must believe that no unbiased reader, after examining the facts I am about to set forth, will deny their authenticity, interest, or claim to serious consideration.

MONTEZUMA'S EVIDENCE AS TO HIS ANCESTRY AND ORIGIN

Even the most extreme autochthonists will surely admit that no authority on the question of their own history and origin could be higher than that of a member of what Dr Albert Réville describes as "the firmly-organized Mexican priesthood in which was centered the whole intellectual life and all that can be called the science of Mexico."

The highest value must therefore be assigned to the utterances of Montezuma, the high-priest and ruler, concerning his ancestry and origin, as translated by Doña Marina to Cortés and his companions. Cortés, whose acumen no one denies, reported Montezuma's words to the Emperor Charles V in his well-known second letter written from Villa Segura de la Frontera, October 30, 1520. The following is a careful literal translation of the discourse addressed by Montezuma to the Spaniards assembled in his palace, as reported by Cortés :

"For a long time and by means of writings, we have possessed a knowledge, transmitted from our ancestors, that neither I nor any of us who inhabit this land are of native origin.

"We are foreigners and came here from very remote parts. We possess information that our lineage was led to this land by a lord to whom all owed allegiance [vassalage]. He afterward left this for his native country and returned again, but after so long an absence that, meanwhile, those who had remained behind had married native women, had raised large families and built towns in which they lived. When he wished to take them with him they not only declined to go, but refused to acknowledge him as their lord.

"Consequently he left without them, returning whence he came, but we have ever believed that his descendants would surely come here to subjugate this land and us who are, by rights, their vassals.

"Because of what you say concerning the region whence you came, which is where the sun rises, and because of the things you relate about the great lord or king who sent you thence, we believe and hold as certain that he must be our rightful [natural] lord, especially since you say that, for a long time past, he has known about us. This much you may be cer

tain of that we will obey you and hold you as lieutenant of this great lord of whom you tell us, and this we will do without fail or deceit. And, throughout this land, that is to say, in all of it that I possess by virtue of my lordship, you can command at your will, for you will be obeyed. All that we possess is at your disposal, and since you now are in what rightfully belongs to you, and in your own house, take your ease and rest from the fatigues of your journey and of the wars you have gone through. . Neither you nor your people will receive harm, for you are in your own house and that which is rightfully yours.

After the above Cortés writes:

"I replied to all he said, satisfying him, which seemed expedient, especially making him believe that it was Your Majesty whom they had been expecting. . . .

The above statements by Montezuma are strikingly corroborated by his subsequent harangue to the assembled native chieftains, in which he appealed, without contradiction, to their familiarity with the fact of his ancestry and origin, in the following terms:

"MY BROTHERS AND FRIENDS: You already know that, for a long time past, your fathers and grandfathers have been subjects and vassals of my predecessors, just as you now are my subjects and vassals. You and yours have always been and are still treated well and honorably by us, and you, for your part, have fulfilled the obligations of good and loyal vassals toward their rightful lords.

"I also believe that your own ancestors must have handed down to you the record that we are not natives of this land but came to it from another very distant country, led by a lord. . . . When he returned after a long absence and found that our grandfathers would not accompany him nor accept him as the lord of the land, he departed, leaving word that he would return or send some one with such authority and power that they would be constrained and forced back into his service. And you well know that we have always expected this lord, and now, from what the Captain has told us of the king and lord who sent him here and because of the region from which he says he came, I hold it for certain and you should do the same, that this king is the lord we expected, especially as he tells us that over there they have long had information concerning us. And since our ancestors did not fulfil their obligations to their rightful lord, let us now fulfil ours and render thanks to our gods that that which was long expected, in vain, by our predecessors, has come to pass in our days. I entreat you much, since all of this is well known to you, to

henceforth acknowledge and obey this great king just as you have hitherto acknowledged and obeyed me. For he is your natural sovereign, and as his lieutenant here is his captain, render to him all service and tribute, such as you have given me, for I also must henceforth contribute and serve in all that is ordered me.

"In doing as I beg you to, you will give me much pleasure besides fulfilling what is your obligation and duty."

Cortés continues:

"All of which he [Montezuma] said weeping, with as many sighs and tears as a man could possibly bring forth; and all those lords who heard him also wept so much that, for a long while they were unable to give him their answer. . . . When their weeping had abated they answered ' that they held him as their lord and had promised to do all that he ordered, and for this reason and also because of that which he had given them, they would cheerfully do his bidding.' Henceforth and for always they gave themselves as vassals to Your Highness, and first together and then each one separately they promised to do and fulfil, like good and loyal vassals, all that would be ordered them in Your Majesty's royal name. They also assumed the obligation to render unto you the tribute and service which were formerly given to Montezuma, and to do everything that would be commanded in your name.

Montezuma's assumption that his native hearers were familiar with the history of his foreign ancestry is further proven to have been absolutely true by authentic native testimony of utmost importance. We are indebted for this to the distinguished Spanish friar, Bernardino de Sahagun, who came to Mexico in 1529 and lived there until his death, more than sixty years later.

At one time Sahagun assembled the oldest and most learned inhabitants of Texcoco, who dictated to him, in the Nahuatl language, all that they knew concerning their ancient history and traditions.

While at Florence, some years ago, I copied the original Nahuatl notes preserved in the Laurentian Library, from which Sahagun subsequently made the somewhat abridged translation that has been published as his Historia de Nueva España. Within the last year I had the interesting experience of showing the Nahuatl text relating to the origin of the Mexicans to one of the best living Nahuatl

1 Ed. Lorenzana, pp. 81, 96.

scholars, Sr Manuel Rojas, a descendant and the oldest representative of the ancient caciques of Tepoztlan, state of Morelos. At my instance Señor Rojas made a literal translation of this text into Spanish, which I subsequently carefully collated with the original and with Friar Sahagun's Spanish version. The following is a brief rendering of the main facts recorded in the Nahuatl text and in the two independent translations into Spanish, the last one made after an interval of about three and a half centuries:

"The Mexicans are foreigners, for they came from the province of the Chichimecs, and the following is what there is to relate about them :

"Countless years before the arrival of the Spaniards the ancestors of the Mexicans arrived in boats and disembarked, in the north', at the port named Panoaya, or Panuco, north of the present port of Veracruz. Under the guidance of their high priest, who carried with him an image of their god named Tloquenauaque (lit. 'the All-embracing One'), which he consulted as an oracle, they traveled inland and founded a town named Tamoanchan, where they lived peacefully for a long time. With these colonists came wise men or diviners who were versed in the written or painted books. These wise men and their leader or high priest did not remain permanently with the colonists, but, leaving them settled in Tamoanchan, reëmbarked in boats and departed eastward, carrying away with them their bundles and their painted books relating to their ritual and to their knowledge of mechanical arts (tultecaiotl).

"Before leaving they made the following memorable address to those whom they were leaving behind them: It is the will of our lord, the All-embracing One, the Night, the Air, that you are to live here in the land in which we came to leave you. He bestows it upon you . . . here you are to live and guard what has been given to you. . . . He goes and we go with him, but truly he will return to rescue and succor you (maquixtiquiuh); to teach or guide you (machtiquiuh), and to determine the limits or boundaries of the land. . . .'

"Then the divine regents or governors (teomamaque) departed with their wrapped bundles. . . . Four aged wise men remained behind, and, assembling, said: During the absence of our lord, what method must we adopt in order to rule the people well? What order is to be instituted, now that the wise men have taken with them the painted books according to which they governed?' Then they composed the count of nativity signs or celestial luminaries, the year book, the year count, and the book

of dreams,1 and these remained in use as long as governed the lords of the Toltecs, the Tepanecs, the Mexicans, and the Chichimecs . . . it is not known how long these governed.

"This was, however, recorded by paintings, but these were burnt in the time of the lord Itzcoatl of Mexico, because the lord and princes of that time agreed that it was not expedient that all persons should know such things and that these books should fall into the hands of those who might treat them with contempt or disrespect." "

The text further relates that from Tamoanchan the colonists went to Teotihuacan, where they built the two great pyramids the ruins of which still exist. The above narrative, which was dictated at their leisure by the Texcocan elders, who could scarcely have been informed of the contents of Cortés' letter to Charles V, will be found to agree substantially with Montezuma's words.

Further corroboration of his evidence is furnished by another text dictated by the Texcocans to Sahagun, namely, that of the fine address of welcome delivered by Montezuma, in the presence of a multitude of hearers, when he first met the Spaniards. It completes the native verbatim reports of Montezuma's utterances that have been preserved, and for dignity of expression and beauty of language is one of the finest specimens of native discourse that has been preserved :

me.

"Oh, our lord, be welcome! You have arrived in your country, your town, and your house, Mexico. You have come to seat yourself on your throne and in your chair which I have been occupying for some time in your name. Other lords, who now are dead, occupied it before Their names were Itzcoatl, Moctezuma the Elder, Axayacatl, Tizoc, and Ahuitzotl. I, the last of them all, came to be the one to have the care and governing of your town, Mexico. We all in turn have borne on our shoulders the burden of your republic and your vassals. Would that some of those who have departed and cannot see or know what is happening, were living now and that what is now happening had taken place in their time. But, our lord, they are absent, and with my own

1 The above is an exact literal translation of Friar Sahagun's Nahuatl text of the passage which, after a lapse of thirty years, he freely rendered into Spanish as follows: "They invented judicial astrology, the art of interpreting dreams, and composed the count of the days, of the nights, of the hours, and the differences of times [seasons]. Book X, chap. 29, ¶ II.

2 Ibid., ¶ 12.