of maize are extremely large. The vicinity of the lake also produces fine cochineal, indigo of an excellent kind, very thick and large vanilla, cacao, achiote1, cotton, wax, honey, sweet pine-apples, frijoles (beans), plums, sweet potatoes, all kinds of plantains, and various other vegetables. In short, all that land is very abundant in produce, the climate is healthy, and the whole territory very pleasant and delightful, and it is said that there are not, as in most parts of the Indies, snakes, lizards, alligators, bats, mosquitoes, chiguas (niguas), or other noxious and poisonous reptiles and insects.

"The natives of those islands and of the vicinity of the lake are extremely sagacious and deceitful, and after they left Yucatan they became more ferocious and cruel, for the people of Yucatan did not eat human flesh; on the contrary, in ancient times they abhorred the Mexicans because they did so. But these Itzaex, after their retreat, were given to this brutality, even more than the Mexicans, for there was not a prisoner whom they took in war that they did not sacrifice and devour. And when this game failed them, they sacrificed the fattest of their boys and young men. The Itzaex Indians have good countenances; they have a brown complexion inclining to be ruddy, and are cleverer than the people of Yucatan. They are agile, well made, and have handsome faces, though some of them were marked with lines as a sign of courage. They wore their hair as long as it would grow; indeed it is a most difficult thing to bring the Indians to cut their hair, for wearing it long is a sign of idolatry. The clothes they wore were ayates or gabachos (loose dresses without sleeves), and their

A tree something like an orange-tree, from the grains of whose fruit a red paste is made for dyeing.

314

COSTUME OF THE ITZAEX.

[CHAP.

CHAP. XX.

mantles were all of cotton woven in various colours. The women, as well as the men, wore also sashes of cotton, about four yards long and a foot wide, with which they girded themselves, and at the end of this sash many of them attached a quantity of coloured feathers, which was their greatest ornament. In their wars, and when they went to their sacrificial dances and festivals, they had their faces, arms, thighs, and legs painted and naked. The men are, for the most part, idlers and slow at work; they spend much of their time in idolatry, dancing and getting drunk at all hours. The women, on the contrary, are very notable, and apply themselves very diligently to their labours every day from sunrise to sunset, without speaking a single word: the spun work and cotton tissues of beautiful colours and shades which they manufacture are so excellent, that though the work of the Indian women of Yucatan was much esteemed from the first, and has been improved by Spanish teaching, it is far inferior to the productions of the Itzaex women. Both sexes have their ears and nostrils bored; by some, vanilla is put into the orifices, by others, small plates of very inferior gold and silver. It does not seem that they married more than one wife. Those who died a natural death were buried in the fields in the dresses they had worn; as for those whom they killed, they buried them in their stomachs! Nothing was found in their houses except some cotton, cochineal, indigo, achiote, wax, honey, and idols.

"Of the twenty-one Cues, or temples, which General Ursua found on the island, the largest was that in which the high-priest Quincanek officiated. It was of square form, with a handsome parapet, and was approached by nine steps, all of beautiful stone, and each front of the

rays;

building was about twenty yards long and very high. On the upper step, by the entrance, was an idol of human form with a bad countenance, sitting on his heels, and in the temple in front was another idol of unwrought emerald, which those infidels called the God of Battles: it was a span long, and remained in the possession of General Ursua. Above it was another of gypsum, with the face marked with mother-of-pearl, forming a sun and its and in its mouth was inserted teeth taken from the Spaniards whom they had killed. In the midst of the temple, which was formed like a castle, there was hanging from the top, by three strips of spun cotton of different colours, a leg-bone half-decayed; and below it hung a little bag, three-quarters of a yard long, containing little pieces of bone, which were also decayed ; and on the ground beneath were placed three braziers for burning perfumes or incense, with storax and other aromatic substances in them, which they used to burn in the sacrifices, and some dry maize-leaves; on the top of the upper part of this leg-bone was set a crown. It was explained that these bones were the fragments of what remained of a great horse which had been left in their care by a king who had passed that way a long time before from which it was certain that it was the horse of Fernando Cortez.

:

"Another great temple, built in the same way, was that of the Canek. In it was a great table or altar of stone for sacrifices, with seats all round it, highly polished. It contained also many statues of stone, wood, and gypsum, well sculptured, though some were horrible figures. In the Canek's house, too, there were several idols, a table for sacrifices, and the Analtches, or historics of all that happened to the people. In another temple,

317

CHAPTER XXI.

COMPLETION OF THE ROAD INTO GUATEMALA.-URSUA REQUESTS ASSISTANCE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF GUATEMALA.-DIFFICULT MARCH OF PAREDES.-URSUA COMMENCES THE FORTIFICATION OF TAYASAL, AND THEN RETURNS TO CAMPEACHY.-INTRIGUES OF SOBERANIS.BAPTISM OF THE CANEK AND HIGH PRIEST.-URSUA'S PRESENCE REQUIRED IN TAYASAL.-HIS EFFORTS ΤΟ RETURN THWARTED BY SOBERANIS, WHO KEEPS BACK THE ROYAL CEDULAS.-URSUA MADE CAPTAIN-GENERAL OF THE ITZALAN TERRITORY.-OPERATIONS RESUMED FOR THE PACIFICATION OF THE PENINSULA.-URSUA AGAIN ARRIVES AT TAYASAL. HE IS JOINED BY DON MELCHOR DE MENCOS FROM GUATEMALA.-THE CONCABO GENERALS.-IMPORTANT COUNCIL OF WAR.-FAILURE OF SUPPLIES. THE LAST JUNTA HELD. -IT IS RESOLVED TO EVACUATE THE COUNTRY.-CONCLUSION.

IS

THE first use to which General Ursua turned his capture of Tayasal, was the employment of the pacificated Indians in the completion of the Guatemala road. The Alain tribe, who were good workmen, were very serviceable in this particular, and in the course of a few days the road was constructed round the head of the lake, connecting the two lines at the points where cach had stopped.

"The communication," says Villagutierre, "was now quite practicable from Yucatan to Guatemala, for carts and horses, and the lake caused not the slightest impediment; indeed, had it not been for the trees which were blown down by the hurricanes, and because the