Courtesy of Harper & Brothers

Left panel of altar, Palenque

distinguished archæologist, Dr. Herbert Joseph Spinden of the Peabody Museum of Harvard University.

Dr. Spinden believes that those magnificent monuments to the vanity of dead priests and emperors were constructed by the direct ancestors of the present Mayas, or at least by a tribe closely related to those direct ancestors. He thinks, however, that the

particular tribe which created the glories of architecture and sculpture and which kept the secret of the hieroglyphs was absolutely wiped out by some great epidemic, probably an epidemic of yellow fever, which was very common in Central America for centuries until the organized campaign of the Rockefeller Foundation was launched against it.

This assumption of Dr. Spinden's would account for the complete absence of traditions among the present natives, whose ancestors may have come into Yucatan from other parts of Central America soon after the epidemic. This hypothesis also jibes with the almost certain modernity of the buildings. "Almost certain modernity," because, although all of these ruined structures are made of limestone, a very soft material, some of them are remarkably well preserved. Now, no one who has seen the effect of time on buildings of hard rock in other parts of the world, and no one who knows anything of the power of the upthrusting roots of a tropical jungle to break up the strongest buildings no one who knows these things can swallow the theory that these temples are five thousand or ten thousand years old. No one can do it unless he lets his imagination run away with his common sense. Just this is done by some good Americans living in Central America because they get more of a romantic thrill by believing that the buildings around them are ten thousand years old than by accepting the expert opinion that they have been built since the beginning of Christianity.

As a matter of fact, though, is n't it true that the younger these cities are, the more romantic is the veil of mys

tery which surrounds them? Is n't our ignorance of them much more remarkable if they were built at the time of the Norman Conquest than if they were built before the hieroglyphs were cut into the rock of Thebes? What more fascinating riddle could you want than is furnished by our ignorance of a great, almost contemporaneous civilization, a civilization more advanced in some ways than Europe was until nearly the seventeenth century, certainly more advanced in its knowledge of astronomy, even though the Mayas seem to have had no telescopes at all? The old Maya calendar, made by naked-eye observations of the heavens, was considerably more accurate than the Julian calendar, which prevailed in Europe at the time the first Spanish explorers set foot among the "barbarians" of Yucatan and Campeche. (Indeed, that same Julian calendar was maintained by Russia and Greece until recently.)

Well, you may ask, if we can understand the calendar of the highly cultivated race which left behind these ruins, is our ignorance of it so profound, after all?

No, our ignorance is not nearly so deep as it was only about thirty-five years ago, but our knowledge is still maddeningly incomplete. We can read perhaps forty per cent. of the discovered Maya characters. We can read their numerals and a few other glyphs, such as the signs for the sun, moon, and the seasons. That is to say, all the characters which we can read deal with the passage of time. Such pieces of the inscriptions or of the three extant Maya books of wood fiber as may deal with history we cannot read at all. Suppose that we could read a few dates in the history of the

Courtesy of Harper & Brothers

Right panel of altar, Palenque

United States such as 1776, 1860, and 1917, but that we knew absolutely nothing of the significance of these dates; suppose this, and you can comprehend the irritating situation in which science to-day envisages the work of further decipherment.

Once Champollion had discovered the famous Rosetta Stone, the mystery of the Egyptian glyphs was easily dis

had after a residence of only thirty days! And, more to the point, the horrible mule trail between the railroad and Chichen Itza was lately replaced by a first-class automobile road. Thus it is now possible to leave Merida, the capital of Yucatan, in the morning, visit Chichen during the day, and return to the capital the same night, and all in perfect comfort. The Governor of Yucatan has promised to complete within a few months another good road to connect Uxmal with the railroad from beautiful Merida. There is a regular service of one steamer a week from New York to Progreso by an American line, there is a Mexican line from Vera Cruz to Progreso, and there are occasional boats from New Orleans and other gulf ports. That Yucatan is now definitely on the tourist map is proved by the fact that one of the largest American tourist agencies has organized a regular winter tour to the land of the sacred serpent.

The opportunity to visit such a country must appeal to any one with a spark of romance in him. Although it is nearly a hundred years since the American explorer Stephens visited forty-four ruined cities to check up the reports of earlier chance discoveries, the surface of the Maya area has even yet been hardly more than scratched by exploration. There are vast areas yet unpenetrated by white men, and hardly a year goes by that some unheard-of city is not found. A good many of these successes must be attributed to the native chicleros, men who gather the chicle for the gum chewed in the United States. Dr. S. G. Morley of the Carnegie Institution has a standing reward out for any chiclero who stumbles on unknown archæological treasure, and already

"Edward H. Thompson began his explorations at Labna as early as 1888, and for several years worked in the vicinity of Labna exploring the caves of Loltun, the ruins of Chacmultun and others. others. Afterwards he started in work at Chichen Itza, where he continued in active service for many years.

"This archæological work in northern Yucatan seems to have had its first impetus in the support which Stephen Salisbury gave to Le Plongeon, but in 1888 Mr. Charles P. Bowditch of Boston visited Yucatan and was so impressed by the ruins that during the rest of his life he greatly inspired exploration and research. The only serious rival to the United States in these beginnings was the great expedition resulting in the rise to the Biologia Centrali-Americana of Godman and Salvin. For this great undertaking Alfred P. Maudslay covered the archæology, exploring Chichen Itza, Copan, Quirigua, Yaxchilan, etc., and published his results in a four-volume atlas. The drawings of hieroglyphic inscriptions given by Maudslay made it easy to work out some of the tantalizing problems of the calendar.

"Intensive exploration and excavation was carried on at Copan, in

western Honduras, for several years (1891-95) under charge of J. G. Owen, who died in the field, and of George Byron Gordon. Marshall H. Saville assisted in early work at Yucatan as well as in the work at Copan. In 1896-97 the caves near Copan were explored as well as interesting remains in the lower valley. This was due to the stopping of the work at Copan when a new Honduranian government rode into power.

"Theoberto Maler, a stranded soldier of Maximillian, carried out field explorations for the Peabody Museum in the department of Peten, Guatemala, and along the great regions of the Usumacinta system. These resulted in splendid photographic records of the monuments at Seibal, Piedras Negras, Yaxchilan, Tikal, and many other sites. This was mostly done between 1898 and 1904. "Alfred M. Tozzer, after carrying on studies for several years among the

Lacondones, the wild Mayan tribe in the depth of the forests, began archæological work in the department of Peten with R. H. Merwin. The great ruin of Tikal was mapped and explorations conducted in a number of smaller sites. This work was carried on by R. H. Merwin, Clarence L. Hay, and Carl Bishop. The chicle trails of Peten were threaded in a search for ruined cities. Some of these explorations centered around Holmul, Nakum, and the fine site of Rio Beque in the southern part of Mexico, territory of Quintana Roo.

"Acting more or less as free-lances, but in the interests of the Peabody Museum, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel K. Lothrop have visited out-of-the-way parts of the Mayan area. To their efforts we are indebted for a map of the fortified city of Tenampua, in central Honduras, and to comparative studies extending into Nicaragua and Costa Rica."

A few years ago Dr. Morley and Dr. Spinden made a trip into the valley of the Usumacinta River, and, as the latter modestly puts it, "were fortunate in finding a considerable number of new monuments with dates upon them." And in 1921 Dr. Spinden himself, to quote his letter again, "went into the very heart of the Yucatan Peninsula, exploring the region of Aguada Carolina, which is situated several days' travel south of the last Indian village, Xkanha. On this exploration three or four sites with important decorative temples were found and innumerable remains of lesser sites. In this region there are perhaps 15,000 square miles of territory which needs to be thoroughly explored, and there are doubtless ruined cities awaiting the successful explorer. It is my hope that the Peabody Museum will continue to work in this new field. . . During this last winter [1923] I was able to visit northern Yucatan and carry out a reconnaissance into northern Honduras. Here remains of an interesting people allied to the Mayas was discovered. There were no great temples of stone, but there were vestiges of special interest to imaginative archæologists.'

Between Florida and Cuba and again between the western tip of Cuba and the eastern tip of the Peninsula of Yucatan is only about a hundred miles of open water, nothing to daunt many a stout cruising yacht of the sort that dawdles out the winter off Florida beaches. That east coast of Yucatan and the turtle-inhabited islands fringing it are dotted with the white-walled remains of what one of the Spanish discoverers described as "large villages" . which

"contained a great number of stone houses, with high towers." Gem of all the known relics left on that east coast by the wonderful builders who vanished into mystery stands Tuloom, which, as Stephens said, "rises on the brink of a high, broken precipitous cliff, commanding a magnificent ocean view, and a picturesque line of coast, being itself visible from a great distance at sea."

Within half a day's walk of that shore there may be any number of ruins whose discovery would enrich all science, all art. Yet since Grijalva manœuvered his clumsy, high-pooped vessels along that palm-green coast in 1518, even conspicuous Tuloom itself has been visited by only a few wanderers blown out of their track and by half a dozen American explorers. Surely it cannot be long before the attention of intrepid American mariners of the type which made famous the Spray, the Typhoon, the Sea Bird, and the Diablesse will turn to fascinating possibilities of combining cruising with exploration. The last great riddle of archæology is beckoning to them, for it is more easily approached by water than by land.

Coasting southward from Tuloom, such navigators will find bay after