The public argument over the merits and discoveries of our respective civilizations was now abandoned for good. But Ama had us frequently brought to her pavilion, where she questioned us closely and seemed greatly interested in our personal history and home life. All subjects interested her: politics, geography and inventions most of all. On one occasion Paul asked for our chests.
“If we had them here,” said he, “I could furnish you and your attendants with much amusement, and prove to you many things that are difficult to explain in words.”
She considered this request, and when we were next called to an interview with her Highness we found the four chests standing in a row before her couch. They had all been broken open and the contents rummaged, but not a single article had been removed or injured in any way—except that the extra gas-jacket and inflatable coverings for the chests had been abstracted. Our electrites, the use of which they shrewdly suspected, and all of our gas-jackets and firearms were withheld from us.
Paul first unrolled our maps and showed Ama the great world, with its lakes, seas and oceans and chains of lofty mountains. He showed her on a smaller map the location of Yucatan, and how insignificant the peninsula was when compared with the great continent of which it formed a part. Then with a pencil he made a tiny dot to show the location of Mount Aota and its comparative size.
Ama observed all this with pensive earnestness. She made no remarks nor admissions, but was evidently impressed. The poor girl had been trained to consider herself the head of a mighty nation which was so important that it haughtily excluded the rest of creation from vulgar contact with it. She had considered the Tcha of superior intellect, far in advance of any other race, and the chosen people of the one great and true god—the Sun.
In this belief she and her preceptors were to an extent justified. Their tiny kingdom lay in the heart of the Itzaex territory, and the savage nations surrounding them were in every respect inferior to the Tcha. They also served as a shield against the nations beyond, and this fact deceived the Tcha, who naturally judged all foreign people by those about them.
Their literature was rich in legendary lore, but of their contemporaries they were wholly ignorant. They kept a record of their own history, using great books made of a fibre parchment, the leaves being sometimes three feet square and bound at the edges. They used both hieroglyphics and picture writing, and what I saw was quite artistically executed. One great building was used as a library for these books and contained records dating from the time of their emigration from Atlantis, whence they had been driven by political wars. The Tcha were merely a branch of the horde that settled in Yucatan. Their leader was a powerful and able Priestess who, discovering the fertile vale within the mountain of Aota—doubtless in bygone ages the mouth of a volcano—decided to settle therein with her especial followers. In some way the Tcha escaped the destruction that overwhelmed the other cities of Yucatan, and their prosperity continued undiminished through all the centuries. They knew when Atlantis was submerged, and by means of a system of spies kept touch with the doings of the Maya tribes that afterward settled in the peninsula. The coming of the Spaniards was a danger recorded in their books, but they had persuaded the Itzaex to stand firm and oppose the invaders, and through their assistance that tribe was never conquered or their territory overrun.
It surprised me that a people so shrewd in other ways had never sent spies or emissaries to the modern nations throughout the world; but the fact was that they had not the faintest conception that our great civilization existed. They alone, in their ignorant belief, were progressive and cultured.
Our advent was destined to undeceive them in this respect.
Having shown Ama how small was her valley Allerton proceeded to prove our superior inventive genius. He exhibited to the wondering eyes of Ama and her pretty priestesses some of the novelties we had brought with us for this very purpose, and for trading. There was a small phonograph for one thing, with an assortment of vocal and instrumental records, and when these were played they created a veritable sensation. Paul promptly presented the outfit to the High Priestess, and it afforded her great pleasure. The Tcha were a music-loving people, but their musical instruments were quite primitive.