324 INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



^words used, it inaj be understood that the discovery 

 w^as then made of an actual existing city, but it is a 

 fair construction of these w^ords to suppose that no- 

 thing more is meant than a discovery of what the 

 words Chi-chen import, viz., the mouths of wells, 

 having reference to the two great senotes, the dis- 

 covery of wells being, among all primitive people, 

 and particularly in the dry region of Yucatan, an 

 event worthy to be noted in their history. 



One of these senotes I have already mentioned ; 

 the other I did not visit till the afternoon preceding 

 our departure from Chichen. Setting out from the 

 Castillo, at some distance we ascended a wooded 

 elevation, which seemed an artificial causeway lead- 

 ing to the senote. The senote was the largest and 

 wildest we had seen ; in the midst of a thick forest, 

 an immense circular hole, with cragged, perpendic- 

 ular sides, trees growing out of them and overhang- 

 ing the brink, and still as if the genius of silence 

 reigned within. A hawk was sailing around it, 

 looking down into the water, but without once flap- 

 ping its wings. The water was of a greenish hue. 

 A mysterious influence seemed to pervade it, in uni- 

 son with the historical account that the well of Chi- 

 chen was a place of pilgrimage, and that human vic- 

 tims were thrown into it in sacrifice. In one place, 

 on the very brink, were the remains of a stone struc- 

 ture, probably connected with ancient superstitious 

 rites; perhaps the place from which the victims 

 were thrown into the dark well beneath. 



