GEOGRAPHY AND ANTIQUITIES. 387 



garded as sacred previous to the conquest by the Spaniards. The 

 aborigines were accustomed to thro\v into it treasures as offerings to 

 their deities, and immense wealth is supposed to be deposited beneath 

 its waters. London Athenaeum, April. 



ANCIENT MONUMENTS ON THE ISLANDS OF LAKE NICARAGUA. 



AT the meeting of the Ethnological Society of New York, on March 

 2, a long paper from Hon. E. G. Squier was read, describing some dis- 

 coveries he had made on the islands of Lake Nicaragua, in Central 

 America. On the island of Pensacola, he discovered two large blocks 

 of stone, which proved to be large and well-proportioned statues of su- 

 perior workmanship. The smaller of the two had evidently been pur- 

 posely buried, and its arm was broken. " It represented a human 

 male figure, of massive proportions, seated upon a square pedestal, its 

 head slightly bent forward, and its hands resting on its thighs. Above 

 the head rose a heavy and monstrous representation of the head of an 

 animal, below which could be traced the folds of a serpent, the fierce 

 head of which was sculptured, open-mouthed, and with life-like accu- 

 racy, by the side of the face of the figure. The whole combination 

 was elaborate and striking ; but the fact of most interest, in an archae- 

 ological point of view, is, that the surmounting animal head is the sa- 

 cred sign of Tochtli of the Mexican calendar, corresponding very near- 

 ly, if not exactly, with the bas-relief of that sign on the great calendar 

 stone of Mexico, and with the painted representations in the Mexican 

 MSS. The stone from which the figure here described is cut, is a 

 hard basalt ; but the sculpture is bold, and the limbs, unlike those of 

 the monoliths of Copan, are so far detached as could be done with 

 safety, and are cut with a freedom which I have observed in no other 

 statuary works of the American aborigines." 



The larger and by far the most interesting of the two statues was 

 after much trouble uncovered and raised. " It represented a man with 

 massive limbs, and broad, prominent chest, in a stooping, or rather 

 crouching, posture, his hands resting on the thighs just above the 

 knees. Above his head rose the monstrous head and jaws of some ani- 

 mal ; its fore paws were placed one upon each shoulder, and the hind 

 ones upon the hands of the statue, as if binding them to the thigh. It 

 probably was intended to represent an alligator, or a similar mytholog- 

 ical animal. Its back was covered with carved plates, like rough mail. 

 The whole rose from abroad, square pedestal. Its carving was bold 

 and free. I never have seen a statue which conveyed so forcibly the 

 idea of power and strength/' A portion of a third statue was after- 

 wards accidentally discovered upon the same island. "The lower 

 half had been broken off, and could not be found ; what remained was 

 simply the bust and head. The latter was disproportionately great ; 

 the eyes were large, round, and staring ; the ears broad and long ; and 

 from the widely-distended mouth, the lower jaw of which was forced 

 down by the two hands of the figure, projected a tongue which reached 

 to the breast, giving to the whole an unnatural and horrible expres- 



sion.' 



