feet square and the height fifty-four feet. The pyramid is seven stories high and apparently solid, except the topmost story which contained interior departments. This crowning structure is now sadly dilapidated. Dupaix’s statement, copied by Humboldt, that the material of the pyramid is porphyry, cut in immense blocks, appears to be an error, since later exploration has revealed the fact that the pyramid was constructed of regularly cut blocks of sandstone laid in mortar, and coated with a hard, smooth cement, three inches thick. A stairway on the eastern front is divided as well as being guarded by solid stone balustrades.[531] For Nahua monuments of the purest type we naturally turn to Anahuac the home of Toltec and Aztec art during its most advanced period of development. But alas! the hand of the conqueror and the zeal of the fanatic have robbed irretrievably the antiquarian and the student of the history of architecture and art, of the best and noblest remains of that strangely interesting civilization. Our attention is naturally directed to the architecture of that ancient religious centre—Cholula—the origin of which, together with that of its great pyramid, we have described in a previous chapter. We have already seen that the prime object for erecting the immense pile, according to Duran, was the worship of the sun, and not to afford a refuge from a deluge as has been generally supposed. The pyramid of Cholula is situated in the eastern portion of a village to which it has given its name, and is reached by a ride of about ten miles westward from the city of Puebla de los Angelos. The magnificent temple upon its summit dedicated to Quetzalcoatl, fell a prey to the destroying vengeance of Cortez, who no doubt was enraged at the stubborn resistance with which he was met by the devoted natives, in a hard-fought battle at the foot and upon the slopes of the pyramid. Of the large number of descriptions, either made from personal observation or written from a comparison of accounts, none surpass that of Humboldt, which was the result of a careful survey, performed in 1803. Humboldt’s drawing, however, was a restoration and not a picture of the condition of the shrub-grown hill as he saw it.[532] The pyramid, according to Humboldt, measures at the base six hundred and thirty-nine metres or a trifle more than fourteen hundred and twenty-eight feet square; in other words, about forty-four acres. The base is shown by Humboldt to be more than twice as large as that of Cheops. Humboldt and Dupaix give its height as fifty-four metres or one hundred and seventy-seven feet; Mayer says it is two hundred and four feet; Tylor, two hundred and five feet, and Heller[533] states that its summit platform covers an area of 13,285 square feet. Its height is somewhat greater than that of the pyramid of Mycerinus. Humboldt compares it to a mass of brick, covering a square four times as large as the Place Vendôme and twice the height of the Louvre.