STONE-HR APS — STONES OF MEMORIAL, ETC. 165 



bodies, are the least subject to decay or change : they also, for the same reason, 

 keep baskets of stones in their cabins." — {Hist. Virginia, p. 184.) 



Besides the rough, upright, and wrought stones, constituting enclosures, or 

 occupying the areas of sacred structures, in Central America and Yucatan, ac- 

 counts of which are given by Mr. Stephens, we have intelligence of the recent 

 discovery of monuments in New Granada (South America), which exhibit a still 

 closer relationship to the primitive stone circles and other analogous structures of 

 the other continent. The subjoined account is given in a letter from Signor 

 Velez, dated Bogota, December, 1846 : 



" In traversing, at different times, the pi'ovince of Tunja, with the sole purpose 

 of examining the country, I acquired some vague information respecting the pre- 

 sumed existence, in the province of Leiva, of some ruins belonging to a temple or 

 a palace of the times of the ancient Indians. As the account varied each time 

 that I attempted to inform myself by inquiries as to the existence of remains of 

 buildings anterior to the conquest, and as no one affirmed that he had seen them 

 himself, I began to doubt the truth of the report. Nevertheless, as the subject 

 was one that interested me exceedingly, I undertook a journey, in the month of 

 June, 1836, in spite of the time and trouble it would necessarily cost me, in order 

 to put an end to my uncertainty. After traversing the province of Leiva in differ- 

 ent directions, without meeting with the object I was in search of, and after 

 advancing as far as the neighborhood of Moniquira, by following the route from 

 Gachantiva to this place, across a beautiful gently sloping plain under cultivation, 

 I discovered a large stone, which, when seen some distance off, did not at first 

 appear as if wrought by the hand of man. On approaching it, I found it was a 

 sort of column, four and two-sixths varas in length by three and one-half in diame- 

 ter. It seemed to me that such stones, although rudely wrought, must have served 

 as columns. On examining the locality, I found, scattered here and there, other 

 stones similar to the first : and at last, thirteen stones of the largest size, ranged 

 as in a circle about fifty varas in circumference. It appeared to me that they must 

 have proceeded from some temple or palace, extending back to a remote period. 

 Some of these columns have a flattened shape, like a fish ; each has notches at its 

 extremeties, which show clearly what means were employed for making fast to 

 them and drawing them from the quarry to the site which they now occupy. 



" But now, when I began to despair of meeting with the ruins of an edifice, 

 which was the main object of my journey, some Indians from a hut pointed out 

 to me a spot some four hundred varas distant from the thirteen last mentioned 

 columns. 1 immediately proceeded thither, and great indeed was my joy at 

 beholding ruins ! I found cylindrical columns, exceedingly well wrought, fixed in 

 the ground, and occupying a surface forty-five varas long by twenty-two broad. 

 These ruins extend, in the direction of their length, from east to west; some 

 arranged in a straight line running in the same direction, with this peculiarity, that 

 the columns are so near together that their distance from each other does not 

 exceed half a vara. Their circumference also is not over half a vara (sic). As 

 to their' length, it could not be determined, these remains being so much damaged. 



