190 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



ness, but all so ruined that, with the exception of 

 this one building, little of the detail could be discov- 

 ered. 



Back of this building, or, rather, on the other 

 front, was a thriving tobacco patch, the only thri- 

 ving thing we saw at Iturbide ; and on the border 

 another ancient well, now, as in ages past, furnish- 

 ing water, and from which the Indian attending the 

 tobacco patch gave us to drink. Beyond were tow- 

 ering mounds and vestiges, indicating the existence 

 of a greater city than any we had yet encountered. 

 In wandering among them Dr. Cabot and myself 

 counted thirty-three, all of which had once held, 

 buildings aloft. The field was so open that they 

 were all comparatively easy of access, but the 

 mounds themselves were overgrown. I clambered 

 up them till the work became tiresome and unprof- 

 itable ; they were all, as the Indians said, puras 

 piedras, pure stones ; no buildings were left; all had 

 fallen ; and though, perhaps, more than at any 

 other place, happy that it was our fortune to wan- 

 der among these crumbling memorials of a once 

 powerful and mysterious people, we almost mourned 

 that our lot had not been cast a century sooner, 

 when, as we beUeved, all these edifices were entire. 



