ship, obsidian and flint knives, arrow and spear heads; but what attracted me most were three small whistles of terra-cotta. They represented human figures in a squatting position, all with maxtlis, or waist-cloths, about the loins, and a coif, or turban, on the heads. One little fat fellow reminded me of the Chinese roly-poly mandarins, and was of light-colored clay. Another, who also had a paunch of generous proportions, presented the profile of an Egyptian sphinx. But the third, which was four and

a quarter inches high and of a dark bronze color, bore a close resemblance to a North American Indian. The figure had earrings precisely like those copper ones that Professor Putnam discovered in the Ohio mounds. This whistle could be made to sound three notes, the mouthpiece being at the posterior base. I tried to buy these interesting relics, which were found buried at a considerable depth, but the owner would not part with them; and as the whole collection is kept in a basket and often

handled, I suppose the photographs I took will soon be all that is left of them. Clay whistles modelled in grotesque form, which also sound three notes, may be found to-day in the plazas for sale; but the material and workmanship of these ancient terra-cottas surpasses any of the work of modern Indios.

At

During the night we were awakened by the noise of the surf on the beach; but when I went out on the piazza there was no wind. Before morning the "City of Belize" the very steamer that had nearly finished our journey in the Rio Polochic-arrived from Pansos. daybreak I found that the bats had ruined my raw-hide lasso, the reins of my bridle, and had eaten the seeds of some toranjas, or shaddocks, which we had carefully saved for planting. We hung all these articles from the ceiling to avoid rats or cockroaches.

Frank and Santiago had no end of difficulty in getting our animals on board the steamer; but it was done at last, as everything else that Frank attempted, and just before noon we started, after an excellent breakfast on board, in which Señor Gomez, the newly appointed Jefe politico, joined us. We were now back to the land of rains; and as we steamed across the lake to Santa Cruz we had a tropical downpour. As the steamer was out of fuel, we coasted the lake to a place about a league above Castillo de San Felipe, where, after getting some three cords of wood on board, we tied to the trees for the night. At daybreak we took on more wood, and then went on to the old fort, where the comandante had some wood to sell, and used his authority to press the soldiers and bystanders to load it. As it was Sunday there were plenty of loafers around; but one dandy who had on a

clean shirt would not work, and another fellow had a stomach-ache and could not; but the military authority was respected, and the wood soon loaded. The pilothouse was a fine, roomy place on the upper deck, and our comfort was in marked contrast to the experience of the canoa-voyage up, some months before. Islands and lagoons succeeded each other rapidly, and we soon crossed the Golfete and were in the beautiful Rio Dulce. At three in the afternoon we arrived at the wharf in Livingston, and our pleasant journey was at an end.

CHAPTER IX.

THE physical

IN THE OLDEN TIME.

HE physical features of Central America are rich and

varied; but the story of the races which have peopled it is tinged with a romance and clouded with a mystery which accord intimately with the cloud-capped summits, the impenetrable forests, and the earth-fires. Stories written in stone, whose authors no man knows, whose meaning none can read, carry us back beyond history and beyond legend; and until patient study unravels the enigma, as it must in time, our vision of the aborigines is illumined only by those legends which beautify and corrupt all history. We may treat all legendary lore as mythic if we are willing to forget that a myth is the creation of an advanced thought and civilization which we do not usually concede to the long-perished races who have preceded us; or we may simply accept what has been preserved for us, smile at its simplicity, wonder at its beauty, or puzzle our brains to connect and classify it with similar matter from other sources and of other times. In an uncontroversial spirit I would accept the slight glimpses of early human races which have lived upon this continent, and leave to others the task, agreeable to their tastes, of weighing, measuring, and analyzing these stories of a simple people who can no longer speak for themselves.

In most ancient times Votan1 came to the coast now known as Tabasco, found savages inhabiting the country, whom by patient labor he civilized, thus founding the Empire of Xibalbay and the dynasty of the Votanides. He or his immediate descendants built Nachan or Culhuacan, whose ruins at Palenque in Yucatan have astonished all travellers and students since their discovery. Similar ruins, inscribed with the same hieroglyphic characters, are found at Copan in Honduras, Quirigua, Tikal, and other places; and the arts of architecture and sculpture show in these remains a development not attained by any succeeding inhabitants of this continent until the present century. While Xibalbay was still extending its empire over portions of Mexico and Central America, another leader brought with him from the North a people called Nahoas, who founded a city not far from Palenque, towards the southwest, naming it Tula (whence this people are often called Tultecas). The chief bore a symbolic name, as is even now usual with the Indian tribes of North America, and Quetzalcoatl (serpent with the plumes of the quetzal), or Gucumatz, -as he is known in the Guatemaltecan legends, by his superior ability (called magic by the people), brought his power to such a height as wholly to overshadow the flourishing Xibalbay, whose conquered inhabitants were scattered in various directions. Some went northward to Mexico and founded a monarchy (according to Clavigero, in the seventh century of our era), which after four hundred years of prosperity was destroyed by famine; and the survivors, led by their

1 Le mithe de Votan. H. de Charencey, Alençon, 1871.

2 Pronounced Shibalbay.

3 Discovered by Spaniards in 1750, but no illustrations were published until 1834.