The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1879-10-09
BELLEVUE La. THURSDAY, OCTOBER g. 1879

more or less remote from one another,
are often loosely spoken of as one mi-
grafton. For example, the family group
which bore the generic name of Nahu-
atlacas was composed of seven tribes, or
perhaps we should better say drifted
southwark in seven successive waves.
All these branches of one trunk spoke sub.
stantially the same language, and issued
from tie same cradle Of civilization
which. should probably be identified
with the valleys of the Mississippi and
Ohio; but they appeared on the plateau
of Anahuac at widely different periods,
4 The Aztecs, whom Cortez found DOM
inant, had been the last to arrive. On
the other hand, it was prior to the COM
mencement of the Christian era-indeed
some archeologists would set the, date
not less than . thousand years before
that epoch-when the mysterious Nahuas
emerged in Mexico. Concerning their
origin and history almost nothing is
known, but this much is established,
that the later Toltecs and Aztecs were
only subdivislons~of the great Nahua
races, and that all spoke; dialects of its
ancestral language. The suggestion has
commended itself to some students that
the primitive Nahuas were themselves
the builders of few, but those the most
ancient, mounds Of the Mississippi Val
ley, and were also the authors of some
of the stone structures in northern Mex
ico during a halt which possibly arrested
for some centuries their southwark
march. a One of the most competent in
terpreters Of the Mexican monuments
and flieroglyphic annals, the Able Bras
seur de Bourbourg, regarded 955 B. c..
as the earliest trustworthy date which
could be establishedin the Nahuau Ian
guage. BY this time, at all events, he
Thought, the first migratory wave from
the north had struck the plain of Ana
huac. ~ an .a.,,ss.,.,...s
Although the Toltec tribes did not
make their appearance in Mexico stimuli
taneously, but. at different epochs and
possibly by different routes, as was the
case, too, with the Aztec group which
succeeded them, their active occupancy
seems to have begun with the seventh
century of our era It should be borne
in mind that the large territory of Mexi-
co had been occupied conjointly by many
pre-Toltec peoples besides the Nahnas,
but whose languages were wholly want
ing in linguistic affinities with the Ma
huatI tongues. 1t was one of these alien
and relatively barbarous tribes, known
as the Ghichimecs, which, after . lapse
of about 400 years, dislodged the Toltecs
from their dominant position, but they
were sthenselyes soon displaced by a
new body of Immigrants known as the
Acolhuas, whose conquests resulted in
the kingdom, of sAeelhuan. Scarcely
was this power established when the last
series OF nligrations from the north took
place. Il Atoomparatively short intervals
the seven Nahuatlacas tribes arrived on
the plateau Of Mexico, the Aztecs bring
ing up therear. According to their own
records, the latter. people had left their
horne in the mysterious Azt1an, about
A D. 1880, and. after various wander
ings and delays IN their southwark jour
ney reached the table lands Of Anahtiac
about century klter. Qualified by their
ethnic relationships TO assimilate, and
in some directions to improve upon the
civilization of their predecessors, the
Aztecs here founded the empire whose
organization and resources filed the
Spanish conquercfs with wonder.
1InMr. Conant's Judgment, the origi-
nal seats of the. Nahna race must be
sought for in the great allivial plains OF
the Mississippi Valley. He thinks it not
. improbable that. the Tlepallan of the
, Toltecs, or, at all events, the Aztlan Of
,, the Aztecs, who were the last to leave
their primitive home, may yet be identi.
fed. It would seem that ike opinions
, were entertained by Humboldt, who OBJ.
served that the names, given by the
Aztecs to the cities built in Anahuae
: ; were said to be derived from towns they
) had abandoned in their ancient country
, and that the whole civilization on the
Mexican table land was regarded by the
2 inhabitants themselves as the copy O
! something which had existed elsewhere
: in their. primitive, seats. Where, ask.
Humboldt, should be placed that paren
home of so many colonies, that Q6fcsat
qeatiuan, which during centuries urget
southwark successive sYarms OF nations
/ that proved able to understand eacl
) others speech and to recognize one an
: other for their kindred? He does no
+ hesitate to answer that the lively remi
! niscences of which we have just spoken
5 and the peculiar physiognomy presented
in other respects by the Mexican civil
!, cation point to the long continued exist
!, enee of an empire in the north Of Amer
I ! lea between the 36th and 42d degrees o
Z latitude. And elsewhere Humboldt cite
the fact that the section of country be
!, tween the parallels drawn through tn
J, mouth,of the Arkansas and the mOutl
: ! of the Missouri was pronounced by tn
Aztec historians themselves the prime
: val nursery of the civilized nations o
i Anahuac. .'il3 satEthd SSaHsA -
: CUCUMBER CATsUP.-Prepare C cucum
] !, bers as for the table, only instead
= slicing crate them on q coarse crater
~ ~ 1:rra x,a,-xr 1;tf1o4 finely chOnnn