ntil the Pleiades reached the zenith in the
sky, whereupon the priests immediately began the sacrifice of a human
victim, whose breast was covered with a wooden shield, which the chief
_flamen_ kindled by friction. When the sufferer received the fatal stab
from the sacrificial knife of _obsidian,_ the machine was set in motion
on his bosom until the blaze had kindled. The anxious crowd stood round
with fear and trembling. Silence reigned over nature and man. Not a word
was uttered among the countless multitude that thronged the hill-sides
and plains, whilst the priest performed his direful duty to the gods. At
length, as the fire sparks gleamed faintly from the whirling instrument,
low sobs and ejaculations were whispered among the eager masses. As the
sparks kindled into a blaze, and the blaze into a flame, and the flaming
shield and victim were cast together on a pile of combustibles which
burst at once into the brightness of a conflagration, the air was rent
with the joyous shouts of the relieved and panic-stricken Indians. Far
and wide over the dusky crowds beamed the blaze like a star of promise.
Myriads of upturned faces greeted it from hills, mountains, temples,
terraces, teocallis, house-tops, and city walls; and the prostrate
multitudes hailed the emblem of light, life, and fruition, as a blessed
omen of the restored favor of their gods, and the preservation of their
race for another cycle. At regular intervals, Indian couriers held aloft
brands of resinous wood, by which they transmitted the "New Fire" from
hand to hand, from village to village, and town to town, throughout the
Aztec empire. Light was radiated from the imperial or ecclesiastical
center of the realm. In every temple and dwelling it was rekindled from
the sacred source; and when the sun rose again on the following morning,
the solemn procession of priests, princes, and subjects, which had taken
up its march from the capital on the preceding night with solemn steps,
returned once more to the abandoned capital, and, restoring the gods to
their altars, abandoned themselves to joy and festivity, in token of
gratitude and relief from impending doom.

* * * * *

=_Albert James Pickett,[41] 1858-._= (Manual, p. 490.)

From "The History of Alabama."

=_137._= THE INDIANS AND THE EARLY SETTLERS OF ALABAMA.

During my youthful days, I was accustomed to be much with the Creek
Indians, hundreds of whom came almost daily