The history of ancient Mexico, from the foundation of that empire to its destruction by the Spaniards, Volume 2

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Page 3 - World. We find a new manner of compounding words from various roots, so as to strike the mind at once with a whole mass of ideas ; a new manner of expressing the cases of substantives, by inflecting the verbs which govern them ; a new number, (the particular plural,) applied to the declension of nouns and conjugation of verbs ; a new concordance in tense of the conjunction with the verb; we see not only pronouns, as in the Hebrew and some other languages, but adjectives, conjunctions, adverbs, combined...
Page 87 - Davila, five of his principal officers, and as many trusty soldiers. Thirty chosen men followed, not in regular order, but sauntering at some distance, as if they had no object but curiosity...
Page 79 - The •whole was ornamented with works of art, painted and admirably plastered and whitened, and it was rendered more delightful by numbers of beautiful birds. When I beheld the scenes that were around me, I thought within myself, that this was the garden of the world...
Page 92 - THUS was a powerful prince seized by a few strangers in the midst of his capital, at noonday, and carried off as a prisoner without opposition or bloodshed. History contains nothing parallel to this event, either with respect to the temerity of the attempt, or the success of the execution ; and were not all the circumstances of this extraordinary transaction...
Page 133 - I have read of the destruction of Jerusalem, but I cannot conceive that the mortality there exceeded this of Mexico; for all the people from the distant provinces which belonged to this empire had concentrated themselves here, where they mostly died.
Page 16 - Humb. Researches, vol. ii. p. 83, 4. Of the Codex Vaticanus, he mentions, ' the group, No. 2, represents the celebrated serpent woman Cihua cohuatl, caUed also Quilatzi or Tonacacihua, woman of our flesh. She is the companion of Tonacateuctli. The Mexicans considered her as the mother of the human race. After the God of the celestial Paradise, Ometeuctli, she held the first rank among the divinities of Anahuac. We see her always represented with a great serpent.
Page 81 - Cortes accosted him with profound reverence, after the European fashion. He returned the salutation, according to the mode of his country, by touching the earth with his hand, and then kissing it. This ceremony, the customary expression of veneration from inferiors towards those who were above them in rank, appeared such amazing condescension in a proud monarch, who scarcely deigned to consider the rest of mankind as of the same species with himself, that all his subjects firmly believed those persons,...
Page 81 - ... so great a monarch. When he drew near, Cortes dismounted, advancing towards him with officious haste, and in a respectful posture. At the same time Montezuma alighted from his chair, and leaning on the arms of two of his near relations, approached with a slow and stately pace, his attendants covering the street with cotton cloths, that he might not touch the ground.
Page 81 - Four of his principal favourites carried him on their shoulders, others supported a canopy of curious workmanship over his head. Before him marched three officers with rods of gold in their hands, which they lifted up on high at certain intervals, and at that signal all the people bowed their heads, and hid their faces, as unworthy to look on so great a monarch.
Page 78 - After having contemplated these noble edifices we walked through the gardens, which were admirable to behold from the variety of beautiful and aromatic plants, and the .numerous alleys filled with fruit trees, roses, and various flowers. Here was...

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