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 acalli 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 hiimming'- 
VOL. XIV. F 
