407 



tecks and the Aztecks*. The knowledge of 

 the system of the calendar followed by the most 

 northerly nations of America and Asia would 

 be highly interesting. Among the inhabitants 

 of Nootka, we still find the Mexican months of 

 twenty days ; but their year has only fourteen 

 months, to which they add, by very complex 

 methods, a great number of intercalary days f . 

 When a nation does not regulate the subdivi- 

 sions of the year after the same lunations, the 

 number of months becomes very arbitrary, and 

 its choice seems to depend only on a particular 

 predilection for certain numbers. The Mexican 

 nations preferred the double decads, because 

 they had simple signs only for the units, far 

 twenty, and for the powers of twenty. 



The use of periodical series, and the hierogly- 

 phics of the day, have exhibited striking analo- 

 gies between the nations of Asia and those of 

 America. Some of these examples have not 

 escaped the penetration of Mr. Dupuis J, though 

 he has confounded the signs of the months with 

 those of the days, and had but a very imperfect 

 knowledge of the Mexican chronology. It 

 would be contrary to the end we have proposed 



* Waddilove, in Robertson's Hist, of America, vol. 3, 

 p. 404, note 35. 



t Don Joze Mozinno, Viage a Noutka, M. S. (See ray 

 Essai Politique, vol. i. p. 335). 



t Mexnoire explicatiFsur le Zodiaque, p. 99. 



