incense in many places, making offerings of meat, cooked without pepper or salt, and drinks made from beans and kernels of calabashes. The lords, and also those who had observed the fast, passed five days and five nights there without returning home—praying, burning copal, and executing sacred dances. During this time the actors went to the houses of the nobles and others, exhibiting their performances and receiving the gifts which were offered to them. At the end of the five days they carried them all to the temple, where they divided them among the priests and the dancers. After this they resumed the banners and idols, which they carried back to the mansion of the prince, from which place each one returned home with whatever he recovered. They said, and devoutly believed, that Kukulcan descended from heaven in person on the last day of the feast and received the sacrifice, the presents, and offerings which they made to him. They called this feast Chic-Kahan.
G.—The month Yaxkin. During this month they commenced to prepare, as was their custom, for a general feast, which was celebrated in Mol, on a day designated by the priest in honor of all the gods; they called it Oloh-Zab-Kam Yax. After the usual ceremonies and incensing which they desired to do, they smeared with their blue paint all the instruments of every profession, from those used by the priests even to the spindles of the women and the doors of their houses. On this occasion they painted the children of both sexes with the same color; but, instead of smearing their hands, they gave them each nine gentle raps on their knuckles, that they might be skillful in the professions of their fathers and mothers. As for the little girls, an old woman brought them there, and for this reason they called her Ixmol, that is to say, conductress. The conclusion of this ceremony was a grand orgy and banquet with the offerings which they had presented, although it was understood that the devoted old woman was not permitted to become intoxicated, lest she should lose on the road the plume of her office.
H.—The month Mol. During this month the apiarists repeated the feast which they had celebrated in the month Tzec, in order that the gods might cause the flowers to grow for the bees.
