the air upon their broomsticks and met at cross-roads, was Tlazolteotl, a divinity who, like all deities of growth, possessed a plutonic significance. The broom is her especial symbol, and in Codex Fejérváry-Mayer (sheet 17) we have a picture of her which represents her as the traditional witch, naked, wearing a peaked hat, and mounted upon a broomstick. In other places she is seen standing beside a house accompanied by an owl, the whole representing the witch’s dwelling, with medicinal herbs drying beneath the eaves. Thus the evidence that the haunting mothers and their patroness present an exact parallel with the witches of Europe seems complete, and should provide those who regard witchcraft as a thing essentially European with considerable food for thought. The sorcery cult of the Mexican Nagualists of post-Columbian times was also permeated with practices similar to those of European witchcraft, and we read of its adherents smearing themselves with ointment to bring about levitation, flying through the air, and engaging in wild and lascivious dances, precisely as did the adherents of Vaulderie, or the worshippers of the Italian Aradia.
There are not wanting signs that living women of evil reputation desired to associate themselves with the Ciuateteô. Says the interpreter of Codex Vaticanus A: “The first of the fourteen day-signs, the house, they considered unfortunate, because they