De Sol is, the historian of the Conquest of Mexico, speaking of the magnificence of Montezuma, and of his works, thus refers to the waters and aqueducts of the city :

" In all these gardens and pleasure houses, he had many fountains of sweet and wholesome water, conveyed from the neighboring mountains, by different canals as far as the causeys, whence in covered pipes, it was introduced into the city for the use ;

whereof there were some public fountains and he permitted some of the meaner sort of ;

people, though not without paying a considerable tribute, to sell about the streets what water they brought from other springs. The conveniency of fountains was very much increased in the time of Montezuma for the great conduit which conveys a current of ;

fresh water to Mexico, from the mountains of Chapoltepec, about a league distant from the city, was a work of his arid by his order and contrivance, a vast cistern of stone ;

was made for a reservatory raising the same to such a height as the delivery of the ;

current required. After this he gave orders for a very thick wall, with two open canals, made of stone and lime, of which one was always in use when the other required cleaning. A building extremely useful and Montezuma valued hmiself so much upon the ;

invention, that he ordered his own effigies and that of his father, which bore a pretty near

* Cronica c"e la Nueva-Espana, por Francisco Lopez de Gomara; Madrid, 1749 j p. 79, (originally printed at Saragossa, 1552.)