4 
INTRODUCTION. 
scribed by pictures. Robertson relates that 
in an interview which Cortes had with the 
Mexican chiefs, the latter were attended by 
painters, who employed themselves diligently 
in delineating upon white cotton cloths, 
figures of the ships, the horses, the artillery, 
the soldiers, and whatever else attracted their 
eyes, as singular, in order to convey to the 
mind of Montezuma, their sovereign, a more 
lively idea of the strange and wonderful ob¬ 
jects now presented to their view, than any 
words could communicate. 
-i 
Even at the present day, when written lan¬ 
guage is so copious, we should be unable to 
describe a rose to those who had never seen 
such a flower, without the assistance of draw¬ 
ing something similar. When the camellia 
japonica was first brought to flower in this 
country, we felt it impossible to give a just 
idea of the flower without drawing a picture 
in language, by representing it like a rose 
formed by wax and placed on a branch of the 
