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82 MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS.
appears to have been known also to the Arabs; but there is no indication whatever of its having been transmitted to the peninsula by the Moors, and afterwards to south America by the Portuguese and Spaniards.
The wooden tongues in the drum teponaztli may be considered as a contrivance exclusively of the ancient American Indians. Nevertheless a construction nearly akin to it may be observed in certain drums of the Tonga and Feejee islanders, and of the natives of some islands in Torres strait. Likewise some negro tribes in western and central Africa have certain instruments of percussion which are constructed on a principle somewhat reminding us of the teponaztli. The method of bracing the drum by means of cords, as exhibited in the huchneil of the Mexican Indians, is evidently of very high antiquity in the east. It was known to the ancient Egyptians.
Rattles, pandean pipes made of reed, and conch trumpets, are found almost all over the world, wherever the materials of which they are constructed are easily obtainable. Still, it may be noteworthy that the Mexicans employed the conch trumpet in their religious observances apparently in much the same way as it is used in the Buddhist worship of the Thibetans and Kalmuks.
As regards the sonorous metal in the great temple at Tezcuco some inquirers are sure that it was a gong : but it must be borne in mind that these inquirers detect everywhere traces proving an invasion of the Mongols, which they maintain to have happened about six hundred years ago. Had they been acquainted with the little Peruvian bell (engraved on page 75) they would have had more tangible musical evidence in support of their theory than the supposed gong; for this bell certainly bears a suggestive resemblance to the little hand-bell which the Buddhists use in their religious ceremonies.
The Peruvians interpolated certain songs, especially those which they were in the habit of singing while cultivating the fields, with the word hailli which signified " Triumph." As the |
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