Page:About Mexico - Past and Present.djvu/121



IFE from its outset must have been a serious business with the Mexican boys and girls. They were taught from their cradle to endure hardship, to sleep on the floor on a mat, to suffer hunger and thirst, pain and fatigue, without complaint. Of home, in our sense of that word, they could have known but little, since education in all its branches was almost entirely in the hands of the government. The fathers and the mothers of Mexico may have had as much natural love for their children as parents have in our own country, but parents had much less opportunity to spoil their children by the over-indulgence which is possible here. Both boys and girls were taken from home at a very early age, to be brought up in the public schools of the tribe.

Some of the laws of Aztec society would not be endured by the young people of our day and country. For instance, respect to parents was carried so far that even after marriage a young man dared not speak in the presence of his father without first obtaining his permission. The wife and the children of a merchant who was away on one of those dangerous trading expeditions were not allowed the luxury of bathing while he was absent; they could not wear their best clothes or live on anything but the plainest fare until he returned in safety. These sacrifices were made to win for him the favor of the gods.