Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1885-12-05
FLAXCALA.
SMALL BUT PLUCKY INDIAN
REPUBLIC.
Hundred Years, Rather Than
Yield to the Montezumas.
Correspondence OF the RECORD UsIoE.l
MEXICO. November 25. 1885.

Correspondence OF the RBcoRD-U sIoE.l
MEXICO, November 25, 1885.
To visit the historic State and city of
Tlaxcala, one must make special pilgrim
age from Puebla, but by different route
than that which we lately took to the
pyramid of Cholula. One days time is
sufficient, leaving the City of the Angels"
in the morning, and returning thereto in
the evening. Tlaxcala-which name, trans
lated from the Aztec, means Land of
Bread"-is that famous mountain republic
of the aboriginal Indians which shut out
the despotism of the Montezumas by an
insurmountable wall. As early as the days
of the first Montezuma (Montezuma nhui-
camina)-somewhere about the year 1440-
the plucky little province was so
completely isolated that its people
could obtain no foreign pro-
duce, not even cotton or salt
Their only food was the maize they Guilt
waited and the game they caught among the
snow capped Tlaxcalan mountains and
their clothing was made of the fibers of the
maguey, braided osiers, or the skins of ami
mails slain in the chase Their Govern
ment was q council of Elders, presided
over by hereditary chief, and their simple
yet firm and dignified political institutions
have been the study and admiration of the
LEARNED OF MANY LANDS.
Cortez found the Tlaxcalans the most
terrible and undaunted of all his enemies
and never could his march to the Capital
have been accomplished had he not won
them over TO his cause by promising to de-
liver into their hands their most ancient
enemies of Tenochtitlan. 1t will be re-
membered that on the momentous day, the
9Th of November, 1919, when the Europeans
first entered Tenochtitlan, the Capital of
the Western World now called the
City of Mexico, the whole company
of 1000 invaders comprised less than
400 Spanish adventures, while all the
rest were Tiaxcaian warriors; and to these
dark-skinned, ferocious allies was mostly
due the victory on that horrible day of
butchery-August Is, 1921, the day of ST.
Hippolytus, the patron saint of modern
Mexico-when the Aztec empire fell.
In his letters to Spain, the conqueror
wrote that stone wall, nine feet high, in
closed Tlaxcala, extending from mountain
to mountain. through which he entered
between overlapping semi-circles of solid
masonry; that he was first attacked by an
army of 5000 warriors, next day by an
army 100000 strong, and on the third day
by $4,000 1t is scarcely probable that he
took time to make so accurate a count
IN THE MIDST OF ASSAULT
And environed by unknown dangers, and
doubtless, like modern adventures, the
story of his exploits lost nothing in the
recital. He further asserts II attacked
one place, which was so large that it con-
tained, according TO an examination |
caused to be made, more than twenty thou
sand houses" OF the capital of Tlaxcala-
the same city which we shall visit day
Cortez wrote: " 1t is larger than Granada,
and much stronger, containing as many
fine houses and much larger population
than did that city at the time of Its cap
ture." lie adds: There is in Tlaxcala q
market in which every day more than
thirty thousand people are buying and sell
ing, besides many other merchants scat
tered about the city. The market contains
a great variety OF articles, both of food and
clothing, and all kinds of shoes for the feet,
jewels of gold, silver and precious stones,
and ornaments of feathers, all as well ar
ranged as can possibly be found in anv
public square in the world"
THE MODERN TLAxcALA
Is a square, flat-roofed, sleepy little place,
wound around by the Zatuapan river, with
present population Of about ten thousand.
although the Mexican official report-a
rare work of fancy, with scarcely reliable
figure in it-gives the population as 44,1S7I
In the center of the town is the usual plaza,
pleasant garden with an antique fountain,
upon the brim of which is carved a lengthy
inscription, stating that ii was erected by
grand Vice-King in 164S. Says a recent
traveller: Here is something savoring of
antiquity at the very start but further re-
search will take US back to the very begin
ming of Tlaxcalan history-to the DAYS
when Spanish soldiers were honored guests
OF this very town. and when MonteZuma
was quaking with fear in anticipation of
their arrival" In the municipal pal
ace are four paintings, having
names which the student of
history will recognize at once as that of
allies of Cortez, after he had left behind
him the hot coast region and had won to
his cause this valient little Republic. They
are duly certified to as true and faithful
pictures" of Vicente Xicotencatl. Don Lo-
renzo Mazlcatzoin, Don Gonzalo Tlanexo-
lotzin, and Bartolome Zitlalpopoca, as they
appeared in 15l9-the Spanish names pre-
liked to their native titles being those of
later baptism. The floor of the palace
chamber wherein these pictures hang is
piled with idols, collected hereabouts-
hldeous monstrosities of stone, which were
worshiped in the early DAYS before Cath
olicism substituted wooden images for IN
dian idolatry and upon the wall hangs the
se.f-same Titulo, or title of freedom, which
the Slaxcalans presented to the King of
Spain, while beside it fiutters the feathery
capote, or cape, of the first Indian chieftain
who received baptism in New Spain In
glass case is
FADED RAG,
Which the uniformed tourist is liable to
pass by without notice. But pause There
is nothing more historically curious to be
found in the new world, for it is the ident-
ical war banner which Cortez carried
on his sanguinarv march, which has re-
NAMED in Tlaxcatan possession (notwith-
repeated demands from the gen
eral Government) ever since the subjuga
ton of the Aztees The silk, woven
ago in CASTLE, Is now faded to a
dim tea color and torn in many places, but
still shows the Spanish arms in the upper
corner. The banner-staff is gone but the
iron pike-no harder than the heart of the
conquerer-that topped the proud emblem,
remains to tell its doleful story OF fanati-
cism, greed and murder
On a little elevation just beyond the
town, is an ancient convent of Franciscans,
one of the first of four that were erected by
the monks Of San Francisco, as early as
1924. Its ceiling is studded with golden
stars and its roof and rafters are solid
beams from the once dense Tlaxcalan for
est that furnished timber Tor those cele-
brated brigantines used at the siege of
Mexico, but which has long since disap-
peared, like the builders of those historic
boats and the Friafs of orders gray" with
their oft-repeated
AVE MARIA PURIssIMA.
L7p4a-i,,s, 4I,a cr,oI eor,,.,,...- - IL