65 



We must not confound this dove with the bird 

 which brings Coxcox tidings, that the waters 

 were dried up. The people of Mechoacan pre- 

 served a tradition, according to which Coxcox, 

 whom they called Tezpi, embarked in a spaci- 

 ous acalll with his wife, his children, several ani- 

 mals, and grain, the preservation of which was 

 of importance to mankind. When the great 

 spirit, Tezcatlipoca, ordered the waters to with- 

 draw, Tezpi sent out from his bark a vulture, the 

 zopilote (vultur aura). This bird, which feeds 

 on dead flesh, did not return on account of the 

 great number of carcases, with which the earth, 

 recently dried up, was strewed. Tezpi sent out 

 other birds, one of which, the humming bird 

 alone, returned, holding in its beak a branch 

 covered with leaves ; Tezpi, seeing that fresh 

 verdure began to clothe the soil, quitted his bark 

 near the mountain of Colhuacan. 



These traditions, we here repeat, remind us of 

 others of high and venerable antiquity. The 

 sight of marine substances, found even on the 

 loftiest summits, might give men, who have had 

 no communication, the idea of great inundations, 

 which for a certain time extinguished organic 

 life on the earth : but ought we not to acknow- 

 ledge the traces of a common origin, wherever 

 cosmogonical ideas, and the first traditions of 

 nations, offer striking analogies even in the mi- 

 nutest circumstances ? does not the humming- 



VOL. xiv. p 



