y with certainty concerning it was that it told
of far journeyings into the west and north. He was much puzzled,
moreover, by a picture that occurred about the middle of the codex, and
that seemed to be intended to represent a walled city among mountains.
To my mind this picture tallied well with what the dying Cacique had
told me touching the hidden stronghold of his race. But Don Rafael
attached very little importance to the Cacique's words; and on
archaeological grounds maintained that a walled city was an impossibility
in primitive Mexico--for while walls were built in plenty by the
primitive Mexicans, and still are to be found in many places, no mention
of a walled city is made by the early chroniclers, and of such a city
there never has been found the slightest trace.

In regard to the engraved disk of gold, Don Rafael said at once and
positively that it represented a name-device which never had been
figured in any known Aztec writing; and he was of the opinion--being led
thereto by consideration of certain delicate peculiarities of the figure
which were too subtle for my uninstructed apprehension to grasp--that
the name here symbolized was that of a ruler who was both priest and
king. That the piece of gold was found associated with picture-writing
unquestionably belonging to the theocratic period lent additional color
to this assumption. The sum of our conclusions, therefore, was that we
had here the name-device of a priest-king who had ruled the Aztec tribe
during some portion of the first migration. And, assuming that he had
lived during the period to which my codex referred, and accepting the
system of dates tentatively adopted by Senor Ramirez, we even fixed the
ninth century of our era as the period in which he had lived and ruled.

During two whole days Don Rafael and I worked together over these
matters in the Museo; and it was not until our investigations were
ended--so far, at least, as investigations could be said to be ended
while yet no definite conclusions were reached--that my thoughts
reverted to Fray Antonio, and to the requirement of courtesy that I
should report to him the result of my course of study in the Indian
tongues. It is but justice to myself to add that, knowing him to be gone
to Santa Maria to attend to the Cacique's burial, I had temporarily
dismissed this matter from my mind.

But when I was come to the Church of San Francisco--carrying with me the
Codex Palgravius and the engrav