[40] It is difficult to convey to Protestant readers the idea which the Spaniards attach to the sacramental bread or wafer after the priest has pronounced the words of consecration. They call it both God and Jesus Christ, and claim for it divine worship. CHAPTER XXII. The old Indian City of Mexico.--The Mosques.--Probable Extent of Civilization.--Aztecs acquired Arts of the Toltecs.--Toltec Civilization, ancient and original.--The Pyramid of Papantla.--The Plunder of Civilization.--Mexico as described by Cortez.--Montezuma's Court.--The eight Months that Cortez held Montezuma.--What happened for the next ten Months.--The Siege of Mexico by Cortez.--Aztecs conquered by Famine and Thirst.--Heroes on Paper and Victories without Bloodshed.--Cortez and Morgan. As we have carefully surveyed the suburbs, and all the valley of Mexico, it is time to take a survey of the city itself, and examine its condition at different periods of its history. THE MEXICO OF THE AZTECS. The Aztec city of Mexico perished with its conquest by the Spaniards. Day by day, as the siege went on, the Indians that followed the soldiers pulled the houses down, when the latter had passed, and threw the rubbish into the canals; so that, on the day on which the conquest was effected, the city ceased to exist. Many times has that old city been restored, in the imagination of enthusiasts, with its forty pyramids (_teocallis_) and unnumbered palaces, adorned with all the luxury and magnificence of the most refined civilization, united with barbaric grandeur and inhumanity in so strange a combination as to distract our feelings between hate and admiration. It was easy to build an Indian city that would present a most imposing appearance, for the climate was well fitted for drying mud thoroughly. Besides, there was an inexhaustible supply of pumice-stone (_tepetate_), and an exceedingly soft, gray quarry stone, for caps and lintels, with an excellent quality of cement, and material for "_fresco_ painting" of the walls, abundant and cheap. All these articles are combined in the building of the modern city, and give it its present appearance of elegance and great durability. But in the old city, one-story palaces of dried mud, plastered and frescoed, with large interior courts like that I have described at Tezcuco, must have been among the most imposing structures. If _tepetate_ was employed in the construction of the royal palaces, it would not have added materially to the weight resting upon the earthy foundations; for when the water in the ditches occupied half the street,[41] the foundations must have been so much softer than at present, that structures of the lightest material only could be borne.