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212 the vicar, who collected them and put them in this chapel of the Sacro Monte.

The Indians of Amecameca and of all the surrounding pueblos greatly reverenced, with strange ceremonies, an image of Christ made by the Indians of Amecameca, and carefully preserved by them year after year. A legend states that long ago certain muleteers who were carrying this image to a southern town, missed the mule upon whose pack it had been placed. When the mule was discovered he was standing quietly in the cave upon the sacred mountain, surrounded by all the people of the town, who, conceiving the Christ had chosen their cave for his abode, purchased the image from the muleteers, and constructed for it in that spot a shrine, where it still remains after three centuries. A great pilgrimage is made to the shrine on the top of the sacred Mount. Every year, in Holy Week and on Ash Wednesday, the image is brought down to the parish church. The annual fair is held at this time in the Market Place, doubtless a continuation of some ancient Aztec festival in honor of the return of the Sun. All the country around assembles, and the culmination of the feast is on Good Friday, when the Christ is returned to his shrine on the mountain.

The good Viceroy Velasco died in 1564, having governed the country for fourteen years. Both Mexicans and Spaniards sincerely mourned his loss, giving him the affectionate title of the Father of the country.

During the government of this ruler and his predecessor all the administration of New Spain,