ately amongst all concerned--all, therefore, were
interested in making the result of their combined labour as lucrative
as possible.

This system worked admirably for a very long period. But as time went
on negligence and self-seeking crept in. Those whose duty it was to
superintend, threw more and more responsibility on their inferiors in
office, and in time it became rare for the rulers to interfere or to
interest themselves in any of the operations. This was the beginning
of the evil days. The members of the dominant class who had previously
given all their time to the state duties began to think about making
their own lives more pleasant. The elaboration of luxury was setting
in.

There was one cause in particular which produced great discontent
amongst the lower classes. The system under which the youth of the
nation was drafted into the technical schools has already been
referred to. Now it was always one of the superior class whose psychic
faculties had been duly cultivated, to whom the duty was assigned of
selecting the children so that each one should receive the training,
and ultimately be devoted to the occupation, for which he was
naturally most fitted. But when those possessed of the clairvoyant
vision, by which alone such choice could be made, delegated their
duties to inferiors who were wanting in such psychic attributes, the
results ensuing were that the children were often thrust into wrong
grooves, and those whose capacity and taste lay in one direction often
found themselves tied for life to an occupation which they disliked,
and in which, therefore, they were rarely successful.

The systems of land tenure which ensued in different parts of the
empire on the breaking up of the great Toltec dynasty were many and
various. But it is not necessary to follow them. In the later days of
Poseidonis they had, as a rule, given place to the system of
individual ownership which we know so well.

Reference has already been made, under the head of "Emigrations," to
the system of land tenure which prevailed during that glorious period
of Peruvian history when the Incas held sway about 14,000 years ago. A
short summary of this may be of interest as demonstrating the source
from which its ground-work was doubtless derived, as well as
instancing the variations which had been adopted in this somewhat more
complicated system.

All title to land was derived in the first instance from the Inca, but
half of it was as