TARAHUMARE INDIANS IN CHIHUAHUA CITY, MEXICO 



Not even Greece and Rome in the palmiest days of their athletic history produced a race 

 of greater physical endurance than is to be found in the Tarahumare Indians of Mexico. 

 Their favorite pastime is chasing a big ball, which they sometimes do from morning to night. 

 Lumholtz, in his "Unknown Mexico," says they can run down and catch wild horses, and 

 that the women are as good runners as the men. 



for architect. Their shadowy history re- 

 minds us of those primitive races who 

 preceded the ancient Egyptians in the 

 march of civilization, fragments of whose 

 monuments, as the}- are seen at this day, 

 incorporated with the buildings of the 

 Egyptians themselves, give to these latter 

 the appearance of almost modern con- 

 structions. 



DID THE TOLTECS BUILD MITEA AND 

 PAEENQUE 



After a period of four centuries, the 

 Toltecs, who had extended their sway 

 over the remotest borders of Anahuac, 

 having been greatly reduced, it is said, 

 by famine, pestilence, and unsuccessful 

 wars, disappeared from the land as si- 

 lently and mysteriously as they had en- 

 tered it. A few r of them still lingered 

 behind, but much the greater number, 

 probably, spread over the region of Cen- 



tral America and the neighboring isles ; 

 and the traveler now speculates on the 

 majestic ruins of Mitla and Palenque, as 

 possibly the work of this extraordinary 

 people. 



The Mexicans, with whom our history 

 is principally concerned, came, also, from 

 the remote regions of the north — the 

 populous hive of nations in the New 

 World, as it has been in the Old. They 

 arrived on the borders of Anahuac. to- 

 ward the beginning of the thirteenth cen- 

 tury, some time after the occupation of 

 the land by the kindred races. For a long 

 time they did not establish themselves in 

 any permanent residence, but continued 

 shifting their quarters to different parts 

 of the Mexican Valley, enduring all the 

 casualties and hardships of a migratory 

 life. On one occasion they were enslaved 

 by a more powerful tribe, but their feroc- 



