XXii ACCOUNT OF THE WRITERS OF THE 



Fernando d' Alvarado Tezozomoc, an Indian of Mexi- 

 co. He wrote in Spanifli a Mexican Chronicle, about 

 the year 1598, which was preferved in the above men- 

 tioned library of St. Peter and St. Paul. 



Bartolome de Las Cafas, a famous Dominican Span- 

 iard, fird bifhop of Chiapa, and highly worthy of memory 

 among the Indians. The bitter memorials prefented by 

 this venerable prelate to king Charles V. and Philip II. 

 in favour of the Indians, and againft the Spanifli con- 

 querors, printed in Seville, and afterwards tranflated and 

 reprinted, in odium to the Spaniards, in various langua- 

 ges of Europe ; contain fome particulars of the ancient 

 hiflory of the Mexicans, but fo altered and exaggerated, 

 we cannot rely on the authority of the author, however 

 otherwife refpeftable. The excefEve fire of his zeal fent 

 forth light and fmoke together, that is, he mixed truth 

 with falfehood, not becaufe he fludied an opportunity of 

 deceiving his king and the world, as a fufpicion of fuch 

 guilt in him would be offering wrong to that virtue which 

 his enemies acknowledged and revered ; but becaufe, 

 not having been prefent at what he relates concerning 

 Mexico, he trufted too much to information from others, 

 which will be made to appear in fome parts of this hif- 

 tory. We fliould have, probably, been much more affift- 

 ed by two great works of the fame prelate never pub- 

 lifEed, the one, A Hiflory of the Climate and Soil of the 

 Countries of America ; and the Genius and Manners, 

 See, of the Americans under Subjection to the Catholic 

 King. This manufcript, conflfling of 830 pages, was 

 preferved in the library of the Dominicans of Valladolid, 

 in Spain, where it was put by Remefal, as he makes us. 

 credit in his Chronicle of the Dominicans of Chiapa and 

 Guatemala. The other, A General Hiflory of America, 



in 



