The conclusion of this festival--the last of the kind that was ever celebrated in the halls of Montezuma--was a unique and magnificent specimen of Aztec taste and luxury. At a signal from the master of ceremonies, the royal garden was suddenly illuminated by a thousand torches, borne by as many well trained servants in white livery. They were so stationed as to represent, from different points of view, groups of bright figures whirling in the mazy evolutions of a wild Indian dance. The harmony of their movements, and the picturesque effect of their frequent changes of position, was truly wonderful. It seemed more like magic than any thing belonging to the ordinary denizens of earth. By continually passing and re-passing each other, approaching and receding, raising and depressing their torches, the bearers were enabled to describe a great variety of fantastic figures. So well did they perform their parts, that, to the crowd of spectators from the palace, it was a perfect pantomime of light. At length the dance ended, and the figures of the various groups in light, gathering around a high altar, all of fire, seemed waiting for some sacred rite to be performed. Presently a tall princely figure was seen, approaching with slow and solemn pace, leading a lovely female to the altar. The high priest joined their hands in the indissoluble bond, and waved his wand of fire over their heads, in token of the divine blessing; upon which the dance of the torches was instantly renewed, accompanied with strains of the most joyous music, each group breathing out its peculiar airs and melodies, while the whole were beautifully blended and harmonized by the master spirit of the fête. It seemed like the bridal of two angels of light, witnessed and celebrated by all the stars and constellations of the celestial spheres. The sudden extinguishment of these pantomimic stars, revealed to the surprised revellers the presence of the dawn, before whose coming the stars of every sphere go out, and revelry gives place to the sober realities of life. [D] If this incident be deemed apocryphal, by the rigid historian, the fable is fully justified by the known state of public sentiment among the Aztecs at this time. Sagahun, according to a note in Prescott, states, that polygamy, though allowed, was by no means generally practised among them; and that the prevailing sentiment of the nation was opposed to it. One of the very few relics of their ancient literature, which were preserved in the general devastation of the conquest, is a letter of advice from a father to his child, on the eve of her marriage, in which he declares that it was the purpose of God, in his grand design of replenishing the earth, to make the sexes equal, and to allow only one wife to each man; and any deviation from this arrangement, was contrary to the plainest laws of nature. CHAPTER X.