The members of the _North American Branch_ present more decided differences among themselves than those in the southern division, so far as race is concerned, but their characteristics are merged one in the other. Nevertheless, the populations inhabiting respectively the south, the north-east, and the north-west can be considered as forming so many distinct families, which we shall pa.s.s in review in succession.

SOUTHERN FAMILY.

The southern family of the Northern Branch still preserves much resemblance to the families of the southern branch which we have just been considering. The complexion of its members is rather fair, the forehead depressed, and the figure tolerably well proportioned.

This group embraces a great number of tribes speaking different languages, peculiar to the central part of the northern continent. The princ.i.p.al among these nations are the _Aztecs_, or primitive Mexicans, and the _Moya_ and _Lenca_ Indians.

_Aztecs._--When the Spaniards landed in Mexico, they found there a people whose customs were far removed from those of savage life. They were very expert in the practice of different useful and ornamental arts, and their knowledge was rather extensive, but thorough cruelty could always be laid to their charge.

The Aztecs were intelligent and hard-working cultivators. They knew how to work mines, prepare metals, and set precious stones as ornaments.

Superb monuments had been erected by them, and they possessed a written language which preserved the memorials of their history. Those who dwelt in the region of the present Mexico were advanced in the sciences; they were profoundly imbued with the sentiment of religion; and their sacred ceremonies were full of pomp, but accompanied by expiatory sacrifices revolting in their barbarism. They carried their annals back to very remote antiquity. These annals were traced in historical paintings, the traditional explanation of which was imparted by the natives to some of their conquerors, as well as to a few Spanish and Italian ecclesiastics.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 202.--INDIAN OF THE MEXICAN COAST.]

The princ.i.p.al events recorded in these archives relate to the migrations of three different nations, who, leaving the distant regions of the north-west, arrived successively in Anahuac. They were the _Toltecs_, _Chichimecas_, and _Nahuatlacas_, divided into seven distinct tribes, one of which was that of the Aztecs, or Mexicans. The country whence the first of these people came was called Huehuetlapallan, and they commenced their exodus in the year 544 of our era. Pestilence decimated them in 1051, and they then wandered southwards, but a few remained at Tula. The Chichimecas, a barbarous race, arrived in Mexico in the year 1070, and the incursion of the Nahuatlacas, who spoke the same language as the Toltecs, took place very soon afterwards. The Aztecs, or Mexicans, separated themselves from the other nations, and in 1325 they founded Mexico. In a word, the former inhabitants of Mexico were immigrants from a country situated towards the north, on the central plateau of Anahuac, and their successive migrations had continued during several centuries long prior to the discovery of America by the Europeans.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 203, 204.--INDIANS OF THE MEXICAN COAST.]

The ancient portraits of the Aztecs and the faces of some of their divinities are remarkable for the depression of the forehead, from which results the smallness of the facial angle--a peculiarity which appears to have belonged to the handsome type of the race.

The aboriginal Mexicans of our own time are of good stature and well proportioned in all their limbs. They have narrow foreheads, black eyes, white, well-set, regular teeth, thick, coa.r.s.e, and glossy black hair, thin beards, and are in general without any hairs on their legs, thighs, or arms. Their skin is olive coloured, and many fine young women may be seen among them with extremely light complexions. Their senses are very acute, more especially that of sight, which they enjoy unimpaired to the most advanced age.

The native Indians forming part of the Mexican population are characterized by a broad face and flat nose, recalling somewhat the lineaments of the Mongolian cast of countenance. They may be judged of from Figs. 202, 203, 204, and 205, which represent aborigines of the interior and coast of Mexico.

M. Roude, who has published the narrative of his travels in the state of Chihuahua, brought back accurate drawings ill.u.s.trative of the usages and customs of the population of the Mexican capital.

The ladies envelope themselves very gracefully in their _rebosso_, with which they cover the head, partly hiding the face, and only allowing their eyes to be seen. Among the wealthy this _rebosso_ is generally of black or white silk, embroidered with designs in bright and gaudy colours. Women of the lower cla.s.ses wear a _rebosso_ of blue wool dotted with little white squares. Their petticoat is short, and its lower part embroidered with worsted work. The favourite colour for this latter garment among common people is glaring red.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 205.--MEXICAN INDIAN WOMAN.]

The men's costume (fig. 206) is richer and more varied than that of the women. On Sundays it is laced with silver; white trowsers are indispensable, and they are covered by another pair made of leather, open along the sides from the waist downwards, and ornamented with a row of silver b.u.t.tons. A China c.r.a.pe sash is wound round the waist, and the vest is of deerskin or velvet with silver embroidery. The sombrero has a very broad brim, is made of straw or felt, and decorated with a thick twisted band of black velvet or of silver gilt lace. The _sarape_ is spangled with striking colours and with varied patterns, and the men possess a special talent for draping themselves gracefully in it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 206.--MEXICAN PICADOR.]

The place above all others where the popular life of the inhabitants of Mexico should be studied is in the markets (fig. 207). There may you see Indians, creoles, and foreigners, beggars in rags and rich citizens, black frock coats, embroidered deerskin jackets, threadbare uniforms, soldiers, muleteers, porters, monks of all shades, shod and shoeless Carmelites, all elbowing each other fraternally. There Basil throws the lengthening shadow of his fantastic head-gear on the wall of the neighbouring church; there dealers in hats, poultry, or wooden trays offer their wares to buyers; there pretty fruit and flower girls, tidy servant maids of some decent house, or winsome _Chinas_ with sparkling eyes, pa.s.s to and fro draped in their rebossos. They bear on the upturned palms of the left hand, on a level with the shoulder, and in the most artistic manner, a basket full of green plants, or the graceful red earthenware _cantaro_ painted and glazed, and filled with water.

Through this noisy crowd the water-carrier (_aguador_), clothed in leather, treads his way with short steps, bearing on his back an enormous red earthen jar, fastened by means of two handles and a broad strap to his forehead, which is protected by a little cap of leather; another band pa.s.sing across the top of the crown supports a second and much smaller pitcher, hanging before him at his knees.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 207.--THE ROLDAU BRIDGE MARKET, MEXICO.]

If a person wishes to become acquainted with Mexico, it is among the lower orders that he must study the country. The people are good; eager for knowledge, notwithstanding the want of instruction, and full of energy in spite of their long bondage. He need be on his guard against the higher cla.s.ses only, a small minority spoiled by the priests, whose influence is all-powerful. The ignorance of the monks, who swarm in this land, is doubled by an intolerable vanity that inspires them with antipathy to all progress.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 208.--MEXICAN HATTER.]

The people of Mexico are very simple in their habits. Broth (_pilchero_) and the national dish, _frijoles_ (beans), form the ordinary fare of the middle cla.s.s, to which a stew of spiced duck is sometimes added. They allay their thirst with pure water, contained in an immense gla.s.s, which holds from one to two quarts. This flagon is placed in the centre of the table, and is the only one that appears on the board, from which decanters and bottles, and very often even knives and forks, are banished. Each in turn steeps his lips in this cup, returning it to its place or pa.s.sing it to his neighbour. Besides, Mexicans in general do not drink except at the end of the meal. In the evening the circle is swelled by a few friends; guitars are taken down from the wall, and some simple ballads are sung to mournful airs, or they dance to the same measure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 209.--MEXICAN HAWKER.]

The Aztecs, or primitive Mexicans, like their predecessors, the Toltecs, were, as we have said, strangers in Anahuac. Before their arrival this plateau had been inhabited by different races, some of which had acquired a certain degree of civilization, whilst others were utterly barbarous. The Aztecs spread themselves extensively in Central America.

The _Olmecas_ are mentioned among the most ancient tribes, and they are supposed to have peopled the West India Islands and South America. This nation shared the soil of Mexico with the _Xicalaucas_, _Coras_, _Tepanecas_, _Tarascas_, _Mixtecas_, _Tzapotecas_, and the _Othomis_.

The last named and the _Totonacs_ were two barbarous races occupying the country near Lake Tezcuco, previously to the coming of the Chichimecas.

Whilst all the other known languages of America are polysyllabic, that of the Othomis is monosyllabic.

Farther to the north, and beyond the northern frontiers of the Mexican empire, dwelt the _Huaxtecas_. The _Tarascas_ inhabited the wide and fertile regions of Mechoacan, to the north of Mexico, and were always independent of that kingdom. Their sonorous and harmonious tongue differed from all the others. In civilization and the arts they advanced side by side with the Mexicans, who were never able to subdue them; but their king submitted without resistance to the rule of the Spaniards.

_Moyas_ and _Lencas_.--These are tribes which still live in a wild state in the forests situated between the Isthmus of Panama and that of Thuantepec, but an inquiry into their manners and customs would offer no features of interest. The life of savage nations exhibits an uniformity which greatly abridges our task.

NORTH-EASTERN FAMILY.

In the fifteenth century the North-eastern family occupied that immense expanse of North America which is comprised between the Atlantic Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, but all its nations are now reduced to a few far from numerous tribes, confined to the west of the Mississippi.

The distinguishing qualities of the red race are strongly marked among these groups. A complexion of a light cinnamon-colour, a lengthened head, a long and aquiline nose, horizontal eyes, a depressed forehead, a robust const.i.tution, and a tall stature const.i.tute their princ.i.p.al physical characteristics, to which must be added senses sharpened to an extraordinary degree. They have a habit of painting their bodies, and especially their faces, red. Their disposition is proud and independent, and they support pain with stoical courage.

Almost all these Indian tribes have already disappeared in consequence of the furious war waged upon them by the Europeans. Those that lived in olden times on the declivities of the mountains facing the Atlantic are very nearly extinct. Among such are the Hurons, Iroquois, Algonquins, and the Natchez, rendered famous by Chateaubriand, and the Mohicans, whom Cooper has immortalized.

We cannot speak detailedly here of these different nations, but in order to give an idea of them we shall open Chateaubriand's "Voyage en Amerique," and, having quoted a few lines from it, we will make the reader acquainted with the pith of the observations made in our own day in these same countries by contemporary travellers.

Speaking of the Muscogulges and the Simnioles, Chateaubriand writes in the following terms:--

"The Simnioles and the Muscogulges are rather tall in stature: and, by an extraordinary contrast, their wives are the smallest race of women known in America; they seldom depa.s.s a height of four feet two or three inches; their hands and feet resemble those of an European girl nine or ten years old. But nature has compensated them for this kind of injustice: their figure is elegant and graceful; their eyes are black, extremely long, and full of languor and modesty. They lower their eyelids with a sort of voluptuous bashfulness; if a person did not see them when they speak, he would believe himself listening to children uttering only half-formed words."

The great writer pa.s.sed along the borders of the lake to which its name has been given by the Iroquois colony of the _Onondagas_, and visited the "Sachem" of that people:--

"He was," says Chateaubriand, "an old Iroquois in the strictest sense of the word. His person preserved the memory of the former customs and bygone times of the desert: large, pinked ears, pearl hanging from the nose, face streaked with various colours, little tuft of hair on the top of the head, blue tunic, cloak of skins, leathern belt, with its scalping-knife and tomahawk, tattooed arm, moca.s.sins on his feet, and a porcelain necklace in his hand."

The following is the sketch of an Iroquois:--

"He was of lofty stature, with broad chest, muscular legs, and sinewy arms. His large round eyes sparkled with independence; his whole mien was that of a hero. Shining on his forehead might be seen high combinations of thought and exalted sentiments of soul. This fearless man was not in the least astonished at firearms when for the first time they were used against him; he stood firm to the whistling of bullets and the roar of cannon as if he had been hearing both all his life, and appeared to heed them no more than he would a storm. As soon as he could procure himself a musket, he used it better than an European. He did not abandon for it his tomahawk, his knife, or his bow and arrows, but added to them the carbine, pistol, poniard, and axe, and seemed never to possess arms sufficient for his valour. Doubly arrayed in the murderous weapons of Europe and America, with his head decked with bunches of feathers, his ears pinked, his face smeared black, his arms dyed in blood, this n.o.ble champion of the New World became as formidable to behold, as he was to contend against, on the sh.o.r.e which he defended foot by foot against the foreigner."

With this terrible portrait Chateaubriand contrasts the blithe countenance of the Huron, who had nothing in common with the Iroquois but language:--

"The gay, sprightly, and volatile Huron, of rash, dazzling valour, and tall, elegant figure, had the air of being born to be the ally of the French."

We now come to travellers of our own day. Fig. 210 is a sketch of the costumes of the wild Indians dwelling at the foot of the Rocky Mountains in Missouri, and who bear the name of Creeks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 210.--CREEK INDIANS.]

In his travels through the United States and Canada, M. H. Deville had an opportunity of visiting an establishment of Iroquois. These savages were remarkable for their reddish colour and coa.r.s.e features. They wore round hats with broad brims, and robed themselves in Spanish fashion in a piece of dark cloth.