History of the Conquest of Mexico (Vol. 1-4). William Hickling Prescott
were, in like manner, paid in the produce of the country. The various branches of the royal expenditure were defrayed by specified towns and districts; and the whole arrangements here, and in Mexico, bore a remarkable resemblance to the financial regulations of the Persian empire, as reported by the Greek writers (see Herodotus, Clio, sec. 192); with this difference, however, that the towns of Persia proper were not burdened with tributes, like the conquered cities. Idem, Thalia, sec. 97.
[75] Lorenzana, Hist. de Nueva-España, p. 172.—Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 2, cap. 89; lib. 14, cap. 7.—Boturini, Idea, p. 166.—Camargo, Hist. de Tlascala, MS.—Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 7, cap. 13.—The people of the provinces were distributed into calpulli, or tribes, who held the lands of the neighborhood in common. Officers of their own appointment parcelled out these lands among the several families of the calpulli; and on the extinction or removal of a family its lands reverted to the common stock, to be again distributed. The individual proprietor had no power to alienate them. The laws regulating these matters were very precise, and had existed ever since the occupation of the country by the Aztecs. Zurita, Rapport, pp. 51-62.
[76] The following items of the tribute furnished by different cities will give a more precise idea of its nature:—20 chests of ground chocolate; 40 pieces of armor, of a particular device; 2400 loads of large mantles, of twisted cloth; 800 loads of small mantles, of rich wearing-apparel; 5 pieces of armor, of rich feathers; 60 pieces of armor, of common feathers; a chest of beans; a chest of chian; a chest of maize; 8000 reams of paper; likewise 2000 loaves of very white salt, refined in the shape of a mould, for the consumption only of the lords of Mexico; 8000 lumps of unrefined copal; 400 small baskets of white refined copal; 100 copper axes; 80 loads of red chocolate; 800 xícaros, out of which they drank chocolate; a little vessel of small turquoise stones; 4 chests of timber, full of maize; 4000 loads of lime; tiles of gold, of the size of an oyster, and as thick as the finger; 40 bags of cochineal; 20 bags of gold dust, of the finest quality; a diadem of gold, of a specified pattern; 20 lip-jewels of clear amber, ornamented with gold; 200 loads of chocolate; 100 pots or jars of liquid-amber; 8000 handfuls of rich scarlet feathers; 40 tiger-skins; 1600 bundles of cotton, etc., etc. Col. de Mendoza, part 2, ap. Antiq. of Mexico, vols. i., vi.{*}
{*} [From those too poor to pay the regular taxes, snakes, scorpions, centipedes, and vermin were exacted. “It is related that soon after Cortés arrived in the city of Mexico certain cavaliers of his force ... were roaming through the royal palace, ... when they came across some bags filled with some soft, fine, and weighty material.... They hastened to untie one of the sacks and found its contents to consist of nothing but lice, which had been paid as a tribute by the poor.” Bancroft, Native Races, vol. ii. p. 235. Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., tom. i. p. 461.—M.]
[77] Mapa de Tributos, ap. Lorenzana, Hist. de Nueva-España.—Tribute-roll, ap. Antiq. of Mexico, vol. i., and Interpretation, vol. vi., pp. 17-44.—The Mendoza Collection, in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, contains a roll of the cities of the Mexican empire, with the specific tributes exacted from them. It is a copy made after the Conquest, with a pen, on European paper. (See Foreign Quarterly Review, No. XVII. Art. 4.) An original painting of the same roll was in Boturini’s museum. Lorenzana has given us engravings of it, in which the outlines of the Oxford copy are filled up, though somewhat rudely. Clavigero considers the explanations in Lorenzana’s edition very inaccurate (Stor. del Messico, tom. i. p. 25), a judgment confirmed by Aglio, who has transcribed the entire collection of the Mendoza papers, in the first volume of the Antiquities of Mexico. It would have much facilitated reference to his plates if they had been numbered;—a strange omission!
[78] The caciques who submitted to the allied arms were usually confirmed in their authority, and the conquered places allowed to retain their laws and usages. (Zurita, Rapport, p. 67.) The conquests were not always partitioned, but sometimes, singularly enough, were held in common by the three powers. Ibid., p. 11.
[79] [Very few garrisons were ever quartered in subject pueblos. The warriors Cortés encountered in his second attack upon Mexico were not the garrisons of the cities, but special bodies sent out to meet the Spaniards. The “calpixqui,” or tax-gatherers, were spies as well as officers, and were hated as were the “publicans” in all lands where the taxes were “farmed.” The “chief of men” had many subordinates. His couriers were not infrequently outcasts. Bearing in mind the class of persons with whom he had to deal officially, and the fact that it was his function to represent the majesty of the clan on all public occasions, it is not remarkable that he should have conducted himself with such haughtiness as to lead the Spaniards to suppose that he was an absolute king. That he had really no kingly power was manifested when Montezuma was a prisoner in the hands of the Spaniards. His special duty was to execute the commands of the tribal council.—M.]
[80] Col. of Mendoza, ap. Antiq. of Mexico, vol. vi. p. 17.—Carta de Cortés, ap. Lorenzana, Hist. de Nueva-España, p. 110.—Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 14, cap. 6, 8.—Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 7, cap. 13.—Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, lib. 8, cap. 18, 19.
[81] The Hon. C. A. Murray, whose imperturbable good humor under real troubles forms a contrast, rather striking, to the sensitiveness of some of his predecessors to imaginary ones, tells us, among other marvels, that an Indian of his party travelled a hundred miles in four-and-twenty hours. (Travels in North America (New York, 1839), vol. i. p. 193.) The Greek who, according to Plutarch, brought the news of victory to Platæa, a hundred and twenty-five miles, in a day, was a better traveller still. Some interesting facts on the pedestrian capabilities of man in the savage state are collected by Buffon, who concludes, truly enough, “L’homme civilisé ne connaît pas ses forces.” (Histoire naturelle: De la Jeunesse.)
[82] Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 14, cap. 1.—The same wants led to the same expedients in ancient Rome, and still more ancient Persia. “Nothing in the world is borne so swiftly,” says Herodotus, “as messages by the Persian couriers;” which his commentator Valckenaer prudently qualifies by the exception of the carrier-pigeon. (Herodotus, Hist., Urania, sec. 98, nec non Adnot. ed. Schweighäuser.) Couriers are noticed, in the thirteenth century, in China, by Marco Polo. Their stations were only three miles apart, and they accomplished five days’ journey in one. (Viaggi di Marco Polo, lib. 2, cap. 20, ap. Ramusio, tom. ii.) A similar arrangement for posts subsists there at the present day, and excites the admiration of a modern traveller. (Anderson, British Embassy to China (London, 1796), p. 282.) In all these cases, the posts were for the use of government only.
[83] Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, lib. 3, Apend., cap. 3.
[84] [The general council of the tribe.—M.]
[85] Zurita, Rapport, pp. 68, 120.—Col. of Mendoza, ap. Antiq. of Mexico, vol. i. Pl. 67; vol. vi. p. 74.—Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 14, cap. 1.—The reader will find a remarkable resemblance to these military usages in those of the early Romans. Com. Liv., Hist., lib. 1, cap. 32; lib. 4, cap. 30, et alibi.
[86] [“Distinguished braves,” see note, p. 35.—M.]
[87] Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 14, cap. 4, 5.—Acosta, lib. 6, ch. 26.—Col. of Mendoza, ap. Antiq. of