crushed maize and seed;[1] the Polynesian deities coming incarnate in the bodies of birds to feed on the meat-offerings and carcases of human victims set out upon the altar-scaffolds;[2] the well-fed sacred snakes of West Africa, and local fetish animals like the alligator at Dix Cove which will come up at a whistle, and follow a man half a mile if he carries a white fowl in his hands, or the shark at Bonny that comes to the river bank every day to see if a human victim has been provided for his repast;[3] in modern India the cows reverently fed with fresh grass, Durga's meat-offerings laid out on stones for the jackals, the famous alligators in their temple-tanks.[4] The definition of sacred animal from this point of view distinctly includes man. Such in Mexico was the captive youth adored as living representative of Tezcatlipoca, and to whom banquets were made during the luxurious twelvemonth which preceded his sacrifice at the festival of the deity whom he personated: such still more definitely was Cortes himself, when Montezuma supposed him to be the incarnate Quetzalcoatl come back into the land, and sent human victims accordingly to be slaughtered before him, should he seem to lust for blood.[5] Such in modern India is the woman who as representative of Radha eats and drinks the offerings at the shameless orgies of the Saktas.[6] More usually it is the priest who as minister of the deities has the lion's share of the offerings or the sole privilege of consuming them, from the Fijian priest who watches for the turtle and puddings apportioned to his god,[7] and the West African priest who carries the allowances of food sent to the local spirits of mountain, or river, or grove, which food he eats himself as the spirit's
- ↑ Rochefort, 'Iles Antilles,' p. 367.
- ↑ Ellis, 'Polyn. Res.' vol. i. pp. 336, 358. Williams, 'Fiji,' vol. i. p. 220.
- ↑ Bosman, 'Guinea,' in Pinkerton, vol. xvi. p. 494; J. L. Wilson, 'W. Afr.' p. 218; Burton, 'W. & W. fr. W. Afr.' p. 331.
- ↑ Ward, 'Hindoos,' vol. ii. p. 195, &c.
- ↑ Clavigero, 'Messico,' vol. ii. p. 69. J. G. Müller, p. 631.
- ↑ Ward, vol. ii. p. 194; 'Mem. Anthrop. Soc.' vol. i. p. 332.
- ↑ Williams, 'Fiji,' vol. i. p. 226.
