alled the "White Woman" from its
broad robe of snow. The first lies about forty miles southeast of the
capital to which their march was directed. It is more than 2,000 feet
higher than Mont Blanc, and has two principal craters, one of which is
about 1,000 feet deep and has large deposits of sulfur which are
regularly mined. Popocatepetl has long been only a quiescent volcano,
but during the invasion by Cortes it was often burning, especially at
the time of the siege of Tlascala. That was naturally interpreted all
over the district of Anahuac to be a bad omen, associated with the
landing and approach of the Spaniards. Cortes insisted on several
descents being made into the great crater till sufficient sulfur was
collected to supply gunpowder to his army. The icy cold winds, varied by
storms of snow and sleet, were more trying to the Europeans than the
Tlascalans, but some relief was found in the stone shelters which had
been built at certain intervals along the roads for the accommodation
of couriers and other travelers.

At last they reached the crest of the sierra which unites Popocatepetl,
the "great _Volcan_," to its sister mountain the "Woman in White." Soon
after, at a turning of the road, the invaders enjoyed their first view
of the famous Valley of Mexico or Tenochtitlan, with its beautiful lakes
in their setting of cultivated plains, here and there varied by woods
and forests. "In the midst, like some Indian empress with her coronal of
pearls, the fair city with her white towers and pyramidal temples,
reposing as it were on the bosom of the waters--the far-famed 'Venice of
the Aztecs.'"

This view of the "Promised Land" will remind some of the picturesque
account given by Livy (xxi, 35) of Hannibal reaching the top of the pass
over the Alps and pointing out the fair prospect of Italy to his
soldiers. We may thus render the passage: "On the ninth day the ridge of
the Alps was reached, over ground generally trackless and by roundabout
ways.... The order for marching being given at break of day, the army
were sluggishly advancing over ground wholly covered with snow,
listlessness, and despair depicted on the features of all, Hannibal went
on in front, and after ordering the soldiers to halt on a height which
commanded a distant view, far and wide, points out to them Italy and the
plains of Lombardy on both banks of the Po, at the foot of the Alps,
telling them that at that moment they were crossing not only the wa