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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central
+America, by Pedro Velasquez
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central America
+       Resulting in the Discovery of the Idolatrous City of
+       Iximaya, in an Unexplored Region; and the Possession of
+       two Remarkable Aztec Children, Descendants and Specimens
+       of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now nearly extinct,) of the
+       Ancient Aztec Founders of the Ruined Temples of that
+       Country, Described by John L. Stevens, Esq., and Other
+       Travellers.
+
+Author: Pedro Velasquez
+
+Release Date: July 12, 2009 [EBook #29388]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIR OF EVENTFUL EXPEDITION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note
+
+Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. A list of corrections
+is found at the end of the text. Inconsistencies in spelling and
+hyphenation have been maintained. A list of inconsistently spelled
+and hyphenated words is found at the end of the text.
+
+Oe ligatures have been expanded.
+
+
+
+
+
+  MEMOIR
+  OF AN
+  EVENTFUL EXPEDITION
+  IN
+  CENTRAL AMERICA;
+
+  RESULTING IN THE DISCOVERY OF THE IDOLATROUS CITY OF
+  IXIMAYA,
+
+  In an unexplored region; and the possession of two
+
+  REMARKABLE AZTEC CHILDREN,
+
+  Descendants and Specimens of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now
+  nearly extinct,) of the Ancient Aztec Founders of the
+  Ruined Temples of that Country,
+
+  DESCRIBED BY
+
+  JOHN L. STEVENS, ESQ.,
+  AND OTHER TRAVELLERS.
+
+  Translated from the Spanish of
+  PEDRO VELASQUEZ,
+  of SAN SALVADOR.
+
+
+  NEW YORK:
+  E. F. Applegate, Printer, 111 Nassau Street.
+  1850.
+
+
+
+
+  PROFILE ILLUSTRATIONS
+  FROM
+  CENTRAL AMERICAN RUINS,
+  OF
+  ANCIENT RACES STILL EXISTING
+  IN IXIMAYA.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The above three figures, sketched from engravings in "Stevens's Central
+America," will be found, on personal comparison, to bear a remarkable
+and convincing resemblance, both in the general features and the
+position of the head, to the two living Aztec children, now exhibiting
+in the United States, of the ancient sacerdotal caste of _Kaanas_, or
+Pagan Mimes, of which a few individuals remain in the newly discovered
+city of Iximaya. See, the following _Memoir_, page 31.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+These two figures, sketched from the same work, are said, by Senor
+Velasquez, in the unpublished portion of his narrative, to be
+"irresistible likenesses" of the equally exclusive but somewhat more
+numerous priestly caste of _Mahaboons_, still existing in that city,
+and to which belonged Vaalpeor, an official guardian of those children,
+as mentioned in this memoir. Velasquez states that the likeness of
+Vaalpeor to the right hand figure in the frontispiece of Stevens' second
+volume, which is here also the one on the right hand, was as exact, in
+outline, as if the latter had been a daguerreotype miniature.
+
+While writing his "Narrative" after his return to San Salvador, in the
+spring of the present year, (1850,) Senor Velasquez was favored, by an
+American gentleman of that city, with a copy of "Layard's Nineveh," and
+was forcibly struck with the close characteristic resemblance of the
+faces in many of its engravings to those of the inhabitants in general,
+as a peculiar family of mankind, both of Iximaya and its surrounding
+region. The following are sketches, (somewhat imperfect,) of two of the
+male faces to which he refers:
+
+[Illustration]
+
+And the following profile, from the same work, is pronounced by
+Velasquez to be equally characteristic of the female faces of that
+region, making due allowance for the superb head dresses of tropical
+plumage, with which he describes the latter as being adorned, instead of
+the male galea, or close cap, retained in the engraving.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+These illustrations, slight as they are, are deemed interesting, because
+the Iximayans assert their descent from a very ancient Assyrian colony
+nearly co-temporary with Nineveh itself--a claim which receives strong
+confirmation, not only from the hieroglyphics and monuments of Iximaya,
+but from the engravings in Stevens' volumes of several remarkable
+objects, (the inverted winged globe especially,) at Palenque--once a
+kindred colony.
+
+It should have been stated in the following Memoir, that Senor
+Velasquez, on his return to San Salvador, caused the two Kaana children
+to be baptized into the Catholic Church, by the Bishop of the Diocese,
+under the names of Maximo and Bartola Velasquez.
+
+
+
+
+  MEMOIR
+  OF A RECENT
+  EVENTFUL EXPEDITION
+  IN
+  CENTRAL AMERICA.
+
+
+In the second volume of his travels in Central America--than which no
+work ever published in this country, has created and maintained a higher
+degree of interest, both at home and abroad--Mr. Stevens speaks with
+enthusiasm of the conversations he had held with an intelligent and
+hospitable Padre, or Catholic priest, of Santa Cruz del Quiche, formerly
+of the village of Chajul; and of the exciting information he had
+received from him, concerning immense and marvellous antiquities in the
+surrounding country, which, to the present hour, remain entirely unknown
+to the world. The Padre told him of vast ruins, in a deserted and
+desolate region, but four leagues from Vera Paz, more extensive than
+Quiche itself; and of another ruined city, on the other side of the
+great traversing range of the Cordilleras, of which no account has been
+given. But the most stimulating story of all, was the existence of a
+_living_ city, far on the other side of the great sierra, large and
+populous, occupied by Indians of the same character, and in precisely
+the same state, as those of the country in general, before the discovery
+of the continent and the desolating conquests of its invaders.
+
+The Padre averred that, in younger days, he had climbed to the topmost
+ridge of the sierra, a height of 10 or 12,000 feet, and from its naked
+summit, looking over an immense plain, extending to Yucatan and the Gulf
+of Mexico, had seen, with his own eyes, in the remote distance, "a large
+city, spread over a great space, with turrets white and glittering in
+the sun." His account of the prevalent Indian report concerning it was,
+that no white man had ever reached that city; that the inhabitants, who
+speak the Maya language, are aware that a race of white strangers has
+conquered the whole country around them, and have hence murdered every
+white man that has since attempted to penetrate their territory. He
+added that they have no coin or other circulating medium; no horses,
+mules, or other domestic animals, except fowls, "and keep the cocks
+under ground to prevent their crowing being heard." This report of their
+slender resources for animal food, and of their perpetual apprehension
+of discovery, as indicated in this inadequate and childish expedient to
+prevent it, is, in most respects, contradicted by that of the
+adventurous expedition about to be described, and which, having passed
+the walls of their city, obtained better information of their internal
+economy and condition than could have been acquired by any Indians at
+all likely to hold communication with places so very remote from the
+territory as Quiche or Chajul.
+
+The effects of these extraordinary averments and recitals of the Padre,
+upon the mind of Mr. Stevens, together with the deliberate conclusions
+which he finally drew from them, is best expressed in his own language.
+
+     "The interest awakened in us, was the most thrilling I ever
+     experienced. One look at that city, was worth ten years of an every
+     day life. If he is right, a place is left where Indians and a city
+     exist, as Cortez and Alvarado found them; there are living men who
+     can solve the mystery that hangs over the ruined cities of America;
+     who can, perhaps, go to Copan and read the inscriptions on its
+     monuments. No subject more exciting and attractive presents itself
+     to any mind, and the deep impression in my mind, will never be
+     effaced.
+
+     "Can it be true? Being now in my sober senses, I do verily believe
+     there is much ground to suppose that what the Padre told us is
+     authentic. That the region referred to does not acknowledge the
+     government of Guatimala, and has never been explored, and that no
+     white man has ever pretended to have entered it; I am satisfied.
+     From other sources we heard that a large _ruined_ city was visible;
+     and we were told of another person who had climbed to the top of
+     the sierra, but on account of the dense clouds raising upon it,
+     he had not been able to see anything. At all events, the belief at
+     the village of Chajul is general, and a curiosity is aroused that
+     burns to be satisfied. We had a craving desire to reach the
+     mysterious city. No man if ever so willing to peril his life, could
+     undertake the enterprise, with any hope of success, without
+     hovering for one or two years on the borders of the country
+     studying the language and character of the adjoining Indians, and
+     making acquaintance with some of the natives. Five hundred men
+     could probably march directly to the city, and the invasion would
+     be more justifiable than any made by Spaniards; but the government
+     is too much occupied with its own wars, and the knowledge could not
+     be procured except at the price of blood. Two young men of good
+     constitution, and who could afford to spend five years, might
+     succeed. If the object of search prove a phantom, in the wild
+     scenes of a new and unexplored country, there are other objects of
+     interest; but, if real, besides the glorious excitement of such a
+     novelty, they will have something to look back upon through life.
+     As to the dangers, they are always magnified, and, in general,
+     peril is discovered soon enough for escape. But, in all
+     probability, if any discovery is made, it will be made by the
+     Padres. As for ourselves, to attempt it alone, ignorant of the
+     language and with the mozos who were a constant annoyance to us,
+     was out of the question. The most we thought of, was to climb to
+     the top of the sierra, thence to look down upon the mysterious
+     city; but we had difficulties enough in the road before us; it
+     would add ten days to a journey already almost appalling in the
+     perspective; for days the sierra might be covered with clouds; in
+     attempting too much, we might lose all; Palenque was our great
+     point, and we determined not to be diverted from the course we had
+     marked out." Vol. II, p. 193-196.
+
+It is now known that two intrepid young men, incited probably by this
+identical passage in Mr. Stevens's popular work--one a Mr. Huertis, of
+Baltimore, an American of Spanish parents, from Cuba, possessing an
+ample fortune, and who had travelled much in Egypt, Persia, and Syria,
+for the personal inspection of ancient monuments; and the other, a Mr.
+Hammond, a civil-engineer from Canada, who had been engaged for some
+years on surveys in the United States, agreed to undertake the perilous
+and romantic enterprise thus cautiously suggested and chivalrously
+portrayed.
+
+Amply equipped with every desirable appointment, including daguerreotype
+apparatuses, mathematical instruments, and withal fifty repeating
+rifles, lest it should become necessary to resort to an armed
+expedition, these gentlemen sailed from New-Orleans and arrived at
+Belize, in the fall of 1848. Here they procured horses, mules, and a
+party of ten experienced Indians and Mestitzos; and after pursuing a
+route, through a wild, broken, and heavily wooded region, for about 150
+miles, on the Gulf of Amatique, they struck off more to the south-west,
+for Coban, where they arrived on the morning of Christmas day, in time
+to partake of the substantial enjoyments, as well as to observe the
+peculiar religious ceremonies, of the great Catholic festival, in that
+intensely interior city.
+
+At this place, while loitering to procure information and guides for
+their future journey to Santa Cruz del Quiche, they got acquainted with
+Sr. Pedro Velasquez, of San Salvador, who describes himself as a man of
+family and education, although a trader in indigo; and his intermediate
+destination, prior to his return to the capital, happening also to be
+the same city, he kindly proffered to the two Americans his superior
+knowledge of the country, or any other useful service he could render
+them; and he was accordingly very gladly received as their friend and
+companion on the way. It is from a copy of a manuscript journal of this
+gentleman, that the translator has obtained the only information as yet
+brought to the United States concerning the remarkable results of the
+exploring expedition which he will proceed to describe, or of the fate
+of Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, its unfortunate originators and
+conductors, or of those extraordinary living specimens of a _sui
+generis_ race of beings, hitherto supposed to be either fabulous or
+extinct, which are at once its melancholy trophies and its physiological
+attesters. And it is from Senor Velasquez alone that the public can
+receive any further intelligence upon this ardently interesting subject,
+beyond that which his manuscript imperfectly affords.
+
+In order, however, to avoid an anticipatory trespass upon the natural
+sequence of the narrative, it may be proper to state, that prior to his
+departure in their company from Coban, Senor Velasquez had received from
+his fellow travellers no intimation whatever concerning the ulterior
+object of their journey, and had neither seen nor heard of those volumes
+describing the stupendous vestiges of ancient empire, in his native
+land, which had so strongly excited the emulous passion of discovery in
+their minds.
+
+Frequently called by his mercantile speculations, which he seems to have
+conducted upon an extensive scale, to perform long journeys from San
+Salvador, on the Pacific side of the Cordilleras, to Comyagua in the
+mid-interior, and thence to Truxillo, Omoa, and Ysabal, on the Bay and
+Gulf of Honduras, he had traversed a large portion of the country, and
+had often been surprised with sudden views of mouldering temples,
+pyramids, and cities of vast magnitude and marvellous mythology. And
+being, as it evidently appears, a man of unusual intelligence and
+scholastic acquirements, he had doubtless felt, as he states, a profound
+but hopeless curiosity concerning their origin and history. He had even
+seen and consecutively examined the numerous and ornate monuments of
+Copan; but it was not until he had proceeded to the second stage of the
+journey from Coban to Quiche, that he was shown the engravings in the
+first volume of Stevens's Central America, in which they are so
+faithfully depicted. He recognized many of them as old acquaintances,
+and still more as new ones, which had escaped his more cursory
+inspection; and in all he could trace curious details which, on the
+spot, he regretted the want of time to examine. He, moreover, knew the
+surly Don Gregorio, by whom Mr. Stevens had been treated so
+inhospitably, and several other persons in the vicinity of the ruins
+whom he had named, and was delighted with the _vraisemblance_ of his
+descriptions. The Senor confesses that these circumstances inspired him
+with unlimited confidence in that traveller's statements upon other
+subjects; and when Mr. Huertis read to him the further account of the
+information given to Mr. Stevens by the jolly and merry, but intelligent
+old Padre of Quiche, respecting other ruined cities beyond the Sierra
+Madre, and especially of the living city of independent Candones, or
+unchristianized Indians, supposed to have been seen from the lofty
+summit of that mountain range, and was told by Messrs. Huertis and
+Hammond that the exploration of this city was the chief object of their
+perilous expedition, the Senor adds, that his enthusiasm became
+enkindled to at least as high a fervor as theirs, and that, "with more
+precipitancy than prudence, in a man of his maturer years and important
+business pursuits, he resolved to unite in the enterprise, to aid the
+heroic young men with his experience in travel and knowledge of the
+wild Indians of the region referred to, and to see the end of the
+adventure, result as it may."
+
+He was confirmed in this resolution by several concurring facts of which
+his companions were now told for the first time. He intimately knew and
+had several times been the guest of the worthy Cura of Quiche, from whom
+Mr. Stevens received assurances of the existence of the ruined city of
+the ancient Aztecs, as well as the living city of the Candones, in the
+unsubjugated territory beyond the mountains. And he was induced to yield
+credence to the Padre's confident report of the latter, because his
+account of the former had already been verified, and become a matter of
+fact and of record. He, Senor Velasquez, himself, during the preceding
+summer, joined a party of several foreigners and natives in exploring an
+ancient ruined city, of prodigious grandeur and extent, in the province
+of Vera Paz, but little more than 150 miles to the east of Guatimala,
+(instead of nearly 200, as the Padre had supposed,) which far surpassed
+in magnificence every other ruin, as yet discovered, either in Central
+America or Mexico. It lay overgrown with huge timber in the midst of a
+dense forest, far remote from any settlement, and near the crater of a
+long extinct volcano, on whose perpendicular walls, 300 or 400 feet
+high, were aboriginal paintings of warlike and idolatrous processions,
+dances, and other ceremonies, exhibiting like the architectural
+sculptures on the temples, a state of advancement in the arts
+incomparably superior to all previous examples. And as the good Padre
+had proved veracious and accurate on this matter, which he knew from
+personal observation, the Senor would not uncharitably doubt his
+veracity on a subject in which he again professed to speak from the
+evidence of his own eye-sight.
+
+The party thus re-assured, and more exhilarated than ever with the
+prospect of success, proceeded on their journey with renewed vigor.
+Although the Senor modestly abstains from any allusion to the subject,
+in the MSS. which have reached us, it cannot be doubted that Messrs.
+Huertis and Hammond considered him an invaluable accession to their
+party. He was a guide on whom they could rely; he was acquainted with
+the dialects of many of the Indian tribes through which they would have
+to pass; was familiar with the principal stages and villages on their
+route, and knew both the places and persons from whence the best
+information, if any, concerning the paramount object of their journey,
+could be obtained.
+
+It appears, also, from an incidental remark in his journal, that Senor
+Velasquez would have been at their right hand in a fight, in the event
+of any hostile obstruction on their way. As a volunteer, he had held a
+command under Morazan, during the sanguinary conflicts of the republic,
+and had been a soldier through several of the most arduous campaigns, in
+the fierce struggle between the general and Carrera. He was thus,
+apparently, in all respects, precisely such an auxiliary as they would
+have besought Providence to afford them, to accomplish the hazardous
+enterprise they had so daringly projected and commenced.
+
+Unfortunately for the public, the Senor's journal, fragmentary
+throughout, is especially meagre concerning the incidents of travel
+between the capital of Vera Paz and Santa Cruz del Quiche. At this
+period he appears to have left the task of recording them almost
+entirely to his two friends, whose memoranda, in all probability, are
+forever lost. Some of those incidents appear, even from his brief
+minutes of them, to have been of the most imminent and critical
+importance. Thus under the date of February 2nd, 1849, he says, "on the
+bank of a branch of the Salamo, attacked in the night by about thirty
+Indian robbers, several of whom had fire-arms. Sr. Hammond, sitting
+within the light of the fire, was severely wounded through the left
+shoulder; they had followed us from the hacienda, six leagues, passed us
+to the north and lay in ambush; killed four, wounded three; of the rest
+saw no more; poor Juan, shot through the body, died this morning; lost
+two mules."
+
+After this, there is nothing written until the 16th, when they had
+arrived at a place called San Jose, where he says, "Good beef and fowls;
+Sr. Huertis much better; Sr. Hammond very low in intermittent fever;
+fresh mules and good ones." Next on the 5th of March, at the Indian
+village of Axitzel, is written, "Detained here five days; Hammond,
+strong and headstrong. Agree with Huertis that, to be safe, we must wait
+with patience the return of the good Cura." Slight and tantalizing
+memoranda of this kind occur, irregularly, until April 3rd, when we find
+the party safely arrived at Quiche, and comfortably accommodated in a
+convent. The jovial Padre, already often mentioned, who maybe regarded
+as the unconscious father of the expedition, had become helplessly, if
+not hopelessly, dropsical, and lost much of his wanted jocosity. He
+declared, however, that Senor Velasquez's description of the ruins
+explored the previous summer, recalling as it did his own profoundly
+impressed recollection of them, when he walked through their desolate
+avenues and deserted palaces; and corroborating as it did, in every
+particular, his own reiterated account of them, which he had often
+bestowed upon incredulous and unworthy ears, would "act like _cannabis_
+upon his bladder," as it already had upon his eyes; and if he could but
+live to see the description in print, so as to silence all gainsayers,
+he had no doubt it would completely cure him, and add many years to his
+life. He persisted in his story of the unknown city in the Candone
+wilderness, as seen by himself, nearly forty years ago, from the summit
+of the sierra; and promised the travellers a letter to his friend, the
+Cura of Gueguetenango, requesting him to procure them a guide to the
+very spot from whence they could behold it for themselves.
+
+This promise, in the course of a few days, the Senor says, he faithfully
+performed, describing from recollection, by the hand of an amanuensis to
+whom he dictated, not only the more striking but even minute and
+peculiar landmarks for the guidance of the guide. On the 10th of April,
+the party, fully recruited in health and energy, set out for
+Totonicapan; and thence we trace them by the journal through a
+succession of small places to Quezaltenango, where they remained but two
+days; and thence through the places called Aguas Calientes, and San
+Sebastiano, to Gueguetenango; this portion of their route being
+described as one of unprecedented toil, danger, and exhaustion, from its
+mountainous character, accidents to men and mules, terrific weather and
+loss of provisions. Arrived, however, at length, at the town last named,
+which they justly regarded as an eminently critical stage of their
+destiny, they found the Cura, and presented him with the letter of
+introduction from his friend, the Padre of Quiche. They were somewhat
+discouraged on perceiving that the Cura indicated but little confidence
+in the accuracy of his old friend's memory, and asked them rather
+abruptly, if they thought him really serious in his belief in his
+distant vision of an unknown city from the sierra, because, for his own
+part, he had always regarded the story as one of Padre's broadest jokes,
+and especially since he had never heard of any other person possessing
+equal visual powers. "The mountain was high, it is true, but not much
+more than half as high as the hyperbolous memory of his reverend friend
+had made it, and he much feared that the Padre, in the course of forty
+years, had so frequently repeated a picture of his early imagination as
+to have, at length, cherished it as a reality." This was said in smooth
+and elegant Spanish, but says the Senor, "with an air of dignified
+sarcasm upon our credulity, which was far from being agreeable to men
+broken down and dispirited, by almost incredible toil, in pursuit of an
+object thus loftily pronounced a ridiculous phantom of the brain." This
+part of Senor Velasquez's journal being interesting and carefully
+written, we give the following translation without abridgement:--
+
+     "The Cura, nevertheless, on finding that his supercilious
+     scepticism had not proved so infectious among us as he expected and
+     that we were rather vexed than vacillating, offered to procure us
+     guides in the course of a day or two, who were familiar with many
+     parts of the sierra, and who, for good pay, he doubted not, would
+     flatter our expectations to the utmost extent we could desire. He
+     advised us, however, in the same style of caustic dissuasion, to
+     take with us both a barometer and a telescope, if we were provided
+     with those instruments, because the latter, especially, might be
+     found useful in discovering the unknown city, and the former would
+     not only inform us of the height of the mountain, but of the
+     weather in prospect most favorable to a distant view. Senor Huertis
+     replied that such precautions would be adopted, as a matter of
+     course, and would, moreover, furnish him, on our return to
+     Gueguetenango, with the exact latitude and longitude of the spot
+     from which the discovery might be made. He laughed very heartily
+     and rejoined that he thought this operation would be much easier
+     than to furnish the same interesting particulars concerning the
+     location of the spots at which the discovery might fail to be made;
+     and saying this he robed himself for mass, which we all, rather
+     sullenly, attended.
+
+     "Next morning, two good looking Meztitzos, brothers, waited on us
+     with a strong letter of recommendation from the Cura, as guides to
+     that region of the sierra which the Padre's letter had so
+     particularly described, and which description, the Cura added, he
+     had taken much pains to make them understand. On being questioned
+     concerning it, they startled and somewhat disconcerted us by calm
+     assurances, in very fair Spanish, that they were not only familiar
+     with all the land-marks, great and small, which the Cura had read
+     to them, but had several times seen the very city of which we were
+     in search, although none but full-blooded Indians had ever ventured
+     on a journey to it. This was rather too much, even for us, sanguine
+     and confiding as we were. We shared a common suspicion that the
+     Cura had changed his tactics, and resolved to play a practical joke
+     upon our credulity--to send us on a fool's errand and laugh at us
+     for our pains. That he had been tampering with the two guides for
+     this purpose, struck us forcibly; for while he professed never to
+     have known any man who had seen the distant city, he recommended
+     these Meztitzos, as brothers, whom he had known from their boyhood,
+     they declared they had beheld it from the sierra on various
+     occasions. Nevertheless, Senor Huertis believed that the young men
+     spoke the truth, while the Cura, probably, did not; and hoping to
+     catch him in his own snare, if such had been laid, asked the guides
+     their terms, which, though high, he agreed to at once, without
+     cavil. They said it would take us eight days to reach the part of
+     the sierra described in the letter, and that we might have to wait
+     on the summit several days more, before the weather would afford a
+     clear view. They would be ready in two days; they had just returned
+     across the mountains from San Antonia de Guista, and needed rest
+     and repairs. There was a frankness and simplicity about these fine
+     fellows which would bear the severest scrutiny, and we could only
+     admit the bare possibility of our being mistaken.
+
+     "It took us three days, however, to procure a full supply of the
+     proper kind of provisions for a fortnight's abode in the sky, and
+     on the fourth, (May 5th,) we paid our formal respects to the Cura,
+     and started for the ascent--he not forgetting to remind us of the
+     promise to report to him the precise geographical locality of our
+     discovery."
+
+The journal is again blank until May 9th, when the writer says, "Our
+altitude, by barometer, this morning, is over 6000 feet above the valley
+which we crossed three days ago; the view of it and its surrounding
+mountains, sublime with chasms, yet grotesque in outline, and all
+heavily gilded with the setting sun, is one of the most oppressively
+gorgeous I ever beheld. The guides inform us that we have but 3000 feet
+more to ascend, and point to the gigantic pinnacle before us, at the
+apparent distance of seven or eight leagues; but that, before we can
+reach it, we have to descend and ascend an immense barranca, (ravine,)
+nearly a thousand feet deep from our present level, and of so difficult
+a passage that it will cost us several days. The side of the mountain
+towards the north-west, is perfectly flat and perpendicular for more
+than half its entire height, as if the prodigious section had been riven
+down by the sword of the San Miguel, and hurled with his foot among the
+struggling multitude of summits below. So far, the old Padre is accurate
+in every particular." In a note opposite this extract, written
+perpendicularly on the margin of the manuscript, the writer says, "The
+average breadth of the plain on this ridge of the sierra, (that is the
+ridge on which they were then encamped for the night,) is nearly half a
+mile, and exhibits before us a fine rolling track as far as we can see.
+Neither birds, beasts, nor insects--I would there were no such
+barranca!" On the tenth he says, "on the brink of the abyss--the
+heaviest crags we can hurl down, return no sound from the bottom."
+
+The next entry in the journal is dated May 15th.--"Recovered the body of
+Sebastiano and the load of his mule; his brother is building a cross for
+his grave, and will not leave it until famished with thirst and hunger.
+All too exhausted to think of leaving this our first encampment since we
+descended. Present elevation but little above that of the opposite ridge
+which we left on the 11th, still, at least 3000 feet to climb." On the
+19th, 4 o'clock, P. M., he records, "Myself, Sr. Hammond and Antonio, on
+the highest summit, an inclined plain of bare rock, of about fifteen
+acres. The Padre again right. Sr. Huertis and others just discernable,
+but bravely coming on. Elevation, 9,500 feet. Completely in the clouds,
+and all the country below invisible. Senor Hammond already bleeding at
+the nose, and no cigar to stop it." At 10 o'clock, the same night, he
+writes, "All comfortably asleep but myself and Sr. Hammond, who is going
+to take the latitude." Then follows, "He finds the latitude 15 degrees
+and 48 minutes _north_." Opposite this, in the margin is written, "the
+mean result of three observations of different stars. Intend to take the
+longitude to-morrow." Next day, the 20th, he says, "A bright and most
+auspicious morning, and all, but poor Antonio, in fine health and
+feeling. The wind by compass, N. E., and rolling away a billowy ocean of
+mist, toward, I suppose, the Bay of Honduras. Antonio says the Pacific
+will be visible within an hour; (present time not given) more and more
+of the lower mountains becoming clear every moment. Fancy we already
+see the Pacific, a faint yellow plain, almost as elevated as ourselves.
+Can see part of the State of Chiapas pretty distinctly." At 12 o'clock,
+meridian, he says, "Sr. Hammond is taking the longitude, but finds a
+difference of several minutes between his excellent watch and
+chronometer, and fears the latter has been shaken. Both the watch and
+its owner, however, have been a great deal more shaken, for the
+chronometer has been all the time in the midst of a thick blanket, and
+has had no falls. Sr. Huertis, with the glass, sees whole lines and
+groups of pyramids, in Chiapas." At 1 o'clock, P. M. he records, "Sr.
+Hammond reports the longitude, 92 degrees 15 minutes _west_. Brave
+Huertis is in ecstacy with some discovery, but will not part with the
+glass for a moment. No doubt it is the Padre's city, for it is precisely
+in the direction he indicated. Antonio says he can see it with his naked
+eye, although less distinctly than heretofore. I can only see a white
+straight line, like a ledge of limestone rock, on an elevated plain, at
+least twenty leagues distant, in the midst of a vast amphitheatre of
+hills, to the north east of our position, toward the State of Yucatan.
+Still, it is no doubt the place the Padre saw, and it may be a great
+city."
+
+At 2 o'clock P. M., he says "All doubt is at an end! We have all seen it
+through the glass, as distinctly as though it were but a few leagues
+off, and it is now clear and bright to the unaided eye. It is
+unquestionably a richly monumented city, of vast dimensions, within
+lofty parapeted walls, three or four miles square, inclined inward in
+the Egyptian style, and its interior domes and turrets have an
+emphatically oriental aspect. I should judge it to be not more than
+twenty-five leagues from Ocosingo, to the eastward, and nearly in the
+same latitude; and this would probably be the best point from which to
+reach it, travelling due east, although the course of the river Legartos
+seems to lead directly to it. That it is still an inhabited place, is
+evident from the domes of its temples, or churches. Christian churches
+they cannot be, for such a city would have an Archbishop and be well
+known to the civilized world. It must be a Pagan strong-hold that
+escaped the conquest by its remote position, and the general retreat,
+retirement, and centralizing seclusion of its surrounding population. It
+may now be opened to the light of the true faith."
+
+They commenced their descent the same day, and rested at night on the
+place of their previous encampment, a narrow shelf of the sierra. Here,
+on the brink of the terrible ravine, which they had again to encounter,
+they consulted upon a plan for their future operations; and it was
+finally agreed that Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, with Antonio, and such
+of the Indian muleteers as could be induced to proceed with the
+expedition, should follow the bottom of the ravine, in its north-east
+course, in which, according to Antonio, the river Legartos took its
+principal supply of water, and remain at a large village, adjacent to
+its banks, which they had seen, about five leagues distant; while Senor
+Velasquez was to trace their late route, by way of Gueguetenango, to
+Quezaltenango, where all the surplus arms and ammunition had been
+deposited, and recruit a strong party of Indians, to serve as a guard,
+in the event of an attack from the people of the unexplored region,
+whither they were resolutely bound. In the meantime, Antonio was to
+return home to Gueguetenango, await the return of Velasquez, with his
+armed party, from Quezaltenango, and conduct them over the mountains to
+the village on the plains, where Messrs. Huertis and Hammond were to
+remain until they should arrive. It appears that Senor Velasquez was
+abundantly supplied with solid funds for the recruiting service, and
+that Mr. Huertis also furnished Antonio with a liberal sum, in addition
+to his stipulated pay, wherewith to procure masses for the repose of his
+unfortunate brother.
+
+Of the adventures of Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, in the long interval
+prior to the return of Velasquez, we have no account whatever; nor does
+the journal of the latter contain any remarks relative to his own
+operations, during the same period. The next date is July the 8th, when
+we find him safely arrived with "nearly all the men he had engaged," at
+an Indian village called Aguamasinta, where his anxious companions were
+overjoyed to receive him, and where "they had obtained inestimable
+information regarding the proper arrangement of the final purpose."
+After this we trace them, by brief memoranda, for a few days, on the
+devious course of the Legartos, when the journal abruptly and finally
+closes. The remaining narrative of the expedition was written by Senor
+Velasquez from memory, after his return to San Salvador, while all the
+exciting events and scenes which it describes were vividly sustained by
+the feelings which they originally inspired. As this excessively
+interesting document will be translated for the public press as soon as
+the necessary consent of its present proprietor can be obtained, the
+writer of this pamphlet the less regrets the very limited use of it to
+which he is now restricted--which is but little more than that of making
+a mere abridgement and connexion of such incidents as may serve to
+explain the origin and possession of those _sui generis_ specimens of
+humanity, the Aztec brother and sister, now exhibiting to the public, in
+the United States. From the introductory paragraphs, we take the
+liberty to quote the following without abridgement:--
+
+     "Our latitude and longitude were now 16° 42' N. and 91° 35' W; so
+     that the grand amphitheatre of hills, forming three fourths of an
+     oval outline of jagged summits, a few leagues before us, most
+     probably inclosed the mysterious object of our anxious and
+     uncertain labors. The small groups of Indians through which we had
+     passed, in the course of the day, had evidently been startled by
+     sheer astonishment, into a sort of passive and involuntary
+     hospitality, but maintained a stark apprehensive reserve in most of
+     their answers to our questions. They spoke a peculiar dialect of
+     the Maya, which I had never heard before, and had great difficulty
+     in comprehending, although several of the Maya Indians of our
+     party understood it familiarly and spoke it fluently. From them we
+     learned that they had never seen men of our race before, but that a
+     man of the same race as Senor Hammond, who was of a bright-florid
+     complexion, with light hair and red whiskers, had been sacrificed
+     and eaten by the Macbenachs, or priests of Iximaya, the great city
+     among the hills, about thirty moons ago. Our interpreters stated
+     that the word "Iximaya" meant the "Great Centre," and that
+     "Macbenach" meant the "Great Son of the Sun." I at once resolved to
+     make the most of my time in learning as much as possible of this
+     dialect from these men, because they said it was the tongue spoken
+     by the people of Iximaya and the surrounding region. It appeared to
+     me to be merely a provincial corruption, or local peculiarism, of
+     the great body of the Maya language, with which I was already
+     acquainted; and, in the course of the next day's conversation, I
+     found that I could acquire it with much facility."
+
+To this circumstance the writer is probably indebted for his life. In
+another day, the determined explorers had come within the circuit of the
+alpine district in which Iximaya is situated, and found it reposing, in
+massive grandeur, in the centre of a perfectly level plain, about five
+leagues in diameter, at a distance of scarcely two from the spot they
+had reached. At the base of all the mountains, rising upon their sides,
+and extending nearly a mile inward upon the plain, was a dark green
+forest of colossal trees and florid shrubbery, girding it around; while
+the even valley itself exhibited large tracts of uncultivated fields,
+fenced in with palisades, and regular, even to monotony, both in size
+and form. "Large herds of deer, cattle, and horses, were seen in the
+openings of the forest, and dispersed over the plain, which was also
+studded with low flat-roofed dwellings of stone, in small detached
+clusters, or hamlets. Rich patches of forest, of irregular forms,
+bordered with gigantic aloes, diversified the landscape in effective
+contrast with bright lakes of water which glowed among them."
+
+While the whole party, with their cavalcade of mules and baggage were
+gazing upon the scene, two horsemen, in bright blue and yellow tunics,
+and wearing turbans decorated with three large plumes of the quezal,
+dashed by them from the forest, at the distance of about two hundred
+yards, on steeds of the highest Spanish mould, followed by a long
+retinue of athletic Indians, equally well mounted, clothed in brilliant
+red tunics, with coronals of gay feathers, closely arranged within a
+band of blue cloth. Each horseman carried a long spear, pointed with a
+polished metal; and each held, in a leash, a brace of powerful
+blood-hounds, which were also of the purest Spanish breed. The two
+leaders of this troop, who were Indians of commanding air and stature,
+suddenly wheeled their horses and glared upon the large party of
+intruders with fixed amazement. Their followers evinced equal surprise,
+but forgot not to draw up in good military array, while the blood-hounds
+leapt and raged in their thongs.
+
+     "While the leaders," says Senor Velasquez, "seemed to be intently
+     scrutinizing every individual of our company, as if silently
+     debating the policy of an immediate attack, one of the Maya
+     Indians, of whom I had been learning the dialect, stepped forward
+     and informed us that they were a detachment of rural guards, a very
+     numerous military force, which had been appointed from time
+     immemorial, or, at least from the time of the Spanish invasion, to
+     hunt down and capture all strangers of a foreign race that should
+     be found within a circle of twelve leagues of the city; and he
+     repeated the statement made to us from the beginning, that no white
+     man had hitherto eluded their vigilance or left their city alive.
+     He said there was a tradition that many of the pioneers of
+     Alvarado's army had been cut off in this manner, and never heard of
+     more, while their skulls and weapons are to this day suspended
+     round the altars of the pagan gods. He added, finally, that if we
+     wished to escape the same fate, now was our only chance; that as we
+     numbered thirty-five, all armed with repeating rifles, we could
+     easily destroy the present detachment, which amounted to but fifty,
+     and secure our retreat before another could come up; but that, in
+     order to do this, it was necessary first to shoot the dogs, which
+     all our Indians regarded with the utmost dread and horror.
+
+     "I instantly felt the force of this advice, in which, also, I was
+     sustained by Senor Hammond; but Senor Huertis, whom, as the leader
+     of the expedition, we were all bound and solemnly pledged to obey;
+     utterly rejected the proposition. He had come so far to see the
+     city and see it he would, whether taken thither as a captive or
+     not, and whether he ever returned from it or not, that this was the
+     contract originally proposed, and to which I had assented; that the
+     fine troop before us was evidently not a gang of savages, but a
+     body of civilized men and good soldiers; and as to the dogs, they
+     were noble animals of the highest blood he ever saw. If, however, I
+     and his friend Hammond, who seemed afraid of being eaten, in
+     preference to the fine beef and venison which we had seen in such
+     profusion on the plain, really felt alarmed at the bugbear legends
+     of our vagabond Indians, before any demonstration of hostility had
+     been made, we were welcome to take two-thirds of the men and mules
+     and make our retreat as best we could, while he would advance with
+     Antonio and the remainder of the party, to the gates of the city,
+     and demand a peaceable admission. I could not but admire the
+     romantic intrepidity of this resolve, though I doubted its
+     discretion; and assured him I was ready to follow his example and
+     share his fate.
+
+     "While this conversation was passing among us, the Indian
+     commanders held a conference apparently as grave and important. But
+     just as Senor Huertis and myself had agreed to advance towards them
+     for a parley, they separated without deigning a reply to our
+     salutation--the elder and more highly decorated, galloped off
+     towards the city with a small escort, while the other briskly
+     crossed our front at the head of his squadron and entered the
+     forest nearer the entrance of the valley. This opening in the
+     hills, was scarcely a quarter of a mile wide, and but a few minutes
+     elapsed before we saw a single horseman cross it toward the wood on
+     the opposite side. Presently, another troop of horse of the same
+     uniform appearance as the first, were seen passing a glade of the
+     wood which the single horseman had penetrated, and it thus became
+     evident that a manoeuvre had already been effected to cut off our
+     retreat. The mountains surrounding the whole area of the plain,
+     were absolutely perpendicular for three-fourths of their altitude,
+     which was no where less than a thousand feet; and from many parts
+     of their wildly piled outline, huge crags projected in monstrous
+     mammoth forms, as if to plunge to the billows of forest beneath. At
+     no point of this vast impassible boundary was there a chasm or
+     declivity discernable by which we could make our exit, except the
+     one thus formidably intercepted.
+
+     "To retire into the forest and water our mules at a copious stream
+     which rushed forth from its recesses, and recruit our own exhausted
+     strength with food and rest, was our first necessary resource. In
+     tracing the rocky course of the current for a convenient watering
+     place, Antonio discovered that it issued from a cavern, which,
+     though a mere fissure exteriorly, was, within, of cathedral
+     dimensions and solemnity; we all entered it and drank eagerly from
+     a foaming basin, which it immediately presented to our fevered
+     lips. Our first sensations were those of freedom and independence,
+     and of that perfect security which is the basis of both. It was
+     long since we had slept under a roof of any kind, while here a few
+     men could defend our repose against an assault from thousands; but
+     it was horribly evident, to my mind, that a few watchful assailants
+     would suffice to reduce us to starvation, or destroy us in detail.
+     Our security was that of a prison, and our freedom was limited to
+     its walls. Happily, however, for the present hour, this reflection
+     seemed to trouble no one. Objects of wonder and veneration grew
+     numerous to our gaze. Gigantic statues of ancient warriors, with
+     round shields, arched helmets, and square breast-plates, curiously
+     latticed and adorned, stood sculptured in high relief, with grave
+     faces and massive limbs, and in the regular order of columns around
+     the walls of this grand mausoleum. Many of them stood arrayed in
+     the crimson of the setting sun, which then flamed through the tall
+     fissure into the cavern; and the deep gloom into which long rows of
+     others utterly retired from our view, presented a scene at once of
+     mingled mystery and splendor. It was evidently a place of great and
+     recent resort, both for men and horses, for plentiful supplies of
+     fresh fodder for the latter were heaped in stone recesses; while
+     the ashes of numerous fires, mingled with discarded moccasins and
+     broken pipes and pottery, attested a domiciliary occupation by the
+     former. Farther into the interior, were found seats and
+     sleeping-couches of fine cane work; and in a spacious recess, near
+     the entrance, a large collection of the bones, both of the ox and
+     the deer, with hides, also, of both, but newly flayed and suspended
+     on pegs by the horns. These last evidences of good living had more
+     effect upon our hungry Indians than all the rest, and within an
+     hour after dark, while we were seeking our first sleep, four fine
+     deer were brought in by about a dozen of our party, whom we
+     supposed to have been faithfully guarding our citadel. It is
+     unnecessary to say that we gladly arose to the rich repast that
+     ensued, for we had eaten nothing but our scant allowance of
+     tortillas for many days, and were in the lassitude of famine."
+
+Tempting as such extracts are, we must avoid them, and hasten through a
+summary of subsequent events. There is one singular incident, however,
+mentioned in the passage immediately following the above, possessing too
+important a connexion with the final catastrophe to be pretermitted at
+this place. Mr. Hammond, the Canadian engineer, fearing that the
+peculiarity of his appearance, as a man of fair and ruddy complexion,
+among a swarthy race, would subject him to great annoyance, and perhaps
+involve him in the horrible fate of a similar person, reported by the
+Indians, resolved to stain his skin of a darker hue, by means of some
+chemical preparation which he had precautionarily provided for this
+purpose, before he left the United States. With the friendly
+assistance of Antonio, this metamorphosis was completed over his whole
+person before he retired to rest; his red whiskers were shaved off, and
+his light hair died of a jet black; and so perfect was the disguise,
+that not one of the party who went foraging for venison recognized him
+on their return, but marvelled, as he sat at supper, whence so singular
+a stranger could have come. Velasquez states, however, that his new
+complexion was unlike that of any human being on the face of the earth,
+and scarcely diminished the certainty of his becoming an object of
+curiosity, among an Indian population.
+
+In the morning, about the break of day, the infernal yells of a pack of
+blood-hounds suddenly rang through the cavern, and the party could
+scarcely seize their rifles before many of the dogs, who had driven in
+the affrighted Indians on guard, were springing at their throats. Mr.
+Huertis, however, the American leader of the expedition, with that
+presence of mind which seems always to have distinguished him, told the
+men that rifles were useless in such a contest, and that the hounds must
+be dispatched with their long knives as fast as they came in, while the
+fire-arms were to be reserved for their masters. This canine butchery
+was accomplished with but little difficulty; none of the party received
+any serious injury from their fangs; and the Indians were exhilarated
+with a victory which was chiefly a conquest of their fears. These
+unfortunate dogs, it appears, were the advanced van of a pack, or
+perhaps merely a few unleashed as scouts to others held in reserve; for
+no more were seen or heard for sometime. Meanwhile, Mr. Huertis seems to
+have struck out a brilliant scheme. He collected his whole party into
+that obscure branch of the cavern, near its entrance, which has been
+described as a depository of animal bones, and ordering them to sling
+their rifles at their backs, bade them stand ready with their knives.
+Almost instantly, they observed a party of ten dismounted natives, in
+scarlet tunics, and armed with spears, enter the cavern in single file;
+and, it would seem, from seeing the dogs slain and no enemy in sight,
+they rushed out again, without venturing on farther search. In a few
+minutes, however, they returned with forty or fifty more, in the same
+uniform, headed by the younger of the two personages whom they had seen
+in command the previous evening. As soon as they were well advanced into
+the cavern, and heard disturbing the tired mules, Mr. Huertis and his
+party marched quietly out and seized their horses, which were picketed
+close by, in charge of two or three men, whom they disarmed. At a short
+distance, however, drawn up in good order, was another squadron of
+horses, which Mr. Huertis determined instantly to charge. Ordering his
+whole party to mount the noble stallions they had captured, and reserve
+their fire until he gave the word, he, Velasquez, and Hammond, drew the
+short sabres they had worn on their march, and led the attack. The
+uniformed natives, however, did not wait the encounter, but scattered in
+wonderment and consternation; doubtless under the impression that all
+their comrades had been slain. But the rapid approach of a much larger
+force--which is found, eventually, to have consisted of two detachments
+of fifty each, being just twice their number--speedily reassured them,
+and falling in line with this powerful reinforcement, the whole hundred
+and fifty charged upon our comparative handful of travellers, at a rapid
+pace. Huertis promptly ordered his little party to halt, and form in
+line, two deep, with presented arms; and doubtless feeling that,
+notwithstanding the disparity of numbers, the enemy, armed only with
+spears and small side-hatchets, held but a slender chance of victory
+over a party of thirty-eight--most of them old campaigners in the
+sanguinary expeditions of the terrible Carrera--armed with new
+"six-shooting" rifles and long knives, generously commanded them to keep
+aim upon the horses only, until further orders. In the meantime, most of
+their plumed opponents, instead of using their long spears as in lance
+practice, threw them through the air from so great a distance that
+nearly all fell short of the mark--an infallible indication both of
+timidity and inexperience in action. The unfortunate Mr. Hammond,
+however, was pierced through the right breast, and another of the party
+was killed by being transfixed through the bowels. At this instant
+Huertis gave the word to fire; and, at the next, no small number of the
+enemy were rolling upon the sod, amid their plunging horses. A second
+rapid, but well delivered volley, brought down as many more, when the
+rest, in attitudes of frantic wonder and terror, unconsciously dropped
+their weapons and fled like affrighted fowls under the sudden swoop of
+the kite. Their dispersion was so outrageously wild and complete that no
+two of them could be seen together as they radiated over the plain. The
+men and horses seemed impelled alike by a preternatural panic; and
+neither Cortez in Mexico, nor Pizarro in Peru, ever witnessed greater
+consternation at fire-arms among a people, who, for the first time,
+beheld their phenomena and effects--when mere hundreds of invaders
+easily subjugated millions of natives chiefly by this appalling
+influence--than was manifested by these Iximayans on this occasion.
+Indeed, it appears that these primitive and isolated people, holding no
+intercourse whatever with the rest of mankind, were as ignorant as their
+ancestors even of the existence of this kind of weapons; and although
+their modern hieroglyphical annals were found to contain vague allusions
+to the use of them in the conquest of the surrounding country, by means
+of a peculiar kind of thunder and lightning, and several old Spanish
+muskets and pistols were found in their scant collection of foreign
+curiosities, yet, not even the most learned of their priests had
+retained the slightest notion of the uses for which they were designed.
+
+While this summary conflict was enacted on the open lawn of the forest,
+the dismounted company in the cavern having completed their fruitless
+search for the fugitives, emerged from its portal with all the mules and
+baggage, just in time to see and hear the fiery explosions of the rifles
+and their effect upon the whole body of scarlet cavalry. The entire
+scene, including the mounted possession of their horses by uncouthly
+attired strangers, previously invisible, must have appeared to these
+terror-stricken natives an achievement of supernatural beings. And when
+Mr. Huertis wheeled his obstreperously laughing party to recover his
+mules, he found most of the astounded men prostrated upon their faces,
+while others, more self-possessed, knelt upon the bended knee, and, with
+drooping heads, crossed their hands behind them to receive the bonds of
+captives. Their gallant and gaily accoutred young chieftain, however,
+though equally astonished and dismayed, merely surrendered his javelin
+as an officer would his sword, under the like circumstances, in
+civilized warfare. But, with admirable tact and forethought, Huertis
+declined to accept it, immediately returning it with the most profound
+and deferential cordiality of manner. He at the same time informed him,
+through Velasquez, that, though strangers, his party were not enemies
+but friendly visitors, who, after a long and painful journey, again to
+be pursued, desired the temporary hospitality of his countrymen in their
+magnificent city.
+
+The young chief replied, with evident discomposure and concern, that his
+countrymen showed no hospitality to strangers, it being interdicted by
+their laws and punishable with death; that the inhabitants of their city
+held intercourse only with the population of the surrounding valley, who
+were restricted alike by law and by patriotism from ever leaving its
+confines; he and his fellow soldiers alone being privileged to visit the
+neighboring regions for the purpose of arresting intruders, (_cowana_,)
+and escorting certain kind of merchandize which they exchanged with a
+people of their own race in an adjoining district. He added, with much
+eloquence of manner, and as Velasquez believed, of language, which he
+but partially understood, that the independence and peace of his nation,
+who were a peaceful and happy people, depended upon these severe
+restrictions, which indeed had been the only means of preserving it,
+while all the country besides, from sea to sea, had bowed to a foreign
+yoke, and seen their ancient cities, once the seats and centres of
+mighty empires, overgrown with forest, and the temples of their gods
+demolished.
+
+He further added, says Velasquez, in a very subdued but significant
+tone, that some few strangers, it was true, had been taken to the city
+by its guards in the course of many generations, but that none of them
+had been allowed an opportunity of betraying its existence and locality
+to the cruel rapacity of the foreign race. He concluded by earnestly
+entreating them, since he could not compel them as prisoners, to enter
+the city as friends, with the view of residing there for life; promising
+them wives, and dwellings, and honors; for even now, if they attempted
+to retreat, they would be overtaken by thousands of armed men on fleet
+horses, that would overpower them by their numbers and subject them to a
+very different fate.
+
+Mr. Huertis rejoined, through the same interpreter, that he could
+destroy any number of armed men, on the swiftest horses, before they
+could approach him, as the chief had already seen; and since he could
+enforce his exit from the city whenever he thought proper, he would
+enter it upon his own terms, either as a conqueror, or as a friend,
+according to the reception he met with; that there was now no race of
+conquerors to whom the city could be betrayed, even if he were disposed
+to do so, as the people of the whole country, of all races, were now
+living in a state of perfect freedom and equality; and that, therefore,
+there was no necessity for those unsocial and sanguinary laws which
+secluded the Iximayans from friendly intercourse with their fellow-men.
+Saying which, and without waiting for further colloquy, he ordered his
+party to dismount, restore the horses to their owners, and march with
+the train of mules toward the city, in the usual style of travel. With
+this order, his Indians complied very reluctantly, but on assuring them
+that it was a matter of the highest policy, they evinced their wonted
+confidence in his judgment and ability. To the young chief he restored
+his own richly caparisoned steed, which had fallen to the lot of the
+unfortunate Mr. Hammond, who was now lying desperately wounded, in the
+care of the faithful Antonio. For himself and Senor Velasquez, Mr.
+Huertis retained the horses they had first seized, and placing
+themselves on each side of the Iximayan commander, with their friend
+Hammond borne immediately behind them, in one of the cane couches of the
+cavern, on the backs of two mules yoked together, they advanced to the
+head of their party, while the red troopers, followed by the surviving
+bloodhounds leashed in couples, brought up the rear. Huertis, however,
+had taken the precaution to add the spears and hatchets of these men to
+the burdens of the forward mules, to abide the event of his reception at
+the city gates. The appearance of the whole cavalcade must have been
+unique and picturesque; for Velasquez informs us, that while he wore the
+uniform of a military company to which he belonged in San Salvador, much
+enhanced in effect by some brilliant additions, and crowned with a broad
+sombrero and plume, Huertis wore that of an American naval commander,
+with gold epaulettes; his riflemen and muleteers generally were clothed
+in blue cotton and grass hats, while the native cavalry, in the
+brilliant tunics and feathered coronals, already described, must have
+completed the diversity of the variegated cortege. Had poor Hammond been
+mounted among them, his costume would have been as equivocal as his new
+complexion, for he had attired himself in the scarlet coat of a British
+officer of rank, with several blazing stars of glass jewels, surmounted
+by a white Panama hat, in which clustered an airy profusion of ladies'
+ostrich feathers, dyed blue at the edges.
+
+In passing the spot of the recent skirmish, they found that nine horses
+and two men had been killed, the latter unintentionally, besides the
+rifleman of their own party. Many other horses were lying wounded, in
+the struggles of death, and several of their riders were seated on the
+ground, disabled by bruises or dislocations. Huertis' men buried their
+comrades in a grave hastily dug with the spears which lay around him,
+while the Iximayans laid their dead and wounded upon horses, to be
+conveyed to a village on the plain. The former, it was found, were
+consumed there the next day, in funereal fires, with idolatrous rites;
+and it was observed by the travellers that the native soldiers regarded
+their dead with emotions of extreme sensibility, and almost feminine
+grief, like men wholly unaccustomed to scenes of violent death. But
+Velasquez remarks, that the strongest emotion evinced by the young
+chief, throughout their intercourse, was when he heard the word
+"Iximaya," in interpreting for Huertis. He then seemed to be smitten and
+subdued, by blank despair, as if he felt that the city and its location
+were already familiarly known to the foreign world.
+
+As already intimated, the distance to the city was about six miles. The
+expedition found the road to it bordered, on either side, as far as the
+eye could reach, with a profuse and valuable vegetation, the result of
+evidently assiduous and skilful culture. Indigo, corn, oats, a curious
+five-eared wheat, gourds, pine-apples, esculent roots, pulse, flax, and
+hemp, the white as well as the crimson cotton, vineyards, and fruit
+orchards, grew luxuriantly in large, regularly divided fields, which
+were now ripe for the harvest. The villages, large and populous, were
+mostly composed of flat-roofed dwellings with broad overhanging eaves or
+architraves, supported by heavy columns, often filletted over spiral
+flutings, in the Egyptian style, and generally terminating in foliaged
+capitals, of the same character. None of the houses were mean, while
+many were superb; and of the mosque-like larger buildings, which
+occasionally appeared, and which were supposed to be rural temples, some
+were grand and imposing. A profusion of bold sculpture, was the
+prevailing characteristic, and perhaps defect, of all. The inhabitants,
+who thronged the wayside in great numbers, appeared excited with
+surprise and exultation, on beholding the large company of strangers
+apparently in the custody of their military, while the disarmed
+condition of the latter, and the bodies of the slain, were a mystery
+they could not explain. Many of the husbandmen were observed to be in
+possession of bows and arrows, and some of the women held rusty spears.
+The predominant costume of both sexes was a pale blue tunic, gathered in
+at the breast and descending to the knee, with reticulated buskins, of
+red cord, covering the calf of the leg. The women, with few exceptions,
+were of fine form, and the highest order of Indian beauty, with an
+extraordinary affluence of black hair, tastefully disposed, and
+decorated with plumes and flowers. At the village where the dead and
+wounded were left, with their relatives and friends, doleful
+lamentations were heard, until the expedition approached the city.
+
+The walls of this metropolis were sixty feet high, sloping inward from
+the foundation, surmounted by a parapet which overhung in a concave
+curve and rested upon a plain moulding. They were evidently a massive
+work of a remote period, for although constructed of large blocks of
+granitic stone, white and glittering in the sun, passing ages had
+corroded rough crevices between the layers, and the once perfect
+cornices had become indented by the tooth of time. The sculptured annals
+of the city recorded them an antiquity of four thousand years. They
+formed a parallelogram four miles long and three in width, thus
+inclosing an area of nearly twelve square miles, and they breasted the
+cardinal points of the horizon with a single gate, or propylon, midway
+on every side. On approaching the eastern gate, the travellers
+discovered that the foundations of the walls were laid in a deep foss or
+moat a hundred feet wide, nearly full to its brink and abounding with
+water-fowl. It was replenished from the mountains, and discharged its
+surplus waters into the lakes of the valley. It was to be crossed by a
+draw-bridge now raised over the gate, and the parapet was thronged with
+the populace to behold the entrance of so large a number of strangers
+for whom there was no return.
+
+At a signal from the young chief, the bridge slowly descended and the
+cavalcade passed over; but the folding gates, which were composed of
+blocks of stone curiously dovetailed together, and which revolved upon
+hinges of the same material by a ball and socket contrivance above and
+below, were not yet opened, and the party were detained on the bridge. A
+small oval orifice only appeared, less than a human face, and an ear
+was applied there to receive an expected word in a whisper. This
+complied with, the ponderous gates unfolded, and a vista of solemn
+magnificence was presented to the view. It was a vista at once of
+colossal statues and trees, interminable in perspective and extending,
+as it was found, the whole length of the city to its western gate.
+Incredible as it may be, until we reflect upon the ancient statuary of
+the eastern world, Velasquez reports each and all of these monuments as
+being exactly of the height of the city wall, that is, sixty feet, and
+all possessing the proportions of the human figure. He adds, what is
+equally marvelous, that no two of them were precisely alike in
+countenance, and very few in their sculptural costume. There was some
+distinctive emblem upon each, and he was informed that they were statues
+of the ancient kings of Assyria, from before the foundation of Babylon,
+and of their descendants in the Aztec empires of this continent. They
+stood sixty feet apart, with a smaller monument of some mythological
+animal between each, and were said to number one hundred and fifteen, on
+each side of the avenue they formed, which was one hundred and twenty
+feet in width. A similar but shorter avenue, it appears, crossed the
+city from north to south, having a proportional number of such monuments
+through its entire extent; and these two grand avenues ran through wide
+areas of green sward richly grouped with lofty trees. But the translator
+finds himself trespassing upon forbidden ground and must forbear.
+
+As the cavalcade advanced through this highway to the centre of the
+city, they found it crowded on each side with the masses of the
+population assembled to behold a spectacle so unprecedented and
+mysterious; but the utmost order prevailed and even the silence was
+profound. The news of the slaughter and dispersion of their military
+guardians, by an army of strangers, wielding deadly weapons of fire and
+smoke, had already run through every quarter of the city with increasing
+exaggeration and terror; but the people wisely left its investigation to
+their constituted authorities, and were rendered comparatively tranquil
+by their personal observation of its actual results. Arrived at the
+quadrated point, where the two great avenues we have described
+intersect, Mr. Huertis boldly demanded of his guide the further course
+and character of his destination. He was answered by his dignified
+companion, that he would be conducted to the building immediately before
+him, which is described as one of majestic dimensions and style, where
+the monarch of the nation daily assembled with his councillors, at the
+hour of noon, to administer justice and listen to complaints. In the
+meantime, his wounded friend could be placed in a state of greater ease
+and repose, in one of the apartments of the edifice, while the mules
+and baggage could be disposed of in its basement vaults. When this was
+accomplished the hours of audience had arrived.
+
+The entire party of strangers, with the young chief and several of his
+subordinates, were then led into a large and lofty hall, surrounded by
+columns, and displaying three raised seats covered with canopies of rich
+drapery and design. On the one of these, which stood at the eastern end,
+sat the monarch himself, a personage of grave but benignant aspect,
+about sixty years of age, arrayed in scarlet and gold, and having a
+golden image of the rising sun, of extraordinary splendor, displayed on
+the back of his throne. On the seat on the southern side, sat a
+venerable man of advanced age, not less gorgeously attired; and the seat
+at the western end was occupied by a functionary of similar years and
+costume. Around the apartment, and especially around the steps of the
+throne, sat other grave looking men, in scarlet robes. Huertis,
+Velasquez, and their Indians, still carrying their loaded rifles, of
+which he had not suffered them to be deprived, stood on the left side of
+the monarch, and the young chief and his soldiers on the right. The
+latter gave his statement with truth and manly candour, although the
+facts which he averred seemed to fill the whole council with amazement,
+and left a settled gloom upon the imperial brow. The whole proceeding
+possesses great interest in Velasquez's narrative, but we can only
+briefly state that it resulted in the decision, which was concurred in
+by the associate councillors, that the strangers having magnanimously
+released and restored the company of guards, after they had surrendered
+themselves prisoners; and having voluntarily entered the city in a
+peaceable manner, when they might possibly have effected their escape,
+were entitled to their personal freedom, within the limits of the city,
+and might eventually, under voluntary but indispensable obligations,
+become eligible to all the privileges of citizenship, within the same
+limits. In the mean time, they were to be maintained as pensioners of
+state, on condition that they made no use of their dangerous weapons,
+nor exhibited them to terrify the people. With this decision, Huertis
+and his companions were perfectly satisfied, for the latter had
+undiminished confidence in his ability and determination to achieve
+their escape, as soon as he should have accomplished the scientific
+objects of his expedition. On leaving the hall of justice, they observed
+the elder military chief, of whom a slight mention has been made,
+brought in with two others of inferior rank; and it was afterwards
+currently reported that they had been sentenced to close imprisonment.
+It was, also, ascertained by Velasquez, that the four companies of
+rangers, already noticed, composing a regiment of two hundred men,
+constituted the whole military force of this timid and peaceful people.
+
+From this point, our abstract of the narrative must be chiefly a brief
+catalogue of the most important of the concluding events. The place of
+residence assigned to our travellers, was the vacant wing of a spacious
+and sumptuous structure, at the western extremity of the city, which had
+been appropriated, from time immemorial, to the surviving remnant of an
+ancient and singular order of priesthood called Kaanas, which, it was
+distinctly asserted in their annals and traditions, had accompanied the
+first migration of this people from the Assyrian plains. Their peculiar
+and strongly distinctive lineaments, it is now perfectly well
+ascertained are to be traced in many of the sculptured monuments of the
+central American ruins, and were found still more abundantly on those of
+Iximaya. Forbidden, by inviolably sacred laws, from intermarrying with
+any persons but those of their own caste, they had here dwindled down,
+in the course of many centuries, to a few insignificant individuals,
+diminutive in stature, and imbecile in intellect. They were,
+nevertheless, held in high veneration and affection by the whole
+Iximayan community, probably as living specimens of an antique race so
+nearly extinct. Their position, as an order of priesthood, it is now
+known, had not been higher, for many ages, if ever, than that of
+religious mimes and bacchanals, in a certain class of pagan ceremonies,
+highly popular with the multitude. This, indeed, is evident from their
+characteristics in the sculptures. Their ancient college, or hospital,
+otherwise vacant and forlorn, was now chiefly occupied by a much higher
+order of priests, called Mahaboons, who were their legal and sacerdotal
+guardians. With a Yachin, one of the junior brethren of this order,
+named Vaalpeor, a young man of superior intellect and attainments,
+Velasquez soon cultivated a friendly and confidential acquaintance,
+which proved reciprocal and faithful. And while Huertis was devoting all
+his time and energies to the antiquities, hieroglyphics, ethnology,
+science, pantheism, theogony, arts, manufactures, and social
+institutions of this unknown city and people, the ear of this young
+pagan priest was as eagerly imbibing, from the wiley lips of Velasquez,
+a similar knowledge of the world at large, to him equally new and
+enchanting. If Huertis had toiled so severely, and hazarded so much,
+both as to himself and companions, to acquire a knowledge of this one
+city and people, it soon became clear to the penetrating mind of
+Velasquez, that Vaalpeor possessed enough both of mental ambition and
+personal energy to incur equal toil and risk to learn the wonders of the
+cities and races of the greater nations of mankind. Indeed, this desire
+evidently glowed in his breast with a consuming fervor, and when
+Velasquez, after due observation proposed the liberation of the whole
+expedition, with Vaalpeor himself, as its protected companion, the now
+consciously imprisoned pagan, horror-stricken at first, regarded the
+proposition with complacency, and finally, with a degree of delight,
+regardless of consequences. It was, however, mutually agreed that the
+design should be kept secret from Huertis, until ripe for success. A
+serious obstacle existed in his plighted guardianship of the Kaana
+children, whom he could abandon only with his life; but even this was
+not deemed insurmountable.
+
+In the meantime, Huertis, to facilitate his own objects, had prevailed
+upon his entire party to conform in dress and habits with the community
+in which they lived. The city was surrounded on all sides by a lofty
+colonade, sustaining the upper esplanade of the city walls, and forming
+a broad covered walk beneath, in which the population could promenade,
+sheltered from sun and shower. In these places of general resort, the
+new citizens appeared daily, until they had become familiarly known to
+the greater part of the eighty-five thousand inhabitants of the city.
+Huertis, moreover, had formed domestic and social connexions; was the
+welcome guest of families of the highest rank, who were fascinated with
+the information he afforded them of the external world; had made tacit
+converts to liberty of many influential persons; had visited each of
+the four grand temples which stood in the centre of the several
+quadrangular divisions of the city, and externally conformed to their
+idolatrous worship. He had even been admitted into some of the most
+sacred mysteries of these temples, while Velasquez, more retired, and
+avowedly more scrupulous, was content to receive the knowledge thus
+acquired, in long conversations by the sick couch of poor Hammond, now
+rapidly declining to the grave.
+
+Mr. Hammond's dreadful wound had but partially healed in the course of
+several months; his constitution was exhausted, and he was dying of
+remittent fever and debility. His chief regret was that he could not
+assist his friend Huertis in his researches and drawings, and determine
+the place of the city by astronomical observations which his friends
+were unable to take. The day before he died, he was visited by some of
+the medical priesthood, who, on seeing numerous light spots upon his
+skin, where the preparation with which he had stained it had
+disappeared, they pronounced him _a leper_, and ordered that all
+intercourse with the building should be suspended. No explanation would
+convince them to the contrary, and his death confirmed them in their
+opinion. Availing himself of this opportunity, and under the plea that
+it was important to their safety, Vaalpeor removed the two orphan
+children in his charge to one of the country temples in the plain, and
+the idle mules of the strangers were employed to carry tents, couches,
+and other bulky requisites for an unprovided rural residence. It may be
+added that he included among them much of the baggage of his new
+friends, with the greater part of their rifles and ammunition. In the
+mean time Huertis, Velasquez, and about half of their party, were
+closely confined to the part of the edifice assigned for their
+occupation. Their friend Hammond had been interred without the walls, in
+a field appropriated to lepers by the civic authorities. Huertis, was
+now informed of the plan of escape, but was not ready; he had more
+daguerreotype views to take, and many curiosities to collect. The
+interdicted period of nine days having expired, the young priest, who
+had free access to the city at all times, again appeared at their abode
+and urged an early retreat, as the return of the orphan children would
+soon be required. But Huertis was abroad in the city and could not be
+consulted. He remained absent all the day, and did not return to his
+apartments at night. It was so all the next day and night, and
+Velasquez was deeply alarmed. On searching his rooms for his papers,
+drawings and instruments, for secret transmittal into the country, he
+found them all removed, including those of Mr. Hammond which were among
+them. It was then vainly hoped that he had effected his escape with all
+his treasures, but his Indians knew nothing of the matter.
+
+Shortly after this discovery, Vaalpeor arrived with its explanation.
+Huertis had made a confidant of his intended flight whom he idly hoped
+would accompany it, and she had betrayed him. His offence, after his
+voluntary vows, and his initiation into the sacred mysteries, was
+unpardonable, and his fate could not be doubted. Indeed, the trembling
+priest at length admitted that he had been sacrificed in due form upon
+the high altar of the sun, and that he himself had beheld the fatal
+ceremony. Huertis, however, had implicated none of his associates, and
+there was yet a chance of escape. To pass the gates was impossible; but
+the wall might be descended in the night by ropes, and to swim the moat
+was easy. This was effected by Velasquez and fifteen of his party the
+same night; the rest either did not make the attempt or failed, and the
+faithful Antonio was among them. The fugitives had scarcely reached the
+secluded retreat of Vaalpeor, and mounted their mules, before the low
+yelp of blood-hounds was heard upon their trail and soon burst into full
+cry. But the dogs were somewhat confused by the scent of so many
+footsteps on the spot at which the party mounted, and did not follow the
+mules until the horsemen led the way. This afforded time for the
+fugitives, racing their swift mules at full speed, to reach the opening
+of the valley, when Velasquez wheeled and halted, for the pursuers were
+close at hand. A conflict ensued in which many of the horsemen were
+slain, and the young kaana received an accidental wound of which he
+retains the scar. It must suffice to say, that the party eventually
+secured their retreat without loss of life; and by break of day they
+were on a mountainous ridge many leagues from Iximaya. In about fourteen
+days, they reached Ocosingo, after great suffering. Here Velasquez
+reluctantly parted with most of his faithful Indians, and here also died
+Vaalpeor, from the unaccustomed toil and deprivations of the journey.
+Velasquez, with the two Aztec children, did not reach San Salvador until
+the middle of February, when they became objects of the highest
+interest to the most intellectual classes of that city. As the greatest
+ethnological curiosities in living form, that ever appeared among
+civilised men, he was advised to send them to Europe for exhibition.
+
+With this view they were taken to Grenada where they remained the
+objects of much local curiosity, until it was deemed proper and
+advisable first to exhibit them to the people of the United States. The
+parties whom Senor Velasquez first appointed as their temporary
+guardians brought them to New York via Jamaica, and they will no doubt
+attract and reward universal attention. They are supposed to be eight
+and ten years of age, and both are lively, playful and affectionate. But
+it is as specimens of an _absolutely unique_ and nearly extinct race of
+mankind that they claim the attention of Physiologists and all men of
+science.
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note
+
+
+The following errors were corrected.
+
+  Page  Error
+   4  Vaalpeor, in changed to Vaalpeor, an
+   4  Diocess changed to Diocese
+   5  scirra changed to sierra
+   6  attemped changed to attempted
+   6  Gautamala changed to Guatimala
+   6  seirra changed to sierra
+   6  rasing changed to raising
+   7  seirra changed to sierra
+   7  Balize changed to Belize
+   8  way changed to way.
+   8  Hammand changed to Hammond
+   8  attestors changed to attesters
+   9  proceded changed to proceeded
+   9  regreted changed to regretted
+   9  repecting changed to respecting
+   9  experince changed to experience
+  10  idolitrous changed to idolatrous
+  10  invaluble changed to invaluable
+  11  joval changed to jovial
+  11  mentined changed to mentioned
+  13  realitily changed to reality
+  13  rediculous changed to ridiculous
+  14  guilded changed to gilded
+  14  pinacle changed to pinnacle
+  15  mountians changed to mountains
+  15  Chiapas. changed to Chiapas."
+  16  limbstone changed to limestone
+  16  parapetted changed to parapeted
+  16  Aarchbishop changed to Archbishop
+  17  amunition changed to ammunition
+  17  orign changed to origin
+  18  Mayua changed to Maya
+  18  interpeters changed to interpreters
+  18  provinical changed to provincial
+  19  pewerful changed to powerful
+  19  I changed to "I
+  19  solemly changed to solemnly
+  21  mocassins changed to moccasins
+  21  States changed to States.
+  24  defferential changed to deferential
+  27  pine-apples changed to pine-apples,
+  29  a ear changed to an ear
+  29  disperson changed to dispersion
+  29  ran through changed to run through
+  30  appartments changed to apartments
+  30  indispensible changed to indispensable
+  31  destinctive changed to distinctive
+  33  amunition changed to ammunition
+  33  apropriated changed to appropriated
+  33  appartments changed to apartments
+  34  Valasquez changed to Velasquez
+  34  transmital changed to transmittal
+
+The following words were inconsistently spelled or hyphenated.
+
+  blood-hounds / bloodhounds
+  land-marks / landmarks
+  Meztitzos / Mestitzos
+  re-assured / reassured
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in
+Central America, by Pedro Velasquez
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+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
+  <head>
+    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />
+    <title>
+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central America, by Pedro Velasquez.
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css">
+
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+<body>
+
+
+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central
+America, by Pedro Velasquez
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central America
+       Resulting in the Discovery of the Idolatrous City of
+              Iximaya, in an Unexplored Region; and the Possession of
+              two Remarkable Aztec Children, Descendants and Specimens
+              of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now nearly extinct,) of the
+              Ancient Aztec Founders of the Ruined Temples of that
+              Country, Described by John L. Stevens, Esq., and Other
+              Travellers.
+
+Author: Pedro Velasquez
+
+Release Date: July 12, 2009 [EBook #29388]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIR OF EVENTFUL EXPEDITION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<div class="tn">
+<p class="titlepage"><b>Transcriber’s Note</b></p>
+
+<p class="noindent">Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. A <a href="#trans_note">list</a> of these changes
+is found at the end of the text.</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="chapbreak" />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 361px;">
+<a href="images/illus-01-full.png"><img src="images/illus-01.png" width="361" height="600" alt="Title page" title="" /></a>
+</div>
+
+
+<h1 class="chapterhead">MEMOIR<br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 50%;">OF AN</span><br />
+
+EVENTFUL EXPEDITION<br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 50%;">IN</span><br />
+
+CENTRAL AMERICA;</h1>
+
+<p class="titlepage"><span style="font-size: 80%;">RESULTING IN THE DISCOVERY OF THE IDOLATROUS CITY OF</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 120%;">IXIMAYA,</span></p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1.5em;">In an unexplored region; and the possession of two</p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1em;">REMARKABLE AZTEC CHILDREN,</p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1em;">Descendants and Specimens of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now<br />
+nearly extinct,) of the Ancient Aztec Founders of the<br />
+Ruined Temples of that Country,</p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1.5em;"><span style="font-size: 80%;">DESCRIBED BY</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 120%;">JOHN L. STEVENS, ESQ.,</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 80%;">AND OTHER TRAVELLERS.</span></p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1.5em;">Translated from the Spanish of<br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 120%;">PEDRO VELASQUEZ,</span><br />
+
+of SAN SALVADOR.</p>
+
+<p class="titlepage" style="margin-top: 1.5em;">NEW YORK:<br />
+
+E. F. Applegate, Printer, 111 Nassau Street.<br />
+
+1850.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span></p>
+
+<hr class="chapbreak" />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h2 class="chapterhead">PROFILE ILLUSTRATIONS<br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 60%;">FROM</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 80%;">CENTRAL AMERICAN RUINS,</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 60%;">OF</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 90%;"><b>ANCIENT RACES STILL EXISTING</b><br />
+  IN IXIMAYA.</span></h2>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 266px;">
+<a href="images/illus-03-1-full.png"><img src="images/illus-03-1.png" width="266" height="168" alt="Three figures from the East Court of Palenque" title="" /></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>The above three figures, sketched from engravings in “Stevens’s Central
+America,� will be found, on personal comparison, to bear a remarkable
+and convincing resemblance, both in the general features and the
+position of the head, to the two living Aztec children, now exhibiting
+in the United States, of the ancient sacerdotal caste of <i>Kaanas</i>, or
+Pagan Mimes, of which a few individuals remain in the newly discovered
+city of Iximaya. See, the following <i>Memoir</i>, page 31.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 299px;">
+<a href="images/illus-03-2-full.png"><img src="images/illus-03-2.png" width="299" height="179" alt="Two figures in profile" title="" /></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>These two figures, sketched from the same work, are said, by Senor
+Velasquez, in the unpublished portion of his narrative, to be
+“irresistible likenesses� of the equally exclusive but somewhat more
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>numerous priestly caste of <i>Mahaboons</i>, still existing in that city,
+and to which belonged Vaalpeor, <a name="corr1" id="corr1"></a>an official guardian of those children,
+as mentioned in this memoir. Velasquez states that the likeness of
+Vaalpeor to the right hand figure in the frontispiece of Stevens’ second
+volume, which is here also the one on the right hand, was as exact, in
+outline, as if the latter had been a daguerreotype miniature.</p>
+
+<p>While writing his “Narrative� after his return to San Salvador, in the
+spring of the present year, (1850,) Senor Velasquez was favored, by an
+American gentleman of that city, with a copy of “Layard’s Nineveh,� and
+was forcibly struck with the close characteristic resemblance of the
+faces in many of its engravings to those of the inhabitants in general,
+as a peculiar family of mankind, both of Iximaya and its surrounding
+region. The following are sketches, (somewhat imperfect,) of two of the
+male faces to which he refers:</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 151px;">
+<a href="images/illus-04-1-full.png"><img src="images/illus-04-1.png" width="151" height="160" alt="Profile of two figures, one pulling a bow" title="" /></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>And the following profile, from the same work, is pronounced by
+Velasquez to be equally characteristic of the female faces of that
+region, making due allowance for the superb head dresses of tropical
+plumage, with which he describes the latter as being adorned, instead of
+the male galea, or close cap, retained in the engraving.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 92px;">
+<a href="images/illus-04-2-full.png"><img src="images/illus-04-2.png" width="92" height="88" alt="Profile of a Maya head" title="" /></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>These illustrations, slight as they are, are deemed interesting, because
+the Iximayans assert their descent from a very ancient Assyrian colony
+nearly co-temporary with Nineveh itself&mdash;a claim which receives strong
+confirmation, not only from the hieroglyphics and monuments of Iximaya,
+but from the engravings in Stevens’ volumes of several remarkable
+objects, (the inverted winged globe especially,) at Palenque&mdash;once a
+kindred colony.</p>
+
+<p>It should have been stated in the following Memoir, that Senor
+Velasquez, on his return to San Salvador, caused the two Kaana children
+to be baptized into the Catholic Church, by the Bishop of the <a name="corr2" id="corr2"></a>Diocese,
+under the names of Maximo and Bartola Velasquez.</p>
+
+<hr class="chapbreak" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<h2 class="chapterhead"><span style="font-size: 80%;">MEMOIR</span><br />
+<span style="font-size: 60%;">OF A RECENT</span><br />
+EVENTFUL EXPEDITION<br />
+<span style="font-size: 60%;">IN</span><br />
+<span style="font-size: 90%;">CENTRAL AMERICA.</span></h2>
+
+<hr class="decshort" />
+
+<p><span class="smcap">In</span> the second volume of his travels in Central America&mdash;than which no
+work ever published in this country, has created and maintained a higher
+degree of interest, both at home and abroad&mdash;Mr. Stevens speaks with
+enthusiasm of the conversations he had held with an intelligent and
+hospitable Padre, or Catholic priest, of Santa Cruz del Quiche, formerly
+of the village of Chajul; and of the exciting information he had
+received from him, concerning immense and marvellous antiquities in the
+surrounding country, which, to the present hour, remain entirely unknown
+to the world. The Padre told him of vast ruins, in a deserted and
+desolate region, but four leagues from Vera Paz, more extensive than
+Quiche itself; and of another ruined city, on the other side of the
+great traversing range of the Cordilleras, of which no account has been
+given. But the most stimulating story of all, was the existence of a
+<i>living</i> city, far on the other side of the great sierra, large and
+populous, occupied by Indians of the same character, and in precisely
+the same state, as those of the country in general, before the discovery
+of the continent and the desolating conquests of its invaders.</p>
+
+<p>The Padre averred that, in younger days, he had climbed to the topmost
+ridge of the <a name="corr3" id="corr3"></a>sierra, a height of 10 or 12,000 feet, and from its naked
+summit, looking over an immense plain, extending to Yucatan and the Gulf
+of Mexico, had seen, with his own eyes, in the remote distance, “a large
+city, spread over a great space, with turrets white and glittering in
+the sun.� His<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span> account of the prevalent Indian report concerning it was,
+that no white man had ever reached that city; that the inhabitants, who
+speak the Maya language, are aware that a race of white strangers has
+conquered the whole country around them, and have hence murdered every
+white man that has since <a name="corr4" id="corr4"></a>attempted to penetrate their territory. He
+added that they have no coin or other circulating medium; no horses,
+mules, or other domestic animals, except fowls, “and keep the cocks
+under ground to prevent their crowing being heard.� This report of their
+slender resources for animal food, and of their perpetual apprehension
+of discovery, as indicated in this inadequate and childish expedient to
+prevent it, is, in most respects, contradicted by that of the
+adventurous expedition about to be described, and which, having passed
+the walls of their city, obtained better information of their internal
+economy and condition than could have been acquired by any Indians at
+all likely to hold communication with places so very remote from the
+territory as Quiche or Chajul.</p>
+
+<p>The effects of these extraordinary averments and recitals of the Padre,
+upon the mind of Mr. Stevens, together with the deliberate conclusions
+which he finally drew from them, is best expressed in his own language.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p>“The interest awakened in us, was the most thrilling I ever
+experienced. One look at that city, was worth ten years of an every
+day life. If he is right, a place is left where Indians and a city
+exist, as Cortez and Alvarado found them; there are living men who
+can solve the mystery that hangs over the ruined cities of America;
+who can, perhaps, go to Copan and read the inscriptions on its
+monuments. No subject more exciting and attractive presents itself
+to any mind, and the deep impression in my mind, will never be
+effaced.</p>
+
+<p>“Can it be true? Being now in my sober senses, I do verily believe
+there is much ground to suppose that what the Padre told us is
+authentic. That the region referred to does not acknowledge the
+government of <a name="corr5" id="corr5"></a>Guatimala, and has never been explored, and that no
+white man has ever pretended to have entered it; I am satisfied.
+From other sources we heard that a large <i>ruined</i> city was visible;
+and we were told of another person who had climbed to the top of
+the <a name="corr6" id="corr6"></a>sierra, but on account of the dense clouds <a name="corr7" id="corr7"></a>raising upon it,
+he had not been able to see anything. At all events, the belief at
+the village of Chajul is general, and a curiosity is aroused that
+burns to be satisfied. We had a craving desire to reach the
+mysterious city. No man if ever so willing to peril his life, could
+undertake the enterprise, with any hope of success, without
+hovering for one or two years on the borders of the country<span class='pagenum' style="font-size: 91%;"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+studying the language and character of the adjoining Indians, and
+making acquaintance with some of the natives. Five hundred men
+could probably march directly to the city, and the invasion would
+be more justifiable than any made by Spaniards; but the government
+is too much occupied with its own wars, and the knowledge could not
+be procured except at the price of blood. Two young men of good
+constitution, and who could afford to spend five years, might
+succeed. If the object of search prove a phantom, in the wild
+scenes of a new and unexplored country, there are other objects of
+interest; but, if real, besides the glorious excitement of such a
+novelty, they will have something to look back upon through life.
+As to the dangers, they are always magnified, and, in general,
+peril is discovered soon enough for escape. But, in all
+probability, if any discovery is made, it will be made by the
+Padres. As for ourselves, to attempt it alone, ignorant of the
+language and with the mozos who were a constant annoyance to us,
+was out of the question. The most we thought of, was to climb to
+the top of the <a name="corr8" id="corr8"></a>sierra, thence to look down upon the mysterious
+city; but we had difficulties enough in the road before us; it
+would add ten days to a journey already almost appalling in the
+perspective; for days the sierra might be covered with clouds; in
+attempting too much, we might lose all; Palenque was our great
+point, and we determined not to be diverted from the course we had
+marked out.� Vol. II, p. 193-196.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is now known that two intrepid young men, incited probably by this
+identical passage in Mr. Stevens’s popular work&mdash;one a Mr. Huertis, of
+Baltimore, an American of Spanish parents, from Cuba, possessing an
+ample fortune, and who had travelled much in Egypt, Persia, and Syria,
+for the personal inspection of ancient monuments; and the other, a Mr.
+Hammond, a civil-engineer from Canada, who had been engaged for some
+years on surveys in the United States, agreed to undertake the perilous
+and romantic enterprise thus cautiously suggested and chivalrously
+portrayed.</p>
+
+<p>Amply equipped with every desirable appointment, including daguerreotype
+apparatuses, mathematical instruments, and withal fifty repeating
+rifles, lest it should become necessary to resort to an armed
+expedition, these gentlemen sailed from New-Orleans and arrived at
+<a name="corr9" id="corr9"></a>Belize, in the fall of 1848. Here they procured horses, mules, and a
+party of ten experienced Indians and Mestitzos; and after pursuing a
+route, through a wild, broken, and heavily wooded region, for about 150
+miles, on the Gulf of Amatique, they struck off more to the south-west,
+for Coban, where they arrived on the morning of Christmas day, in time
+to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> partake of the substantial enjoyments, as well as to observe the
+peculiar religious ceremonies, of the great Catholic festival, in that
+intensely interior city.</p>
+
+<p>At this place, while loitering to procure information and guides for
+their future journey to Santa Cruz del Quiche, they got acquainted with
+Sr. Pedro Velasquez, of San Salvador, who describes himself as a man of
+family and education, although a trader in indigo; and his intermediate
+destination, prior to his return to the capital, happening also to be
+the same city, he kindly proffered to the two Americans his superior
+knowledge of the country, or any other useful service he could render
+them; and he was accordingly very gladly received as their friend and
+companion on the <a name="corr10" id="corr10"></a>way. It is from a copy of a manuscript journal of this
+gentleman, that the translator has obtained the only information as yet
+brought to the United States concerning the remarkable results of the
+exploring expedition which he will proceed to describe, or of the fate
+of Messrs. Huertis and <a name="corr11" id="corr11"></a>Hammond, its unfortunate originators and
+conductors, or of those extraordinary living specimens of a <i>sui
+generis</i> race of beings, hitherto supposed to be either fabulous or
+extinct, which are at once its melancholy trophies and its physiological
+<a name="corr12" id="corr12"></a>attesters. And it is from Senor Velasquez alone that the public can
+receive any further intelligence upon this ardently interesting subject,
+beyond that which his manuscript imperfectly affords.</p>
+
+<p>In order, however, to avoid an anticipatory trespass upon the natural
+sequence of the narrative, it may be proper to state, that prior to his
+departure in their company from Coban, Senor Velasquez had received from
+his fellow travellers no intimation whatever concerning the ulterior
+object of their journey, and had neither seen nor heard of those volumes
+describing the stupendous vestiges of ancient empire, in his native
+land, which had so strongly excited the emulous passion of discovery in
+their minds.</p>
+
+<p>Frequently called by his mercantile speculations, which he seems to have
+conducted upon an extensive scale, to perform long journeys from San
+Salvador, on the Pacific side of the Cordilleras, to Comyagua in the
+mid-interior, and thence to Truxillo, Omoa, and Ysabal, on the Bay and
+Gulf of Honduras, he had traversed a large portion of the country, and
+had often been surprised with sudden views of mouldering temples,
+pyramids, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> cities of vast magnitude and marvellous mythology. And
+being, as it evidently appears, a man of unusual intelligence and
+scholastic acquirements, he had doubtless felt, as he states, a profound
+but hopeless curiosity concerning their origin and history. He had even
+seen and consecutively examined the numerous and ornate monuments of
+Copan; but it was not until he had <a name="corr13" id="corr13"></a>proceeded to the second stage of the
+journey from Coban to Quiche, that he was shown the engravings in the
+first volume of Stevens’s Central America, in which they are so
+faithfully depicted. He recognized many of them as old acquaintances,
+and still more as new ones, which had escaped his more cursory
+inspection; and in all he could trace curious details which, on the
+spot, he <a name="corr14" id="corr14"></a>regretted the want of time to examine. He, moreover, knew the
+surly Don Gregorio, by whom Mr. Stevens had been treated so
+inhospitably, and several other persons in the vicinity of the ruins
+whom he had named, and was delighted with the <i>vraisemblance</i> of his
+descriptions. The Senor confesses that these circumstances inspired him
+with unlimited confidence in that traveller’s statements upon other
+subjects; and when Mr. Huertis read to him the further account of the
+information given to Mr. Stevens by the jolly and merry, but intelligent
+old Padre of Quiche, <a name="corr15" id="corr15"></a>respecting other ruined cities beyond the Sierra
+Madre, and especially of the living city of independent Candones, or
+unchristianized Indians, supposed to have been seen from the lofty
+summit of that mountain range, and was told by Messrs. Huertis and
+Hammond that the exploration of this city was the chief object of their
+perilous expedition, the Senor adds, that his enthusiasm became
+enkindled to at least as high a fervor as theirs, and that, “with more
+precipitancy than prudence, in a man of his maturer years and important
+business pursuits, he resolved to unite in the enterprise, to aid the
+heroic young men with his <a name="corr16" id="corr16"></a>experience in travel and knowledge of the
+wild Indians of the region referred to, and to see the end of the
+adventure, result as it may.�</p>
+
+<p>He was confirmed in this resolution by several concurring facts of which
+his companions were now told for the first time. He intimately knew and
+had several times been the guest of the worthy Cura of Quiche, from whom
+Mr. Stevens received assurances of the existence of the ruined city of
+the ancient Aztecs,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span> as well as the living city of the Candones, in the
+unsubjugated territory beyond the mountains. And he was induced to yield
+credence to the Padre’s confident report of the latter, because his
+account of the former had already been verified, and become a matter of
+fact and of record. He, Senor Velasquez, himself, during the preceding
+summer, joined a party of several foreigners and natives in exploring an
+ancient ruined city, of prodigious grandeur and extent, in the province
+of Vera Paz, but little more than 150 miles to the east of Guatimala,
+(instead of nearly 200, as the Padre had supposed,) which far surpassed
+in magnificence every other ruin, as yet discovered, either in Central
+America or Mexico. It lay overgrown with huge timber in the midst of a
+dense forest, far remote from any settlement, and near the crater of a
+long extinct volcano, on whose perpendicular walls, 300 or 400 feet
+high, were aboriginal paintings of warlike and <a name="corr17" id="corr17"></a>idolatrous processions,
+dances, and other ceremonies, exhibiting like the architectural
+sculptures on the temples, a state of advancement in the arts
+incomparably superior to all previous examples. And as the good Padre
+had proved veracious and accurate on this matter, which he knew from
+personal observation, the Senor would not uncharitably doubt his
+veracity on a subject in which he again professed to speak from the
+evidence of his own eye-sight.</p>
+
+<p>The party thus re-assured, and more exhilarated than ever with the
+prospect of success, proceeded on their journey with renewed vigor.
+Although the Senor modestly abstains from any allusion to the subject,
+in the MSS. which have reached us, it cannot be doubted that Messrs.
+Huertis and Hammond considered him an <a name="corr18" id="corr18"></a>invaluable accession to their
+party. He was a guide on whom they could rely; he was acquainted with
+the dialects of many of the Indian tribes through which they would have
+to pass; was familiar with the principal stages and villages on their
+route, and knew both the places and persons from whence the best
+information, if any, concerning the paramount object of their journey,
+could be obtained.</p>
+
+<p>It appears, also, from an incidental remark in his journal, that Senor
+Velasquez would have been at their right hand in a fight, in the event
+of any hostile obstruction on their way. As a volunteer, he had held a
+command under Morazan, during the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> sanguinary conflicts of the republic,
+and had been a soldier through several of the most arduous campaigns, in
+the fierce struggle between the general and Carrera. He was thus,
+apparently, in all respects, precisely such an auxiliary as they would
+have besought Providence to afford them, to accomplish the hazardous
+enterprise they had so daringly projected and commenced.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately for the public, the Senor’s journal, fragmentary
+throughout, is especially meagre concerning the incidents of travel
+between the capital of Vera Paz and Santa Cruz del Quiche. At this
+period he appears to have left the task of recording them almost
+entirely to his two friends, whose memoranda, in all probability, are
+forever lost. Some of those incidents appear, even from his brief
+minutes of them, to have been of the most imminent and critical
+importance. Thus under the date of February 2nd, 1849, he says, “on the
+bank of a branch of the Salamo, attacked in the night by about thirty
+Indian robbers, several of whom had fire-arms. Sr. Hammond, sitting
+within the light of the fire, was severely wounded through the left
+shoulder; they had followed us from the hacienda, six leagues, passed us
+to the north and lay in ambush; killed four, wounded three; of the rest
+saw no more; poor Juan, shot through the body, died this morning; lost
+two mules.�</p>
+
+<p>After this, there is nothing written until the 16th, when they had
+arrived at a place called San Jose, where he says, “Good beef and fowls;
+Sr. Huertis much better; Sr. Hammond very low in intermittent fever;
+fresh mules and good ones.� Next on the 5th of March, at the Indian
+village of Axitzel, is written, “Detained here five days; Hammond,
+strong and headstrong. Agree with Huertis that, to be safe, we must wait
+with patience the return of the good Cura.� Slight and tantalizing
+memoranda of this kind occur, irregularly, until April 3rd, when we find
+the party safely arrived at Quiche, and comfortably accommodated in a
+convent. The <a name="corr19" id="corr19"></a>jovial Padre, already often <a name="corr20" id="corr20"></a>mentioned, who maybe regarded
+as the unconscious father of the expedition, had become helplessly, if
+not hopelessly, dropsical, and lost much of his wanted jocosity. He
+declared, however, that Senor Velasquez’s description of the ruins
+explored the previous summer, recalling as it did his own profoundly
+impressed recollec<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>tion of them, when he walked through their desolate
+avenues and deserted palaces; and corroborating as it did, in every
+particular, his own reiterated account of them, which he had often
+bestowed upon incredulous and unworthy ears, would “act like <i>cannabis</i>
+upon his bladder,� as it already had upon his eyes; and if he could but
+live to see the description in print, so as to silence all gainsayers,
+he had no doubt it would completely cure him, and add many years to his
+life. He persisted in his story of the unknown city in the Candone
+wilderness, as seen by himself, nearly forty years ago, from the summit
+of the sierra; and promised the travellers a letter to his friend, the
+Cura of Gueguetenango, requesting him to procure them a guide to the
+very spot from whence they could behold it for themselves.</p>
+
+<p>This promise, in the course of a few days, the Senor says, he faithfully
+performed, describing from recollection, by the hand of an amanuensis to
+whom he dictated, not only the more striking but even minute and
+peculiar landmarks for the guidance of the guide. On the 10th of April,
+the party, fully recruited in health and energy, set out for
+Totonicapan; and thence we trace them by the journal through a
+succession of small places to Quezaltenango, where they remained but two
+days; and thence through the places called Aguas Calientes, and San
+Sebastiano, to Gueguetenango; this portion of their route being
+described as one of unprecedented toil, danger, and exhaustion, from its
+mountainous character, accidents to men and mules, terrific weather and
+loss of provisions. Arrived, however, at length, at the town last named,
+which they justly regarded as an eminently critical stage of their
+destiny, they found the Cura, and presented him with the letter of
+introduction from his friend, the Padre of Quiche. They were somewhat
+discouraged on perceiving that the Cura indicated but little confidence
+in the accuracy of his old friend’s memory, and asked them rather
+abruptly, if they thought him really serious in his belief in his
+distant vision of an unknown city from the sierra, because, for his own
+part, he had always regarded the story as one of Padre’s broadest jokes,
+and especially since he had never heard of any other person possessing
+equal visual powers. “The mountain was high, it is true, but not much
+more than half as high as the hyperbolous memory of his reverend friend
+had made it, and he much feared that the Padre, in the course of forty
+years, had so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> frequently repeated a picture of his early imagination as
+to have, at length, cherished it as a <a name="corr21" id="corr21"></a>reality.� This was said in smooth
+and elegant Spanish, but says the Senor, “with an air of dignified
+sarcasm upon our credulity, which was far from being agreeable to men
+broken down and dispirited, by almost incredible toil, in pursuit of an
+object thus loftily pronounced a <a name="corr22" id="corr22"></a>ridiculous phantom of the brain.� This
+part of Senor Velasquez’s journal being interesting and carefully
+written, we give the following translation without abridgement:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p>“The Cura, nevertheless, on finding that his supercilious
+scepticism had not proved so infectious among us as he expected and
+that we were rather vexed than vacillating, offered to procure us
+guides in the course of a day or two, who were familiar with many
+parts of the sierra, and who, for good pay, he doubted not, would
+flatter our expectations to the utmost extent we could desire. He
+advised us, however, in the same style of caustic dissuasion, to
+take with us both a barometer and a telescope, if we were provided
+with those instruments, because the latter, especially, might be
+found useful in discovering the unknown city, and the former would
+not only inform us of the height of the mountain, but of the
+weather in prospect most favorable to a distant view. Senor Huertis
+replied that such precautions would be adopted, as a matter of
+course, and would, moreover, furnish him, on our return to
+Gueguetenango, with the exact latitude and longitude of the spot
+from which the discovery might be made. He laughed very heartily
+and rejoined that he thought this operation would be much easier
+than to furnish the same interesting particulars concerning the
+location of the spots at which the discovery might fail to be made;
+and saying this he robed himself for mass, which we all, rather
+sullenly, attended.</p>
+
+<p>“Next morning, two good looking Meztitzos, brothers, waited on us
+with a strong letter of recommendation from the Cura, as guides to
+that region of the sierra which the Padre’s letter had so
+particularly described, and which description, the Cura added, he
+had taken much pains to make them understand. On being questioned
+concerning it, they startled and somewhat disconcerted us by calm
+assurances, in very fair Spanish, that they were not only familiar
+with all the land-marks, great and small, which the Cura had read
+to them, but had several times seen the very city of which we were
+in search, although none but full-blooded Indians had ever ventured
+on a journey to it. This was rather too much, even for us, sanguine
+and confiding as we were. We shared a common suspicion that the
+Cura had changed his tactics, and resolved to play a practical joke
+upon our credulity&mdash;to send us on a fool’s errand and laugh at us
+for our pains. That he had been tampering with the two guides for
+this purpose,<span class='pagenum' style="font-size: 91%;"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span> struck us forcibly; for while he professed never to
+have known any man who had seen the distant city, he recommended
+these Meztitzos, as brothers, whom he had known from their boyhood,
+they declared they had beheld it from the sierra on various
+occasions. Nevertheless, Senor Huertis believed that the young men
+spoke the truth, while the Cura, probably, did not; and hoping to
+catch him in his own snare, if such had been laid, asked the guides
+their terms, which, though high, he agreed to at once, without
+cavil. They said it would take us eight days to reach the part of
+the sierra described in the letter, and that we might have to wait
+on the summit several days more, before the weather would afford a
+clear view. They would be ready in two days; they had just returned
+across the mountains from San Antonia de Guista, and needed rest
+and repairs. There was a frankness and simplicity about these fine
+fellows which would bear the severest scrutiny, and we could only
+admit the bare possibility of our being mistaken.</p>
+
+<p>“It took us three days, however, to procure a full supply of the
+proper kind of provisions for a fortnight’s abode in the sky, and
+on the fourth, (May 5th,) we paid our formal respects to the Cura,
+and started for the ascent&mdash;he not forgetting to remind us of the
+promise to report to him the precise geographical locality of our
+discovery.�</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The journal is again blank until May 9th, when the writer says, “Our
+altitude, by barometer, this morning, is over 6000 feet above the valley
+which we crossed three days ago; the view of it and its surrounding
+mountains, sublime with chasms, yet grotesque in outline, and all
+heavily <a name="corr23" id="corr23"></a>gilded with the setting sun, is one of the most oppressively
+gorgeous I ever beheld. The guides inform us that we have but 3000 feet
+more to ascend, and point to the gigantic <a name="corr24" id="corr24"></a>pinnacle before us, at the
+apparent distance of seven or eight leagues; but that, before we can
+reach it, we have to descend and ascend an immense barranca, (ravine,)
+nearly a thousand feet deep from our present level, and of so difficult
+a passage that it will cost us several days. The side of the mountain
+towards the north-west, is perfectly flat and perpendicular for more
+than half its entire height, as if the prodigious section had been riven
+down by the sword of the San Miguel, and hurled with his foot among the
+struggling multitude of summits below. So far, the old Padre is accurate
+in every particular.� In a note opposite this extract, written
+perpendicularly on the margin of the manuscript, the writer says, “The
+average breadth of the plain on this ridge of the sierra, (that is the
+ridge on which they were then encamped for the night,) is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span> nearly half a
+mile, and exhibits before us a fine rolling track as far as we can see.
+Neither birds, beasts, nor insects&mdash;I would there were no such
+barranca!� On the tenth he says, “on the brink of the abyss&mdash;the
+heaviest crags we can hurl down, return no sound from the bottom.�</p>
+
+<p>The next entry in the journal is dated May 15th.&mdash;“Recovered the body of
+Sebastiano and the load of his mule; his brother is building a cross for
+his grave, and will not leave it until famished with thirst and hunger.
+All too exhausted to think of leaving this our first encampment since we
+descended. Present elevation but little above that of the opposite ridge
+which we left on the 11th, still, at least 3000 feet to climb.� On the
+19th, 4 o’clock, P. M., he records, “Myself, Sr. Hammond and Antonio, on
+the highest summit, an inclined plain of bare rock, of about fifteen
+acres. The Padre again right. Sr. Huertis and others just discernable,
+but bravely coming on. Elevation, 9,500 feet. Completely in the clouds,
+and all the country below invisible. Senor Hammond already bleeding at
+the nose, and no cigar to stop it.� At 10 o’clock, the same night, he
+writes, “All comfortably asleep but myself and Sr. Hammond, who is going
+to take the latitude.� Then follows, “He finds the latitude 15 degrees
+and 48 minutes <i>north</i>.� Opposite this, in the margin is written, “the
+mean result of three observations of different stars. Intend to take the
+longitude to-morrow.� Next day, the 20th, he says, “A bright and most
+auspicious morning, and all, but poor Antonio, in fine health and
+feeling. The wind by compass, N. E., and rolling away a billowy ocean of
+mist, toward, I suppose, the Bay of Honduras. Antonio says the Pacific
+will be visible within an hour; (present time not given) more and more
+of the lower <a name="corr25" id="corr25"></a>mountains becoming clear every moment. Fancy we already
+see the Pacific, a faint yellow plain, almost as elevated as ourselves.
+Can see part of the State of Chiapas pretty distinctly.� At 12 o’clock,
+meridian, he says, “Sr. Hammond is taking the longitude, but finds a
+difference of several minutes between his excellent watch and
+chronometer, and fears the latter has been shaken. Both the watch and
+its owner, however, have been a great deal more shaken, for the
+chronometer has been all the time in the midst of a thick blanket, and
+has had no falls. Sr. Huertis, with the glass, sees whole lines and
+groups of pyramids, in <a name="corr26" id="corr26"></a>Chiapas.� At 1 o’clock, P. M. he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> records, “Sr.
+Hammond reports the longitude, 92 degrees 15 minutes <i>west</i>. Brave
+Huertis is in ecstacy with some discovery, but will not part with the
+glass for a moment. No doubt it is the Padre’s city, for it is precisely
+in the direction he indicated. Antonio says he can see it with his naked
+eye, although less distinctly than heretofore. I can only see a white
+straight line, like a ledge of <a name="corr27" id="corr27"></a>limestone rock, on an elevated plain, at
+least twenty leagues distant, in the midst of a vast amphitheatre of
+hills, to the north east of our position, toward the State of Yucatan.
+Still, it is no doubt the place the Padre saw, and it may be a great
+city.�</p>
+
+<p>At 2 o’clock P. M., he says “All doubt is at an end! We have all seen it
+through the glass, as distinctly as though it were but a few leagues
+off, and it is now clear and bright to the unaided eye. It is
+unquestionably a richly monumented city, of vast dimensions, within
+lofty <a name="corr28" id="corr28"></a>parapeted walls, three or four miles square, inclined inward in
+the Egyptian style, and its interior domes and turrets have an
+emphatically oriental aspect. I should judge it to be not more than
+twenty-five leagues from Ocosingo, to the eastward, and nearly in the
+same latitude; and this would probably be the best point from which to
+reach it, travelling due east, although the course of the river Legartos
+seems to lead directly to it. That it is still an inhabited place, is
+evident from the domes of its temples, or churches. Christian churches
+they cannot be, for such a city would have an <a name="corr29" id="corr29"></a>Archbishop and be well
+known to the civilized world. It must be a Pagan strong-hold that
+escaped the conquest by its remote position, and the general retreat,
+retirement, and centralizing seclusion of its surrounding population. It
+may now be opened to the light of the true faith.�</p>
+
+<p>They commenced their descent the same day, and rested at night on the
+place of their previous encampment, a narrow shelf of the sierra. Here,
+on the brink of the terrible ravine, which they had again to encounter,
+they consulted upon a plan for their future operations; and it was
+finally agreed that Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, with Antonio, and such
+of the Indian muleteers as could be induced to proceed with the
+expedition, should follow the bottom of the ravine, in its north-east
+course, in which, according to Antonio, the river Legartos took its
+principal sup<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>ply of water, and remain at a large village, adjacent to
+its banks, which they had seen, about five leagues distant; while Senor
+Velasquez was to trace their late route, by way of Gueguetenango, to
+Quezaltenango, where all the surplus arms and <a name="corr30" id="corr30"></a>ammunition had been
+deposited, and recruit a strong party of Indians, to serve as a guard,
+in the event of an attack from the people of the unexplored region,
+whither they were resolutely bound. In the meantime, Antonio was to
+return home to Gueguetenango, await the return of Velasquez, with his
+armed party, from Quezaltenango, and conduct them over the mountains to
+the village on the plains, where Messrs. Huertis and Hammond were to
+remain until they should arrive. It appears that Senor Velasquez was
+abundantly supplied with solid funds for the recruiting service, and
+that Mr. Huertis also furnished Antonio with a liberal sum, in addition
+to his stipulated pay, wherewith to procure masses for the repose of his
+unfortunate brother.</p>
+
+<p>Of the adventures of Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, in the long interval
+prior to the return of Velasquez, we have no account whatever; nor does
+the journal of the latter contain any remarks relative to his own
+operations, during the same period. The next date is July the 8th, when
+we find him safely arrived with “nearly all the men he had engaged,� at
+an Indian village called Aguamasinta, where his anxious companions were
+overjoyed to receive him, and where “they had obtained inestimable
+information regarding the proper arrangement of the final purpose.�
+After this we trace them, by brief memoranda, for a few days, on the
+devious course of the Legartos, when the journal abruptly and finally
+closes. The remaining narrative of the expedition was written by Senor
+Velasquez from memory, after his return to San Salvador, while all the
+exciting events and scenes which it describes were vividly sustained by
+the feelings which they originally inspired. As this excessively
+interesting document will be translated for the public press as soon as
+the necessary consent of its present proprietor can be obtained, the
+writer of this pamphlet the less regrets the very limited use of it to
+which he is now restricted&mdash;which is but little more than that of making
+a mere abridgement and connexion of such incidents as may serve to
+explain the <a name="corr31" id="corr31"></a>origin and possession of those <i>sui generis</i> specimens of
+humanity, the Aztec brother and sister, now exhibiting to the public, in
+the United States. From the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> introductory paragraphs, we take the
+liberty to quote the following without abridgement:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p>“Our latitude and longitude were now 16° 42' N. and 91° 35' W; so
+that the grand amphitheatre of hills, forming three fourths of an
+oval outline of jagged summits, a few leagues before us, most
+probably inclosed the mysterious object of our anxious and
+uncertain labors. The small groups of Indians through which we had
+passed, in the course of the day, had evidently been startled by
+sheer astonishment, into a sort of passive and involuntary
+hospitality, but maintained a stark apprehensive reserve in most of
+their answers to our questions. They spoke a peculiar dialect of
+the Maya, which I had never heard before, and had great difficulty
+in comprehending, although several of the <a name="corr32" id="corr32"></a>Maya Indians of our
+party understood it familiarly and spoke it fluently. From them we
+learned that they had never seen men of our race before, but that a
+man of the same race as Senor Hammond, who was of a bright-florid
+complexion, with light hair and red whiskers, had been sacrificed
+and eaten by the Macbenachs, or priests of Iximaya, the great city
+among the hills, about thirty moons ago. Our <a name="corr33" id="corr33"></a>interpreters stated
+that the word “Iximaya� meant the “Great Centre,� and that
+“Macbenach� meant the “Great Son of the Sun.� I at once resolved to
+make the most of my time in learning as much as possible of this
+dialect from these men, because they said it was the tongue spoken
+by the people of Iximaya and the surrounding region. It appeared to
+me to be merely a <a name="corr34" id="corr34"></a>provincial corruption, or local peculiarism, of
+the great body of the Maya language, with which I was already
+acquainted; and, in the course of the next day’s conversation, I
+found that I could acquire it with much facility.�</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>To this circumstance the writer is probably indebted for his life. In
+another day, the determined explorers had come within the circuit of the
+alpine district in which Iximaya is situated, and found it reposing, in
+massive grandeur, in the centre of a perfectly level plain, about five
+leagues in diameter, at a distance of scarcely two from the spot they
+had reached. At the base of all the mountains, rising upon their sides,
+and extending nearly a mile inward upon the plain, was a dark green
+forest of colossal trees and florid shrubbery, girding it around; while
+the even valley itself exhibited large tracts of uncultivated fields,
+fenced in with palisades, and regular, even to monotony, both in size
+and form. “Large herds of deer, cattle, and horses, were seen in the
+openings of the forest, and dispersed over the plain, which was also
+studded with low flat-roofed dwellings of stone, in small detached
+clusters, or hamlets. Rich patches of forest, of irregular forms,
+bordered with gigantic aloes, diversified the landscape<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> in effective
+contrast with bright lakes of water which glowed among them.�</p>
+
+<p>While the whole party, with their cavalcade of mules and baggage were
+gazing upon the scene, two horsemen, in bright blue and yellow tunics,
+and wearing turbans decorated with three large plumes of the quezal,
+dashed by them from the forest, at the distance of about two hundred
+yards, on steeds of the highest Spanish mould, followed by a long
+retinue of athletic Indians, equally well mounted, clothed in brilliant
+red tunics, with coronals of gay feathers, closely arranged within a
+band of blue cloth. Each horseman carried a long spear, pointed with a
+polished metal; and each held, in a leash, a brace of <a name="corr35" id="corr35"></a>powerful
+blood-hounds, which were also of the purest Spanish breed. The two
+leaders of this troop, who were Indians of commanding air and stature,
+suddenly wheeled their horses and glared upon the large party of
+intruders with fixed amazement. Their followers evinced equal surprise,
+but forgot not to draw up in good military array, while the blood-hounds
+leapt and raged in their thongs.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p>“While the leaders,� says Senor Velasquez, “seemed to be intently
+scrutinizing every individual of our company, as if silently
+debating the policy of an immediate attack, one of the Maya
+Indians, of whom I had been learning the dialect, stepped forward
+and informed us that they were a detachment of rural guards, a very
+numerous military force, which had been appointed from time
+immemorial, or, at least from the time of the Spanish invasion, to
+hunt down and capture all strangers of a foreign race that should
+be found within a circle of twelve leagues of the city; and he
+repeated the statement made to us from the beginning, that no white
+man had hitherto eluded their vigilance or left their city alive.
+He said there was a tradition that many of the pioneers of
+Alvarado’s army had been cut off in this manner, and never heard of
+more, while their skulls and weapons are to this day suspended
+round the altars of the pagan gods. He added, finally, that if we
+wished to escape the same fate, now was our only chance; that as we
+numbered thirty-five, all armed with repeating rifles, we could
+easily destroy the present detachment, which amounted to but fifty,
+and secure our retreat before another could come up; but that, in
+order to do this, it was necessary first to shoot the dogs, which
+all our Indians regarded with the utmost dread and horror.</p>
+
+<p><a name="corr36" id="corr36"></a>“I instantly felt the force of this advice, in which, also, I was
+sustained by Senor Hammond; but Senor Huertis, whom, as the leader
+of the expedition, we were all bound and <a name="corr37" id="corr37"></a>solemnly pledged to obey;
+utterly rejected the proposition. He had come<span class='pagenum' style="font-size: 91%;"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span> so far to see the
+city and see it he would, whether taken thither as a captive or
+not, and whether he ever returned from it or not, that this was the
+contract originally proposed, and to which I had assented; that the
+fine troop before us was evidently not a gang of savages, but a
+body of civilized men and good soldiers; and as to the dogs, they
+were noble animals of the highest blood he ever saw. If, however, I
+and his friend Hammond, who seemed afraid of being eaten, in
+preference to the fine beef and venison which we had seen in such
+profusion on the plain, really felt alarmed at the bugbear legends
+of our vagabond Indians, before any demonstration of hostility had
+been made, we were welcome to take two-thirds of the men and mules
+and make our retreat as best we could, while he would advance with
+Antonio and the remainder of the party, to the gates of the city,
+and demand a peaceable admission. I could not but admire the
+romantic intrepidity of this resolve, though I doubted its
+discretion; and assured him I was ready to follow his example and
+share his fate.</p>
+
+<p>“While this conversation was passing among us, the Indian
+commanders held a conference apparently as grave and important. But
+just as Senor Huertis and myself had agreed to advance towards them
+for a parley, they separated without deigning a reply to our
+salutation&mdash;the elder and more highly decorated, galloped off
+towards the city with a small escort, while the other briskly
+crossed our front at the head of his squadron and entered the
+forest nearer the entrance of the valley. This opening in the
+hills, was scarcely a quarter of a mile wide, and but a few minutes
+elapsed before we saw a single horseman cross it toward the wood on
+the opposite side. Presently, another troop of horse of the same
+uniform appearance as the first, were seen passing a glade of the
+wood which the single horseman had penetrated, and it thus became
+evident that a manœuvre had already been effected to cut off our
+retreat. The mountains surrounding the whole area of the plain,
+were absolutely perpendicular for three-fourths of their altitude,
+which was no where less than a thousand feet; and from many parts
+of their wildly piled outline, huge crags projected in monstrous
+mammoth forms, as if to plunge to the billows of forest beneath. At
+no point of this vast impassible boundary was there a chasm or
+declivity discernable by which we could make our exit, except the
+one thus formidably intercepted.</p>
+
+<p>“To retire into the forest and water our mules at a copious stream
+which rushed forth from its recesses, and recruit our own exhausted
+strength with food and rest, was our first necessary resource. In
+tracing the rocky course of the current for a convenient watering
+place, Antonio discovered that it issued from a cavern, which,
+though a mere fissure exteriorly, was, within, of cathedral
+dimensions and solemnity; we all entered it and drank eagerly from
+a foaming basin, which it immediately presented to<span class='pagenum' style="font-size: 91%;"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span> our fevered
+lips. Our first sensations were those of freedom and independence,
+and of that perfect security which is the basis of both. It was
+long since we had slept under a roof of any kind, while here a few
+men could defend our repose against an assault from thousands; but
+it was horribly evident, to my mind, that a few watchful assailants
+would suffice to reduce us to starvation, or destroy us in detail.
+Our security was that of a prison, and our freedom was limited to
+its walls. Happily, however, for the present hour, this reflection
+seemed to trouble no one. Objects of wonder and veneration grew
+numerous to our gaze. Gigantic statues of ancient warriors, with
+round shields, arched helmets, and square breast-plates, curiously
+latticed and adorned, stood sculptured in high relief, with grave
+faces and massive limbs, and in the regular order of columns around
+the walls of this grand mausoleum. Many of them stood arrayed in
+the crimson of the setting sun, which then flamed through the tall
+fissure into the cavern; and the deep gloom into which long rows of
+others utterly retired from our view, presented a scene at once of
+mingled mystery and splendor. It was evidently a place of great and
+recent resort, both for men and horses, for plentiful supplies of
+fresh fodder for the latter were heaped in stone recesses; while
+the ashes of numerous fires, mingled with discarded <a name="corr38" id="corr38"></a>moccasins and
+broken pipes and pottery, attested a domiciliary occupation by the
+former. Farther into the interior, were found seats and
+sleeping-couches of fine cane work; and in a spacious recess, near
+the entrance, a large collection of the bones, both of the ox and
+the deer, with hides, also, of both, but newly flayed and suspended
+on pegs by the horns. These last evidences of good living had more
+effect upon our hungry Indians than all the rest, and within an
+hour after dark, while we were seeking our first sleep, four fine
+deer were brought in by about a dozen of our party, whom we
+supposed to have been faithfully guarding our citadel. It is
+unnecessary to say that we gladly arose to the rich repast that
+ensued, for we had eaten nothing but our scant allowance of
+tortillas for many days, and were in the lassitude of famine.�</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Tempting as such extracts are, we must avoid them, and hasten through a
+summary of subsequent events. There is one singular incident, however,
+mentioned in the passage immediately following the above, possessing too
+important a connexion with the final catastrophe to be pretermitted at
+this place. Mr. Hammond, the Canadian engineer, fearing that the
+peculiarity of his appearance, as a man of fair and ruddy complexion,
+among a swarthy race, would subject him to great annoyance, and perhaps
+involve him in the horrible fate of a similar person, reported by the
+Indians, resolved to stain his skin of a darker hue, by means of some
+chemical preparation which he had precautionarily provided for this
+purpose, before he left the United <a name="corr39" id="corr39"></a>States. With<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span> the friendly
+assistance of Antonio, this metamorphosis was completed over his whole
+person before he retired to rest; his red whiskers were shaved off, and
+his light hair died of a jet black; and so perfect was the disguise,
+that not one of the party who went foraging for venison recognized him
+on their return, but marvelled, as he sat at supper, whence so singular
+a stranger could have come. Velasquez states, however, that his new
+complexion was unlike that of any human being on the face of the earth,
+and scarcely diminished the certainty of his becoming an object of
+curiosity, among an Indian population.</p>
+
+<p>In the morning, about the break of day, the infernal yells of a pack of
+blood-hounds suddenly rang through the cavern, and the party could
+scarcely seize their rifles before many of the dogs, who had driven in
+the affrighted Indians on guard, were springing at their throats. Mr.
+Huertis, however, the American leader of the expedition, with that
+presence of mind which seems always to have distinguished him, told the
+men that rifles were useless in such a contest, and that the hounds must
+be dispatched with their long knives as fast as they came in, while the
+fire-arms were to be reserved for their masters. This canine butchery
+was accomplished with but little difficulty; none of the party received
+any serious injury from their fangs; and the Indians were exhilarated
+with a victory which was chiefly a conquest of their fears. These
+unfortunate dogs, it appears, were the advanced van of a pack, or
+perhaps merely a few unleashed as scouts to others held in reserve; for
+no more were seen or heard for sometime. Meanwhile, Mr. Huertis seems to
+have struck out a brilliant scheme. He collected his whole party into
+that obscure branch of the cavern, near its entrance, which has been
+described as a depository of animal bones, and ordering them to sling
+their rifles at their backs, bade them stand ready with their knives.
+Almost instantly, they observed a party of ten dismounted natives, in
+scarlet tunics, and armed with spears, enter the cavern in single file;
+and, it would seem, from seeing the dogs slain and no enemy in sight,
+they rushed out again, without venturing on farther search. In a few
+minutes, however, they returned with forty or fifty more, in the same
+uniform, headed by the younger of the two personages whom they had seen
+in command the previous evening. As soon as they were well advanced into
+the cavern, and heard disturbing the tired mules, Mr. Huertis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> and his
+party marched quietly out and seized their horses, which were picketed
+close by, in charge of two or three men, whom they disarmed. At a short
+distance, however, drawn up in good order, was another squadron of
+horses, which Mr. Huertis determined instantly to charge. Ordering his
+whole party to mount the noble stallions they had captured, and reserve
+their fire until he gave the word, he, Velasquez, and Hammond, drew the
+short sabres they had worn on their march, and led the attack. The
+uniformed natives, however, did not wait the encounter, but scattered in
+wonderment and consternation; doubtless under the impression that all
+their comrades had been slain. But the rapid approach of a much larger
+force&mdash;which is found, eventually, to have consisted of two detachments
+of fifty each, being just twice their number&mdash;speedily reassured them,
+and falling in line with this powerful reinforcement, the whole hundred
+and fifty charged upon our comparative handful of travellers, at a rapid
+pace. Huertis promptly ordered his little party to halt, and form in
+line, two deep, with presented arms; and doubtless feeling that,
+notwithstanding the disparity of numbers, the enemy, armed only with
+spears and small side-hatchets, held but a slender chance of victory
+over a party of thirty-eight&mdash;most of them old campaigners in the
+sanguinary expeditions of the terrible Carrera&mdash;armed with new
+“six-shooting� rifles and long knives, generously commanded them to keep
+aim upon the horses only, until further orders. In the meantime, most of
+their plumed opponents, instead of using their long spears as in lance
+practice, threw them through the air from so great a distance that
+nearly all fell short of the mark&mdash;an infallible indication both of
+timidity and inexperience in action. The unfortunate Mr. Hammond,
+however, was pierced through the right breast, and another of the party
+was killed by being transfixed through the bowels. At this instant
+Huertis gave the word to fire; and, at the next, no small number of the
+enemy were rolling upon the sod, amid their plunging horses. A second
+rapid, but well delivered volley, brought down as many more, when the
+rest, in attitudes of frantic wonder and terror, unconsciously dropped
+their weapons and fled like affrighted fowls under the sudden swoop of
+the kite. Their dispersion was so outrageously wild and complete that no
+two of them could be seen together as they radiated over the plain. The
+men and horses seemed impelled alike by a preternatural panic; and
+neither Cortez in Mexico, nor Pizarro in Peru, ever wit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>nessed greater
+consternation at fire-arms among a people, who, for the first time,
+beheld their phenomena and effects&mdash;when mere hundreds of invaders
+easily subjugated millions of natives chiefly by this appalling
+influence&mdash;than was manifested by these Iximayans on this occasion.
+Indeed, it appears that these primitive and isolated people, holding no
+intercourse whatever with the rest of mankind, were as ignorant as their
+ancestors even of the existence of this kind of weapons; and although
+their modern hieroglyphical annals were found to contain vague allusions
+to the use of them in the conquest of the surrounding country, by means
+of a peculiar kind of thunder and lightning, and several old Spanish
+muskets and pistols were found in their scant collection of foreign
+curiosities, yet, not even the most learned of their priests had
+retained the slightest notion of the uses for which they were designed.</p>
+
+<p>While this summary conflict was enacted on the open lawn of the forest,
+the dismounted company in the cavern having completed their fruitless
+search for the fugitives, emerged from its portal with all the mules and
+baggage, just in time to see and hear the fiery explosions of the rifles
+and their effect upon the whole body of scarlet cavalry. The entire
+scene, including the mounted possession of their horses by uncouthly
+attired strangers, previously invisible, must have appeared to these
+terror-stricken natives an achievement of supernatural beings. And when
+Mr. Huertis wheeled his obstreperously laughing party to recover his
+mules, he found most of the astounded men prostrated upon their faces,
+while others, more self-possessed, knelt upon the bended knee, and, with
+drooping heads, crossed their hands behind them to receive the bonds of
+captives. Their gallant and gaily accoutred young chieftain, however,
+though equally astonished and dismayed, merely surrendered his javelin
+as an officer would his sword, under the like circumstances, in
+civilized warfare. But, with admirable tact and forethought, Huertis
+declined to accept it, immediately returning it with the most profound
+and <a name="corr40" id="corr40"></a>deferential cordiality of manner. He at the same time informed him,
+through Velasquez, that, though strangers, his party were not enemies
+but friendly visitors, who, after a long and painful journey, again to
+be pursued, desired the temporary hospitality of his countrymen in their
+magnificent city.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>The young chief replied, with evident discomposure and concern, that his
+countrymen showed no hospitality to strangers, it being interdicted by
+their laws and punishable with death; that the inhabitants of their city
+held intercourse only with the population of the surrounding valley, who
+were restricted alike by law and by patriotism from ever leaving its
+confines; he and his fellow soldiers alone being privileged to visit the
+neighboring regions for the purpose of arresting intruders, (<i>cowana</i>,)
+and escorting certain kind of merchandize which they exchanged with a
+people of their own race in an adjoining district. He added, with much
+eloquence of manner, and as Velasquez believed, of language, which he
+but partially understood, that the independence and peace of his nation,
+who were a peaceful and happy people, depended upon these severe
+restrictions, which indeed had been the only means of preserving it,
+while all the country besides, from sea to sea, had bowed to a foreign
+yoke, and seen their ancient cities, once the seats and centres of
+mighty empires, overgrown with forest, and the temples of their gods
+demolished.</p>
+
+<p>He further added, says Velasquez, in a very subdued but significant
+tone, that some few strangers, it was true, had been taken to the city
+by its guards in the course of many generations, but that none of them
+had been allowed an opportunity of betraying its existence and locality
+to the cruel rapacity of the foreign race. He concluded by earnestly
+entreating them, since he could not compel them as prisoners, to enter
+the city as friends, with the view of residing there for life; promising
+them wives, and dwellings, and honors; for even now, if they attempted
+to retreat, they would be overtaken by thousands of armed men on fleet
+horses, that would overpower them by their numbers and subject them to a
+very different fate.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Huertis rejoined, through the same interpreter, that he could
+destroy any number of armed men, on the swiftest horses, before they
+could approach him, as the chief had already seen; and since he could
+enforce his exit from the city whenever he thought proper, he would
+enter it upon his own terms, either as a conqueror, or as a friend,
+according to the reception he met with; that there was now no race of
+conquerors to whom the city<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span> could be betrayed, even if he were disposed
+to do so, as the people of the whole country, of all races, were now
+living in a state of perfect freedom and equality; and that, therefore,
+there was no necessity for those unsocial and sanguinary laws which
+secluded the Iximayans from friendly intercourse with their fellow-men.
+Saying which, and without waiting for further colloquy, he ordered his
+party to dismount, restore the horses to their owners, and march with
+the train of mules toward the city, in the usual style of travel. With
+this order, his Indians complied very reluctantly, but on assuring them
+that it was a matter of the highest policy, they evinced their wonted
+confidence in his judgment and ability. To the young chief he restored
+his own richly caparisoned steed, which had fallen to the lot of the
+unfortunate Mr. Hammond, who was now lying desperately wounded, in the
+care of the faithful Antonio. For himself and Senor Velasquez, Mr.
+Huertis retained the horses they had first seized, and placing
+themselves on each side of the Iximayan commander, with their friend
+Hammond borne immediately behind them, in one of the cane couches of the
+cavern, on the backs of two mules yoked together, they advanced to the
+head of their party, while the red troopers, followed by the surviving
+bloodhounds leashed in couples, brought up the rear. Huertis, however,
+had taken the precaution to add the spears and hatchets of these men to
+the burdens of the forward mules, to abide the event of his reception at
+the city gates. The appearance of the whole cavalcade must have been
+unique and picturesque; for Velasquez informs us, that while he wore the
+uniform of a military company to which he belonged in San Salvador, much
+enhanced in effect by some brilliant additions, and crowned with a broad
+sombrero and plume, Huertis wore that of an American naval commander,
+with gold epaulettes; his riflemen and muleteers generally were clothed
+in blue cotton and grass hats, while the native cavalry, in the
+brilliant tunics and feathered coronals, already described, must have
+completed the diversity of the variegated cortege. Had poor Hammond been
+mounted among them, his costume would have been as equivocal as his new
+complexion, for he had attired himself in the scarlet coat of a British
+officer of rank, with several blazing stars of glass jewels, surmounted
+by a white Panama hat, in which clustered an airy profusion of ladies’
+ostrich feathers, dyed blue at the edges.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>In passing the spot of the recent skirmish, they found that nine horses
+and two men had been killed, the latter unintentionally, besides the
+rifleman of their own party. Many other horses were lying wounded, in
+the struggles of death, and several of their riders were seated on the
+ground, disabled by bruises or dislocations. Huertis’ men buried their
+comrades in a grave hastily dug with the spears which lay around him,
+while the Iximayans laid their dead and wounded upon horses, to be
+conveyed to a village on the plain. The former, it was found, were
+consumed there the next day, in funereal fires, with idolatrous rites;
+and it was observed by the travellers that the native soldiers regarded
+their dead with emotions of extreme sensibility, and almost feminine
+grief, like men wholly unaccustomed to scenes of violent death. But
+Velasquez remarks, that the strongest emotion evinced by the young
+chief, throughout their intercourse, was when he heard the word
+“Iximaya,� in interpreting for Huertis. He then seemed to be smitten and
+subdued, by blank despair, as if he felt that the city and its location
+were already familiarly known to the foreign world.</p>
+
+<p>As already intimated, the distance to the city was about six miles. The
+expedition found the road to it bordered, on either side, as far as the
+eye could reach, with a profuse and valuable vegetation, the result of
+evidently assiduous and skilful culture. Indigo, corn, oats, a curious
+five-eared wheat, gourds, <a name="corr41" id="corr41"></a>pine-apples, esculent roots, pulse, flax, and
+hemp, the white as well as the crimson cotton, vineyards, and fruit
+orchards, grew luxuriantly in large, regularly divided fields, which
+were now ripe for the harvest. The villages, large and populous, were
+mostly composed of flat-roofed dwellings with broad overhanging eaves or
+architraves, supported by heavy columns, often filletted over spiral
+flutings, in the Egyptian style, and generally terminating in foliaged
+capitals, of the same character. None of the houses were mean, while
+many were superb; and of the mosque-like larger buildings, which
+occasionally appeared, and which were supposed to be rural temples, some
+were grand and imposing. A profusion of bold sculpture, was the
+prevailing characteristic, and perhaps defect, of all. The inhabitants,
+who thronged the wayside in great numbers, appeared excited with
+surprise and exultation, on beholding the large company of strangers
+apparently in the custody of their military, while the disarmed
+condition of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> the latter, and the bodies of the slain, were a mystery
+they could not explain. Many of the husbandmen were observed to be in
+possession of bows and arrows, and some of the women held rusty spears.
+The predominant costume of both sexes was a pale blue tunic, gathered in
+at the breast and descending to the knee, with reticulated buskins, of
+red cord, covering the calf of the leg. The women, with few exceptions,
+were of fine form, and the highest order of Indian beauty, with an
+extraordinary affluence of black hair, tastefully disposed, and
+decorated with plumes and flowers. At the village where the dead and
+wounded were left, with their relatives and friends, doleful
+lamentations were heard, until the expedition approached the city.</p>
+
+<p>The walls of this metropolis were sixty feet high, sloping inward from
+the foundation, surmounted by a parapet which overhung in a concave
+curve and rested upon a plain moulding. They were evidently a massive
+work of a remote period, for although constructed of large blocks of
+granitic stone, white and glittering in the sun, passing ages had
+corroded rough crevices between the layers, and the once perfect
+cornices had become indented by the tooth of time. The sculptured annals
+of the city recorded them an antiquity of four thousand years. They
+formed a parallelogram four miles long and three in width, thus
+inclosing an area of nearly twelve square miles, and they breasted the
+cardinal points of the horizon with a single gate, or propylon, midway
+on every side. On approaching the eastern gate, the travellers
+discovered that the foundations of the walls were laid in a deep foss or
+moat a hundred feet wide, nearly full to its brink and abounding with
+water-fowl. It was replenished from the mountains, and discharged its
+surplus waters into the lakes of the valley. It was to be crossed by a
+draw-bridge now raised over the gate, and the parapet was thronged with
+the populace to behold the entrance of so large a number of strangers
+for whom there was no return.</p>
+
+<p>At a signal from the young chief, the bridge slowly descended and the
+cavalcade passed over; but the folding gates, which were composed of
+blocks of stone curiously dovetailed together, and which revolved upon
+hinges of the same material by a ball and socket contrivance above and
+below, were not yet opened, and the party were detained on the bridge. A
+small oval orifice<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span> only appeared, less than a human face, and <a name="corr42" id="corr42"></a>an ear
+was applied there to receive an expected word in a whisper. This
+complied with, the ponderous gates unfolded, and a vista of solemn
+magnificence was presented to the view. It was a vista at once of
+colossal statues and trees, interminable in perspective and extending,
+as it was found, the whole length of the city to its western gate.
+Incredible as it may be, until we reflect upon the ancient statuary of
+the eastern world, Velasquez reports each and all of these monuments as
+being exactly of the height of the city wall, that is, sixty feet, and
+all possessing the proportions of the human figure. He adds, what is
+equally marvelous, that no two of them were precisely alike in
+countenance, and very few in their sculptural costume. There was some
+distinctive emblem upon each, and he was informed that they were statues
+of the ancient kings of Assyria, from before the foundation of Babylon,
+and of their descendants in the Aztec empires of this continent. They
+stood sixty feet apart, with a smaller monument of some mythological
+animal between each, and were said to number one hundred and fifteen, on
+each side of the avenue they formed, which was one hundred and twenty
+feet in width. A similar but shorter avenue, it appears, crossed the
+city from north to south, having a proportional number of such monuments
+through its entire extent; and these two grand avenues ran through wide
+areas of green sward richly grouped with lofty trees. But the translator
+finds himself trespassing upon forbidden ground and must forbear.</p>
+
+<p>As the cavalcade advanced through this highway to the centre of the
+city, they found it crowded on each side with the masses of the
+population assembled to behold a spectacle so unprecedented and
+mysterious; but the utmost order prevailed and even the silence was
+profound. The news of the slaughter and <a name="corr43" id="corr43"></a>dispersion of their military
+guardians, by an army of strangers, wielding deadly weapons of fire and
+smoke, had already run <a name="corr44" id="corr44"></a>through every quarter of the city with increasing
+exaggeration and terror; but the people wisely left its investigation to
+their constituted authorities, and were rendered comparatively tranquil
+by their personal observation of its actual results. Arrived at the
+quadrated point, where the two great avenues we have described
+intersect, Mr. Huertis boldly demanded of his guide the further course
+and character of his destination. He was an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>swered by his dignified
+companion, that he would be conducted to the building immediately before
+him, which is described as one of majestic dimensions and style, where
+the monarch of the nation daily assembled with his councillors, at the
+hour of noon, to administer justice and listen to complaints. In the
+meantime, his wounded friend could be placed in a state of greater ease
+and repose, in one of the <a name="corr45" id="corr45"></a>apartments of the edifice, while the mules
+and baggage could be disposed of in its basement vaults. When this was
+accomplished the hours of audience had arrived.</p>
+
+<p>The entire party of strangers, with the young chief and several of his
+subordinates, were then led into a large and lofty hall, surrounded by
+columns, and displaying three raised seats covered with canopies of rich
+drapery and design. On the one of these, which stood at the eastern end,
+sat the monarch himself, a personage of grave but benignant aspect,
+about sixty years of age, arrayed in scarlet and gold, and having a
+golden image of the rising sun, of extraordinary splendor, displayed on
+the back of his throne. On the seat on the southern side, sat a
+venerable man of advanced age, not less gorgeously attired; and the seat
+at the western end was occupied by a functionary of similar years and
+costume. Around the apartment, and especially around the steps of the
+throne, sat other grave looking men, in scarlet robes. Huertis,
+Velasquez, and their Indians, still carrying their loaded rifles, of
+which he had not suffered them to be deprived, stood on the left side of
+the monarch, and the young chief and his soldiers on the right. The
+latter gave his statement with truth and manly candour, although the
+facts which he averred seemed to fill the whole council with amazement,
+and left a settled gloom upon the imperial brow. The whole proceeding
+possesses great interest in Velasquez’s narrative, but we can only
+briefly state that it resulted in the decision, which was concurred in
+by the associate councillors, that the strangers having magnanimously
+released and restored the company of guards, after they had surrendered
+themselves prisoners; and having voluntarily entered the city in a
+peaceable manner, when they might possibly have effected their escape,
+were entitled to their personal freedom, within the limits of the city,
+and might eventually, under voluntary but <a name="corr46" id="corr46"></a>indispensable obligations,
+become eligible to all the privileges of citizenship, within the same
+limits. In the mean<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span> time, they were to be maintained as pensioners of
+state, on condition that they made no use of their dangerous weapons,
+nor exhibited them to terrify the people. With this decision, Huertis
+and his companions were perfectly satisfied, for the latter had
+undiminished confidence in his ability and determination to achieve
+their escape, as soon as he should have accomplished the scientific
+objects of his expedition. On leaving the hall of justice, they observed
+the elder military chief, of whom a slight mention has been made,
+brought in with two others of inferior rank; and it was afterwards
+currently reported that they had been sentenced to close imprisonment.
+It was, also, ascertained by Velasquez, that the four companies of
+rangers, already noticed, composing a regiment of two hundred men,
+constituted the whole military force of this timid and peaceful people.</p>
+
+<p>From this point, our abstract of the narrative must be chiefly a brief
+catalogue of the most important of the concluding events. The place of
+residence assigned to our travellers, was the vacant wing of a spacious
+and sumptuous structure, at the western extremity of the city, which had
+been appropriated, from time immemorial, to the surviving remnant of an
+ancient and singular order of priesthood called Kaanas, which, it was
+distinctly asserted in their annals and traditions, had accompanied the
+first migration of this people from the Assyrian plains. Their peculiar
+and strongly <a name="corr47" id="corr47"></a>distinctive lineaments, it is now perfectly well
+ascertained are to be traced in many of the sculptured monuments of the
+central American ruins, and were found still more abundantly on those of
+Iximaya. Forbidden, by inviolably sacred laws, from intermarrying with
+any persons but those of their own caste, they had here dwindled down,
+in the course of many centuries, to a few insignificant individuals,
+diminutive in stature, and imbecile in intellect. They were,
+nevertheless, held in high veneration and affection by the whole
+Iximayan community, probably as living specimens of an antique race so
+nearly extinct. Their position, as an order of priesthood, it is now
+known, had not been higher, for many ages, if ever, than that of
+religious mimes and bacchanals, in a certain class of pagan ceremonies,
+highly popular with the multitude. This, indeed, is evident from their
+characteristics in the sculptures. Their ancient college, or hospital,
+otherwise vacant and forlorn, was now chiefly occupied by a much higher
+order of priests, called Mahaboons, who were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span> their legal and sacerdotal
+guardians. With a Yachin, one of the junior brethren of this order,
+named Vaalpeor, a young man of superior intellect and attainments,
+Velasquez soon cultivated a friendly and confidential acquaintance,
+which proved reciprocal and faithful. And while Huertis was devoting all
+his time and energies to the antiquities, hieroglyphics, ethnology,
+science, pantheism, theogony, arts, manufactures, and social
+institutions of this unknown city and people, the ear of this young
+pagan priest was as eagerly imbibing, from the wiley lips of Velasquez,
+a similar knowledge of the world at large, to him equally new and
+enchanting. If Huertis had toiled so severely, and hazarded so much,
+both as to himself and companions, to acquire a knowledge of this one
+city and people, it soon became clear to the penetrating mind of
+Velasquez, that Vaalpeor possessed enough both of mental ambition and
+personal energy to incur equal toil and risk to learn the wonders of the
+cities and races of the greater nations of mankind. Indeed, this desire
+evidently glowed in his breast with a consuming fervor, and when
+Velasquez, after due observation proposed the liberation of the whole
+expedition, with Vaalpeor himself, as its protected companion, the now
+consciously imprisoned pagan, horror-stricken at first, regarded the
+proposition with complacency, and finally, with a degree of delight,
+regardless of consequences. It was, however, mutually agreed that the
+design should be kept secret from Huertis, until ripe for success. A
+serious obstacle existed in his plighted guardianship of the Kaana
+children, whom he could abandon only with his life; but even this was
+not deemed insurmountable.</p>
+
+<p>In the meantime, Huertis, to facilitate his own objects, had prevailed
+upon his entire party to conform in dress and habits with the community
+in which they lived. The city was surrounded on all sides by a lofty
+colonade, sustaining the upper esplanade of the city walls, and forming
+a broad covered walk beneath, in which the population could promenade,
+sheltered from sun and shower. In these places of general resort, the
+new citizens appeared daily, until they had become familiarly known to
+the greater part of the eighty-five thousand inhabitants of the city.
+Huertis, moreover, had formed domestic and social connexions; was the
+welcome guest of families of the highest rank, who were fascinated with
+the information he afforded them of the external world; had made tacit
+converts to liberty of many influential<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span> persons; had visited each of
+the four grand temples which stood in the centre of the several
+quadrangular divisions of the city, and externally conformed to their
+idolatrous worship. He had even been admitted into some of the most
+sacred mysteries of these temples, while Velasquez, more retired, and
+avowedly more scrupulous, was content to receive the knowledge thus
+acquired, in long conversations by the sick couch of poor Hammond, now
+rapidly declining to the grave.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Hammond’s dreadful wound had but partially healed in the course of
+several months; his constitution was exhausted, and he was dying of
+remittent fever and debility. His chief regret was that he could not
+assist his friend Huertis in his researches and drawings, and determine
+the place of the city by astronomical observations which his friends
+were unable to take. The day before he died, he was visited by some of
+the medical priesthood, who, on seeing numerous light spots upon his
+skin, where the preparation with which he had stained it had
+disappeared, they pronounced him <i>a leper</i>, and ordered that all
+intercourse with the building should be suspended. No explanation would
+convince them to the contrary, and his death confirmed them in their
+opinion. Availing himself of this opportunity, and under the plea that
+it was important to their safety, Vaalpeor removed the two orphan
+children in his charge to one of the country temples in the plain, and
+the idle mules of the strangers were employed to carry tents, couches,
+and other bulky requisites for an unprovided rural residence. It may be
+added that he included among them much of the baggage of his new
+friends, with the greater part of their rifles and <a name="corr48" id="corr48"></a>ammunition. In the
+mean time Huertis, Velasquez, and about half of their party, were
+closely confined to the part of the edifice assigned for their
+occupation. Their friend Hammond had been interred without the walls, in
+a field <a name="corr49" id="corr49"></a>appropriated to lepers by the civic authorities. Huertis, was
+now informed of the plan of escape, but was not ready; he had more
+daguerreotype views to take, and many curiosities to collect. The
+interdicted period of nine days having expired, the young priest, who
+had free access to the city at all times, again appeared at their abode
+and urged an early retreat, as the return of the orphan children would
+soon be required. But Huertis was abroad in the city and could not be
+consulted. He remained absent all the day, and did not return to his
+<a name="corr50" id="corr50"></a>apartments at night. It was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span> so all the next day and night, and
+<a name="corr51" id="corr51"></a>Velasquez was deeply alarmed. On searching his rooms for his papers,
+drawings and instruments, for secret <a name="corr52" id="corr52"></a>transmittal into the country, he
+found them all removed, including those of Mr. Hammond which were among
+them. It was then vainly hoped that he had effected his escape with all
+his treasures, but his Indians knew nothing of the matter.</p>
+
+<p>Shortly after this discovery, Vaalpeor arrived with its explanation.
+Huertis had made a confidant of his intended flight whom he idly hoped
+would accompany it, and she had betrayed him. His offence, after his
+voluntary vows, and his initiation into the sacred mysteries, was
+unpardonable, and his fate could not be doubted. Indeed, the trembling
+priest at length admitted that he had been sacrificed in due form upon
+the high altar of the sun, and that he himself had beheld the fatal
+ceremony. Huertis, however, had implicated none of his associates, and
+there was yet a chance of escape. To pass the gates was impossible; but
+the wall might be descended in the night by ropes, and to swim the moat
+was easy. This was effected by Velasquez and fifteen of his party the
+same night; the rest either did not make the attempt or failed, and the
+faithful Antonio was among them. The fugitives had scarcely reached the
+secluded retreat of Vaalpeor, and mounted their mules, before the low
+yelp of blood-hounds was heard upon their trail and soon burst into full
+cry. But the dogs were somewhat confused by the scent of so many
+footsteps on the spot at which the party mounted, and did not follow the
+mules until the horsemen led the way. This afforded time for the
+fugitives, racing their swift mules at full speed, to reach the opening
+of the valley, when Velasquez wheeled and halted, for the pursuers were
+close at hand. A conflict ensued in which many of the horsemen were
+slain, and the young kaana received an accidental wound of which he
+retains the scar. It must suffice to say, that the party eventually
+secured their retreat without loss of life; and by break of day they
+were on a mountainous ridge many leagues from Iximaya. In about fourteen
+days, they reached Ocosingo, after great suffering. Here Velasquez
+reluctantly parted with most of his faithful Indians, and here also died
+Vaalpeor, from the unaccustomed toil and deprivations of the journey.
+Velasquez, with the two Aztec children, did not reach San Salvador until
+the middle of February, when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span> they became objects of the highest
+interest to the most intellectual classes of that city. As the greatest
+ethnological curiosities in living form, that ever appeared among
+civilised men, he was advised to send them to Europe for exhibition.</p>
+
+<p>With this view they were taken to Grenada where they remained the
+objects of much local curiosity, until it was deemed proper and
+advisable first to exhibit them to the people of the United States. The
+parties whom Senor Velasquez first appointed as their temporary
+guardians brought them to New York via Jamaica, and they will no doubt
+attract and reward universal attention. They are supposed to be eight
+and ten years of age, and both are lively, playful and affectionate. But
+it is as specimens of an <i>absolutely unique</i> and nearly extinct race of
+mankind that they claim the attention of Physiologists and all men of
+science.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr class="chapbreak" />
+
+<div class="tn">
+<p class="titlepage"><a name="trans_note" id="trans_note"></a><b>Transcriber’s Note</b></p>
+
+
+<p class="noindent">The following typographical errors were corrected:</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="margin-left: 0;" summary="Typographical errors">
+<tr>
+  <td style="width: 10%;">Page</td>
+  <td style="width: 40%;">Error</td>
+  <td style="width: 40%;">Correction</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr1">4</a></td>
+  <td>Vaalpeor, in</td>
+  <td>Vaalpeor, an</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr2">4</a></td>
+  <td>Diocess</td>
+  <td>Diocese</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr3">5</a></td>
+  <td>scirra</td>
+  <td>sierra</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr4">6</a></td>
+  <td>attemped</td>
+  <td>attempted</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr5">6</a></td>
+  <td>Gautamala</td>
+  <td>Guatimala</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr6">6</a></td>
+  <td>seirra</td>
+  <td>sierra</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr7">6</a></td>
+  <td>rasing</td>
+  <td>raising</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr8">7</a></td>
+  <td>seirra</td>
+  <td>sierra</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr9">7</a></td>
+  <td>Balize</td>
+  <td>Belize</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr10">8</a></td>
+  <td>way</td>
+  <td>way.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr11">8</a></td>
+  <td>Hammand</td>
+  <td>Hammond</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr12">8</a></td>
+  <td>attestors</td>
+  <td>attesters</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr13">9</a></td>
+  <td>proceded</td>
+  <td>proceeded</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr14">9</a></td>
+  <td>regreted</td>
+  <td>regretted</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr15">9</a></td>
+  <td>repecting</td>
+  <td>respecting</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr16">9</a></td>
+  <td>experince</td>
+  <td>experience</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr17">10</a></td>
+  <td>idolitrous</td>
+  <td>idolatrous</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr18">10</a></td>
+  <td>invaluble</td>
+  <td>invaluable</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr19">11</a></td>
+  <td>joval</td>
+  <td>jovial</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr20">11</a></td>
+  <td>mentined</td>
+  <td>mentioned</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr21">13</a></td>
+  <td>realitily</td>
+  <td>reality</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr22">13</a></td>
+  <td>rediculous</td>
+  <td>ridiculous</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr23">14</a></td>
+  <td>guilded</td>
+  <td>gilded</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr24">14</a></td>
+  <td>pinacle</td>
+  <td>pinnacle</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr25">15</a></td>
+  <td>mountians</td>
+  <td>mountains</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr26">15</a></td>
+  <td>Chiapas.</td>
+  <td>Chiapas.�</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr27">16</a></td>
+  <td>limbstone</td>
+  <td>limestone</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr28">16</a></td>
+  <td>parapetted</td>
+  <td>parapeted</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr29">16</a></td>
+  <td>Aarchbishop</td>
+  <td>Archbishop</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr30">17</a></td>
+  <td>amunition</td>
+  <td>ammunition</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr31">17</a></td>
+  <td>orign</td>
+  <td>origin</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr32">18</a></td>
+  <td>Mayua</td>
+  <td>Maya</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr33">18</a></td>
+  <td>interpeters</td>
+  <td>interpreters</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr34">18</a></td>
+  <td>provinical</td>
+  <td>provincial</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr35">19</a></td>
+  <td>pewerful</td>
+  <td>powerful</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr36">19</a></td>
+  <td>I</td>
+  <td>“I</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr37">19</a></td>
+  <td>solemly</td>
+  <td>solemnly</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr38">21</a></td>
+  <td>mocassins</td>
+  <td>moccasins</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr39">21</a></td>
+  <td>States</td>
+  <td>States.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr40">24</a></td>
+  <td>defferential</td>
+  <td>deferential</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr41">27</a></td>
+  <td>pine-apples</td>
+  <td>pine-apples,</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr42">29</a></td>
+  <td>a ear</td>
+  <td>an ear</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr43">29</a></td>
+  <td>disperson</td>
+  <td>dispersion</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr44">29</a></td>
+  <td>ran through</td>
+  <td>run through</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr45">30</a></td>
+  <td>appartments</td>
+  <td>apartments</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr46">30</a></td>
+  <td>indispensible</td>
+  <td>indispensable</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr47">31</a></td>
+  <td>destinctive</td>
+  <td>distinctive</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr48">33</a></td>
+  <td>amunition</td>
+  <td>ammunition</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr49">33</a></td>
+  <td>apropriated</td>
+  <td>appropriated</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr50">33</a></td>
+  <td>appartments</td>
+  <td>apartments</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr51">34</a></td>
+  <td>Valasquez</td>
+  <td>Velasquez</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td class="tdr"><a href="#corr52">34</a></td>
+  <td>transmital</td>
+  <td>transmittal</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class="noindent">The following words were inconsistently spelled or hyphenated.</p>
+
+
+<ul class="ix">
+  <li>blood-hounds / bloodhounds</li>
+  <li>land-marks / landmarks</li>
+  <li>Meztitzos / Mestitzos</li>
+  <li>re-assured / reassured</li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in
+Central America, by Pedro Velasquez
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+</pre>
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+</body>
+</html>
+
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@@ -0,0 +1,1775 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central
+America, by Pedro Velasquez
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in Central America
+       Resulting in the Discovery of the Idolatrous City of
+       Iximaya, in an Unexplored Region; and the Possession of
+       two Remarkable Aztec Children, Descendants and Specimens
+       of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now nearly extinct,) of the
+       Ancient Aztec Founders of the Ruined Temples of that
+       Country, Described by John L. Stevens, Esq., and Other
+       Travellers.
+
+Author: Pedro Velasquez
+
+Release Date: July 12, 2009 [EBook #29388]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEMOIR OF EVENTFUL EXPEDITION ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note
+
+Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. A list of corrections
+is found at the end of the text. Inconsistencies in spelling and
+hyphenation have been maintained. A list of inconsistently spelled
+and hyphenated words is found at the end of the text.
+
+Oe ligatures have been expanded.
+
+
+
+
+
+  MEMOIR
+  OF AN
+  EVENTFUL EXPEDITION
+  IN
+  CENTRAL AMERICA;
+
+  RESULTING IN THE DISCOVERY OF THE IDOLATROUS CITY OF
+  IXIMAYA,
+
+  In an unexplored region; and the possession of two
+
+  REMARKABLE AZTEC CHILDREN,
+
+  Descendants and Specimens of the Sacerdotal Caste, (now
+  nearly extinct,) of the Ancient Aztec Founders of the
+  Ruined Temples of that Country,
+
+  DESCRIBED BY
+
+  JOHN L. STEVENS, ESQ.,
+  AND OTHER TRAVELLERS.
+
+  Translated from the Spanish of
+  PEDRO VELASQUEZ,
+  of SAN SALVADOR.
+
+
+  NEW YORK:
+  E. F. Applegate, Printer, 111 Nassau Street.
+  1850.
+
+
+
+
+  PROFILE ILLUSTRATIONS
+  FROM
+  CENTRAL AMERICAN RUINS,
+  OF
+  ANCIENT RACES STILL EXISTING
+  IN IXIMAYA.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The above three figures, sketched from engravings in "Stevens's Central
+America," will be found, on personal comparison, to bear a remarkable
+and convincing resemblance, both in the general features and the
+position of the head, to the two living Aztec children, now exhibiting
+in the United States, of the ancient sacerdotal caste of _Kaanas_, or
+Pagan Mimes, of which a few individuals remain in the newly discovered
+city of Iximaya. See, the following _Memoir_, page 31.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+These two figures, sketched from the same work, are said, by Senor
+Velasquez, in the unpublished portion of his narrative, to be
+"irresistible likenesses" of the equally exclusive but somewhat more
+numerous priestly caste of _Mahaboons_, still existing in that city,
+and to which belonged Vaalpeor, an official guardian of those children,
+as mentioned in this memoir. Velasquez states that the likeness of
+Vaalpeor to the right hand figure in the frontispiece of Stevens' second
+volume, which is here also the one on the right hand, was as exact, in
+outline, as if the latter had been a daguerreotype miniature.
+
+While writing his "Narrative" after his return to San Salvador, in the
+spring of the present year, (1850,) Senor Velasquez was favored, by an
+American gentleman of that city, with a copy of "Layard's Nineveh," and
+was forcibly struck with the close characteristic resemblance of the
+faces in many of its engravings to those of the inhabitants in general,
+as a peculiar family of mankind, both of Iximaya and its surrounding
+region. The following are sketches, (somewhat imperfect,) of two of the
+male faces to which he refers:
+
+[Illustration]
+
+And the following profile, from the same work, is pronounced by
+Velasquez to be equally characteristic of the female faces of that
+region, making due allowance for the superb head dresses of tropical
+plumage, with which he describes the latter as being adorned, instead of
+the male galea, or close cap, retained in the engraving.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+These illustrations, slight as they are, are deemed interesting, because
+the Iximayans assert their descent from a very ancient Assyrian colony
+nearly co-temporary with Nineveh itself--a claim which receives strong
+confirmation, not only from the hieroglyphics and monuments of Iximaya,
+but from the engravings in Stevens' volumes of several remarkable
+objects, (the inverted winged globe especially,) at Palenque--once a
+kindred colony.
+
+It should have been stated in the following Memoir, that Senor
+Velasquez, on his return to San Salvador, caused the two Kaana children
+to be baptized into the Catholic Church, by the Bishop of the Diocese,
+under the names of Maximo and Bartola Velasquez.
+
+
+
+
+  MEMOIR
+  OF A RECENT
+  EVENTFUL EXPEDITION
+  IN
+  CENTRAL AMERICA.
+
+
+In the second volume of his travels in Central America--than which no
+work ever published in this country, has created and maintained a higher
+degree of interest, both at home and abroad--Mr. Stevens speaks with
+enthusiasm of the conversations he had held with an intelligent and
+hospitable Padre, or Catholic priest, of Santa Cruz del Quiche, formerly
+of the village of Chajul; and of the exciting information he had
+received from him, concerning immense and marvellous antiquities in the
+surrounding country, which, to the present hour, remain entirely unknown
+to the world. The Padre told him of vast ruins, in a deserted and
+desolate region, but four leagues from Vera Paz, more extensive than
+Quiche itself; and of another ruined city, on the other side of the
+great traversing range of the Cordilleras, of which no account has been
+given. But the most stimulating story of all, was the existence of a
+_living_ city, far on the other side of the great sierra, large and
+populous, occupied by Indians of the same character, and in precisely
+the same state, as those of the country in general, before the discovery
+of the continent and the desolating conquests of its invaders.
+
+The Padre averred that, in younger days, he had climbed to the topmost
+ridge of the sierra, a height of 10 or 12,000 feet, and from its naked
+summit, looking over an immense plain, extending to Yucatan and the Gulf
+of Mexico, had seen, with his own eyes, in the remote distance, "a large
+city, spread over a great space, with turrets white and glittering in
+the sun." His account of the prevalent Indian report concerning it was,
+that no white man had ever reached that city; that the inhabitants, who
+speak the Maya language, are aware that a race of white strangers has
+conquered the whole country around them, and have hence murdered every
+white man that has since attempted to penetrate their territory. He
+added that they have no coin or other circulating medium; no horses,
+mules, or other domestic animals, except fowls, "and keep the cocks
+under ground to prevent their crowing being heard." This report of their
+slender resources for animal food, and of their perpetual apprehension
+of discovery, as indicated in this inadequate and childish expedient to
+prevent it, is, in most respects, contradicted by that of the
+adventurous expedition about to be described, and which, having passed
+the walls of their city, obtained better information of their internal
+economy and condition than could have been acquired by any Indians at
+all likely to hold communication with places so very remote from the
+territory as Quiche or Chajul.
+
+The effects of these extraordinary averments and recitals of the Padre,
+upon the mind of Mr. Stevens, together with the deliberate conclusions
+which he finally drew from them, is best expressed in his own language.
+
+     "The interest awakened in us, was the most thrilling I ever
+     experienced. One look at that city, was worth ten years of an every
+     day life. If he is right, a place is left where Indians and a city
+     exist, as Cortez and Alvarado found them; there are living men who
+     can solve the mystery that hangs over the ruined cities of America;
+     who can, perhaps, go to Copan and read the inscriptions on its
+     monuments. No subject more exciting and attractive presents itself
+     to any mind, and the deep impression in my mind, will never be
+     effaced.
+
+     "Can it be true? Being now in my sober senses, I do verily believe
+     there is much ground to suppose that what the Padre told us is
+     authentic. That the region referred to does not acknowledge the
+     government of Guatimala, and has never been explored, and that no
+     white man has ever pretended to have entered it; I am satisfied.
+     From other sources we heard that a large _ruined_ city was visible;
+     and we were told of another person who had climbed to the top of
+     the sierra, but on account of the dense clouds raising upon it,
+     he had not been able to see anything. At all events, the belief at
+     the village of Chajul is general, and a curiosity is aroused that
+     burns to be satisfied. We had a craving desire to reach the
+     mysterious city. No man if ever so willing to peril his life, could
+     undertake the enterprise, with any hope of success, without
+     hovering for one or two years on the borders of the country
+     studying the language and character of the adjoining Indians, and
+     making acquaintance with some of the natives. Five hundred men
+     could probably march directly to the city, and the invasion would
+     be more justifiable than any made by Spaniards; but the government
+     is too much occupied with its own wars, and the knowledge could not
+     be procured except at the price of blood. Two young men of good
+     constitution, and who could afford to spend five years, might
+     succeed. If the object of search prove a phantom, in the wild
+     scenes of a new and unexplored country, there are other objects of
+     interest; but, if real, besides the glorious excitement of such a
+     novelty, they will have something to look back upon through life.
+     As to the dangers, they are always magnified, and, in general,
+     peril is discovered soon enough for escape. But, in all
+     probability, if any discovery is made, it will be made by the
+     Padres. As for ourselves, to attempt it alone, ignorant of the
+     language and with the mozos who were a constant annoyance to us,
+     was out of the question. The most we thought of, was to climb to
+     the top of the sierra, thence to look down upon the mysterious
+     city; but we had difficulties enough in the road before us; it
+     would add ten days to a journey already almost appalling in the
+     perspective; for days the sierra might be covered with clouds; in
+     attempting too much, we might lose all; Palenque was our great
+     point, and we determined not to be diverted from the course we had
+     marked out." Vol. II, p. 193-196.
+
+It is now known that two intrepid young men, incited probably by this
+identical passage in Mr. Stevens's popular work--one a Mr. Huertis, of
+Baltimore, an American of Spanish parents, from Cuba, possessing an
+ample fortune, and who had travelled much in Egypt, Persia, and Syria,
+for the personal inspection of ancient monuments; and the other, a Mr.
+Hammond, a civil-engineer from Canada, who had been engaged for some
+years on surveys in the United States, agreed to undertake the perilous
+and romantic enterprise thus cautiously suggested and chivalrously
+portrayed.
+
+Amply equipped with every desirable appointment, including daguerreotype
+apparatuses, mathematical instruments, and withal fifty repeating
+rifles, lest it should become necessary to resort to an armed
+expedition, these gentlemen sailed from New-Orleans and arrived at
+Belize, in the fall of 1848. Here they procured horses, mules, and a
+party of ten experienced Indians and Mestitzos; and after pursuing a
+route, through a wild, broken, and heavily wooded region, for about 150
+miles, on the Gulf of Amatique, they struck off more to the south-west,
+for Coban, where they arrived on the morning of Christmas day, in time
+to partake of the substantial enjoyments, as well as to observe the
+peculiar religious ceremonies, of the great Catholic festival, in that
+intensely interior city.
+
+At this place, while loitering to procure information and guides for
+their future journey to Santa Cruz del Quiche, they got acquainted with
+Sr. Pedro Velasquez, of San Salvador, who describes himself as a man of
+family and education, although a trader in indigo; and his intermediate
+destination, prior to his return to the capital, happening also to be
+the same city, he kindly proffered to the two Americans his superior
+knowledge of the country, or any other useful service he could render
+them; and he was accordingly very gladly received as their friend and
+companion on the way. It is from a copy of a manuscript journal of this
+gentleman, that the translator has obtained the only information as yet
+brought to the United States concerning the remarkable results of the
+exploring expedition which he will proceed to describe, or of the fate
+of Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, its unfortunate originators and
+conductors, or of those extraordinary living specimens of a _sui
+generis_ race of beings, hitherto supposed to be either fabulous or
+extinct, which are at once its melancholy trophies and its physiological
+attesters. And it is from Senor Velasquez alone that the public can
+receive any further intelligence upon this ardently interesting subject,
+beyond that which his manuscript imperfectly affords.
+
+In order, however, to avoid an anticipatory trespass upon the natural
+sequence of the narrative, it may be proper to state, that prior to his
+departure in their company from Coban, Senor Velasquez had received from
+his fellow travellers no intimation whatever concerning the ulterior
+object of their journey, and had neither seen nor heard of those volumes
+describing the stupendous vestiges of ancient empire, in his native
+land, which had so strongly excited the emulous passion of discovery in
+their minds.
+
+Frequently called by his mercantile speculations, which he seems to have
+conducted upon an extensive scale, to perform long journeys from San
+Salvador, on the Pacific side of the Cordilleras, to Comyagua in the
+mid-interior, and thence to Truxillo, Omoa, and Ysabal, on the Bay and
+Gulf of Honduras, he had traversed a large portion of the country, and
+had often been surprised with sudden views of mouldering temples,
+pyramids, and cities of vast magnitude and marvellous mythology. And
+being, as it evidently appears, a man of unusual intelligence and
+scholastic acquirements, he had doubtless felt, as he states, a profound
+but hopeless curiosity concerning their origin and history. He had even
+seen and consecutively examined the numerous and ornate monuments of
+Copan; but it was not until he had proceeded to the second stage of the
+journey from Coban to Quiche, that he was shown the engravings in the
+first volume of Stevens's Central America, in which they are so
+faithfully depicted. He recognized many of them as old acquaintances,
+and still more as new ones, which had escaped his more cursory
+inspection; and in all he could trace curious details which, on the
+spot, he regretted the want of time to examine. He, moreover, knew the
+surly Don Gregorio, by whom Mr. Stevens had been treated so
+inhospitably, and several other persons in the vicinity of the ruins
+whom he had named, and was delighted with the _vraisemblance_ of his
+descriptions. The Senor confesses that these circumstances inspired him
+with unlimited confidence in that traveller's statements upon other
+subjects; and when Mr. Huertis read to him the further account of the
+information given to Mr. Stevens by the jolly and merry, but intelligent
+old Padre of Quiche, respecting other ruined cities beyond the Sierra
+Madre, and especially of the living city of independent Candones, or
+unchristianized Indians, supposed to have been seen from the lofty
+summit of that mountain range, and was told by Messrs. Huertis and
+Hammond that the exploration of this city was the chief object of their
+perilous expedition, the Senor adds, that his enthusiasm became
+enkindled to at least as high a fervor as theirs, and that, "with more
+precipitancy than prudence, in a man of his maturer years and important
+business pursuits, he resolved to unite in the enterprise, to aid the
+heroic young men with his experience in travel and knowledge of the
+wild Indians of the region referred to, and to see the end of the
+adventure, result as it may."
+
+He was confirmed in this resolution by several concurring facts of which
+his companions were now told for the first time. He intimately knew and
+had several times been the guest of the worthy Cura of Quiche, from whom
+Mr. Stevens received assurances of the existence of the ruined city of
+the ancient Aztecs, as well as the living city of the Candones, in the
+unsubjugated territory beyond the mountains. And he was induced to yield
+credence to the Padre's confident report of the latter, because his
+account of the former had already been verified, and become a matter of
+fact and of record. He, Senor Velasquez, himself, during the preceding
+summer, joined a party of several foreigners and natives in exploring an
+ancient ruined city, of prodigious grandeur and extent, in the province
+of Vera Paz, but little more than 150 miles to the east of Guatimala,
+(instead of nearly 200, as the Padre had supposed,) which far surpassed
+in magnificence every other ruin, as yet discovered, either in Central
+America or Mexico. It lay overgrown with huge timber in the midst of a
+dense forest, far remote from any settlement, and near the crater of a
+long extinct volcano, on whose perpendicular walls, 300 or 400 feet
+high, were aboriginal paintings of warlike and idolatrous processions,
+dances, and other ceremonies, exhibiting like the architectural
+sculptures on the temples, a state of advancement in the arts
+incomparably superior to all previous examples. And as the good Padre
+had proved veracious and accurate on this matter, which he knew from
+personal observation, the Senor would not uncharitably doubt his
+veracity on a subject in which he again professed to speak from the
+evidence of his own eye-sight.
+
+The party thus re-assured, and more exhilarated than ever with the
+prospect of success, proceeded on their journey with renewed vigor.
+Although the Senor modestly abstains from any allusion to the subject,
+in the MSS. which have reached us, it cannot be doubted that Messrs.
+Huertis and Hammond considered him an invaluable accession to their
+party. He was a guide on whom they could rely; he was acquainted with
+the dialects of many of the Indian tribes through which they would have
+to pass; was familiar with the principal stages and villages on their
+route, and knew both the places and persons from whence the best
+information, if any, concerning the paramount object of their journey,
+could be obtained.
+
+It appears, also, from an incidental remark in his journal, that Senor
+Velasquez would have been at their right hand in a fight, in the event
+of any hostile obstruction on their way. As a volunteer, he had held a
+command under Morazan, during the sanguinary conflicts of the republic,
+and had been a soldier through several of the most arduous campaigns, in
+the fierce struggle between the general and Carrera. He was thus,
+apparently, in all respects, precisely such an auxiliary as they would
+have besought Providence to afford them, to accomplish the hazardous
+enterprise they had so daringly projected and commenced.
+
+Unfortunately for the public, the Senor's journal, fragmentary
+throughout, is especially meagre concerning the incidents of travel
+between the capital of Vera Paz and Santa Cruz del Quiche. At this
+period he appears to have left the task of recording them almost
+entirely to his two friends, whose memoranda, in all probability, are
+forever lost. Some of those incidents appear, even from his brief
+minutes of them, to have been of the most imminent and critical
+importance. Thus under the date of February 2nd, 1849, he says, "on the
+bank of a branch of the Salamo, attacked in the night by about thirty
+Indian robbers, several of whom had fire-arms. Sr. Hammond, sitting
+within the light of the fire, was severely wounded through the left
+shoulder; they had followed us from the hacienda, six leagues, passed us
+to the north and lay in ambush; killed four, wounded three; of the rest
+saw no more; poor Juan, shot through the body, died this morning; lost
+two mules."
+
+After this, there is nothing written until the 16th, when they had
+arrived at a place called San Jose, where he says, "Good beef and fowls;
+Sr. Huertis much better; Sr. Hammond very low in intermittent fever;
+fresh mules and good ones." Next on the 5th of March, at the Indian
+village of Axitzel, is written, "Detained here five days; Hammond,
+strong and headstrong. Agree with Huertis that, to be safe, we must wait
+with patience the return of the good Cura." Slight and tantalizing
+memoranda of this kind occur, irregularly, until April 3rd, when we find
+the party safely arrived at Quiche, and comfortably accommodated in a
+convent. The jovial Padre, already often mentioned, who maybe regarded
+as the unconscious father of the expedition, had become helplessly, if
+not hopelessly, dropsical, and lost much of his wanted jocosity. He
+declared, however, that Senor Velasquez's description of the ruins
+explored the previous summer, recalling as it did his own profoundly
+impressed recollection of them, when he walked through their desolate
+avenues and deserted palaces; and corroborating as it did, in every
+particular, his own reiterated account of them, which he had often
+bestowed upon incredulous and unworthy ears, would "act like _cannabis_
+upon his bladder," as it already had upon his eyes; and if he could but
+live to see the description in print, so as to silence all gainsayers,
+he had no doubt it would completely cure him, and add many years to his
+life. He persisted in his story of the unknown city in the Candone
+wilderness, as seen by himself, nearly forty years ago, from the summit
+of the sierra; and promised the travellers a letter to his friend, the
+Cura of Gueguetenango, requesting him to procure them a guide to the
+very spot from whence they could behold it for themselves.
+
+This promise, in the course of a few days, the Senor says, he faithfully
+performed, describing from recollection, by the hand of an amanuensis to
+whom he dictated, not only the more striking but even minute and
+peculiar landmarks for the guidance of the guide. On the 10th of April,
+the party, fully recruited in health and energy, set out for
+Totonicapan; and thence we trace them by the journal through a
+succession of small places to Quezaltenango, where they remained but two
+days; and thence through the places called Aguas Calientes, and San
+Sebastiano, to Gueguetenango; this portion of their route being
+described as one of unprecedented toil, danger, and exhaustion, from its
+mountainous character, accidents to men and mules, terrific weather and
+loss of provisions. Arrived, however, at length, at the town last named,
+which they justly regarded as an eminently critical stage of their
+destiny, they found the Cura, and presented him with the letter of
+introduction from his friend, the Padre of Quiche. They were somewhat
+discouraged on perceiving that the Cura indicated but little confidence
+in the accuracy of his old friend's memory, and asked them rather
+abruptly, if they thought him really serious in his belief in his
+distant vision of an unknown city from the sierra, because, for his own
+part, he had always regarded the story as one of Padre's broadest jokes,
+and especially since he had never heard of any other person possessing
+equal visual powers. "The mountain was high, it is true, but not much
+more than half as high as the hyperbolous memory of his reverend friend
+had made it, and he much feared that the Padre, in the course of forty
+years, had so frequently repeated a picture of his early imagination as
+to have, at length, cherished it as a reality." This was said in smooth
+and elegant Spanish, but says the Senor, "with an air of dignified
+sarcasm upon our credulity, which was far from being agreeable to men
+broken down and dispirited, by almost incredible toil, in pursuit of an
+object thus loftily pronounced a ridiculous phantom of the brain." This
+part of Senor Velasquez's journal being interesting and carefully
+written, we give the following translation without abridgement:--
+
+     "The Cura, nevertheless, on finding that his supercilious
+     scepticism had not proved so infectious among us as he expected and
+     that we were rather vexed than vacillating, offered to procure us
+     guides in the course of a day or two, who were familiar with many
+     parts of the sierra, and who, for good pay, he doubted not, would
+     flatter our expectations to the utmost extent we could desire. He
+     advised us, however, in the same style of caustic dissuasion, to
+     take with us both a barometer and a telescope, if we were provided
+     with those instruments, because the latter, especially, might be
+     found useful in discovering the unknown city, and the former would
+     not only inform us of the height of the mountain, but of the
+     weather in prospect most favorable to a distant view. Senor Huertis
+     replied that such precautions would be adopted, as a matter of
+     course, and would, moreover, furnish him, on our return to
+     Gueguetenango, with the exact latitude and longitude of the spot
+     from which the discovery might be made. He laughed very heartily
+     and rejoined that he thought this operation would be much easier
+     than to furnish the same interesting particulars concerning the
+     location of the spots at which the discovery might fail to be made;
+     and saying this he robed himself for mass, which we all, rather
+     sullenly, attended.
+
+     "Next morning, two good looking Meztitzos, brothers, waited on us
+     with a strong letter of recommendation from the Cura, as guides to
+     that region of the sierra which the Padre's letter had so
+     particularly described, and which description, the Cura added, he
+     had taken much pains to make them understand. On being questioned
+     concerning it, they startled and somewhat disconcerted us by calm
+     assurances, in very fair Spanish, that they were not only familiar
+     with all the land-marks, great and small, which the Cura had read
+     to them, but had several times seen the very city of which we were
+     in search, although none but full-blooded Indians had ever ventured
+     on a journey to it. This was rather too much, even for us, sanguine
+     and confiding as we were. We shared a common suspicion that the
+     Cura had changed his tactics, and resolved to play a practical joke
+     upon our credulity--to send us on a fool's errand and laugh at us
+     for our pains. That he had been tampering with the two guides for
+     this purpose, struck us forcibly; for while he professed never to
+     have known any man who had seen the distant city, he recommended
+     these Meztitzos, as brothers, whom he had known from their boyhood,
+     they declared they had beheld it from the sierra on various
+     occasions. Nevertheless, Senor Huertis believed that the young men
+     spoke the truth, while the Cura, probably, did not; and hoping to
+     catch him in his own snare, if such had been laid, asked the guides
+     their terms, which, though high, he agreed to at once, without
+     cavil. They said it would take us eight days to reach the part of
+     the sierra described in the letter, and that we might have to wait
+     on the summit several days more, before the weather would afford a
+     clear view. They would be ready in two days; they had just returned
+     across the mountains from San Antonia de Guista, and needed rest
+     and repairs. There was a frankness and simplicity about these fine
+     fellows which would bear the severest scrutiny, and we could only
+     admit the bare possibility of our being mistaken.
+
+     "It took us three days, however, to procure a full supply of the
+     proper kind of provisions for a fortnight's abode in the sky, and
+     on the fourth, (May 5th,) we paid our formal respects to the Cura,
+     and started for the ascent--he not forgetting to remind us of the
+     promise to report to him the precise geographical locality of our
+     discovery."
+
+The journal is again blank until May 9th, when the writer says, "Our
+altitude, by barometer, this morning, is over 6000 feet above the valley
+which we crossed three days ago; the view of it and its surrounding
+mountains, sublime with chasms, yet grotesque in outline, and all
+heavily gilded with the setting sun, is one of the most oppressively
+gorgeous I ever beheld. The guides inform us that we have but 3000 feet
+more to ascend, and point to the gigantic pinnacle before us, at the
+apparent distance of seven or eight leagues; but that, before we can
+reach it, we have to descend and ascend an immense barranca, (ravine,)
+nearly a thousand feet deep from our present level, and of so difficult
+a passage that it will cost us several days. The side of the mountain
+towards the north-west, is perfectly flat and perpendicular for more
+than half its entire height, as if the prodigious section had been riven
+down by the sword of the San Miguel, and hurled with his foot among the
+struggling multitude of summits below. So far, the old Padre is accurate
+in every particular." In a note opposite this extract, written
+perpendicularly on the margin of the manuscript, the writer says, "The
+average breadth of the plain on this ridge of the sierra, (that is the
+ridge on which they were then encamped for the night,) is nearly half a
+mile, and exhibits before us a fine rolling track as far as we can see.
+Neither birds, beasts, nor insects--I would there were no such
+barranca!" On the tenth he says, "on the brink of the abyss--the
+heaviest crags we can hurl down, return no sound from the bottom."
+
+The next entry in the journal is dated May 15th.--"Recovered the body of
+Sebastiano and the load of his mule; his brother is building a cross for
+his grave, and will not leave it until famished with thirst and hunger.
+All too exhausted to think of leaving this our first encampment since we
+descended. Present elevation but little above that of the opposite ridge
+which we left on the 11th, still, at least 3000 feet to climb." On the
+19th, 4 o'clock, P. M., he records, "Myself, Sr. Hammond and Antonio, on
+the highest summit, an inclined plain of bare rock, of about fifteen
+acres. The Padre again right. Sr. Huertis and others just discernable,
+but bravely coming on. Elevation, 9,500 feet. Completely in the clouds,
+and all the country below invisible. Senor Hammond already bleeding at
+the nose, and no cigar to stop it." At 10 o'clock, the same night, he
+writes, "All comfortably asleep but myself and Sr. Hammond, who is going
+to take the latitude." Then follows, "He finds the latitude 15 degrees
+and 48 minutes _north_." Opposite this, in the margin is written, "the
+mean result of three observations of different stars. Intend to take the
+longitude to-morrow." Next day, the 20th, he says, "A bright and most
+auspicious morning, and all, but poor Antonio, in fine health and
+feeling. The wind by compass, N. E., and rolling away a billowy ocean of
+mist, toward, I suppose, the Bay of Honduras. Antonio says the Pacific
+will be visible within an hour; (present time not given) more and more
+of the lower mountains becoming clear every moment. Fancy we already
+see the Pacific, a faint yellow plain, almost as elevated as ourselves.
+Can see part of the State of Chiapas pretty distinctly." At 12 o'clock,
+meridian, he says, "Sr. Hammond is taking the longitude, but finds a
+difference of several minutes between his excellent watch and
+chronometer, and fears the latter has been shaken. Both the watch and
+its owner, however, have been a great deal more shaken, for the
+chronometer has been all the time in the midst of a thick blanket, and
+has had no falls. Sr. Huertis, with the glass, sees whole lines and
+groups of pyramids, in Chiapas." At 1 o'clock, P. M. he records, "Sr.
+Hammond reports the longitude, 92 degrees 15 minutes _west_. Brave
+Huertis is in ecstacy with some discovery, but will not part with the
+glass for a moment. No doubt it is the Padre's city, for it is precisely
+in the direction he indicated. Antonio says he can see it with his naked
+eye, although less distinctly than heretofore. I can only see a white
+straight line, like a ledge of limestone rock, on an elevated plain, at
+least twenty leagues distant, in the midst of a vast amphitheatre of
+hills, to the north east of our position, toward the State of Yucatan.
+Still, it is no doubt the place the Padre saw, and it may be a great
+city."
+
+At 2 o'clock P. M., he says "All doubt is at an end! We have all seen it
+through the glass, as distinctly as though it were but a few leagues
+off, and it is now clear and bright to the unaided eye. It is
+unquestionably a richly monumented city, of vast dimensions, within
+lofty parapeted walls, three or four miles square, inclined inward in
+the Egyptian style, and its interior domes and turrets have an
+emphatically oriental aspect. I should judge it to be not more than
+twenty-five leagues from Ocosingo, to the eastward, and nearly in the
+same latitude; and this would probably be the best point from which to
+reach it, travelling due east, although the course of the river Legartos
+seems to lead directly to it. That it is still an inhabited place, is
+evident from the domes of its temples, or churches. Christian churches
+they cannot be, for such a city would have an Archbishop and be well
+known to the civilized world. It must be a Pagan strong-hold that
+escaped the conquest by its remote position, and the general retreat,
+retirement, and centralizing seclusion of its surrounding population. It
+may now be opened to the light of the true faith."
+
+They commenced their descent the same day, and rested at night on the
+place of their previous encampment, a narrow shelf of the sierra. Here,
+on the brink of the terrible ravine, which they had again to encounter,
+they consulted upon a plan for their future operations; and it was
+finally agreed that Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, with Antonio, and such
+of the Indian muleteers as could be induced to proceed with the
+expedition, should follow the bottom of the ravine, in its north-east
+course, in which, according to Antonio, the river Legartos took its
+principal supply of water, and remain at a large village, adjacent to
+its banks, which they had seen, about five leagues distant; while Senor
+Velasquez was to trace their late route, by way of Gueguetenango, to
+Quezaltenango, where all the surplus arms and ammunition had been
+deposited, and recruit a strong party of Indians, to serve as a guard,
+in the event of an attack from the people of the unexplored region,
+whither they were resolutely bound. In the meantime, Antonio was to
+return home to Gueguetenango, await the return of Velasquez, with his
+armed party, from Quezaltenango, and conduct them over the mountains to
+the village on the plains, where Messrs. Huertis and Hammond were to
+remain until they should arrive. It appears that Senor Velasquez was
+abundantly supplied with solid funds for the recruiting service, and
+that Mr. Huertis also furnished Antonio with a liberal sum, in addition
+to his stipulated pay, wherewith to procure masses for the repose of his
+unfortunate brother.
+
+Of the adventures of Messrs. Huertis and Hammond, in the long interval
+prior to the return of Velasquez, we have no account whatever; nor does
+the journal of the latter contain any remarks relative to his own
+operations, during the same period. The next date is July the 8th, when
+we find him safely arrived with "nearly all the men he had engaged," at
+an Indian village called Aguamasinta, where his anxious companions were
+overjoyed to receive him, and where "they had obtained inestimable
+information regarding the proper arrangement of the final purpose."
+After this we trace them, by brief memoranda, for a few days, on the
+devious course of the Legartos, when the journal abruptly and finally
+closes. The remaining narrative of the expedition was written by Senor
+Velasquez from memory, after his return to San Salvador, while all the
+exciting events and scenes which it describes were vividly sustained by
+the feelings which they originally inspired. As this excessively
+interesting document will be translated for the public press as soon as
+the necessary consent of its present proprietor can be obtained, the
+writer of this pamphlet the less regrets the very limited use of it to
+which he is now restricted--which is but little more than that of making
+a mere abridgement and connexion of such incidents as may serve to
+explain the origin and possession of those _sui generis_ specimens of
+humanity, the Aztec brother and sister, now exhibiting to the public, in
+the United States. From the introductory paragraphs, we take the
+liberty to quote the following without abridgement:--
+
+     "Our latitude and longitude were now 16 deg. 42' N. and 91 deg. 35' W; so
+     that the grand amphitheatre of hills, forming three fourths of an
+     oval outline of jagged summits, a few leagues before us, most
+     probably inclosed the mysterious object of our anxious and
+     uncertain labors. The small groups of Indians through which we had
+     passed, in the course of the day, had evidently been startled by
+     sheer astonishment, into a sort of passive and involuntary
+     hospitality, but maintained a stark apprehensive reserve in most of
+     their answers to our questions. They spoke a peculiar dialect of
+     the Maya, which I had never heard before, and had great difficulty
+     in comprehending, although several of the Maya Indians of our
+     party understood it familiarly and spoke it fluently. From them we
+     learned that they had never seen men of our race before, but that a
+     man of the same race as Senor Hammond, who was of a bright-florid
+     complexion, with light hair and red whiskers, had been sacrificed
+     and eaten by the Macbenachs, or priests of Iximaya, the great city
+     among the hills, about thirty moons ago. Our interpreters stated
+     that the word "Iximaya" meant the "Great Centre," and that
+     "Macbenach" meant the "Great Son of the Sun." I at once resolved to
+     make the most of my time in learning as much as possible of this
+     dialect from these men, because they said it was the tongue spoken
+     by the people of Iximaya and the surrounding region. It appeared to
+     me to be merely a provincial corruption, or local peculiarism, of
+     the great body of the Maya language, with which I was already
+     acquainted; and, in the course of the next day's conversation, I
+     found that I could acquire it with much facility."
+
+To this circumstance the writer is probably indebted for his life. In
+another day, the determined explorers had come within the circuit of the
+alpine district in which Iximaya is situated, and found it reposing, in
+massive grandeur, in the centre of a perfectly level plain, about five
+leagues in diameter, at a distance of scarcely two from the spot they
+had reached. At the base of all the mountains, rising upon their sides,
+and extending nearly a mile inward upon the plain, was a dark green
+forest of colossal trees and florid shrubbery, girding it around; while
+the even valley itself exhibited large tracts of uncultivated fields,
+fenced in with palisades, and regular, even to monotony, both in size
+and form. "Large herds of deer, cattle, and horses, were seen in the
+openings of the forest, and dispersed over the plain, which was also
+studded with low flat-roofed dwellings of stone, in small detached
+clusters, or hamlets. Rich patches of forest, of irregular forms,
+bordered with gigantic aloes, diversified the landscape in effective
+contrast with bright lakes of water which glowed among them."
+
+While the whole party, with their cavalcade of mules and baggage were
+gazing upon the scene, two horsemen, in bright blue and yellow tunics,
+and wearing turbans decorated with three large plumes of the quezal,
+dashed by them from the forest, at the distance of about two hundred
+yards, on steeds of the highest Spanish mould, followed by a long
+retinue of athletic Indians, equally well mounted, clothed in brilliant
+red tunics, with coronals of gay feathers, closely arranged within a
+band of blue cloth. Each horseman carried a long spear, pointed with a
+polished metal; and each held, in a leash, a brace of powerful
+blood-hounds, which were also of the purest Spanish breed. The two
+leaders of this troop, who were Indians of commanding air and stature,
+suddenly wheeled their horses and glared upon the large party of
+intruders with fixed amazement. Their followers evinced equal surprise,
+but forgot not to draw up in good military array, while the blood-hounds
+leapt and raged in their thongs.
+
+     "While the leaders," says Senor Velasquez, "seemed to be intently
+     scrutinizing every individual of our company, as if silently
+     debating the policy of an immediate attack, one of the Maya
+     Indians, of whom I had been learning the dialect, stepped forward
+     and informed us that they were a detachment of rural guards, a very
+     numerous military force, which had been appointed from time
+     immemorial, or, at least from the time of the Spanish invasion, to
+     hunt down and capture all strangers of a foreign race that should
+     be found within a circle of twelve leagues of the city; and he
+     repeated the statement made to us from the beginning, that no white
+     man had hitherto eluded their vigilance or left their city alive.
+     He said there was a tradition that many of the pioneers of
+     Alvarado's army had been cut off in this manner, and never heard of
+     more, while their skulls and weapons are to this day suspended
+     round the altars of the pagan gods. He added, finally, that if we
+     wished to escape the same fate, now was our only chance; that as we
+     numbered thirty-five, all armed with repeating rifles, we could
+     easily destroy the present detachment, which amounted to but fifty,
+     and secure our retreat before another could come up; but that, in
+     order to do this, it was necessary first to shoot the dogs, which
+     all our Indians regarded with the utmost dread and horror.
+
+     "I instantly felt the force of this advice, in which, also, I was
+     sustained by Senor Hammond; but Senor Huertis, whom, as the leader
+     of the expedition, we were all bound and solemnly pledged to obey;
+     utterly rejected the proposition. He had come so far to see the
+     city and see it he would, whether taken thither as a captive or
+     not, and whether he ever returned from it or not, that this was the
+     contract originally proposed, and to which I had assented; that the
+     fine troop before us was evidently not a gang of savages, but a
+     body of civilized men and good soldiers; and as to the dogs, they
+     were noble animals of the highest blood he ever saw. If, however, I
+     and his friend Hammond, who seemed afraid of being eaten, in
+     preference to the fine beef and venison which we had seen in such
+     profusion on the plain, really felt alarmed at the bugbear legends
+     of our vagabond Indians, before any demonstration of hostility had
+     been made, we were welcome to take two-thirds of the men and mules
+     and make our retreat as best we could, while he would advance with
+     Antonio and the remainder of the party, to the gates of the city,
+     and demand a peaceable admission. I could not but admire the
+     romantic intrepidity of this resolve, though I doubted its
+     discretion; and assured him I was ready to follow his example and
+     share his fate.
+
+     "While this conversation was passing among us, the Indian
+     commanders held a conference apparently as grave and important. But
+     just as Senor Huertis and myself had agreed to advance towards them
+     for a parley, they separated without deigning a reply to our
+     salutation--the elder and more highly decorated, galloped off
+     towards the city with a small escort, while the other briskly
+     crossed our front at the head of his squadron and entered the
+     forest nearer the entrance of the valley. This opening in the
+     hills, was scarcely a quarter of a mile wide, and but a few minutes
+     elapsed before we saw a single horseman cross it toward the wood on
+     the opposite side. Presently, another troop of horse of the same
+     uniform appearance as the first, were seen passing a glade of the
+     wood which the single horseman had penetrated, and it thus became
+     evident that a manoeuvre had already been effected to cut off our
+     retreat. The mountains surrounding the whole area of the plain,
+     were absolutely perpendicular for three-fourths of their altitude,
+     which was no where less than a thousand feet; and from many parts
+     of their wildly piled outline, huge crags projected in monstrous
+     mammoth forms, as if to plunge to the billows of forest beneath. At
+     no point of this vast impassible boundary was there a chasm or
+     declivity discernable by which we could make our exit, except the
+     one thus formidably intercepted.
+
+     "To retire into the forest and water our mules at a copious stream
+     which rushed forth from its recesses, and recruit our own exhausted
+     strength with food and rest, was our first necessary resource. In
+     tracing the rocky course of the current for a convenient watering
+     place, Antonio discovered that it issued from a cavern, which,
+     though a mere fissure exteriorly, was, within, of cathedral
+     dimensions and solemnity; we all entered it and drank eagerly from
+     a foaming basin, which it immediately presented to our fevered
+     lips. Our first sensations were those of freedom and independence,
+     and of that perfect security which is the basis of both. It was
+     long since we had slept under a roof of any kind, while here a few
+     men could defend our repose against an assault from thousands; but
+     it was horribly evident, to my mind, that a few watchful assailants
+     would suffice to reduce us to starvation, or destroy us in detail.
+     Our security was that of a prison, and our freedom was limited to
+     its walls. Happily, however, for the present hour, this reflection
+     seemed to trouble no one. Objects of wonder and veneration grew
+     numerous to our gaze. Gigantic statues of ancient warriors, with
+     round shields, arched helmets, and square breast-plates, curiously
+     latticed and adorned, stood sculptured in high relief, with grave
+     faces and massive limbs, and in the regular order of columns around
+     the walls of this grand mausoleum. Many of them stood arrayed in
+     the crimson of the setting sun, which then flamed through the tall
+     fissure into the cavern; and the deep gloom into which long rows of
+     others utterly retired from our view, presented a scene at once of
+     mingled mystery and splendor. It was evidently a place of great and
+     recent resort, both for men and horses, for plentiful supplies of
+     fresh fodder for the latter were heaped in stone recesses; while
+     the ashes of numerous fires, mingled with discarded moccasins and
+     broken pipes and pottery, attested a domiciliary occupation by the
+     former. Farther into the interior, were found seats and
+     sleeping-couches of fine cane work; and in a spacious recess, near
+     the entrance, a large collection of the bones, both of the ox and
+     the deer, with hides, also, of both, but newly flayed and suspended
+     on pegs by the horns. These last evidences of good living had more
+     effect upon our hungry Indians than all the rest, and within an
+     hour after dark, while we were seeking our first sleep, four fine
+     deer were brought in by about a dozen of our party, whom we
+     supposed to have been faithfully guarding our citadel. It is
+     unnecessary to say that we gladly arose to the rich repast that
+     ensued, for we had eaten nothing but our scant allowance of
+     tortillas for many days, and were in the lassitude of famine."
+
+Tempting as such extracts are, we must avoid them, and hasten through a
+summary of subsequent events. There is one singular incident, however,
+mentioned in the passage immediately following the above, possessing too
+important a connexion with the final catastrophe to be pretermitted at
+this place. Mr. Hammond, the Canadian engineer, fearing that the
+peculiarity of his appearance, as a man of fair and ruddy complexion,
+among a swarthy race, would subject him to great annoyance, and perhaps
+involve him in the horrible fate of a similar person, reported by the
+Indians, resolved to stain his skin of a darker hue, by means of some
+chemical preparation which he had precautionarily provided for this
+purpose, before he left the United States. With the friendly
+assistance of Antonio, this metamorphosis was completed over his whole
+person before he retired to rest; his red whiskers were shaved off, and
+his light hair died of a jet black; and so perfect was the disguise,
+that not one of the party who went foraging for venison recognized him
+on their return, but marvelled, as he sat at supper, whence so singular
+a stranger could have come. Velasquez states, however, that his new
+complexion was unlike that of any human being on the face of the earth,
+and scarcely diminished the certainty of his becoming an object of
+curiosity, among an Indian population.
+
+In the morning, about the break of day, the infernal yells of a pack of
+blood-hounds suddenly rang through the cavern, and the party could
+scarcely seize their rifles before many of the dogs, who had driven in
+the affrighted Indians on guard, were springing at their throats. Mr.
+Huertis, however, the American leader of the expedition, with that
+presence of mind which seems always to have distinguished him, told the
+men that rifles were useless in such a contest, and that the hounds must
+be dispatched with their long knives as fast as they came in, while the
+fire-arms were to be reserved for their masters. This canine butchery
+was accomplished with but little difficulty; none of the party received
+any serious injury from their fangs; and the Indians were exhilarated
+with a victory which was chiefly a conquest of their fears. These
+unfortunate dogs, it appears, were the advanced van of a pack, or
+perhaps merely a few unleashed as scouts to others held in reserve; for
+no more were seen or heard for sometime. Meanwhile, Mr. Huertis seems to
+have struck out a brilliant scheme. He collected his whole party into
+that obscure branch of the cavern, near its entrance, which has been
+described as a depository of animal bones, and ordering them to sling
+their rifles at their backs, bade them stand ready with their knives.
+Almost instantly, they observed a party of ten dismounted natives, in
+scarlet tunics, and armed with spears, enter the cavern in single file;
+and, it would seem, from seeing the dogs slain and no enemy in sight,
+they rushed out again, without venturing on farther search. In a few
+minutes, however, they returned with forty or fifty more, in the same
+uniform, headed by the younger of the two personages whom they had seen
+in command the previous evening. As soon as they were well advanced into
+the cavern, and heard disturbing the tired mules, Mr. Huertis and his
+party marched quietly out and seized their horses, which were picketed
+close by, in charge of two or three men, whom they disarmed. At a short
+distance, however, drawn up in good order, was another squadron of
+horses, which Mr. Huertis determined instantly to charge. Ordering his
+whole party to mount the noble stallions they had captured, and reserve
+their fire until he gave the word, he, Velasquez, and Hammond, drew the
+short sabres they had worn on their march, and led the attack. The
+uniformed natives, however, did not wait the encounter, but scattered in
+wonderment and consternation; doubtless under the impression that all
+their comrades had been slain. But the rapid approach of a much larger
+force--which is found, eventually, to have consisted of two detachments
+of fifty each, being just twice their number--speedily reassured them,
+and falling in line with this powerful reinforcement, the whole hundred
+and fifty charged upon our comparative handful of travellers, at a rapid
+pace. Huertis promptly ordered his little party to halt, and form in
+line, two deep, with presented arms; and doubtless feeling that,
+notwithstanding the disparity of numbers, the enemy, armed only with
+spears and small side-hatchets, held but a slender chance of victory
+over a party of thirty-eight--most of them old campaigners in the
+sanguinary expeditions of the terrible Carrera--armed with new
+"six-shooting" rifles and long knives, generously commanded them to keep
+aim upon the horses only, until further orders. In the meantime, most of
+their plumed opponents, instead of using their long spears as in lance
+practice, threw them through the air from so great a distance that
+nearly all fell short of the mark--an infallible indication both of
+timidity and inexperience in action. The unfortunate Mr. Hammond,
+however, was pierced through the right breast, and another of the party
+was killed by being transfixed through the bowels. At this instant
+Huertis gave the word to fire; and, at the next, no small number of the
+enemy were rolling upon the sod, amid their plunging horses. A second
+rapid, but well delivered volley, brought down as many more, when the
+rest, in attitudes of frantic wonder and terror, unconsciously dropped
+their weapons and fled like affrighted fowls under the sudden swoop of
+the kite. Their dispersion was so outrageously wild and complete that no
+two of them could be seen together as they radiated over the plain. The
+men and horses seemed impelled alike by a preternatural panic; and
+neither Cortez in Mexico, nor Pizarro in Peru, ever witnessed greater
+consternation at fire-arms among a people, who, for the first time,
+beheld their phenomena and effects--when mere hundreds of invaders
+easily subjugated millions of natives chiefly by this appalling
+influence--than was manifested by these Iximayans on this occasion.
+Indeed, it appears that these primitive and isolated people, holding no
+intercourse whatever with the rest of mankind, were as ignorant as their
+ancestors even of the existence of this kind of weapons; and although
+their modern hieroglyphical annals were found to contain vague allusions
+to the use of them in the conquest of the surrounding country, by means
+of a peculiar kind of thunder and lightning, and several old Spanish
+muskets and pistols were found in their scant collection of foreign
+curiosities, yet, not even the most learned of their priests had
+retained the slightest notion of the uses for which they were designed.
+
+While this summary conflict was enacted on the open lawn of the forest,
+the dismounted company in the cavern having completed their fruitless
+search for the fugitives, emerged from its portal with all the mules and
+baggage, just in time to see and hear the fiery explosions of the rifles
+and their effect upon the whole body of scarlet cavalry. The entire
+scene, including the mounted possession of their horses by uncouthly
+attired strangers, previously invisible, must have appeared to these
+terror-stricken natives an achievement of supernatural beings. And when
+Mr. Huertis wheeled his obstreperously laughing party to recover his
+mules, he found most of the astounded men prostrated upon their faces,
+while others, more self-possessed, knelt upon the bended knee, and, with
+drooping heads, crossed their hands behind them to receive the bonds of
+captives. Their gallant and gaily accoutred young chieftain, however,
+though equally astonished and dismayed, merely surrendered his javelin
+as an officer would his sword, under the like circumstances, in
+civilized warfare. But, with admirable tact and forethought, Huertis
+declined to accept it, immediately returning it with the most profound
+and deferential cordiality of manner. He at the same time informed him,
+through Velasquez, that, though strangers, his party were not enemies
+but friendly visitors, who, after a long and painful journey, again to
+be pursued, desired the temporary hospitality of his countrymen in their
+magnificent city.
+
+The young chief replied, with evident discomposure and concern, that his
+countrymen showed no hospitality to strangers, it being interdicted by
+their laws and punishable with death; that the inhabitants of their city
+held intercourse only with the population of the surrounding valley, who
+were restricted alike by law and by patriotism from ever leaving its
+confines; he and his fellow soldiers alone being privileged to visit the
+neighboring regions for the purpose of arresting intruders, (_cowana_,)
+and escorting certain kind of merchandize which they exchanged with a
+people of their own race in an adjoining district. He added, with much
+eloquence of manner, and as Velasquez believed, of language, which he
+but partially understood, that the independence and peace of his nation,
+who were a peaceful and happy people, depended upon these severe
+restrictions, which indeed had been the only means of preserving it,
+while all the country besides, from sea to sea, had bowed to a foreign
+yoke, and seen their ancient cities, once the seats and centres of
+mighty empires, overgrown with forest, and the temples of their gods
+demolished.
+
+He further added, says Velasquez, in a very subdued but significant
+tone, that some few strangers, it was true, had been taken to the city
+by its guards in the course of many generations, but that none of them
+had been allowed an opportunity of betraying its existence and locality
+to the cruel rapacity of the foreign race. He concluded by earnestly
+entreating them, since he could not compel them as prisoners, to enter
+the city as friends, with the view of residing there for life; promising
+them wives, and dwellings, and honors; for even now, if they attempted
+to retreat, they would be overtaken by thousands of armed men on fleet
+horses, that would overpower them by their numbers and subject them to a
+very different fate.
+
+Mr. Huertis rejoined, through the same interpreter, that he could
+destroy any number of armed men, on the swiftest horses, before they
+could approach him, as the chief had already seen; and since he could
+enforce his exit from the city whenever he thought proper, he would
+enter it upon his own terms, either as a conqueror, or as a friend,
+according to the reception he met with; that there was now no race of
+conquerors to whom the city could be betrayed, even if he were disposed
+to do so, as the people of the whole country, of all races, were now
+living in a state of perfect freedom and equality; and that, therefore,
+there was no necessity for those unsocial and sanguinary laws which
+secluded the Iximayans from friendly intercourse with their fellow-men.
+Saying which, and without waiting for further colloquy, he ordered his
+party to dismount, restore the horses to their owners, and march with
+the train of mules toward the city, in the usual style of travel. With
+this order, his Indians complied very reluctantly, but on assuring them
+that it was a matter of the highest policy, they evinced their wonted
+confidence in his judgment and ability. To the young chief he restored
+his own richly caparisoned steed, which had fallen to the lot of the
+unfortunate Mr. Hammond, who was now lying desperately wounded, in the
+care of the faithful Antonio. For himself and Senor Velasquez, Mr.
+Huertis retained the horses they had first seized, and placing
+themselves on each side of the Iximayan commander, with their friend
+Hammond borne immediately behind them, in one of the cane couches of the
+cavern, on the backs of two mules yoked together, they advanced to the
+head of their party, while the red troopers, followed by the surviving
+bloodhounds leashed in couples, brought up the rear. Huertis, however,
+had taken the precaution to add the spears and hatchets of these men to
+the burdens of the forward mules, to abide the event of his reception at
+the city gates. The appearance of the whole cavalcade must have been
+unique and picturesque; for Velasquez informs us, that while he wore the
+uniform of a military company to which he belonged in San Salvador, much
+enhanced in effect by some brilliant additions, and crowned with a broad
+sombrero and plume, Huertis wore that of an American naval commander,
+with gold epaulettes; his riflemen and muleteers generally were clothed
+in blue cotton and grass hats, while the native cavalry, in the
+brilliant tunics and feathered coronals, already described, must have
+completed the diversity of the variegated cortege. Had poor Hammond been
+mounted among them, his costume would have been as equivocal as his new
+complexion, for he had attired himself in the scarlet coat of a British
+officer of rank, with several blazing stars of glass jewels, surmounted
+by a white Panama hat, in which clustered an airy profusion of ladies'
+ostrich feathers, dyed blue at the edges.
+
+In passing the spot of the recent skirmish, they found that nine horses
+and two men had been killed, the latter unintentionally, besides the
+rifleman of their own party. Many other horses were lying wounded, in
+the struggles of death, and several of their riders were seated on the
+ground, disabled by bruises or dislocations. Huertis' men buried their
+comrades in a grave hastily dug with the spears which lay around him,
+while the Iximayans laid their dead and wounded upon horses, to be
+conveyed to a village on the plain. The former, it was found, were
+consumed there the next day, in funereal fires, with idolatrous rites;
+and it was observed by the travellers that the native soldiers regarded
+their dead with emotions of extreme sensibility, and almost feminine
+grief, like men wholly unaccustomed to scenes of violent death. But
+Velasquez remarks, that the strongest emotion evinced by the young
+chief, throughout their intercourse, was when he heard the word
+"Iximaya," in interpreting for Huertis. He then seemed to be smitten and
+subdued, by blank despair, as if he felt that the city and its location
+were already familiarly known to the foreign world.
+
+As already intimated, the distance to the city was about six miles. The
+expedition found the road to it bordered, on either side, as far as the
+eye could reach, with a profuse and valuable vegetation, the result of
+evidently assiduous and skilful culture. Indigo, corn, oats, a curious
+five-eared wheat, gourds, pine-apples, esculent roots, pulse, flax, and
+hemp, the white as well as the crimson cotton, vineyards, and fruit
+orchards, grew luxuriantly in large, regularly divided fields, which
+were now ripe for the harvest. The villages, large and populous, were
+mostly composed of flat-roofed dwellings with broad overhanging eaves or
+architraves, supported by heavy columns, often filletted over spiral
+flutings, in the Egyptian style, and generally terminating in foliaged
+capitals, of the same character. None of the houses were mean, while
+many were superb; and of the mosque-like larger buildings, which
+occasionally appeared, and which were supposed to be rural temples, some
+were grand and imposing. A profusion of bold sculpture, was the
+prevailing characteristic, and perhaps defect, of all. The inhabitants,
+who thronged the wayside in great numbers, appeared excited with
+surprise and exultation, on beholding the large company of strangers
+apparently in the custody of their military, while the disarmed
+condition of the latter, and the bodies of the slain, were a mystery
+they could not explain. Many of the husbandmen were observed to be in
+possession of bows and arrows, and some of the women held rusty spears.
+The predominant costume of both sexes was a pale blue tunic, gathered in
+at the breast and descending to the knee, with reticulated buskins, of
+red cord, covering the calf of the leg. The women, with few exceptions,
+were of fine form, and the highest order of Indian beauty, with an
+extraordinary affluence of black hair, tastefully disposed, and
+decorated with plumes and flowers. At the village where the dead and
+wounded were left, with their relatives and friends, doleful
+lamentations were heard, until the expedition approached the city.
+
+The walls of this metropolis were sixty feet high, sloping inward from
+the foundation, surmounted by a parapet which overhung in a concave
+curve and rested upon a plain moulding. They were evidently a massive
+work of a remote period, for although constructed of large blocks of
+granitic stone, white and glittering in the sun, passing ages had
+corroded rough crevices between the layers, and the once perfect
+cornices had become indented by the tooth of time. The sculptured annals
+of the city recorded them an antiquity of four thousand years. They
+formed a parallelogram four miles long and three in width, thus
+inclosing an area of nearly twelve square miles, and they breasted the
+cardinal points of the horizon with a single gate, or propylon, midway
+on every side. On approaching the eastern gate, the travellers
+discovered that the foundations of the walls were laid in a deep foss or
+moat a hundred feet wide, nearly full to its brink and abounding with
+water-fowl. It was replenished from the mountains, and discharged its
+surplus waters into the lakes of the valley. It was to be crossed by a
+draw-bridge now raised over the gate, and the parapet was thronged with
+the populace to behold the entrance of so large a number of strangers
+for whom there was no return.
+
+At a signal from the young chief, the bridge slowly descended and the
+cavalcade passed over; but the folding gates, which were composed of
+blocks of stone curiously dovetailed together, and which revolved upon
+hinges of the same material by a ball and socket contrivance above and
+below, were not yet opened, and the party were detained on the bridge. A
+small oval orifice only appeared, less than a human face, and an ear
+was applied there to receive an expected word in a whisper. This
+complied with, the ponderous gates unfolded, and a vista of solemn
+magnificence was presented to the view. It was a vista at once of
+colossal statues and trees, interminable in perspective and extending,
+as it was found, the whole length of the city to its western gate.
+Incredible as it may be, until we reflect upon the ancient statuary of
+the eastern world, Velasquez reports each and all of these monuments as
+being exactly of the height of the city wall, that is, sixty feet, and
+all possessing the proportions of the human figure. He adds, what is
+equally marvelous, that no two of them were precisely alike in
+countenance, and very few in their sculptural costume. There was some
+distinctive emblem upon each, and he was informed that they were statues
+of the ancient kings of Assyria, from before the foundation of Babylon,
+and of their descendants in the Aztec empires of this continent. They
+stood sixty feet apart, with a smaller monument of some mythological
+animal between each, and were said to number one hundred and fifteen, on
+each side of the avenue they formed, which was one hundred and twenty
+feet in width. A similar but shorter avenue, it appears, crossed the
+city from north to south, having a proportional number of such monuments
+through its entire extent; and these two grand avenues ran through wide
+areas of green sward richly grouped with lofty trees. But the translator
+finds himself trespassing upon forbidden ground and must forbear.
+
+As the cavalcade advanced through this highway to the centre of the
+city, they found it crowded on each side with the masses of the
+population assembled to behold a spectacle so unprecedented and
+mysterious; but the utmost order prevailed and even the silence was
+profound. The news of the slaughter and dispersion of their military
+guardians, by an army of strangers, wielding deadly weapons of fire and
+smoke, had already run through every quarter of the city with increasing
+exaggeration and terror; but the people wisely left its investigation to
+their constituted authorities, and were rendered comparatively tranquil
+by their personal observation of its actual results. Arrived at the
+quadrated point, where the two great avenues we have described
+intersect, Mr. Huertis boldly demanded of his guide the further course
+and character of his destination. He was answered by his dignified
+companion, that he would be conducted to the building immediately before
+him, which is described as one of majestic dimensions and style, where
+the monarch of the nation daily assembled with his councillors, at the
+hour of noon, to administer justice and listen to complaints. In the
+meantime, his wounded friend could be placed in a state of greater ease
+and repose, in one of the apartments of the edifice, while the mules
+and baggage could be disposed of in its basement vaults. When this was
+accomplished the hours of audience had arrived.
+
+The entire party of strangers, with the young chief and several of his
+subordinates, were then led into a large and lofty hall, surrounded by
+columns, and displaying three raised seats covered with canopies of rich
+drapery and design. On the one of these, which stood at the eastern end,
+sat the monarch himself, a personage of grave but benignant aspect,
+about sixty years of age, arrayed in scarlet and gold, and having a
+golden image of the rising sun, of extraordinary splendor, displayed on
+the back of his throne. On the seat on the southern side, sat a
+venerable man of advanced age, not less gorgeously attired; and the seat
+at the western end was occupied by a functionary of similar years and
+costume. Around the apartment, and especially around the steps of the
+throne, sat other grave looking men, in scarlet robes. Huertis,
+Velasquez, and their Indians, still carrying their loaded rifles, of
+which he had not suffered them to be deprived, stood on the left side of
+the monarch, and the young chief and his soldiers on the right. The
+latter gave his statement with truth and manly candour, although the
+facts which he averred seemed to fill the whole council with amazement,
+and left a settled gloom upon the imperial brow. The whole proceeding
+possesses great interest in Velasquez's narrative, but we can only
+briefly state that it resulted in the decision, which was concurred in
+by the associate councillors, that the strangers having magnanimously
+released and restored the company of guards, after they had surrendered
+themselves prisoners; and having voluntarily entered the city in a
+peaceable manner, when they might possibly have effected their escape,
+were entitled to their personal freedom, within the limits of the city,
+and might eventually, under voluntary but indispensable obligations,
+become eligible to all the privileges of citizenship, within the same
+limits. In the mean time, they were to be maintained as pensioners of
+state, on condition that they made no use of their dangerous weapons,
+nor exhibited them to terrify the people. With this decision, Huertis
+and his companions were perfectly satisfied, for the latter had
+undiminished confidence in his ability and determination to achieve
+their escape, as soon as he should have accomplished the scientific
+objects of his expedition. On leaving the hall of justice, they observed
+the elder military chief, of whom a slight mention has been made,
+brought in with two others of inferior rank; and it was afterwards
+currently reported that they had been sentenced to close imprisonment.
+It was, also, ascertained by Velasquez, that the four companies of
+rangers, already noticed, composing a regiment of two hundred men,
+constituted the whole military force of this timid and peaceful people.
+
+From this point, our abstract of the narrative must be chiefly a brief
+catalogue of the most important of the concluding events. The place of
+residence assigned to our travellers, was the vacant wing of a spacious
+and sumptuous structure, at the western extremity of the city, which had
+been appropriated, from time immemorial, to the surviving remnant of an
+ancient and singular order of priesthood called Kaanas, which, it was
+distinctly asserted in their annals and traditions, had accompanied the
+first migration of this people from the Assyrian plains. Their peculiar
+and strongly distinctive lineaments, it is now perfectly well
+ascertained are to be traced in many of the sculptured monuments of the
+central American ruins, and were found still more abundantly on those of
+Iximaya. Forbidden, by inviolably sacred laws, from intermarrying with
+any persons but those of their own caste, they had here dwindled down,
+in the course of many centuries, to a few insignificant individuals,
+diminutive in stature, and imbecile in intellect. They were,
+nevertheless, held in high veneration and affection by the whole
+Iximayan community, probably as living specimens of an antique race so
+nearly extinct. Their position, as an order of priesthood, it is now
+known, had not been higher, for many ages, if ever, than that of
+religious mimes and bacchanals, in a certain class of pagan ceremonies,
+highly popular with the multitude. This, indeed, is evident from their
+characteristics in the sculptures. Their ancient college, or hospital,
+otherwise vacant and forlorn, was now chiefly occupied by a much higher
+order of priests, called Mahaboons, who were their legal and sacerdotal
+guardians. With a Yachin, one of the junior brethren of this order,
+named Vaalpeor, a young man of superior intellect and attainments,
+Velasquez soon cultivated a friendly and confidential acquaintance,
+which proved reciprocal and faithful. And while Huertis was devoting all
+his time and energies to the antiquities, hieroglyphics, ethnology,
+science, pantheism, theogony, arts, manufactures, and social
+institutions of this unknown city and people, the ear of this young
+pagan priest was as eagerly imbibing, from the wiley lips of Velasquez,
+a similar knowledge of the world at large, to him equally new and
+enchanting. If Huertis had toiled so severely, and hazarded so much,
+both as to himself and companions, to acquire a knowledge of this one
+city and people, it soon became clear to the penetrating mind of
+Velasquez, that Vaalpeor possessed enough both of mental ambition and
+personal energy to incur equal toil and risk to learn the wonders of the
+cities and races of the greater nations of mankind. Indeed, this desire
+evidently glowed in his breast with a consuming fervor, and when
+Velasquez, after due observation proposed the liberation of the whole
+expedition, with Vaalpeor himself, as its protected companion, the now
+consciously imprisoned pagan, horror-stricken at first, regarded the
+proposition with complacency, and finally, with a degree of delight,
+regardless of consequences. It was, however, mutually agreed that the
+design should be kept secret from Huertis, until ripe for success. A
+serious obstacle existed in his plighted guardianship of the Kaana
+children, whom he could abandon only with his life; but even this was
+not deemed insurmountable.
+
+In the meantime, Huertis, to facilitate his own objects, had prevailed
+upon his entire party to conform in dress and habits with the community
+in which they lived. The city was surrounded on all sides by a lofty
+colonade, sustaining the upper esplanade of the city walls, and forming
+a broad covered walk beneath, in which the population could promenade,
+sheltered from sun and shower. In these places of general resort, the
+new citizens appeared daily, until they had become familiarly known to
+the greater part of the eighty-five thousand inhabitants of the city.
+Huertis, moreover, had formed domestic and social connexions; was the
+welcome guest of families of the highest rank, who were fascinated with
+the information he afforded them of the external world; had made tacit
+converts to liberty of many influential persons; had visited each of
+the four grand temples which stood in the centre of the several
+quadrangular divisions of the city, and externally conformed to their
+idolatrous worship. He had even been admitted into some of the most
+sacred mysteries of these temples, while Velasquez, more retired, and
+avowedly more scrupulous, was content to receive the knowledge thus
+acquired, in long conversations by the sick couch of poor Hammond, now
+rapidly declining to the grave.
+
+Mr. Hammond's dreadful wound had but partially healed in the course of
+several months; his constitution was exhausted, and he was dying of
+remittent fever and debility. His chief regret was that he could not
+assist his friend Huertis in his researches and drawings, and determine
+the place of the city by astronomical observations which his friends
+were unable to take. The day before he died, he was visited by some of
+the medical priesthood, who, on seeing numerous light spots upon his
+skin, where the preparation with which he had stained it had
+disappeared, they pronounced him _a leper_, and ordered that all
+intercourse with the building should be suspended. No explanation would
+convince them to the contrary, and his death confirmed them in their
+opinion. Availing himself of this opportunity, and under the plea that
+it was important to their safety, Vaalpeor removed the two orphan
+children in his charge to one of the country temples in the plain, and
+the idle mules of the strangers were employed to carry tents, couches,
+and other bulky requisites for an unprovided rural residence. It may be
+added that he included among them much of the baggage of his new
+friends, with the greater part of their rifles and ammunition. In the
+mean time Huertis, Velasquez, and about half of their party, were
+closely confined to the part of the edifice assigned for their
+occupation. Their friend Hammond had been interred without the walls, in
+a field appropriated to lepers by the civic authorities. Huertis, was
+now informed of the plan of escape, but was not ready; he had more
+daguerreotype views to take, and many curiosities to collect. The
+interdicted period of nine days having expired, the young priest, who
+had free access to the city at all times, again appeared at their abode
+and urged an early retreat, as the return of the orphan children would
+soon be required. But Huertis was abroad in the city and could not be
+consulted. He remained absent all the day, and did not return to his
+apartments at night. It was so all the next day and night, and
+Velasquez was deeply alarmed. On searching his rooms for his papers,
+drawings and instruments, for secret transmittal into the country, he
+found them all removed, including those of Mr. Hammond which were among
+them. It was then vainly hoped that he had effected his escape with all
+his treasures, but his Indians knew nothing of the matter.
+
+Shortly after this discovery, Vaalpeor arrived with its explanation.
+Huertis had made a confidant of his intended flight whom he idly hoped
+would accompany it, and she had betrayed him. His offence, after his
+voluntary vows, and his initiation into the sacred mysteries, was
+unpardonable, and his fate could not be doubted. Indeed, the trembling
+priest at length admitted that he had been sacrificed in due form upon
+the high altar of the sun, and that he himself had beheld the fatal
+ceremony. Huertis, however, had implicated none of his associates, and
+there was yet a chance of escape. To pass the gates was impossible; but
+the wall might be descended in the night by ropes, and to swim the moat
+was easy. This was effected by Velasquez and fifteen of his party the
+same night; the rest either did not make the attempt or failed, and the
+faithful Antonio was among them. The fugitives had scarcely reached the
+secluded retreat of Vaalpeor, and mounted their mules, before the low
+yelp of blood-hounds was heard upon their trail and soon burst into full
+cry. But the dogs were somewhat confused by the scent of so many
+footsteps on the spot at which the party mounted, and did not follow the
+mules until the horsemen led the way. This afforded time for the
+fugitives, racing their swift mules at full speed, to reach the opening
+of the valley, when Velasquez wheeled and halted, for the pursuers were
+close at hand. A conflict ensued in which many of the horsemen were
+slain, and the young kaana received an accidental wound of which he
+retains the scar. It must suffice to say, that the party eventually
+secured their retreat without loss of life; and by break of day they
+were on a mountainous ridge many leagues from Iximaya. In about fourteen
+days, they reached Ocosingo, after great suffering. Here Velasquez
+reluctantly parted with most of his faithful Indians, and here also died
+Vaalpeor, from the unaccustomed toil and deprivations of the journey.
+Velasquez, with the two Aztec children, did not reach San Salvador until
+the middle of February, when they became objects of the highest
+interest to the most intellectual classes of that city. As the greatest
+ethnological curiosities in living form, that ever appeared among
+civilised men, he was advised to send them to Europe for exhibition.
+
+With this view they were taken to Grenada where they remained the
+objects of much local curiosity, until it was deemed proper and
+advisable first to exhibit them to the people of the United States. The
+parties whom Senor Velasquez first appointed as their temporary
+guardians brought them to New York via Jamaica, and they will no doubt
+attract and reward universal attention. They are supposed to be eight
+and ten years of age, and both are lively, playful and affectionate. But
+it is as specimens of an _absolutely unique_ and nearly extinct race of
+mankind that they claim the attention of Physiologists and all men of
+science.
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note
+
+
+The following errors were corrected.
+
+  Page  Error
+   4  Vaalpeor, in changed to Vaalpeor, an
+   4  Diocess changed to Diocese
+   5  scirra changed to sierra
+   6  attemped changed to attempted
+   6  Gautamala changed to Guatimala
+   6  seirra changed to sierra
+   6  rasing changed to raising
+   7  seirra changed to sierra
+   7  Balize changed to Belize
+   8  way changed to way.
+   8  Hammand changed to Hammond
+   8  attestors changed to attesters
+   9  proceded changed to proceeded
+   9  regreted changed to regretted
+   9  repecting changed to respecting
+   9  experince changed to experience
+  10  idolitrous changed to idolatrous
+  10  invaluble changed to invaluable
+  11  joval changed to jovial
+  11  mentined changed to mentioned
+  13  realitily changed to reality
+  13  rediculous changed to ridiculous
+  14  guilded changed to gilded
+  14  pinacle changed to pinnacle
+  15  mountians changed to mountains
+  15  Chiapas. changed to Chiapas."
+  16  limbstone changed to limestone
+  16  parapetted changed to parapeted
+  16  Aarchbishop changed to Archbishop
+  17  amunition changed to ammunition
+  17  orign changed to origin
+  18  Mayua changed to Maya
+  18  interpeters changed to interpreters
+  18  provinical changed to provincial
+  19  pewerful changed to powerful
+  19  I changed to "I
+  19  solemly changed to solemnly
+  21  mocassins changed to moccasins
+  21  States changed to States.
+  24  defferential changed to deferential
+  27  pine-apples changed to pine-apples,
+  29  a ear changed to an ear
+  29  disperson changed to dispersion
+  29  ran through changed to run through
+  30  appartments changed to apartments
+  30  indispensible changed to indispensable
+  31  destinctive changed to distinctive
+  33  amunition changed to ammunition
+  33  apropriated changed to appropriated
+  33  appartments changed to apartments
+  34  Valasquez changed to Velasquez
+  34  transmital changed to transmittal
+
+The following words were inconsistently spelled or hyphenated.
+
+  blood-hounds / bloodhounds
+  land-marks / landmarks
+  Meztitzos / Mestitzos
+  re-assured / reassured
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Memoir of an Eventful Expedition in
+Central America, by Pedro Velasquez
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