Page:The Story of Mexico.djvu/123

Rh a daughter of a most noble Aculhuan, and as all the monarchs of the valley practised polygamy, allowed himself two other wives. Of one of these wives the son Huitzilihuitl was the immediate successor to the throne, and his half-brother, son of another wife, reigned next, named Chimalpopoca. A third son, born of a slave to the king, lived to reign in his stead after the death of the half-brothers. But the father of these sons lived himself to reign for twenty years, if reigning it can be called, to keep in hand a handful of poor Indians just escaping from barbarism and degeneration of the lowest sort. Their one city was but fifty years old. They had no capital, no resources beyond the toil of their hands in fishing and hunting. They were regarded as interlopers by the petty kingdoms which surrounded them, and their lives were made miserable by the tyranny of any one of their neighbors who felt himself strong enough to exact tribute. Yet some great vital force was in them to hold them together and bring them increase.

Their belief in their old god, Huitzilopochtli, was strong as ever; probably their fortunes rose and fell with the intelligence or the lack of it in the priests who transmitted to the people the will of this deity. Through them it was decreed that the tribute demanded by the Tepanecs should be paid. These neighbors were pacified, and the Mexicans could go on unmolested in their work of improving their city, which they did by building temples and houses, and cutting canals through their island that the water of the lake might circulate freely.