166 THE NATURALIST IN NICARAGUA. [Ch. IX. 



and continued round to the back, in the same way as the 

 arms. 



The back of the figure was elaborately carved, the 

 most noticeable features being a wide ornamented belt 

 around the waist, and two well-carved crosses, one on 

 each shoulder. 



The other stones lying about were broken portions of 

 other smaller figures and of pedestals. All were made 

 out of very hard, tough trachyte ; and the labour required 

 to make the principal one out of such difficult material 

 without tools of iron must have been immense. 



The fragments were all lying out on the bare plain. I 

 thought they must have been brought from some burial- 

 place of the ancient Indians. Our guide, on being asked, 

 said he had seen other cairns of stones besides these on 

 the hill-top, but could not recollect where. He was very 

 uneasy when questioned ; and at last said he had business 

 to attend to, and left us abruptly. After he went away, 

 we examined all around for traces of graves. Between 

 the plain and the river was a thicket of low trees and 

 undergrowth. Peering into this, we saw some heaps of 

 stones ; and, pushing in amongst the bushes, we found it 

 was full of old Indian graves, marked by heaps of stones, 

 in the centres of some of which still stood the pedestals on 

 which the statues had been placed. Most of the heaps were 

 about twenty feet in diameter, and composed of stones of 

 the average size of a man's head : but one, from the 

 centre of which grew an immense cotton-wood tree, was 

 made of about a dozen very large stones, some of which 

 were about five feet long, three broad, and one thick. 

 Here we got a clue to the explanation of the behaviour of 

 our guide. When he told us that he knew not where there 



