COLUMBIAN HISTORICAL EXPOSITION AT MADRID. 27 



What impresses the observer most in this collection as unusual are 

 the numerous smoking pipes of clay, many of them elaborately orna 

 mented, sometimes painted. Although the use of tobacco was known 

 among the ancient Mexicans to some extent, it would appear that they 

 very rarely smoked it in pipes. Such, however, could not have been 

 the case in Michoacan, for the large number of these pipes and the 

 skill with which they are made indicate that they were looked upon 

 as a favorite object with the smoker. Probably nowhere else in 

 America, south of the Mississippi Valley, do we find so many and 

 varied forms of the smoking pipe as within the State of Michoacan, 

 and the number of these presented in this collection is such as to show 

 conclusively that this was a popular method of consuming that narcotic 

 plant. 



A series of vases from the same locality, intended for decoration or 

 for holding flowers, is shown. The substance from which they are 

 made is generally a red or black clay, but a few are of alabaster, basaltic 

 lava, or other stone. Some of these represent figures one a man upon 

 his knees with his hands above him; another a human figure bearing 

 a vase upon his back; another a human head, and still another the head 

 of a monkey with his four members in low relief. 



Such figures bring us to those objects which are classified as belong 

 ing distinctively to the religious experiences of the natives. These 

 are principally in clay and stone, and represent figures of men and 

 women, sometimes only the heads, others only the bodies or busts. 

 They are rude, and do not show any careful study of the dimensions 

 of the human body. There are also a few masks of obsidian and cal- 

 cite, and a number of amulets of stone and bone and burnt clay, usually 

 representing an animal, such as a bird, a snail, a frog, etc. 



Quite a number of musical instruments are included in the collection, 

 but it would not appear from them that the natives of Michoacan had 

 in this respect developed anything different from their neighbors, the 

 Mexicans proper. We find, for instance, quite a number of whistles and 

 flutes made of burnt clay, either red or black, producing the sound on 

 the same principal as the clay whistle formerly in use in Nicaragua and 

 other parts inhabited by the N almas. Copper bowls and rattles were 

 displayed, also a large conch shell employed by the Indians as a wind 

 instrument, and a curious instrument of percussion formed of a human 

 thigh bone, cut on the surface into a number of notches, examples of 

 which are also obtained from Mexico proper. 



The implements of war and the chase consist principally of arrow 

 heads of obsidian, quartz, bone, flint, and copper. They are in most 

 respects similar to those of the surrounding nations. Some display on 

 the surface a peculiar discoloration, which it has been suggested is 

 indicative of great age. 



Nearly all the objects above referred to were obtained on the site of 

 an ancient city a short distance west from the present town of Jacona. 



