ABSTRACT
The ancient city of Mexico covered the spot occupied by the modern capital. The average level of the Tezcucan lake is but four feet lower than the great square of Mexico. Yet an Aztec of the days of Montezuma, could he behold the modern metropolis, which has risen with such phcenix-like splendour from the ashes of the old, would not recognize its site as that of his own Tenochtitlan. The primitive Aztecs, in their poverty of land, availed themselves of the hint thus afforded by nature. For the latter was encompassed by the salt floods of Tezcuco, which flowed in ample canals through every part of the city; while the Mexico of our day stands high and dry on the mainland, nearly a league distant, at its centre, from the water. The great streets, which were coated with hard cement, were intersected by numerous canals.
