400 ANNUAL EEPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1916. 



them under the heading " De nanacatl sen Fungorum genere." From 

 the harmless white mushrooms (iztacnanacame), red mushrooms 

 (tlapalnanacame), and yellow orbicular mushrooms (chimalnana- 

 came), used for food, he distinguished them as teyhuinti, which 

 signifies " intoxicating." ^ 



In this connection it is interesting to note that this Nahuatl word, 

 teyhuinti, or teyuinti (from yuinti, to be drunk), survives in the 

 form of tejuino or tehuino in the State of Jalisco, Mexico, and 

 tesuino or tizwin in the southwestern United States as the name of 

 certain intoxicating drinks, the principal of which is a kind of beer 

 brewed from malted maize. 



DETERMINATION OF THE DRUG. 



Three centuries of investigation have failed to reveal an endemic 

 fungus used as an intoxicant in Mexico, nor is such a fungus men- 

 tioned either in works on mycology or pharmacography, yet the 

 belief prevails even now that there is a narcotic Mexican fungus, and 

 it is supported by Simeon in his monumental dictionary of the 

 Nahuatl language, in which the following definitions occur: 



Teonanacatl, espece de petit champignon qui a mauvais gout, 

 enivre et cause des hallucinations; il est medicinal contre les fievres 

 et la goutte. ^ 



Teyuinti, qui enivre quelqu'un, enivrant ; teyuinti nanacatl, cham- 

 pignon enivrant. ^ 



In connection with his study of the economic plants of the Mexi- 

 cans and the Indians of the southwestern United States the writer 

 has sought diligently for a fungus having the properties attributed 

 to the teonanacatl. As this narcotic was used by various tribes of 

 Chichimecas, and the Chichimecas inhabited the territory situated 

 in what is now northern Mexico and the southwestern United States, 

 it was natural to look for the plant in this region. No such fungus, 

 however, was discovered, but in its place a narcotic plant having 

 properties exactly like those attributed to the teonanacatl was en- 

 countered; moreover, one form of this plant, when prepared as a 

 drug, resembles a dried mushroom so remarkably that at first glance 

 it will even deceive a mycologist (pi. 5). It is discoid in form and 

 apparently peltate when seen from below; but the upper surface 

 bears tufts of silky hairs, and a close inspection reveals the fact that 

 it is the crown of a small fleshy spineless cactus which has been cut 

 off and dried. The cactus in question, Lophophora Williamsii, when 



1 " Quoniam inebrare solent, Teyhuinti nomine nuncupati sunt, et e fulvo in fuscum 

 vergant colorem, risum inopportunum concitent, imaginemque citra risum Inebriautium 

 possint exhibere." Hernandez, Francisco (1514-1578). Hist. PI. Nov. Hisp. (ed. Rom.) 

 2: 357. 1790. 



2 Simfion, R^mi, Diet, de la langue NaliuatI, p. 436, 1885. 

 sOp. cit., p. 412. 



