THE MEXICAN MESSIAH. 95 



names of candidates for admission into their body to be approved 

 by the Government before the first are delivered or the second 

 elected. The French savants are, it is true, ennobled and decorated 

 by orders, which the wiser among them, in common with true phi- 

 losophers of any country, regard with indifference." 



THE MEXICAN" MESSIAH. 



By DOMINICK DALY. 



THERE are few more puzzling characters to be found in the 

 pages of history than Quetzatcoatl, the wandering stranger 

 whom the early Mexicans adopted as the air-god of their mythol- 

 ogy. That he was a real personage that he was a white man from 

 this side of the Atlantic, who lived and taught in Mexico centuries 

 before Columbus was born that what he taught was Christianity 

 and Christian manners and morals all these are plausible infer- 

 ences from facts and circumstances so peculiar as to render other 

 conclusion well-nigh impossible. 



When, in 1519, Cortes and his companions landed in Mexico, 

 they were astonished at being hailed as the realization of an an- 

 cient native tradition, which ran in this wise: Many centuries 

 previously a white man had come across the Atlantic from the 

 northeast, in a boat with " wings " (sails), like those of the Span- 

 ish vessels. He stayed several years in the country, and taught 

 the Mexicans (Toltecs) a new and humane system of religion, in- 

 structed them in the principles of good government, and imparted 

 to them a knowledge of many useful industrial arts. He loved 

 peace, and had a horror of war. By his great wisdom and knowl- 

 edge of divine things, his piety and his many personal and god- 

 like virtues, he won the esteem and veneration of all the people, 

 and exercised great control over them. His sojourn in Mexico 

 was a kind of golden age. Peace, plenty, and happiness prevailed 

 throughout the land. The Mexicans knew him as Quetzatcoatl, or 

 the Green Serpent, the word " green " in their language being a 

 term for a rare and precious thing. Through some malign influ- 

 ence Quetzatcoatl was obliged or induced to quit the country. On 

 his way to the coast he stayed for a time at the city of Cholula, 

 where, subsequently, a great pyramidical mound, surmounted by 

 a temple, was erected in his honor. On the shores of the Gulf of 

 Mexico he took leave of his followers, soothing their sorrow at 

 his departure with the assurance that he would not forget them, 

 and that he himself, or some one sent by him, would return at 

 some future time to visit them. He had made for himself a ves- 

 sel of serpents' skins, and in this strange contrivance he sailed 



