River Panuco. The language numbered about sixteen dialects, none very
remote from the parent stem, which linguists identify as the Maya proper
of the Yucatecan peninsula. While there are a number of verbal
similarities between Maya and Nahuatl, the radicals of the two idioms
and their grammatical structure are widely asunder. The Nahuatl is an
excessively pliable, polysyllabic and highly synthetic tongue; the Maya
is rigid, its words short, of one or two syllables generally, and is
scarcely more synthetic than French. This contrast is carried out in the
style of their writers. Those in Nahuatl were lovers of amplification,
of flowing periods, of Ciceronian fullness; the Mayas cultivated
sententious brevity, they are elliptical, often to obscurity, and may be
compared rather to Tacitus, in his _Annals_, than to Cicero.

All the Maya tribes had strong literary tastes, but with characteristic
tenacity they clung entirely to their native tongues; and I know not a
single instance where one has left compositions in Spanish. Their
language is easy to learn; to a stranger to both, Maya comes easier than
Spanish, as intelligent writers in Yucatan have testified; and this
aided its survival. Their passion for learning to read and write was
strong, and had it been fed, instead of rigidly suppressed, there is
little doubt but that they would have become a highly enlightened
nation. The wretched system which smothered free thought in Spain killed
it in Yucatan.[27]

The principal literary monument in the pure Maya is the collection known
as "The Books of Chilan Balam." I have described this collection at
length in previous publications, and shall content myself with a brief
reference to it.[28] The title "Chilan Balam" means, in this connection,
"the interpreting priest;" that is, the sacred official who, in the
ancient religion, revealed the will of the gods. There are at least