The Peruvian architecture, bearing also the general
characteristics of an imperfect state of refinement, had still
its peculiar character; and so uniform was that character, that
the edifices throughout the country seem to have been all cast in
the same mould. *25 They were usually built of porphyry or
granite; not unfrequently of brick. This, which was formed into
blocks or squares of much larger dimensions than our brick, was
made of a tenacious earth mixed up with reeds or tough grass, and
acquired a degree of hardness with age that made it insensible
alike to the storms and the more trying sun of the tropics. *26
The walls were of great thickness, but low, seldom reaching to
more than twelve or fourteen feet in height. It is rare to meet
with accounts of a building that rose to a second story. *27
[Footnote 25: It is the observation of Humboldt. "Il est
impossible d'examiner attentivement un seul edifice du temps des
Incas, sans reconnoitre le meme type dans tous les autres qui
couvrent le dos des Andes, sur une longueur de plus de quatre
cent cinquante lieues, depuis mille jusqu'a quatre mille metres
d'elevation au-dessus du niveau de l'Ocean. On dirait qu'un seul
architecte a construit ce grand nombre de monumens." Vues des
Cordilleres, p. 197.]
[Footnote 26: Ulloa, who carefully examined these bricks,
suggests that there must have been some secret in their
composition, - so superior in many respects to our own
manufacture, - now lost.
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