Page:Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines.djvu/304

 entertained in a house that had large courts, upper and lower floors, and very delightful gardens. The walls were of stone, the timber-work well wrought; there were many and spacious rooms, hung with cotton hangings, extraordinary rich in their way." His accommodations in the pueblo of Mexico will elsewhere be noticed. After the capture of the pueblo, AlvaredoAlvarado [sic] was sent.southward with two hundred foot and forty horse to the province of Tututlepec, on the Pacific. "When he arrived, the lord of Tututlepec offered to quarter the Spaniards in his palace, which was very magnificent." In 1525 Cortez made his celebrated march to Guatemala with one hundred and fifty horse, the same number of foot, and three hundred Indians. "Being well received in the city of Apoxpalan, Cortez and all the Spaniards, with their horses, were quartered in one house, the Mexicans being dispersed into others, and all of them plentifully supplied with provisions during their stay." The first "palace" described by Herrera was discovered by Balboa somewhere in the present Costa Rica, and Comagre has gone into history as its proprietor. "This palace was more remarkable and better built than any that had been yet seen on the islands, or the little that was then known of the continent, being one hundred and fifty paces in length and eighty in breadth, founded on very large posts, inclosed by a stone wall, with timber intermixed at the top, and hollow spaces, so beautifully wrought that the Spaniards were amazed at the sight of it, and could not express the manner and curiosity of it. There were in it several chambers and apartments, and one that was like a buttery and full of such provisions as the country afforded, as bread, venison, swine's flesh, &c. There was another large room like a cellar, full of earthern vessels, cont. lining several sorts of white and red liquors, made of Indian wheat," etc. The noticeable fact in this description is the two chambers, containing provisions and stores for the household, which was undoubtedly the case with all of those named. Zempoala, near Vera Cruz, is described as "a very large town, with stately buildings of good timber work," and every house had a garden with water, so that it looked like a terrestrial paradise. * * * The scouts, advancing on horseback, came to the great square and courts where the prime houses were, which having been lately new plastered over, were