"A few years ago (June, 1881), Mr. Aymé, the American Consul at Merida, visited Kabah and made a remarkable discovery. He found on one of the walls of a ruined building a rude painting of a man mounted on a horse. As the horse was unknown in Yucatan until after the arrival of the Spaniards, M. Charnay argues from this discovery that the ruins of Kabah are not of great antiquity, and that the painting was made during or since the Conquest by a native artist. On the other hand, Dr. Le Plongeon argues that the work is of very great age, and he refers to some of the hieroglyphics in proof of his belief.
"You can take your choice between two experts, one placing the age of the painting at less than 400 years, and the other at two or three thousand years and perhaps more. For our part we prefer to believe in the one who maintains that Kabah was an old city when the Romans built the Coliseum, and had begun to decay long before Mohammed founded the religion of Islam.
RUINED ARCH AT KABAH.
"We must not forget to mention a beautiful arch at Kabah which is wonderfully suggestive of the triumphal arches of the Romans and other European nations. It stands apart from the other structures, and this fact leads explorers to believe that it was built to commemorate an important event in the history of the people or of one of its rulers. The centre of the arch has fallen in, but the massive columns remain and show that it was firmly built. The arch is not the straight-sided one of the Mayas, but curves like the Greek and Roman arch. What a pity the crown is gone, so that we do not know whether it was built with a key-stone or not!
FAÇADE OF EL CASTILLO.