In course of time this worship may have been replaced by idolatrous rites, introduced by the barbarous or half civilized tribes which invaded the country, and implanted among the inhabitants their religious belief, their idolatrous superstitions and form of worship with their symbols. The monuments of Uxmal afford ample evidence of that fact. My studies, however, have nothing to do with the history of the country posterior to the invasion of the Nahualts. These people appear to have destroyed the high form of civilization existing at the time of their advent; and tampered with the ornaments of the buildings in order to introduce the symbols of the reciprocal forces of nature. The language of the ancient Mayas, strange as it may appear, has survived all the vicissitudes of time, wars, and political and religious convulsions. It has, of course, somewhat degenerated by the mingling of so many races in such a limited space as the peninsula of Yucatan is; but it is yet the vernacular of the people. The Spaniards themselves, who strived so hard to wipe out all vestiges of the ancient customs of the aborigines, were unable to destroy it; nay, they were obliged to learn it; and now many of their descendants have forgotten the mother tongue of their sires, and speak Maya only. In some localities in Central America it is still spoken in its pristine purity, as, for example, by the _Chaacmules_, a tribe of bearded men, it is said, who live in the vicinity of the unexplored ruins of the ancient city of _Tekal_. It is a well-known fact that many tribes, as that of the Itzaes, retreating before the Nahualt invaders, after the surrender and destruction of their cities, sought refuge in the islands of the lake _Peten_ of to-day, and called it _Petenitza_, the _islands of the Itzaes_; or in the well nigh inaccessible valleys, defended by ranges of towering mountains. There they live to-day, preserving the customs, manners, language of their forefathers unaltered, in the tract of land known to us as _Tierra de Guerra_. No white man has ever penetrated their zealously guarded stronghold that lays between Guatemala, Tabasco, Chiapas and Yucatan, the river _Uzumasinta_ watering part of their territory. The Maya language seems to be one of the oldest tongues spoken by man, since it contains words and expressions of all, or nearly all, the known polished languages on earth. The name _Maya_, with the same signification everywhere it is met, is to be found scattered over the different countries of what we term the Old World, as in Central America.