At any one ruin the characters for the same idea are alike, and alike to a marvelous degree. At another ruin the type is just a little different, but the fidelity to this type is equally great. Synonyms exist; that is, the same idea may be given by two or more utterly different signs. But a given sign is made in a fixed and definite way. Finally the MSS. are, I think, later than the stones. Hence the root of the matter is the interpretation of the stones, or not so much their full interpretation as the discovery of a _method of interpretation_, which shall be sure. Suppose, for example, that we know the meaning of a dozen characters only, and the way a half dozen of these are joined together in a sentence. The _method_ by which these were obtained will serve to add others to the list, and progress depends in such a case only on our knowledge of the people who wrote, and of the subjects upon which they were writing. Such knowledge and erudition belongs to the archaeologists by profession. A step that might take me a year to accomplish might be made in an instant by one to whom the Maya and Aztec mythology was familiar, if he were proceeding according to a sound method. At the present time we know nothing of the meaning of any of the Maya hieroglyphs. It will, therefore, be my object to go as far in the subject as I can proceed with certainty, every step being demonstrated so that not only the archaeologist but any intelligent person can follow. As soon as the border-land is reached in which proof disappears and opinion is the only guide, the search must be abandoned except by those whose cultivated and scientific opinions are based on knowledge far more profound and various than I can pretend or hope to have.