CHAPTER X.
Saturday, February 26, 1848.—This morning we got a mail from the city, and I received one letter from a schoolmate of mine.
At noon a party of us started for a place called Indian Town, and settled altogether with the original Aztecs, and mixed races. The villa has the appearances of poverty, built up with huts and a few Indian temples, where they worship in the original Indian style.
They say that Cortez, or his priests, never came that way to inspire the new religion among them, simply because they had no gold to pay for it, nor any to steal from them.
There are several opinions concerning these Indians, who were the first settlers of the new world, though no positive facts points them out. There are theories, not without weight of circumstantial evidence, that the lost tribes of Israel were the founders of the cities whose ruins strew Mexico and
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