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On this stone the Aztecs were wont vulgarly called 'the calendar.' to sacrifice the messenger of the sun, by beheading him. The blood flowed into the central cavity and was thence carried away through the canal and poured out before the chamber of the sun, and the sun, which was seated (sculptured) on the stone, gloated on this blood.

"In this xicalli, or jicara (cup), were sometimes placed the hearts of the victims, which were then called by the special title of cuauheagles' figs." Hence there appears to be nochtli which means some ground for the name vulgarly given to this monument, namely, the Stone of Sacrifices, for it was occasionally so employed, yet, as we have shown, it was not the techcatl of the ordinary sacrifices, nor the temalacatl of the gladiators.

"But where is the effigy of the sun which was graven on the upper surface of the stone? Let us analyze the bas-reliefs. The central cavity is surrounded by halos formed of single or composite rings. The first is a single ring; the second consists of sixteen small concentric circles in pairs; the third is single and broad; the fourth single and narrow; the fifth is made up of forty narrow rings; the sixth is single; the seventh consists of forty-eight narrow rings. This last halo or ring is surmounted by four figures, like the capital letter A without the transverse line, but with the extremities bent into a spiral. These divide the outer circumference of the halos into four equal parts. Among these figures there is found an eighth ring divided into four parts, each of which contains eight Four triancruciform figures with a small circle within the arms. gular figures stand above this ring, which divide it into eight equal parts.

"In the spaces between these four triangles are eight figures in the form of double semi-ellipses-in all, sixty-four for the circumference. Finally, in the spaces between the triangular figures above these ellipses, there are eight trapezoidal figures resembling a quiver full of arrows. These have at the base one of the cruciform figures, and terminate above in four semi-elliptical figures. Two double circles flank this figure, one on each side. These figures divide the outer circumference into sixteen equal parts. The relief of the sculpture is twenty-five millimetres (nearly one inch) high.

"The first thing which strikes us is the fact that these triangular figures, trapeziums, single and double rings, cruciform figures, and semi-ellipses, all occur in fours or multiples of four. It must be observed that among the Mexicans the number four was cabalistic

and mystical. They counted four cosmogonic suns or ages of the world; four motions of the sun, which give rise to the four seasons; four chief divisions of the day, subdivided into eight; and four tlolpilli (or periods of thirteen years) in their cycle of fifty-two years.

"According to them, the sun was four times extinguished with the human race; four times, too, mankind was restored to the earth, a single pair escaping in the four great cataclysms produced by the four elements, air, earth, water, and fire.

"The whole design undoubtedly was intended to represent the sun as the Mexican astronomers conceived of its physical constitution.

"We will now consider the bas-reliefs on the convex surface of this monument. They consist of fifteen groups, of two persons each, facing one another. What is the meaning of these groups?

"In the hieroglyphic pictures of the Mexicans, combat, battle, and war had divers modes of expression. The natural, mimetic representation of war would be to paint a multitude of armed men fighting, the dead and wounded on the field-in short, the destructive effects of all the enginery of war as we represent them ourselves in paintings. But, probably, having found that plan very embarrassing, considered as a mode of writing, the Mexicans came at last to represent by a single figure each of the two sides. Hence, in the 'Codex Telleriano,' the 'Remense,' and the 'Vaticano,' and in other manuscripts, war is represented by two individuals engaged in fight. In order to avoid all obscurity, each combatant has his costume, his arms, and his ornaments; besides, he bears the name of the population to which he belongs, or the distinctive marks of his tribe.

"In Plate I of the 'Codex Mendoza' we see a warrior armed and brandishing his weapons, with another warrior unarmed before him, who bows down to him in token of submission. Behind this second warrior is the name of the town he represents, and a teocalli in flames, with the roof falling. This latter sign, which in the 'Codex Mendoza' accompanies the names of all the subject provinces, is used exclusively to denote the cities taken by assault; for it was the custom of the Mexicans to burn down and destroy the chapels of the principal teocalli when they took a town by force.

"In this case the picture passes from the mimetic to the allegorical painting, inasmuch as it indicates not only the battle, but

also the submission, the destruction, and the pillage of the enemy's

town.

"Again, among the plates of the 'Codex Mendoza,' which refer to the conquests of the kings, one of the latter is seen with a sign inscribed in front of him, namely, a shield (chimalli) supported on a sheaf of arrows (mitl); near by you see the symbols of subjugated

nations.

"The interpretation of all this is easy. Some king has conquered such or such a population. The arrows and the shield possess the phonetic value of yaoyotl (war, battle). Or we may combine the significations of the two objects, and then we should read 'Mitl Chimalli,' which metaphorically would in the language of the Mexicans mean war and battles. In that case the sign would be transformed from the allegorical into the ideographical, or even into the phonetic.

"Applying this system to the groups on the sun-stone, we shall have no difficulty in admitting that they represent battles, the victor being the figure on the right holding the vanquished by the hair of the head. The vanquished one is recognized by his bent figure and his submissive attitude. The hieroglyphic sign above his head gives the name of the population to which he belongs. We can not, with Gama, suppose these groups to represent dancers; they are victors and vanquished."

According to the "Codex Mendoza," Tizoc ascended the throne of Mexico in 1481 and died in 1486.

This Tizoc, who was the seventh Aztec king, is represented by a leg, which was his hieroglyphic name. The leg, which personifies him, is inscribed above his head. So with the figures of the vanquished each is accompanied by a sign which gives the name of the nation which he represents. They carry in the left hand two arrows, and with the right they appear to be presenting to the victor a weapon which is nothing else than the knife that was used for the sacrifice.

The cavity in the center of this stone, which formerly received the hearts of the victims offered to the sun-god, is now used as a bath by the doves which frequent the courtyard of the Museum.

DÉSIRÉ CHARNAY.

THE PERPETUITY OF CHINESE INSTITUTIONS.

AMONG the points relating to the Chinese people which have attracted the attention of students in human history, their long duration and literary institutions have probably taken precedence. To estimate the causes of the first requires much knowledge of the second, and from them one is gradually led on to an examination of the government, religion, and social life of this people in the succeeding epochs of their existence. The inquiry will reveal much that is instructive, and show us that, if they have not equaled many other nations in the arts and adornments of life, they have attained a high position in its comforts, and developed much that is creditable in education, government, and security of life and property.

As results must have their proportionate causes, one wishes to know what are the reasons for the remarkable duration of the Chinese people. Why have not their institutions fallen into decrepitude, and this race given place to others during the forty centuries it claims to have existed? Is it owing to the geographical isolation of the land, which has prevented other nations easily reaching it? Or have the language and literature unified and upheld the people whom they have taught? Or, lastly, is it a religious belief and the power of a ruling class working together, which has brought about the security and freedom now seen in this thrifty, industrious, and practical people? Probably all these causes have conduced to this end, and our present object is to outline what seems to have been their mode of operation.

It may be remarked, in limine, that we wish to examine this subject in the belief of the personal rule of an Almighty Governor over the nations of the earth-One who not only has made of one blood all nations, and determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation, but who also prolongs or cuts short their national life according to their moral condition and regard for

justice, truth, and peace. The Bible clearly furnishes the only adequate explanation of God's government of nations as distinct communities, and its declarations give us both light and arguments in the study and appreciation of Chinese character and civilization. We hardly need say, too, that the ignorance of its people of that Book, and of the existence and attributes of God, the sanctions of his law, and their own relations to his government here and hereafter, adds a feature of peculiar interest to this inquiry.

The position of their country has tended to separate them from other Asiatic races, even from very early times. It compelled them to work out their own institutions without any hints or modifying interference from abroad. They seem, in fact, to have had no neighbors of any importance until about the Christian era, up to which time they occupied chiefly the basin of the Yellow River, or the nine northern provinces as the empire is now divided. Till about B. C. 220, feudal states covered this region, and their quarrels only ended by their subjection to Tsin Chi Hwangti, or the Emperor First, whose strong hand molded the people as he led them to value security and yield to just laws. He thus prepared the way for the Emperors Wăn-ti (B. c. 179–156) and Wu-ti (B. c. 140-86), of the Han dynasty, to consolidate, during their long reigns of twenty-nine and fifty-four years, their schemes of good government.

The four northern provinces all lie on the southeastern slope of the vast plateau of Central Asia, the ascent to which is confined to a few passes, leading up five or six thousand feet through mountain defiles to the sterile, bleak plains of Gobi. This great sandy region has always given subsistence to wandering nomads enough to enable traders to cross its grassy wastes. When their numbers increased, they burst their borders in periodical raids, ravaging and weakening those whom they were too few to conquer and too ignorant to govern. The Chinese were too unwarlike to keep these tribes in subjection for long, and never themselves colonized the region, though the attempt to ward off its perpetual menace to their safety, by building the Great Wall to bar out their enemies, proves how they had learned to dread them. Yet this desert waste has proved a better defense for China against armies coming from the basin of the Tarim River than the lofty mountains on its west did to ancient Persia and modern Russia. It was easier and more inviting for the Scythians, Huns, Mongols, and Turks successively to push their arms westward, and China thereby remained intact, even when driven within her own borders.