village. When Mr. Poinsett visited it during his residence in Mexico as Envoy from the United States, he observed no relic of the past worthy of examination or record except the fragment of a pillar represented in the annexed drawing.
# THE PYRAMID OF XOCHICALCO.
About eighteen miles south of Cuernavaca, in the State of Mexico, there is a cerro or hill, known as Xochicalco or the "hill of flowers," whose summit is occupied by the remains of an ancient stone pyramid. The traveller reaches this eminence after travelling over a wide plain intersected by deep barrancas, and almost entirely denuded of trees and shrubbery. The base of this hill is surrounded by the remains of a deep wide ditch, and its top is attained by five spiral terraces, supported by walls of stone joined with cement. At suitable distances from each other, along the edge of this winding path are the remains of bulwarks fashioned like the bastions of a fortification. On the summit there is a wide extensive level, the eastern part of which is occupied by three truncated cones, resembling the smaller mounds found among the pyramids of Teotihuacan. On the other three sides of the esplenade there are other masses of stones, which may have also been portions of similar tumuli. The stones of which these lesser mounds were constructed have evidently been nicely shaped and covered with a coat of stucco.
Passing upward, amid tangled trees and vines, along the last terrace, and through the cornfield which is cultivated on the plain at top by an Indian