In this case it was so dilapidated that the judges and officers of the court about to be held took seats outside on the lawn in front of one of the walls.

They were preparing to administer justice to a couple of offenders, and as this is the only occasion on which I have seen the details of Indian judicial procedure carried out so minutely as to suggest early missionary times, I am happy to record the affair here in full.
The gobernador and four of the judges seated themselves, white man's fashion, on a bench erected for the purpose, where they looked more grand than comfortable.

Two of them held in their right hands canes of red Brazil wood, the symbol of their dignity.

The idea of the staff of command, sceptre, or wand, is wide spread among the Indians of Mexico; therefore, when the Spaniards conquered the various tribes, they had little difficulty in introducing their batons (_la vara_), as emblems of authority, which to this day are used by the gobernadors and other officials.

They are made much in the same way as the ancient staffs, and of the same material, the heavy, red Brazil wood.