yramids in the vallies of
the Euphrates and the Nile, and the idea appears to have reached
America without any deviation whatever in its relative position, or its
general design. It was every were, throughout America, as we find it,
in the vallies of Mexico and the Mississippi, erected in rich and level
vallies, or plains, and dedicated to idolatrous worship.

The mound builders of North America, north of the tropical latitudes,
appear like bad copyists of a sublime original. They retained the idea
of the oriental pyramid, but being no mechanics constructed piles of
earth to answer the ancient purpose, both of worship and interment. Our
largest structures of this kind, are the mound of Grave Creek in
Western Virginia, containing about three millions of cubic feet, and
the great group of the Monks of _La Trappe_ in Illinois, estimated at
seven millions of cubic feet.[12] Those of Saint Louis, mount Joliet,
and the Blue mounds respectively are now known to be of _geological_
origin.

[12] The central mound of this group has been cut through since
the date of my paper before the Ethnological Society, and proved
to be _artificial_.

But the Mexican and South American tribes built more boldly, and have
left several specimens of the pyramids, which deserve to be mentioned,
as well from the evidences they afford of mechanical skill, as from
their magnificent proportions, and their Nilotic power of endurance.
The pyramid of Cholula, in the valley of Mexico, exists in three vast
steps, retreating as they ascend, the highest of which was crowned with
a temple, whose base was one hundred and seventy-seven feet above the
plain. This is nine feet higher than that of Myrcerinus, the third of
the great group of Ghiza on the Nile; but its base of one thousand four
hundred and twenty-three feet, exceeds that of any edifice of the kind
found by travellers in the old world, and is double that of Cheops. To
realize a clear idea of its magnitude, we may imagine a solid structure
of earth, bricks and stone, which would fill the Washington parade
ground, squared by its east and west lines, and rising seventy-five
feet above the turrets of the New York University.

The pyramids of the empire of the Incas are not less remarkable. There
are at Saint Juan Teotihuacan, near lake Tezcuco, in the Mexican
valley, two very large antique pyramids, which were consecrated by the
ancient inhabitants to the Sun and Moon. The largest,