Read Ebook: Caxton's Book: A Collection of Essays Poems Tales and Sketches. by Rhodes W H William Henry O Connell Daniel Editor

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But the Padre told us more; something that increased our excitement to the highest pitch. On the other side of the great traversing range of Cordilleras lies the district of Vera Paz, once called Tierra de Guerra, or land of war, from the warlike character of its aboriginal inhabitants. Three times the Spaniards were driven back in their attempt to conquer it.

The rest of the Tierra de Guerra never was conquered; and at this day the northeastern section bounded by the range of the Cordilleras and the State of Chiapa is occupied by Cadones, or unbaptized Indians, who live as their fathers did, acknowledging no submission to the Spaniards, and the government of Central America does not pretend to exercise any control over them. But the thing that roused us was the assertion by the Padre that four days on the road to Mexico, on the other side of the Great Sierra, was a LIVING CITY, large and populous, occupied by Indians, precisely in the same state as before the discovery of America. He had heard of it many years before, at the village of Chajal, and was told by the villagers that from the topmost ridge of the Sierra this city was distinctly visible. He was then young, and with much labor climbed to the naked summit of the Sierra, from which, at a height of ten or twelve thousand feet, he looked over an immense plain extending to Yucatan and the Gulf of Mexico, and saw at a great distance a large city, spread over a great space, and with turrets white and glittering in the sun. The traditionary account of the Indians of Chajal is, that no white man has ever reached the city; that the inhabitants speak the Maya language; are aware that a race of strangers has conquered the whole country around, and murder any white man who attempts to enter their territory. They have no coin or other circulating medium; no horses, cattle, mules, or other domestic animals, except fowls, and the cocks they keep under ground to prevent their crowing being heard.

Mr. Stephens then adds:

One look at that city is worth ten years of an every-day life. If he is right, a place is left where Indians and an Indian city exist as Cortez and Alvarado found them. There are living men who can solve the mystery that hangs over the ruined cities of America; perhaps, who can go to Copan and Palenque and read the inscriptions on their monuments.

The moon, long past the meridian, was sinking slowly to her western goal, whilst the east was already beginning to blush and redden with the dawn. Before us rose high and clear three distinct mountain peaks, covered with a mantle of snow. I began to tremble with cold. But our pace did not slacken, nor our altitude diminish. On the contrary, we began to rise gradually, until we found ourselves nearly upon a level with the three peaks. Selecting an opening or gap betwixt the two westernmost, we glided through like the wind. I shivered and my teeth chattered as we skimmed along those everlasting snows. Here, thought I, the condor builds his nest in summer, and the avalanches find a home. The eagle's wing has not strength enough to battle with this thin and freezing atmosphere, and no living thing but "the proud bird, the condor of the Andes," ever scaled these hoary summits. But our descent had already commenced. Gradually, as the morning broke, the region of ice and snow was left behind us, and just as the first ray of the rising sun shot over the peaks we had but a moment before surmounted, I beheld, glittering in the dim and shadowy distance, the white walls of a magnificent city. An exclamation of surprise and pleasure involuntarily escaped my lips; but one glance at my companion checked all further utterance. She raised her rounded forefinger to her lip, and made a gesture, whose purport I well understood.

We swept over forests and cornfields and vineyards, the city growing upon the vision every moment, and rising like the Mexican capital, when first beheld by Europeans from the bosom of a magnificent lake. Finally, we found ourselves immediately above it, and almost at the same moment, began to descend. In a few seconds I stood alone, in a large open space, surrounded upon all sides by lofty stone edifices, erected upon huge pyramidal structures, that resembled the forest-covered mounds at Palenque. The day had fully dawned, but I observed no inhabitants. Presently a single individual appeared upon one of the towers near me, and gave a loud, shrill whistle, such as we sometimes hear in crowded theatres. In an instant it was echoed and re-echoed a thousand times, upon every side, and immediately the immense city seemed to be awake, as if by magic. They poured by thousands into the open square, where I stood petrified with astonishment. Before me, like a vision of midnight, marched by, in almost countless throngs, battalion on battalion of a race of men deemed and recorded extinct by the wisest historians.

They presented the most picturesque appearance imaginable, dressed apparently in holiday attire, and keeping step to a low air, performed on instruments emitting a dull, confused sound, that seldom rose so as to be heard at any great distance.

Hitherto not a word had been spoken. The ceremony I had witnessed was a religious one, and was at once interpreted by me to be the worship of the sun. I remembered well that the ancient Peruvians were heliolaters, and my imagination had been dazzled when but a child by the gorgeous description given by the historian Robertson, of the great Temple of the Sun at Cuzco. There the Incas had worshiped the God of Day from the period when Manco Capac came from the distant Island of Oello, and taught the native Indians the rudiments of civilization, until the life of the last scion of royal blood was sacrificed to the perfidy of the Spanish invaders. These historical facts had long been familiar to my mind; but I did not recollect any facts going to show that the ancient Aztecs were likewise heliolaters; but further doubt was now impossible.

In perfect silence I was hurried up the stone steps of the great Teocallis, toward the palace erected upon its summit, into whose broad and lofty corridors we soon entered. These we traversed in several directions, leaving the more outward and gradually approaching the heart or central apartments.

Finally, I was ushered into one of the most magnificently decorated audience-chambers that the eye of man ever beheld.

The roof was high, and decorated with the plumage of the Quezale and other tropical birds, whilst a throne was erected in the centre of the apartment, glittering in gold and silver ornaments, hung about with beautiful shells, and lined with the skins of the native leopard, prepared in the most exquisite style.

Seated upon a throne, I recognized the princess whose morning devotions I had just witnessed. At a gesture, I was carried up close to the foot of the throne.

After closely inspecting her features, I satisfied myself that she was not the companion of my mysterious journey, being several years older in appearance, and of a darker complexion. Still, there was a very striking resemblance between them, and it was evident that they not only belonged to the same race, but to the same family. I looked up at her with great respect, anticipating some encouraging word or sign. But instead of speaking, she commenced a low, melodious whistle, eying me intently during the whole time. Ceasing, she evidently anticipated some reply on my part, and I at once accosted her in the following terms:

"Most beautiful Princess, I am not voluntarily an invader of your realm. I was transported hither in a manner as mysterious as it was unexpected. Teach me but to read these hieroglyphics, and I will quit your territories forever."

A smile flitted across the features of the Princess as I uttered these words; and she gave an order, by a sharp whistle, to an officer that stood near, who immediately disappeared. In a few moments, he returned, bringing with him a native dressed very coarsely in white cotton cloth, and who carried an empty jar, or water tank, upon his head. He was evidently a laborer, and, judging from the low obeisances he constantly made, much to the amusement of the courtiers standing around, I am satisfied that he never before in his whole life had been admitted to the presence of his sovereign.

Making a gesture to the officer who had introduced him, he spoke a few low words to the native, who immediately turned toward me, and uttered, slowly and distinctly, the following sentence:

"Ix-itl hua-atl zi-petl poppicobatl."

I shook my head despairingly. Several other attempts to communicate with me were made, both by the Princess and the interpreter, but all to no purpose. I could neither understand the melodies nor the jargon. But I noticed throughout all these proceedings that there seemed to be two entirely distinct modes of expression; the first by whistling, and the second by utterance. The idea at once flashed across my mind, that there were two languages used in the country--one sacred to the blood royal and the nobility, and the other used by the common people. Impressed with this thought, I immediately set about verifying it by experiment.

It is unnecessary to detail the ingenious methods I devised to ascertain this fact. It is sufficient for the present purposes of this narrative to state, that, during the day, I was abundantly satisfied with the truth of my surmise; and that, before night, I learned another fact, equally important, that the hieroglyphics were written in the royal tongue, and could be read only by those connected by ties of blood with the reigning family.

There was at first something ludicrous in the idea of communicating thought by sound emitted in the way indicated above. In my wildest dreams, the notion of such a thing being possible had never occurred to my imagination. And when the naked fact was now demonstrated to me every moment, I could scarcely credit my senses. Still, when I reflected that night upon it, after I retired to rest, the system did not appear unnatural, nor even improbable. Birds, I knew, made use of the same musical tongue; and when but a boy, on the shores of the distant Albemarle, I had often listened, till long after midnight, to the wonderful loquacity of the common mocking-bird, as she poured forth her summer strains. Who has not heard the turtle dove wooing her mate in tones that were only not human, because they were more sadly beautiful? Many a belated traveler has placed his hand upon his sword-hilt, and looked suspiciously behind him, as the deep bass note of the owl has startled the dewy air. The cock's crow has become a synonym for a paean of triumph.

The ludicrousness of the idea soon gave place to admiration, and before I had been domiciliated in the palace of the Princess a month, I had become perfectly infatuated with her native language, and regarded it as the most beautiful and expressive ever spoken by man. And now, after several years have elapsed since its melodious accents have fallen upon my ears, I hesitate not to assert that for richness and variety of tone, for force and depth of expression, for harmony and sweetness--in short, for all those characteristics that give beauty and strength to spoken thought--the royal tongue of the aboriginal Americans is without a rival.

For many days after my mysterious appearance in the midst of the great city I have described, my fate still hung in the balance. I was examined and re-examined a hundred times as to the mode of my entrance into the valley; but I always persisted in making the same gestures, and pointed to the sky as the region whence I had descended. The guards stationed at every avenue of entrance and exit were summoned to the capital, and questioned closely as to the probability of my having passed them unawares; but they fully exculpated themselves from all blame, and were restored to their forfeited posts.

Gradually the excitement in the city subsided, and one by one the great nobles were won over to credit the story of my celestial arrival in their midst, and I believed the great object of my existence in a fair way to be accomplished.

Every facility was afforded me to learn the royal tongue, and after a little more than a year's residence in the palace, I spoke it with considerable fluency and accuracy.

But all my efforts hitherto were vain to obtain a key to the hieroglyphics. Not only was the offense capital to teach their alphabet to a stranger, but equally so to natives themselves, unconnected with the blood royal. With all my ingenuity and industry, I had not advanced a single letter.

One night, as I lay tossing restlessly upon my bed, revolving this insoluble enigma in my mind, one of the mosaic paving-stones was suddenly lifted up in the middle of the room, and the figure of a young man with a lighted taper in his hand stood before me.

Raising my head hastily from the pillow, I almost sank back with astonishment when I recognized in the form and features of my midnight visitor, Pio the Carib boy.

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

--SHAKSPEARE.

I sprang to my feet with all the eagerness of joy, and was about to rush into the arms of Pio, when he suddenly checked my enthusiasm by extinguishing the light. I stood still and erect, like one petrified into stone. That moment I felt a hand upon my arm, then around my waist, and ere I could collect my thoughts, was distinctly lifted from the ground. But I was carried only a few steps. On touching the floor with my feet, I was planted firmly, and the arms of my companion were tightly drawn around my own so as to prevent me from raising them. The next instant, and the stone upon which we stood suddenly slid from its position, and gradually sank perpendicularly,--we still retaining our position upon it.

The light stood upon a stone stand about four feet high, at the intersection of these passages. We took the one to the left, and advanced twenty or thirty yards, when Pio halted. On coming up to him, he placed his mouth close to the wall, and exclaimed as before. "We are here." A huge block of granite swung inward, and we entered a small but well-lighted apartment, around which were hanging several costly and magnificent suits of Palenquin costume.

When all was completed, Pio, for the first time, addressed me as follows: "Young stranger, whoever you may be, or to whatever nation you may belong, matters but little to me. The attendant guardian spirit of our race and country has conducted you hither, in the most mysterious manner, and now commands me to have you instructed in the most sacred lore of the Aztecs. Your long residence in this palace has fully convinced you of the danger to which we are both exposed; I in revealing and you in acquiring the key to the interpretation of the historical records of my country. I need not assure you that our lives are both forfeited, should the slightest suspicion be aroused in the breasts of the Princess or the nobility.

"You are now dressed in the appropriate costume of a student of our literature, and must attend me nightly at the gathering of the Queen's kindred to be instructed in the art. Express no surprise at anything you see or hear; keep your face concealed as much as possible, fear nothing, and follow me."

At a preconcerted signal given by Pio, a door flew open and we entered the vestibule of a large and brilliantly illuminated chamber.

As soon as we passed the entrance I saw before me not less than two hundred young persons of both sexes, habited in the peculiar garb of students, like our own. We advanced slowly and noiselessly, until we reached two vacant places, prepared evidently beforehand for us. Our entrance was not noticed by the classes, nor by those whom I afterwards recognized as teachers. All seemed intent upon the problem before them, and evinced no curiosity to observe the new comers. My own curiosity at this moment was intense, and had it not been for the prudent cautions constantly given me by Pio, by touching my robes or my feet, an exposure most probably would have occurred the first night of my initiation, and the narrative of these adventures never been written.

My presence of mind, however, soon came to my assistance, and before the evening was over, I had, by shrewdly noticing the conduct of others, shaped my own into perfect conformity with theirs, and rendered detection next to impossible.

It now becomes necessary to digress a moment from the thread of my story, and give an accurate description of the persons I beheld around me, the chamber in which we were gathered, and the peculiar mode of instruction pursued by the sages.

The one held in the left hand resembled a white porcelain slate, only being much larger than those in common use. It was nearly twenty inches square, and was divided by mathematical lines into thirty-six compartments. It was covered over with a thin crystal, resembling glass, which is found in great quantities in the neighboring mountains, and is perfectly transparent. The crystal was raised about the one eighth of an inch from the surface of the slate, and allowed a very fine species of black sand to move at will between them. The instrument carried in the right hand resembled the bow of a common violin, more than anything else. The outer edge was constructed of a beautiful yellow wood, polished, and bent into the arc of a quarter circle; whilst a mass of small cords, made of the native hemp, united the two ends.

The method of using the bow was this: The slate was shaken violently once or twice, so as to distribute the black sand equally over the white surface, and then the bow was drawn perpendicularly down the edge of the slate, very rapidly, so as to produce a quick whistling sound. The effect produced upon the grains of sand was truly wonderful to the uninitiated in the laws of acoustics. They arranged themselves into peculiar figures, sometimes in the form of a semicircle, sometimes into that of a spiral, sometimes into a perfect circle, or a cone, or a rhomboid, or an oval, dependent entirely upon two things: first, the place where the slate was held by the left hand; and second, the point where the bow was drawn across the edge. As the slate was subdivided into thirty-six compartments, by either one of which it could be held, and as there was a corresponding point, across which the bow could be drawn, there were seventy-two primitive sounds that might be produced by means of this simple contrivance. Each of these sounds inherently and necessarily produced a different figure upon the slate, and there were consequently just seventy-two initial letters in the Aztec alphabet.

The mode of instruction was extremely simple. A word was pronounced by the aged teacher at the front of the stage, written upon his slate, exhibited to the scholar at the black tablet, and by him copied upon it. The whole class then drew down their bows, so as to produce the proper sound, and the word itself, or its initial letter, was immediately formed upon the slate.

The hieroglyphics of the Aztecs are all of them both symbolical and phonetic. Hence, in almost every one we observe, first, the primitive sound or initial letter, and its various combinations; and, secondly, some symbolic drawing, as a human face, for instance, or an eagle's bill, or a fish, denoting some peculiar characteristic of the person or thing delineated.

But to return to the Hall of Students. The men and women on the stage were placed there as critics upon the pronunciation of each articulate sound. They were selected from the wisest men and best elocutionists in the kingdom, and never failed to detect the slightest error in the pronunciation of the tutor.

Let the natural philosophers of the rising generation direct their especial attention toward the fields I have indicated, and the rewards awaiting their investigations will confer upon them immortality of fame.

There is a reason why the musical scale should not mount in whole tones up to the octave; why the mind grasps decimals easier than vulgar fractions, and why, by the laws of light, the blood-red tint should be heavier than the violet. Let Nature, in these departments, be studied with the same care that Cuvier explored the organization of insects, that Liebig deduced the property of acids, and that Leverrier computed the orbit of that unseen world which his genius has half created, and all the wonderful and beautiful secrets now on the eve of bursting into being from the dark domain of sound, color, and shape, will at once march forth into view, and take their destined places in the ranks of human knowledge.

Then the science of computation will be intuitive, as it was in the mind of Zerah Colburn; the art of music creative, as in the plastic voices of Jehovah; and the great principles of light and shape and color divine, as in the genius of Swedenborg and the imagination of Milton.

I have now completed the outline of the sketch, which in the foregoing pages I proposed to lay before the world.

The peculiar circumstances which led me to explore the remains of the aboriginal Americans, the adventures attending me in carrying out that design, the mode of my introduction into the Living City, spoken of by Stephens, and believed in by so many thousands of enlightened men, and above all, the wonderful and almost incredible character of the people I there encountered, together with a rapid review of their language and literature, have been briefly but faithfully presented to the public.

Before copying from the blurred and water-soaked manuscript before me, a single extract from the literary remains of the monumental race amongst whom I have spent three years and a half of my early manhood, it may not be deemed improper to remark that a large work upon this subject is now in course of publication, containing the minutest details of the domestic life, public institutions, language, and laws of that interesting people.

The extracts I present to the reader may be relied upon as exactly correct, since they are taken from the memoranda made upon the spot.

Directly in front of the throne, in the great audience-chamber described in the preceding chapter, and written in the most beautiful hieroglyphic extant, I found the following account of the origin of the land:

The Great Spirit, whose emblem is the sun, held the water-drops out of which the world was made, in the hollow of his hand. He breathed a tone, and they rounded into the great globe, and started forth on the errand of counting up the years.

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