This proof of the great knowledge possessed by the being before him vastly impressed the Mexican. How could this strange being know the Mexican tongue, and be acquainted with its gods, unless he were one of them? It had pleased him to assume ignorance of other matters, but doubtless he was well aware of everything that had passed in the country since he left it. Henceforth the respect which he and his companions paid to Roger was redoubled. As soon as they had reached the borders of Mexico, a swift runner had been dispatched to the nearest post with a message, to be sent forward to the King of Tezcuco, with the tidings of the arrival of a strange white being in the land; and asking for instructions as to what was to be done with him. In the meantime, the merchants told Roger that they wished him to abstain from going out into the various villages and towns at which they stopped. "Until we know what are the king's wishes concerning you, it were better that you were not seen. In the first place, all this country by the coast is under the Aztec rule, and as soon as you were seen, messages would be sent forward to Mexico, and the Emperor might desire that so great a wonder should be sent direct to him; whereas, if our own King sends first for you, you would be his property as it were, and even Montezuma would not interfere. "It will not be long before an answer arrives, for along all the roads there are post houses, two leagues apart from each other. At each of these couriers are stationed, men trained to run at great speed, and these carry the dispatches from post to post, at the rate of eight or nine miles an hour." "But the messages must get changed, where they have to be given so often?" "Not at all," he said. "The couriers know nothing of the dispatches they carry." "Oh, they are written dispatches?" Roger said. "Then you possess the art of writing?" "Writing, what is writing?" the merchant asked. "Letters are inscribed on paper," Roger said, "so that the person receiving them at a distance understands exactly what the one who wrote wished to say." The merchant shook his head. "I know nothing of what you call letters," he said. "We draw pictures, on a fabric formed of prepared skins, or of a composition of silk and gum, but chiefly on a paper prepared from the leaves of the aloe. Besides the pictures there are marks, which are understood to represent certain things. These picture dispatches are made in the form of rolls, or books. I myself have a slave who is skilled in such work, and who has depicted you, and added all particulars, and the roll has been forwarded to Tezcuco." Chapter 7: A Wonderful Country.