CHOLULA. 



203 



LETTER IX. 



The ancient city of Cholula lies on a broad plain, 

 extending to the base of the chains in advance of the 

 Great Nevadas, and at an elevatidn of sixjhousand five 

 hundred feet above the sea. 



Situated some miles to the south of the great road 

 between the large Spanish-built city of Puebla de los 

 Angeles and the capital, it is comparatively seldom 

 visited. To the north, beyond the barren but beauti- 

 fully formed Sierra Malinche, lies the territory of 

 Tlascala, whose republican inhabitants, spurred on by 

 their hatred to the Mexican yoke, acted such an impor- 

 tant part in the history of the conquest, as the allies of 

 Cortez. 



Cholula was the sacred city of the Mexican empire, 

 and at the time of the Spanish invasion numbered a 

 population within its precincts, to which the few thou- 

 sands who now occupy a small portion of its ancient 

 site are but a fraction. If we are rightly informed, its 

 decay is far from having reached its term, and this may 

 be easily accounted for by the vicinity of the city of 

 Puebla, which has sprung up within a few leagues to 

 the eastward. The principal square is very spacious, 

 and there are many large churches ; but we found little 

 in the city worthy of withholding our attention, during 

 the brief hours of our halt from the main object of our 

 visit, which it is hardly necessary to tell you was the 

 celebrated pyramid. 



This vast mound, in spite of the waste of centuries, 

 which has destroyed the regularity of its form, rounded 

 and broken down its angles, confounded its terraces, and 

 given it the air of a shapeless mass of earth, is still a 

 marvel and a wonder in the land, and will probably re- 

 main so to the end of time. 



