[226] P. Martyr, De Orbe Novo, Decades (Compluti, 1530), dec. 5, p. 191.--Acosta, lib. 4, cap. 3.--Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. iii. pp. 114-125.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 13, cap. 34. “Men wrought in brass,” says Hesiod, “when iron did not exist.” χαλκῴ δʹ ἐργάϛοντο μέλας δʹ οὐκ ἒσκε σίδηρο HESIOD, Ἒργα καὶ Ἥμεραι. The Abbé Raynal contends that the ignorance of iron must necessarily have kept the Mexicans in a low state of civilization, since without it “they could have produced no work in metal, worth looking at, no masonry nor architecture, engraving nor sculpture.” (History of the Indies, Eng. trans., vol. iii. b. 6.) Iron, however, if known, was little used by the ancient Egyptians, whose mighty monuments were hewn with bronze tools; while their weapons and domestic utensils were of the same material, as appears from the green color given to them in their paintings. [227] Gama, Descripcion, Parte 2, pp. 25-29.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., ubi supra. [228] Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, lib. 9, cap. 15-17.--Boturini, Idea, p. 77.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., loc. cit.--Herrera, who says they could also enamel, commends the skill of the Mexican goldsmiths in making birds and animals with movable wings and limbs, in a most curious fashion. (Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 7, cap. 15.) Sir John Maundeville, as usual, “with his hair on end At his own wonders,” notices the “gret marvayle” of similar pieces of mechanism at the court of the grand Chane of Cathay. See his Voiage and Travaile, chap. 20. [229] Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 7, cap. 11.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 13, cap. 34.--Gama, Descripcion, Parte 2, pp. 27, 28. [230] “Parece, que permitia Dios, que la figura de sus cuerpos se asimilase á la que tenian sus almas por el pecado, en que siempre permanecian.” Monarch. Ind., lib. 13, cap. 34. [231] Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. ii. p. 195. [232] Gama, Descripcion, Parte 1, p. 1. Besides the _plaza mayor_, Gama points out the Square of Tlatelolco, as a great cemetery of ancient relics. It was the quarter to which the Mexicans retreated, on the siege of the capital. [233] Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 13, cap. 34.--Gama, Descripcion, Parte 2, pp. 81-83.--These statues are repeatedly noticed by the old writers. The last was destroyed in 1754, when it was seen by Gama, who highly commends the execution of it. Ibid. [234] This wantonness of destruction provokes the bitter animadversion of Martyr, whose enlightened mind respected the vestiges of civilization wherever found. “The conquerors,” he says, “seldom repaired the buildings that were defaced. They would rather sack twenty stately cities than erect one good edifice.” De Orbe Novo, dec. 5, cap. 10.