In Central America and in South America the blood of sacrificial offerings was smeared on the doorways of houses as well as of temples, as a means of covenanting with the local deities. Illustrations of this are found in the records and remains of Peru[206] and Guatemala.[207] In both Europe and America, the practice of nailing horseshoes on the side-posts of a doorway, for “good luck,” or as a means of guarding the inmates of the house from evil, is very common. So lately as the seventeenth century it was said: “Most houses of the West End of London have the horseshoe on the threshold.”[208] Even at the threshold of Christian churches, in recent years, the symbol of the horseshoe was to be found as a means of protection.[209] The horseshoe is often to be found on a ship’s mast. At the present time, horseshoes of various sizes, for use as doorway guards against evil, are found on sale in Philadelphia, and other centers of civilization. 8. SYMBOL OF THE RED HAND. It would seem that, in primitive practice, the hand of the covenanter dipped in the sacrificial blood on the threshold, and stamped on the door-posts and lintel, was the sign-manual of the covenant between the contracting party or parties, and God, or the gods, invoked in the sacrifice. Illustrations of this custom, as still surviving in the East, have been given, from Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Morocco.[210] Naturally, therefore, the sign-manual by itself came to stand for, or to symbolize, the covenant of the threshold altar; and the stamp of the red hand became a token of trust in God or the gods covenanted with in sacrifice, and of power or might resulting from this covenant relation. Wherever the red hand was shown, or found, it was a symbol of covenant favor with Deity, and it came to be known, accordingly, as the “hand of might.” In the region of ancient Babylonia, also, the red-hand stamp is still to be seen on houses and on animals, apparently as the symbol of their covenant consecration by their owner. Dr. Hilprecht says: “Over all the doors of the rooms in the large khan of Hillah, on the Euphrates, partly built upon the ruins of ancient Babylon, I noticed the red impression of an outspread hand, when I was there in January, 1889. Several white horses in our caravan from Bagdâd to Nippur had the stamp of a red hand on their haunches.”