HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



125 



preachings to the people until the laft month of hie 

 life. We could make a long catalogue of thofe who 

 in the two centuries paft have exceeded one hundred 

 years of life in thefe countries. Particularly among the 

 Indians there are not a few who reach ninety and one 

 hundred years, preferving to old age their hair black, 

 their teeth firm, and their countenance frefh; but as 

 there have been fo very few who fince the twenty- third 

 century of the world have prolonged their lives to one 

 hundred and fifty years, that they are regarded as pro- 

 digies, we cannot aflent to the extravagant chronology 

 of Torquemada, fupported only perhaps on the evidence 

 of fome painting or hiftory of the Tezcucans, and par- 

 ticularly as that author himfelf confefies that that na- 

 tion kept no account of years. We believe, however, 

 without hefitation, that the arrival of the Checheme- 

 cas in Anahuac happened in the twelfth century, and 

 probably towards the year 1 1 70. 



Eight years had fcarcely elapfed after XolotI, the firft 

 Chechemecan king, was eftabliflied in Tenajuca, when 

 new people arrived there, conducted, as we have already 

 faid, by fix chiefs. We do not doubt that thefe new 

 people were the fix tribes of the Xochimilcas, Tepanecas, 

 Colhuas, Chalchefe, Tlahuicas, and Tlafcalans, feparat- 

 ed from the Mexicans in Chicomoztoc, and arrived in 

 the vale of Mexico not all at once, but in the order and 

 diftance of time we have mentioned. It is certain that 

 when the Acolhuas arrived a few years after, they found 

 the city of Azcapozalco already founded by the Tepa- 

 necas, and Colhuacan by the Colhuas. It is known be- 



fides, 



pie of Sombrerete with thofe words of St. Paul ; " Bouum certamen certavi, 

 " curfum confummavi, &c»" 



