kindred to revenge.’” Mr. Squier adds that, “according to Adair, this fear was not unmingled with veneration. Charlevoix states that the Natchez had the figure of a rattlesnake, carved from wood, placed among other objects upon the altar of their temple, to which they paid great honour. Heckwelder relates that the Linni Linape called the rattlesnake ‘grandfather,’ and would on no account allow it to be destroyed. Hemy states that the Indians around Lake Huron had a similar superstition, and also designated the rattlesnake as their ‘grandfather.’ He also mentions instances in which offerings of tobacco were made to it, and its parental care solicited for the party performing the sacrifice. Carver also mentions an instance of similar regard on the part of a Menominee Indian, who carried a rattlesnake constantly with him, ‘treating it as a deity, and calling it his great father.’” The most curious notion, however, is that of the Mexicans, who always represented the first woman, whose name was translated by the old Spanish writers “the woman of our flesh,” as accompanied by a great male serpent. The serpent is the sun-god _Tonacatle-coatl_, the principal deity of the Mexican Pantheon, and his female companion, the goddess mother of mankind, has the title _cihua-cohuatl_, which signifies “woman of the serpent.” With the Peruvians, also, the principal deity was the serpent-sun, whose wife, the female serpent, gave birth to a boy and a girl from whom all mankind were said to be descended. It is remarkable that the serpent origin thus ascribed to the human race is not confined to the aborigines of America. According to Herodotus, the primeval mother of the Scyths was a monster, half woman and half serpent. This reminds us of the serpent parentage ascribed to various personages of classical antiquity.[223] Among the Semites, Zohák, the traditional Arabian conqueror of Central Asia, is represented as having two snakes growing at his back; and Mr. Bruce mentions that the line of the Abyssinian kings begins with “The Serpent,” _Arwe_, who is said to have reigned at Axum for 400 years, showing that the royal descent was traced from this animal. From the position assigned to the dragon in China, it probably was formerly thought to stand in a similar relation to the Emperor, of whom it is the special symbol.