Page:Young Folks History Of Mexico.pdf/97

Rh destruction, establishing boundaries beyond which no one was allowed to cut. Wishing one day to see if the law was observed, he went out in disguise, into the forest. He found a poor boy on the edge of the wood carefully gathering up a few chips some one had left. The king asked him why he did not go into the wood, where there was plenty.

"Because," answered the boy, "the king has forbidden



it." His family was in great want, but though the disguised king urged him to break the law, he remained firm, preferring to suffer from want rather than to incur the penalty. Moved by this scene, the king is said to have enlarged the boundaries.

Though without books or letters, he instituted academies, where oratory, history, poetry, sculpture, and works in feathers, gold, and precious stones were greatly developed. He was himself at the head of a council of music, with the kings of Mexico and Tacuba as associates.