Bisbee daily review., 1906-07-01

ASSANAl bSNN0Sh AAlC AS1hAhuH OA huantepec and the boundaries of Gau- temala, and every one who goes down there is kept in a state of continual astonishment at the size and number of the stone buildings and the high degree of architectural merit repre- sented by them. l went about amazed at the skill, the taste, the labor and the ingenuity of the architects who designed and erected the temples and palaces and other buildings unnum- bered centuries ago. We do not know when these buildings were erected any more than we know who designed them. It is impossible to when or why the builders disappeared and how the arts in which they were so proficient came to be lost. At the time of the conquest they had al ready vanished and their descendants were in a state of decadence. It is the popular supposition that their dis appearance was the result of wars and dissensions among themselves. Possible epidemics may have had something to do with reducing the population. But we have no record, no evidence to sustain any theory. This rise and fall of nations since the beginning of time is often difficult to explain except on the general prin- ciple that progress is the law of na. ture; that If people do not advance they go backward, and that periods of growth alternate with periods of decadence. The rule applies to the prehistoric civilizations of Mexico and other countries of America as well as those of the old world.
 q saw so much in Chiapas and Yu- catan that I ceased to be astonished and no recent discoveries would sur prise me. l am willing to believe al most any report that may be brought out of the mountains of the isthmus and Chiapas concerning the grandeur and magnitude of abandoned cities, temples and palaces. I am prepared to accept the reports of the tie cutters to whom you hve referred. and l do not see any reason to reject their sto- ries as untrue or even exaggerated. The woods are full of ruins all througk that part of Mexico and the region in which the new discoveries were made is practically unknown. There may be more than one city in that locality as grand as Palenque. The forests are almost impenetrable. Nobody ever thinks of searching them, and the won derful things that are concealed by them are unknown to people who re- side in the immediate neighborhood.
 'Brassuer, a French archaeologist, who was down there not long ago, tells us that the country around the town of San Cristobal is filled with ruins and he predicts that remarkable things will be brought to light some day. San Cristobal was mentioned by the tie hunters who discovered the al legged city. as being the nearest town of importance. Brassuer refers to sev- eral ruins of which he obtained knowl- edge. He mentions the aboriginal town of Tonala, which you describe in your letter from the isthmus, and he says that 1t was. destroyed by Ava rado on his march to Guatemala after the conquest of Mexico. Brassuer says, The shapeless ruins are still visible on a hill near the Pacific. which l presume, are the same that you said were visited by MT. Cox, manager of the Pan-American Rail road.
 Few explorers have ever been in the Valley of the River Chiapas, whero the newly disC0vpl ed ruins are S@:i NO HSiNS DtSH tOulli OlSNSuS anu Otll- CT explorers passed either to the right or the left of il in following the trails and hence they overlooked everything that is concealed in the mighty jungles and forests that cover the valleys and mountain sides. We have no knowl- edge of anything that exists in those juuSles, except what has come to us by such rumors as you have reported. 'Palenque is a type of those ruined cities-perhaps the best known an the most thoroughly explored. It is sit | uated in the State of Chiapas, on the l northern slope, toward the Gulf of Mexico, and at one time undoubtedly
 was the capital of large and prosper
 OuS nation. much farther advanced 1 in civilization than the people who occupy the same territory at the pres
 ent day. Its period of greatest pros perity and advancement was many centuries before the coming of the ! SpaniardS. Palenque was already in ruins when CorteZ passed near by ] without even hearing a rumor of il, ! which would have been impossible if ! it had been live city at that time. 1 The ruins were doubtless more or less | familiar to the inhabitants. but had | become commonplace to them, and 1 they no longer talked about them or cared for them. There is no local in,
 terest in the ruins of Palenque now except so far as the visits of strangers excite curiosity and furnish employ
 ment to the people. They have nc traditions concerning PalenQue. When
 We talked about the ruins to the most intelligent of the inhabitants of the neighborhood they showed the utmost indifference except so far as our own personal movements were concerned Palenque was an object of interest fol the time being simply because a party of Americanos had come down there to explore and wanted to employ mer
 and horses and purchase supplies. The
 unwTitten records of the past did not appeal to them at all. -.-. 'PaleIque is in the midst Of a typ ical, tropical forest of the most won
 deTful kind. The growth of yegeta
 tion is so dense and so rapid that il eight or ten years the ruins are com pletely concealed by it. It has beer cut away number Of times WI were there ten years ago, but if yol | -E.