4 CHICHEN ITZl. 



Sweet, of Boston, who had been for some months assisting Mr. Thompson, the American 

 Consul, in his explorations at Labna, came to pay me a visit for a week and then 

 volunteered to stay and help me as long as his engagements would permit him. 

 Luckily for me nothing occurred to necessitate his return home until July, and 1 

 gained not only a delightful companion but a most energetic and enthusiastic worker, 

 and without his timely help my expedition must have proved almost a failure. As 

 Mr. Sweet is a careful and finished photographer I turned over my apparatus to his 

 charge, and the series of photographs of Chichen now published can be left to speak 

 for themselves. 



I could now devote my time more particularly to the survey, but in this work also 

 Mr. Sweet gave me the greatest assistance. 



During the month of May we were both ill with fever, but as our attacks fortunately 

 occurred on alternate days we could each take it in turn to be nurse and patient. The 

 fever left us both very weak, and as at this time we were entirely deserted by our 

 workmen it was difficult even to supply ourselves with wood and water ; and I well 

 remember one occasion on which it took us the whole afternoon to draw our water 

 at the 'cenote, carry the tin only half full to the foot of the stairway, and then drag it 

 step by step up to the house, so weak had the fever left us. 



However, we both appeared to make a complete recovery, and as about this time 

 the supply of labourers was better, we made great progress with the clearing. Then 

 the heat became intense and the physical hard work very trying ; for the Indians, 

 although they could be trusted to some extent in the matter of clearing bush, would 

 do next to nothing in the way of digging and moving away earth and rubble, unless 

 one of us not only worked with them but worked much harder with pickaxe and 

 spade than they did. 



Towards the end of our stay we were principally occupied in making paper moulds 

 of the sculpture, all of which we had to do ourselves, as none of our labourers could 

 be trusted as assistants in such work. At last our stock of provisions began to run 

 short, and as we could buy hardly anything to eat in the neighbourhood, after living 

 for a day or two on nothing more than a little rice and some beef-tea, we were forced 

 to pack up, and on the 2nd July set out on our return to Merida. Mr. Sweet had 

 business to occupy him for a few days in Merida, so I said good-bye to him and took 

 passage in the first steamer for New York; just in time, I think, for the change of air 

 to save me from a serious illness, and as it was I did not recover my usual health for 

 more than six months. 



I attribute our fever to the bad water of the 'cenote. The Casa de Monjas made us 

 an excellent dwelling-house, and as we had seven stone-roofed rooms at our disposal we 

 were even able to make ourselves quite comfortable. On the broad terrace which ran 

 round the house, thirty feet above the ground, we were on a level with the tree-tops, 

 and we could see over the country for miles round to an unbroken horizon. 



