INTERIOR OF THE WELL. 353 



and roof were of rough, broken stone, and through 

 the centre ran the same worn path. From this pas- 

 sage others branched off to the right and left, and 

 in passing along it, at one place the Indians held 

 their torches dow^n to a block of sculptured stone. 

 We had, of course, already satisfied ourselves that 

 the cave or passage, whatever it might lead to, was 

 the work of nature, and had given up all expectation 

 of seeing the great monuments of art which had 

 been described to us ; but the sight of this block en- 

 couraged us with the hope that the accounts might 

 have some foundation. Very soon, however, our 

 hopes on this head were materially abated, if not 

 destroyed, by reaching what the Indians had de- 

 scribed as a mesa, or table. This had been a great 

 item in all the accounts, and was described as made 

 by hand and highly polished. It was simply a huge 

 block of rude stone, the top of which happened to 

 be smooth, but entirely in a state of nature. Be- 

 yond this we passed into a large opening of an ir- 

 regular circular form, being what had been descri- 

 bed to us as a plaza. Here the Indians stopped 

 and flared their torches. It was a great vault- 

 ed chamber of stone, with a high roof supported 

 by enormous stalactite pillars, which were what 

 the Indians had called the columns, and though 

 entirely different from what we had expected, the 

 effect under the torchUght, and heightened by the 

 wild figures of the Indians, was grand, and almost 

 repaid us for all our trouble. This plaza lay at one 

 Vol. I.— Yy 



