140 



SIX MONTHS IN MEXICO. 



posed sixty hymns, in praise of the Creator 

 of heaven, which were very much thought of 

 by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, 

 and his two odes or songs which were trans- 

 lated into Spanish by his descendant Don 

 Fernando Alva Ixtlilxochilt, have been pre- 

 served to our days. He also had some know- 

 ledge of astronomy by examining frequently 

 the luminous bodies of the heavens, and 

 equally applied himself to the knowledge of 

 plants and animals, and all those that he 

 could not possess on account of the differ- 

 ence of climate, he had them depicted, as it 

 has been ascertained by the celebrated Doctor 

 Hernandez, who saw them and copied some 

 of them. This king also investigated the 

 cause of many effects which existed in nature, 

 which made him detest idolatry, exhorting 

 privately his children to have it in abhorrence, 

 though publicly they might pretend to ad- 

 here to it. He abolished for awhile human 



