Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-12-14

into the artistic and scientific concep-
tons of the dead MRyas and carried
them forward to even greater glory?
And would the Pueblos in their protect
ed villages of New Mexico and Arizona
have 0Eorked out communistic and
individualistic scheme Of life more
nearly resembling Utopia than any
thing man has yet achieved?
We will never know the answer.
American culture was paralyzed by the
European conquest, even though the
death blow was not finally given until
the Spaniards extinguished the last
stronghold Of the independent Maya
princes and priests at Tayasal on Lake
Peten, Guatemala, in 1897.
Yet that phrase death blow" Is not.
entirely accurate. The simile of paraly-
sis is better. American culture was
paralyzed by the conquest, not entirely
killed. A little life Is maintained in the
body yet, but it is life which looks
backward, which takes from the past,
not the truly creative life of q vital
people. american culture is like a great
tree whose trunk is virtually dead, but
whose branches still put out "a few
feeble leaves. The botanist who in
spectS these leaves can see what the
whole structure was like in its prime,
even though he cannot expect any
further noteworthy growth. In South
America there are still tribes Of red
men who keep up many Of the Gus
toms that were scattered far and wide
by the imperialistic drive Of the Inca
Empire. In the inaccessible mountains
Of Northwestern Panama the uncon-
quered Guaymis still maintain many
of the cultural traits Of the Aztecs in
Guiding the use Of the spear thrower
or atlatl much like those found in the
Gypsum Cave, and which the Guaymis
call natlatei.
Hyatt verrill, who has visited the
Guaymis, says that "in their dialect,
the Guaymis are distinctly Aztecan, and
over 20 per cent Of the words in their
language are almost pure Nahuatl"
(the language of ancient Mexico)
In the mountains of Guatemala
Oliver LaFarge found the Jacaltecas
maintaining many of the ancient cere-
monials of the Mayas for the OBJ
servance of rites which neither the
| Spaniards nor the modern Guate-
malans have succeeded in stamping out.
Every year the Jacaltecas elect prayer
makers" or chaks whose functions are
much similar to those Of the rain
priests Of old. This tribe Of red men
also elects captains of dancers, which
have charge of the sacred wooden
drum, the nose of the village" The
Watch Winaq (good mem, of whom
there are eight at Jacaltenango, are
self-electing, hold Office for life and
know good deal Of the secret, old
knowledge" Mr.. LaFarge tells me.
"In their prayers they called on the
days, such as Eight Ahau. and particu-
larly on Year Bearers. 1t is they who
ON the Year Bearer day sacrifice a
turkey and burn its blood. the same
ceremony that was described by Bishop
Landa and that may be seen In the
old Maya book called the Dresden
CodeX. The Year Bearer is the day on
which the year begins according to the
old Maya calendar This day changes,
altogether there being four Year Bear
erS.
Believe Days Were Gods.
at must be remembered that the
Mayas believed that the days are really
gods who once lived on earth, which,"
says Mr.. LaFarge, helps to explain
why the Old People worship them so
much. The ordinary Indian, as in
olden times, knows little of all this, but
just does what the soothsayer tells him
| to. At present the Year Bearer and
| New Year here come in March" CThis
was in 1929
What a thrill there is in finding that
all the applied cruelty of the Spanish
Conquest, all the RECOMMENDATION and
IcptcSolOH OL ulcStlnO government since
| the SpaniArds were driven out of
America have not succeeded in killing
the old customs, so that even the an
cient calendar of the best astronomers
Of the entire world in 1892 is secretly
observed today by red men keeping
their stores in villages tucked away in
the Guatemalan mountains!
Similarly have seen the modern
Mayas of Yucatan, Quintana Roo and
British Honduras burning copal to an
Gent gods Of the rain in their wayside
shrines, have heard them tell how they
still have maize masses to beseech
both the white mans Christ and the
red mans Kukulcan to bless the earth
with the friendly showers which mean
bountiful crops Of the good yellow
maize of the ancientS.
Columbus, of course, thought he was
discovering not America, but India
Modern ethnologists studying tribes In
such remote places as the hills Of Qua
temala, modern Psychologists recover
ing Peruvian tapestries from graves
or Maya inscriptions from crumbling
temples, modern paleontologists un-
earthing stone dart points from amid
the fossilized bones Of creatures long
extinct-these men are In fact only