ons in the block, in the lower
corner to the left of the spectator, offers a certain resemblance to the
form of the constellation of Ursa Major, this may be merely the result of
chance.

Facing the problem of the meaning and purpose of the "Calendar-stone,"
after thirteen years of assiduous study, I find that the interpretation I
suggested in 1886, is substantially strengthened and corroborated by
freshly accumulated evidence. The difference is that I now lay less stress
upon the phonetic elements and values of the symbols, although, as I shall
set forth in the special publication alluded to, no study of the monument
can be considered complete unless these be carefully analyzed and
understood. The one great stride in advance that I think I have made is
the recognition that the monolith is an image of the Great Plan or Scheme
of Organization which has been expounded in the preceding pages and which
permeated every branch of native thought.

The monument represents the high-water mark reached in the evolution of a
set of ideas, which were suggested to primitive man by long-continued
observation of the phenomena of Nature and by the momentous recognition of
the

"northern star,
Of whose true-fixed, and resting quality,
There is no fellow in the firmament.
The skies are painted with unnumber'd sparks,
They are all fire, and every one doth shine;
But there's but one in all doth hold his place."(70)

This inscribed tablet, which constitutes one of the most important
documents in the history of the human race, is as clearly an image of the
nocturnal heaven as it is of a vast terrestrial state which once existed
in the valley of Mexico, and had been established as a reproduction upon
earth of the harmonious order and fixed laws which apparently governed the
heavens.

The monument exposes these laws, the dominion of which probably extended
throughout the American Continent, and still faintly survive in some
existing aboriginal communities. It not only sets forth the organization
of state government and the subdivision of the people into classes bearing
a fixed relation to each other, but also serves as a chart of the
territory of the State, its capital and its four provinces, and minor
topographical divisions. Finally, it reveals that the progress of time,
the succession of days, years and epochs, _i. e._ the Calendar, was
conceived as a reproduction of the wheel of sini