Incidents of Travel in Yucatan, Vol. I.

by John L. Stephens

The first place which we proposed visiting was the ruins of Xcoch, and in the very beginning of our researches in this neighbourhood we found that we were upon entirely new ground. The attention of the people had never been turned to the subject of the ruins in the neighbourhood. Xcoch was but a league distant, and, besides the ruins of buildings it contained an ancient poso, or well, of mysterious and marvellous reputation, the fame of which was in everybody's mouth. This well was said to be a vast subterraneous structure, adorned with sculptured figures, an immense table of polished stone, and a plaza with columns supporting a vaulted roof, and it was said to have a subterraneous road, which led to the village of Mani, twenty-seven miles distant.

Notwithstanding this wondrous reputation and the publicity of the details, and although within three miles of Nohcacab, the intelligence we received was so vague and uncertain that we were at a loss how to make our arrangements for exploring the well. Not a white man in the place had ever entered it, though several had looked in at the mouth, who said that the wind had taken away their breath, and they had not ventured to go in. Its fame rested entirely upon the accounts of the Indians, which, coming to us through interpreters, were very confused. By the active kindness of the padrecito and his brother, the new alcalde Segunda, two men were brought to us who were considered most familiar with the place, and they said that it would be impossible to enter it except by employing several men one or two days in making ladders, and, at all events, they said it would be useless to attempt the descent after the sun had crossed the meridian; and to this all our friends and counsellors, who knew nothing about it, assented. Knowing, however, their dilatory manner of doing business, we engaged them to be on the ground at daylight. In the mean time we got together all the spare ropes in the village, including one from the noria, and at eight o'clock the next morning we set out.

For a league we followed the camino real, at which distance we saw a little opening on the left, where one of our Indians was waiting for us. Following him by a narrow path just opened, we again found ourselves among ruins, and soon reached the foot of the high mound which towered above the plain, itself conspicuous from the House of the Dwarf at Uxmal, and which is represented in the engraving above. The ground in this neighbourhood was open, and there were the remains of several buildings, but all prostrate and in utter ruin.

The great cerro stands alone, the only one that now rises above the plain. The sides are all fallen, though in some places the remains of steps are visible. On the south side, about half way up, there is a large tree, which facilitates the ascent to the top. The height is about eighty or ninety feet. One corner of a building is all that is left; the rest of the top is level and overgrown with grass. The view commanded an immense wooded plain, and, rising above it, toward the southeast the great church of Nohcacab, and on the west the ruined buildings of Uxmal.

Returning in the same direction, we entered a thick grove, in which we dismounted and tied our horses. It was the finest grove we had seen in the country, and within it was a great circular cavity or opening in the earth, twenty or thirty feet deep, with trees and bushes growing out of the bottom and sides, and rising above the level of the plain. It was a wild-looking place, and had a fanciful, mysterious, and almost fearful appearance; for while in the grove all was close and sultry, and without a breath of air, and every leaf was still, within this cavity the branches and leaves were violently agitated, as if shaken by an invisible hand.

This cavity was the entrance to the poso, or well, and its appearance was wild enough to bear out the wildest accounts we had heard of it. We descended to the bottom. At one corner was a rude natural opening in a great mass of limestone rock, low and narrow, through which rushed constantly a powerful current of wind, agitating the branches and leaves in the area without. This was the mouth of the well, and on our first attempting to enter it the rush of wind was so strong that it made us fall back gasping for breath, confirming the accounts we had heard in Nohcacab. Our Indians had for torches long strips of the castor-oil plant, which the wind only ignited more thoroughly, and with these they led the way. It was one of the marvels told us of this place, that it was impossible to enter after twelve o'clock. This hour was already past; we had not made the preparations which were said to be necessary, and, without knowing how far we should be able to continue, we followed our guides, other Indians coming after us with coils of rope.

The entrance was about three feet high and four or five wide. It was so low that we were obliged to crawl on our hands and feet, and descended at an angle of about fifteen degrees in a northerly direction. The wind, collecting in the recesses of the cave, rushed through this passage with such force that we could scarcely breathe; and as we all had in us the seeds of fever and ague, we very much doubted the propriety of going on, but curiosity was stronger than discretion, and we proceeded. In the floor of the passage was a single track, worn two or three inches deep by long-continued treading of feet, and the roof was incrusted with a coat of smoke from the flaring torches. The labour of crawling through this passage with the body bent, and against the rush of cold air, made a rather severe beginning, and, probably, if we had undertaken the enterprise alone we should have turned back.

At the distance of a hundred and fifty or two hundred feet the passage enlarged to an irregular cavern, forty or fifty feet wide and ten or fifteen high. We no longer felt the rush of cold wind, and the temperature was sensibly warmer. The sides and roof were of rough, broken stone, and through the centre ran the same worn path. From this passage others branched off to the right and left, and in passing along it, at one place the Indians held their torches down to a block of sculptured stone. We had, of course, already satisfied ourselves that the cave or passage, whatever it might lead to, was the work of nature, and had given up all expectation of seeing the great monuments of art which had been described to us; but the sight of this block encouraged us with the hope that the accounts might have some foundation. Very soon, however, our hopes on this head were materially abated, if not destroyed, by reaching what the Indians had described as a mesa, or table. This had been a great item in all the accounts, and was described as made by hand and highly polished. It was simply a huge block of rude stone, the top of which happened to be smooth, but entirely in a state of nature. Beyond this we passed into a large opening of an irregular circular form, being what had been described to us as a plaza. Here the Indians stopped and flared their torches. It was a great vaulted chamber of stone, with a high roof supported by enormous stalactite pillars, which were what the Indians had called the columns, and though entirely different from what we had expected, the effect under the torchlight, and heightened by the wild figures of the Indians, was grand, and almost repaid us for all our trouble. This plaza lay at one side of the regular path, and we remained in it some minutes to refresh ourselves, for the closeness of the passage and the heat and smoke were becoming almost intolerable.

Farther on we climbed up a high, broken piece of rock, and descended again by a low, narrow opening, through which we were obliged to crawl, and which, from its own closeness, and the heat and smoke of the torches, and the labour of crawling through it, was so hot that we were panting with exhaustion and thirst. This brought us to a rugged, perpendicular hole, three or four feet in diameter, with steps barely large enough for a foothold, worn in the rock. We descended with some difficulty, and at the foot came out upon a ledge of rock, which ran up on the right to a great height, while on the left was a deep, yawning chasm. A few rude logs were laid along the edge of this chasm, which, with a pole for a railing, served as a bridge, and, with the torchlight thrown into the abyss below, made a wild crossing-place; the passage then turned to the right, contracting to about three feet in height and the same in width, and descending rapidly. We were again obliged to betake ourselves to crawling, and again the heat became insufferable. Indeed, we went on with some apprehensions. To faint in one of those narrow passages, so far removed from a breath of air, would be almost to die there. As to carrying a man out, it was impossible for either of us to do more than drag himself along, and I believe that there could have been no help from the Indians.