ich one may be lost. Notwithstanding its
wonderful reputation, and a name which alone, in any other country,
would induce a thorough exploration, it is a singular fact, and
exhibits more strikingly than anything I can mention the indifference
of the people of all classes to the antiquities of the country, that up
to the time of my arrival at the door, this Laberinto had never been
examined. My friend Don Lorenzo Peon would give me every facility for
exploring it except joining me himself. Several persons had penetrated
to some distance with a string held outside, but had turned back, and
the universal belief was, that it contained passages without number and
without end.

Under these circumstances, I certainly felt some degree of excitement
as I stood in the doorway. The very name called up those stupendous
works in Crete and on the shores of the M[oe]ritic Lake which are now
almost discredited as fabulous.

My retinue consisted of eight men, who considered themselves in my
employ, besides three or four supernumeraries, and all together formed
a crowd around the door. Except the mayoral of Uxmal, I had never seen
one of them before, and as I considered it important to have a reliable
man outside, I stationed him at the door with a ball of twine. I tied
one end round my left wrist, and told one of the men to light a torch
and follow me, but he refused absolutely, and all the rest, one after
the other, did the same. They were all ready enough to hold the string;
and I was curious to know, and had a conference with them on the
interesting point, whether they expected any pay for their services in
standing out of doors. One expected pay for showing me the place,
others for carrying water, another for taking care of the horses, and
so on, but I terminated the matter abruptly by declaring that I should
not pay one of them a medio; and, ordering them all away from the door,
which they were smothering, and a little infected with one of their
apprehensions of starting some wild beast, which might be making his
lair in the recesses of the cave, I entered with a candle in one hand
and a pistol in the other.

The entrance faces the west. The mouth was filled up with rubbish,
scrambling over which, I stood in a narrow passage or gallery,
constructed, like all the apartments above ground, with smooth walls
and triangular arched ceiling. This passage was about four feet wide,
and seven feet high to the top of the arch. It ran due e