THE RAILWAY JUDAS.
"Another popular festival is on the last day of Holy Week, which is devoted to the death of Judas. Effigies of Judas abound everywhere; they are hung on trees and from windows, on lamp-posts, balconies—in fact, everywhere they can be made to hang. You see them on the front of every locomotive on that day, and on many another vehicle; in fact, it would be easier to say where Judas is not than where he is. The figures are of all dimensions, but usually of life size. They are filled with fireworks of various sorts, so that they explode when a match is touched to them. If from any cause they do not explode, they are torn in pieces when they fall to the ground. In thus destroying them the people indicate their detestation of the betrayer of his Master. Not infrequently the figures that are hung from private houses have thirty silver dollars pasted upon them, as a reminder of the thirty pieces of silver which were the traitor's price. Of course there is a lively scramble for these coins when the Judas falls to the ground."
[CHAPTER XXI.]
EXCURSION TO TULA.—AN ANCIENT CITY OF THE TOLTECS.—CHURCH OF THE TIME OF CORTEZ.—MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE TOLTECS.—TOLTEC KINGS, COURTS, AND KNIGHTHOOD.—RUINS OF THE TEMPLE AND PALACE.—JOURNEY TO MORELOS.—INTEROCEANIC RAILWAY.—MORELOS AND HIS SERVICES TO MEXICO.—CUAUTLA AND ITS ATTRACTIONS.—TERRIBLE RAILWAY ACCIDENT.—DOWN THE SOUTHERN SLOPE.—IN TIERRA CALIENTE.—VISITING A SUGAR ESTATE.—TO YAUTEPEC AND CUERNAVACA.—RIDE OVER THE MOUNTAINS.—SITUATION OF CUERNAVACA.—OLD CHURCH AND PALACE OF CORTEZ.—A FORTUNATE FRENCHMAN.—ROMANTIC INCIDENT IN THE CAPTURE OF CUERNAVACA.
One of the volumes in which our young friends were interested during their stay in Mexico was "The Ancient Cities of the New World," by M. Charnay. The perusal of this book led them to wish to visit Tula, which is famous for having been a city of the Toltecs, and a flourishing place at the time of the Conquest.
Leaving the city of Mexico at half-past seven o'clock one morning by the Central Railway, they reached Tula at 9.40 a.m.; the distance is about fifty miles, and the route is the same as already described, through the Nochistongo cut. The returning train at 4.40 p.m. brought them back to the city at seven o'clock, and the trio unanimously voted that they had passed a most agreeable and instructive day. The heads of the youths were filled with archæology, and they felt themselves almost competent to write a history of the Toltecs and their migrations, in spite of the obscurity of many of the traditions about this remarkable people.