Although the eating of human flesh by the ancient Mexicans was not merely to satisfy the appetite for such food but in obedience to religion, yet there must have been quite a good deal of partaking of it as the number of human sacrifices each year was very great. Too, must be kept in view, the sacrifices included men and women, quite often young people, and likewise children, even infants. One peculiar custom was that the giver of the feast where the body of a human sacrifice was served did not partake of the flesh of his own captive, having been disbarred from this because he was supposed to stand to the victim in the relation of father to son. =Lore.= "Various portents were drawn from the animal world; the cries of beasts of prey at night were supposed to forebode disaster to those who heard them, and the voices of certain birds were believed equally unlucky. The owl, so closely associated with Mictlantecutli, was especially regarded as the harbinger of ill-fortune and death, and if one of these birds perched upon the house of a sick man his demise was considered certain. It was held unlucky to encounter a skunk or a weasel, and the entry into the house of a rabbit or a troop of ants foreboded bad luck. If a certain kind of spider was found in the house, the owner traced a cross upon the ground, at the center of which he placed the insect. If it went towards the north, the direction of the underworld, it was regarded as a sign of death for the observer, any other direction foretelling misfortune of minor importance.