Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Notes |
CHAPTER II: OF THE ANIMALS [p.17]
THERE are many animals of different kinds, as tigers, lions, and wolves, and likewise jackals,4 which are between a fox and a dog, and others between lion and wolf. The tigers are of the same size as the lions, or perhaps a little larger, except that they are more robust and ferocious; they have the whole body full of white spots, and none of these animals harms the Spaniards, but to the people of the country they show no tenderness, but on the contrary eat them. There are also deer, and wild foxes, fallow deer, hares, and rabbits. The pigs5 have the navel in the spine, and there are many other and divers animals, particularly one rather larger than a tom-cat, which has a purse [pouch] in its belly in which it hides its young when it wants to flee with them, because they never leave her, and there she carries them [18] unseen and unknown, and when it flees, climbs with them into trees.6
This province of New Spain is for the greater part thickly peopled. There are great cities and towns, as many on the plains as in the mountains. The houses are of rough stones and mortar, and of earth and adobe, and all have flat roofs.7 This refers to the habitations of those who dwell in the interior, but those who live near the sea have the walls of their houses of adobes, earth, and boards, with thatched roofs. The natives of this land have for a long time had the most beautiful mesquites [mosques]8 with great towers and living quarters in which they worshipped their idols and sacrificed to them. Many of their cities are better laid out than those here [of Spain,] with very handsome streets and squares where they have their markets. |
