Page:The rise and fall of the Emperor Maximilian.djvu/95

Rh state of things, the colonisation of the country by industrious families cannot yet be undertaken or encouraged. The commission will submit to us the arrangement and scheme which appear best fitted to collect the elements of exact information.'

In writing these instructions, Maximilian forgot that under his sceptre there were about six millions of Indians, a sober and industrious race, who, before they were reduced to slavery by a victorious aristocracy, astonished Cortez by their civilisation, not less magnificent than the court of Montezuma. The Spanish conqueror sent to Charles V. a vessel laden with the most wonderful productions of Mexican art which had evaded the first plundering of his soldiers. 'Their feather-paintings, their ornaments chased in gold and silver, and their utensils,' he wrote to his sovereign, 'are marvellous.' It is true that these simple-minded people had hitherto despised the precious metals as money, as they used in their barter nothing but the small almonds of the cacao. Robertson's description of them from the manuscripts of Cortez and Herrara is eloquent enough. 'The improved state of government among the Mexicans is conspicuous, not only in points essential to the being of a well-ordered society, but in several regulations of inferior consequence with respect to police. The institution, which I have already mentioned, of public couriers, stationed at proper intervals, to convey intelligence from one part of the empire to the other, was a refinement in police not introduced into any kingdom of Europe at that period. The structure of the capital city in a lake, with artificial dykes, and causeways of great length, which served as avenues to it from different quarters, erected in the water, with no less ingenuity than labour, seems to be an idea that could not have