The American Egypt: A Record of Travel in YucatanThis volume contains a travelogue on the Yucatan written by two Englishmen who journeyed there in the 1890s. |
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ancient appear archæological Aztecs believe birds Boro Budor Buddhist building built cacique called carved Cedral cenote Central America centre centuries Chichen Chichen Itza chief civilisation coast colour Copan Cozumel Cruz D. G. Brinton Diaz doorways east eyes face feet high feet long feet wide figures forest girls glyphs green grey Guatemala hacienda hammocks hand head henequen hieroglyphics horses houses huge huts inches Indian island Itza Jefe Kabah Labna land lived look Maya Mayan Mayapan Merida Mexican Mexico Mexico City miles mound natives never night once ornamentation painted palace Palenque Peninsula plaza priests probably pyramid Quirigua race reached round ruins Señor side Spaniards Spanish stand stelae Stephens stone suggested tapir temple Tizimin to-day Toltec tortillas town trees tribes tropic Uxmal Vera Cruz village walls women wonderful woodland woods yards Yucatan Yucatecan
Popular passages
Page 104 - They say the Lion and the Lizard keep The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep: And Bahrain that great Hunter — the Wild Ass Stamps o'er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep.
Page 268 - In the course of many years' residence on the frontiers, including various journeyings among the tribes, I have had frequent occasion to remark the use of the hand alone as a symbol, but it has generally been a symbol applied to the naked body after its preparation and decoration for sacred or festive dances. And the fact deserves...
Page 94 - ... his hip, which was look'd upon among them as the greatest dexterity; and to this effect, that the ball might rebound the better, they fastned a piece of stiff leather on their hips. They might strike it every time it rebounded, which it would do several times one after another, in so much that it look'd as if it had been alive.
Page 95 - On the side walls they fix'd certain stones, like those of a mill, with a hole quite through the middle, just as big as the ball, and he that could strike it through there won the game...
Page 343 - In matters of commerce, the fault of the Dutch Is giving too little and asking too much; With equal advantage the French are content: So we'll clap on Dutch bottoms a twenty per cent.
Page 288 - Near here on the road to the city of San Pedro, in the first town within the province of Honduras, called Copan, are certain ruins and vestiges of a great population and of superb edifices, of such skill and splendor that it appears they could never have been built by the natives of that province.
Page 268 - This use of the hand is not 41 confined to a single tribe or people. I have noticed it alike among the Dacotahs, the Winnebagoes, and other Western tribes, as among the numerous branches of the red race still located east of the Mississippi River, above the latitude of 42 degrees, who speak dialects of the Algonquin language.
Page 94 - The balls made thereof, though hard and heavy to the hand, did bound and fly as well as our footballs...
Page 207 - ... or what they knew or had heard from their ancestors concerning them. But they had no books relating to their antiquities, nor do I believe that in all this district there is more than one, which I possess. They say that in ancient times there came from Yucatan a great lord, who built these edifices, but that at the end of some years he returned to his native country, leaving them entirely deserted.
Page 224 - this city was distinctly visible. He was then young, and " with much labour climbed to the naked summit of the " Sierra, from which, at a height of ten or twelve thousand " feet, he looked over an immense plain, extending to " Yucatan and the Gulf of Mexico, and saw at a distance a " large city spread over a great space, and with turrets white