, 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 o