Page:The food of the Gods - A Popular Account of Cocoa.djvu/148

Rh was the drawing of blood from different parts of the body with which to anoint the idol;" and, as Ximinez states, "the blood of slain fowls was sprinkled over the land to be sown."



The idea that secret rites were necessary at the planting of cacao to counteract their ignorance of its requirements was long current also among the superstitious Spaniards, who similarly accounted for the early failures of the English, as witness the following amusing