358 
with great difficulty, their languages, their my- 
thology, their divisions of time, every thing as- 
sumes a character of individuality, that almost 
effaces the primitive type of their national phy- 
siognomy. 
In fact, instead of the cycles of sixty years, of 
years divided into twelve months, and small 
periods of seven days, used among the nations of 
Asia, we find among the Mexicans cycles of 
fifty-two years, years of eighteen months of 
twenty days each, half decades, and half luna- 
tions of thirteen days. The system of periodical 
series, the correspondent terms of which serve 
to denote the dates of the days and the years, is 
the same in both continents ; a great many of 
the signs that compose the series in the Mexican 
calendar are borrowed from the zodiac of the 
nations of Thibet and Tartary ; but neither 
their number, nor the order in which they follow 
each other, are those observed in Asia. 
The Tartarian zodiac does not begin, like that 
of the Hindoos, with the Dog, which answers to 
our sign of the Ram, but with the Rat, which re- 
presents Aquarius*. This same zodiac has besides 
the striking particularity, that the celestial animals 
are reckoned contrary to the order of the signs : 
instead of placing them in that which is marked 
^ Souclet, voi. 2, p. 136. Baillj, Ast, ind., p. 212. Lan- 
gles; notes du Voyage de Thunberg, p< 319. 
