the author of by far the most important work on the religion, manners
and customs of the ancient Mexicans.

By long residence and close application Sahagun acquired a complete
mastery of the Nahuatl tongue. He composed his celebrated _Historia de
las Cosas de la Nueva España_ primarily in the native language, and from
this original wrote out a Spanish translation, in some parts
considerably abbreviated. This incomplete reproduction is that which was
published in Spanish by Lord Kingsborough and Bustamente, and in a
French rendering with useful notes by Dr. Jourdanet and M. Rémi Simeon.

So far as I know, the only complete copy of the Nahuatl original now in
existence is that preserved in the Bibliotheca Laurentio-Mediceana in
Florence, where I examined it in April, 1889. It is a most elaborate and
beautiful MS., in three large volumes, containing thirteen hundred and
seventy-eight illustrations, carefully drawn by hand, mostly colored,
illustrative of the native mythology, history, arts and usages, besides
many elaborate head and tail pieces to the chapters.

There is another Nahuatl MS. of Sahagun's history in the private
library of the King of Spain at Madrid, which I examined in May, 1888,
and of which I published a collation in the _Mémoires de la Sociétè
Internationale des Américanistes_, for that year. It is incomplete,
embracing only the first six books of the _Historia_, and should be
considered merely as a _borrador_ or preliminary sketch for the
Florentine copy. It contains, however, a certain amount of material not
included in the latter, and has been peculiarly useful to me in the
preparation of the present volume, as not only affording another reading
of the text, valuable for comparison, but as furnishing a gloss or
Nahuatl paraphrase of most of the hymns, which does not appear in the