[107] “Los grandes recibimientos que hacian á los capitanes que venian y alcanzaban victoria en las guerras, las fiestas y solenidades con que se solenizaban á manera de triunfo, que los metian en andas en su puebla, trayendo consigo á los vencidos; y por eternizar sus hazañas se las cantaban publicamente, y ansí quedaban memoradas y con estatuas que les ponian en los templos.” Ibid., MS.
[108] For the whole ceremony of inauguration,—though, as it seems, having especial reference to the merchant-knights,—see Appendix, No. 9, where the original is given from Camargo.
[109] “Ha bel paese,” says the Anonymous Conqueror, speaking of Tlascala at the time of the invasion, “di pianure et motagne, et è provincia popolosa et vi si raccoglie molto pane.” Rel. d’un gentil’ huomo, ap. Ramusio, tom. iii. p. 308.
[110] A full account of the manners, customs, and domestic policy of Tlascala is given by the national historian, throwing much light on the other states of Anahuac, whose social institutions seem to have been all cast in the same mould.
[111] Camargo, Hist. de Tlascala, MS.—Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 2, cap. 70.
[112] Camargo (Hist. de Tlascala, MS.) notices the extent of Montezuma’s conquests,—a debatable ground for the historian.
[113] Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 3, cap. 16.—Solís says, “The Tlascalan territory was fifty leagues in circumference, ten long, from east to west, and four broad, from north to south.” (Conquista de Méjico, lib. 3, cap. 3.) It must have made a curious figure in geometry!
[114] Camargo, Hist. de Tlascala, MS.
[115] “Los Señores Mejicanos y Tezcucanos en tiempo que ponian treguas por algunas temporadas embiaban á los Señores de Tlaxcalla grandes presentes y dádivas de oro, ropa, y cacao, y sal, y de todas las cosas de que carecian, sin que la gente plebeya lo entendiese, y se saludaban secretamente, guardándose el decoro que se debian; mas con todos estos trabajos la órden de su república jamas se dejaba de gobernar con la rectitud de sus costumbres guardando inviolablemente el culto de sus Dioses.” Ibid., MS.
[116] The Tlascalan chronicler discerns in this deep-rooted hatred of Mexico the hand of Providence, who wrought out of it an important means for subverting the Aztec empire. Hist. de Tlascala, MS.