Aztec Autumn

remembered the shortest way across scorching patches of desert, and the easiest way to skirt around the bases of mountains instead of having to climb over them and the shallow places where we could ford rivers without having to wait and hope for someone to come by in an acali. Often, though, we had to veer from the paths he remembered, to make a prudent circuit around parts of Michihuacan where, the local folk told us, there were still battles going on between the unrelenting Caxtilteca and the proudly stubborn Purempecha.

When, somewhere in the Tecpaneca lands, we did eventually begin to encounter an occasional white man and the animals called horses, and the other animals called cows and the other animals called staghounds, we did our best to assume an air of indifference, as if we had been accustomed to seeing them all our lives long. The white men seemed equally indifferent to our passing by, as if we too were only commonplace animals.

All along our way, Uncle Mixtzin kept pointing out to my mother and myself landmarks he recalled from his earlier journey—curiously shaped mountains; ponds of water too bitter to be drinkable, but so hot that they steamed even in the sun; trees and cactuses of sorts that did not grow where we lived, some of those bearing delicious fruits. He also kept up a commentary (though we had heard it all before, and more than once) on the difficulties of that earlier excursion toward Tenochtitlan:

'As you know, my men and I were rolling the giant carved stone disk representing the moon goddess Coyolxauqui, taking it to present as a gift to the Revered Speaker Motecuzoma. A disk is round, true, and you might suppose it would roll easily along. But a disk is also flat on both faces. So an unexpected dip in the ground, or an unnoticed unevenness, could cause it to tilt sideways. And, though my men were sturdy and attentive to their labors, they could not always prevent the tilted stone from falling completely on its back or sometimes, grievous to relate, the dear goddess would fall flat on her face. And heavy? To raise that thing up on edge again each time, I swear to Mictlan, required us to beg the aid of every other man we could find in the surrounding area...'

And Mixtzin would recollect, as he had done more than once before: 'I might never even have got to meet the Uey-Tlatoani Motecuzoma, because I was apprehended by his palace guards and very nearly imprisoned as a despoiler of the city. As you can imagine, all of us were filthy and fatigued by the time we arrived there, and our raiment was torn and tattered, so no doubt we did resemble savages who had wandered in from some wilderness. Also, Tenochtitlan was the first and only city we traversed that had fine stone-paved streets and causeways. It did not occur to us that our rolling the massive Moon Stone through those streets would so badly crunch and crush the elegant paving. But then the angry guards swooped down upon us...' and Mixtzin laughed at the memory.

As we ourselves got closer and closer to Tenochtitlan, we learned—from the people whose communities we passed through—a few things that prepared us so we would not arrive at our destination seeming like absolute country clods. For one thing, we were told that the white men did not care to be called Caxtilteca. We had been wrong in supposing the two names—castellanos and espanoles—to be interchangeable. Of course, I later came to understand that all castellanos were espanoles, but not all espanoles were castellanos—that the latter hailed from a particular province of Old Spain called Castile. Anyway, we three made sure, from then on, to refer to the white men as Spaniards and their language as Spanish. We were also advised to be careful about attracting any Spaniard's attention to ourselves:

'Do not simply stroll about the city, gawking,' said one country fellow who had recently been there. 'Always walk briskly, as if you have a specific objective toward which you are going. And it is wise to be always carrying something when you do. I mean a building brick or block of wood or coil of rope, as if you were on your way to some task already assigned you. Otherwise, if you go about empty-handed, some Spanish overseer of some work project will be sure to give you a job to do. And you had better do it.'

So, forewarned, we three went on. And even from our first sight of it, from afar, the City of Mexico was awe- inspiring, bulking as large as it did, towering from the floor of the bowl-shaped valley in which it stands. Our actual entry, though, was a little disappointing. As we walked over a long, wide, banistered stone causeway that took us from the town of Tepayaca on the mainland to the city's islands my uncle muttered:

'Strange. This causeway used to vault an expanse of water, busily swarming with acaltin of every size. But now look.'

We did, seeing nothing below us but an immense stretch of rather smelly wetland, all mud and weeds and frogs and a few herons—very like the swamps around Aztlan before they were drained.

But, beyond the causeway was the city. And I, even though forewarned, was immediately and often that day tempted to do what we had been told not to do—because the hugeness and magnificence of the City of Mexico were such as to stun me into motionless ogling and admiration. Each time, fortunately, my uncle would prod me onward, because he himself was not much impressed by the sights of the place, he having once seen the sights of the vanished Tenochtitlan. And again he supplied a commentary for me and my mother:

'We are now in the Ixacualco quarter of the city, the very best residential district, where lived that friend also named Mixtli, who had persuaded me to bring the Moon Stone hither, and I visited in his house while I was here. His house and the others around it were much more various and handsome then. These new ones all look alike. Friend'—and he reached out to catch the hand of a passerby (carrying a load of firewood, with a tumpline about his forehead)—'friend, is this quarter of the city still known as Ixacualco?'

'Ayya,' muttered the man, giving Mixtzin a suspicious look. 'How is it that you do not know? This quarter is now called San Sebastian Ixacualco.'

'And what means 'San Sebastian'?' my uncle asked.

The man shrugged his load of wood. 'San means 'santo,' a lesser god of the Spanish Christians. Sebastian is the name of one of the santos, but what he is the god of, I have never been told.'

So we moved on, and Mixtzin continued his narration:

'Notice now. Here was a broad canal, always busy and crowded with a traffic of immense freight acaltin. I have no idea why it has been filled in and paved over to become a street instead. And there— ayyo, there before you, sister, nephew'—he made an impressively sweeping gesture of both arms—'there, enclosed by the undulating Snake Wall painted in many vivid colors, that was the vast open space—the bright-shining marble square that was The Center of The Heart of The One World. And in it, yonder, was the sumptuous Palace of Motecuzoma. And yonder, the court for the ceremonial tlachtli ball games. And yonder, the Stone of Tizoc, where warriors dueled to the death. And yonder'—he broke off to catch the arm of a passerby (carrying a basket of lime mortar)—'friend, tell me, what is that gigantic and ugly structure still a-building over there?'

'That? You do not know? Why, that will be the Christian priests' central temple. I mean cathedral. The Cathedral Church of San Francisco.'

'Another of their santos, eh?' said Mixtzin. 'And for what aspect of the world is this lesser god responsible?'

The man said uneasily, 'As best I know, stranger, he just happens to be the personal favorite godling of Bishop Zumarraga, the chief of all the Christian priests.' Then the man scurried away.

'Yya ayya,' Mixtzin mourned. 'Ninotlancuicui in Teo Francisco. I pick my teeth at the little god Francisco. If that is his temple, it is a poor substitute for its predecessor. For there, sister, nephew, there stood the most awesome edifice ever erected in all The One World. It was the Great Pyramid, massive but graceful, and so sky-reaching that one had to climb a hundred fifty and six marble stair-treads to attain the top, and there be awed all over again by the brilliantly colored and roofcombed temples of the gods Tlaloc and Huitzilopochtli. Ayyo, but this city had gods worth celebrating in those days! And—'

He was abruptly interrupted, as all three of us were suddenly propelled forward. We might have been standing on a beach with our backs to the sea, and neglecting to count the waves, and thus getting unexpectedly deluged by the always-mountainous seventh wave. What shoved against us from behind was that crowd of people being herded by the soldiers into the open square we had been eyeing. We were in the forefront of the throng, and we managed to stay close together. So, when the square was packed full and the milling had ceased and all was quiet, we had an unimpeded view of the platform onto which the priests were ascending, and the metal post to which the condemned man was led and bound. We had a rather better view than I might, in retrospect, have wished to have. Because I can still see him burning.

As I have told, the old man Juan Damasceno spoke only briefly before the torch was laid to the wood heaped