STATISTICAL VII. Intendancy of Oaxaca. ANALYSIS. Tehuantepec, on the great road from Guatimala to Mexico. The vegetation is beautiful and vigorous throughout the whole province of Oaxaca, and especially half way down the declivity in the temperate region, in which the rains are very copious from the month of May to the month of October. At the village of Santa Maria del Tule, three leagues east from the capital, between Santa Lucia and Tlacochiguaya, there is an enormous trunc of cupressus disticha (sabino). of 36 metres* in circumference. This ancient tree is consequently larger than the cypress of Atlixco, of which we have already spoken, the dragonnier of the Canary Islands, and all the boababs (Adansonia) of Africa. But on examining it narrowly, M. Anza observes that what excites the admiration of travellers is not a single individual, and that three united truncs form the famous sabino of Santa Maria del Tule. The intendancy of Oaxaca comprehends two mountainous countries, which from the remotest times went under the names of Mixteca and Tzapoteca. These denominations, which remain to this day, indicate a great diversity of origin among the natives. The old Mixtecapan is now divided into upper and lower Mixteca (Mixteca *118 feet. Trans. STATISTICAL VII. Intendancy of Oaxaca. ANALYSIS. } alta y bara). The eastern limit of the former, which adjoins the intendancy of Puebla, runs in a direction from Ticomabacca, by Quaxiniquilapa, towards the South Sea. It passes between Colotopeque and Tamasulapa. The Indians of Mixteca are an active, intelligent, and industrious people. If the province of Oaxaca contains no monuments of ancient Aztec architecture equally astonishing from their dimensions as the houses of the gods (teocallis) of Cholula, Papantla, and Teotihuacan, it contains the ruins of edifices more remarkable for their symmetry and the elegance of their ornaments. The walls of the palace of Mitla are decorated with Grecques, and labyrinths in mosaic of small porphyry stones. We perceive in them the same design which we admire in the vases falsely called Tuscan, or in the frise of the old temple of Deus Redicolus, near the grotto of the nymph Egeria at Rome. I caused part of these American ruins to be engraved, which were very carefully drawn by Colonel Don Pedro de la Laguna, and by an able architect, Don Luis Martin. If we are justly struck with the great analogy between the ornaments of the palace of Mitla and those employed by the Greeks and Romans, we are not on that account to give ourselves lightly up to historical STATISTICAL ANALYSIS. VII. Intendancy of Oaxaca. hypotheses, on the possibility of the existence of ancient communications between the two continents. We must not forget, that under almost every zone (as I have elsewhere endeavoured to demonstrate) mankind take a pleasure in a rhythmical repetition of the same forms which constitute the principal character of all that we call Grecques*, meanders, labyrinths, and arabesques. The village of Mitla was formerly called Miguitlan, a word which means in the Mexican language a place of sadness. The Tzapotec Indians call it Leoba, which signifies Tomb. In fact the palace of Mitla, the antiquity of which is unknown, was, according to the tradition of the natives, as is also manifest from the distribution of its parts, a palace constructed over the tombs of the kings. It was an edifice to which the sovereign retired for some time on the death of a son, a wife, or a mother. Comparing the magnitude of these tombs with the smallness of the houses which served for abodes to the living, we feel inclined to say with Diodorus Siculus (lib. i. c. 51.) that there are nations who erect sumptuous monuments for the dead, because, *M. Zoega, the most profound connoisseur in Egyptian antiquities, has made the curious observation that the Egyptians have never employed this species of ornament. STATISTICAL } VII. Intendancy of Oaxaca. looking on this life as short and passing, they think it unworthy the trouble of constructing them for the living. The palace, or rather the tombs of Mitla, form three edifices symmetrically placed in an extremely romantic situation. The principal edifice is in best preservation, and is nearly 40 metres in length. A stair formed in a pit leads to a subterraneous apartment of 27 metres in length and 8† in breadth. This gloomy apartment is covered with the same Grecques which ornament the exterior walls of the edifice. But what distinguishes the ruins of Mitla from all the other remains of Mexican architecture, is six porphyry columns which are placed in the midst of a vast hall and support the cieling. These columns, almost the only ones found in the new continent, bear strong marks of the infancy of the art. They have neither base nor capitals. A simple contraction of the upper part is only to be remarked. Their total height is five metres; but their shaft is of one piece of amphibolous porphyry. Broken down fragments, for ages heaped together, conceal more than a third of the height of these columns. On uncovering them M. Martin found 131 feet. Trans. 16.4 feet. † 88 feet by 26. Trans. VOL. II. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS. VII. Intendancy of Oaxaca. ·} their height equal to six diameters, or 12 modules. Hence the symmetry would be still lighter than that of the Tuscan order, if the inferior diameter of the columns of Mitla were not in the proportion of 3:2 to their upper diameter. The distribution of the apartments in the interior of this singular edifice bears a striking analogy to what has been remarked in the monuments of Upper Egypt, drawn by M. Denon and the savans, who compose the institute of Cairo. M. de Laguna found in the ruins of Mitla curious paintings representing warlike trophies and sacrifices. I shall have occasion elsewhere (in the historical account of my travels) to return to these remains of ancient civilization. The intendancy of Oaxaca has alone preserved the cultivation ofcochineal (coccus caeti), a branch of industry which it formerly shared with the provinces of Puebla and New Galicia. The family of Hernan Cortez bears the title of Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca. The property is composed of the four villas del Marquesado and 49 villages, which contain 17,700 inhabitants. The most remarkable places of this province are: Oaxaca, or Guaraca, the ancient Huaxyacac, called Antequera at the |