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A STUDY OF THE MANUSCRIPT TROANO

Codex; sometimes on the bench or form on which persons are seated or lying—see Plates XXXII, XXXIII, XXV*, XXXIV*, &c.; on the blocks or square figures on Plates II* to X* which relate to the festival of the apiarists; on the foundation or substance Fig. 74. which plants and vines arise, I as on Plates XXXII and XXXIII; Fig. 74. and as a character into which the machete or hatchet is thrust (Plate XXIV*). In the Codex it is found on the wall and base of what appears to be a kind of house, or a niche in a temple (Plates 30 and 67); on seats or benches, and in one instance on something laid on a pyramidal altar, on which a human head is placed, having the "dead eye," as though representing the act of cremation. It is evident that no one substance can be indicated in all these places.

On the plates relating to the bee-keepers' festival, where it is figured thus (Fig. 75), as on Plate VIII*, the block or vessel is red, or marked with a red border, is suspended by cords, and a bee is placed across it. Fig. 75. Here it is probable that it should be interpreted cab, "honey," or cabnal, "bee-hive." But this explanation will not answer in one out of a hundred of the other places where it is used.

Where it marks the substance out of which plants arise, as on Plates XXXII and XXXIII, it is probably used to signify the earth or soil. We find by reference to the lexicons that cab has also as one of its significations "earth" or "soil," and that cabal signifies "at the foot," "at the foundation," "at or on the ground," &c. This will furnish explanation of all those cases where "earth," "ground," or "soil" is applicable, or where it is on that out of which plants grow and on which persons are seated or lying. In the lower division of Plate XXXII are the figures of four seats or forms similar in outline to that, shown at a, Fig. 74,; two are marked with the character interpreted ppec, or "stone," and two with the character represented at a, Fig. 74. If two are stone, as we have good reason for believing, the others must be wood or earth. The fact that persons are represented lying down at full length