NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 371 



The head of a sacrificed person was strung up ; tlie limbs eaten 

 at the feast ; the body given to the wild beasts which were kept 

 within the temple circuits ; moreover, in that accursed house they 

 kept vijiers and venomous snakes who had something at theu- tails 

 which sounded like mon-is-bells, and they are the worst of all 

 vipers ; these were kept in cradles, and barrels, and earthen vessels, 

 upon feathers, and there they laid their eggs, and nmsed up their 

 snakeUngs, and they were fed with the bodies of the sacrificed, and 

 with dog's flesh. We learnt for certain, that, after they had 

 driven us from Mexico, and slain above 850 of our soldiers and of 

 the men of Narvaez, these beasts and snakes, who had been 

 oifered to their cruel idol to be in his company, were supported 

 upon then- flesh for many days, ^^^len these lions and tygers 

 roared, and the jackals and foxes howled, and the snakes hissed, 

 it was a grim thing to hear them, and it seemed like hell. 



' Mexico/ says Mr. Bullock, ' still possesses many ob- 

 jects of study for the antiquarian ;' and he goes on to 

 tell us that sculptured idols are to be found in various 

 parts of the city. The corner-stone of the building occu- 

 pied by the lottery-office when he was there, and front- 

 ing the market for shoes, was the head of the serpent- 

 idol, of great magnitude : in his judgment, it was not less 

 than seventy feet in length when entire. Under the 

 gateway of the house nearly opposite the entrance to 

 the mint was a fine statue of a deity, having the human 

 form in a recumbent posture, about the size of life. This 

 was found in digging a well. The house at the corner of 

 a street, at the south-east side of the great square, was 

 built upon, and in part supported by, a fine circular altar 

 of black basalt, ornamented with the tail and claws of a 

 gigantic reptile. In the cloisters behind the Dominican 

 convent was a noble specimen of the great serpent-idol, 

 almost perfect, and of fine workmanship, represented in 

 the act of swallowing a human victim, which is crushed 

 and struggling in its horrid jaws. 



The sacrificial stone, or altar, is buried in the square of the 

 catheckal, within a hundred yards of the calendar stone.* The 



Popularly called Montezuma's watch. 



