20 THE TEMPLE OF THE CEOSS. 



few persons only could have witnessed them. It may have been a dais under 

 which magistrates administering justice took their seats. Above all these rooms 

 are raised two i^arallel narrow walls, reaching to a height of eighty feet above 

 the ground. They are pierced with square apertures, and by means of projecting 

 stones one can reach the upper part, from which a most extended view over the 

 plains toward the north is presented. 



" The physiognomies of the human figures in alto-relievo indicate that they 

 represent a race not differing from the modern Indians ; they were, perhaps, 

 taller than the latter, who are of a middle or rather small stature, compared with 

 Europeans. There are also found among the ruins stones for grinding maize, 

 shaped exactly like those employed to-day by the Central American and Mexican 

 Indians. They consist of a stone slab with three feet, all made from one piece, 

 and a stout stone roller, with which the women crush the maize on the slab. 



" Though the Maya language is not spoken in all its purity in this neighbor- 

 hood, I am of opinion that it was derived from the ancient people that left 

 these ruins, and that it is one of the original languages of America. It is still 

 used by most of the Indians, and even by the other inhabitants, of the eastern 

 part of Tabasco, of Peten, and Yucatan. Books are printed in Maya, and the 

 clergy preach and confess the Indians in the same language."* 



Having duly noticed in the preceding pages the earlier accounts of the 

 Temple of the Cross, I will now present, in a cumulative form, the statements 

 of Stephens and Charnay relating to the same subject, with such additional 

 information as may be derived from Waldeck's designs and his scanty expla- 

 nations. 



The pyramidal structure bearing the temple stands, according to Stephens, 

 on a broken stone terrace, about sixty feet on the slope, with a level esplanade at 

 the top, one hundred and ten feet in breadth. The pyramid itself, now ruined 

 and overgrown with trees, is one hundred and thirty-four feet high on the slope, 

 as stated on a preceding page.f Charnay places the Temple of the Cross at about 

 three hundred metres to the right of the Palace. He alludes to the height of 

 the pyramid, without giving the measurement, and complains of the difficulties 

 encountered in its ascent. " The stones with which the pyramid was cased give 

 way under the feet ; creeping plants impede the progress, and the trees are 

 sometimes so close together as to bar the passage. It is difficult to account for 

 the mode of construction of these stupendous works, and the question arises 

 whether the builders did not avail themselves of the natural eminences so com- 

 mon in America, modifying them according to their designs, either by raising or 



* Galindo's letter to the Geographicnl Society of Paris (April 27, 1831), in : Antiquites Mexicaines, Note^et 

 Documents Divers; torn, i, p. 74. 



f Stephens; Central America, etc., vol ii, p. 344. 



