Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1904-01-08
AZTEC RACE LIVES ON.
REPRESENTS oNE-EIcHTH THE
PRESENT POPULATION or
MEXICO.
These indians Still Look for the Day
When the Montezumas viii Resume
Their scepter in the South-Their
Famous SacrificiaI Stone.

Jesse Huber writes as follows from
the City CT Mexico to the Pittsburg
Dispatch: Aztecs are in this city to-
day, as they were nearly four centur.
les ago, when Cortez and his soldiers
created CONSERVATION among them by
the free 8 of the firebrand and
sword. They are every whit Indian
and cling to their old-time traditions
with the tenacity of the Chinese.
Though they have been conquered and
their national existence merged into
the present Republican fern of gov
eminent, yet they still cherish the
belief that Montezuma will return and
their kin will be restored to the pos
session and control of the land Owe
which their forefathers once ruled
with u%ndisputed sway.
These primitive people number L.
100000, representing one-eighth of the
total population of Mexico. You can
see them every day on the streets,
along the country roads or in their
mountain retreats, some of them
speaking the Manhattan language
and wearing plain garments of home
spun, just as their ancestors did be-
fore the eye of Columbus sighted the
shore of the western world.
The Aztecs were in some respects
an advanced people when they were
first surprised by European invaders.
They had acquired wonderful skill in
working in metals. Their process Of
tempering copper to the hardness of
steel is a lost art. / was shown a cop
per ak among a collection of Aztec rel
les that was sc finely tempered that
a file drawn firmly across its polished
surface failed to leave ever a trace.
They knew how to extract gold and
silver from the ore and work them in.
to fine ornaments. They could cut
and polish the hardest gems, and their
skill in making baskets. pottery and
feather pictures and in working out
quaint and artistic designs in leather,
woven fabrics and wood carvings is
practiced by their descendants today.
1t is astonishing what skill and
taste these primitive people display in
the articles they supply for the curio
market. Take their feather pictures
as a sample of what they can do.
These works of art awaken the admir-
alton of travellers today, as they did of
Cortez and his followers. They rep
resent animals, birds, buildings or
sweeping landscapes. Nearly every
detail is brought out, with exquisite
nicely, not with paint and brush. but
by deftly combining feathers plucked
from birds of brilliant plumage and
fastened on the white surface of card
board.
In striking contrast with the arts
tic skill of the Aztecs are their sloven-
ly habits of life. They are careless in
dress and content with any kind of a
hut for shelter. They are not amphi-
bious by nature, and will cheerfully go
for weeks without the application CT
| water even to their hands or faces. AS
parents, they are affectionate to their
children. To domestic animals they
are cruel.
The Aztecs take a keen delight in
music. They will stand entranced
while listening to the soft melody of
the guitar or the food of harmonious
strains from a military band.
They venerate the memory of the
heroes Of their race. Guatemotzin,
the last of the Aztec kings. is their
ideal because of the indomitable re-
sistance brought against the invading
| Spaniards under his heroic leadership.
The colossal statue erected to his MEM
DRY in this city is a masterpiece of
monumental art. In August of each
year crowds of Aztecs gather around
this monument and hold an all-day
celebration, praising their departed
ruler in speech and song and honoring
his memory by r%everently entwining
the monument with garlands of flow
erS.
The Aztecs are incltled toward reIi-
gion and are most devoted worshippers
at the shrine of the Virgin Guadalupe.
In the villages they seldom pass a
cathedral without removing their hats.
/ have seen groups of these natives
standing at street in the quiet
of evening and just as the vesper bells
begin to peal forth from the church
tower, each would quietly remove his
pointed sombrero and hold it over his
shoulder until the last soft reverbera-
tons ceased to float on the balmy twi-
light. air.
The stone images before which the
ancestors of these people once stood In
abject fear have lost their power over
them and arc viewed only as objects
of historic interest. A good many OF
these idols have been collected by the
| Mexicans and grouped in the National
Museum of this city.
have stood before some Of these
stone idols, tracing their weird outlines
t cut by some master sculptor from
rough blocks of dark stone, quarried
from the ~neighboring mountains, and
wondered if only those lips of adamani
could speak what stories they could
relate OF the early life of aEvanishing
race.
Here is Huitzilopochtli, the once
dreaded war god or the AZtecS. He Is
a large, blocky image with a savage
cavernous mouth and a skirt Of inter.
| coiled snakes. A hollow-eyed human
| skull is carved on his belt, symbolic
ing death, 1t was believed that the des-
TIMES of wal were in his control. He
could decree victory or defeat. Hideous
monster that he represented it was
| thought that only the blood of captives
taken in battle could appease his wrath
and lend victory to Aztec arms
The human lives annually offered in
superstitious dread to satiate the thirst
for blood of this stone deity is appalI.
ing. Fifty thousand victims r sail
to have been sacrificed when he wa
enthroned In the temple where tht
Suaniards first saw him.
Bernal Diaz, who was with Cortei
as chronieler of the expedition. wrote
! of his first visit to the temple. that The