209 



fanciful. I have engraved a part of the figures, 

 which most excited my curiosity ; I have added 

 to each group, represented in the 15th plate, the 

 citation of the Codex Borgiamts, and that of the 

 Italian manuscript, which was to serve as a 

 commentary. 



No. 1. An unknown animal, decorated with 

 a collar, and a kind of harness, but pierced with 

 darts. Fabrega calls it the crowned rabbit, the 

 sacred rabbit. This figure is found in several 

 rituals of the ancient Mexicans. According to 

 the traditions, which have been preserved to our 

 times, it is a symbol of suffering innocence. 

 Under this point of view, the allegorical repre- 

 sentation reminds us of the lamb of the Hebrews, 

 or the mystic idea of an expiatory sacrifice des- 

 tined to calm the anger of the divinity. The in- 

 cisive teeth, and the form of the head and tail, 

 seem to indicate, that the painter wished to re- 

 present an animal of the order glires (rongeurs) : 

 although the feet with two hoofs, and a toe 

 which does not touch the ground, indicate a 

 species of the ruminating tribe ; I doubt whether 

 it be a cavia, or Mexican hare ; perhaps it may 

 be some unknown quadruped, living in the inte- 

 rior, on the north of the Rio Gila, towards the 

 north-west part of America. 



This same animal, with a much longer tail, 

 seems to me to figure a second time in the Codex 

 Borgianus at the fifty-third page : of this No. I I, 



VOL. XIII. p 



