We pass on now to discuss the various tools which we have reason to think were cast in copper or in bronze, by the early Mexicans. The _axe_ stands in the first place. Cortes, we shall remember, omitted to specify any of the objects which he saw exposed for sale in the market-place. Not so his companion, Bernal Diaz. He, after a lapse of 40 years, when occupied with the writing of his memoirs, has no recollection of other tools, which he undoubtedly must have seen, except the much admired bronze axes. Specimens of these were sent over to Spain in the same vessel on which the above mentioned presents to the Emperor were shipped. At their arrival at Palos, Petrus Martyr of the Council House of the Indies was one of the first to examine the curiosities sent from the New World, and to gather from the lips of the bearers their verbal comments. His remarks on the axes he had seen, are “with their bronze axes and hatchets, cunningly tempered, they (the Indians) fell the trees.” There are three expressions in this passage which will claim our attention. First, we learn that two classes of axes were sent over, one of which Martyr recognized as a “_secūris_” the other as a “_dolabra_” hence a common axe, and another which was like a pick or a hoe. Further on we shall give an illustration of these axes, taken from the pictures of the natives, when we are to recur again to this subject. Our author, in the second place, describes the two axes as of bronze, for this is the English rendering of the Latin expression: _aurichalcea_. Thirdly, we learn, that the blades were “cunningly tempered” or “_argute temperata_.” This language requires explanation. The attentive reader will remember what has been said respecting Cortes and Bernal Diaz, whether they recognized the bronze objects in the market as a mixture of copper and tin, of themselves, or whether they had been inquisitive enough to ask for information, and in consequence learned that it was a common practice among the workmen to mix these two metals, in certain proportions, in order to produce a harder quality of copper. The latter hypothesis seems to gain a certain corroboration from Martyr’s language. For there cannot be the slightest doubt as to what he meant when putting down the words “cunningly tempered.” He wished to express the idea, that he had positive grounds for the conviction, that the metal of which the axes were made, was not a _natural_ but an _artificial_ product. What grounds for this conviction he had, he does not, however, communicate to his reader.