In Mexico itself the earliest general narrative was not cast in the usual historical form, but in the guise of a dialogue, held night after night, between a Spaniard and an Indian, the ancient history of the country was recounted. The author, Joseph Joaquin Granados y Galvez, published it in 1778, as _Tardes Américanas: gobierno gentil y católico: breve y particular noticia de toda la historia Indiana: sucesos, casos notables, y cosas ignoradas, desde la entrada de la Gran nacion Tulteca á esta tierra de Anahuac, hasta los presentes tiempos_.[960] The most comprehensive grouping of historical material is in the _Diccionario Universal de historia y de Geografía_ (Mexico, 1853-56),[961] of which Manuel Orozco y Berra was one of the chief collaborators. This last author has in two other works added very much to our knowledge of the racial and ancient history of the indigenous peoples. These are his _Geografía de las lenguas y Carta Etnográfica de México_ (Mexico, 1864),[962] and his _Historia antigua y de la Conquista de México_ (Mexico, 1880, in four volumes).[963] Perhaps the most important of all the Mexican publications is Manuel Larrainzar’s _Estudios sobre la historia de América, sus ruinas y antigüedades, comparadas con lo más notable del otro Continente_ (Mexico, 1875-1878, in five volumes). In German the most important of recent books is Hermann Strebel’s _Alt-Mexico_ (Hamburg, 1885); but Waitz’s _Amerikaner_ (1864, vol. ii.) has a section on the Mexicans. Adolph Bastian’s “Zur Geschichte des Alten Mexico” is contained in the second volume of his _Culturländer des Alten America_ (Berlin, 1878), in which he considers the subject of Quetzalcoatl, the religious ceremonial, administrative and social life, as well as the different stocks of the native tribes. NOTES. I. THE AUTHORITIES ON THE SO-CALLED CIVILIZATION OF ANCIENT MEXICO AND ADJACENT LANDS, AND THE INTERPRETATION OF SUCH AUTHORITIES. THE ancient so-called civilization which the Spaniards found in Mexico and Central America is the subject of much controversy: in the first place as regards its origin, whether indigenous, or allied to and derived from the civilizations of the Old World; and in the second place as regards its character, whether it was something more than a kind of grotesque barbarism, or of a nature that makes even the Spanish culture, which supplanted it, inferior in some respects by comparison.[964] The first of these problems, as regards its origin, is considered in another place. As respects the second, or its character, it is proposed here to follow the history of opinions.