Incidents of Travel in Yucatan Volume II Part 5

The first is that represented in the plate opposite. It stands on a substantial terrace, but lower than most of the others. The front is one hundred and twelve feet long, and when entire must have presented a grand appearance. The end on the left in the engraving has fallen, carrying with it one doorway, so that now only four appear. The doorway was the largest and most imposing we had seen in the country, but, unfortunately, the ornaments over it were broken and fallen. In the centre apartment the back corridor is raised, and the ascent to it is by three steps.

[Engraving 21: A Doorway]

All the doorways were plain except the centre one (the second to the left in the engraving), which is represented in the plate opposite. It is in a dilapidated condition, but still presents bold and striking ornaments. Even on this scale, however, the details of the sitting figures above the cornice do not appear.

While we were engaged in making a clearing in front of this building, two young men came down upon the terrace from the corner that was fallen, and apparently from the top of the building, with long guns, the locks covered with deer-skin, and all the accoutrements of cacadores, or hunters. They were tall, fine-looking fellows, fearless and frank in appearance and manner. Dr. Cabot's gun was the first object that attracted their attention, after which they laid down their guns, and, as if for the mere sport of swinging their machetes, were soon foremost in making the clearing. When this was finished, Mr. C.

sat up his camera lucida, and though at first all gathered round, in a few minutes he was left with only the two brothers, one of them holding over him an umbrella to protect him from the sun.

Except the little boy and the woman, these were the first persons we had seen within speaking distance. We were so pleased with their appearance that we proposed to one of them to accompany us in our search after ruins. The elder was quite taken with the idea of rambling, but soon said, with a rather disconsolate tone, that he had a wife and children. His hermanito, or younger brother, however, had no such ties, and would go with us. We made an agreement on the spot; and nothing can show more plainly the sense which we entertained of the security of travelling in Yucatan. In Central America we never dared to take a man into our service without strong recommendations, for he might be a robber or an a.s.sa.s.sin. These men we had never heard of till they came upon us with their guns. Their manly bearing as hungers inspired confidence, and the only suspicious circ.u.mstance was that they were willing to take us without references; but we found afterward that they had both known us at Nohcacab. The one whom we engaged was named Dimas, and he continued with us until we left the country.

[Engraving 22: A Building]

On the same line, and but a short distance removed, though on a lower terrace, is another building, measuring eighty-five feet in front, which is represented in the plate opposite. It had a freshness about it that suggested the idea of something more modern than the others. The whole was covered with a coat of plaster but little broken, and it confirmed us in the opinion we had entertained before, that the fronts of all the buildings had been thus covered.

Our meeting with these young men was a fortunate circ.u.mstance for us in exploring these ruins. From boyhood their father had had his rancho on the savanna, and with their guns they had ranged over the whole country for leagues around.

From the terrace of the first building we saw at a distance a high hill, almost a mountain, on the top of which rose a wooded elevation surrounding an ancient building. There was something extraordinary in its position, but the young men told us it was entirely ruined, and, although it was then but eleven o'clock, if we attempted to go to it, we could not return till after dark. They told us, also, of others at the distance of half a league, more extensive, and some of which, they said, were, in finish and preservation, equal to these.

At one o'clock Doctor Cabot and myself, under the guidance of Dimas, set out to look for them. It was desperately hot. We pa.s.sed several huts, and at one of them asked for some water; but it was so full of insects that we could barely taste it. Dimas led us to the hut of his mother, and gave us some from a vessel in which the insects had settled to the bottom.

Beyond this we ascended the spur of a high hill, and coming down into a thickly-wooded valley, after the longest half league we ever walked, we saw through the trees a large stone structure. On reaching it, and climbing over a broken terrace, we came to a large mound faced on all sides with stone, which we ascended, and crossing over the top, looked down upon an overgrown area, having on each side a range of ruined buildings, with their white facades peering through the trees; and beyond, at a distance, and seemingly inaccessible, was the high hill with the ruins on the top, which we had seen from the terrace of the first building. Hills rose around us on every side, and, for that country, the scene was picturesque, but all waste and silent. The stillness of the grave rested upon the ruins, and the notes of a little flycatcher were the only sounds we heard.

[Engraving 23: A Building]

The ruins in sight were much more extensive than those we had first visited, but in a more ruinous condition. We descended the mound to the area in front, and, bearing down the bushes, pa.s.sed in the centre an uncouth, upright, circular stone, like that frequently referred to before, called the picote, or whipping-post, and farther on we reached an edifice, which Mr. Catherwood afterward drew, and which is represented in the engraving opposite. It is thirty-three feet in front, and has two apartments, each thirteen feet long by eight feet six inches deep, and conspicuous in the facade are representations of three uncouth human figures, in curious dresses, with their hands held up by the side of the head, supporting the cornice.

These ruins, Dimas told us, were called Schoolhoke, but, like the others, they stand on what is called the savanna of Chunhuhu; and the ruined building on the top of the hill, visible from both places, seems towering as a link to connect them together. What the extent of this place has been it is impossible to say. Returning, overtaken by night, and in apprehension of rain, we were an hour and a half, which would make the two, by the path we took, at least five miles apart, though much nearer in a straight line. Supposing the two piles of ruins to have formed part of the same city, there is reason to believe that it once covered as much ground and contained as many inhabitants as any that has yet been presented.

The first intelligence I received of the existence of these ruins was from Cocom, who, the reader may remember, was our guide at Nohpat; and this is all that I am able to communicate in regard to their history.

We returned to the rancho worn down with fatigue, just in time to escape a violent rain. This brought within, as an accompaniment to the fleas of the night before, our carriers and servants, and we had eleven hammocks, in close juxtaposition, and through the night a concert of nasal trombones, with Indian variations. The rain continued all the next day, and as no work could be done, Mr. Catherwood took advantage of the opportunity to have another attack of fever. We were glad of it on another account, for we had kept a man constantly employed in the woods searching for water; our horses had exhausted all the rocky cavities around, and we could not have held out another day. The rain replenished them, and relieved us from some compunctions.

In the afternoon the little boy came down with a message from his mother, desiring to know when we were going away. Perhaps the leader is curious to know the costume of boys at Chunhuhu. It consists of a straw hat and a pair of sandals. This one had, besides, some distinguishable spots of dirt, and Mr. Catherwood made a drawing of him as he stood.

Soon afterward the poor woman herself was seen hovering about the house. She considered that it was really time to come. We had made a great inroad upon her provisions; given the corn to our horses, and cooked the frigoles; but the special cause of her coming was to return a medio, which she said was bad. She was mild, amiable, and simple as a child; complained that we said we were only going to remain one night, and now she did not know when we were going away. With great difficulty, we prevailed upon her to enter the hut, and told her she might return whenever she pleased. She laughed good-naturedly, and, after looking round carefully to see that nothing was missing, went away comforted by our promise to depart the next day.

CHAPTER VIII.

Journey to Bolonchen.--Bad Road.--Large Hacienda.--Imposing Gateway.--An inhospitable Host.--Ruins of Ytsimpte.--Ruined Edifice.--Staircase with sculptured Stones.--Square Building.--Facade decorated with Pillars.--Ruined Walls.--Remains of a sculptured Figure.--Character and Aspect of the Ruins.--Departure.--Arrival at the Village of Bolonchen.--Scene of Contentment.--Wells.--Derivation of the Word Bolonchen.--Origin of the Wells unknown.--The Cura.--Visit to an extraordinary Cave.--Entrance to it.--Precipitous Descents.--A wild Scene.--Rude Ladders.--Dangers of the Descent.--Indian Name of this Cave.--A subterranean Ball-room.--Cavernous Chamber.--Numerous Pa.s.sages.--Great Number of Ladders.--Rocky Basin of Water.--Great Depth of the Cave.--A Bath in the Basin.--Its Indian Name.--Return to the Rocky Chamber.--Exploration of another Pa.s.sage.--Another Basin.--Indian Stories.--Two other Pa.s.sages and Basins.--Seven Basins in all.--Indian Names of the remaining five.--Want of Philosophical Instruments.--Surface of the Country.--This Cave the sole Watering-place of a large Indian Village.--Return.--Visit to the Cura.--Report of more Ruins.

At daylight the next morning the woman was on the spot to remind us of our promise. We gave her a cup of coffee, and with a small present, which amply satisfied her for our forcible occupation of her hut, left her again in possession.

Our party this morning divided into three parcels. The carriers set out direct for Bolonchen; Mr Catherwood went, under the guidance of Dimas, to make a drawing of the last building, and Doctor Cabot, myself, and Albino to visit another ruined city, all to meet again at Bolonchen in the evening.

Doctor Cabot and myself were warned that the path we proposed taking was not pa.s.sable on horseback. For the first league our arms and legs were continually scratched and torn by briers, and only our hats saved us from the fate of Absalom. In that hot climate, it was always uncomfortable to tie the sombrero under the chin; and there were few things more annoying than to have it knocked off every five minutes, and be obliged to dismount and pick it up. Our Indian guide moved easily on foot, just clearing the branches on each side and overhead.

We had one alternative, which was to dismount and lead our horses; but, unused to having favours shown them, they pulled back, so that the labour of dragging them on added greatly to the fatigue of walking.

Emerging from this tangled path, we came out upon a large hacienda, and stopped before an imposing gateway, under the shade of great seybo trees, within which were large and well-filled water-tanks. Our horses had drunk nothing since the afternoon before; we therefore dismounted, loosened the saddle girths, and, as a matter of form, sent Albino to ask permission to water them, who returned with the answer that we might for a real. At Chunhuhu it always cost us more than this in the labour of Indians; but the demand seemed so churlish at the gate of this large hacienda, that we refused to pay, and again mounted. Albino told us that we might save a slight circuit by pa.s.sing through the cattle-yard; and we rode through, close beside the water-tanks and a group of men, at the head of whom was the master, and, coming out upon the camino real, shook from off our feet the dust of the inhospitable hacienda. Our poor horses bore the brunt of sustaining our dignity.

At one o'clock we came to a rancho of Indians, where we bought some tortillas and procured a guide. Leaving the camino real, we turned again into a milpa path, and in about an hour came in sight of another ruined city, known by the name of Ytsimpte. From the plain on which we approached we saw on the left, on the brow of a hill, a range of buildings, six or eight hundred feet in length, all laid bare to view, the trees having just been felled; and as we drew near we saw Indians engaged in continuing the clearing. On arriving at the foot of the buildings, Albino found that the clearing was made by order of the alcalde of Bolonchen, at the instance and under the direction of the padre, in expectation of our visit and for our benefit!

We had another subject of congratulation on account of our horses.

There was an aguada in the neighbourhood, to which we immediately sent them, and, carrying our traps up to the terrace of the nearest building, we sat down before it to meditate and lunch.

This over, we commenced a survey of the ruins. The clearings made by our unknown friends enabled us to form at once a general idea of their character and extent, and to move from place to place with comparative facility. These ruins lie in the village of Bolonchen, and the first apartment we entered showed the effects of this vicinity. All the smooth stones of the inner wall had been picked out and carried away for building purposes, and the sides presented the cavities in the bed of mortar from which they had been taken. The edifice was about two hundred feet long. It had one apartment, perhaps sixty feet long, and a grand staircase twenty feet wide rose in the centre to the top. This staircase was in a ruinous condition, but the outer stones of the lower steps remained, richly ornamented with sculpture; and probably the whole casing on each side had once possessed the same rich decoration.

Beyond this was another large building, square and peculiar in its plan. At the extreme end the whole facade lay unbroken on the ground, held together by the great ma.s.s of mortar and stones and presenting the entire line of pillars with which it had been decorated. In the doorway of an inner apartment was an ornamented pillar, and on the walls was the print of the mysterious red hand. Turn which way we would, ruin was before us. At right angles with the first building was a line of ruined walls, following which I pa.s.sed, lying on the ground, the headless trunk of a sculptured body; the legs, too, were gone. At the end was an arch, which seemed, at a distance, to stand entire and alone, like that named the arch of triumph at Kabah; but it proved to be only the open and broken arch of a ruined building. From the extent of these remains, the ma.s.ses of sculptured stones, and the execution of the carving, this must have been one of the first cla.s.s of the aboriginal cities. In moral influence there was none more powerful. Ruin had been so complete that we could not profit by the kindness of our friends, and it was melancholy that when so much had been done for us, there was so little for us to do. It was but another witness to the desolation that had swept over the land.

A short ride brought us to the suburbs of the village of Bolonchen, and we entered a long street, with a line of straggling houses or huts on each side. It was late in the afternoon. Indian children were playing in the road, and Indians, returned from their work, were swinging in hammocks within the huts. As we advanced, we saw a vecino, with a few neighbours around him, sitting in the doorway thrumming a guitar. It was, perhaps, a scene of indolence, but it was one of quiet and contentment, of comfort and even thrift. Often, in entering the disturbed villages of Central America, among intoxicated Indians and swaggering white men, all armed, we felt a degree of uneasiness. The faces that looked upon us seemed scowling and suspicious; we always apprehended insult, and frequently were not disappointed. Here all looked at us with curiosity, but without distrust; every face bore a welcome, and, as we rode through, all gave us a friendly greeting. At the head of the street the plaza opened upon us on a slight elevation, with groups of Indian women in the centre drawing water from the well, and relieved against a background of green hills rising above the tops of the houses, which, under the reflection of the setting sun, gave a beauty and picturesqueness of aspect that no other village in the country had exhibited. On the left, on a raised platform, stood the church, and by its side the convent. In consideration of what the cura had already done for us, and that we had a large party--perceiving, also, that the casa real, a long stone building with a broad portico in front, was really inviting in its appearance, we resolved to spare the cura, and rode up to the casa real. Well-dressed Indians, with a portly, well-fed cacique, stood ready to take our horses. We dismounted and entered the princ.i.p.al apartment. On one side were the iron gratings of the prison, and on the other two long beams of wood with holes in them for stocks, and a caution to strangers arriving in the village to be on their good behaviour. Our carriers had arrived. We sent out to buy ramon and corn for the horses, had our hammocks swung, and sat down under the corridor.

We had hardly time to seat ourselves before the vecinos, in their clean afternoon clothes, and some with gold-headed canes, came over to "call upon us." All were profuse in offers of services; and as it was the hour for that refreshment, we had a perplexing number of invitations to go to their houses and take chocolate. Among our visiters was a young man with a fine black beard all over his face, well dressed, and the only one wearing a black hat, whom, as we knew they were about drilling companies in the villages to resist the apprehended invasion of Santa Ana, we supposed to belong to the army, but we afterward learned that he was a member of the church militant, being the ministro, or a.s.sistant, of the cura. The cura himself did not come, but one of our visiters, looking over to the convent, and seeing the doors and windows closed, said he was still taking his siesta.

We had time to look at the only objects of interest in the village, and these were the wells, which, after our straits at Chunhuhu, were a refreshing spectacle, and of which our horses had already enjoyed the benefit by a bath.

Bolonchen derives its name from two Maya words: _Bolon_, which signifies nine, and _chen_ wells, and it means the nine wells. From time immemorial, nine wells formed at this place the centre of a population, and these nine wells are now in the plaza of the village.

Their origin is as obscure and unknown as that of the ruined cities which strew the land, and as little thought of.

These wells were circular openings cut through a stratum of rock. The water was at that time ten or twelve feet from the surface, and in all it was at the same level. The source of this water is a mystery to the inhabitants, but there are some facts which seem to make the solution simple. The wells are mere perforations through an irregular stratum of rock, all communicate, and in the dry season a man may descend in one and come out by another at the extreme end of the plaza; it is manifest, therefore, that the water does not proceed from springs.

Besides, the wells are all full during the rainy season; when this is over the water begins to disappear, and in the heat of the dry season it fails altogether; from which it would appear that under the surface there is a great rocky cavern, into which the floods of the rainy season find a way by crevices or other openings, which cannot be known without a survey of the country, and, having little or no escape, are retained, and furnish a supply so long as they are augmented by the rains.

The custody and preservation of these wells form a princ.i.p.al part of the business of the village authorities, but, with all their care, the supply lasts but seven or eight months in the year. This year, on account of the long continuance of the rainy season, it had lasted longer than usual, and was still abundant. The time was approaching, however, when these wells would fail, and the inhabitants be driven to an extraordinary cueva at half a league from the village.

At about dark Mr. Catherwood arrived, and we returned to the casa real.

In a room fifty feet long, free from fleas, servants, and Indian carriers, and with a full swing for our hammocks, we had a happy change from the hut at Chunhuhu.

During the evening the cura came over to see us, but, finding we had retired, did not disturb us; early in the morning he was rapping at our door, and would not leave us till we promised to come over and take chocolate with him.

As we crossed the plaza he came out to meet us, in black gown and cape, bare-headed, with white hair streaming, and both arms extended; embraced us all, and, with the tone of a man who considered that he had not been treated well, reproached us for not coming directly to the convent; then led us in, showed us its comforts and conveniences, insisted upon sending for our luggage, and only consented to postpone doing so while we consulted on our plans.

These were, to leave Bolonchen in the afternoon for the ruins of San Antonio, four leagues distant. The cura had never heard of such ruins, and did not believe that any existed, but he knew the hacienda, and sent out to procure information. In the mean time it was arranged that we should employ the morning in a visit to the cueva, and return to dine with him. He reminded us that it was Friday, and, consequently, fast day; but, knowing the padres as we did, we had no apprehension.

There was one great difficulty in the way of our visiting the cueva at this time. Since the commencement of the rainy season it had not been used; and every year, before having recourse to it, there was a work of several days to be done in repairing the ladders. As this, however, was our only opportunity, we determined to make the attempt.

The cura undertook to make the arrangements and after breakfast we set out, a large party, including both Indians and vecinos.

At the distance of half a league from the village, on the Campeachy road, we turned off by a well-beaten path, following which we fell into a winding lane, and, descending gradually, reached the foot of a rude, lofty, and abrupt opening, under a bold ledge of overhanging rock, seeming a magnificent entrance to a great temple for the worship of the G.o.d of Nature. The engraving which follows represents this aperture, an Indian with a lighted torch being seen just entering.

[Engraving 24: Entrance to a Cave at Bolonchen]

We disenc.u.mbered ourselves of superfluous apparel, and, following the Indian, each with a torch in hand, entered a wild cavern, which, as we advanced, became darker. At the distance of sixty paces the descent was precipitous, and we went down by a ladder about twenty feet. Here all light from the mouth of the cavern was lost, but we soon reached the brink of a great perpendicular descent, to the very bottom of which a strong body of light was thrown from a hole in the surface, a perpendicular depth, as we afterward learned by measurement, of two hundred and ten feet. As we stood on the brink of this precipice, under the shelving of an immense ma.s.s of rock, seeming darker from the stream of light thrown down the hole, gigantic stalact.i.tes and huge blocks of stone a.s.sumed all manner of fantastic shapes, and seemed like monstrous animals or deities of a subterranean world.

From the brink on which we stood an enormous ladder, of the rudest possible construction, led to the bottom of the hole. It was between seventy and eighty feet long, and about twelve feet wide, made of the rough trunks of saplings lashed together lengthwise, and supported all the way down by horizontal trunks braced against the face of the precipitous rock. The ladder was double, having two sets or flights of rounds, divided by a middle part.i.tion, and the whole fabric was lashed together by withes. It was very steep, seemed precarious and insecure, and confirmed the worst accounts we had heard of the descent into this remarkable well.

Our Indians began the descent, but the foremost had scarcely got his head below the surface before one of the rounds slipped, and he only saved himself by clinging to another. The ladder having been made when the withes were green, these were now dry, cracked, and some of them broken. We attempted a descent with some little misgivings, but, by keeping each hand and foot on a different round, with an occasional crash and slide, we all reached the foot of the ladder; that is, our own party, our Indians, and some three or four of our escort, the rest having disappeared.

[Engraving 25: Princ.i.p.al Staircase in the Cave]