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National Geographic : 1916 Jul
Contents
STREET OF THE DEAD: SAN JUAN TEOTIHUACAN, MEXICO The sacred pyramids of San Juan Teotihuacan, situated 27 miles northeast of Mexico City, are reputed to be the largest artificial mounds in the New World. It is believed that they were built at least 900 years before Columbus discovered America. tablished on the great roads, about two leagues distant from each other. The courier, bearing his dispatches in the form of a hieroglyphical painting, ran with them to the first station, where they were taken by another messenger and carried forward to the next, and so on till they reached the capital. These cou riers, trained from childhood, traveled with incredible swiftness; not four or five leagues an hour, as an old chronicler would make us believe, but with such speed that despatches were carried from 100 to 200 miles a day. Fresh fish was frequently served at Montezuma's table in 24 hours from the time it had been taken in the Gulf of Mexico, 200 miles from the capital. In this way intelligence of the movements of the royal armies was rapidly brought to court; and the dress of the courier, denoting by its color that of his tidings, spreading joy or consternation in the towns through which he passed. But the great aim of the Aztec insti tutions, to which private discipline and public honors were alike directed, was the profession of arms. In Mexico, as in Egypt, the soldier shared with the priest the highest consideration. The king, as we have seen, must be an experienced warrior. The tutelary deity of the Aztecs was the god of war. A great object of their military expeditions was to gather hecatombs of captives for his altars. The soldier who fell in battle was transported at once to the region of ineffable bliss in the bright mansions of the Sun. THE AZTEC COUNTERPART OE CHRISTIAN CRUSADERS Every war, therefore, became a cru sade; and the warrior, animated by a re ligious enthusiasm, like that of the early Saracen, or the Christian crusader, was not only raised to contempt of danger, but courted it, for the imperishable crown of martyrdom. Thus we find the same
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