lenge duration with eternity, not only on account of the solidity of their materials, but also of the sites on which they were erected, alike display their skill in sculpture, and their ambition for immortality. That they were extremely solicitous on this head, both with respect to the sculptures and the dead bodies, is attested by the multitude of mummies which, after a lapse of so many years, indeed, of so many ages, are to be found entire in the catacombs. The examination of them, may, perhaps, instruct us in the mode by which they contrived to secure them from putrefaction, and from the destructive hand of time[1].
The ruins of Pachacamac; the edifices of Cuzco and Quito; the fortresses of Herbay and Câxâhuana; and the roads cut through the middle of the Cordillera mountains, the one more especially, in the formation of which the most elevated hills were to be made level with the vallies[2], attest the skill of the ancient Indians in civil and military architecture.
The
- ↑ It is conjectured by some, that the Indians preserved the dead bodies, merely by exposing them to the action of frost. This supposition might be allowed, if these mummies were alone to be found in Sierra, and in the cold temperatures. But, on the other hand, they are to be met with in abundance, in catacombs dug out in the vallies, and in the warmer climates.
- ↑ The authors of the Encyclopedia, under the head of America, deny the exist-
supporting large unwieldy busts. They are situated on the declivities of mountains, and in spots so inaccesible, that, in their construction, both the materials and the workmen must have been lowered down by the means of strong cordage. They appear to have been the mausolea of certain caciques or principal people, who, being desirous to perpetuate their memory, endeavoured not only to secure these monuments from the ravages of time, by forming them of the most durable substance, by also from the rude attacks of man, by placing them where the precipice would prevent his approach.
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