Dr. Arthur Schott ("Smith.  Rep.,” 1869, p. 391), in describing the “Cara Gigantesca,” or gigantic face, a monument of Yzamal, in Yucatan, says, “Behind and on both sides, from under the mitre, a short veil falls upon the shoulders, so as to protect the back of the head and the neck.  This particular appendage vividly calls to mind the same feature in the symbolic adornments of Egyptian and Hindoo priests, and even those of the Hebrew hierarchy.”  Dr. Schott sees in the orbicular wheel-like plates of this statue the wheel symbol of Kronos and Saturn; and, in turn, it may be supposed that the wheel of Kronos was simply the cross of Atlantis, surrounded by its encircling ring.

Painting.—­This art was known on both sides of the Atlantic.  The paintings upon the walls of some of the temples of Central America reveal a state of the art as high as that of Egypt.

Engraving.—­Plato tells us that the Atlanteans engraved upon pillars.  The American nations also had this art in common with Egypt, Phoenicia, and Assyria.

Agriculture.—­The people of Atlantis were pre-eminently an agricultural people; so were the civilized nations of America and the Egyptians.  In Egypt the king put his hand to the plough at an annual festival, thus dignifying and consecrating the occupation of husbandry.  In Peru precisely the same custom prevailed.  In both the plough was known; in Egypt it was drawn by oxen, and in Peru by men.  It was drawn by men in the North of Europe down to a comparatively recent period.

Public Works.—­The American nations built public works as great as or greater than any known in Europe.  The Peruvians had public roads, one thousand five hundred to two thousand miles long, made so thoroughly as to elicit the astonishment of the Spaniards.  At every few miles taverns or hotels were established for the accommodation of travellers.  Humboldt pronounced these Peruvian roads “among the most useful and stupendous works ever executed by man.”  They built aqueducts for purposes of irrigation some of which were five hundred miles long.  They constructed magnificent bridges of stone, and had even invented suspension bridges thousands of years before they were introduced into Europe.  They had, both in Peru and Mexico, a system of posts, by means of which news was transmitted hundreds of miles in a day, precisely like those known among the Persians in the time of Herodotus, and subsequently among the Romans.  Stones similar to mile-stones were placed along the roads in Peru. (See Prescott’s “Peru,”)

Navigation.—­Sailing vessels were known to the Peruvians and the Central Americans.  Columbus met, in 1502, at an island near Honduras, a party of the Mayas in a large vessel, equipped with sails, and loaded with a variety of textile fabrics of divers colors.

Ancient Irish vase of the bronze age

Manufactures.—­The American nations manufactured woollen and cotton goods; they made pottery as beautiful as the wares of Egypt; they manufactured glass; they engraved gems and precious stones.  The Peruvians had such immense numbers of vessels and ornaments of gold that the Inca paid with them a ransom for himself to Pizarro of the value of fifteen million dollars.