we reached its foot;
and the mound itself, though retaining the symmetry of its original
proportions, was also so overgrown that it appeared a mere wooded hill,
but peculiar in its regularity of shape. Four grand staircases, each
twenty-five feet wide, ascended to an esplanade within six feet of the
top. This esplanade was six feet in width, and on each side was a
smaller staircase leading to the top. These staircases are in a ruinous
condition; the steps are almost entirely gone, and we climbed up by
means of fallen stones and trees growing out of its sides. As we
ascended, we scared away a cow, for the wild cattle roaming on these
wooded wastes pasture on its sides, and ascend to the top.

The summit was a plain stone platform, fifteen feet square. It had no
structure upon it, nor were there vestiges of any. Probably it was the
great mound of sacrifice, on which the priests, in the sight of the
assembled people, cut out the hearts of human victims. The view
commanded from the top was a great desolate plain, with here and there
another ruined mound rising above the trees, and far in the distance
could be discerned the towers of the church at Tekoh.

Around the base of this mound, and throughout the woods, wherever we
moved, were strewed sculptured stones. Most of them were square, carved
on the face, and having a long stone tenon or stem at the back;
doubtless they had been fixed in the wall, so as to form part of some
ornament, or combination of ornaments, in the facade, in all respects
the same as at Uxmal.

[Engraving 3: Sculptured Figures]

Besides these, there were other and more curious remains. These were
representations of human figures, or of animals, with hideous features
and expressions, in producing which the skill of the artist seems to
have been expended. The sculpture of these figures was rude, the stones
were timeworn, and many were half buried in the earth. The following
engraving represents two of them. One is four, and the other three feet
high. The full length seems intended to represent a warrior with a
shield. The arms are broken off, and to my mind they conveyed a lively
idea of the figures or idols which Bernal Dias met with on the coast,
containing hideous faces of demons. Probably, broken and half buried as
they lie, they were once objects of adoration and worship, and now
exist as mute and melancholy memorials of ancient paganism.

At a short distance from the base of the mound was an o