24 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



publication relates to a stone tablet covered with glyphic designs which 

 was formerly in the possession of the National Institute for the Promo- 

 tion of Science (established at Washington about forty years ago) and 

 became afterward the property of the Smithsonian Institution. The 

 records state that the fragments constituting this tablet were presented 

 to the National Institute by Mr. Charles Russell, consul of the United 

 States at Laguna, island of Carmen, Mexico. They had been obtained 

 at Palenque in a manner not explained, and arrived in Washington in 

 1842, and were deposited in the Patent Office with the collections of the 

 National Institute. The transfer of these collections to the Smithsonian 

 Institution took place in 1858. 



The archaeological importance of this tablet was first pointed out in 

 18G3 by Dr. George A. Matile. While engaged in making a cast of it, 

 at the request of the late Professor Henry, he recognized it as one of the 

 three stone slabs which, placed together, bore on their surface the sculpt- 

 ure of the famous group of the cross, forming the chief ornament of one 

 of the temples at Palenque. The earliest explorers of the ancient city, 

 Del Rio and Dupaix, still saw the Smithsonian tablet in its proper place 

 in the "Temple of the Cross," and figured it, though in a very defective 

 manner, as a part of the group ; but it probably was already broken in 

 1832, when Waldeck explored the ruins of Palenque. Stephens, who 

 was there eight years afterward, noticed its scattered pieces. As a Con- 

 sequence, neither of the last-named explorers has left a representation 

 of this valuable complement of the celebrated sculpture. 



Impressed with the importance of the subject, the author undertook 

 to prepare this monograph, which is not merely confined to a description 

 of the tablet but embraces also a number of cognate topics. Of the two 

 accompanying plates, which were specially executed for the work, one 

 represents the Smithsonian tablet in juxtaposition with Catherwood's 

 well-known delineation of the Tablet of the Cross in Volume 1 1 of Ste- 

 phens's "Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yuca- 

 tan"; the other is an artotype showing the Smithsonian tablet as it 

 appears after its restoration. Most of the illustrations in the text were 

 kindly lent by Mr. II. II. Bancroft, of San Francisco; the others were 

 expressly engraved for the publication. 



The work comprises five chapters, to which an appendix is added. 



In the first chapter the author gives the history of the Smithsonian 

 tablet as far as he could trace it by an examination of the existing re- 

 cords. The second chapter treats in chronological order of the expedi- 

 tions undertaken for the purpose of exploring the ruins of Palenque, 

 and of the works and minor publications resulting from these explora- 

 tions. It is a curious circumstance that the existence of the ancient 

 city remained unknown until the second half of the eighteenth century, 

 when accident led to the discovery of these remarkable ruins, hidden 

 for centuries in the shadows of a Guatemalan forest. Cortez, on his 



