QUIRIGUA, STELA D, EAST SIDE.
I must own that it was a very great disappointment to me never once to catch sight of a monkey; their cry was often to be heard in the surrounding forest, and they were especially noisy about sunset; but they have become shy of the neighbourhood of clearings, and I could not bear the heat and toil of a scramble through the thick and thorny undergrowth to reach a spot from which they could be seen. However, one’s eyes never failed to find animals and insects well worth the watching, and, amongst them all, the parasol-ants were perhaps the most fascinating, as they passed along their well-worn tracks, each with a piece of green leaf or coloured flower about the size of a threepenny-bit held over its head. I had read Mr. Belt’s interesting description of their habits, and had learned how the leaves they so carefully cut from the trees are stored in subterranean galleries and used to form a sort of mushroom bed on which to grow the fungus which forms their principal food. We traced one of their pathways for some distance through the undergrowth until we reached their nest, a low mound three or four yards across, formed of the earth which had been thrown out when digging the galleries beneath, and a few blows on the ground with a stick soon brought out the fierce-looking hall-porters who guard the mouth of the burrows. My husband had on one occasion to place his camera on the top of one of these nests, as the only place from which a certain view could be taken. Going about his work as quietly as possible, he managed to get the focus adjusted before his presence was discovered, but whilst he was putting in the slide the ants swarmed up over him. He jumped away as soon as the plate had been exposed, and managed to brush them off his neck and hands, but fifty or sixty of the ants had fixed their strong nippers into the flannel of his shirt and trousers and refused to be shaken from their hold, and when he attempted to pull them off, the small body always came away between his thumb and finger, leaving the big head and nippers still fast to the flannel.
Note (by A. P. M.).—This was my fourth visit to the ruins of Quirigua. It was here that in 1881 I first made acquaintance with American antiquities. A native from the village guided me to the site of the ruins, but the undergrowth was so dense that we had some difficulty in finding any of the monuments, and even when within touch of them, so thickly were they covered with creepers, ferns, and moss, that it was not easy to distinguish them from dead tree-trunks. When the creepers and larger plants had been cleared off, the thick growth of moss still obscured the carving, and as we had come totally unprepared to meet this difficulty, some time was occupied in improvising scrubbing-brushes from bundles of the wiry midribs of palm-leaves. The final scrubbing was done with an ivory-backed hair-brush out of my dressing-bag; and I well remember the fire of chaff I was subjected to on my return home, when the wreck of that hair-brush was pounced upon by an old servant, who wanted to know “what Mr. Alfred could have been doing with his hair whilst he was in foreign parts!”
We slept only one night in the forest, and I cannot give a better instance of the denseness of the vegetation than by saying that I cleared a space for my camp cot on the south side of the monument marked A in the plan; yet it was only by chance that late in the following afternoon I became aware of the existence of the splendid Altar (marked B) within twelve yards of my sleeping-place. It was the unexpected magnificence of the monuments which that day came into view that led me to devote so many years to securing copies of them, which, preserved in the museums of Europe and America, are likely to survive the originals. In 1882 I spent a fortnight amongst the ruins and cleared enough of the forest to enable me to take a good set of photographs of the monuments, and returned again in 1883, accompanied by Mr. Giuntini, Mr. Charles Blockley, and the Lopez brothers, more thoroughly equipped for the work of exploration, and remained camped in the ruins for over three months. The following extract from a paper read before the Royal Geographical Society gives an account of the expedition:—
The ruins, which are completely hidden in a thick tropical forest, stand about three-quarters of a mile from the left bank of the river Motagua, and about five miles from the miserable little village of Quirigua, from which they take their name. They consist of numerous square or oblong mounds and terraces, varying from six to forty feet in height, some standing by themselves, others clustered in irregular groups. Most of these mounds were faced with worked stone, and were ascended by flights of stone steps.
The interest centres in the thirteen large carved monoliths which are arranged irregularly round what were probably the most important plazas. Six of these monuments are tall stones measuring three to five feet square, and standing 14 to 20 feet out of the ground; the other five are oblong or rounded blocks of stone shaped so as to represent huge turtles or armadilloes or some such animals. All these monuments are covered with elaborate carving; usually on both back and front of the tall monoliths there is carved a huge human figure standing full-face, and in a stiff and conventional attitude. The sides of the monuments are covered with tables of hieroglyphs, most of them in fairly good preservation. In addition to these tables of hieroglyphs there are series of squares or cartouches of what appears to be actual picture-writing, each division measuring about 18 inches square, and containing usually two or three grotesque figures of men and animals. The design of these picture-writings shows considerable variety and freedom of treatment as compared with that of the large-sized human figures, in the execution of which the artist seems to have been bound by conventional rules.
The largest of the stone animals is perhaps the most remarkable of all the monuments; its measurement is roughly a cube of eight feet, it must weigh nearly twenty tons, and it rests on three large slabs of stone. It is shaped like a turtle, and is covered with the most elaborate and curious ornament, and with tables of hieroglyphics and cartouches of picture-writing. The greater part of the ornament throughout these carvings is formed from the grotesque representations of the human face or the faces of animals, the features frequently so greatly exaggerated that it is most difficult to recognize them, but a careful examination enables one almost invariably to trace back to this facial origin what, at first sight, appears to be merely conventional scrollwork. Forms derived from leaves or flowers are altogether absent; occasional use is made of a plaited ribbon, and a very free use of plumes of feathers, which are often most gracefully arranged and beautifully carved. The fifteen monuments are divided into two groups; in one the figures are all those of men, in the other of women[1]. It might be rash to argue from this, that women had attained a high place in the social arrangement of the people who raised these monuments; but there is one other feature that certainly may be admitted as showing an advanced and peaceful condition of existence, and that is the entire absence of any representation of weapons of war.
The work of examining and copying the carvings at Quirigua was one of no small difficulty; it was necessary, after clearing away the thick undergrowth, to fell the forest trees, and after an interval of about ten days, to run fire through the clearing.
The earth round the monuments had to be cleared away usually to the depth of two or three feet, as, probably owing to floods from the river, the level of the ground had considerably altered since they were originally placed in position; a scaffold had then to be built round each monument and the carving subjected to a careful and thorough cleaning. This cleaning proved to be the most tedious part of the work, as the stone was always covered with thick and adhesive growths of moss and lichen. Two of the animal-shaped monoliths were almost completely buried under huge forest trees, which had grown exactly on the top of them, and it was only by a chance notice of some carved stone appearing between the roots that I became aware of their existence. I had one of these trees felled, but found the stones so much crushed and destroyed by the pressure of the roots that nothing remained worth moulding.