by Lew Wallace
CHAPTER IV.
TENOCHTITLAN AT NIGHT.
The site of the city of Tenochtitlan was chosen by the gods. In thesouthwestern border of Lake Tezcuco, one morning in 1300, a wanderingtribe of Aztecs saw an eagle perched, with outspread wings, upon acactus, and holding a serpent in its talons. At a word from theirpriests, they took possession of the marsh, and there stayed theirmigration and founded the city: such is the tradition. As men love totrace their descent back to some storied greatness, nations delight toassociate the gods with their origin.
Originally the Aztecs were barbarous. In their southern march, theybrought with them only their arms and a spirit of sovereignty. Thevalley of Anahuac, when they reached it, was already peopled; in fact,had been so for ages. The cultivation and progress they found andconquered there reacted upon them. They grew apace; and as they carriedtheir shields into neighboring territory, as by intercourse and commercethey crept from out their shell of barbarism, as they strengthened inopulence and dominion, they repudiated the reeds and rushes of whichtheir primal houses were built, and erected enduring temples andresidences of Oriental splendor.
Under the smiles of the gods, whom countless victims kept propitiated,the city threw abroad its arms, and, before the passage of a century,became the emporium of the valley. Its people climbed the mountainsaround, and, in pursuit of captives to grace their festivals, made theconquest of "Mexico." Then the kings began to centralize. They madeTenochtitlan their capital; under their encouragement, the arts grew andflourished; its market became famous; the nobles and privileged ordersmade it their dwelling-place; wealth abounded; as a consequence, a vastpopulation speedily filled its walls and extended them as required. Atthe coming of the "conquistadores," it contained sixty thousand housesand three hundred thousand souls. Its plat testifies to a high degree oforder and regularity, with all the streets running north and south, andintersected by canals, so as to leave quadrilateral blocks. An ancientmap, exhibiting the city proper, presents the face of a checker-board,each square, except those of some of the temples and palaces, beingmeted with mathematical certainty.
Such was the city the 'tzin and the cacique were approaching. Left ofthem, half a league distant, lay the towers and embattled gate of Xoloc.On the horizon behind paled the fires of Iztapalapan, while those ofTenochtitlan at each moment threw brighter hues into the sky, and morerichly empurpled the face of the lake. In mid air, high over all others,like a great torch, blazed the pyre of Huitzil'.[12] Out on the sea, thecourse of the _voyageurs_ was occasionally obstructed by _chinampas_ atanchor, or afloat before the light wind; nearer the walls, the floatinggardens multiplied until the passage was as if through an archipelago inminiature. From many of them poured the light of torches; others gave tothe grateful sense the melody of flutes and blended voices; while overthem the radiance from the temples fell softly, revealing whitepavilions, orange-trees, flowering shrubs, and nameless varieties of theunrivalled tropical vegetation. A breeze, strong enough to gently ripplethe lake, hovered around the undulating retreats, scattering a largesseof perfume, and so ministering to the voluptuous floramour of thelocality.
As the _voyageurs_ proceeded, the city, rising to view, underwent anumber of transformations. At first, amidst the light of its ownfires,[13] it looked like a black sea-shore; directly its towers andturrets became visible, some looming vaguely and dark, others glowingand purpled, the whole magnified by the dim duplication below; then itseemed like a cloud, one half kindled by the sun, the other obscured bythe night. As they swept yet nearer, it changed to the likeness of along, ill-defined wall, over which crept a hum wing-like andstrange,--the hum of myriad life.
In silence still they hurried forward. Vessels like their own, but withlanterns of stained _aguave_ at the prows, seeking some favorite_chinampa_, sped by with benisons from the crews. At length they reachedthe wall, and, passing through an interval that formed the outlet of acanal, entered the city. Instantly the water became waveless; housesencompassed them; lights gleamed across their way; the hum that hoveredover them while out on the lake realized itself in the voices of men andthe notes of labor.
Yet farther into the city, the light from the temples increased. Fromtowers, turreted like a Moresco castle, they heard the night-watchersproclaiming the hour. Canoes, in flocks, darted by them, decked withgarlands, and laden with the wealth of a merchant, or the trade of amarket-man, or full of revellers singing choruses to the stars or to thefair denizens of the palaces. Here and there the canal was bordered withsidewalks of masonry, and sometimes with steps leading from the water upto a portal, about which were companies whose flaunting, parti-coloredcostumes, brilliant in the mellowed light, had all the appearance ofVenetian masqueraders.
At last the canoes gained the great street that continued from thecauseway at the south through the whole city; then the Tezcucan touchedthe 'tzin, and said,--
"The son of 'Hualpilli accepts the challenge, Aztec. In the _tianguez_to-morrow."
Without further speech, the foemen leaped on the landing, and separated.
FOOTNOTES:
[12] The God of War,--aptly called the "Mexican Mars."
[13] There was a fire for each altar in the temples which was inextinguishable; and so numerous were the altars, and so brilliant their fires, that they kept the city illuminated throughout the darkest nights. Prescott, Conq. of Mexico, Vol. I., p 72.