now decayed figured as populous centres, for which the Spaniards erected but sparse equivalents. Mexico appears from monumental and documentary evidence to have been more extensive and populous, and in Tlascala a census was taken by Cortés which showed that there were several times more occupants than toward the close of the colonial period.[1] Franciscan missionaries alone claimed to have baptized 6,000,000 natives between 1524 and 1540, and Dominicans and Augustinians worked hard to swell the number, yet immense fields remained untrodden. These claims cannot of course be relied upon, nor the estimates of deaths from small-pox and other ravages. In 1576 about 2,000,000 are said to have been swept away in the central provinces alone, and at other times whole districts to have been almost depopulated.[2]
We find the population distributed in a somewhat different manner from that of South America and the United States, not along the coasts, which are here low-lying and malarious, but mainly on the interior plateau, where culture and wealth had ever centred, notably along a narrow strip embracing Puebla and Mexico, and two other towns of from 35,000 to 130,000 inhabitants, and only one or two days' journey apart, while elsewhere great stretches of fine country lie almost uninhabited. With the influx of negroes the coast line received in time an increase of occupants, on whom the fevers had little effect, and with their aid thriving plantations of sugar-cane and other produce drew riches from a hitherto neglected soil. The Indians maintained their preponderance at the rate of three fourths to seven eighths in Puebla,
- ↑ As indicated in Hist. Mex., i., this series. It is true that many Tlascaltecs were sent away to colonize other provinces, but this could not have affected the total very seriously. An estimate for 1729 reduces the Indians greatly. Doc. Hist. Mex., série ii. tom. iv. 341-2.
- ↑ As referred to in this and the preceding volume. Clavigero indulges in quite a dissertation on this topic, chiefly as a reply to de Pauw. Storia, Mess., iv. 271-87. It is widely claimed that excepting the ravages suffered from epidemics, the aboriginal race has increased in number during the colonial rule, and this assertion cannot well be disproved for want of reliable data concerning either the pests or the original population.
