NATIONAL MUSEUM. 
101 
This is really one of the most beautiful relies in the Museum, and is 
very accurately represented on the opposite page. It was discovered 
about nine feet below the surface of the ground ; the upper portion of it 
was filled with skulls, while thd lower contained fragments of the rest 
of the human frame. There appears to have been no bottom to the vase, 
but it was covered with the circular top delineated in the engraving. 
The whole vessel is one foot ten inches high, by one foot three and a half 
inches in diameter. 
This vase, besides being remarkable for the ornaments in relief upon 
it, presents all the colors with which it was originally painted, in high 
preservation and brilliancy, immediately below the rim is a winged 
head, with an Indian dress of plumes. The eyes are wide and fixed, 
and the mOuth is partly opened, displaying the teeth. The handles are 
oddly shaped, and depending from the tips of the wings is a collar formed 
of alternate ears of corn and sunflowers. The colors of the body of this 
vase are a bright azure ; the upper rim is a brilliant crimson, and the next 
a light-pink. The head and the ends of the wings, with the stripe in the 
middle, are painted a light-brown. The circular ornament in the centre 
is crimson, and the figures on it yellow. The sunflowers are also yel- 
low, while the two outer ears of corn are red, and the centre one blue. 
The band below these is brown, similar to the head and wings. 
The head on this vase is very i-emarkable in its expression. There is 
a fixed, intense, stony stare in the eyes, and a pinched sharpness about 
the mouth, which denote its character. It was evidently the idea of an 
Angel of death, while the full blown sunflower, and the ripe and stripped 
ears of corn, denote the fullness of years. 
In one of the cases are a series of interesting objects, of which the fol- 
lowing designs will give the reader some idea. 
Tnis is a rattle, made of baked clay, finely tempered, containing a 
small ball, the size of a pea. 
