Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-08-23
A FORT OF MYSTERY
STRUCTURE DISCOVER
ED IN WILDs OF MEXICO.
It II Believed to Re q Castle in Which
He Hid His Treasure-A Mystic.
rious Cave and Tunnel.

From the Kansas City Journal.
While recently on q prospecting tour
through Mexico I was informed by our
landlord at Rosario that near that place
there were some ruins whose history was
not known by the Inhabitants Of that SEC
ton OF the country. Aware OF the fact that
not one-tsnth part Of Mexico's prehistoric
ruins have been brought to light. did not
hesitAts to make up my mind to visit the
place. So 1t was that after working our
way through q dense chaparral wood.
emerging with clothes badly torn. hats
ruined. faces and hands scratched and lac
Grated due to the vicious cat-claw bushes
which blocked our way. we came to the
beautiful Ajamilpa river.
Montezuma, or his Aztec predecessor II
to that tribe may be attributed the con-
struction OF the wonderful fort, exercised
an extraordinary judgment in selecting the
site. FOR from the bed OF the Ajamilpa to
the summit Of the promontory upon which
the now tottering walls stand, by actual
measurement there are 440 meters and 60
centimeters. fully 1.4O0 feet: and though
almost impossible ascent. every evidence
tenos TO snow that at one time there was
no way to ascend from the river side.
AFTER most iaborious climb Of half an
nour we were suddenly confronted with the
massive but silent eastern wall. fully sew
enty rect In height, constructed of red
sandstone slabs, some of which measured
s sI ny WE'VE feet. and some much larger.
al wen smoothed on every edge. These
SLABS formed an outer wall which covered
a two-root wall Of gravel and cement and
pehind TINS gravel Is still another wall, one
t1ot thick 80 that the average thickness Of
feet. 1893 'idh iouF
Dimensions Of Fort.
The fort Is constructed on a kind of do.
tacned hill, or as we would call II. promon
tory. which projects into a wonderful can
yon or ravine.
IN all, the now Undiscovered and black
ened walls inclose fully twenty acres, and
within this Enclosure there are MANY walls
or separate rooms or houses, not the lea SIT
foot walls with no opening to their fnclos
ures. which seem to have been a series OF
dungeons.
Because of the fact that the declivity is
so steep. and we had no place upon which
to stand. we were unable to take views of
the most interesting outer walls, one of
which. projecting into the canyon. is fully
eighty feet high, with an incline OF twenty
degrees from the perpendicular. and which
no human being could ever scale.
There are the remains Of cemented floors,
ovens, subterranean passages, obsidian ar
rows. ETC.. In abundance and no one can
even imagine what important archaeology
cal data are hidden beneath these floors.
At one corner my attention was attracted
b IL,
ed It, an oval-shaped opening just large
enough for a small-sized man to crawl or
squirm through. My guide. who probably
knew as little about 1t as I. repeated a
legend current among his people to the If
feet that the Aztec medicine men compelled
their untried warriors to go through this.
some 100 feet long as test of their nerves
OF endurance.
This narrow opening leads to a very large
subterranean cave. apparently artificial.
into which whatever came through the vent
or sluice was emptied. In my opinion the
larger is an important subterranean cave
we'll worthy OF full investigation. A great
many stone slabs from the coping and wall
overhead have fallen into and blocked the
nearby say that whoever enters the cave
never returns. This Is probably true. as the
accumulated foul gases would quickly suffo-
cate one.
Made Discoveries.
An old gentleman. seventy-one years of
age whom I met on train. informed me
that at one time he and five other brave
young men had made attempt to ex-
plors this cave. Three remained at the en-
trance while the other three, with lighted
wax matches in hand, cautiously CROPPED
their inward way. They had gone some
sixty feet, when one called to the others to
come In and see the wonderful objects which
ornamented the walls. The sound Of this
young mans voice was so startling that
as he expressed it, "a sudden gust of wind
extinguished the light, and then-well. they
reached open air again and lived to tell the
tale to their progeny"
Some Of the shepherds. who at different
times missed sheep from their focks, spoke
in lowered voices of two-headed man or
object who used to be seen emerging from
this cave: but they asserted that since the
entrance had been closed by the falling
stones he had not been seen. but that loud
unearthly murmurings had often been heard
coming, as 1t seemed to them, from the
yery bowels of the mountains.
AS matter Of history during the French
invasion, Gen. Cristobal Palacios remodeled
some of the outer walls, and at one time,
between 1S8S-67, more than 1900 Mexican
soldiers were stationed in the CASTLE In
fact, a roadway was made and cannon
brought into the fort.
There is every reason, considering the
data obtained. to believe that this fortress
was built not less than 100 years ago by
the first Inhabitants Of Anahuc; but-Mexi-
co.'s history prior to the Spanish conquest Is
shrouded under the same veil Of mystery as
were the lives Of many unfortunates who
disappeared during Torquemada' 8 reign Of
inquisitorial murder and terror.
The most remarkable feature connected
with the ruined fortress, however, is that
at this late day, when the iron horse of
commerce makes Its mad race over its steel
rails within seven miles on Huajuapam de
Leon road and eighteen miles on the Inter-
oceanic; when American progress has en-
twined American rails around the base of
snowcapped Popocatepetl, near Ixtlaci
huatl. the two wonderful volcanoes not forty
miles distant from Mexico City, and not
moro than forty miles from the fortress,
there Is no written record Of its existence