186 
sex of the offender. A mother exposes her 
daughter to the smoke of pimento (capsicum 
baccatum) : a father pricks his son eight years 
old with agave leaves^ which are terminated by 
thorns. The painting indicates in what cases 
the hand only of the child should be pricked, 
and in what other cases pai^ents are permitted 
to extend this painful operation over the whole 
of the body. A priest, teopixqui. chastises a 
novice, by throwing burning coals on his head, 
because he has passed the night beyond the 
boundary of the temple. Another priest is re- 
presented as sitting in the attitude of observing 
the stars, to indicate the hour of midnight. 
We here perceive, in the Mexican painting, 
the hieroglyphics of midnight placed above the 
head of the priest, and a dotted line from the 
eye of the observer pointing towards a star*. 
We see also figures, which represent women 
spinning with a distaff, and weaving at a loom 
the warp of which is perpendicular : a gold- 
smith blowing a charcoal fire through a pipe ; 
an old man of seventy, to whom the law allows 
the privilege of intoxication, as it did to a wo- 
man when she became a grandmother : a match- 
maker, called cihuatlanqiiey who carries the 
young virgin on her back to the house of the 
bridegroom; and lastly the nuptial benedic- 
* Thevenot, vol. 2, FI. 4, %. 49, 51, 55, 61. 
