IV.

1. The fleeting pomps of the world are like the green willow trees, which, aspiring to permanence, are consumed by a fire, fall before the axe, are upturned by the wind, or are scarred and saddened by age.

2. The grandeurs of life are like the flowers in color and in fate; the beauty of these remains so long as their chaste buds gather and store the rich pearls of the dawn and saving it, drop it in liquid dew; but scarcely has the Cause of All directed upon them the full rays of the sun, when their beauty and glory fail, and the brilliant gay colors which decked forth their pride wither and fade.

3. The delicious realms of flowers count their dynasties by short periods; those which in the morning revel proudly in beauty and strength, by evening weep for the sad destruction of their thrones, and for the mishaps which drive them to loss, to poverty, to death and to the grave. All things of earth have an end, and in the midst of the most joyous lives, the breath falters, they fall, they sink into the ground.

4. All the earth is a grave, and nought escapes it; nothing is so perfect that it does not fall and disappear. The rivers, brooks, fountains and waters flow on, and never return to their joyous beginnings; they hasten on to the vast realms of Tlaloc, and the wider they spread between their marges the more rapidly do they mould their own sepulchral urns. That which was yesterday is not to-day; and let not that which is to-day trust to live to-morrow.

5. The caverns of earth are filled with pestilential dust which once was the bones, the flesh, the bodies of great ones who sate upon thrones, deciding causes, ruling assemblies, governing armies, conquering provinces, possessing treasures, tearing down temples, flattering themselves with pride, majesty, fortune, praise and dominion. These glories have passed like the dark smoke thrown out by the fires of Popocatepetl, leaving no monuments but the rude skins on which they are written.

6. Ha! ha! Were I to introduce you into the obscure bowels of this temple, and were to ask you which of these bones were those of the powerful Achalchiuhtlanextin, first chief of the ancient Toltecs; of Necaxecmitl, devout worshiper of the gods; if I inquire where is the peerless beauty of the glorious empress Xiuhtzal, where the peaceable Topiltzin, last monarch of the hapless land of Tulan; if I ask you where are the sacred ashes of our first father Xolotl; those of the bounteous Nopal; those of the generous Tlotzin; or even the still warm cinders of my glorious and immortal, though unhappy and luckless father Ixtlilxochitl; if I continued thus questioning about all our august ancestors, what would you reply? The same that I reply--I know not, I know not; for first and last are confounded in the common clay. What was their fate shall be ours, and of all who follow us.

7. Unconquered princes, warlike chieftains, let us seek, let us sigh for the heaven, for there all is eternal, and nothing is corruptible. The darkness of the sepulchre is but the strengthening couch for the glorious sun, and the obscurity of the night but serves to reveal the brilliancy of the stars. No one has power to alter these heavenly lights, for they serve to display the greatness of their Creator, and as our eyes see them now, so saw them our earliest ancestors, and so shall see them our latest posterity.

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It will be seen that the philosophy of these songs is mostly of the Epicurean and _carpe diem_ order. The certainty of death and the mutability of fortune, observations which press themselves upon the mind of man everywhere, are their principal staples, and cast over them a hue of melancholy, relieved by exhortations to enjoy to the utmost what the present moment offers of pleasure and sensual gratification. Here and there a gleam of a higher philosophy lights the sombre reflections of the bard; his thoughts turn toward the infinite Creator of this universe, and he dimly apprehends that by making Him the subject of his contemplation, there is boundless consolation even in this mortal life.

Both these leading _motifs_ recur over and over again in the songs printed in the original in the present volume, and this similarity is a common token of the authenticity of the book.

§ 10. _THE HISTORY OF THE PRESENT COLLECTION._

The most recent Mexican writers formally deny that any ancient Mexican poetry is now extant. Thus the eminent antiquary, Don Alfredo Chavero, in his elaborate work, _México á través de los Siglos_, says, "the truth is, we know no specimens of the ancient poetry, and those, whether manuscript or printed, which claim to be such, date from after the Conquest."[55] In a similar strain the grammarian Diario Julio Caballero, writes: "There has never come into our hands a single poetic composition in this language. It is said that the great King Nezahualcoyotl was a poet and composed various songs; however that may be, the fact is that we have never seen any such compositions, nor met any person who has seen them."[56]

It is important, therefore, to state the exact provenance of the specimens printed in this volume, many of which I consider to have been composed previous to the Conquest, and written down shortly after the Nahuatl language had been reduced to the Spanish alphabet.

All of them are from a MS. volume in the library of the University of Mexico, entitled _Cantares de los Mexicanos y otros opusculos_, composed of various pieces in different handwritings, which, from their appearance and the character of the letter, were attributed by the eminent antiquary Don José F. Ramirez, to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

The copy I have used is that made by the late Abbé Brasseur (de Bourbourg). It does not appear to be complete, but my efforts to have it collated with the original have not been successful. Another copy was taken by the late well-known Mexican scholar Faustino Chimalpopoca, which was in the possession of Señor Ramirez and sold at the vendue of his books in 1880. It is No. 511 of the catalogue.

The final decision of the age of the poems must come from a careful scrutiny of the internal evidence, especially the thoughts they contain and the language in which they are expressed. In applying these tests, it should be remembered that a song may be almost wholly ancient, that is, composed anterior to the Conquest, and yet display a few later allusions introduced by the person who preserved it in writing, so as to remove from it the flavor of heathenism. Some probable instances of this kind will be pointed out in the Notes.

The songs are evidently from different sources and of different epochs. There are two notes inserted in the MS. which throw some light on the origin of a few of the poems. The first is in connection with No. XII. In my copy of the MS, the title of this song is written twice, and between the two the following memorandum appears in Spanish:

"Ancient songs of the native Otomis, which they were accustomed to sing at their festivals and marriages, translated into the Mexican language, the play and the spirit of the song and its figures of speech being always retained; as Your Reverence will understand, they displayed considerable style and beauty, better than I can express with my slight talent; and may Your Reverence at your convenience approve and be entertained by them, as a skilled master of the tongue, as Your Reverence is."

From its position and from the titles following, this note appears to apply only to No. XII.

The second note is prefixed to No. XIV, which has no title. It is in Nahuatl, and reads as follows:--

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I H S

Nican ompehua in cuicatl motenehua melahuac Huexotzincayotl ic moquichitoya in tlatoque Huexotzinca mani mecatca; yexcan inic tlatlamantitica, teuccuicatl ahnoço quauhcuicatl, xochicuicatl, icnocuicatl. Auh inic motzotzona huehuetl cencamatl mocauhtiuh, auh in occencamatl ipan huetzi yetetl ti; auh in huel ic ompehua centetl ti; auh inic mocuepa quiniquac iticpa huehuetzi y huehuetl, zan mocemana in maitl; auh quiniquac iyeinepantla occeppa itenco hualcholoa in huehuetl; tel yehuatl itech mottaz, ynima ynaquin cuicani quimati iniuh motzotzona; auh yancuican yenoceppa inin cuicatl ychan D. Diego de Leon, Governador Azcapotzalco; yehuatl oquitzotzon in D. Frco Placido ypan xihuitl 1551, ypan in ezcalilitzin tl Jesu Christo.

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This may be freely translated as follows:--

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"Here begins a song called a plain song of Huexotzinco as it was recited by the lords of Huexotzinco. These songs are divided into three classes, the songs of the nobles or of the eagles, the flower songs, and the songs of destitution. (Directions follow for beating the drum in unison with the voices.) This song was sung at the house of Don Diego de Leon, Governor of Azcapotzalco; he who beat the drum was Don Francisco Placido; in the year of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ 1551."

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This assigns beyond doubt the song in question to the first half of the sixteenth century, and we may therefore take its phraseology as a type of the Nahuatl poetry shortly after the Conquest. It is also stated to be a native composition, and from its contents, it was clearly composed by one of the converts to the Christian faith.

ANCIENT NAHUATL POEMS.

_CUICAPEUHCAYOTL._