their character. It was
not alone true of the Mexicans, but of all the Nahua tribes and of
the Mayas, though in a less degree. On every occasion of the least
importance victims were sacrificed. Any unusual event was celebrated
in a similar manner. Before the departure of a warlike expedition, the
favor of Huitzilopochtli was sought by the sacrifice of human life;
on the return of the same, similar scenes were enacted. On all such
occasions the more victims the better. These victims were mostly
captives taken in war, and wars were often entered into for the express
purpose of procuring such victims. They were even made a subject of
tribute. Devout people sometimes offered themselves or their children
for the sacrifice. The number of victims, of course, varied from year
to year, but it is possible that it counted up into the thousands every
year.

What we are able to gather from the religious beliefs of the civilized
nations sustains the conclusions we have already arrived at in reference
to their culture. We can but believe this had been greatly overrated.
It is the religion of barbarians, not of a cultivated and enlightened
people the historians would have us believe in. It is a religion in
keeping with the character of the people who had confederated together
for the purpose of compelling unwilling tribute from weaker tribes. It
is in keeping with what we would expect of a people still in the Stone
Age, who still practised communism in living, and whose political and
social organization was founded on the gens as a unit.

It will not be out of place to devote some space to a consideration
of their advance in learning; and first of all let us see about their
system of counting or numeration. This knowledge, as Mr. Gallatin
remarks, must necessarily have preceded any knowledge of astronomy, or
any effort to compute time. They must have known how to count the days
of a year before they knew how many days it contained. We all know how
natural it is for a child to count by means of his fingers. This was
undoubtedly the first method employed by primitive man. Proof of this
is found in the wide extended use of the decimal system. Among the
civilized nations, traces of this early custom are still preserved in
the meaning of the words used to express the numbers.

To express the numbers up to twenty, small dots or circles were
used--one for each unit. For the number twenty they painted a little
flag, for the number four hun