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"It took us three days, however, to procure a full supply of the proper kind of provisions for a fortnight's abode in the sky, an on the fourth, (May 5th,) we paid our formal respects to the Cura, and started for the ascent -- he not forgetting to remind us of the promise to report to him the precise geographical locality of our discovery."

The journal is again blank until May 9th, when the writer says, "Our altitude, by barometer, this morning, is over 6000 feet above the valley which we crossed three days ago; the view of it and its surrounding mountains, sublime with chasms, yet grotesque in outline, and all heavily gilded with the setting sun, is one of the most oppressively gorgeous I ever beheld. The guides inform us that we have but 3000 feet more to ascend, and point to the gigantic pinnacle before us, at the apparent distance of seven or eight leagues; but that, before we can reach it, we have to descend and ascend an immense barranca, (ravine,) nearly a thousand feet drop from our present level, and of so difficult a passage that it will cost us several days. The side of the mountain towards the north-west, is perfectly flat and perpendicular for more than half its entire height, as if the prodigious section had been riven down by the sword of the San Miguel, and hurled with his foot among the struggling multitude of summits below. So far, the old Padre is accurate in every particular." In a note opposite this extract, written perpendicularly on the margin of the manuscript, the writer says, "The average breadth of the plain on this ridge of the sierra, (that is the ridge on which they were then encamped for the night,) is nearly half a mile, and exhibits before us a fine rolling track as far as we can see. Neither birds, beasts, nor insects -- I would there were no such barranca!" On the tenth he says, "on the brink of the abyss -- the heaviest crags we can hurl down, return no sound from the bottom."

The next entry in the journal is dated May 15th. -- "Recovered the body of Sebastiano and the load of his mule; his brother is building a cross for his grave, and will not leave it until famished with thirst and hunger. All too exhausted to think of leaving this our first encampment since we descended. Present elevation but little above that of the opposite ridge which we left on the 11th, still, at least 3000 feet to climb." On the 19th, 4 o'clock, P. M., he records, "Myself, Sr. Hammond and Antonio, on the highest summit, an inclined plain of bare rock, of about fifteen acres. The Padre again right. Sr. Huertis and others just discernable, but bravely coming on. Elevation, 9,500 feet. Completely in the clouds, and all the country below invisible. Senor Hammond already bleeding at the nose, and no (?) to stop it." At 10 o'clock, the same night, he writes, "All comfortably asleep but myself and Sr. Hammond, who is going to take the latitude." Then follows, "He finds the latitude 15 degrees and 48 minutes north." Opposite this, in the margin is written, "the mean result of three observations of different stars. Intend to take the longitude to-morrow." Next day, the 20th, he says, "A bright and most auspicious morning, and all, but poor Antonio, in fine health and feeling. The wind by compass, N. E., and rolling away a billowy ocean of mist, toward, I suppose, the Bay of Honduras. Antonio says the Pacific will be visible within an hour; (present time not given) more and more of the lower mountains becoming clear every moment. Fancy we already see the Pacific, a faint yellow plain, almost as elevated as ourselves. Can see part of the State of Chiapas pretty distinctly." At 12 o'clock, meridian, he says, "Sr. Hammond is taking the longitude, but finds a difference of several minutes between his excellent watch and chronometer, and fears the latter has been shaken. Both the watch and its owner, however, have been a great deal more shaken, for the chronometer has been all the time in the midst of a thick blanker and has had no falls. Sr. Huertis, with the glass, sees whole lines and groups of pyramids, in Chiapas. At 1 o'clock, P. M. he records, "Sr. Hammond reports the longitude, 92 degree 15 minutes west. Brave Huertis is in ecstasy with some discovery, but will not part with the glass for a moment. No doubt it is the Padre's city, for it is precisely in the direction he indicated. Antonio says he can see it with his naked eye, although less -- distinctly than heretofore. I can only see a white straight line, like a ledge of limestone rock, on an elevated plain, at least twenty leagues distant; in the midst of a vast amphitheatre of hills, to the north east of our position, toward the State of Yucatan. Still, it is no doubt the place the Padre saw, and it may be a great city."

At 2 o'clock P. M., he says "All doubt is at an end! We have all seen it through the glass, as distinctly as though it were but a few leagues off, and it is now clear and bright to the unaided eye. It is unquestionably a richly monumented city, of vast dimensions, within lofty parapetted walls, three or four miles square, inclined inward in the Egyptian style, and its interior domes and turrets have an emphatically oriental aspect. I should judge it to be not more than twenty-five leagues from Ocosingo, to the eastward, and nearly in the same latitude; and this would probably be the best point from which to reach it, travelling due east, although the course of the river Legartos seems to lead directly to it. That it is still an inhabited place, is evident from the domes of its temples, or churches. Christian churches they cannot be, for such a city would have an Archbishop and be well known to the civilized world. It must be a Pagan strong-hold that escaped the conquest by its remote position, and the general retreat, retirement, and centralizing seclusion of its surrounding population. It may now be opened to the light of the true faith."