180 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



The collecting, packing, and transporting of these 

 things had given me more trouble and annoyance 

 than any other circumstance in our journey, and 

 their loss cannot be replaced ; for, being first on the 

 ground, and having all at my choice, I of course se- 

 lected only those objects which were most curious 

 and valuable ; and if I were to go over the whole 

 ground again, I could not find others equal to them. 

 I had the melancholy satisfaction of seeing their 

 ashes exactly as the fire had left them. We seem- 

 ed doomed to be in the midst of ruins ; but in all our 

 explorations there was none so touching as this. 



Next to the great building of the Casa del Gober- 

 nador, and hardly less extraordinary and imposing 

 in character, are the three great terraces which hold 

 it aloft, and give it its grandeur of position ; all of 

 them artificial, and built up from the level of the 

 plain. 



The lowest of these terraces is three feet high, 

 fifteen feet broad, and five hundred and seventy-five 

 feet long ; the second is twenty feet high, two hun- 

 dred and fifty feet wide, and five hundred and forty- 

 five feet in length ; and the third, on which the build- 

 ing stands, is nineteen feet high, thirty feet broad, 

 and three hundred and sixty feet in front. They were 

 all supported by substantial stone walls ; that of the 

 second terrace is still in a good state of preservation, 

 and at the corners the stones which support it are still 

 in their places, with their outer surfaces rounded, in- 

 stead of presenting sharp angles. 



