m descriptions contained
in the Mexican Codex Chimalpopoca and in the Popol Vuh, the sacred book of
the Quiches, it will be seen that the phenomena described are such as
would naturally accompany a volcanic outbreak on a great scale.
Considering that, in Mexico alone, there are no less than nine monster
volcanoes, of which two are not yet extinct, and that in Guatemala, in
historical times, whole cities have been destroyed by earthquakes and
volcanic action, it is not at all astonishing to find traditions of great
catastrophes amongst the inhabitants of these regions.

No one can look upon the grand snow-clad peaks of the great volcanoes,
which surround the high central plateau of Mexico, without realizing that
mighty upheavals and disturbances, such as the world has seldom seen, must
have attended the formation of the huge craters next to which Vesuvius
seems but a hillock. A volcanic outbreak amongst these elevated peaks,
which range from 15,000 to 19,000 feet above the sea-level, would
obviously be accompanied by great inundations caused by the melting of the
masses of snow which crown their heights. The valley of Mexico in which
the large lagoons lie, as in a basin without an outlet, and the plains
which surround Cholula and stretch to the base of the volcanoes must
repeatedly have been the scene of ruin and desolation, lasting for many
centuries. As the Abbe Bourbourg justly remarks: "The majority of the
edifices in the City of Mexico are built of volcanic tufa, said to have
been formed by the small volcanoes which lie at the southeast of the
valley of Mexico. At various periods of antiquity great masses of lava
have descended into this valley, in which one extensive ancient lava-field
is now known as the 'Pedregal de San Augustin.' " Another great flow of
lava has actually been traced from its apparent source, the now extinct
volcano of Ajusco, at the south of the valley of Mexico, to Acapulco, on
the Pacific coast.

The Mexican chronicles describe as follows the destruction of the earth by
fire: "... there came a rain of fire: all that existed was burnt and a
rain composed of sand-stone fell. It is said that whilst the sand-stone we
now see was being formed the tet-zontli [_i. e._ volcanic tufa], boiled
with great noise. Then the red mountains also lifted themselves up ... the
sun consumed itself [was darkened], all houses were destroyed and all the
lords or chiefs perished...."

The same author relates how, af