ANTIQUARIAN CONJECTURES. 347 



a child; all speculations on the subject are of course 

 entitled to little regard, but perhaps it would not be 

 wrong to ascribe to these personages a sacerdotal 

 character. The hieroglyphics doubtless explain all. 

 Near them are other hieroglyphics, which reminded us 

 of the Egyptian mode for recording the name, history, 

 office, or character of the persons represented. This 

 tablet of the cross has given rise to more learned spec- 

 ulations than perhaps any others found at Palenque. 

 Dupaix and his commentators, assuming for the build- 

 ing a very remote antiquity, or, at least, a period long 

 antecedent to the Christian era, account for the appear- 

 ance of the cross by the argument that it was known 

 and had a symbolical meaning among ancient nations 

 long before it was established as the emblem of the 

 Christian faith. Our friends the padres, at the sight of 

 it, immediately decided that the old inhabitants of Pa- 

 lenque were Christians, and by conclusions which are 

 sometimes called jumping, they fixed the age of the 

 buildings in the third century. 



There is reason to believe that this particular build- 

 ing was intended as a temple, and that the enclosed 

 inner chamber was an adoratorio, or oratory, or altar. 

 "What the rites and ceremonies of worship may have 

 been, no one can undertake to say. 



The upper part of this building differs from the first. 

 As before, there was no staircase or other communica- 

 tion inside or out, nor were there the remains of any. 

 The only mode of access was, in like manner, by climb- 

 ing a tree, the branches of which spread across the roof. 

 The roof was inclined, and the sides were richly orna- 

 mented with stucco figures, plants, and flowers, but 

 mostly ruined. Among them were the fragments of a 

 beautiful head and of two bodies, in justness of propor- 



