Some Malays and Chinese, who have come from the BOOK Philippine Islands to establish themselves in Mexico, can- LXXXIV. not be included in this enumeration. The number of copper-coloured Indians of the pure race, principally concentrated in the southern part of the table land of Anahuac, exceeds two millions and a half; thus forming about twofifths of the entire population. They are infinitely more rare, however, in the north of New Spain, and the provinces denominated internas. genous na than before than the disco The very. Far from becoming extinct, the indigenous population The indigoes on increasing, especially during the last hundred tives more years; and, accordingly, it would appear that, in total numerous amount, these countries are more populous at present they were previously to the arrival of Europeans. kingdom of Montezuma did not equal in extent the eighth part of New Spain as it now exists. The great towns of the Aztecs, and their most cultivated lands, were met with in the environs of the capital of Mexico, and particularly in the delicious valley of Tenochtitlan. The kings of Alcolhuacan, of Tlacopan, and of Mehuacan, were independent princes. Beyond the parallel of 20° were the Chichimegs and Otomites, two wandering and barbarous nations, whose hordes, though far from numerous, pushed their incursions as far as Tula, a town situated near the northern border of the valley of Tenochtitlan. It would be just as difficult however to estimate, with any degree of accuracy, the number of Montezuma's subjects, as it would be to decide respecting the ancient population of Egypt, Persia, Carthage, or Greece, or even with regard to many modern states. History presents us, on the one hand, with a train of conquerors ambitious to throw additional lustre on their own exploits; on the other, religious and sensible. men, directing, with noble ardour, the arms of eloquence against the cruelty of the first colonists. Both parties were equally interested in exaggerating the flourishing condition of the newly discovered countries. At all events, * Clavigero, Storia antica di Messico, t. I. p. 36; t. IV. p. 282. BOOK the extensive ruins of towns and villages that are met with LXXXIV. in the 18° and 20° of latitude in the interior of Mexico, seem to prove that the population of this single part of the kingdom was once far superior to what it is now. Yet it must be remarked that these ruins are dispersed over a space that, relatively speaking, is but very limited. Physical character tives. To a great degree of muscular strength, the copper-coof the indi- loured natives add the advantage of being seldom or never genous na- subject to any deformity. M. Humboldt assures us that he never saw a hunch-back Indian, and that they very seldom squint, or are met with either lame, or wanting the use of their arms. In those countries where the inhabitants suffer from the goitre, this affection of the thyroid gland is never observed among the Indians, and rarely among the Metis. The Indians of New Spain, and especially the women, generally live to an advanced age. Their hair, it is said, never turns grey, and they preserve all their strength till the period of their death. In respect of the moral faculties of the indigenous Mexicans, it is difficult to form a just estimate of them, if we consider this unhappy nation almost in the only light in which there has been an opportunity of viewing it by intelligent travellers, as sinking under long oppression, and depressed almost to the lowest point of degradation. At the commencement of the conquest, the wealthiest Indians, those, in short, among whom a certain degree of intellectual cultivation may be supposed to have existed, almost entirely perished, the victims of European ferocity. Christian fanaticism chiefly raged against the Aztec priests. The ministers of religion were exterminated, all those, in fact, who inhabited the houses of God, and who might be considered as depositories of the historical, mythological, and even astronomical knowledge of the country; for it was the priests who observed the meridian shade on the dials, and regulated the intercalations. The Spanish monks burned the hieroglyphical paintings, by which knowledge of every kind had been transmitted LXXXIV. from generation to generation.* Deprived of these means BOOK of instruction, the people sunk back into a degree of ignorance which became the more profound, because the missionaries, little versed in the Mexican languages, substituted few new ideas in place of the ancient ones that had thus been lost. The Indian women who still preserved some fortune, preferred an alliance with their conquerors to sharing the general contempt which was entertained for their nation. Of the natives, therefore, only the most indigent class remained, the poor cultivators, the artisans, among whom were to be reckoned a great number of weavers; the porters, who, from a want of the larger quadrupeds, were made use of as beasts of burthen, and above all, that refuse of the people, the crowd of mendicants, who proving at the same time the imperfection of social institutions, and the yoke of feudalism, already, even in the time of Cortez, filled the streets of all the great towns of the Mexican empire. How, therefore, from such miserable remains of a once powerful people, can we possibly judge either of the degree of cultivation to which they had been raised, from the twelfth to the sixteenth century, or of the intellectual development of which they are susceptible? Still, however, none can doubt that a part of the Mexican Ancient nation had attained a certain degree of improvement, when we reflect on the care with which the hieroglyphical books were composed, and call to mind that a citizen of Tlascala, surrounded by the perils and din of war, profited by the facility which our Roman alphabet afforded him to write in his native language five extensive volumes upon the history of a country, of which he deplored the subjugation. The Mexicans possessed an almost correct knowledge of the true length of the year, which they intercalated at the end of their great cycle of a hundred and four years, with more exactness than the Greeks, the Romans, See Humboldt's Researches on Institutions and Monuments of Ancient America, Pref. p. 3. + 1bid. I. 287. The Mexicans intercalated 13 days every 52 years. The cycle of 104 years was simply religious. civiliza tion. BOOK or the Egyptians. The Toltecs appeared in New Spain LXXXIV. in the seventh century, and the Aztecs in the twelfth. Origin of this civilization." Long before this they drew out a geographical map of the country which they had traversed; they built towns, and formed roads, dikes, canals, and immense pyramids, the faces of which were accurately direct to the four cardinal points, and the base extended the length of 474 yards. Their feudal system, and their civil and military hierarchy, were, even at that period, of so complicated a nature, that we must naturally suppose the previous existence of a long series of political events, in order that their singular concatenation of public authorities, of nobility and clergy, could have been established, and that a small portion of the people, itself a slave of the Mexican Sultan, could subjugate the great mass of the nation. Small tribes, weary of tyranny, gave themselves republican constitutions, which can never be formed, except in consequence of long continued popular storms, and the very establishment of which indicates no recent civilization. But from whence did this come, or where did it take its rise? Accustomed servilely to admit only exclusive systems, and knowing only how to learn without meditating, we forget that civilization is nothing but the employment and development of our moral and intellectual faculties. The inimitable Greeks attributed their superior civilization to Minerva; in other words, to their own proper genius; yet we obstinately persist in giving them the Egyptians as masters. These, on the other hand, revered Osiris as their first great founder; while we affect to look for the source of their civilization in India. But, in that case, who instructed the Indians? Was it Brama, Confucius, Zoroaster, Manco-Capac, Idacanzas, or Bochica? Every thing must have a beginning; and if civilization could rise into existence in the Old Continent, why might it not also have done the same in the New? the total want of wheat, oats, barley, rye, of those nourishing grasses which are designated by the general name of cerealia, or corn, appears LXXXIV. to prove that, if Asiatic tribes really have passed into BOOK America, they must be descended from some wandering or pastoral people. In the Old Continent we find the cultivation of the cerealia, and the use of milk, introduced from the most remote period of which history preserves any record. The inhabitants of the New Continent cultivated no other grain than maize, (zea ;) they consumed no preparation of milk, although two species of the ox, natives of the north, might have afforded them abundance of milk. These are striking contrasts, and taken in conjunction with the results of a comparison of their various languages, must prove that the Mongol race could never have contributed any thing but wandering tribes to the population of America. qualities. In his present condition, the Mexican Indian is grave, Moral melancholy, and taciturn, as long as he is not under the influence of intoxicating liquors. This gravity is particularly remarkable in the children of Indians, who, at the early age of four or five years, display infinitely greater intelligence and development of mind than the children of whites. They delight in throwing an air of mystery over their most trifling remarks. Not a passion manifests itself in their features. At all times sombre, there is something terrific in the change, when he passes all at once from a state of absolute repose to violent and ungovernable agitation. The energy of his character, to which every shade of softness is unknown, habitually degenerates into ferocity. This is especially the case with the inhabitants of Tlascala. In the midst of their degradation, the descendants of these republicans are still distinguished by a certain haughtiness with which they are inspired by the remembrance of their former greatness. The indigenous natives of Mexico, like all other nations who have long groaned under civil and religious despotism, are attached, with an extreme degree of obstinacy, to their habits, their manners, and their opinions. The introduction of Christi- Assimilaanity among them has scarcely produced any other effect ton of religious than merely substituting new ceremonies, the symbols of belief, |