“I AROSE cautiously, expecting to find an ache in every bone and muscle, and was agreeably surprised to discover myself without an ache or a pain, though a little stiff. Apparently the hot sun had baked all pains away. In a shady place near by sat my Indian, not sleeping, apparently not even thinking, but just doing nothing at all, an art in which he was an adept.

“I was conscious of an earnest desire for two things,—a bath and breakfast,—and I wanted a great deal of both. Without much difficulty, in sign language, I made my wishes clear to the native and he conducted me a distance of half a mile or so, not to the Sacred Well but to another well or cenote called Tol-oc, which is about two hundred feet to the left of the road leading to the village of PistÉ. How he knew so definitely the location of the well is a mystery to me.

“This great cool, crystal-clear pool was the water-supply of the ancient city. A wide flight of steps, now much broken, leads into its depths and the lower steps are at present actually some distance beneath the surface of the water. On the stone rim of the sides of the pool are deep grooves, worn in olden times by the ceaseless raising and lowering of rope-suspended water-jugs or gourds. And can’t you picture the women of old Chi-chen Itza in a constant stream passing from dawn till dusk along the road to the well of Tol-oc?—the servant glad to escape for a time the sharp tongue of her mistress; the wrinkled, toothless crone to whom a trip to the well means an opportunity to exchange the latest gossip; the comely young matron anxious to get back to her household tasks; the belle of the neighborhood, on her way to the well, light-heartedly swinging her empty water-jug and bantering those who pass. This is a phase of life as old as communal existence. One may see the same scene enacted to-day almost anywhere south of the Rio Grande or in Spain, Egypt, or the Orient.

“As I swam about in the pool fresh vigor flowed into my veins, and I emerged with an increased craving for breakfast. When I reached the hacienda I found my Indian had anticipated this and while the repast he provided might not have appealed to a pampered appetite, I found it a Lucullian feast; and my guide proved no mean trencherman, either, although I suspect he had fortified himself with no less heartening a meal two hours earlier, when he found me asleep.

“While he performed the housewifely task of doing the dishes, which consisted of throwing away the big green leaves we used as plates, I sat in the shade of a magnificent old yax-che—the sacred tree of the Mayas—and puffed my favorite and most disreputable pipe. Sitting somewhere in the shade around Chi-chen Itza is the most pleasant occupation in the universe, for there is a perpetual breeze and no matter how hot the sun, one is always cool and comfortable in the shade. Sitting thus is the favorite and major occupation of the native, and the white man can very easily acquire the habit.

“As I sat there, at peace with the world, my experiences of the previous night seemed unreal—the fantasmagoria of a fevered dream and, much as I enjoyed this shady spot where I sat, the ancient city called me.

“Taking the Indian with me, I returned to make a superficial examination of the place. My newly acquired estate of about thirty-six square miles included the abandoned, dilapidated manor, corrals, and other buildings. And within its boundaries lie the Sacred Well and all of the ancient ruins and temples that are still standing, not to mention many others which are now covered with debris. It also includes several Indian villages. Chi-chen Itza is really two cities. The more ancient is overgrown by a thick forest and its location is indicated only by an occasional grassy, thicket-covered mound out of which grow great trees and whose sides are covered with scattered carved stones. The newer city is clearly defined by the buildings which are still standing. The whole, including the older and the newer city, covers an area of about twelve square miles.

“There is no apparent plan in the situation of the various structures, although most of them are arranged in such a way that their openings avoid the direct rays of the sun at midday. The city was built in this location because of the two great wells and the lesser one, which I am sure are not the work of men, although they may have been altered or enlarged. In all probability there were no definite and continuous streets; with the exception of the Via Sacra or Sacred Way, there is little or no evidence of what might be called a city street.

“I reason that there was little need for streets, because there were no beasts of burden, nor vehicular traffic. Loads were transported upon the backs of men, just as they are largely transported at the present time. The ancient builders did construct very good narrow, ballasted stone roads which led into Chi-chen Itza from various directions, but they were roads for human feet to travel. Surely the architects of these wonderful buildings; these people who knew much of astronomy and who could count into prodigious figures had the intelligence to lay out their cities in blocks and squares if any particular advantage or convenience were to be gained thereby!

“The only evident plan is that the present buildings, which are temples and perhaps palaces for the kings and those of high religious or noble rank, are centrally located. Beyond these for miles about are the remains of small rectangular foundations, evidently the sites of what were once the dwelling-places of the large population of the city.

“In the area which I designate as new Chi-chen Itza are twelve buildings in an almost perfect state of preservation, as though built no more than twenty or thirty years ago. Ten of them are still covered with their original ponderous stone roofs and are entirely habitable. These structures alone might house a considerable population. I have lived for months at a time in one or another of them and have found them to be delightfully comfortable and cool. Indeed, these elevated Maya temples are the most ideal living-quarters, much to be preferred to the usual house built upon level ground. Although they contain no windows, they are well lighted by the reflected sunlight striking through the doorways upon the white limestone floors.

“Passing across what is now a lovely flower garden in the rear of my home,—which is no other than the building in whose broken corridor I spent my first night,—my guide and I came at no great distance upon a rise of ground where are situated two most interesting groups of buildings. The first one, a massive structure on our right, bears the curious name Akab Tzib, ‘House of the Writing in the Dark.’ It is one of the few buildings which has no sub-base or plinth of artificially heaped earth or stone to give it elevation. It is built upon the natural ground-level, which, however, is somewhat higher at this point than the surrounding terrain. And it stands sheer on the edge of a depression in the ground some four hundred feet across.

“It is possible that this depression represents the site of an ancient quarry from which the stone for the building of the city was taken, or it may be simply a natural hollow caused by the caving in of the soft limestone surface rock. The front of Akab Tzib stretches a distance of one hundred and seventy-six feet and in depth the building is forty-eight feet. The structure is low, the faÇade rising only to a height of eighteen feet. The walls, however, are capable of withstanding a siege. They are of great thickness and constructed of perfectly joined rectangular stones, the surfaces of which are dressed and polished to smoothness. The expanse of the west wall is broken by a shallow recess in the center which divides the wall into three equal sections, with the middle section recessed or offset by a depth of about three feet.

“This central part is pierced by three square-cut doorways. John L. Stephens, who visited the temple more than eighty years ago, says that in the middle section of the interior was a great stairway that led to the roof. It has since collapsed and is now but a heap of stones and dust. Apparently it was about forty-five feet wide. Knowing the Maya custom, which was common, of erecting one structure on top of another, we may surmise that this stairway was probably a sort of flying arch and intended as a means of reaching a second temple to be built on top of the low, massive-walled Akab Tzib. For some unknown reason the upper temple was never erected. Many interesting theories have been advanced as to why the architects abandoned their original plan. On each side of what was once the stairway are doors leading into chambers. Besides these entrances there are seven handsome doorways along the western faÇade of the building. In all, there are eighteen rooms or apartments.

“The whole massive structure is an unsolved mystery. Over the doorway of a small, dim chamber in the southeastern part of the building is a carved lintel on which is depicted in bas-relief the seated figure of a priest or a god, wearing a feathered head-dress and with a long nose-plug protruding from the nostrils. The figure is seated on a throne and holds in its hand the ceremonial caluac or baton of rank. In front of the figure, at its feet, is a graceful brazier containing what was probably a burnt offering of some sort—copal or incense. On each side of this well-carved picture are double rows of hieroglyphs, the meaning of which is unknown. There are no other carvings, glyphs, or pictures in the entire building. This fact is hard to understand, because these ancient builders usually inscribed every available surface. In one room is a large depression in the floor, and in the center of the building is what appears to be a solid mass of masonry forty-four by thirty feet and reaching clear to the ceiling. Perhaps it contains hidden and secret chambers; that remains to be found out.

“Of one thing, however, I am reasonably sure: the carved lintel was not inscribed nor originally designed for its present position, but was taken bodily from some earlier structure, probably one of the now leveled temples of the older Chi-chen Itza. It represents the period of the highest Mayan art, which occurred before the domination of the Nahuatls, who swept down from the north some centuries later. I believe this building was not erected until after the abandonment of Chi-chen Itza, the long residence at Chan Kan Putun, the return to Chi-chen Itza, and the enslavement of the Mayas by the Nahuatls. Very likely it is the most recently built of all the present monuments in the city, and the one carved piece in it, the lintel, was taken from an older building without reference to the significance of the glyphs. From this lintel is derived the name of the temple, for Akab Tzib means literally ‘House of the Writing in the Dark.’

“Leaving Akab Tzib, we walk for the distance of a city block or so through dense shrubbery and over an old stone fence, built perhaps eighty years ago, and come to a most interesting building called La Casa de las Monjas or the Nunnery. It is what might be called rambling, yet is of exquisite architectural harmony and richly ornamented, in utter contrast to the building we have just left. It is one of the most wonderfully carved edifices of this old civilization to be found anywhere in Yucatan. It spreads out for an eye-filling distance of two hundred and twenty-eight feet, the center part of the huge pile rising for nearly ninety feet, in three separate tiers, each smaller than the one below it. Stretching away on each side of this center portion are one- and two-story annexes.

“How well its name fits this grimly beautiful old building is a matter of conjecture. We know that the Maya priesthood was dominant in all matters and that the lives of the people seem to have been governed by a constant devotion to their pantheon of gods and especially to the all-great Kukul Can. Their ceremonies were numerous and elaborate. Doubtless there were many priests and perhaps priestesses. Long training must have been required in the amazing and intricate rituals. And the ancient historians relate that it was the custom to sequester certain girls or women belonging to religious orders. It is not unlikely that this vast building of many rooms and annexes, which seems more fitted to be a place of residence than a temple, may have been the abode of Mayan monks or nuns, or possibly a training school for novitiates. Some believe it to have been the king’s palace.

“Not the least perplexing thing about La Casa de las Monjas is the plain evidence that what now meets our eyes as a symmetrical whole is, in fact, the result of several different periods of building. The principal structure has been built in stages—for all the world as a swallow year after year builds one nest on top of the previous one. And the annexes evidently were built at various times, as the need for them arose. The whole base of the building is buried in debris, which detracts from the true and lovely lines of the architecture. I have excavated a trench part-way around, to clear out this rubbish, and the trench reveals the fact that La Casa de las Monjas has served as a dwelling-place for many people, or that many lived near by even long after the place had lost its sacred significance and its very name and purpose were no longer known.

“Without danger of contradiction, I think we may in fancy reconstruct this Nunnery, in the order of its building. The first structure was a single, rectangular unit about one hundred feet in length. A later builder caused it to be entirely filled with great stones and rubble and cement, so that it formed a solid base or foundation. More masonry was then erected to the same height, on three sides, to enlarge this base area, and upon the whole was erected a building ninety feet long and one third as wide, leaving a flat promenade twenty-five feet wide all around, from which there is a delightful view of the surrounding country. We have dug through the masonry of the sub-structures and into the old, original building which was filled in with stone-work to provide a support for the later and upper buildings, so that our theories are substantiated that far at least.

“To reach the second structure, whose floor is thirty-four feet above-ground, a great stone stairway of forty steps was erected, up which twenty men might march abreast. If they were men of our day they must surely come tumbling down again, for the steps are each nine inches high but with very narrow treads, built for bare-footed or sandaled folk and not for clodhopper boots or shoes.

“A third and still smaller structure—now little more than a jumble of stones, except for a part of one faÇade and a doorway—was built atop the second temple and served by another grand and steep stairway, a continuation of the first. This topmost temple was rich in carved stones, taken, in all probability, from the oft-ravaged older city. The various annexes were built on to or adjacent to the first and largest building. All this the reader will see from the illustrations opposite page 65 and page 69 [missing]. The custom of enlarging Maya temples by such methods as just described was not uncommon. Perhaps it indicated growing power or population. Surely it indicated long residence.

“The main building, constituting the second story, has five doorways on the south side and one doorway at each end, and contains many chambers and intercommunicating doorways. The end rooms extend clear across the building. The central rooms are long and narrow, each with three doorways. There are also very many shallow alcoves, scarcely more than niches, which may have contained idols or scrolls—some say books. The center portion is solid masonry, which originally may have contained apartments later filled with stone to provide support for the third story.

“The entire rambling structure is ornamented with symbolistic carvings and murals in a profusion of designs, many of them of matchless beauty in inspiration and execution. The faÇade of the main building is twenty-five feet in height, with two handsome stone cornices extending its whole length. The eastern faÇade in particular is crowded with ornamentation. The dominant motif is the face of the god Kukul Can—symbolic masks with upturned snouts which some observers have called ‘elephant trunks.’ The same masks are seen again and again in all these old ruins, but in many cases the projecting snouts have been broken off by vandals; indeed, a special zeal has at some time been devoted to this particular destruction. Linking the masks and carrying the whole in a carefully planned and balanced decorative series are geometrical designs and figures. Above the broad band of the upper cornice and carved in deep relief are geometrical stone screens not inferior to those of the Moors or of India.

“Over the main doorway are two bands of small, undeciphered hieroglyphs, above which project six bold and gracefully curved ornaments. From them, we may imagine, once hung a costly curtain, heavy with embroidery. And still higher above the doorway, interrupting the geometrical sculptures of the whole faÇade, is a horseshoe-shaped frame within which may still be seen a badly defaced seated figure with feathered head-dress. The lintels over the classic doorways are of huge perfectly cut and polished stones, each bearing a multiplicity of clear-cut glyphs which, like many things in this City of the Sacred Well, tenaciously hold their secrets.

“The Nunnery stands a monument of grace and beauty whose charm is at once evident to any beholder, and doubly so to him who perceives how closely in every line and dimension, yet how subtly, it accords with our modern ideas and rules of good design. But nowhere else in the world is there anything like it. Unique, distinctive, it is characteristic only of this ancient culture. The cut facing page 65, representing one of the best of my many photographic attempts, tells all that a photograph can, but it cannot begin to convey the beauty of this masterpiece. In the great main hall were once many colorful paintings upon the walls and ceilings, still indicated by bits of color here and there or by an interrupted broad band of black or red. And in the various rooms were paintings, nearly all now obliterated. They seem to have reached quite lately their critical age, for many that were almost perfect as recently as twenty years ago are faded or chipped now. In a few years they will be gone forever, and for this reason I have taken pains to obtain the most faithful possible copies of all of them. These Maya paintings represent several periods of culture. Some are childishly crude. Many are of an excellence of line and balance and color not inferior to the best of modern art. Some even are drawn in a most pleasingly free and sketchy manner which so exquisitely portrays an idea without unnecessary detail that one almost expects to see scrawled in the lower right hand corner the signature of some well-known modern artist.

“The eastern or ground-level portion of the added basic structure contains many rooms entered by way of six wide outer doorways.

“Near the main building are two smaller detached ones, the more interesting being known as the Iglesia or Church. It is small in comparison with the bulk of La Casa de las Monjas, being but twenty-six feet long, half as wide, and thirty-two feet high. It has three cornices and the principal decoration consists of two seated human figures over the doorway. Hardly a square inch of its surface is undecorated. Formerly it was stuccoed, or plastered, and painted. Much of the original color still clings to the crevices and interstices of its carved walls and it is evident that new layers of stucco were added from time to time and new paint in appropriate colors. Such layers of stucco and color may be seen where the stone has been chipped, with the colors sometimes varying from those of the early coats.

“The carvings again portray the mask of Kukul Can, with interlinking geometrical designs. A single doorway gives access to the interior, once rich in murals, and the bright sunshine striking upon the white floor floods the whole room with clear light. Close to the ceiling are traces of a row of medallions which originally contained hieroglyphs.

“Another building of about the same size is similarly finished and decorated with the mask of Kukul Can. It contains several small rooms. The entire wall of one apartment has been removed, by not very ancient builders, for the prosaic purpose of making a stone fence. In passing I might mention also that a good-sized pit has been made near one side of the grand stairway of La Casa de las Monjas, it being easier to get cut stone in this way than to quarry it.

“No great amount of labor would be required to put this group of buildings in nearly its pristine condition. Nearly all the stones that have fallen lie where they fell and could easily be replaced. Near the grand stairway lie many sculptured images of serpents, birds, and animals, of massive size and carved in full relief. These formed the balustrade and might be replaced even though some are missing. I have no doubt that when the debris at the base of the buildings is removed new archÆological treasures will be revealed.

“As an interesting bit of authentic history, the main building was occupied by the soldiers of Montejo, who were besieged there by the enraged native populace. They escaped by night, through the rear of the buildings, by means of a ruse. The besiegers did not discover until dawn that the enemy had fled many hours before.

“Just when one decides that there is nothing new to surprise him, in this old city, he comes upon something else to puzzle his brain, spurring his curiosity into vain excursions after the why and wherefore of it all.

“We leave the unexplainable Casa de las Monjas and, walking westward less than a hundred yards, stand before the Caracol or Snail-shell, which is entirely unlike any other building in the City of the Sacred Well or in all of Yucatan. This curious structure, we imagine, was either a watch-tower or an astronomical observatory—though it may have served a quite different purpose. It is round and built on a terrace two hundred feet square of cut stone, twenty feet in height. Above this is a second stone terrace, twelve feet high. These terraces have sheer vertical sides, but much fallen stone and debris have gathered about them. From the west a stairway forty-five feet wide leads to the first terrace; it was once bordered with great stone balusters in the form of tremendous entwined serpents, their heads on the ground, their bodies forming the balustrade and ending at the top in rattles. The same sort of device is found again and again in Maya architecture. A second similar stairway leads to the upper terrace and the door of the building. A projecting ornamented cornice caps each terrace.

“At the top of the second stairway was once some large object which Stephens thought was an idol, and here was uncovered a hieroglyphed monument bearing the longest inscription yet found in the city. The round tower is forty feet in diameter and forty feet high, with two concentric walls, each two and a half feet thick. The inner wall incloses a circular chamber at the center of which is a core of small diameter, solid except for a winding stairway at its center, extending from the ground-level to the height of the double walls. There is also a passage, now almost obliterated, piercing the lower terrace and connecting with this winding stairway. The building at the top of the double walls has a deep-jutting five-tiered cornice above which rises another and smaller single-walled tower, surrounded by a promenade or ledge, not unlike the balcony of a lighthouse, at the height of the cornice.

“The space between the outer and the inner wall provides an arched chamber five feet wide and one hundred feet in circumference. The inner chamber also is arched and is eight feet wide. The usual Maya arch construction is employed, the arch beginning at a height of ten feet and being about twenty-four feet at the peak. The upper ruined tower, about twenty feet high, contained a stone-lined passage facing due west which might have been used as a line of sight for astronomical observations.

“The outer walls are pierced by four openings—windows or doorways, whichever they may have been—corresponding to the four points of the compass. Similar openings occur in the inner wall but, curiously, they are exactly forty-five degrees out of line with the openings in the outer wall. One of the most novel features in the construction are the many wooden beams placed horizontally between the inner and outer shells of masonry. As these are set in the masonry, it is evident that they are an original and integral part of the building, probably put there to help support the stone-work during construction. Many have stood the test of time and are still stanch and firm. They are hewn from the famous sapote tree, whose wood of steel-like hardness alone could have endured through the centuries. There is no ornamentation within the building, nor upon its walls, and the construction is pure Maya except that it is round where all else is square.

“The curious edifice is on high ground and its construction leads inevitably to the idea of a watch-tower. Its builders knew in their time quite as much about astronomy as did any contemporary race—if not more. The periods of sun, moon, and planets they knew with great accuracy. For these reasons I like to think that their priests and sages came to this tower, making divinations from the stars and laboriously charting their positions and courses. Possibly they were panic-stricken by an occasional eclipse of moon or sun, which they called chi-bal-kin, ‘the moon or sun devoured by serpents or other beings.’

“But perhaps this tower was no more than a military precaution, a place where solitary watchers by day and night constantly scanned the horizon. Maybe it was merely the local police station or fire department from which could be seen any undue disturbance or the outbreak of a conflagration. I shall leave it to you to make your own conclusions, which may be quite as near to or as far from the actual fact as my own, over which I have puzzled backward and forward for many years.

“To the north a distance of four hundred feet is the so-called Red House, or Chich-an Chob, the latter name meaning ‘strong, clean house.’ The name Red House is derived from the fact that the antechamber or vestibule across the front of the building has a broad painted band of red running about its four walls. This is the best-preserved building of all my city; scarcely a stone is missing. Its four walls face exactly the four points of the compass; its main entrance is in the western wall, while the eastern wall is unbroken. It now rises from a lovely grassy terrace, slightly sloping from the vertical and about twelve feet high by sixty feet long, faced with large stone blocks and having rounded corner stones at each of the four sloping edges of the pyramidal form. Extending around the top of the terrace is a regular Maya cornice, or projecting coping. Approaching the western entrance is a stone stairway, twenty feet wide, of sixteen high and shallow cut-stone steps—a staircase as distinctly Mayan as the mask of Kukul Can. And this stairway is as perfect to-day as the day it was finished, not a stone out of place or broken. It seems incredible that it could have lain there so many centuries at the mercy of the tropical wilderness and of passing vandals and have suffered not at all.

“Chich-an Chob deceives one at first glance, seeming to rise to a stately height because of its twenty-eight foot faÇade. The roof, however, is but twenty feet above the floor. The false front is nevertheless very lovely, being made of stone latticework which skilfully weaves with geometrical designs the ever-present elongated masks of the great Kukul Can, with the upturned snouts unbroken. The construction throughout is pure Mayan of the highest period, typical of many buildings seen in the southern part of Yucatan and particularly at Palenque. Three square-cut, high doorways give access to a shallow vestibule running the length of the building. Back of this is a wall with three more doorways, each opening into a separate chamber. A frieze of hieroglyphs cut in the stones somewhat above the doors completely encircles the walls of the vestibule. All of the interior walls are plastered and painted and have been replastered and repainted many times. The outer walls up to the stone latticework are quite plain, the cornices or moldings are unadorned, and except for the absence of pillars it could pass for a gem of Doric architecture. Its very simplicity is a pleasing contrast to the Nunnery; yet it is no less distinctly Mayan.

“Two hundred feet beyond Chich-an Chob is a level terrace, or pyramid, sixty-four feet square, which supports a small three-chambered temple with an entrance to the south. One end has fallen in, but two of the chambers are in good repair. This temple, so far as I know, is nameless and at present is of no special interest. Clustered near by, to the right, are several smaller pyramids whose buildings are merely heaped ruins. Some of these contain tombs. Probably all were burial-places of great men. The principal pyramid of this group contains the tomb of the high priest and it is the scene of one of my most thrilling adventures.”

The story of the exploration of the high priest’s tomb, alluded to by Don Eduardo, is very interesting and will be related in another chapter.

In about the center of the City of the Sacred Well is El Castillo, whose imposing bulk is by far the greatest of all of the silent old structures of this ancient metropolis. Don Eduardo has told us that this huge pile struck him speechless when he came upon it suddenly in the moonlight upon his first introduction to Chi-chen Itza. He is not the only one who has been struck dumb by the first sight of the rugged and beautiful temple, high and huge above its surroundings. Coming back from the States one year, I made the acquaintance, on the boat, of a middle-aged American and his charming daughter, who with some others composed a small party bound for MÉrida, the capital of Yucatan. As I had been to Chi-chen Itza many times, I naturally, in my talk with this gentleman, was enthusiastic over the idea of showing him the ruined city, and finally the whole party decided to go there. We arrived at the little town of Dzitas, where the gentlemen on horseback, I on an ambling mule, and the rest in volans set out for the City of the Well. All the way the members of the party took turns in joking me about my pet city and my stories concerning it. I was in every sense the tail of the procession, as my mule had decided ideas of its own, as mules have, and would travel no faster than a slow walk; but the rest of the party were not traveling on a bed of roses and there was no unwillingness to stop and wait for me while they composed ironical witticisms.

When we came near to Chi-chen Itza I ranged my mule alongside the gentleman who was leader in the heckling. I did this knowing that we would travel almost to the Great Pyramid of El Castillo and then, at a sharp turn to the right, view it completely and suddenly.

My friend was in the middle of another verbal dig when the sight smote him. His mouth simply remained open. I have not yet heard the last of his apologies for his previous jesting remarks and I find my revenge very sweet.

The pyramid, or terrace, on which El Castillo stands is two hundred feet square and rises to a height of seventy-five or eighty feet. The exact height is rather difficult to measure because of the debris at the bottom. The top of the terrace has a level surface, or platform, sixty feet square, upon which stands the temple. The four sides of the pyramid rise steeply at an angle of fifty degrees and the pyramid is terraced, each terrace being nine feet high, with a narrow horizontal offset. The rises are faced with cut stone beautifully paneled. Each of the four pyramid faces is vertically bisected by a wide stone stairway more gentle in its incline than the angle of the pyramid itself but still very long and steep. The stairs start at the top flush with the ledge upon which the temple stands and draw away farther and farther, as they descend, from the plane of the pyramid face, with an increasing ratio of projection so that at the bottom they project an appreciable distance beyond the pyramid base. Thus the stairways pleasingly break the monotony of line—which is good art and good architecture. Like all Maya stairways, they have narrow treads and high risers.

The cult of Kukul Can, indicated everywhere in the City of the Sacred Well, nowhere attains so overshadowing an importance as here in this vast temple. Each of the four corners of the pyramid is bounded by the huge undulating body of a stone serpent, extending from the ground clear to the top of the pyramid. Each undulation of the serpent’s body marks a terrace or gradient and to lift a single stone section of one of these mammoth serpents would be a task for a dozen men. Everywhere on the horizontal levels of the terraces springs up each year a thick growth of grasses as high as a tall man’s head.

The principal stairway, facing the north, is guarded at the base by two huge heads of feathered serpents, jaws open, fangs displayed, and forked tongues extended. And each of these heads, excepting only the forked tongue, is hewn from a single solid block of stone, with every crotalic detail perfectly carved. The bodies belonging to these serpent heads, conventionalized into two broad, flat bands, extend up the mound, one on each side of the stairway, to the principal entrance of the temple. On the narrow platform and forming the main doorway of this holy of holies are two more immense monolithic serpent heads, now partially destroyed. They are used as pillars trisecting into three parts the great forty-foot doorway. The conventionalized and foreshortened head of the serpent forms the base of the column and the foreshortened tail forms the capital which is, in its own way, no less a worthy architectural creation than the Greek Corinthian column, with its capital of acanthus leaves.

The triply vaulted ceiling rests upon great sapote beams supported by three-foot-thick walls and massive square-faced, paneled stone pillars. This sapote wood, called ya by the natives, is dark red in color and turns chocolate brown with age and exposure. It is nearly as heavy as iron and is very hard. In many ways it resists the action of the tropical elements better than metal, and insects seem to produce no effect upon its adamantine surface. These beams are wondrously carved and with few exceptions have faithfully sustained the tremendous weight of stone put upon them. Only a few have broken with age, so that but a part of the faÇade of the temple has fallen. For a thousand years, at least, they have stood and at the time of the Conquest in 1540 they were in much the same condition in which we now find them.

In front of the main doorway originally stood a great stone table with an intricately carved surface. It was supported by curious Atlantean stone figures and some of these strange male caryatids were bearded. Other figures on piers and columns within the temple also are bearded—with one exception the only bearded figures portrayed in this whole city which was inhabited by a beardless race. Close examination shows, however, that the carved figures wear masks and it is the masks which are bearded. This fact only enhances the mystery, pointing to the possibility of a still more ancient past and of ritualistic traditions so remote in their beginnings that all memory of their original meaning has faded and only the ritual or empty shell remains of what was once living fact. Analogous are some of the archaic Greek rituals and Druidical rites.

Who were the prototypes of these bearded figures? Were they the mysterious, blue-eyed, fair-skinned people clad in armor who were supposed to have once landed at Tamoclan near Tampico? Norsemen? Or were they the old Atlanteans whose country Plato says “sank in one day and one night beneath the waves of the ocean”?

Of the many marvelous carvings and paintings in this temple I shall say more in another chapter.

Doubtless upon the wide level roof of the temple were performed religious rites,—solemn invocations to the sun and the like,—for, throughout, this edifice leaves one with the impression that its character was purely religious. There are no warlike scenes pictured, only solemnity and high reverence for the great gods.

Lying within the shadow of El Castillo are the broken remains of another building, called the Temple of the Tigers. It takes its name from a frieze of bas-reliefs which is one of the outstanding treasures of the lost art of the Mayas. In these wonderful carvings the sculptor has perfectly caught the feline vigor and grace of the American jaguar. No doubt he had a first-hand knowledge of jaguars, which were very plentiful then and still abound in this vicinity if one wishes to go to the trouble of looking for them. To the Mayas the jaguar was the “Protector of the Fields” because he lay in wait for the deer in the open and cultivated spaces. It was the custom of the natives to put some gift or friendly token in the corner of the field for this god-like beast. Probably his very life was sacred as are those of many animals in India.

The Tiger Temple is built on a pyramid base with a stairway up the side approaching a wide doorway which is divided by pillars into three parts. Much of the sustaining pyramid has crumbled away, or been removed, leaving the building perched on a sheer wall of roughly cemented rubble as viewed from one side. The faÇade is thirty-five feet long and twenty-two feet high and at each side of the entrance is a great serpent’s head. Each of these monoliths weighs several tons and is carved with amazing skill; every feature and scale is flawless and they are painted or enameled, the colors being still visible if not vivid. The head of each is green, while eyes and open mouth are red. The scales end with the head, and the remainder of the body, elaborately feathered, rises in a graceful cylindrical column, with the tail now broken but originally projecting upward along the face of the building and terminating in well-defined rattles. A portion of the front roof has fallen, due to the breaking of wooden lintels supporting the mass of stone of which it was composed, but fortunately the serpents’ heads and the door columns are unharmed.

All of the interior walls are solidly painted with battle scenes, scenes of domestic life, and pictures of sacrificial pageants. Many of the colors are as brilliant as the day they were laid on these smooth walls, although the wonderful paintings have been much marred by vandals. The many figures, each in a different posture, each group differently clothed or armed, and all cleverly drawn, in good proportion, and elaborately colored, are capable of holding the most casual observer by the hour and are a never-ending delight to the enthusiast.

The Tiger Temple is in every way the prize exhibit among the various edifices of the Sacred City, not for its size but for the craftsmanship and charm of its every detail. And yet I must make one small reservation, for just back and at the base of the Tiger Temple is a small, almost ruined building, nameless, lacking a roof and a front, yet containing on its three still standing walls and what little remains of a ceiling more than eighty sculptured figures. There are warriors in armor of metal, hide, and wood; priests in ceremonial vestments; kings and chieftains. The various figures are distinct and different from one another and the features are individual, doubtless recognizable if we but knew the great men in whose likeness they were carved. Each figure is identified by its own personal and distinguishing sign, or mark, usually placed overhead. Vivid paint or enamel was painstakingly applied to the sculpture and in many places it is still pronounced.

Some of the work is crude, other parts exquisitely refined, indicating that it is not all the work of one man. I am told by those well versed in stone-carving and the making of bas-reliefs that even with modern stone-cutting tools it would take one man at least twenty years to accomplish this work. For lack of a better name I always call this wonderful roofless place the Temple of Bas-Reliefs. When first observed, the sculptured walls look merely like a variegated patchwork. In order to see it at its best one should arrive at about ten o’clock in the morning, at which time the shadows cast by the background bring out all the raised parts in strong contrast and the whole procession of priests and warriors marches clearly before one’s eyes. The south wall, however, can be seen at its best only for a short time soon after sunrise and it is well worth the discomfort of early rising. Very probably there was an arrangement of smooth-faced, light-reflecting pillars in this building which caused all the walls to stand out in bold relief.

In the middle of the floor and facing the entrance squats a stone jaguar. Perhaps upon his broad, flat back may have been placed holy offerings to the gods.

The fallen front of this temple was once supported by two finely carved and painted square columns, still majestically erect, and remindful of those other ancient temples of Greece and Egypt.

And now we come to what is perhaps the most curious thing in the whole metropolis. The Tiger Temple, the Temple of Bas-Reliefs, and two other buildings surrounded a great inclosure having a flat paved floor four hundred and twenty feet long, bounded on the sides by smooth, perpendicular walls more than twenty feet high and thirty feet thick.

A hundred feet from the northern extremity of this extraordinary court and facing it is a building consisting of a single chamber. Its front wall is lacking, but arising from the rubbish are two ornamented round columns which were evidently the supports for the wall. The whole interior of the building, from floor to peak, is covered with worn and faded bas-reliefs. In the center of the rear wall is the perfect figure of a man, bearded and with decidedly Hebraic features.

At the opposite end of the court and a hundred feet back from it is a building extending nearly the entire width of the court. The roof of this structure has fallen, but the remains of sculptured square columns are visible.

And on the two side walls of the court, on the precise middle line, were mounted two great carved stone rings, like millstones, twenty feet above the floor. Each ring is beautifully carved with the entwined bodies of serpents. The rings are four feet in diameter and a foot thick, and the hole in each is one foot seven inches in diameter. One of these rings is still mounted in the masonry of the wall, while its counterpart once on the adjacent wall has fallen, but, happily, is unbroken.

A very similar court and similar rings have been found at Uxmal, another ancient Maya city of Yucatan.

Obviously this court was intended for some public game and it has therefore been given the name of the Tennis-court or Gymnasium. In an account of the diversions of Montezuma, given by Herrera, who accompanied Cortes, is the following illuminating description:

The Emperor took much delight in seeing the game of ball which the Spaniards have since prohibited due to the mischief which often happens at the game. By the Aztecs this game was called tlachtli—being like our tennis. The ball was made from the gum of a tree that grows in hot countries, which, after having holes made in it, distills great white drops that soon harden and being worked and molded together, this material turns as black as pitch.[5] The balls made thereof, although quite hard and heavy to the hand, did bound and fly as well as our footballs and there was no need to blow them, nor did they use staves. They struck the ball with any part of the body as it happened or as they could most conveniently. Sometimes he lost who touched it with any other part but his hips, which was looked upon among them as very dexterous and for the purpose that the ball might rebound better they fastened a piece of stiff leather on to their hips. They might strike the ball every time it rebounded, which it would do several times one after another, in so much that it looked as if it had been alive. They played in parties, so many on each side, for a load of mantles or what the gamesters could afford. They also played for gold and feather work and sometimes they played themselves away. The place where they played was a ground room, long, narrow and high and higher at the sides than at the ends. They kept the walls plastered and smooth, also the floor. On the side walls they fixed certain stones like those used in a mill, with a hole quite through the middle. The hole was just as big as the ball and he who could strike it through thereby won the game, and in token of its being an extraordinary success which rarely happened, he had the right to the cloaks of all the lookers-on.

It was very pleasant to see that as soon as ever the ball was in the hole, those standing by took to their heels, running away with all their might to save their cloaks, laughing and rejoicing, while others scoured after them to secure their cloaks for the winner, who was obliged to offer some sacrifice to the idol of the Court and to the stone whose hole the ball had passed.

Every Court had a temple day where at midnight they performed certain ceremonies and enchantments on the two walls and on the middle of the floor, singing certain songs or ballads, after which a priest of the Great Temple went with some of their religious men to bless it. He uttered some words, threw the ball about the court four times (towards the four points of the compass) and then it was consecrated and might be played in, but not before.

The owner of the Court, who was also a lord, never played without making some offering and performing some ceremony to the Idol of the Game, which shows how superstitious they were even in their diversions.

This account which has come down to us will save much head-scratching on the part of future archÆologists as to the purpose of the unique court and its carved millstones.

The Gymnasium or Tennis-court and the buildings surrounding it were not pure Mayan, but were unquestionably introduced under the Nahuatl or Aztec rÉgime.

Nearly all of the remaining buildings are in too bad a condition to yield much of further interest until careful digging and replacing of fallen parts can restore them to some semblance of their original form. One such fallen temple on a great pyramid is now marked only by four nine-foot pillars whose square sides are chiseled with queer bearded figures, some of whom carry what I can only call a “rabbit-stick”—evidently some sort of ceremonial staff or wand. These pillars were unquestionably the front of an immense temple whose wooden lintels have given way, letting fall the whole edifice. In front of this ruin were several stone tables, and apparently they stretched at one time, end to end, clear across the base of the pyramid. The tables were of various heights and consisted of stone slabs six inches thick and about three feet wide. They were supported by grotesque dwarfish Atlantean figures with upraised hands, the palms held flat and on a level with their heads. While grotesque, these figures have much dignity and sureness of line. Originally they were brightly painted.

The tables have been so disarranged that it is impossible to tell what was their original position or even to guess at their purpose. The temple faced west, as indicated by the broken stairway leading up to it. In the midst of the debris lies a fractured serpent column nearly five feet in length, with a stone tongue projecting two feet from its fanged lips. The column rising from the serpent’s head is two feet in diameter and its capital was the creature’s tail. The broken outlines of a rear chamber reached through a vestibule just behind the serpent column measure thirty-six by fifteen feet. The doorway of the chamber has square-cut, sculptured jambs.

A few hundred feet to the north is the ruined Temple of the Cones. Strewn all about are large cone-shaped stones like big projectiles, but cut and carved. It is thought that they formed some sort of ornamental frieze. Some are handsomely sculptured. There are also in this vicinity figures of the Chac Mool type—an animal body, usually a jaguar, with the head of a man.

Some distance to the right of El Castillo are the ruins of what must have been a very important temple. They occupy a great irregular mound some six hundred feet long and are bordered by several pyramids and other ruins of varied character. The largest of the pyramids is fifty feet high and stands in the northwest corner of the group of ruins. All that remains of it are columns, but there are almost a forest of them, some round, some square. We have called this ruin the Temple of Columns. It seems as though here must have been an elaborate plaza of temples, colonnades, and sunken courts. Even now archÆologists from the Carnegie Foundation of Washington, D.C., are at work in reclaiming this portion of the Sacred City from the jungle, clearing the debris and working out the jig-saw puzzle of replacing each fallen stone in its rightful position.

Everywhere for miles one comes upon huddled debris-covered mounds and carved stones. In the very heart of the jungle is the overgrown ruin of a tremendous pyramid and temple, while here and there unexpected columns rise amid the trees. More than thirty such ruins have been counted, choked by rank jungle growth—palaces, no doubt, of high priests and mighty chieftains. And I think sadly as I view them that the study of archÆology is long and time is fleeting.