which sometimes flowed through it carried with them so much sand and rubbish that the canal was soon choked up, not being made with a sufficient slope to give momentum to the current. The sides gave way, the vaulted roof fell in, and the upper lake was dammed up again. More than seventy years afterward the consulado, or incorporated merchants of Mexico, took the work in hand and resolved to make an open cut. This was done, at an enormous expense of men and money, about one hundred
and thirty years after it was begun. During this time Mexico was almost entirely under water for five consecutive years. The foundations of houses were destroyed, and such misery prevailed that the court at Madrid gave orders that the city which Cortez built should be abandoned and a new Mexico built, on higher ground. Happily, several earthquakes during the year 1634 cracked the ground in various directions, and the surplus water made its way down through the yawning fissures, much to the relief of the inhabitants, who had been living
