I have said that we were somewhat excited by the first view of the facade of this building. Ascending the steps and standing in the doorway of the centre apartment, we broke out into an exclamation of surprise and admiration. At Uxmal there was no variety; the interiors of all the apartments were the same. Here we were presented with a scene entirely new. The plate opposite represents the interior of this apartment. It consists of two parallel chambers, the one in front being twenty-seven feet long and ten feet six inches wide, and the other of the same length, but a few inches narrower, communicating by a door in the centre. The inner room is raised two feet eight inches higher than the front, and the ascent is by two stone steps carved out of a single block of stone, the lower one being in the form of a scroll. The sides of the steps are ornamented with sculpture, as is also the wall under the doorway. The whole design is graceful and pretty, and, as a mere matter of taste, the effect is extremely good. Here, on the first day of our arrival, we spread out our provisions, and ate to the memory of the former tenant. His own domains could not furnish us with water, and we were supplied from the wells of Nohcacab. In the engraving but one doorway appears on each side of the centre, the front wall at the two ends having fallen. On both sides of this centre doorway were two other doorways opening into apartments. Each apartment contains two chambers, with the back one raised, but there are no steps, and the only ornament is a row of small pilasters about two feet high under the door, and running the whole length of the room. Such is a brief description of the facade and front apartments, and these formed not more than one third of the building. At the rear and under the same roof were two ranges of apartments of the same dimensions with those just described, and having a rectangular area in front. The whole edifice formed nearly a square, and though having less front, with a great solid mass nearly as thick as one of the corridors, for the centre wall, it covered nearly as many square feet as the Casa del Gobernador, and probably, from its lavishness of ornament, contained more sculptured stone. The rest of the building, however, was in a much more ruinous condition than that presented. At both ends the wall had fallen, and the whole of the other front, with the roof, and the ruins filled up the apartments so that it was extremely difficult to make out the plan. The whole of the terrace on this latter side is overgrown with trees, some of which have taken root among the fragments, and are growing out of the interior of the chambers. [Engraving 41: Rankness of Tropical Vegetation]