Page:Vol 1 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/147

Rh of human sacrifices. And here, beside evidences of heathen abominations in the forms of a great temple, idols, priests, and the bodies of two recently sacrificed boys, they had gnats and mosquitoes to annoy them, all which led them to consider the terror of their voyage and the advisability of return. Of the Indian, Francisco, Grijalva asked the significance of the detestable rite of ripping open living human bodies and offering bloody hearts to hungry gods; and the heathen answered, because the people of Culhua, or Ulua, as he pronounced the name, would have it so. From this circumstance, together with the facts that the name of the commander was Juan, and that it was now about the time of the anniversary of the feast of John the Baptist, the island was named San Juan de Ulua, while the continent in that vicinity was called Santa María de las Nieves.