Bretagne and the northwest of France. So thoroughly has the religion of Baal been fastened upon the peoples of these regions that portions of them at this day salute the arrival of the Summer Solstice, June twenty-fourth, with burning fires, the precise meaning of which is forgotten, but through those fires in all the early portions of the present century the inhabitants have jumped with their little ones in their arms, as the phrase goes, on Saint John’s eve, “for luck.” The wizard of the north, Sir Walter Scott, in his song entitled “Hail to the Chief,” in the Lady of the Lake, has the following when speaking of “Clan Alpines Pine”:

“Ours is no saplin,
Chance sown by the fountain,
Blooming at Beltane,” (Baaltime)
“In winter to fade.”

Indeed the literary men of Scotland very generally call the Summer Solstice the Beltane. One of the finest of the smaller towns in England even to this day bears the name of Belper, (i. e. Baalpeor.)

They built that wonderful prehistoric open air temple, still standing upon Salsbury Plain, and bearing the name of Stonehenge, the most wonderful monument now standing upon the earth’s surface. They built several other circular open air temples in the British Islands, and conspicuously among them, away up in the Orkneys, above Scotland, a very perfect and beautiful one called the “Standing Stones of Stennes.”

They visited the Azore Islands, west of Gibraltar, out in the Atlantic ocean, and as we learn by Chateaubriand’s Outretombe, Phœnician coin in the last century was found scattered in the soil of these Islands. A man who carries his eyes about him will rarely enter a large Irish assembly, or an assembly of Canadian Frenchmen whose blood comes principally from Bretagne, without noticing here and there a swarthy complexion surrounding intensely bright flashing eyes which speak of Spain and Carthage and the blood of warmer climes.

About one thousand years before Christ, Solomon, the Prince of Israel, resolved to build a temple to the God of Abraham which should exhibit on Mount Zion architectural skill and beauty such as the world had never seen. The construction of that erection was intrusted entirely to the people of Phœnicia; everything was perfected at Tyre so completely that “no hammer or instrument of iron sounded upon the building” after its component parts reached the Mount of God. Even the basins that were to be used in the Lord’s house were constructed by the artizans of Phœnicia.

IS THERE ANY EVIDENCE EXISTING UPON THE WESTERN CONTINENT SHOWING OR TENDING TO SHOW WHENCE THE PEOPLE WHO ERECTED THE PREHISTORIC STRUCTURES ON THE WESTERN CONTINENT CAME?

FIRST.

The soil, climate and productions of the Peninsula of Yucatan, and that part of Mexico and Guatemala where these prehistoric remains are found, are precisely what are described by the European writers who speak of the beauty, the loveliness and the grandeur of the Hesperides and the homes founded by eastern adventurers beyond the western ocean.

SECOND.

The prehistoric structures found in those regions and in neighboring regions are all built on plans and patterns borrowed from lands bordering the Mediterranean Sea, although the structures seem to have followed verbal descriptions rather than exact mechanical patterns.

All of these structures north of Panama seem to have been erected for public purposes, and probably in connection with the offices of some form of religion; and every structure of them, of which any appreciable portion is standing, is built upon or in connection with pyramids as perfectly pyramidal and regularly constructed as were the pyramids of ancient Egypt. Most of these pyramids, however, are mere earth mounds, instead of being constructed of brick or stone as were those upon the banks of the Nile. Let us refer to a few of the localities where these pyramidal structures are most conspicuous.

At Copan, situate at the western border of Honduras, and by the side of the river Copan, is a large enclosure, some two miles in extent, bounded upon the one side by the Copan river, on the bank of which are walls of beautiful cut and fitted stone rising to the height of fifty to one hundred feet, designed to keep the earth upon that side of the river from being carried away by floods. This river at this place constitutes one side of a tract of land laid out nearly in a square, along the outer sides of which, at regular intervals, are constructed, and still remaining, a very large number of pyramids made of hewn stone evidently designed to outline this extended sacred field.

This field within, is ornamented with a wealth of statuary, monuments and figures of idols, practically inconceivable in amount; but we count this statuary of no importance now, as we are confining our attention to the tendency of this prehistoric people to erect pyramids. For a fuller account of this locality we refer to Stephens’ Travels in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan, Vol. 1, Chap. 8.

At Santa Cruz Del Quiche, within the State of Chiapas, Mexico, there exists a pyramid erected for defensive purposes, constructed of earth and terraced as it rises, of enormous proportions; upon its top is a regular fortification upon the top of which rises a pyramidal temple above the fortification. This structure is particularly described by Stephens in the work above quoted, in his second volume, chapter 10, page 161, &c.

At Occasingo in Chiapas, there is a conspicuous pyramid constructed of earth, of somewhat exalted proportions, upon the top of which is a small pyramidal temple having over its porch the ornamentation which is so common upon the temples of ancient Egypt, and occasionally seen in the land of Phœnicia, to wit: a winged globe wrought in stone. The globe itself has become loosened, and has dropped from its place upon the front of the temple but still rests upon the ground before it, while the wing to which it was attached remains in place upon the temple as perfect as when it was first wrought. For a description of these works at Occasingo, see Stephens’ second volume, chapter 15, page 258, &c.

The same sort of pyramidal structures remain in admirable preservation conspicuous at Palenque, in Chiapas, where an immense pyramid still exists standing in great perfection with an elegant temple upon its top. Pyramidal structures and shapings are found everywhere at Palenque. See Stephens’ Work, above quoted, vol. 2, chap. 20, page 337, &c.

At Uxmal, also in Chiapas, we have another exhibition of pyramidal structures with temples upon their tops. We refer again to the same work of Stephens, vol. 2, chap. 25, page 420, &c.

These remains, to which we have referred, have far greater importance in our investigation than can be attached to the mere building of pyramidal structures. The wealth of sculpture found at the places referred to is immensely great and deserves the attention of scholars and thinking men to an extent greater than we can now devote to them.

In our view, the people who erected those structures possessed a knowledge and civilization far in advance of the population that surrounded them, and that the surrounding populations to a great degree imitated their examples and adopted their religion.

That, as we believe, led to the construction at Cholula, a little town now of ten thousand inhabitants, fifteen miles from Puebla, on the road leading from Vera Cruz to Mexico, on the plains of Anahuac, at the height of 6912 feet above the sea, of that immense