284 



INCIDENTS OF TRAVEL. 



physical conformation which has been bestowed 

 with amazing uniformity upon all the tribes on our 

 continent, from Canada to Patagonia, and from the 

 Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. He adds, that it af- 

 fords additional support to the opinion which he 

 has always entertained, that, notwithstanding some 

 slight variation in physical conformation, and others 

 of a much more remarkable character in intellectual 

 attainments, all the aboriginal Americans of all 

 known epochs belong to the same great and dis- 

 tinctive race. 



If this opinion is correct, and I believe it — if this 

 skeleton does present the same Uj'pe of physical 

 conformation with all the tribes of our continent — 

 then, indeed, do these crumbling bones declare, as 

 with a voice from the grave, that we cannot go back 

 to any ancient nation of the Old World for the build- 

 ers of these cities ; they are not the works of peo- 

 ple who have passed away, and whose history is 

 lost, but of the same great race which, changed, 

 miserable, and degraded, still clings around their 

 ruins. 



To return to the ruins of San Francisco. We 

 devoted two days more to excavating, but did not 

 make any farther discoveries. 



Among the ruins were circular holes in the 

 ground like those at Uxmal. The mouth of one 

 was broken and enlarged, and I descended by a 

 ladder into a dome-shaped chamber, precisely the 

 same as at Uxmal, but a little larger. At Uxmal 



