he knew what his men were saying. Cortez, though aware of the gossip that was current in the army, feigned not to understand, and asked with unconcern, "What do they say?"

"They say," answered Alderete, "that your honour, in connivance with Guatemozin, is concealing the immense treasure of the Aztec Crown and that

"By Santiago!" interrupted Cortez, making a movement towards his poniard, "I will cut the tongue out of any man who says so!"

"You may cut the tongues out of your soldiers, but not out of the king's treasurer," retorted Alderete. Cortez seemed for a moment in doubt what to say or do, and then, biting his lip, replied:

"What you say is indeed grave, but what would you recommend me to do to silence this gossip?" "There is one course," said Alderete, "that will vindicate you in the eyes of your men, and in that of His Majesty the King. Guatemozin must know where the treasures are hidden. Tell him to bring them forth, and if he refuses, put him to the torture, and if that does not answer, hang him."

"Nothing of the sort shall be done," firmly answered Cortez. "He is my prisoner; I have given him my word that no harm shall befall him, and a Castilian never breaks his word."

"A Castilian keeps his word when pledged to another Castilian, but not when pledged to an infidel, a barbarian. Remember the torments of the sixty-four Castilians, sacrificed on the altars of their heathen gods," returned the treasurer.

"I remember it," said the great Conquisatadore, "but as Christians we should forget it.”

"As you please," spoke back Alderete, "but remember that a friend came to warn you when you stood over the precipice. You are about to forfeit your glories and your conquests, and you will appear in the light of a defrauder of the king's revenue.'

Cortez grew pale, and turning aside to the physician Murcia said, "Well, here are the keys of his prison; take him, but remember I wash my hands of this whole business."

Alderete, accompanied by the doctor, went to the prison and brought out the king of the Aztecs and the prince of Tacubaya. Their feet were dipped in oil and roasted before a slow fire. The Tacubaya chief, unable to endure the pain, cried to Guatemozin that he was in awful agony.

"My friend," said the last of the Montezumas, "do not think that I am as comfortable as I would be in my bath."

Such is the story of the torture of the Aztec chiefs, and the part of Pilate played by Cortez, as told by the Spanish historian Diaz, who accompanied Cortez to Mexico.*

A bust of this heroic Indian-its pedestal containing inscriptions on one side in the Nahuatl tongue, on the other in Spanish recording his "heroic defence of the city of Mexico," adorns the banks of the Viga Canal just outside the Mexican capital.

*The Aztec chiefs were not tortured to death. They were burned on the feet to force a confession from them, a practice common to all Europe in those days, and in force down to the opening of the eighteenth century.

CHAPTER XI

THE CATHEDRAL AND NATIONAL MUSEUM OF

MEXICO

.. Majesty,

Power, glory, strength and beauty, all are aisled
In this eternal ark of worship undefiled.

-Byron.

NATURALLY the first building to which the stranger turns when he enters Mexico City is the great cathedral. As the visitor to Rome, long before he enters the imperial city, sees from afar the dome of St. Peter's apparently suspended in the air, so the passenger on the Mexican Central catches a glimpse of the royal dome and prodigious towers of this magnificent temple when he is yet many miles from the city. We have no ecclesiastical building in Canada, nor, indeed is there any church in the United States to be compared with it.

The cathedral, "The Holy Metropolitan Church of Mexico," is built upon the site of the Aztec temple (the Teocalli) which the Spaniards levelled soon after they captured the city. On the roof of this Aztec pantheon thousands of prisoners were slaughtered, their hearts torn out, and offered in atonement to the Aztec gods. Near this site, also, the memory of the conquest was celebrated for centuries by the "parade of the banner," in which the mayor of the city carried the standard of Cortez, followed

by the viceroy, the council, and nobility on horseback.

When the city was divided into wards this site was set apart for a Christian church, and, in 1523, eleven years before Jacques Cartier entered the St. Lawrence, a church was opened for service. The first stone of the present cathedral was laid in 1573, and its final dedication took place in December, 1667; the immense towers were not completed till 1791, and the cost of the building was over $2,000,000. This is exclusive of the priceless paintings and Tolsa's famous altar.

The façade, from the sides of which spring the towers, is divided into three parts of various orders of architecture. The lower is severe Doric, the second part Ionic, supporting a Corinthian storey. The bas-reliefs, statues, friezes, bases and capitals are carved in white marble, producing with the dark gray stone a very charming colour effect. The towers are two hundred and four feet high, and in two divisions, lower, Doric, and upper, Ionic, capped with bell-shaped domes of native limestone. The cornices of these towers are surmounted by balustrades of carved stone, upon which repose beautiful chiselled vases. Beneath the domes are pedestals supporting marble statues of the doctors of the church and the patriarchs of the Jews.

Over the central entrance are blazoned the arms of the republic of Mexico-an eagle perched on a cactus, strangling a snake. Above all rises the dome, surmounted by its single, graceful lantern.

In the towers hang a number of costly bells, the largest seventeen feet in height and worth $10,000. From east to west this great Christian temple measures four hundred and sixty feet, and from north to south four hundred feet. It has an interior height of one hundred and seventy-nine feet. The interior is in the form of a Latin cross and has five naves. In the centre are two rows of eight pillars, which support the vaulted roof, above which rises a splendid octagonal dome. There are fourteen chapels, or side altars, separated from the body of the building by upright iron railings. Back of the second pair of pillars the choir commences, and here also is the Altar of Forgiveness, over which are two valuable paintings, the "Blessed Virgin holding the Infant Jesus," and "The Resurrection."

Two immense organs in carved wood rise almost to the arches of the choir. Over the entrance to the choir is a very old life-size carving of the crucifixion, in which the thieves are roped, not nailed to their crosses. At the northern end of the cathedral is the Altar of the Kings, a mass of gold and gilt, and the most imposing in the temple. The gilded cross which crowns the dome of the altar almost touches the arches of the roof. It was modelled after the one in the cathedral of Seville in Spain and was done by the same artist.

The side paintings, "The Adoration of the Kings" and “The Assumption," are particularly fine. Beneath this altar are buried the heads of the patriots Allende, Jiminez, Aldama, and the warrior priest,