MEXICO AND ITS ANTIQUITIES. 



625 



and consequently requiring more ingenious combination and greater 

 art and labor. They are inlaid on the surface of the wall, and their 

 duration is owing to the method of fixing the prepared stones into the 

 stone surface, which makes their union with it perfect." M. Charnay 

 says that the beauty of these buildings can be matched only by that 

 of the monuments of Greece and Rome in their best days. 



The Pyramid of Cholula was one of the great edifices of the world. 

 It was 1,423 feet wide at the base, 177 feet high, and covered a super- 

 ficial area of forty-five acres. Civilized man is gradually destroying 

 it, and a cut has been made in one side of it for a railroad-track. 

 Near it are other smaller pyramids. 



Fig. 4. Aztec Temple at Cholttla. 



The teocallis of San Juan Teotihuacan are next in age to those of 

 Cholula. The two largest are dedicated to the Sun and the Moon. 

 The former is 180 feet high, and 682 feet long at the base. Its sum- 

 mit now marked by a platform about 75 feet square and a modern 

 cylindrical monument of stone is said to have been crowned with a 

 temple, in which was a gigantic statue of the Sun, made of an entire 

 block of stone, and wearing a breastplate of gold and silver. The 

 two principal pyramids are surrounded by several smaller ones, few of 

 which exceed twenty-five feet in height. According to tradition, they 

 were dedicated to the Stars, and served as sepulchres for the illustrious 

 men of the nation. 



Toltec ruins are found at Tula, about fifty miles north of the 

 capital. 



TOL. XXIY. 40 



