150 ON THE GARDENS OF MEXICO. 



cedar groves, whose gigantic branches threw a refreshing coolness 

 over the verdure in the sultriest seasons of the year, rose the royal 

 villa, with its light arcades and airy halls, drinking in the sweet 

 perfumes of the gardens. Here the monarch often retired to throw 

 off the burden of state, and refresh his wearied spirits in the society 

 of his favourite wives ; reposing, during the noontide heats, in the 

 embowering shades of his paradise, or mingling in the cool of the 

 evening in their festive sports and dances. Here he entertained his 

 imperial brothers of Mexico and Ilacopans, and followed the hardier 

 pleasures of the chase in the noble woods that stretched for miles 

 around his villa, flourishing in all their primeval majesty. Here, too, 

 he often repaired in the latter days of his life, when age had tem- 

 pered ambition, and cooled the ardour of his blood, to pursue in 

 solitude the studies of philosophy, and gather wisdom from medita- 

 tion. The extraordinary accounts of the Tescucan architecture are 

 confirmed, in the main, by the relics which still cover the hill of 

 Tezcotzinco, or are half buried beneath its surface. They attract 

 little attention indeed in the country, where their true history has 

 long since passed into oblivion ; while the traveller, whose curiosity 

 leads him to the spot, speculates on their probable origin ; and as he 

 stumbles over the huge fragments of sculptured porphyry and granite, 

 refers them to the primitive races who spread their colossal archi- 

 tecture over the country long before the coming of the Acolhuans and 

 the Aztecs. 



" And here, also, they beheld those fairy islands of flowers, over- 

 shadowed occasionally by trees of considerable size, rising and falling 

 with the gentle undulations of the billows. Here, again, they found 

 fresh cause for admiration in the grandeur of the city, and the supe-* 

 rior style of its architecture. The dwellings of the poorer classes 

 were, indeed, chiefly of reeds and mud. But the great avenue 

 through which they were now marching was lined with the houses of 

 the nobles, who were encouraged by the emperor to make the capital 

 their residence. They were built of a red porous stone, drawn from 

 quarries in the neighbourhood, and, though they rarely rose to a 

 second story, often covered a large space of ground. The flat roofs, 

 azoteas, were protected by stone parapets, so that every house was a 

 fortress. Sometimes these roofs resembled parterres of flowers, so 

 thickly were they covered with them; but more frequently these 





