243 



a house, containing only two rooms, which are 

 near seven metres in height. This house and 

 the enclosure, represented in the sixteenth plate, 

 form part of a system of walls and fortifications, 

 of which we shall hereafter speak, and which are 

 more than one hundred and fifty metres in length. 

 The cut of the stones, the disposition of the 

 doors and niches, the perfect analogy between 

 this edifice and those of Cuzco, leave no doubt 

 respecting the origin of this military monument, 

 which served as a lodging to the Incas, when 

 those princes journeyed occasionally from Peru to 

 the kingdom of Quito. The foundations of a 

 great number of edifices, which surround the 

 enclosure, indicate, that there was room enough 

 at Cannar to lodge the small army, which gene- 

 rally attended the Incas in their journeys. I 

 found among these foundations a stone cut with 

 great nicety, as represented in the fore-ground 

 of the drawing on the left : but I cannot guess 

 the purpose, for which it was shaped in this par- 

 ticular manner. 



What is most curious in this small edifice, 

 surrounded by a few trunks of schinus molle, is 

 the form of its roof, which gives it a perfect re- 

 semblance to European houses. One of the first 

 historians of America, Pedro de Cieca de Leon, 

 who began to describe his travels in 1541, gives 

 the detail of several houses of the Inca in the 

 province of Los Canares. He expressly 



r2 



