143 



judges except through an interpreter, considered 

 the employment of hieroglyphics as doubly ne- 

 cessary. They were presented before the several 

 courts of justice in New-Spain (the Real Audi- 

 encia, the Sala del Crimen, and the Juzgado de 

 Indios) as late as the beginning of the seven- 

 teenth century. When the Emperor Charles V. 

 with a view to encourage the culture of the arts* 

 and sciences in these distant regions,, founded, 

 in 1553, the University of Mexico, three profes- 

 sorships were established ; one for teaching the 

 Azteck language, another for the Otomite, and 

 a third for the explanation of hieroglyphical 

 paintings. It was for a long time deemed indis- 

 pensable to have attorneys, pleaders, and judges, 

 who were able to read the titles, the genealogical 

 paintings, the ancient code of the laws, and the 

 list of taxes (tributes) which each feudatory was 

 obliged to pay his lord. Two professors of the 

 Indian language still exist at Mexico ; but the 

 chair destined for the study of the Azteck anti- 

 quities has been suppressed. The use of paint- 

 ings is entirely lost; not because the knowledge 

 of the Spanish language has increased among 

 the natives, but because, from the present orga- 

 nization of the tribunals, it is found more useful 

 to apply to lawyers to plead the cause of the peo- 

 ple before the judges. 



The painting represented on the twelfth plate 

 seems to indicate a law-suit between some natives 



