country. At the same time, they have been abominably sweated in many instances, and their treatment by their Spanish masters in the hennequen plantations has frequently aroused the indignation of the civilised world.
Perhaps it may not be out of place here briefly to describe the superstitions and occult beliefs of the Mexican Indians, a subject upon which practically nothing Superstitions. has been written, and which possesses a fascinating interest all its own. But little regarding the occult is to be gleaned from native sources, and the belief that the ancient Mexican and Maya hieroglyphic paintings possess any magical meaning may here be disposed of once and for ever. These are mostly calendric in their significance, and their only connection with occultism is that they may have been employed for astrological purposes. Of occult secrets they hold none, and for the records of sorcery in the land of the Aztecs we have to fall back upon the writings of Spanish priests, who were naturally unfriendly to the science they discussed and to its practitioners.
Therefore we have to search among anathemas for notices of the Black Art in Anahuac. An intensive examination of the subject points to resemblances and affinities between the occultism of the peoples of Mexico and the Red Man of North America. For it is necessary to remember that the Aztec and Chichimec inhabitants of the Mexican Valley were closely related to the Indians of British Columbia and the Zuñi of New Mexico; and that, although they had fallen heirs to an ancient and complex civilisation, they received the rudiments of this when in a condition of savagery.
The early settlers in New Spain, as Mexico was designated under Castilian rule, frequently allude to the naualli, or magician caste. The name is derived from a root na, which contains the germ of a group of words meaning "to know." These men were masters of mystic knowledge, practitioners in the Black Art, sorcerers or wizards. They were not
