st here
thy creature whom thou hast sent into this world, this place of
sorrow, suffering, and penitence. Grant him, O Lord, thy gifts and
thine inspiration."

The science of the Aztecs has excited the wonder of all competent
judges, such as Humboldt (already quoted) and the astronomer La Place.
Lord Kingsborough remarks in his great work:

It can hardly be doubted that the Mexicans were acquainted with
many scientifical instruments of strange invention;... whether the
telescope may not have been of the number is uncertain; but the
thirteenth plate of M. Dupaix's Monuments, which represents a man
holding something of a similar nature to his eye, affords reason to
suppose that they knew how to improve the powers of vision.

References to the calendar of the Aztecs should not omit the secular
festival occurring at the end of their great cycle of fifty-two years.
From the length of the period, two generations, one might compare it
with the "jubilee" of ancient Israel--a word made familiar toward the
close of Queen Victoria's reign. The great event always took place at
midwinter, the most dreary period of the year, and when the five
intercalary days arrived they "abandoned themselves to despair,"
breaking up the images of the gods, allowing the holy fires of the
temples to go out, lighting none in their homes, destroying their
furniture and domestic utensils, and tearing their clothes to rags. This
disorder and gloom signified that figuratively the end of the world was
at hand.

On the evening of the last day, a procession of priests, assuming
the dress and ornaments of their gods, moved from the capital
toward a lofty mountain, about two leagues distant. They carried
with them a noble victim, the flower of their captives, and an
apparatus for kindling the _new fire_, the success of which was an
augury of the renewal of the cycle. On the summit of the mountain,
the procession paused till midnight, when, as the constellation of
the Pleiades[11] approached the zenith, the new fire was kindled by
the friction of some sticks placed on the breast of the victim. The
flame was soon communicated to a funeral-pyre on which the body of
the slaughtered captive was thrown. As the light streamed up toward
heaven, shouts of joy and triumph burst forth from the countless
multitudes who covered the hills, the terraces of the te