odoriferous gums, while
the altars of the deity were stained with no blood save that of animals.
These were the peaceful rites derived from their Toltec predecessors,
on which the fierce Aztecs engrafted a superstition too loathsome to be
exhibited in all its nakedness, and one over which I would gladly draw a
veil altogether, but that it would leave the reader in ignorance of
their most striking institution, and one that had the greatest influence
in forming the national character. Human sacrifices were adopted by the
Aztecs early in the fourteenth century, about two hundred years before
the Conquest. Rare at first, they became more frequent with the wider
extent of their empire; till, at length, almost every festival was
closed with this cruel abomination. These religious ceremonials were
generally arranged in such a manner as to afford a type of the most
prominent circumstances in the character or history of the deity who was
the object of them. A single example will suffice. One of their most
important festivals was that in honour of the god Tezcatlipoca, whose
rank was inferior only to that of the Supreme Being. He was called "the
soul of the world," and supposed to have been its creator. He was
depicted as a handsome man, endowed with perpetual youth. A year before
the intended sacrifice, a captive, distinguished for his personal
beauty, and without a blemish on his body, was selected to represent
this deity. Certain tutors took charge of him, and instructed him how to
perform his new part with becoming grace and dignity. He was arrayed in
a splendid dress, regaled with incense, and with a profusion of
sweet-scented flowers, of which the ancient Mexicans were as fond as
their descendants of the present day. When he went abroad, he was
attended by a train of the royal pages, and, as he halted in the streets
to play some favourite melody, the crowd prostrated themselves before
him, and did him homage as the representative of their good deity. In
this way he led an easy, luxurious life, till within a month of his
sacrifice. Four beautiful girls, bearing the names of the principal
goddesses, were then selected to share the honours of his bed; and with
them he continued to live in idle dalliance feasted at the banquets of
the principal nobles, who paid him all the honours of a divinity. At
length the fatal day of sacrifice arrived. The term of his short-lived
glories was at an end. He was stripped of his gaudy apparel, and bade
adieu to the fair partners of his revelries. One of the royal barges
transported him across the lake to a temple which rose on its margin,
about a league from the city. Hither the inhabitants of the capital
flocked, to witness the consummation of the ceremony. As the sad
procession wound up the sides of the pyramid, the unhappy victim threw
away his gay chaplet of flowers, and broke in pieces the musical
instruments with which he had solaced the hours of captivity. On the
summit he was received by six priests, whose long and matted locks
flowed disorderly over their sable robes, covered with hieroglyphic
scrolls of mystic import. They led him to the sacrificial stone, a huge
block of jasper, with its upper surface somewhat convex. On this the
prisoner was stretched. Five priests secured his head and his limbs;
while the sixth, clad in a scarlet mantle, emblematic of his bloody
office, dexterously opened the breast of the wretched victim with a
sharp razor of itztli,- a volcanic substance hard as flint,- and,
inserting his hand in the wound, tore out the palpitating heart. The
minister of death, first holding this up towards the sun, an object of
worship throughout Anahuac, cast it at the feet of the deity to whom the
temple was devoted, while the multitudes below prostrated themselves in
humble adoration. The tragic story of this prisoner was expounded by
the priests as the type of human destiny, which, brilliant in its
commencement, too often closes in sorrow and disaster. Such was the form
of human sacrifice usually practised by the Aztecs. It was the same
that often met the indignant eyes of the Europeans, in their progress
through the country, and from the dreadful doom of which they themselves
were not exempted. There were, indeed, some occasions when preliminary
tortures, of the most exquisite kind,- with which it is unnecessary to
shock the reader,- were inflicted, but they always terminated with the
bloody ceremony above described. It should be remarked, however, that
such tortures were not the spontaneous suggestions of cruelty, as with
the North American Indians; but were all rigorously prescribed in the
Aztec ritual, and doubtless, were often inflicted with the same
compunctious visitings which a devout familiar of the Holy Office might
at times experience in executing its stern decrees. Women, as well as
the other sex, were sometimes reserved for sacrifice. On some occasions,
particularly in seasons of drought, at the festival of the insatiable
Tlaloc, the god of rain, children, for the most part infants, were
offered up. As they were borne along in open litters, dressed in their
festal robes, and decked with the fresh blossoms of spring, they moved
the hardest heart to pity, though their cries were drowned in the wild
chant of the priests, who read in their tears a favourable augury for
their petition. These innocent victims were generally bought by the
priests of parents who were poor, but who stifled the voice of nature,
probably less at the suggestions of poverty than of a wretched
superstition. The most loathsome part of the story, the manner in which
the body of the sacrificed captive was disposed of, remains yet to be
told. It was delivered to the warrior who had taken him in battle, and
by him, after being dressed, was served up in an entertainment to his
friends. This was not the coarse repast of famished cannibals, but a
banquet teeming with delicious beverages and delicate viands, prepared
with art, and attended by both sexes, who, as we shall see hereafter,
conducted themselves with all the decorum of civilised life. Surely,
never were refinement and the extreme of barbarism brought so closely in
contact with each other! Human sacrifices have been practised by many
nations, not excepting the most polished nations of antiquity; but never
by any, on a scale to be compared with those in Anahuac. The amount of
victims immolated on its accursed altars would stagger the faith of the
least scrupulous believer. Scarcely any author pretends to estimate the
yearly sacrifices throughout the empire at less than twenty thousand,
and some carry the number as high as fifty! On great occasions, as the
coronation of a king, or the consecration of a temple, the number
becomes still more appalling. At the dedication of the great temple of
Huitzilopochtli, in 1486, the prisoners, who for some years had been
reserved for the purpose, were drawn from all quarters to the capital.
They were ranged in files, forming a procession nearly two miles long.
The ceremony consumed several days, and seventy thousand captives are
said to have perished at the shrine of this terrible deity! But who can
believe that so numerous a body would have suffered themselves to be
led, unresistingly, like sheep to the slaughter? Or how could their
remains, too great for consumption in the ordinary way, be disposed of,
without breeding a pestilence in the capital? Yet the event was of
recent date, and is unequivocally attested by the best informed
historians. One fact may be considered certain. It was customary to
preserve the skulls of the sacrificed, in buildings appropriated to the
purpose. The companions of Cortes counted one hundred and thirty-six
thousand in one of these edifices! Without attempting a precise
calculation, therefore, it is safe to conclude that thousands were
yearly offered up, in the different cities of Anahuac, on the bloody
altars of the Mexican divinities. Indeed, the great object of war with
the Aztecs was quite as much to gather victims for their sacrifices, as
to extend their empire. Hence it was, that an enemy was never slain in
battle, if there was a chance of taking him alive. To this circumstance
the Spaniards repeatedly owed their preservation. When Montezuma was
asked, "why he had suffered the republic of Tlazcala to maintain her
independence on his borders," he replied, "That she might furnish him
with victims for his gods!" As the supply began to fail, the priests,
the Dominicans of the New World, bellowed aloud for more, and urged on
their superstitious sovereign by the denunciations of celestial wrath.
Like the militant churchmen of Christendom in the Middle Ages, they
mingled themselves in the ranks, and were conspicuous in the thickest of
the fight, by their hideous aspects and frantic gestures. Strange, that
in every country the most fiendish passions of the human heart have
been those kindled in the name of religion! The influence of these
practices on the Aztec character was as disastrous as might have been
expected. Familiarity with the bloody rites of sacrifice steeled the
heart against human sympathy, and begat a thirst for carnage, like that
excited in the Romans by the exhibitions of the circus. The perpetual
recurrence of ceremonies, in which the people took part, associated
religion with their most intimate concerns, and spread the gloom of
superstition over the domestic hearth, until the character of the nation
wore a grave and even melancholy aspect, which belongs to their
descendants at the present day. The influence of the priesthood, of
course, became unbounded. The sovereign thought himself honoured by
being permitted to assist in the services of the temple. Far from
limiting the authority of the priests to spiritual matters, he often
surrendered his opinion to theirs, where they were least competent to
give it. It was their opposition that prevented the final capitulation
which would have saved the capital. The whole nation, from the peasant
to the prince, bowed their necks to the worst kind of tyranny- that of a
blind fanaticism. Human sacrifice, however cruel, has nothing in it
degrading to its victim. It may be rather said to ennoble him, by
devoting him to the gods. Although so terrible with the Aztecs, it was
sometimes voluntarily embraced by them, as the most glorious death, and
one that opened a sure passage into paradise. The Inquisition, on the
other hand, branded its victims with infamy in this world, and consigned
them to everlasting perdition in the next. One detestable feature of
the Aztec superstition, however, sunk it far below the Christian. This
was its cannibalism; though, in truth, the Mexicans were not cannibals,
in the coarsest acceptation of the term. They did not feed on human
flesh merely to gratify a brutish appetite, but in obedience to their
religion. Their repasts were made of the victims whose blood had been
poured out on the altar of sacrifice. This is a distinction worthy of
notice. Still, cannibalism, under any form, or whatever sanction, cannot
but have a fatal influence on the nation addicted to it. It suggests
ideas so loathsome, so degrading to man, to his spiritual and immortal
nature, that it is impossible the people who practise it should make any
great progress in moral or intellectual culture. The Mexicans furnish
no exception to this remark. The civilisation which they possessed
descended from the Toltecs, a race who never stained their altars, still
less their banquets, with the blood of man. All that deserved the name
of science in Mexico came from this source; and the crumbling ruins of
edifices, attributed to them, still extant in various parts of New
Spain, show a decided superiority in their architecture over that of the
later races of Anahuac. It is true, the Mexicans made great proficiency
in many of the social and mechanic arts, in that material culture,- if I
may so call it,- the natural growth of increasing opulence, which
ministers to the gratification of the senses. In purely intellectual
progress, they were behind the Tezcocans, whose wise sovereigns came
into the abominable rites of their neighbours with reluctance, and
practised them on a much more moderate scale.
Chapter IV
AZTEC HIEROGLYPHICS- MANUscriptTS- ARITHMETIC- CHRONOLOGY- ASTRONOMY
IT is a relief to turn from the gloomy pages of the preceding chapter
to a brighter side of the picture, and to contemplate the same nation in
its generous struggle to raise itself from a state of barbarism, and to
take a positive rank in the scale of civilisation. It is not the less
interesting, that these efforts were made on an entirely new theatre of
action, apart from those influences that operate in the Old World; the
inhabitants of which, forming one great brotherhood of nations, are knit
together by sympathies, that make the faintest spark of knowledge
struck out in one quarter, spread gradually wider and wider, until it
has diffused a cheering light over the remotest. It is curious to
observe the human mind, in this new position, conforming to the same
laws as on the ancient continent, and taking a similar direction in its
first inquiries after truth,- so similar, indeed, as, although not
warranting, perhaps, the idea of imitation, to suggest, at least, that
of a common origin. In the eastern hemisphere, we find some nations, as
the Greeks, for instance, early smitten with such a love of the
beautiful as to be unwilling to dispense with it, even in the graver
productions of science; and other nations, again, proposing a severer
end to themselves, to which even imagination and elegant art were made
subservient. The productions of such a people must be criticised, not by
the ordinary rules of taste, but by their adaptation to the peculiar
end for which they were designed. Such were the Egyptians in the Old
World, and the Mexicans in the New. We have already had occasion to
notice the resemblance borne by the latter nation to the former in their
religious economy. We shall be more struck with it in their scientific
culture, especially their hieroglyphical writing and their astronomy. To
describe actions and events by delineating visible objects, seems to be
a natural suggestion, and is practised, after a certain fashion, by the
rudest savages. The North American Indian carves an arrow on the bark
of trees to show his followers the direction of his march, and some
other sign to show the success of his expeditions. But to paint
intelligibly a consecutive series of these actions- forming what
Warburton has happily called picture-writing- requires a combination of
ideas, that amounts to a positively intellectual effort. Yet further,
when the object of the painter, instead of being limited to the present,
is to penetrate the past, and to gather from its dark recesses lessons
of instruction for coming generations, we see the dawning of a literary
culture, and recognise the proof of a decided civilisation in the
attempt itself, however imperfectly it may be executed. The literal
imitation of objects will not answer for this more complex and extended
plan. It would occupy too much space, as well as time, in the execution.
It then becomes necessary to abridge the pictures, to confine the
drawing to outlines, or to such prominent parts of the bodies
delineated, as may readily suggest the whole. This is the representative
or figurative writing, which forms the lowest stage of hieroglyphics.
But there are things which have no type in the material world; abstract
ideas, which can only be represented by visible objects supposed to have
some quality analogous to the idea intended. This constitutes
symbolical writing, the most difficult of all to the interpreter, since
the analogy between the material and immaterial object is often purely
fanciful, or local in its application. Who, for instance, could suspect
the association which made a beetle represent the universe, as with the
Egyptians, or a serpent typify time, as with the Aztecs? The third and
last division is the phonetic, in which signs are made to represent
sounds, either entire words, or parts of them. This is the nearest
approach of the hieroglyphical series to that beautiful invention, the
alphabet, by which language is resolved into its elementary sounds, and
an apparatus supplied for easily and accurately expressing the most
delicate shades of thought. The Egyptians were well skilled in all three
kinds of hieroglyphics. But, although their public monuments display
the first class, in their ordinary intercourse and written records, it
is now certain that they almost wholly relied on the phonetic character.
Strange, that having thus broken down the thin partition which divided
them from an alphabet, their latest monuments should exhibit no nearer
approach to it than their earliest. The Aztecs, also, were acquainted
with the several varieties of hieroglyphics. But they relied on the
figurative infinitely more than on the others. The Egyptians were at the
top of the scale, the Aztecs at the bottom. In casting the eye over a
Mexican manuscript, or map, as it is called, one is struck with the
grotesque caricatures it exhibits of the human figure; monstrous,
overgrown heads, on puny misshapen bodies, which are themselves hard and
angular in their outlines, and without the least skill in composition.
On closer inspection, however, it is obvious that it is not so much a
rude attempt to delineate nature, as a conventional symbol, to express
the idea in the most clear and forcible manner; in the same way as the
pieces of similar value on a chess-board, while they correspond with one
another in form, bear little resemblance, usually, to the objects they
represent. Those parts of the figure are most distinctly traced, which
are the most important. So, also the colouring, instead of the delicate
gradations of nature, exhibits only gaudy and violent contrasts, such as
may produce the most vivid impression. "For even colours," as Gama
observes, "speak in the Aztec hieroglyphics." But in the execution of
all this the Mexicans were much inferior to the Egyptians. The drawings
of the latter, indeed, are exceedingly defective when criticised by the
rules of art; for they were as ignorant of perspective as the Chinese,
and only exhibited the head in profile, with the eye in the centre, and
with total absence of expression. But they handled the pencil more
gracefully than the Aztecs, were more true to the natural forms of
objects, and, above all, showed great superiority in abridging the
original figure by giving only the outlines, or some characteristic. or
essential feature. This simplified the process, and facilitated the
communication of thought. An Egyptian text has almost the appearance of
alphabetical writing in its regular lines of minute figures. A Mexican
text looks usually like a collection of pictures, each one forming the
subject of a separate study. This is particularly the case with the
delineations of mythology; in which the story is told by a
conglomeration of symbols, that may remind one more of the mysterious
anaglyphs sculptured on the temples of the Egyptians, than of their
written records. The Aztecs had various emblems for expressing such
things as, from their nature, could not be directly represented by the
painter; as, for example, the years, months, days, the seasons, the
elements, the heavens, and the like. A "tongue" denoted speaking; a
"footprint," travelling; "a man sitting on the ground," an earthquake.
These symbols were often very arbitrary, varying with the caprice of the
writer; and it requires a nice discrimination to interpret them, as a
slight change in the form or position of the figure intimated a very
different meaning. An ingenious writer asserts, that the priests devised
secret symbolic characters for the record of their religious mysteries.
It is possible. But the researches of Champollion lead to the
conclusion, that the similar opinion, formerly entertained respecting
the Egyptian hieroglyphics, is without foundation. Lastly, they
employed, as above stated, phonetic signs, though these were chiefly
confined to the names of persons and places; which, being derived from
some circumstance, or characteristic quality, were accommodated to the
hieroglyphical system. Thus the town Cimatlan was compounded of cimatl, a
"root," which grew near it, and tlan, signifying "near"; Tlaxcallan
meant "the place of bread," from its rich fields of corn; Huexotzinco,
"a place surrounded by willows." The names of persons were often
significant of their adventures and achievements. That of the great
Tezcocan prince, Nezahualcoyotl, signified "hungry fox," intimating his
sagacity, and his distresses in early life. The emblems of such names
were no sooner seen, than they suggested to every Mexican the person and
place intended; and, when painted on their shields, or embroidered on
their banners, became the armorial bearings by which city and chieftain
were distinguished, as in Europe, in the age of chivalry. But, although
the Aztecs were instructed in all the varieties of hieroglyphical
painting, they chiefly resorted to the clumsy method of direct
representation. Had their empire lasted, like the Egyptian, several
thousand, instead of the brief space of two hundred, years, they would,
doubtless, like them, have advanced to the more frequent use of the
phonetic writing. But, before they could be made acquainted with the
capabilities of their own system, the Spanish Conquest, by introducing
the European alphabet, supplied their scholars with a more perfect
contrivance for expressing thought, which soon supplanted the ancient
pictorial character. Clumsy as it was, however, the Aztec
picture-writing seems to have been adequate to the demands of the
nation, in their imperfect state of civilisation. By means of it were
recorded all their laws, and even their regulations for domestic
economy; their tribute-rolls, specifying the imposts of the various
towns; their mythology, calendars, and rituals; their political annals,
carried back to a period long before the foundation of the city. They
digested a complete system of chronology, and could specify with
accuracy the dates of the most important events in their history; the
year being inscribed on the margin, against the particular circumstance
recorded. It is true, history, thus executed, must necessarily be vague
and fragmentary. Only a few leading incidents could be presented. But in
this it did not differ much from the monkish chronicles of the dark
ages, which often dispose of years in a few brief sentences; quite long
enough for the annals of barbarians. In order to estimate aright the
picture-writing of the Aztecs, one must regard it in connection with
oral tradition, to which it was auxiliary. In the colleges of the
priests the youth were instructed in astronomy, history, mythology,
etc.; and those who were to follow the profession of hieroglyphical
painting were taught the application of the characters appropriated to
each of these branches. In an historical work, one had charge of the
chronology, another of the events. Every part of the labour was thus
mechanically distributed. The pupils, instructed in all that was before
known in their several departments, were prepared to extend still
further the boundaries of their imperfect science. The hieroglyphics
served as a sort of stenography, a collection of notes, suggesting to
the initiated much more than could be conveyed by a literal
interpretation. This combination of the written and the oral
comprehended what may be called the literature of the Aztecs. Their
manuscripts were made of different materials,- of cotton cloth, or skins
nicely prepared; of a composition of silk and gum; but, for the most
part, of a fine fabric from the leaves of the aloe, agave Americana,
called by the natives, maguey, which grows luxuriantly over the
tablelands of Mexico. A sort of paper was made from it, resembling
somewhat the Egyptian papyrus, which, when properly dressed and
polished, is said to have been more soft and beautiful than parchment.
Some of the specimens, still existing, exhibit their original freshness,
and the paintings on them retain their brilliancy of colours. They were
sometimes done up into rolls, but more frequently into volumes of
moderate size, in which the paper was shut up, like a folding-screen,
with a leaf or tablet of wood at each extremity, that gave the whole,
when closed, the appearance of a book. The length of the strips was
determined only by convenience. As the pages might be read and referred
to separately, this form had obvious advantages over the rolls of the
ancients. At the time of the arrival of the Spaniards, great quantities
of these manuscripts were treasured up in the country. Numerous persons
were employed in painting, and the dexterity of their operations excited
the astonishment of the conquerors. Unfortunately, this was mingled
with other, and unworthy feelings. The strange, unknown characters
inscribed on them excited suspicion. They were looked on as magic
scrolls; and were regarded in the same light with the idols and temples,
as the symbols of a pestilent superstition that must be extirpated. The
first archbishop of Mexico, Don Juan de Zumarraga,- a name that should
be as immortal as that of Omar,- collected these paintings from every
quarter, especially from Tezcoco, the most cultivated capital in
Anahuac, and the great depository of the national archives. He then
caused them to be piled up in a "mountain-heap,"- as it is called by the
Spanish writers themselves,- and reduced them all to ashes! His greater
countryman, Archbishop Ximenes, had celebrated a similar auto-dafe of
Arabic manuscripts, in Granada, some twenty years before. Never did
fanaticism achieve two more signal triumphs, than by the annihilation of
so many curious monuments of human ingenuity and learning! The
unlettered soldiers were not slow in imitating the example of their
prelate. Every chart and volume which fell into their hands was wantonly
destroyed; so that, when the scholars of a later and more enlightened
age anxiously sought to recover some of these memorials of civilisation,
nearly all had perished, and the few surviving were jealously hidden by
the natives. Through the indefatigable labours of a private individual,
however, a considerable collection was eventually deposited in the
archives of Mexico; but was so little heeded there, that some were
plundered, others decayed piecemeal from the damps and mildews, and
others, again, were used up as waste-paper! We contemplate with
indignation the cruelties inflicted by the early conquerors. But
indignation is qualified with contempt, when we see them thus ruthlessly
trampling out the spark of knowledge, the common boon and property of
all mankind. We may well doubt, which has the strongest claims to
civilisation, the victor or the vanquished. A few of the Mexican
manuscripts have found their way, from time to time, to Europe, and are
carefully preserved in the public libraries of its capitals. They are brought
together in the magnificent work of Lord Kingsborough; but not one is
there from Spain. The most important of them, for the light in throws on
the Aztec institutions, is the Mendoza Codex; which, after its
mysterious disappearance for more than a century, has at length
re-appeared in the Bodleian library at Oxford. It has been several times
engraved. The most brilliant in colouring, probably, is the Borgian
collection, in Rome. The most curious, however, is the Dresden Codex,
which has excited less attention than it deserves. Although usually
classed among Mexican manuscripts, it bears little resemblance to them
in its execution; the figures of objects are more delicately drawn, and
the characters, unlike the Mexican, appear to be purely arbitrary, and
are possibly phonetic. Their regular arrangement is quite equal to the
Egyptian. The whole infers a much higher civilisation than the Aztec,
and offers abundant food for curious speculation. Some few of these maps
have interpretations annexed to them, which were obtained from the
natives after the Conquest. The greater part are without any, and cannot
now be unriddled. Had the Mexicans made free use of a phonetic
alphabet, it might have been originally easy, by mastering the
comparatively few signs employed in this kind of communication, to have
got a permanent key to the whole. A brief inscription has furnished a
clue to the vast labyrinth of Egyptian hieroglyphics. But the Aztec
characters, representing individuals, or at most, species, require to be
made out separately; a hopeless task, for which little aid is to be
expected from the vague and general tenor of the few interpretations now
existing. In less than a hundred years after the Conquest, the
knowledge of the hieroglyphics had so far declined, that a diligent
Tezcocan writer complains he could find in the country only two persons,
both very aged, at all competent to interpret them. It is not probable,
therefore, that the art of reading these picture-writings will ever be
recovered; a circumstance certainly to be regretted. Not that the
records of a semi-civilised people would be likely to contain any new
truth or discovery important to human comfort or progress; but they
could scarcely fail to throw some additional light on the previous
history of the nation, and that of the more polished people who before
occupied the country. This would be still more probable, if any literary
relics of their Toltec predecessors were preserved; and, if report be
true, an important compilation from this source was extant at the time
of the invasion, and may have perhaps contributed to swell the holocaust
of Zumarraga. It is no great stretch of fancy, to suppose that such
records might reveal the successive links in the mighty chain of
migration of the primitive races, and, by carrying us back to the seat
of their possessions in the Old World, have solved the mystery which has
so long perplexed the learned, in regard to the settlement and
civilisation of the New. Besides the hieroglyphical maps, the traditions
of the country were embodied in the songs and hymns, which, as already
mentioned, were carefully taught in the public schools. These were
various, embracing the mythic legends of a heroic age, the warlike
achievements of their own, or the softer tales of love and pleasure.
Many of them were composed by scholars and persons of rank, and are
cited as affording the most authentic record of events. The Mexican
dialect was rich and expressive, though inferior to the Tezcocan, the
most polished of the idioms of Anahuac. None of the Aztec compositions
have survived, but we can form some estimate of the general state of
poetic culture from the odes which have come down to us from the royal
house of Tezcoco. Sahagun has furnished us with translations of their
more elaborate prose, consisting of prayers and public discourses, which
give a favourable idea of their eloquence, and show that they paid much
attention to rhetorical effect. They are said to have had, also,
something like theatrical exhibitions, of a pantomimic sort, in which
the faces of the performers were covered with masks, and the figures of
birds or animals were frequently represented; an imitation to which they
may have been led by the familiar delineation of such objects in their
hieroglyphics. In all this we see the dawning of a literary culture,
surpassed, however, by their attainments in the severer walks of
mathematical science. They devised a system of notation in their
arithmetic, sufficiently simple. The first twenty numbers were expressed
by a corresponding number of dots. The first five had specific names;
after which they were represented by combining the fifth with one of the
four preceding: as five and one for six, five and two for seven, and so
on. Ten and fifteen had each a separate name, which was also combined
with the first four, to express a higher quantity. These four,
therefore, were the radical characters of their oral arithmetic, in the
same manner as they were of the written with the ancient Romans; a more
simple arrangement, probably, than any existing among Europeans. Twenty
was expressed by a separate hieroglyphic,- a flag. Larger sums were
reckoned by twenties, and, in writing, by repeating the number of flags.
The square of twenty, four hundred, had a separate sign, that of a
plume, and so had the cube of twenty, or eight thousand, which was
denoted by a purse, or sack. This was the whole arithmetical apparatus
of the Mexicans, by the combination of which they were enabled to
indicate any quantity. For greater expedition, they used to denote
fractions of the larger sums by drawing only a part of the object. Thus,
half or three-fourths of a plume, or of a purse, represented that
proportion of their respective sums, and so on. With all this, the
machinery will appear very awkward to us, who perform our operations
with so much ease by means of the Arabic, or rather, Indian ciphers. It
is not much more awkward, however, than the system pursued by the great
mathematicians of antiquity unacquainted with the brilliant invention
which has given a new aspect to mathematical science, of determining the
value, in a great measure, by the relative position of the figures. In
the measurement of time, the Aztecs adjusted their civil year by the
solar. They divided it into eighteen months of twenty days each. Both
months and days were expressed by peculiar hieroglyphics,- those of the
former often intimating the season of the year, like the French months,
at the period of the Revolution. Five complementary days, as in Egypt,
were added, to make up the full number of three hundred and sixty-five.
They belonged to no month, and were regarded as peculiarly unlucky. A
month was divided into four weeks, of five days each, on the last of
which was the public fair or market day. This arrangement, different
from that of the nations of the Old Continent, whether of Europe or
Asia, has the advantage of giving an equal number of days to each month,
and of comprehending entire weeks, without a fraction, both in the
months and in the year. As the year is composed of nearly six hours more
than three hundred and sixty-five days, there still remained an excess,
which, like other nations who have framed a calendar, they provided for
by intercalation; not, indeed, every fourth year, as the Europeans, but
at longer intervals, like some of the Asiatics. They waited till the
expiration of fifty-two vague years, when they interposed thirteen days,
or rather twelve and a half, this being the number which had fallen in
arrear. Had they inserted thirteen, it would have been too much, since
the annual excess over three hundred and sixty-five is about eleven
minutes less than six hours. But, as their calendar, at the time of the
Conquest, was found to correspond with the European (making allowance
for the subsequent Gregorian reform), they would seem to have adopted
the shorter period of twelve days and a half, which brought them, within
an almost inappreciable fraction, to the exact length of the tropical
year, as established by the most accurate observations. Indeed, the
intercalation of twenty-five days, in every hundred and four years,
shows a nicer adjustment of civil to solar time than is presented by any
European calendar; since more than five centuries must elapse, before
the loss of an entire day. Such was the astonishing precision displayed
by the Aztecs, or, perhaps, by their more polished Toltec predecessors,
in these computations, so difficult as to have baffled, till a
comparatively recent period, the most enlightened nations of
Christendom! The chronological system of the Mexicans, by which they
determined the date of any particular event, was also very remarkable.
The epoch, from which they reckoned, corresponded with the year 1091, of
the Christian era. It was the period of the reform of their calendar,
soon after their migration from Aztlan. They threw the years, as already
noticed, into great cycles, of fifty-two each, which they called
"sheafs," or "bundles," and represented by a quantity of reeds bound
together by a string. As often as this hieroglyphic occurs in their
maps, it shows the number of half centuries. To enable them to specify
any particular year, they divided the great cycle into four smaller
cycles, or indictions, of thirteen years each. They then adopted two
periodical series of signs, one consisting of their numerical dots up to
thirteen, the other, of four hieroglyphics of the years.* These latter
they repeated in regular succession, setting against each one a number
of the corresponding series of dots, continued also in regular
succession up to thirteen. The same system was pursued through the four
indictions, which thus, it will be observed, began always with a
different hieroglyphic of the year from the preceding; and in this way,
each of the hieroglyphics was made to combine successively with each of
the numerical signs, but never twice with the same; since four, and
thirteen, the factors of fifty-two,- the number of years in the cycle,-
must admit of just as many combinations as are equal to their product.
Thus every year had its appropriate symbol, by which it was, at once,
recognised. And this symbol, preceded by the proper number of "bundles,"
indicating the half centuries, showed the precise time which had
elapsed since the national epoch of 1091. The ingenious contrivance of a
periodical series, in place of the cumbrous system of hieroglyphical
notation, is not peculiar to the Aztecs, and is to be found among
various people on the Asiatic continent,- the same in principle, though
varying materially in arrangement. * These hieroglyphics were a
"rabbit," a "reed," a "flint," a "house." (SEE ILLUSTRATION.) The solar
calendar, above described, might have answered all the purposes of the
nation; but the priests chose to construct another for themselves. This
was called a "lunar reckoning," though nowise accommodated to the
revolutions of the moon. It was formed, also, of two periodical series;
one of them consisting of thirteen numerical signs, or dots, the other
of the twenty hieroglyphics of the days. But, as the product of these
combinations would only be 260, and, as some confusion might arise from
the repetition of the same terms for the remaining 105 days of the year,
they invented a third series, consisting of nine additional
hieroglyphics, which, alternating with the two preceding series,
rendered it impossible that the three should coincide twice in the same
year, or indeed in less than 2340 days; since 20 X 13 X 9 = 2340.
Thirteen was a mystic number, of frequent use in their tables. Why they
resorted to that of nine, on this occasion, is not so clear. This second
calendar rouses a holy indignation in the early Spanish missionaries,
and Father Sahagun loudly condemns it as "most unhallowed, since it is
founded neither on natural reason nor on the influence of the planets,
nor on the true course of the year; but is plainly the work of
necromancy, and the fruit of a compact with the Devil!" One may doubt,
whether the superstition of those who invented the scheme was greater
than that of those who impugned it. At all events, we may, without
having recourse to supernatural agency, find in the human heart a
sufficient explanation of its origin; in that love of power, that has
led the priesthood of many a faith to affect a mystery, the key to which
was in their own keeping. By means of this calendar the Aztec priests
kept their own records, regulated the festivals and seasons of
sacrifice, and made all their astrological calculations. The
astrological scheme of the Aztecs was founded less on the planetary
influences than on those of the arbitrary signs they had adopted for the
months and days. The character of the leading sign, in each lunar cycle
of thirteen days, gave a complexion to the whole; though this was
qualified, in some degree, by the signs of the succeeding days, as well
as by those of the hours. It was in adjusting these conflicting forces
that the great art of the diviner was shown. In no country, not even in
ancient Egypt, were the dreams of the astrologer more implicitly
deferred to. On the birth of a child, he was instantly summoned. The
time of the event was accurately ascertained; and the family hung in
trembling suspense, as the minister of Heaven cast the horoscope of the
infant, and unrolled the dark volume of destiny. The influence of the
priest was confessed by the Mexican, in the very first breath which he
inhaled. We know little further of the astronomical attainments of the
Aztecs. That they were acquainted with the cause of eclipses is evident
from the representation on their maps, of the disk of the moon projected
on that of the sun. Whether they had arranged a system of
constellations, is uncertain; though, that they recognised some of the
most obvious, as the Pleiades for example, is evident from the fact that
they regulated their festivals by them. We know of no astronomical
instruments used by them, except the dial. An immense circular block of
carved stone, disinterred in 1790, in the great square of Mexico, has
supplied an acute and learned scholar with the means of establishing
some interesting facts in regard to Mexican science. This colossal
fragment, on which the calendar is engraved, shows that they had the
means of settling the hours of the day with precision, the periods of
the solstices and of the equinoxes, and that of the transit of the sun
across the zenith of Mexico. We cannot contemplate the astronomical
science of the Mexicans, so disproportioned to their progress in other
walks of civilisation, without astonishment. An acquaintance with some
of the more obvious principles of astronomy is within the reach of the
rudest people. With a little care, they may learn to connect the
regular. changes of the seasons with those of the place of the sun at
his rising and setting. They may follow the march of the great luminary
through the heavens, by watching the stars that first brighten on his
evening track, or fade in his morning beams. They may measure a
revolution of the moon by marking her phases, and may even form a
general idea of the number of such revolutions in a solar year. But that
they should be capable of accurately adjusting their festivals by the
movements of the heavenly bodies, and should fix the true length of the
tropical year, with a precision unknown to the great philosophers of
antiquity, could be the result only of a long series of nice and patient
observations, evincing no slight progress in civilisation. But whence
could the rude inhabitants of these mountain regions have derived this
curious erudition? Not from the barbarous hordes who roamed over the
higher latitudes of the north; nor from the more polished races on the
southern continent, with whom it is apparent they had no intercourse. If
we are driven, in our embarrassment, like the greatest astronomer of
our age, to seek the solution among the civilised communities of Asia,
we shall still be perplexed by finding, amidst general resemblance of
outline, sufficient discrepancy in the details, to vindicate, in the
judgments Of many, the Aztec claim to originality. I shall conclude the
account of Mexican science with that of a remarkable festival,
celebrated by the natives at the termination of the great cycle of
fifty-two years. We have seen, in the preceding chapter, their
traditions of the destruction of the world at four successive epochs.
They looked forward confidently to another such catastrophe, to take
place like the preceding, at the close of a cycle, when the sun was to
be effaced from the heavens, the human race from the earth, and when the
darkness of chaos was to settle on the habitable globe. The cycle would
end in the latter part of December, and, as the dreary season of the
winter solstice approached, and the diminished light of day gave
melancholy presage of its speedy extinction, their apprehensions
increased; and, on the arrival of the five "unlucky" days which closed
the year, they abandoned themselves to despair. They broke in pieces the
little images of their household gods, in whom they no longer trusted.
The holy fires were suffered to go out in the temples, and none were
lighted in their own dwellings. Their furniture and domestic utensils
were destroyed; their garments torn in pieces; and everything was thrown
into disorder, for the coming of the evil genii who were to descend on
the desolate earth. On the evening of the last day, a procession of
priests, assuming the dress and ornaments of their gods, moved from the
capital towards a lofty mountain about two leagues distant. They carried
with them a noble victim, the flower of their captives, and an
apparatus for kindling the new fire, the success of which was an augury
of the renewal of the cycle. On reaching the summit of the mountain, the
procession paused till midnight; when, as the constellation of the
Pleiades approached the zenith, the new fire was kindled by the friction
of the sticks placed on the wounded breast of the victim. The flame was
soon communicated to a funeral pile, on which the body of the
slaughtered captive was thrown. As the light streamed up towards heaven,
shouts of joy and triumph burst forth from the countless multitudes who
covered the hills, the terraces of the temples, and the house-tops,
with eyes anxiously bent on the mount of sacrifice. Couriers, with
torches lighted at the blazing beacon, rapidly bore them over every part
of the country; and the cheering element was seen brightening on altar
and hearthstone, for the circuit of many a league, long before the Sun,
rising on his accustomed track, gave assurance that a new cycle had
commenced its march, and that the laws of nature were not to be
reversed. The following thirteen days were given up to festivity. The
houses were cleansed and whitened. The broken vessels were replaced by
new ones. The people, dressed in their gayest apparel, and crowned with
garlands and chaplets of flowers, thronged in joyous procession, to
offer up their oblations and thanksgiving in the temples. Dances and
games were instituted, emblematical of the regeneration of the world. It
was the carnival of the Aztecs; or rather the national jubilee, the
great secular festival, like that of the Romans, or ancient Etruscans,
which few alive had witnessed before,- or could expect to see again.
Chapter V
AGRICULTURE- THE MECHANICAL ARTS- MERCHANTS- DOMESTIC MANNERS
AGRICULTURE in Mexico was in the same advanced state as the other arts
of social life. In few countries, indeed, has it been more respected. It
was closely interwoven with the civil and religious institutions of the
nation. There were peculiar deities to preside over it; the names of
the months and of the religious festivals had more or less reference to
it. The public taxes, as we have seen, were often paid in agricultural
produce. All, except the soldiers and great nobles, even the inhabitants
of the cities, cultivated the soil. The work was chiefly done by the
men; the women scattering the seed, husking the corn, and taking part
only in the lighter labours of the field. There was no want of judgment
in the management of their ground. When somewhat exhausted, it was
permitted to recover by lying fallow. Its extreme dryness was relieved
by canals, with which the land was partially irrigated; and the same end
was promoted by severe penalties against the destruction of the woods,
with which the country, as already noticed, was well covered before the
Conquest. Lastly, they provided for their harvests ample granaries,
which were admitted by the conquerors to be of admirable construction.
In this provision we see the forecast of civilised man. Amongst the most
important articles of husbandry, we may notice the banana, whose
facility of cultivation and exuberant returns are so fatal to habits of
systematic and hardy industry. Another celebrated plant was the cacao,
the fruit of which furnished the chocolate,- from the Mexican
chocolatl,- now so common a beverage throughout Europe. The vanilla,
confined to a small district of the sea-coast, was used for the same
purposes, of flavouring their food and drink, as with us. The great
staple of the country, as, indeed, of the American continent, was maize,
or Indian corn, which grew freely along the valleys, and up the steep
sides of the Cordilleras to the high level of the talbleland. The Aztecs
were as curious in its preparation, and as well instructed in its
manifold uses, as the most expert New England housewife. Its gigantic
stalks, in these equinoctial regions, afford a saccharine matter, not
found to the same extent in northern latitudes, and supplied the natives
with sugar little inferior to that of the cane itself, which was not
introduced among them till after the Conquest. But the miracle of nature
was the great Mexican aloe, or maguey, whose clustering pyramid of
flowers, towering above their dark coronals of leaves, were seen
sprinkled over many a broad acre of the tableland. As we have already
noticed, its bruised leaves afforded a paste from which paper was
manufactured; its juice was fermented into an intoxicating beverage,
pulque, of which the natives, to this day, are excessively fond; its
leaves further supplied an impenetrable thatch for the more humble
dwellings; thread, of which coarse stuffs were made, and strong cords,
were drawn from its tough and twisted fibres; pins and needles were made
of the thorns at the extremity of its leaves; and the root, when
properly cooked, was converted into a palatable and nutritious food. The
agave, in short, was meat, drink, clothing, and writing materials for
the Aztec! Surely, never did Nature enclose in so compact a form so many
of the elements of human comfort and civilisation! It would be
obviously out of place to enumerate in these pages all the varieties of
Plants, many of them of medicinal virtue, which have been introduced
from Mexico into Europe. Still less can I attempt a catalogue of its
flowers, which, with their variegated and gaudy colours, form the
greatest attraction of our greenhouses. The opposite climates embraced
within the narrow latitudes of New Spain have given to it, probably, the
richest and most diversified Flora to be found in any country on the
globe. These different products were systematically arranged by the
Aztecs, who understood their properties, and collected them into
nurseries, more extensive than any then existing in the Old World. It is
not improbable that they suggested the idea of those "gardens of
plants" which were introduced into Europe not many years after the
Conquest. The Mexicans were as well acquainted with the mineral, as with
the vegetable treasures of their kingdom. Silver, lead, and, tin they
drew from the mines of Tasco; copper from the mountains of Zacotollan.
These were taken, not only from the crude masses on the surface, but
from veins wrought in the solid rock, into which they opened extensive
galleries. In fact, the traces of their labours furnished the best
indications for the early Spanish miners. Gold, found on the surface, or
gleaned from the beds of rivers, was cast into bars, or, in the form of
dust, made part of the regular tribute of the southern provinces of the
empire. The use of iron, with which the soil was impregnated, was
unknown to them. Notwithstanding its abundance, it demands so many
processes to prepare it for use, that it has commonly been one of the
last metals pressed into the service of man. The age of iron has
followed that of brass, in fact as well as in fiction. They found a
substitute in an alloy of tin and copper; and, with tools made of this
bronze, could cut not only metals, but, with the aid of a siliceous
dust, the hardest substances, as basalt, porphyry, amethysts, and
emeralds. They fashioned these last, which were found very large, into
many curious and fantastic forms. They cast, also, vessels of gold and
silver, carving them with their metallic chisels in a very delicate
manner. Some of the silver vases were so large, that a man could not
encircle them with his arms. They imitated very nicely the figures of
animals, and, what was extraordinary, could mix the metals in such a
manner, that the feathers of a bird, or the scales of a fish, should be
alternately of gold and silver. The Spanish goldsmiths admitted their
superiority over themselves in these ingenious works. They employed
another tool, made of itztli, or obsidian, a dark transparent mineral,
exceedingly hard, found in abundance in their hills. They made it into
knives, razors, and their serrated swords. It took a keen edge, though
soon blunted. With this they wrought the various stones and alabasters
employed in the construction of their public works and principal
dwellings. I shall defer a more particular account of these to the body
of the narrative, and will only add here, that the entrances and angles
of the buildings were profusely ornamented with images, sometimes of
their fantastic deities, and frequently of animals. The latter were
executed with great accuracy. "The former," according to Torquemada,
"were the hideous reflection of their own souls. And it was not till
after they had been converted to Christianity, that they could model the
true figure of a man." The old chronicler's facts are well founded,
whatever we may think of his reasons. The allegorical phantasms of his
religion, no doubt, gave a direction to the Aztec artist, in his
delineation of the human figure; supplying him with an imaginary beauty
in the personification of divinity, itself. As these superstitions lost
their hold on his mind, it opened to the influences of a purer taste;
and, after the Conquest, the Mexicans furnished many examples of
correct, and some of beautiful portraiture. Sculptured images were so
numerous, that the foundations of the cathedral in the Plaza Mayor, the
great square of Mexico, are said to be entirely composed of them. This
spot may, indeed, be regarded as the Aztec forum,- the great depository
of the treasures of ancient sculpture, which now he hid in its bosom.
Such monuments are spread all over the capital, however, and a new
cellar can hardly be dug, or foundation laid, without turning up some of
the mouldering relics of barbaric art. But they are little heeded, and,
if not wantonly broken in pieces at once, are usually worked into the
rising wall, or supports of the new edifice! Two celebrated bas-reliefs
of the last Montezuma and his father, cut in the solid rock in the
beautiful groves of Chapultepec, were deliberately destroyed, as late as
the last century, by order of the government! The monuments of the
barbarian meet with as little respect from civilised man, as those of
the civilised man from the barbarian. The most remarkable piece of
sculpture yet disinterred is the great calendar stone, noticed in the
preceding chapter. It consists of dark porphyry, and in its original
dimensions, as taken from the quarry, is computed to have weighed nearly
fifty tons. It was transported from the mountains beyond Lake Chalco, a
distance of many leagues, over a broken country intersected by
water-courses and canals. In crossing a bridge which traversed one of
these latter, in the capital, the supports gave way, and the huge mass
was precipitated into the water, whence it was with difficulty
recovered. The fact, that so enormous a fragment of porphyry could be
thus safely carried for leagues, in the face of such obstacles, and
without the aid of cattle,- for the Aztecs had no animals of draught,-
suggests to us no mean ideas of their mechanical skill, and of their
machinery; and implies a degree of cultivation little inferior to that
demanded for the geometrical and astronomical science displayed in the
inscriptions on this very stone. The ancient Mexicans made utensils of
earthenware for the ordinary purposes of domestic life, numerous
specimens of which still exist. They made cups and vases of a lacquered
or painted wood, impervious to wet, and gaudily coloured. Their dyes
were obtained from both mineral and vegetable substances. Among them was
the rich crimson of the cochineal, the modern rival of the famed Tyrian
purple. It was introduced into Europe from Mexico, where the curious
little insect was nourished with great care on plantations of cactus,
since fallen into neglect. The natives were thus enabled to give a
brilliant colouring to the webs, which were manufactured of every degree
of fineness from the cotton raised in abundance throughout the warmer
regions of the country. They had the art, also, of interweaving with
these the delicate hair of rabbits and other animals, which made a cloth
of great warmth as well as beauty, of a kind altogether original; and
on this they often laid a rich embroidery of birds, flowers, or some
other fanciful device. But the art in which they most delighted was
their plumaje, or feather-work. With this they could produce all the
effect of a beautiful mosaic. The gorgeous plumage of the tropical
birds, especially of the parrot tribe, afforded every variety of colour;
and the fine down of the humming-bird, which revelled in swarms among
the honeysuckle bowers of Mexico, supplied them with soft aerial tints
that gave an exquisite finish to the picture. The feathers, pasted on a
fine cotton web, were wrought into dresses for the wealthy, hangings for
apartments, and ornaments for the temples. No one of the American
fabrics excited such admiration in Europe, whither numerous specimens
were sent by the Conquerors. It is to be regretted that so graceful an
art should have been suffered to fall into decay. There were no shops in
Mexico, but the various manufactures and agricultural products were
brought together for sale in the great market-places of the principal
cities. Fairs were held there every fifth day, and were thronged by a
numerous concourse of persons, who came to buy or sell from all the
neighbouring country. A particular quarter was allotted to each kind of
article. The numerous transactions were conducted without confusion, and
with entire regard to justice, under the inspection of magistrates
appointed for the purpose. The traffic was carried on partly by barter,
and partly by means of a regulated currency, of different values. This
consisted of transparent quills of gold dust; of bits of tin, cut in the
form of a T; and of bags of cacao, containing a specified number of
grains. "Blessed money," exclaims Peter Martyr, "which exempts its
possessors from avarice, since it cannot be long hoarded, nor hidden
under ground!" There did not exist in Mexico that distinction of castes
found among the Egyptian and Asiatic nations. It was usual, however, for
the son to follow the occupation of his father. The different trades
were arranged into something like guilds; having each a particular
district of the city appropriated to it, with its own chief, its own
tutelar deity, its peculiar festivals, and the like. Trade was held in
avowed estimation by the Aztecs. "Apply thyself, my son," was the advice
of an aged chief, "to agriculture, or to feather-work, or some other
honourable calling. Thus did your ancestors before you. Else, how would
they have provided for themselves and their families? Never was it
heard, that nobility alone was able to maintain its possessor." Shrewd
maxims, that must have sounded somewhat strange in the ear of a Spanish
hidalgo! But the occupation peculiarly respected was that of the
merchant. It formed so important and singular a feature of their social
economy, as to merit a much more particular notice than it has received
from historians. The Aztec merchant was a sort of itinerant trader, who
made his journeys to the remotest borders of Anahuac, and to the
countries beyond, carrying with him merchandise of rich stuffs, jewelry,
slaves, and other valuable commodities. The slaves were obtained at the
great market of Azcapotzalco, not many leagues from the capital, where
fairs were regularly held for the sale of these unfortunate beings. They
were brought thither by their masters, dressed in their gayest apparel,
and instructed to sing, dance, and display their little stock of
personal accomplishments, so as to recommend themselves to the
purchaser. Slave-dealing was an honourable calling among the Aztecs.
With this rich freight, the merchant visited the different provinces,
always bearing some present of value from his own sovereign to their
chiefs, and usually receiving others in return, with a permission to
trade. Should this be denied him, or should he meet with indignity or
violence, he had the means of resistance in his power. He performed his
journeys with a number of companions of his own rank, and a large body
of inferior attendants who were employed to transport the goods. Fifty
or sixty pounds were the usual load for a man. The whole caravan went
armed, and so well provided against sudden hostilities, that they could
make good their defence, if necessary, till reinforced from home. In one
instance, a body of these militant traders stood a siege of four years
in the town of Ayotlan, which they finally took from the enemy. Their
own government, however, was always prompt to embark in a war on this
ground, finding it a very convenient pretext for extending the Mexican
empire. It was not unusual to allow the merchants to raise levies
themselves, which were placed under their command. It was, moreover,
very common for the prince to employ the merchants as a sort of spies,
to furnish him information of the state of the countries through which
they passed, and the dispositions of the inhabitants towards himself.
Thus their sphere of action was much enlarged beyond that of a humble
trader, and they acquired a high consideration in the body politic. They
were allowed to assume insignia and devices of their own. Some of their
number composed what is called by the Spanish writers a council of
finance; at least, this was the case in Tezcoco. They were much
consulted by the monarch, who had some of them constantly near his
person; addressing them by the title of "uncle," which may remind one of
that of primo, or "cousin," by which a grandee of Spain is saluted by
his sovereign. They were allowed to have their own courts, in which
civil and criminal cases, not excepting capital, were determined; so
that they formed an independent community, as it were, of themselves.
And, as their various traffic supplied them with abundant stores of
wealth, they enjoyed many of the most essential advantages of an
hereditary aristocracy. That trade should prove the path to eminent
political preferment in a nation but partially civilised, where the
names of soldier and priest are usually the only titles to respect, is
certainly an anomaly in history. It forms some contrast to the standard
of the more polished monarchies of the Old World, in which rank is
supposed to be less dishonoured by a life of idle ease or frivolous
pleasure, than by those active pursuits which promote equally the
prosperity of the state and of the individual. If civilisation corrects
many prejudices, it must be allowed that it creates others. We shall be
able to form a better idea of the actual refinement of the natives, by
penetrating into their domestic life, and observing the intercourse
between the sexes. We have fortunately the means of doing this. We shall
there find the ferocious Aztec frequently displaying all the
sensibility of a cultivated nature; consoling his friends under
affliction, or congratulating them on their good fortune, as on occasion
of a marriage, or of the birth or the baptism of a child, when he was
punctilious in his visits, bringing presents of costly dresses and
ornaments, or the more simple offering of flowers, equally indicative of
his sympathy. The visits, at these times, though regulated with all the
precision of Oriental courtesy, were accompanied by expressions of the
most cordial and affectionate regard. The discipline of children,
especially at the public schools, as stated in a previous chapter, was
exceedingly severe. But after she had come to a mature age, the Aztec
maiden was treated by her parents with a tenderness from which all
reserve seemed banished. In the counsels to a daughter about to enter
into life, they conjured her to preserve simplicity in her manners and
conversation, uniform neatness in her attire, with strict attention to
personal cleanliness. They inculcated modesty as the great ornament of a
woman, and implicit reverence for her husband; softening their
admonitions by such endearing epithets, as showed the fulness of a
parent's love. Polygamy was permitted among the Mexicans, though chiefly
confined, probably, to the wealthiest classes. And the obligations of
the marriage vow, which was made with all the formality of a religious
ceremony, were fully recognised, and impressed on both parties. The
women are described by the Spaniards as pretty, unlike their unfortunate
descendants of the present day, though with the same serious and rather
melancholy cast of countenance. Their long black hair, covered, in some
parts of the country, by a veil made of the fine web of the pita, might
generally be seen wreathed with flowers, or among the richer people,
with strings of precious stones, and pearls from the Gulf of California.
They appear to have been treated with much consideration by their
husbands; and passed their time in indolent tranquillity, or in such
feminine occupations as spinning, embroidery and the like; while their
maidens beguiled the hours by the rehearsal of traditional tales and
ballads. The woman partook equally with the men of social festivities
and entertainments. These were often conducted on a large scale, both as
regards the number of guests and the costliness of the preparations.
Numerous attendants, of both sexes, waited at the banquet. The halls
were scented with perfumes, and the courts strewed with odoriferous herb
and flowers, which were distributed in profusion among the guests, as
they arrived. Cotton napkins and ewers of water were placed before them,
as they took their seats at the board; for the venerable ceremony of
ablution, before and after eating, was punctiliously observed by the
Aztecs. Tobacco was then offered to the company, in pipes, mixed up with
aromatic substances, or in the form of cigars, inserted in tubes of
tortoise-shell or silver. They compressed the nostrils with the fingers,
while they inhaled the smoke, which they frequently swallowed. Whether
the women, who sat apart from the men at table, were allowed the
indulgence of the fragrant weed as in the most polished circles of
modern Mexico, is not told us. It is a curious fact, that the Aztecs
also took the dried leaf in the pulverised form of snuff. The table was
well provided with substantial meats, especially game; among which the
most conspicuous was the turkey, erroneously supposed, as its name
imports, to have come originally from the East. These more solid dishes
were flanked by others of vegetables and fruits, of every delicious
variety found on the North American continent. The different viands were
prepared in various ways, with delicate sauces and seasoning, of which
the Mexicans were very fond. Their palate was still further regaled by
confections and pastry, for which their maize-flour and sugar supplied
ample materials. One other dish, of a disgusting nature, was sometimes
added to the feast, especially when the celebration partook of a
religious character. On such occasions a slave was sacrificed, and his
flesh elaborately dressed, formed one of the chief ornaments of the
banquet. Cannibalism, in the guise of an Epicurean science, becomes even
the more revolting. The meats were kept warm by chafing-dishes. The
table was ornamented with vases of silver, and sometimes gold, of
delicate workmanship. The drinking-cups and spoons were of the same
costly materials, and likewise of tortoise-shell. The favourite beverage
was the chocolatl, flavoured with vanilla and different spices. They
had a way of preparing the froth of it, so as to make it almost solid
enough to be eaten, and took it cold. The fermented juice of the maguey,
with a mixture of sweets and acids, supplied also various agreeable
drinks of different degrees of strength, and formed the chief beverage
of the elder part of the company. As soon as they had finished their
repast, the young people rose from the table, to close the festivities
of the day with dancing. They danced gracefully, to the sound of various
instruments, accompanying their movements with chants of a pleasing,
though somewhat plaintive character. The older guests continued at
table, sipping pulque, and gossiping about other times, till the virtues
of the exhilarating beverage put them in good humour with their own.
Intoxication was not rare in this part of the company, and, what is
singular, was excused in them, though severely punished in the younger.
The Aztec character was perfectly original and unique. It was made up of
incongruities apparently irreconcilable. It blended into one the marked
peculiarities of different nations, not only of the same place of
civilisation, but as far removed from each other as the extremes of
barbarism and refinement. It may find a fitting parallel in their own
wonderful climate, capable of producing, on a few square leagues of
surface, the boundless variety of vegetable forms which belong to the
frozen regions of the North, the temperate zone of Europe, and the
burning skies of Arabia and Hindostan!
Chapter VI
THE TEZCOCANS- THEIR GOLDEN AGE- ACCOMPLISHED PRINCES- DECLINE OF THEIR
MONARCHY The reader would gather but an imperfect notion of the
civilisation of Anahuac, without some account of the Acolhuans, or
Tezcocans, as they are usually cared; a nation of the same great family
with the Aztecs, whom they rivalled in power, and surpassed in
intellectual culture and the arts of social refinement. Fortunately, we
have ample materials for this in the records left by Ixtlilxochitl, a
lineal descendant of the royal line of Tezcoco, who flourished in the
century of the Conquest. With every opportunity for information he
combined much industry and talent, and, if his narrative bears the high
colouring of one who would revive the faded glories of an ancient, but
dilapidated house, he has been uniformly commended for his fairness and
integrity, and has been followed without misgiving by such Spanish
writers as could have access to his manuscripts. I shall confine myself
to the prominent features of the two reigns which may be said to embrace
the golden age of Tezcoco; without attempting to weigh the probability
of the details, which I will leave to be settled by the reader,
according to the measure of his faith. The Acolhuans came into the
Valley, as we have seen, about the close of the twelfth century, and
built their capital of Tezcoco on the eastern borders of the lake,
opposite to Mexico. From this point they gradually spread themselves
over the northern portion of Anahuac, when their career was cheeked by
an invasion of a kindred race, the Tepanecs, who, after a desperate
struggle, succeeded in taking their city, slaying their monarch, and
entirely subjugating his kingdom. This event took place about 1418; and
the young prince, Nezahualcoyotl, the heir to the crown, then fifteen
years old, saw his father butchered before his eyes, while he himself
lay concealed among the friendly branches of a tree, which overshadowed
the spot. His subsequent history is full of romantic daring and perilous
escapes. Not long after his flight from the field of his father's
blood, the Tezcocan prince fell into the hands of his enemy, was borne
off in triumph to his city, and was thrown into a dungeon. He effected
his escape, however, through the connivance of the governor of the
fortress, an old servant of his family, who took the place of the royal
fugitive, and paid for his loyalty with his life. He was at length
permitted, through the intercession of the reigning family in Mexico,
which was allied to him, to retire to that capital, and subsequently to
his own, where he found a shelter in his ancestral palace. Here he
remained unmolested for eight years, pursuing his studies under an old
preceptor, who had had the care of his early youth, and who instructed
him in the various duties befitting his princely station. At the end of
this period the Tepanec usurper died, bequeathing his empire to his son,
Maxtla, a man of fierce and suspicious temper. Nezahualcoyotl hastened
to pay his obeisance to him, on his accession. But the tyrant refused to
receive the little present of flowers which he laid at his feet, and
turned his back on him in presence of his chieftains. One of his
attendants, friendly to the young prince, admonished him to provide for
his own safety, by withdrawing, as speedily as possible, from the
palace, where his life was in danger. He lost no time, consequently, in
retreating from the inhospitable court, and returned to Tezcoco. Maxtla,
however, was bent on his destruction. He saw with jealous eye the
opening talents and popular manners of his rival, and the favour he was
daily winning from his ancient subjects. He accordingly laid a plan for
making away with him at an evening entertainment. It was defeated by the
vigilance of the prince's tutor, who contrived to mislead the
assassins, and to substitute another victim in the place of his pupil.
The baffled tyrant now threw off all disguise, and sent a strong party
of soldiers to Tezcoco, with orders to enter the palace, seize the
person of Nezahualcoyotl, and slay him on the spot. The prince, who
became acquainted with the plot through the watchfulness of his preceptor,
instead of flying, as he was counselled, resolved to await his enemy.
They found him playing at ball, when they arrived, in the court of his
palace. He received them courteously and invited them in, to take some
refreshments after their journey. While they were occupied in this way,
he passed into an adjoining saloon, which excited no suspicion, as he
was still visible through the open doors by which the apartments
communicated with each other. A burning censer stood in the passage,
and, as it was fed by the attendants, threw up such clouds of incense as
obscured his movements from the soldiers. Under this friendly veil he
succeeded in making his escape by a secret passage, which communicated
with a large earthen pipe formerly used to bring water to the palace.
Here he remained till nightfall, when, taking advantage of the
obscurity, he found his way into the suburbs, and sought a shelter in
the cottage of one of his father's vassals. The Tepanec monarch, enraged
at this repeated disappointment, ordered instant pursuit. A price was
set on the head of the royal fugitive. Whoever should take him, dead or
alive, was promised, however humble his degree, the hand of a noble
lady, and an ample domain along with it. Troops of armed men were
ordered to scour the country in every direction. In the course of the
search, the cottage in which the prince had taken refuge was entered.
But he fortunately escaped detection by being hid under a heap of maguey
fibres used for manufacturing cloth. As this was no longer a proper
place for concealment, he sought a retreat in the mountainous and woody
district lying between the borders of his own state and Tlazcala. Here
he led a wretched wandering life, exposed to all the inclemencies of the
weather, hiding himself in deep thickets and caverns, and stealing out
at night to satisfy the cravings of appetite; while he was kept in
constant alarm by the activity of his pursuers, always hovering on his
track. On one occasion he sought refuge from them among a small party of
soldiers, who proved friendly to him, and concealed him in a large drum
around which they were dancing. At another time, he was just able to
turn the crest of a hill, as his enemies were climbing it on the other
side, when he fell in with a girl who was reaping chian,- a Mexican
plant, the seed of which was much used in the drinks of the country. He
persuaded her to cover him up with the stalks she had been cutting. When
his pursuers came up, and inquired if she had seen the fugitive, the
girl coolly answered that she had, and pointed out a path as the one he
had taken. Notwithstanding the high rewards offered, Nezahualcoyotl
seems to have incurred no danger from treachery, such was the general
attachment felt to himself and his house. "Would you not deliver up the
prince, if he came in your way?" he inquired of a young peasant who was
unacquainted with his person. "Not I," replied the other. "What, not for
a fair lady's hand, and a rich dowry beside?" rejoined the prince. At
which the other only shook his head and laughed. On more than one
occasion, his faithful people submitted to torture, and even to lose
their lives, rather than disclose the place of his retreat. However
gratifying such proofs of loyalty might be to his feelings, the
situation of the prince in these mountain solitudes became every day
more distressing. It gave a still keener edge to his own sufferings to
witness those of the faithful followers who chose to accompany him in
his wanderings. "Leave me," he would say to them, "to my fate! Why
should you throw away your own lives for one whom fortune is never weary
of persecuting?" Most of the great Tezcocan chiefs had consulted their
interests by a timely adhesion to the usurper. But some still clung to
their prince, preferring proscription, and death itself, rather than
desert him in his extremity. In the meantime, his friends at a distance
were active in measures for his relief. The oppressions of Maxtla, and
his growing empire, had caused general alarm in the surrounding states,
who recalled the mild rule of the Tezcocan princes. A coalition was
formed, a plan of operations concerted, and, on the day appointed for a
general rising, Nezahualcoyotl found himself at the head of a force
sufficiently strong to face his Tepanec adversaries. An engagement came
on, in which the latter were totally discomfited; and the victorious
prince, receiving everywhere on his route the homage of his joyful
subjects, entered his capital, not like a proscribed outcast, but as the
rightful heir, and saw himself once more enthroned in the halls of his
fathers. Soon after, he united his forces with the Mexicans, long
disgusted with the arbitrary conduct of Maxtla. The allied powers, after
a series of bloody engagements with the usurper, routed him under the
walls of his own capital. He fled to the baths, whence he was dragged
out, and sacrificed with the usual cruel ceremonies of the Aztecs; the
royal city of Azcapotzalco was razed to the ground, and the wasted
territory was henceforth reserved as the great slavemarket for the
nations of Anahuac. These events were succeeded by the remarkable league
among the three powers of Tezcoco, Mexico, and Tlacopan, of which some
account has been given in a previous chapter. The first measure of
Nezahualcoyotl, on returning to his dominions, was a general amnesty. It
was his maxim, "that a monarch might punish, but revenge was unworthy
of him." In the present instance, he was averse even to punish, and not
only freely pardoned his rebel nobles, but conferred on some, who had
most deeply offended, posts of honour and confidence. Such conduct was
doubtless politic, especially as their alienation was owing, probably,
much more to fear of the usurper, than to any disaffection towards
himself. But there are some acts of policy which a magnanimous spirit
only can execute. The restored monarch next set about repairing the
damages sustained under the late misrule, and reviving, or rather
remodelling the various departments of government. He framed a concise,
but comprehensive, code of laws, so well suited, it was thought, to the
exigencies of the times, that it was adopted as their own by the two
other members of triple alliance. He divided the burden of government
among a number of departments, as the council of war, the council of
finance, the council of justice. This last was a court of supreme
authority, both in civil and criminal matters, receiving appeals from
the lower tribunals of the provinces, which were obliged to make a full
report, every four months, or eighty days, of their own proceedings to
this higher judicature. In all these bodies, a certain number of
citizens were allowed to have seats with the nobles and professional
dignitaries. There was, however, another body, a council of state, for
aiding the king in the despatch of business, and advising him in matters
of importance, which was drawn altogether from the highest order of
chiefs. It consisted of fourteen members; and they had seats provided
for them at the royal table. Lastly, there was an extraordinary
tribunal, called the council of music, but which, differing from the
import of its name, was devoted to the encouragement of science and art.
Works on astronomy, chronology, history, or any other science, were
required to be submitted to its judgment before they could be made
public. This censorial power was of some moment, at least with regard to
the historical department, where the wilful perversion of truth was
made a capital offence by the bloody code of Nezahualcoyotl. Yet a
Tezcocan author must have been a bungler, who could not elude a
conviction under the cloudy veil of hieroglyphics. This body, which was
drawn from the best instructed persons in the kingdom, with little
regard to rank, had supervision of all the productions of art, and of
the nicer fabrics. It decided on the qualifications of the professors in
the various branches of science, on the fidelity of their instructions
to their pupils, the deficiency of which was severely punished, and it
instituted examinations of these latter. In short it was a general board
of education for the country. On stated days, historical compositions,
and poems treating of moral or traditional topics, were recited before
it by their authors. Seats were provided for the three crowned heads of
the empire, who deliberated with the other members on the respective
merits of the pieces, and distributed prizes of value to the successful
competitors. The influence of this academy must have been most
propitious to the capital, which became the nursery not only of such
sciences as could be compassed by the scholarship of the period, but of
various useful and ornamental arts. Its historians, orators, and poets
were celebrated throughout the country. Its archives, for which
accommodations were provided in the royal palace, were stored with the
records of primitive ages. Its idiom, more polished than the Mexican,
was indeed the purest of all the Nahuatlac dialects; and continued, long
after the Conquest, to be that in which the best productions of the
native races were composed. Tezcoco claimed the glory of being the
Athens of the Western World. Among the most illustrious of her bards was
the emperor himself,- for the Tezcocan writers claim this title for
their chief, as head of the imperial alliance. He, doubtless, appeared
as a competitor before that very academy where he so often sat as a
critic. But the hours of the Tezcocan monarch were not all passed in
idle dalliance with the Muse, nor in the sober contemplations of
philosophy, as at a later period. In the freshness of youth and early
manhood, he led the allied armies in their annual expeditions, which
were certain to result in a wider extent of territory to the empire. In
the intervals of peace he fostered those productive arts which are the
surest sources of public prosperity. He encouraged agriculture above
all; and there was scarcely a spot so rude, or a steep so inaccessible,
as not to confess the power of cultivation. The land was covered with a
busy population, and towns and cities sprung up in places since
deserted, or dwindled into miserable villages. From resources thus
enlarged by conquest and domestic industry, the monarch drew the means
for the large consumption of his own numerous household, and for the
costly works which he executed for the convenience and embellishment of
the capital. He fined it with stately edifices for his nobles, whose
constant attendance he was anxious to secure at his court. He erected a
magnificent pile of buildings which might serve both for a royal
residence and for the public offices. It extended, from east to west,
twelve hundred and thirty-four yards; and from north to south, nine
hundred and seventy-eight. It was encompassed by a wall of unburnt
bricks and cement, six feet wide and nine high for one half of the
circumference, and fifteen feet high for the other half. Within this
enclosure were two courts. The outer one was used as the great
marketplace of the city; and continued to be so until long after the
Conquest. The interior court was surrounded by the council chambers and
halls of justice. There were also accommodations there. for the foreign
ambassadors; and a spacious saloon, with apartments: opening into it,
for men of science and poets, who pursued their studies in this retreat,
or met together to hold converse under its marble porticos. In this
quarter, also, were kept the public archives; which fared better under
the Indian dynasty than they have since under their European successors.
Adjoining this court were the apartments of the king, including those
for the royal harem, as liberally supplied with beauties as that of an
eastern sultan. Their walls were incrusted with alabasters, and richly
tinted stucco, or hung with gorgeous tapestries of variegated
feather-work. They led through long arcades, and through intricate
labyrinths of shrubbery, into gardens, where baths and sparkling
fountains were overshadowed by tall groves of cedar and cypress. The
basins of water were well stocked with fish of various kinds, and the
aviaries with birds glowing in all the gaudy plumage of the tropics.
Many birds and animals, which could not be obtained alive, were
represented in gold and silver so skillfully as to have furnished the
great naturalist Hernandez with models. Accommodations on a princely
scale were provided for the sovereigns of Mexico and Tlacopan, when they
visited the court. The whole of this lordly pile contained three
hundred apartments, some of them fifty yards square. The height of the
building is not mentioned. It was probably not great; but supplied the
requisite room by the immense extent of ground which it covered. The
interior was doubtless constructed of fight materials, especially of the
rich woods, which, in that country, are remarkable, when polished, for
the brilliancy and variety of their colours. That the more solid
materials of stone and stucco were also liberally employed, is proved by
the remains at the present day; remains which have furnished an
inexhaustible quarry for the churches and other edifices since erected
by the Spaniards on the site of the ancient city. We are not informed of
the time occupied in building this palace; but two hundred thousand
workmen, it is said, were employed on it! However this may be, it is
certain that the Tezcocan monarchs, like those of Asia, and ancient
Egypt, had the control of immense masses of men, and would sometimes
turn the whole population of a conquered city, including the women, into
the public works.- The most gigantic monuments of architecture which
the world has witnessed would never have been reared by the hands of
freemen. Adjoining the palace were buildings for the king's children,
who, by his various wives, amounted to no less than sixty sons and fifty
daughters. Here they were instructed in all the exercises and
accomplishments suited to their station; comprehending, what would
scarcely find a place in a royal education on the other side of the
Atlantic,- the arts of working in metals, jewelry, and feather-mosaic.
Once in every four months, the whole household, not excepting the
youngest, and including all the officers and attendants on the king's
person, assembled in a grand saloon of the palace, to listen to a
discourse from an orator, probably one of the priesthood. The princes,
on this occasion, were all dressed in nequen, the coarsest manufacture
of the country. The preacher began by enlarging on the obligations of
morality, and of respect for the gods, especially important in persons
whose rank gave such additional weight to example. He occasionally
seasoned his homily with a pertinent application to his audience, if any
member of it had been guilty of a notorious delinquency. from this
wholesome admonition the monarch himself was not exempted, and the
orator boldly reminded him of his paramount duty to show respect for his
own laws. The king, so far from taking umbrage, received the lesson
with humility: and the audience, we are assured, were often melted into
tears by the eloquence of the preacher. Nezahualcoyotl's fondness for
magnificence was shown in his numerous villas, which were embellished
with all that could make a rural retreat delightful. His favourite
residence was at Tezcotzinco; a conical hill about two leagues from the
capital. It was laid out in terraces, or hanging gardens, having a
flight of steps five hundred and twenty in number, many of them hewn in
the natural porphyry. In the garden on the summit was a reservoir of
water, fed by an aqueduct that was carried over hill and valley, for
several miles, on huge buttresses of masonry. A large rock stood in the
midst of this basin, sculptured with the hieroglyphics representing the
years of Nezahualcoyotl's reign and his principal achievements in each.
On a lower level were three other reservoirs, in each of which stood a
marble statue of a woman, emblematic of the three states of the empire.
Another tank contained a winged lion, cut out of the solid rock, bearing
in his mouth the portrait of the emperor. His likeness had been
executed in gold, wood, feather-work, and stone, but this was the only
one which pleased him. From these copious basins the water was
distributed in numerous channels through the gardens, or was made to
tumble over the rocks in cascades, shedding refreshing dews on the
flowers and odoriferous shrubs below. In the depths of this fragrant
wilderness, marble porticos and pavilions were erected, and baths
excavated in the solid porphyry. The visitor descended by steps cut in
the living stone, and polished so bright as to reflect like mirrors.
Towards the base of the hill, in the midst of cedar groves, whose
gigantic branches threw a refreshing coolness over the verdure in the
sultriest seasons of the year, rose the royal villa, with its light
arcades and airy halls, drinking in the sweet perfumes of the gardens.
Here the monarch often retired, to throw off the burden of state, and
refresh his wearied spirits in the society of his favourite wives,
reposing during the noontide heats in the embowering shades of his
paradise, or mingling, in the cool of the evening, in their festive
sports and dances. Here he entertained his imperial brothers of Mexico
and Tlacopan, and followed the hardier pleasures of the chase in the
noble woods that stretched for miles around his villa, flourishing in
all their primeval majesty. Here, too, he often repaired in the latter
days of his life, when age had tempered ambition and cooled the ardour
of his blood, to pursue in solitude the studies of philosophy and gather
wisdom from meditation. It was not his passion to hoard. He dispensed
his revenues munificently, seeking out poor, but meritorious objects, on
whom to bestow them. He was particularly mindful of disabled soldiers,
and those who had in any way sustained loss in the public service; and,
in case of their death, extended assistance to their surviving families.
Open mendicity was a thing he would never tolerate, but chastised it
with exemplary rigour. It would be incredible, that a man of the
enlarged mind and endowments of Nezahualcoyotl should acquiesce in the
sordid superstitions of his countrymen, and still more in the sanguinary
rites borrowed by them from the Aztecs. In truth, his humane temper
shrunk from these cruel ceremonies, and he strenuously endeavoured to
recall his people to the more pure and simple worship of the ancient
Toltecs. A circumstance produced a temporary change in his conduct. He
had been married some years, but was not blessed with issue. The priests
represented that it was owing to his neglect of the gods of his
country, and that his only remedy was to propitiate them by human
sacrifice. The king reluctantly consented, and the altars once more
smoked with the blood of slaughtered captives. But it was all in vain;
and he indignantly exclaimed, "These idols of wood and stone can neither
hear nor feel; much less could they make the heavens and the earth, and
man, the lord of it. These must be the work of the all-powerful,
unknown God, Creator of the universe, on whom alone I must rely for
consolation and support." He then withdrew to his rural palace of
Tezcotzinco, where he remained forty days, fasting and praying at stated
hours, and offering up no other sacrifice than the sweet incense of
copal, and aromatic herbs and gums. At the expiration of this time, he
is said to have been comforted by a vision assuring him of the success
of his petition. At all events, such proved to be the fact; and this was
followed by the cheering intelligence of the triumph of his arms in a
quarter where he had lately experienced some humiliating reverses.
Greatly strengthened in his former religious convictions, he now openly
professed his faith, and was more earnest to wean his subjects from
their degrading superstitions, and to substitute nobler and more
spiritual conceptions of the Deity. He built a temple in the usual
pyramidal form, and on the summit a tower nine stories high, to
represent the nine heavens; a tenth was surmounted by a roof painted
black, and profusely gilded with stars on the outside, and incrusted
with metals and precious stones within. He dedicated this to "the
unknown God, the Cause of causes." It seems probable, from the emblem on
the tower, as well as from the complexion of his verses, as we shall
see, that he mingled with his reverence for the Supreme the astral
worship which existed among the Toltecs. Various musical instruments
were placed on the top of the tower, and the sound of them, accompanied
by the ringing of a sonorous metal struck by a mallet, summoned the
worshippers to prayers at regular seasons. No image was allowed in the
edifice, as unsuited to the "invisible God"; and the people were
expressly prohibited from profaning the altars with blood, or any other
sacrifice than that of the perfume of flowers and sweet-scented gums.
The remainder of his days was chiefly spent in his delicious solitudes
of Tezcotzinco, where he devoted himself to astronomical and, probably,
astrological studies, and to meditation on his immortal destiny,- giving
utterance to his feelings in songs, or rather hymns, of much solemnity
and pathos. At length, about the year 1470, Nezahualcoyotl, full of
years and honours, felt himself drawing near his end. Almost half a
century had elapsed since he mounted the throne of Tezcoco. He had found
his kingdom dismembered by faction, and bowed to the dust beneath the
yoke of a foreign tyrant. He had broken that yoke; and breathed new life
into the nation, renewed its ancient institutions, extended wide its
domain; had seen it flourishing in all the activity of trade and
agriculture, gathering strength from its enlarged resources, and daily
advancing higher and higher in the great march of civilisation All this
he had seen, and might fairly attribute no small portion of it to his
own wise and beneficent rule. His long and glorious day was now drawing
to its close; and he contemplated the event with the same serenity which
he had shown under the clouds of its morning and in its meridian
splendour. A short time before his death, he gathered around him those
of his children in whom he most confided, his chief counsellors, the
ambassadors of Mexico and Tlacopan, and his little son, the heir to the
crown, his only offspring by the queen. He was then not eight years old;
but had already given, as far as so tender a blossom might, the rich
promise of future excellence. After tenderly embracing the child, the
dying monarch threw over him the robes of sovereignty. He then gave
audience to the ambassadors, and when they had retired, made the boy
repeat the substance of the conversation. He followed this by such
counsels as were suited to his comprehension, and which when remembered
through the long vista of after years, would serve as lights to guide
him in his government of the kingdom. He besought him not to neglect the
worship of "the unknown God," regretting that he himself had been
unworthy to know him, and intimating his conviction that the time would
come when he should be known and worshipped throughout the land. He next
addressed himself to that one of his sons in whom he Placed the
greatest trust, and whom he had selected as the guardian of the realm.
"From this hour," he said to him, "you will fill the place that I have
filled, of father to this child; you will teach him to live as he ought;
and by your counsels he will rule over the empire. Stand in his place,
and be his guide, till he shall be of age to govern for himself." Then,
turning to his other children, he admonished them to live united with
one another, and to show all loyalty to their prince, who, though a
child, already manifested a discretion far above his years. "Be true to
him," he added, "and he will maintain you in your rights and dignities."
Feeling his end approaching, he exclaimed, "Do not bewail me with idle
lamentations. But sing the song of gladness, and show a courageous
spirit, that the nations I have subdued may not believe you
disheartened, but may feel that each one of you is strong enough to keep
them in obedience!" The undaunted spirit of the monarch shone forth
even in the agonies of death. That stout heart, however, melted as he
took leave of his children and friends, weeping tenderly over them,
while he bade each a last adieu. When they had withdrawn, he ordered the
officers of the palace to allow no one to enter it again. Soon after he
expired, in the seventy-second year of his age, and the forty-third of
his reign. Thus died the greatest monarch and, perhaps, the best who
ever sat upon an Indian throne. His character is delineated with
tolerable impartiality by his kinsman, the Tezcocan chronicler. "He was
wise, valiant, liberal; and, when we consider the magnanimity of his
soul, the grandeur and success of his enterprises, his deep policy, as
well as daring, we must admit him to have far surpassed every other
prince and captain of this New World. He had few failings himself, and
rigorously punished those of others. He preferred the public to his
private interest; was most charitable in his nature, often buying
articles at double their worth of poor and honest persons, and giving
them away again to the sick and infirm. In seasons of scarcity he was
particularly bountiful, remitting the taxes of his vassals, and
supplying their wants from the royal granaries. He put no faith in the
idolatrous worship of the country. He was well instructed in moral
science, and sought, above all things, to obtain light for knowing the
true God. He believed in one God only, the Creator of heaven and earth,
by whom we have our being, who never revealed himself to us in human
form, nor in any other; with whom the souls of the virtuous are to dwell
after death, while the wicked will suffer pains unspeakable. He invoked
the Most High, as Him by whom we live, and 'Who has all things in
himself.' He recognised the Sun for his father, and the Earth for his
mother. He taught his children not to confide in idols, and only to
conform to the outward worship of them from deference to public opinion.
If he could not entirely abolish human sacrifices, derived from the
Aztecs, he, at least, restricted them to slaves and captives." I have
occupied so much space with this illustrious prince that but little
remains for his son and successor, Nezahualpilli. I have thought better,
in our narrow limits, to present a complete view of a single epoch, the
most interesting in the Tezcocan annals, than to spread the inquiries
over a broader, but comparatively barren field. Yet Nezahualpilli, the
heir to the crown, was a remarkable person, and his reign contains many
incidents, which I regret to be obliged to pass over in silence.
Nezahualpilli resembled his father in his passion for astronomical
studies, and is said to have had an observatory on one of his palaces.
He was devoted to war in his youth, but, as he advanced in years,
resigned himself to a more indolent way of life, and sought his chief
amusement in the pursuit of his favourite science, or in the soft
pleasures of the sequestered gardens of Tezcotzinco. This quiet life was
ill suited to the turbulent temper of the times, and of his Mexican
rival, Montezuma. The distant provinces fell off from their allegiance;
the army relaxed its discipline; disaffection crept into its ranks; and
the wily Montezuma, partly by violence, and partly by stratagems
unworthy of a king, succeeded in plundering his brother monarch of some
of his most valuable domains. Then it was that he arrogated to himself
the title and supremacy of emperor, hitherto borne by the Tezcocan
princes, as head of the alliance. Such is the account given by the
historians of that nation, who in this way, explain the acknowledged
superiority of the Aztec sovereign, both in territory and consideration,
on the landing of the Spaniards. These misfortunes pressed heavily on
the spirits of Nezahualpilli. Their effect was increased by certain
gloomy prognostics of a near calamity which was to overwhelm the
country. He withdrew to his retreat, to brood in secret over his
sorrows. His health rapidly declined; and in the year 1515, at the age
of fifty-two, he sunk into the grave; happy, at least, that, by his
timely death, he escaped witnessing the fulfilment of his own
predictions, in the ruin of his country, and the extinction of the
Indian dynasties, for ever. In reviewing the brief sketch here presented
of the Tezcocan monarchy, we are strongly impressed with the conviction
of its superiority, in all the great features of civilisation, over the
rest of Anahuac. The Mexicans showed a similar proficiency, no doubt,
in the mechanic arts, and even in mathematical science. But in the
science of government, in legislation, in the speculative doctrines of a
religious nature, in the more elegant pursuits of poetry, eloquence,
and whatever depended on refinement of taste and a polished idiom, they
confessed themselves inferior, by resorting to their rivals for
instruction, and citing their works as the masterpieces of their tongue.
The best histories, the best poems, the best code of laws, the purest
dialect, were all allowed to be Tezcocan. What was the actual amount of
the Tezcocan civilisation, it is not easy to determine, with the
imperfect light afforded us. It was certainly far below anything which
the word conveys, measured by a European standard. In some of the arts,
and in any walk of science, they could only have made, as it were, a
beginning. But they had begun in the right way, and already showed a
refinement in sentiment and manners, a capacity for receiving
instruction, which, under good auspices, might have led them on to
indefinite improvement. Unhappily, they were fast falling under the
dominion of the warlike Aztecs. And that people repaid the benefits
received from their more polished neighbours by imparting to them their
own ferocious superstition, which, falling like a mildew on the land,
would soon have blighted its rich blossoms of promise, and turned even
its fruits to dust and ashes.
