acters for the letter B. Is
it possible that the two principal parts of this compound character
denote the Maya words _oc be_, "foot journey" or "enters upon the
journey"? Attention will be called to this further on, but it is proper
to state here that as the prefix is found in three other corresponding
characters it cannot be a necessary part of that which represents the
footsteps in this case.

[Illustration: No. 21.]

Assuming the theory above given as to the characters in the inscription
which represent the things under the deity figures to be correct,
the second character in the middle group of the lower division of
Plate 65, shown in Fig. 378, will be the symbol for the substance
represented by scrolls under the figure of the deity.[354-1]

The prefix in this case is the same as that to the symbol above described
(No. 20), and of course has the same signification. The other portion of
No. 21 must therefore represent the substance in which the god is
walking. This appears to be dust, sand, or mud.

[Illustration: No. 22. _a_ _b_ _c_]

_Cacauak_ or _cacauche_. The wild or cultivated cacao. Found a number
of times in the Dresden Codex, sometimes as represented in the
marginal figure _a_ and sometimes as in _c_, and always in
connection with figures holding in the hand a fruit of some kind. It
appears once in the Cortesian Codex (Plate 36), as shown in _b_, in
connection with a fruit of precisely the same kind as that figured
in the Dresden Codex. It is found also on Plate XVIII* of the
Manuscript Troano, but is apparently used here to denote an action.

There can be little, if any, doubt, judging by the figures in connection
with which it is found, that this symbol is used in the Dresden and the
Cortesian Codices to denote the cacao. Whether it refers to the tree or
to the fruit is uncertain; possibly the different forms in which it is
found are intended to denote these distinctions. In some of the figures
the capsule appears to be indicated; in others the seed. The prefix to
figure _c_ apparently indicates the heaping or piling up of the fruit on
the dish held in the hands of the individuals figured in the same
connection, as, for example, on Plates 12 and 13 of the Dresden Codex. If
this supposition be correct it gives us a key to the signification of
this prefix. Reference to its use in the upper division of Plate XVIII*,
Manuscript Troano, will be m