him
it supplied the place of genius--or, rather, it was almost genius. On
many occasions, in the course of his long, eventful life, when his
shattered constitution made his physicians despair of preserving him, he
seemed to continue to live merely because it was his will; and when his
unconquerable spirit departed from his enfeebled and worn-out body,
those who knew him well might almost have been tempted to suppose that
he had not been vanquished by death, but had at last consented to
repose. This man, when he took the command at New Orleans, had made up
his mind to beat the English; and, as that mind was so constituted that
it was not susceptible of entertaining much doubt as to the results of
any of its resolves, he went to work with an innate confidence which
transfused itself into the population he had been sent to protect.

* * * * *

=_Brantz Mayer, 1809-._= (Manual, p. 490.)

From "Mexico, Aztec," &c.

=_136._= REKINDLING THE SACRED FIRE.

At the end of the Aztec or Toltec cycle of fifty-two years,--for it
is not accurately ascertained to which of the tribes the astronomical
science of Tenochtitlan is to be attributed,--these primitive children
of the New World believed that the world was in danger of instant
destruction. Accordingly, its termination became one of their most
serious and awful epochs, and they anxiously awaited the moment when the
sun would be blotted out from the heavens, and the globe itself resolved
once more into chaos. As the cycle ended in the winter, the season of
the year, with its drearier sky and colder air, in the lofty regions of
the valley, added to the gloom that fell upon the hearts of the people.
On the last day of the fifty-two years, all the fires in temples and
dwellings were extinguished, and the natives devoted themselves to
fasting and prayer. They destroyed alike their valuable and worthless
wares; rent their garments, put out their lights, and hid themselves for
awhile in solitude....

At dark on the last dread evening,--as soon as the sun had set, as they
imagined, forever,--a sad and solemn procession of priests and people
marched forth from the city to a neighboring hill, to rekindle the "New
Fire." This mournful march was called "the procession of the gods," and
was supposed to be their final departure from their temples and altars.

As soon as the melancholy array reached the summit of the hill, it
reposed in fearful anxiety u