That the reader, who is not informed with respect to the Anahuacans and the conditions which prevailed among them, may be better prepared for an intelligent perusal of our story, the following brief account of them is presented.
They were a remarkable people, in many respects; and, when the lack of opportunities which hindered, and the peculiar conditions which influenced them, are taken into account, were wonderfully intelligent and well advanced in civilization. Although of the Indian race, they had nothing in common with their red brethren of the north in their habits and manners.
Their religion was based on an incongruous and exaggerated mythology, which, through the influence of superstition and the machinations of a perniciously insinuating priesthood, resulted in idol worship and the terribly vitiating practice of human sacrifice. They believed in a supreme being, whom they supplicated, but in an indirect way. They were unable to conceive of a personal unity so comprehensive in attributes of perfection as is the Great Creator and Savior of man, and, therefore, supplicated through inferior ministers--presiding deities, represented in great images set up in their teocallis--temples.
They had a system of education, which embraced a traditional history, astronomy, mechanics, arithmetic, and a means of communicating ideas by written signs, designated hieroglyphical painting, which was imparted to the youth through the medium of a public school, under the management of the priesthood.
Their domestic habits, and the rules regulating intercourse between the sexes, were most advantageous for the women. They, unlike their red sisters of the north, and, we might add, some of the whiter ones of Europe, were required to do no labor that was counted the man's, but were left strictly to the performance of their domestic duties. They were treated with the greatest consideration, especially by their husbands; and, when sought after in marriage, were courted in a manner truly chivalrous.
Of their young women we quote from a well-known and authentic writer: "The Aztec maiden was treated by her parents with a tenderness from which all reserve was banished.... They conjured her to preserve simplicity in her manners and conversation, uniform neatness in her attire, with strict attention to personal cleanliness. They inculcated modesty as the great ornament of a woman, and implicit reverence for her husband a duty."