ith the learned Abbe, that the first two
books of the Quiche MS. contain an almost literal transcript of the
'Popol Vuh,' or that the 'Popol Vuh; was the original of the
'Teo-Amoxtli,' or the sacred book of the Toltecs. All we know is, that
the author wrote his anonymous work because the 'Popol Vuh'--the
national book, or the national tradition--was dying out, and that he
comprehended in the first two sections the ancient traditions common
to the whole race, while he devoted the last two to the historical
annals of the Quiches, the ruling nation at the time of the Conquest
in what is now the republic of Guatemala. If we look at the MS. in
this light, there is nothing at all suspicious in its character and
its contents. The author wished to save from destruction the stories
which he had heard as a child of his gods and his ancestors. Though
the general outline of these stories may have been preserved partly in
the schools, partly in the pictographic MSS., the Spanish Conquest had
thrown everything into confusion, and the writer had probably to
depend chiefly on his own recollections. To extract consecutive
history from these recollections, is simply impossible. All is vague,
contradictory, miraculous, absurd. Consecutive history is altogether
a modern idea, of which few only of the ancient nations had any
conception. If we had the exact words of the 'Popol Vuh,' we should
probably find no more history there than we find in the Quiche MS. as
it now stands. Now and then, it is true, one imagines one sees certain
periods and landmarks, but in the next page all is chaos again. It may
be difficult to confess that with all the traditions of the early
migrations of Cecrops and Danaus into Greece, with the Homeric poems
of the Trojan war, and the genealogies of the ancient dynasties of
Greece, we know nothing of Greek history before the Olympiads, and
very little even then. Yet the true historian does not allow himself
to indulge in any illusions on this subject, and he shuts his eyes
even to the most plausible reconstructions.

The same applies with a force increased a hundredfold to the ancient
history of the aboriginal races of America, and the sooner this is
acknowledged, the better for the credit of American scholars. Even the
traditions of the migrations of the Chichimecs, Colhuas, and Nahuas,
which form the staple of all American antiquarians, are no better than
the Greek traditions about Pelasgians, AEolians, and Ionians