The dog played a large part in the religion both of the Mayas and the Mexican peoples. It was connected especially with the idea of death and destruction. The Lacandones of the present time make a small figure of a dog to place on the grave (Tozzer, 1907, p. 47). This is but one of the many survivals of the ancient pre-Columbian religion found among this people. The dog was regarded as the messenger to prepare the way to the other world. Seler (1900-1901, pp. 82-83) gives an interesting parallel of the Nahua idea of the dog and his connection with death. He paraphrases Sahagun as follows: "The native Mexican dogs barked, wagged their tails, in a word, behaved in all respects like our own dogs, were kept by the Mexicans not only as house companions, but above all, for the shambles, and also in Yucatan and on the coast land for sacrifice. The importance that the dog had acquired in the funeral rites may perhaps have originated in the fact that, as the departed of both sexes were accompanied by their effects, the prince by the women and slaves in his service, so the dog was assigned to the grave as his master's associate, friend, and guard, and that the persistence of this custom in course of time created the belief that the dog stood in some special relation to the kingdom of the dead. It may also be that, simply because it was the practice to burn the dead, the dog was looked on as the Fire God's animal and the emblem of fire, the natives got accustomed to speak of him as the messenger to prepare the way in the kingdom of the dead, and thus eventually to regard him as such. At the time when the Spaniards made their acquaintance, it was the constant practice of the Mexicans to commit to the grave with the dead a dog who had to be of a red-yellow color, and had a string of unspun cotton round his neck, and was first killed by the thrust of a dart in his throat. The Mexicans believed that four years after death, when the soul had already passed through many dangers on its way to the underworld, it came at last to the bank of a great river, the Chicunauhapan, which encircled the underworld proper. The souls could get across this river only when they were awaited by their little dog, who, recognizing his master on the opposite side, rushed into the water to bring him over." (Sahagun, 3 Appendix, Chap. 1.)