that it was
necessary to go all round the temple several times before reaching the
summit. The top was a broad space on which stood two towers, forty or
fifty feet high, which contained the images of the gods. Before these
towers stood the dreadful stone of sacrifice, and two lofty altars on
which the sacred fires burned continually. Human sacrifices were adopted
by the Aztecs about two hundred years before the coming of the
Spaniards. Rare at first, they became more and more frequent till at
length nearly every festival closed with this cruel abomination. The
unhappy victim was held by five priests upon the stone of sacrifice,
while the sixth, who was clothed in a scarlet mantle, emblematic of his
horrible office, cut open his breast with a sharp razor of 'itztli,' a
volcanic substance as hard as flint, and tearing out his heart, held it
first up to the sun, which they worshipped, and then cast it at the feet
of the god to whom the temple was devoted; and to crown the horror, the
body of the captive thus sacrificed was afterwards given to the warrior
who had taken him in battle, who thereupon gave a great banquet and
served him up amid choice dishes and delicious beverages for the
entertainment of his friends. When the great teocalli of Huitzilopochtli
was dedicated in the year 1486, no less than 70,000 prisoners were thus
sacrificed, and in the whole kingdom every year the victims were never
fewer than 20,000, or, as some old writers say, 50,000. The Aztec
writing was not with letters and words, but consisted of little coloured
pictures, each of which had some special meaning. Thus a 'tongue'
denoted speaking, a 'footprint' travelling, a 'man sitting on the
ground' an earthquake. As a very slight difference in position or colour
intimated a different meaning, this writing was very difficult to read,
and in the Aztec colleges the priests specially taught it to their
pupils. At the time of the coming of the Spaniards there were numbers of
people employed in this picture-writing, but unfortunately hardly any of
the manuscripts were preserved; for the Spaniards, looking upon them as
magic scrolls, caused them to be burned by thousands. In many mechanical
arts the Aztecs had made considerable progress. Their ground was well
cultivated, they had discovered and used silver, lead, tin, and copper.
Gold, which was found in the river-beds, they cast into bars, or used as
money by filling transparent quills with gold dust. They al