This hamlet was like a vision of the past, for from all we had seen and knew, it was easy to conjure up what it had been in former times. Nor will it seem unnatural that little or no modification should be observable in an Indian village, if it be considered what powerful factors are traditions, instincts, and surroundings, particularly with a rural population. When the Spaniards imposed their religion on the Mayas, they did so by the sword rather than persuasion; but the natives retained their culture, their customs, and their national dress, whereas the conquerors forgot their own language, were modified at the contact of the subdued race, and adopted their ancient institutions, the better to replace the caciques.
Yucatan, as we have seen, was under a feudal system of government before the Conquest, when it was followed by “encomiendas,” giving the Spaniards the right to enforce the services of the natives to the number of one or two thousand to each cavalier according to his importance. The marks of this system are observable in all great buildings which formerly were a centre or a manor-house; whilst from the number of pyramids may be surmised the power of the cacique once the lord of the locality. At the present day, it is true, centres are few in number, and in consequence of the cruel treatment of the natives by the conquerors, they have fallen to a tenth of their primitive numerical strength; yet cities, hamlets, and haciendas are even now standing witnesses of how far superior was the condition of the Mayas before the coming of the Europeans. Nothing is changed, save that the ancient lords have fallen into servile condition, that haciendas and Moorish-Spanish structures have superseded the princely palaces and the mansions of the gentry, and that the straight American doorway and triangular arch are replaced by the Arab-Hispano arch; but if the ancient palaces are a ruinous mass, the huts of the peasantry cluster now as of old around the manor-house. Religion alone has changed; the church has succeeded to the temple without replacing it; the Christian dogma seems cold and arid to a singularly mystic people, who in the days of their national life peopled the forests with votive chapels and mysterious voices.