The steps or other means of access to this building are gone, and we reached it by clambering over fallen stones. The door opens upon the platform of the wall, overlooking the Tennis-court. The front corridor was supported by massive pillars, portions of which still remain, covered with elaborate sculptured ornaments. The lintel of the inner doorway is a beam of sapote richly carved. The jambs are partly buried, and above the rubbish appear sculptured figures with rich head-dresses, which anywhere else we should have considered it necessary to bring to light and copy; but between these jambs we enter an inner chamber, the walls and ceiling of which are covered, from the floor to the peak of the arch, with designs in painting, representing, in bright and vivid colours, human figures, battles, houses, trees, and scenes of domestic life, and conspicuous on one of the walls is a large canoe; but the first feeling of gratified surprise was followed by heavy disappointment, for the whole was mutilated and disfigured. In some places the plaster was broken off; in every part deep and malignant scratches appeared in the walls, and while individual figures were entire, the connexion of the subjects could not be made out. For a long time we had been tantalized with fragments of painting, giving us the strong impression that in this more perishable art these aboriginal builders had made higher attainments than in that of sculpture, and we now had proofs that our impression did them justice. The plate opposite represents detached portions of these paintings. The colours are green, yellow, red, blue, and a reddish brown, the last being invariably the colour given to human flesh. Wanting the various tints, the engraving, of course, gives only an imperfect idea of them, though, even in outline, they exhibit a freedom of touch which could only be the result of discipline and training under masters. But they have a higher interest than any that attaches to them as mere specimens of art; for among them are seen designs and figures which call forcibly to mind the well-known picture writings of the Mexicans; and if these analogies are sustained, this building attached to the walls of the Tennis-court stands an unimpeachable witness that the people who inhabited Mexico at the time of the conquest belonged to the same great race which furnished the builders of the ruined cities in Yucatan. [Engraving 51: The Castillo]