distances up the sides, and running quite round the building; they had been covered with a cement painted light blue streaked with red, which is yet distinguishable in many places, and pieces of which I brought away: it seemed to me that these stages had been connected by a sloping path at the north-west angle; but if such were really the case, the remains are not sufficiently perceptible to justify a decided conclusion in the affirmative.

"On the summit of each pyramid is a small platform, once apparently covered with cement, and probably surmounted by a temple; but a few modern ruins show clearly, that the Spanish conquerors had erected chapels on the sites of the Mexican edifices.

"In no part could I discover any thing resembling an entrance; but several large holes which had been dug into the sides, either from curiosity or avarice, gave me the opportunity of ascertaining that neither layers of brick, or adobas (unburnt) were used in the construction: common volcanic stones, with which the surrounding plain is strewed, appear to have been first agglomerated into the pyramidal mass, by means of a cement composed of water, earth, and mortar; and the faces of the four inclined planes afterwards smoothed and perfected as to their shape and proportions. The latter operation has been effected with so much care, and the fissures so well closed, that the small nopal and other bushes now growing on them, have scarcely proved injurious to the workmanship."

The group of primitive remains which surround these remarkable structures are no less singular. "Between the two pyramids, arranged in regular order, and forming a kind of street, are a vast number of small mounds or tumuli of volcanic stones; varying in height from five to twenty and thirty feet: these did not seem to have had their sides smoothed, but wore the appearance of heaps raised to commemorate the dead.

"To the right hand of the pyramid of the Moon, stands the head of an immense idol, carved in a hard species of porphyry; and in another place a stone altar extremely well fashioned, which I measured as well as I could with my pocket-handkerchief, and then compared with my own height this rude mode gave eleven feet long (for it had been thrown down,) four wide, and four thick.

"The ground further to the right, outside of the tumuli, was so thickly scattered with small earthenware heads, and grotesque faces of men, that my two servants, assist ed by an Indian, picked up a considerable quantity while I was rambling about the lesser edifice: the difficulty of conveyance made me select only a few; some of which I afterwards gave away, but the Indian assured me I could purchase, at the different huts in the neighbourhood, far better and larger specimens of ancient workmanship."

Many of these singular terra cotta relics are to be found both in public and private British Museums. They are exceedingly varied in design, and have been thought by some writers to bear in many cases a close resemblance to Egyptian relics. Such similarity, however, generally fails to satisfy when subjected to careful scrutiny by students familiar with Egyptian antiquities, and the whole results of the most recent investigations into American antiquities tend to invalidate the conclusions of earlier writers as to an affinity traceable between Egyptian and Mexican antiquities.

CHAPTER III.

RUINS OF YUCATAN.

The dense wild wood, that hid the royal seat,
The lofty palms that choked the winding street,
Man's hand hath felled, and now in day's fair light,
Uxmal's broad ruins burst upon the sight.
City! whose date, and builders are unknown,
Gracing the wild, mysterious and alone.

MICHELL.

COLUMBUS, it is well known, never landed on the continent of America. The spot which he took possession of with such rapturous demonstrations of joy and triumph, was, it is believed, one of the Gucayrs, or Bahama Islands. Pursuing his course, he afterwards discovered Conception, Exuma, and Isla Larga; and when at length he landed at Cuba, he doubted not but he had found the real Cipango, which he had looked forward to as the reward for all his toils; nor did he ever abandon the belief that it formed a part of the Asiatic continent, and of the mainland of India, which he expected to reach when he sailed westward across the unexplored Atlantic Ocean. Later voyagers, however, speedily extended their discoveries. The mainland, and the magnificent capital of Montezuma, were discovered, and Mexico, after a time, yielded to the superior skill and courage of the strangers. But another part of the North American continent was also taken possession of by the Spanish colonists. Yucatan is an extensive peninsula lying between the Bay of Honduras and the Gulf of Mexico. Seen, as it usually is, only delineated

on the map of the continent of America, it appears an insignificant tract of country. But it is in reality a vast region, extending over five degrees of longitude, and includ ing vast, unexplored regions, which, for aught that we know of them, may include ancient cities, not like the crumbling ruins of Uxmal or Mayapan, but still occupied by the descendants of their native builders.

Many allusions to the cities of Yucatan are to be found in the accounts of the early Spanish historians. But an entirely new interest has been conferred on the subject by the publication of Stephens's "Incidents of Travel in Yucatan." This enterprising traveller, after exploring many new regions of Central America, had his attention drawn to Yucatan by accounts he received of ancient ruins of great extent which lay buried in the vast forests with which nearly the whole country is covered. He made a hasty visit to it, along with Mr. Catherwood, the results of which are mentioned in his "Incidents of Travel in Central America," &c., but the information he then received of the ruins of great cities and other ancient remains, determined him to devote another season for exploring this remarkable region. He accordingly revisited Yucatan in the following year, and carried out his design of visiting its chief ruins. On examining these his highest expectations were gratified. In the interesting narrative of his travels he gives an account of visits made to forty-four ruined cities, many of them containing extensive remains of temples and palaces still covered with sculptures, and frequently adorned both with paintings and hieroglyphics. Mr. Stephens's work possesses a further value from being adorned with numerous engravings of these gigantic memorials of an ancient race, large views of the ruined temples and palaces, curious representations of sculptures, hieroglyphic inscriptions, and many of the very singular natural features peculiar to that remarkable country. By means

of these, we are able to form a very clear and definite conception of the actual appearance of the remarkable structures, which stood forth as the architectural adornments of the strange land, to which the Spaniards of the fifteenth century were led by the indomitable faith and genius of Columbus. Yet, as we have already remarked, Columbus never reached the mainland of the new world. On his last and most sad and ill-fated expedition, after experiencing the most tempestuous weather, he reached a small island, which is thought to be the obscure and little noted one, not to be found even now on every map of the west Indian islands, but known by the name of Bonaca. On this island he landed, and while there he beheld approaching from the west a canoe of large size, the Indian crew of which, appeared to be more civilized than any he had yet met with, and on the Spaniards showing them gold, and inquiring by signs where it might be had, they pointed towards the west, and urged them to sail still further in the direction they had come. Columbus never doubted but that he had discovered in the island of Cuba, a land of ancient fame, which latterly he concluded to be that of Ophir, from whence Solomon obtained the stores of gold with which he adorned the temple of Jerusalem. But the star of Columbus's fortune had set, and the discoverer of the western worl was not destined to pass beyond the islands that stand between it and the broad Atlantic. "Well would it have been for Columbus," says his biographer, Washington Irvine," had he followed their advice. Within a day or two he would have arrived at Yucatan; the discovery of Mexico and the other opulent countries of New Spain would have necessarily followed. The Southern Ocean would have been disclosed to him, and a succession of splendid discoveries would have shed fresh glory on his declining age, instead of its sinking amid gloom, neglect, and disappointment."