A portion of this chapter will now be devoted to a description of those repulsive sacrifices, without which no important feast or festival was allowed to terminate. Though the plebeian portion of the Mexicans lived upon the poorest and scantiest food, yet everybody feasted and entertained his friends once in a season. As his guests arrived he presented them with flowers and made them welcome to his house.
The Mexican year contained eighteen months of twenty days each, and each month contained at least one festival. The first month (which commenced in February) held the first feast to Tlaloc, in which children were sacrificed and gladiatorial combats ensued, upon the stone for that purpose in the temple-yard. This was previous to planting; but some of the children were reserved for the altars during the months of March and April, to insure the necessary rains for their crops. Xipe, the god of the goldsmiths, demanded the most cruel of all sacrifices, for after, the prisoners had been murdered in the customary way, by having their hearts cut out, they were skinned. On this account this festival was called the "feast of the flaying of men." A second feast to Tlaloc was offered in April, at which time the filthy skins of the victims to Xipe (which some writers say had been worn by the priests during twenty days) were carried to a temple and deposited in a cave. In the month of April, also, the flower-traders celebrated in a more pleasing manner the festival of Coatlicue, the goddess of flowers, by offerings of garlands of flowers. In the fourth month occurred the "great watch," when the priests, nobility and people kept strict watch throughout the nights, and did severe penance.
A festival to Centeotl, goddess of maize, also occurred in this month, in which were sacrificed human beings, quails, and other animals. Ears of corn were carried by
