GRANITE WORKS OF THE ANCIENTS. ties

designed and executed. One of these scenes represents “a | through. The remaining sixty-six arches, situated on

| large number of captives in the hands of executioners, who are inflicting on them every variety of the most ex- cruciating torture. In some parts, men are figured driving nails into the bodies of unfortunates impaled on a kind of gallows; some are dashing young children against rocks and stone; some are cutting to pieces men and women confined in fetters, or pounding them in mortars; and others are hanging up prisoners to trees by their legs to allow the vultures to attack them.” Truly, as the psalmist exclaimed, the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty !

A curious gong chamber, at one of the angles of the lower corridor or gallery in this mostinteresting structure of a bygone age, reveals the too probable fact of the practice of priestcraft on the superstitious feelings of the people. It was constructed in such a way as to cause a heavy sound, like that emitted by a gong, to reverberate around, when a person standing in the midst of the apartment strikes his breast with his hand, or stamps upon the floor. A gong or bell apparently was for- merly placed here, and considerable ingenuity must have been exercised to construct the walls and roof so as to produce the above effect, which would necessarily give increased power to the instrument. A small perforation in the wall, and a channel scooped out in the pavement of the adjoining passage, manifestly intended for a wire, show that the instrument contained in the gong chamber could have been struck through the agency of a person secreted in one of the more distant apartments.

We remarked at the outset, that the western hemisphere could boast of ancient stone monuments, which manifested the same stupendous labour and manifold skill in their construction and embellishment as those in the eastern. On these, however, we can bestow but a passing notice, The magnificent table-land of Anahuae, or ancient Mexico, and the several intermediate states between it and the isthmus of Panama, are richer in the vestiges of antiquity than any other portions of the northern continent of America. Here the structural genius of the Egyptians and Hindus is oftentimes rivalled, and that of the Greeks and Romans as frequently surpassed. Mexico is a land of pyramids, in earth, brick, and stone; and many of them, for magnitude and splendour, are hardly inferior to those dominating the valley of the Nile. In the for- mation of canals, and in the ingenuity exhibited in over- coming natural obstacles, the ancient inhabitants of this country, whether Aztecs or Toltecs cannot now be deter- mined, rank first among their equals. Of these works of utility, the aqueduct of Chipultepee counts 904 arches, or 10,826 feet of solid masonry, within a space of two miles. That of Santa Fé, similarly formed, is six miles in extent. But these are far transcended by the aqueduct of Cempoalla, which, on account of the circuit obliged to be taken in passing the mountains, was more than thirty miles in length. The greatest difficulty that had to be overcome arose from three great chasms which crossed the route; and these were surmounted by constructing as many bridges of stone and mortar. The first of forty- seven arches, the second of thirteen, and the third, which was the largest and most surprising, of sixty-seven arches. The largest arch, which is also the central one, being built from the lowest depths of the ravine, is 110 geometrical feet in height, and sixty-one feet in breadth, sufficient to admit of the highest masted vessel passing

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either side of the great one, gradually diminish in depth from the top as they approack the edge of the chasm. This magnificent structure is 3178 feet, or more than a half a mile in length.

The remains of Copan, Quimgua, Santa Cruz del Quiche, Ocosingo, Palenqué, and Uxmal, in Central America, are equally striking. For height and solidity, the walls of Copan, towering sometimes to ninety feet, are unexampled in any part of the world. The ruined mounds and terraces of Quirigua, intermingled with statues of gods and heroes, carved out of solid blocks twenty-six feet and upwards in length, and weighing from thirty to forty tons each, bespeak an antiquity far transcending that of the Aztec conquest of Anahuac. The whole place is a mass of stupendous ruins, almost every stone of which contains its own particular story in the mute hieroglyphies of the workman. The ruins of Santa Cruz del Quiche are equally extensive and enigma- tical. Here it was that Catherwood, the explorer, heard of that mysterious Indian city still existing in all its pagan splendour, in the midst of a country as yet untrodden by the foot of the white man. Ocosingo and Palenqué, each a metropolis of pyramids and palaces, profusely ornamented with figures of men and animals, and exhibiting a superior knowledge of the architectural art, are also spots to excite the admiration, but not to satisfy the curiosity of the dauntless intruder. The atmosphere of each is pestilential, and the stillness of chaos ‘is only broken by the howling of the wild beast or the raging of the tempest. But of all these long since depopulated cities, Uxmal or Itzalan, in Yucatan, is the greatest source of wonder to the visitor. In the vast extent and variety of its ruins, and in their picturesque effect, they have oftentimes been compared to those of Thebes. The style and character of the ornaments are unique and peculiar, bearing no resemblance to those elsewhere on the continent. The edifices are of colossal proportions, and wholly constructed of freestone. Of these, the Casa del Gobernador, the house of the governor, so named by the natives, is the grandest in position, the most stately in architecture and proportions, as well as the most perfect in preservation of all the remaining structures. It stands on three ranges of terraces, the first of which is six hundred feet long, being walled with cut stone. On the upper or third terrace stands the palace itself, the facade measuring three hundred and twenty feet. The whole building is of dressed stone, and as the visitor ascends the steps, and casts his bewildered eye along its open and desolate doors, it is impossible to believe that he sees before him (as reported by Robertson) the work of “a race who were ignorant of art, and perished in the rudeness of savage life!” This palace presents a display of elaborate sculptural carving, 752 feet in length, on which traces of painting are still visible. And idols here, strange to say, are conspicuous by their absence.

The southern continent of America, and more especially the north and north-western portions of it, including the higher ranges of the mighty Andes, presents as interesting a field for exploration and speculation by the archeologist as that on the northern continent. The objects in both are equally deformed by the haze of antiquity. F or here, too, are manifold vestiges of long since extinct civilizations; of civilizations which preceded that of the

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