20 



THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 



Another relic of the same material, and with a like style of ornament, accompanies 

 the vase, and was found in the same neighborhood. It seems to have been de- 

 signed as a pedestal for a small statue. There are also several vases, in which 

 the bones and ashes of the dead were packed after the decomposition of the flesh 

 or after burning. 



The largest and most elaborate monuments in Nicaragua exist in the little 

 Island of Pensaeola, near the base of the extinct volcano of Momobacho. They 

 weigh a number of tons each, and are distinguished as being wrought from blocks 

 of sandstone — a material which is not found on the island. Two of the statues 

 of the Smithsonian collection are from the Island of Zapatero, in Lake Nicaragua, 

 where once existed one of the most imposing aboriginal temples of the country. 

 Here, among the ruins of the teocaUi, or high-places of the former inhabitants;, 

 were found entire statues, besides the fragments of many others, several broken 

 sacrificial stones, etc. 



Xt|e ^q.seiih]. 



The Smithsonian Institution is now in possession of the best collection of the 

 larger North American and European mammalia, both skins and skeletons, to be 

 found in the United States. In birds it is only second to the collection of the 

 Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences — the latter being without doubt the 

 most extensive and perfect now extant. Of fish the Smithsonian has a greater 

 number than is to be found in any cabinet, except that of Professor Agassiz. 



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