The last day we returned from the ruins earlier than usual, and stopped at the campo santo. In front stood a noble seybo tree. I had been anxious to learn something of the growth of this tree, but had never had an opportunity of doing it before. The cura told me that it was then twenty-three years old. There could be no doubt or mistake on this point. Its age was as well known as his own, or that of any other person in the village. The following woodcut represents this tree. The trunk at the distance of five feet from the ground measured 17 1-2 feet in circumference, and its great branches afforded on all sides a magnificent shade. We had found trees like it growing on the tops of the ruined structures at Copan and Palenque, and many had for that reason ascribed to the buildings a very great antiquity. This tree completely removed all doubts which I might have entertained, and confirmed me in the opinion I had before expressed, that no correct judgment could be formed of the antiquity of these buildings from the size of the trees growing upon them. Remarkable as I considered this tree at that time, I afterward saw larger ones, in more favourable situations not so old. [Engraving 18: Seybo Tree] The campo santo was enclosed by a high stone wall. The interior had some degree of plan and arrangement, and in some places were tombs, built above ground, belonging to families in the village, hung with withered wreaths and votive offerings. The population tributary to it was about five thousand; it had been opened but five years, and already it presented a ghastly spectacle. There were many new-made graves, and on several of the vaults were a skull and small collection of bones in a box or tied up in a napkin, being the remains of one buried within and taken out to make room for another corpse. On one of them were the skull and bones of a lady of the village, in a basket; an old acquaintance of the cura, who had died within two years. Among the bones was a pair of white satin shoes, which she had perhaps worn in the dance, and with which on her feet she had been buried.