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A PUEBLO GIEL SELLING CLAY IMAGES, 
 (From a sketch by Gen. Wallace. ) 
 
THE LAND OF THE 
 
 PUEBLOS. 
 
 y 
 
 SUSAX E. WALLACE. 
 Author of •• The Storied Sea,'' '* Ginevra" etc. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTR.VnONS. 
 
 m 20 i8^.' r> / 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 JOHN B. ALDEN, PUBLISHER 
 
 1888. 
 

 Pc- 
 
 Copyrij-ht, 1888. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE PROVIDENT, BOOK COMPANY 
 
THE LAND OF THE PUEBLOS. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Introduction. - - - 6 
 
 I. Tlie Journey. - - 7 
 
 11. Historic. - - - 14 
 
 III. Laws and CustomSo - 37 
 
 lY. The City of the Pueblos. - 53 
 
 Y. Mexican Cottages. - - 62 
 
 YI. To the Turquois Mines. - 69 
 
 YII. To the Turquois Mines, continued. 80 
 
 YIII. To the Turquois Mines, continued. 93 
 
 IX. To the Turquois Mines, continued. lUl 
 
 X. Among the Archives. — Things 
 
 IN'ewandOld. - - 108 
 
 XL Among the Archives. — A Love 
 
 Letter. - - - 114 
 
 XII. Among the Archives, continued. 121 
 
 XIII. Among the Archives, continued. 127 
 
 XI Y. Among the Archives, continued. 134 
 
 XY. The Jornada Del Muerto. - 140 
 
 XYI. Something about the Apache. 152 
 
 XYIL Old Miners. - - 160 
 
 XYIII. The New Miners. - - 167 
 
 XIX. The Honest Miner. - 175 
 
 XX. The Assayers. - - - 180 
 
 XXL The Euby Silver Mine.~A True 
 
 Story. - - - 188 
 
 XXII. The Euby Silver Mine, continued. 196 
 
 XXIIL Mine Experience. - - 203 
 
 XXIY. The Euins of Montezuma's Palace. 218 
 
 XXY. To the Casas Grandes. - - 234 
 
 XX VL A Frontier Idyl. - - 248 
 
 XXYII. The Pimos. - - - 261 
 
 ^ 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTEATIOKS. 
 
 A Pueblo Girl Selling Clay ImageB, Frontispiece 
 
 El Palacio, Santa Fe, - - - - 14 
 
 Living Pueblo (New Mexico), - - - 44 
 
 Zuni War Club, Dance Ornaments, etc., - - 46 
 
 Zuiii Basketry, and Toy Cradles, - - 130 
 
 Zuni Water Vases, - - - - - 132 
 
 Navajo Indian, with Silver Ornaments, - 154 
 
 Zuiii Effigies, - - - - - 200 
 
 Tesuke Water Vases, - - - - 234 
 
 Abandoned Pueblo, - - - - - 288 
 
 Zuni Paint and Condiment Cups, - - 244 
 
 Pueblo Wristlets, Moccasins, etc., - - - 246 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Some years ago these writings appeared in the 
 Independent, Atlantic Monthly, and The Tribune. 
 My thanks are with the respective editors by 
 whose courtesy they assume this altered shape. 
 Several were published in a certain magazine 
 which died young. I send cordial greeting to its 
 chief, and shed a few drops of ink over the name- 
 less one, loved of the gods. Fain would I believe 
 no action of mine had power to hasten that early 
 and untimely end. The hurrying march in 
 which all must join, is so rapid, my first audience 
 is quite out of hearing ; my first inklings have 
 faded from the memory of readers except the 
 one, beloved of my soul, who asks why the old 
 Pueblo papers have not been reprinted. Ah, 
 what exquisite flattery ! 
 
 And just here I kiss the fair hands unseen 
 which send such gracious messages. Dropping 
 flowers in my way, pansies for thoughts, rosemary 
 for remembrance, has made them the whiter and 
 sweeter forevermore. 
 
 The Montezuma myth is so interwoven with 
 the past and future of the Indians that every allu- 
 sion to their history and religion must of neces- 
 sity contain the revered name. The repetition 
 in the compositions now collected did not appear 
 so glaringly when they were detached. My first 
 impulse was to omit such passages, but second 
 thought sends out the letters as when first offered 
 to the public, with all their imperfections (a good 
 many), on their head. 
 
 It would be affectation to make secret what 
 every writer understands : (and what reader have 
 I who is not a writer ?j the pleasure with which 
 
 5 
 
6 Introduction. 
 
 I gather my scattered children under a perma- 
 nent cover. Family resemblance is strong 
 enough to identify them anywhere, but that is no 
 reason why they should not appear in shape 
 which the world will little heed nor long remem- 
 ber. They were written when the ancient Palace 
 I have tried to describe, was the residence of the 
 Governor of New Mexico ; and, in turning the 
 leaves after seven years, I am touched by the 
 same feeling which then moved me to pipe my 
 little songs. Again I feel the deep solitude of 
 the mountains, taste the all pervading alkali dust, 
 and hear the sand-storm beating like sleet against 
 the window panes. The best revv^ard they 
 brought were friendly voices answering in the 
 blue distance across the Sierras, and cheering me 
 with thought that I had won the place of wel- 
 come visitor in happy homes my feet may never 
 enter; that through the bitter winter my room 
 was kept by warm firesides under the evening 
 lamp — there where the treasured books lie from 
 day to day, looking like Elia's old familiar faces. 
 Dear to the heart, beautiful and forever young, 
 are the unseen friends whose presence becomes 
 an abiding consciousness to the writer. 
 
 Crawfordsville, Indiana, March, 1888. 
 
THE UND OF THE PUEBLOS. 
 
 CHAPTER I, 
 
 THE JOURNEY. 
 
 I AM 6,000 feet nearer the sky than you are. 
 Come to the sweet and lonely valley in the West 
 where, free from care and toil, the weary soul 
 may rest ; where there are neither railroads, manu- 
 factures, nor common schools ; and, so little is 
 expected of us in the way of public spirit, we 
 almost venture to do as we please, and forget we 
 should vote, and see to it that the Republic does 
 not go to the "demnition bow-wows." 
 
 Santa Fe is precisely what the ancient Pueblos 
 called it — "the dancing -ground of the sun." The 
 white rays quiver like light on restless waters or 
 on mirrors, and night is only a shaded day. In 
 our summer camp among the foothills we need 
 no tents. It is glorious with stars of the first 
 magnitude, that hang low in a spotless sky, free 
 from fog, mist, or even dew ; not so much as a mote 
 between us and the shining floor of heaven. 
 
 The star-patterns of my coverlet are older than 
 the figures which delighted our grandmothers. 
 They come out not one by one, as in our skies ; 
 but flash suddenly through the blue. Day and 
 night make a brief parting. The short twilight 
 closes, and lo ! in the chambers of the east Orion, 
 belted with jewels, Arcturus and his sons, and 
 even the dim lost Pleiad, forgetting the ruins of 
 old Troy, brightens again. Wrapped in soft, 
 furry robes, we lie on the quiet bosom of Mother 
 Earth in sleep, dreamless and restful as the 
 slumber of those who wake in Paradise. I can- 
 
 7 
 
8 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 not say, with the enthusiastic land-speculator: 
 "Ladies and gentlemen, in this highly-favored re- 
 gion the Moon is always at its full." But her 
 face is so fair and bright I am her avowed adorer, 
 and many a thousand miles from 
 
 ' a ' the steep head of old Latmos," 
 
 she stoops above the sleeping lover, to kiss her 
 sweetest. 
 
 Old travelers tell you the country is like Pales- 
 tine; but it is like nothing outside of the Gar- 
 den eastward in Eden. New Mexico is a slice of 
 old Mexico ; that is, a western section of Spain. 
 " Who knows but you may catch sight of some 
 of your castles there ! " Such was the invitation 
 which came to me across the Rocky Mountains. 
 I hearkened to the voice of the " charmer, charm- 
 ing never so wisely," and, " fleeing from incessant 
 life," started on a journey of two thousand miles. 
 It was in the mild September, and the Mississipi 
 Valley flamed with banners crimson, golden, in 
 which Autumn shrouded the faded face of the 
 dead Summer. 
 
 We sped through Ohio, land of lovely women ; 
 past Peoria, fair Prairie City, the smoke of whose 
 twenty-three distilleries obscures the spires of her 
 churches beautiful as uplifted hands at prayer ; 
 through the bridge at St. Louis, where the fairies 
 and giants once worked together, making a cross- 
 ing over the great Father of Waters; on we 
 went, journeying by night and by day. 
 
 Oh ! the horror of the chamber of torture 
 known to the hapless victims as the sleeping-car. 
 The gay conductor, in gorgeous uniform, told us, 
 in an easy, off-hand manner, a man had been 
 found dead in one of the top berths some weeks 
 before. I only wondered any who ventured there 
 cam 3 out alive. " Each in his narrow cell for- 
 ever laid " went through my mind as I lay down 
 
The Journey. 9 
 
 to wakefulness and unrest in blankets filled with 
 vermin and disease. The passengers were the 
 same you always journey with : the young couple, 
 tender and warm; the old couple, tough and 
 cool ; laughing girls, in fluffy curls and blue rib- 
 bons, who found a world of pleasure in pockets 
 full of photographs ; the good baby, that never 
 cried, and the bad baby, that cried at nothing ; 
 the fussy woman everybody hated, who counted 
 her bundles every half hour, wanted the window 
 up, and no sooner was it raised than she wanted 
 it down again. There, too, was the invalid in 
 every train on the Pacific Road. A college grad- 
 uate of last year, poor, ambitious, crowded four 
 years' study into three, broke down, and now the 
 constant cough tells the rest of the old tale. He 
 was attended by a young sister, warm and rosy 
 as he was pallid and chill, who in the most ap- 
 pealing way took each one of us into her confi- 
 dence, and told how Rob had picked up every 
 step of the road since they left Sandusky. When 
 we entered the wide, monotonous waste between 
 Missouri and Colorado, how the brave girl would 
 try to cheer the boy with riddles, stories, games, 
 muffle him in her furs, slap his cold hands, and 
 lay her red, ripe cheek to his, as if she were 
 hushing a baby. In the drollest way, she resist- 
 ed the blandishments of the vegetable ivory 
 man, the stem-winder, the peanut vender, and 
 with tragic gesture waved off the peddler of the 
 " Adventures of Sally Maclntire, who was Cap- 
 tured by the Dacotahs. A Tale of Horror and of 
 Blood!" When the dazzling conductor illumi- 
 nated the passage of the car with his Kohinoor 
 sleeve-buttons and evening-star breastpin, he 
 would stop beside the sick boy, and in a fresh, 
 breezy way seemed to throw out a morning 
 atmosphere of bracing air, as well as hopeful 
 words. "Now," he would say, twirling his 
 
lo The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 thumb in a Pactolian chain which streamed across 
 his breast and emptied into and overflowed a 
 watch-pocket bulgy with poorly hid treasure — 
 " now we are coming to a place fit to live in. 
 When you get to Pike's Peak, you will be 7,000 
 feet above the level of the sea. It's like breath- 
 ing champagne. You'll come up like a cork ; 
 keep house in a snug cottage ; go home in the 
 Spring so fat you can hardly see out of your 
 eyes." Vain words. The poor boy knew, and 
 we knew, he was fast nearing the awful shadow 
 which every man born of woman must enter 
 alone. The mighty hand was on him. He was 
 going to Colorado Springs only to die. We 
 parted at La Junta, crowding the windows, gayly 
 waving good-byes. I can never forget my last 
 sight of the sweet sister, with her outspread 
 shawl sheltering him from the crisp wind, which 
 blew from every direction at once, as I have seen 
 a mother-bird flutter round her helpless nestlings. 
 The good baby held up its sooty, chubby hand 
 saying, "■ ta, ta," as long as they were in sight, 
 and the mothers smiled tearfully to each other 
 when a rough miner from the Black Hills said, 
 softly, as if talking to himself: "I reckon, if 
 that young woman's dress was unbuttoned, wings 
 would fly out." 
 
 Five hundred miles across plains level as the 
 sea, treeless, waterless, after leaving the Arkan- 
 sas River. Part of our road lay along the old 
 California trail, the weary, weary way the first 
 gold-seekers trod, making but twenty miles a 
 day. Under ceaseless sunshine, against pitiless 
 wind, it is not strange that years afterward their 
 march was readily tracked by graves, not always 
 inviolate from the prairie wolf. The stiff buffalo- 
 grass rose behind the first explorers, and even 
 horses and cattle left no trail. They took their 
 course by the sun, shooting an arrow before 
 
The Journey. II 
 
 them ; before reaching the first arrow they shot 
 another ; and in this manner marched the entire 
 route up to the place where they found water 
 and encamped. 
 
 Occasionally we saw a herdsman's hut stand- 
 ing in the level expanse, lonely as a lighthouse; 
 nothing else in the blank and dreary desert but 
 the railroad track, straight as a rule, narrow as a 
 thread, and its attendant telegraph, precious in 
 our sight as a string of Lothair pearls. Not a 
 stick or stone in a hundred miles. Only the sky, 
 and the earth, clothed with low grass -like moss, 
 the stiff sage-brush, and a vile trailing cactus, 
 which crawls over the ground like hairy green 
 snakes. To be left in such a spot would be like 
 seeing the ship sail off leaving us afloat in fath- 
 omless and unknown seas. 
 
 After a day seeming long as many a month 
 has, the fine pure air of Colorado touched with 
 cooling balm our tired, dusty faces ; and against 
 the loveliest sunset sky, in a heavenly radiance, 
 all amber and carmine, the Spanish peaks majes- 
 tically saluted us. 
 
 Oh ! the glory of that sight ! Two lone sum- 
 mits, remote, inaccessible ; the snowy, the far-off 
 mountains of poetry and picture. Take all the 
 songs the immortcil singers have sung in praise 
 of Alpine heights and lay them at their feet ; it 
 yet would be an offering unworthy their surpass- 
 ing loveliness. Now we lost sight of them ; now 
 they came again ; then vanished in the evening 
 dusk, dropped down from Heaven like the Baby- 
 lonish curtain of purple and gold which veiled 
 the Holy of Holies from profane eyes. Fairest of 
 earthly shows that have blest my waking vision, 
 they stand alone in memory, not to fade from it 
 till all fades. 
 
 At Tr;nidad we left the luxury of steam, and 
 came down to the territorial conveyance. Think, 
 
12 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 dear reader, of two days and a night on a buck- 
 board — an instrument of torture deadly as was 
 ever used in the days of Torquemada, and had 
 anything its equal been resorted to then there 
 would have been {<t\N heretics. 
 
 It is a low-wheeled affair floored with slats, 
 the springs under the seats so weak that at the 
 least jolt they smite together with a horrible 
 blow, which is the more emphatic when over- 
 loaded, as when we crossed the line which 
 bounds " the most desirable of all the Territories." 
 Our night was without a stop, except to change 
 horses. Jolt, jolt ; bang, bang ; cold to the mar- 
 row, though huddled under buffalo robes and 
 heavy blankets. How welcome the warmth of 
 the sun on our stiffened limbs ; and the early 
 breeze, sweet and fresh as airs across Eden when 
 the evening and the morning were the first day! 
 It has a sustaining quality which almost serves 
 for food and sleep. There journeyed with us in 
 the white moonshine spectres, shadowy, ghost- 
 like. Now the sun comes up, we see they are 
 kingly mountains, wrapped in robes of royal pur- 
 ple and wearing crowns of gold. The atmos- 
 phere is so refined and clear, they appear close 
 beside us; but the driver says they are forty 
 miles away. Noon comes on, hot and still, with 
 a desert scorch. We journey over a road sur- 
 prisingly free of stones ; across a blank and col- 
 orless plain, bounded by mountain-walls which 
 stand grim and stark like bastions of stone. 
 Another night and another long day. The driver 
 is not on his high horse now. He has no funny 
 stories of the grizzly and cinnamon bear, which he 
 assures us can climb trees, sticking their claws 
 in the bark, easily as the telegraph-mender, with 
 clamps on his feet, goes up the pole. Along the 
 roadside stretch beautiful park-like intervales, 
 studded with dwarf pines, that appear planted at 
 regular distances. 
 
The Journey. 13 
 
 Will the day never end ? I have no voice nor 
 spirit, and begin to think the wayside crosses 
 mark graves of travelers, murdered, not by assas- 
 sins, but by the buckboard ; and feebly clutch my 
 fellow-sufferer, and shake about in a limp, dis- 
 tracted way, pitying myself, as though I were 
 somebody else. I can hold out no longer. But 
 wake up ! Wake up ! This is the home-stretch. 
 The horses know it and dash across a little 
 brook which they tell me is the Rio Santa Fe. 
 
 Pleasant the sound of running water; tender 
 the light of the evening on the mountains which 
 encircle the ancient capital of the Pueblos. As 
 we approach, it is invested with indescribable 
 romance, the poetic glamor which hovers about 
 all places to us foreign, new, and strange. We go 
 through a straggling suburb of low, dark adobe 
 houses. How comfortless they look ! Two Mex- 
 icans are jabbering and gesticulating, evidently 
 in a quarrel. Swarthy women, with dismal old 
 black shawls over their heads, sit in the porches. 
 I hear the ''Maiden's Prayer" thumped on a poor 
 piano. How foolish in me to think that I could 
 escape the sound of that feeble petition ! Lights 
 stream through narrow windows, sunk in deep case- 
 ments, and a childish voice, strangely at variance 
 with the words, is singing "Silver Threads among 
 the Gold " to the twanging of a weak guitar. 
 Softly the convent-bells are ringing a gracious 
 welcome to the worn-out traveler. The narrow 
 streets are scarcely wide enough for two wagons 
 to pass. The mud walls are high and dark. 
 W^e reach the open Plaza. Long one-story adobe 
 houses front it on every side. And this is the 
 historic city ! Older than our government, older 
 than the Spanish Conquest, it looks older than 
 the hills surrounding it, and worn-out besides. 
 " El Fonda P^ shouts the driver, as we stop before 
 the hotel.' A voice, foreign yet familiar, gayly 
 
14 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 answers : ''Ah! Senora, a los pieds de ustedy 
 At last, at last, I am not of this time nor of 
 this continent; but away, away across the sea, 
 in the land of dreams and visions, " renowned, 
 romantic Spain." 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 HISTORIC. 
 
 I USED to think Fernandina was the sleepiest 
 place in the world, but that was before I had seen 
 Santa Fe. The drowsy old town, lying in a 
 sandy valley inclosed on three sides by mountain 
 walls, is built of adobes laid in one-story houses, 
 and resembles an extensive brick-yard, with 
 scattered sunburnt kilns ready for the fire. The 
 approach in midwinter, when snow, deep on the 
 mountains, rests in ragged patches on the red soil 
 of New Mexico, is to the last degree dishearten- 
 ing to the traveler entering narrow streets which 
 appear mere lanes. Yet, dirty and unkept, 
 swarming with hungry dogs, it has the charm of 
 foreign flavor, and, like San Antonio, retains 
 some portion of the grace which long lingers 
 about, if indeed it ever forsakes, the spot where 
 Spain has held rule for centuries, and the soft 
 syllables of the Spanish tongue are yet heard. 
 
 It was a primeval stronghold before the Span- 
 ish conquest, and a town of some importance to 
 the white race when Pennsylvania was a wilder- 
 ness, and the first Dutch governor was slowly 
 drilling the Knickerbocker ancestry in the diffi- 
 cult evolution of marching round the town pump. 
 Once the capital and centre of the Pueblo king- 
 
Historic. 15 
 
 dom, it is rich in historic interest, and the 
 archives of the Territory, kept, or rather neg- 
 lected, in the leaky old Palacio del Gobernador, 
 where I write, hold treasure well worth the seek- 
 ing of student and antiquary. The building 
 itself has a history full of pathos and stirring 
 incident as the ancient fort of St. Augustine, and 
 is older than that venerable pile. It had been 
 the palace of the Pueblos immemorially before 
 the holy name Santa Fe was given in baptism of 
 blood by the Spanish conquerors; palace of the 
 Mexicans after they broke away from the crown ; 
 and palace ever since its occupation by El Gringo. 
 In the stormy scenes of the seventeenth century 
 it withstood several sieges; was repeatedly lost 
 and won, as the white man or the red held the 
 victory. Who shall say how many and how dark 
 the crimes hidden within these dreary earthen 
 walls ? 
 
 Hawthorne, in a strain of tender gayety, 
 laments the lack of the poetic element in our 
 dear native land, where there is no shadow, no 
 mystery, no antiquity, no picturesque and gloomy 
 wrong, nor anything but commonplace prosperity 
 in broad and simple daylight. Here is every 
 requisite of romance, — the enchantment of dis- 
 tance, the charm of the unknown, — and, in 
 shadowy mists of more than three hundred years, 
 imagination may flower out in fancies rich and 
 strange. Many a picturesque and gloomy wrong 
 is recorded in mouldy chronicles, of the fireside 
 tragedies enacted when a peaceful, simple people 
 were driven from their homes by the Spaniard, 
 made ferocious by his greed of gold and con- 
 quest; and the cross was planted, and sweet 
 hymns to Mary and her Son were chanted on 
 hearths slippery with the blood of men guilty 
 only of the sin of defending them. 
 
 Four hundred years ago the Pueblo Indians 
 
l6 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 were freeholders of the vast unmapped domain 
 lying between the Rio Pecos and the Gila, and 
 their separate communities, dense and self-sup- 
 porting, were dotted over the fertile valleys of 
 Utah and Colorado, and stretched as far south as 
 Chihuahua, Mexico. Bounded by rigid conserv- 
 atism as a wall, in all these ages they have under- 
 gone slight change by contact with the white 
 race, and are yet a peculiar people, distinct from 
 the other aboriginal tribes of this continent as 
 the Jews are from the other races in Christendom. 
 The story of these least known citizens of the 
 United States takes us back to the days of 
 Charles V. and the " spacious times of great 
 Elizabeth." 
 
 About the year 1528 an exploring expedition 
 set out, by order of the king of Spain, from San 
 Domingo to invade Florida, a name then loosely 
 given to the wide area between the bay of Fer- 
 nandina and the Mississippi River. It was 
 commanded by Pamfilo de Narvaez ; the same 
 it will be remembered, who had been sent by the 
 jealous governor of Cuba to capture Cortez, and 
 who, after having declared him an outlaw, was 
 himself easily defeated. His troops deserted to 
 the victorious banner, and when brought before 
 the man he had promised to arrest, Narvaez said, 
 ** Esteem yourself fortunate, Senor Cortez, that 
 you have taken me prisoner." The conqueror 
 replied, with proud humility and with truth, "It 
 is the least of the things I have done in Mexico." 
 
 This anecdote illustrates the haughty and 
 defiant spirit of the general who sailed for battle 
 gayly as to a regatta, with a fleet of five vessels 
 and about six hundred men, of whom eighty 
 were mounted. He carried blood-hounds to 
 track natives, chains and branding-irons for cap- 
 tives ; was clothed with full powers to kill, burn, 
 plunder, enslave; and was appointed governor 
 
Historic. ly 
 
 over all the country he might reduce to posses- 
 sion. 
 
 The leader and his command perished by ship- 
 wreck and disasters, all but four. Among the 
 survivors was one Alvar Nunez Cabeca de Vaca, 
 treasurer for the king and high sheriff, who is de- 
 scribed in the annals of that period as having the 
 most beautiful and noble figure of the conquerors 
 of the New World ; and in the best days of 
 chivalry his valor on the battle-field, his resolution 
 in danger, his constancy and resignation in hard- 
 ship, won for him the proud title " Illustrious 
 Warrior." Ten years he, with three companions, 
 rambled to and fro between the Atlantic and Gulf 
 of California. The plain statement of their priva- 
 tions and miseries must of necessity be filled with 
 marvels ; that of Cabeca de Vaca, duly attested 
 and sworn to, is weakened by wild exaggerations, 
 and the Relacion of this Western Ulysses is 
 touched with high colorings and embellished with 
 fantastic fables equal to the moving accidents by 
 flood and field of the heroic king of Ithaca. He 
 tells of famishing with hunger till they devoured 
 dogs with relish ; of marching " without water and 
 without way" among savages of giant stature, 
 dressed in robes, ''with wrought ties of lion-skin, 
 making a brave show, — the women dressed in 
 wool that grows on trees ; " * of meeting cyclopean 
 tribes, who had the sight of but one eye ; of 
 being enslaved and going naked — "as we were 
 unaccustomed to being so, twice a year we cast 
 our skin, like serpents ;" of his escape, and, after 
 living six years with friendly Indians, of being 
 again made captive by barbarians, who amused 
 themselves by pulling out his beard and beating 
 him cruelly; of living on the strange fruits of 
 mezquit and prickly-pear; of mosquitoes, whose 
 bite made men appear to have ''the plagues of 
 
 * The hanging moss. Tillandsia usneoides. 
 2 
 
The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 holy Lazarus ; " of herds of wonderful cows, with 
 hair an inch thick, frizzled and resembling wool, 
 roaming over boundless plains. 
 
 Holding his course northwest, he came to a 
 people " with fixed habitations of great size, made 
 of earth, along a river which runs between two 
 ridges ;" and here we have tlie earliest record of 
 Pueblo or Town Indians, so named as distin- 
 guished from nomads or hunting tribes, dwelling 
 in lodges of buffalo-skin and boughs. It is diffi- 
 cult to trace his course along the nameless rivers 
 of Texas; he must have ascended the Red River 
 and then struck across to the Canadian, which 
 runs for miles through a deep canon, in which are 
 yet seen extensive ruins of ancient cities. Un- 
 doubtedly he was then among the Pueblo 
 Indians, in the northwestern part of New 
 Mexico. He described them as an intelligent 
 race, with fine persons, possessing great strength, 
 and gave them the name ''Cow Nation," because 
 of the immense number of buffaloes killed in 
 their country and along the river for fifty leagues. 
 The region was very populous, and throughout 
 were signs of a better civilization. The women 
 were better treated and better clad; "they had 
 shawls of cotton;^ their dress was a skirt of 
 cotton that came to the knees, and skirts of 
 dressed deer-skins to the ground, opened in front 
 and fastened with leather straps. They washed 
 their clothes Avith a certain soapy root which 
 cleansed them well, f They also wore shoes." 
 This is the first account of the natives of that 
 country wearing covering on their feet — doubt- 
 less the moccasins still worn by them. 
 
 The gentle savages hailed the white men as 
 children of the sun, and, in adoration, brought 
 
 * Made of the fibre of the maguey, or American aloe. 
 
 t The ;root of the Yucca aloifolia. a spongy, fibrous mass, con- 
 taining gelatinous and alkaline matter. It grows in most parts of 
 New Mexico, where it is called amole, and is used instead of soap 
 for washing. 
 
Historic. 19 
 
 their blind to have their eyes opened, their sick 
 that, by the laying on of hands, they might be 
 healed. Mothers brought little children for bless- 
 ings, and many humbly sought but to touch their 
 garments, believing virtue Vvould pass out of 
 them. The rude hospitality was freely accepted; 
 the sons of the morning feasted on venison, 
 pumpkins, maize bread, the fruit of the prickly- 
 pear; and, refreshed by the banquet, made their 
 worshipers understand that they too were suffer- 
 ing with a disease of the heart, which nothing 
 but gold and precious stones could cure. The 
 Pueblos were then as now a race depending on 
 agriculture rather than the chase, and were in 
 distress because rain had not fallen in two years, 
 and all the corn they had planted had been eaten 
 by moles. They were afraid to plant again until 
 it rained, lest they should lose the little seed left, 
 and begged the lair gods " to tell the sky to 
 rain ; " which the celestial visitants obligingly did, 
 and, in answer to the prayers of the red men, 
 breathed on their buffalo skins, and bestowed a 
 farewell blessing upon them at parting. 
 
 They again pushed westward in search of 
 riches, always further on, crossed a portion of the 
 Llano Estacado, or Staked Plain, and traveled 
 '• for a hundred leagues through a thickly settled 
 country, with towns of earth abounding in maize 
 and beans." Hares were very numerous. When 
 one was started the Indians would attack him 
 with clubs, driving him from one to another till 
 he was killed or captured.^ 
 
 Everywhere they found order, thrift, friendly 
 welcome. The Indians gave Cabeca de Vaca fine 
 turquoises, buffalo robes, or, as he calls them, 
 
 * This is still a favorite sport among the Pueblos. They sally 
 out from their villages, mounted on burros, to the prairies, where 
 rabbits are started from their coverts, when the horsemen chase 
 them ; using clubs, which they throw with great precision, like the 
 boomerang of the savage Australian. In this way they catch a 
 great many. It is very exciting, and is carried on amid yells and 
 much good-natured laughter. 
 
20 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 " blankets of cow skins," and fine emeralds made 
 into arrow-heads, very precious, held sacred, and 
 used only in dances and celebrations. They said 
 these jewels had been received in exchange for 
 bunches of plumes and the bright feathers of par- 
 rots ; they were brought a long distance from 
 lofty mountains in the north, where were crowded 
 cities of very large and strong houses.* 
 
 It appears from his Rclacion that Cabeca de 
 Vaca passed over the entire Territory of New 
 Mexico, went down the Gila to a point near its 
 mouth, struck across to the river San Miguel, 
 thence to Culiacan, and so on to Mexico, where 
 the four wanderers, worn by hardship, gaunt and 
 spectral by famine, were received with distinction 
 by the Viceroy, Mendoza, and Cortez, Marquis of 
 the Valley. 
 
 The venturesome hero was summoned to Val- 
 ladolid to appear before Charles V., and hastened 
 to lay at the feet of his imperial master the gath- 
 ered spoil which cost ten years of life : the hide 
 of a bison, a few valueless stones resembling 
 emerald, and a handful of worthless turquoises. 
 
 Before he set sail for Spain, Cabeca de Vaca 
 told his marvelous story to sympathetic and 
 eager listeners; and, besides, airy rumors had 
 already floated down the valley of Anahuac of a 
 land toward the north where seven high-walled 
 cities, " the Seven Cities of Cibola," were de- 
 fended by impregnable outworks. They were 
 least among the provinces, where were countless 
 greater cities of houses built with numerous 
 stories, ** lighted by jcAvels," and containing treas- 
 ure stored away in secret rooms, rich as Atahual- 
 pa's ransom. Various rovers gave accounts of 
 natives clad in curious raiment, richer and softer 
 
 * In the Navajo countrj^, between the San Juan and Colorado 
 Chiquito, are found quantities of beautiful garnets and a green 
 stone resembling emerald. It abounds in ruins of pueblos capable 
 of holding many thousand souls: in all probability the emeralds 
 presented to De Vaca came from that region. 
 
Historic. 21 
 
 than Utrecht velvet, who wore priceless gems, 
 whole ropes and chains of turquoises, in ignor- 
 ance of their actual value. One of these strag- 
 glers, an Indian, reported that the houses '* of 
 many lofts" were made of lime and stone; he 
 had seen them " with these eyes." The gates 
 and sm.aller pillars of the principal ones were of 
 turquoise, and their princes were served by beau- 
 tiful girls, whom they enslaved; and their spear- 
 heads, drinking-cups, and ornamental vessels 
 were of pure gold. There were Vv^ondrous tales, 
 too, of opal mountains,"^ lifted high in an atmos- 
 phere of such amazing clearness that they could 
 be seen at vast distances; of valleys glittering 
 with garnets and beryls; of clear streams of 
 water flowing over silver sands ; of strange flora ; 
 of the shaggy buffalo ; of the fearful serpent with 
 castanets in its tail ;t of a bird like the peacock ; J 
 and a Llano, broad as the great desert of Africa, 
 over which hovered a mirage more dazzling than 
 the Fata Morgana, more delusive than the spec- 
 tre of the Brocken. 
 
 A friar named Niza, with one of the compan- 
 ions of Cabeca de Vaca, went out " to explore 
 the country " three hundred leagues away, to a 
 city they called Cibola,§ clearly identified as old 
 Zuni, on a river of the same name, one hundred 
 and eighty miles northwest of Santa Fe. This 
 flighty reporter testified to Mendoza that he had 
 been in the cities of Cibola, and had seen the 
 turquoise columns and soft, feathery cloaks of 
 those who dwelt in king's palaces. Their houses 
 were made of stone, several stories high with flat 
 roofs, arranged in good order; they possessed 
 many emeralds and precious stones, but valued 
 
 * The name still attaches to a snowy range southwest of Santa 
 Fe. 
 
 1 Rattlesnake. 
 
 X Turkey. 
 
 § Indian name for buffalo. New Mexico was known to the early 
 Spaniards as the Buffalo Province. 
 
22 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 turquoises above all others. They had vessels of 
 gold and silver more abundant than in Peru. 
 
 " Following as the Holy Ghost did lead," he 
 ascended a mountain, from which he surveyed 
 the promised land with a speculator's eyes ; then, 
 with the help of friendly Indians, he raised a 
 heap of stones, set up a cross, the symbol of 
 taking possession, and under the text, *' The 
 heathen are given as an inheritance," named the 
 province " El Nuevo Regno de San Francisco " 
 (the New Kingdom of St. Francis) ; and from 
 that day to this San Francisco has been the 
 patron saint of New Mexico. 
 
 In our prosaic age of doubt and question it is 
 hard to understand the faith with which sane men 
 trusted these bold falsehoods. They were mad 
 with the lust of gold and passion for adv^enture ; 
 and valiant cavaliers who had won renown in the 
 battles of the Moor among the mountains of 
 Andalusia, and had seen the silver cross of Fer- 
 dinand raised above the red towers of the Alham- 
 bra, now turned their brave swords against the 
 feeble natives of the New World. Less than half 
 a century had gone by since the discovery of 
 America ; the conquests of Pizarro and Cortez 
 were fresh in men's minds, and an expedition 
 containing the enchanting quality called hazard 
 was soon organized. Illustrious noblemen sold 
 their vineyards and mortgaged their estates to fit 
 the adventurers out, assured they v/ould never 
 need more gold than they would bring back from 
 the true El Dorado. The young men saw vis- 
 ions ; the old men dreamed dreams ; volunteers 
 flocked to the familiar standards ; and an army 
 was soon ready ''to discover and subdue to the 
 crown of Spain the Seven Cities of Cibola." 
 
 Francisco Vasquez Coronado, who left a lovely 
 young wife and great wealth to lead the roman- 
 tic enterprise, was proclaimed captain-general ; 
 
Historic. 23 
 
 and Castenada, historian of the campaign, writes, 
 ** I doubt whether there has ever been collected 
 in the Indies so brilliant a troop." The whole 
 force numbered fifteen hundred men and one 
 thousand horses ; sheep and cows were driven 
 along to supply the new settlements in fairy- 
 land. The army mustered in Compostella, un- 
 der no shadow darker than the wavy folds of the 
 royal banner, and one fair spring morning, the 
 day after Easter, 1540, marched out in armor 
 burnished high, with roll of drums, the joyful ap- 
 peal of bugles, and all the pomp and circum- 
 stance the old Spaniard loved so well. The 
 proud cavaliers, ** very gallant in silk upon silk," 
 kindled with enthusiasm., and answered with loud 
 shouts the cheers of the people who thronged 
 the house-tops. The viceroy led the army two 
 days on the march, exhorted the soldiers to 
 obedience and discipline, and returned to await 
 reports. 
 
 When the mind is prepared for wonders the 
 wonderful is sure to appear, and time fails to tell 
 what prodigies the high-born gentlemen beheld : 
 the Indians of monstrous size, so tall the tallest 
 Spaniard could reach no higher than their breasts ; 
 a unicorn, which escaped their chase. "His 
 horn, found in a deep ravine, was a fathom and 
 a half in length ; the base was thick as one's 
 thigh ; it resembled in shape a goat's horn, and 
 was a curious thing." They were the first white 
 men who looked down the gloomy caiion of the 
 Colorado to the black rushing river, walled by 
 sheer precipices fifteen hundred feet high. Two 
 men tried to descend its steep sides. They 
 climbed down perhaps a quarter of the way, 
 when they were stopped by a rock v/hich seemed 
 from above no greater than a man, but which in 
 reality was higher than the top of the cathedral 
 tower at Seville. They passed places where "the 
 
24 The Lciftd of the Piiebios. 
 
 earth trembled like a drum, and ashes boiled in 
 a manner truly infernal ; " watched magnetic 
 stones roll together of their own accord ; and 
 suffered under a storm of hail -stones, ''large as 
 porringers," which indented their helmets, 
 wounded the men, broke their dishes, and cover- 
 ed the ground to the depth of a foot and a half 
 with ice-balls ; and the wind raised the horses 
 off their feet, and dashed them against the sides 
 of the ravine. They fought many tribes of In- 
 dians, and were relieved to meet none who were 
 "man-eaters and none anthropophagi."* 
 
 The route of Coronado is traced Vvith tolerable 
 clearness up the Colorado to the Gila ; up the 
 Gila to the Casa Grande, called Chichiticale, or 
 Red House, standing more than three centuries 
 ago, as it does now, in a mezquit jungle on the 
 edge of the desert ; ''and," writes his secretary, 
 " our general was above all distressed at finding 
 this Chichiticale, of which so much had been 
 said, dwindled down to one mud house, in ruins 
 and roofless, but which seemed to have been for- 
 tified." With true Spanish philosophy, he cov- 
 ered his disappointment, and gave the place an 
 alluring mystery, with the idea that "this house, 
 built of red earth, was the work of a civilized 
 people come from a distance." And into the 
 distance he went, through Arizona, the lower 
 border of Colorado, and turned southeast to 
 where Santa Fe now stands, then the central 
 stronghold of the Pueblo empire. They fought 
 and marched, destroyed villages, leveled the poor 
 temples of the heathen, planted the cross, and 
 sang thanksgiving hymns over innumerable souls 
 
 * Castenada's Narrative covered 147 MS. pages, written on paper 
 in characters of the times, and rolled in parchment. It was pre- 
 served in the colIecti(m of D'Uguina, Paris, was translated and 
 published in French by H.T. Campans, in 1838, and now lies before 
 me. It is wholly free from the vice of the commonplace, being 
 tinged with the warm glow which precedes the morning light of 
 history. Wild as the Homeric legends, it serves like them to point 
 the way. 
 
Historic. 25. 
 
 to be saved, — all very well as far as it went ; but 
 the mud-built pueblos yielded neither gold nor 
 precious metals. 
 
 Acoma, fifty miles east of Zuni, is thus accu- 
 rately described by Castenada, under the name of 
 Acuco : *' It is a very strong place, built upon a 
 rock very high and on three sides perpendicular. 
 The inhabitants are great brigands, and much 
 dreaded by all the province. The only means of 
 reaching the top is by ascending a staircase cut 
 in solid rock : the first flight of steps numbered 
 two hundred, which could only be ascended with 
 difficulty ; when a second flight of one hundred 
 more followed, narrower and more difficult than 
 the first. When surmounted, there remained 
 about twelve more at the top, which could only 
 be ascended by putting the hands and feet in 
 holes cut in the rock. There was space on this 
 summit to store a great quantity of provisions, 
 and to build large cisterns." * 
 
 The chiefs told Coronado that their towns 
 were older than the memory of seven generations. 
 They were all built on the same plan, in blocks 
 shaped like a parallelogram, and were from two 
 to four stories high, with terraces receding from 
 the outside. The lower story, without openings,, 
 was entered from above by ladders, which were 
 pulled up, and secured them against Indian war- 
 fare. There was no interior communication be- 
 tween the stories ; the ascent outside was made 
 from one terrace to another. The houses were of 
 sun-dried bricks^ and for plaster they used a mix- 
 ture of ashes, earth, and coal. Every village had 
 from one to seven estufas, built partly under- 
 ground, walled over the top with flat roofs, and 
 
 * It is the same to-day that it was in 1540,— a place of great 
 strength : and the Jfesa can be ascended only by the artificial 
 road. The houses on top are of adobes, one and two stories in 
 height. Water is brought from the valley below by the woman in 
 jars of earthenware, which they balance on their heads with won- 
 derful ease as they ascend the high steps and ladders. The pres- 
 ent population numbers not over four hundred souls. 
 
26 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 used for political and religious purposes. As in 
 ■certain other mystic lodges which date back to the 
 days of King Solomon, women were not admitted. 
 All matters of importance were there discussed ; 
 there the consecrated fires were kept burning, 
 and were never allowed to go out. The women 
 wore on their shoulders a sort of mantle, which 
 they fastened round the neck, passing it under 
 the right arm, and skirts of cotton. " They also," 
 writes Castenada, *' make garments of skins very 
 well dressed, and trick off the hair behind the 
 ■ears in the shape of a wheel, which resembles the 
 handle of a cup." They wore pearls on their 
 heads and necklaces of shells. Everywhere were 
 plenty of glazed pottery and vases of curious 
 form and workmanship, reminding the Spaniards 
 «of the jars of Guadarrama in old Spain. 
 
 The gallant freebooters traversed deserts, swam 
 rivers, scaled mountains, in a three years' chase 
 after visionary splendors ; but the opal valley 
 and the vanishing cities, with their sunny tur- 
 quoise gates and jeweled colonnades, faded into 
 the common light of day. Though the adventu- 
 rers failed in their mocking " quest of great and 
 exceeding riches," they explored and added to 
 the Spanish crown, by right of occupation, an 
 area twelve times as large as the State of Ohio. 
 
 I dwell on these earliest records because it is 
 the habit of travelers visting ruins, which in the 
 dry, dewless air of New Mexico are almost im- 
 perishable, to ascribe them to an extinct race and 
 lost civilization, superior to any now extant here. 
 They muse over Aztec glories faded, and temples 
 fallen, in the spirit of the immortal antiquary, who 
 saw in a ditch ''slightly marked" a Roman wall, 
 surrounding the stately and crowded praetorium, 
 with its all-conquering standards bearing the 
 -great name of Caesar. 
 
 These edifices are not mysterious except to 
 
Historic. 27* 
 
 fevered fancies, and their tenants were not divers 
 nations, but clans, tribes of one blood, and civil- 
 ized only as compared with the savages surround- 
 ing them — the tameless Apache, the brutish Ute^ 
 the degraded Navajo, against whose attacks they 
 devised their system of defense, so highly ex- 
 tolled by rambling Bohemians, and threw up' 
 " impregnable works," which are only low em- 
 bankments wide enough for the posting of 
 sentinels. 
 
 I have been through many abandoned and 
 inhabited pueblos, examining them with the 
 utmost care, and can discover no essential in 
 which they differ from one another or from those 
 of Castenada's time-. In each one there is the 
 terraced wall ; the vault-like lower story, used as 
 a granary, without openings, and entered from 
 above by ladders ; the small upper rooms, with 
 tiny windows of selenite and mica; the same 
 round oven ; the glazed pottery ; the circular 
 estufa with its undying fire; acequias for irriga- 
 tion, not built like Roman aqueducts, but mere 
 ditches and canals; and from the sameness of the 
 remains I infer that no important facts are to 
 reward the search of dreaming pilgrim or patient 
 student. 
 
 Each village had its peculiar dialect, and chose 
 its own governor. The report of the Rev. John 
 Menaul, of the Laguna Mission, March I, 1879,. 
 gives an abstract of their laws, identical with 
 those framed by "the council of old men," the 
 dusky senators described by Castenada; and then, 
 as now, the governor's orders were proclaimed 
 from the top of the estufa, every morning, by the 
 town-crier. 
 
 After the invasion of Coronado, New Granada^ 
 as it was then called, was crossed by padres, 
 vagabonds of various grades, and later by armies 
 of subjugation. The same tale is told : how the 
 
-28 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 peace-loving Pueblo was found, as his descend 
 ants are, cultivating fields along the rivers or 
 near some unfailing spring, living in community 
 houses wonderfully alike, and keeping alive the 
 sacred fire under laws which like those of the 
 Medes and Persians, change not. The fair 
 •strangers were at first graciously welcomed and 
 feasted; but the red men soon learned that the 
 children of the sun, before whom they knelt, 
 whose march-worn feet they kissed in ado- 
 ration, were come merely for robbery and spoil. 
 The Indian was condemned not only to give up 
 his scanty possessions, and leave the warm 
 precincts of the cheerful day to work in dismal 
 mines, but he must put out the holy flame, and 
 worship the God of his pitiless master. Conver- 
 sion was ever a main object of the zealous co7i- 
 qiiistador, and Vargas, one of the early Spanish 
 governors, applying for troops to carry on the cru- 
 sade, writes — and his record still stands — "You 
 might as well try convert Jews without the In- 
 quisition as Indians without soldiers." The first 
 revolt (1640), while Arguello was governor of the 
 province, grew out of the whipping and hanging 
 •of forty Pueblos, who refused to give up their 
 own religion and accept the holy Catholic faith. 
 
 The Pueblos constantly rebelled, and escaped 
 to the lair of the mountain lion, the den of the 
 grizzly and cinnamon bear, the hole of the fox 
 and coyote. They sought shelter from the ava- 
 rice and bigotry of their Christian persecutors in 
 the steeps of distant canons, and found where to 
 lay their head in the hollows of inaccessible rocks ; 
 and this brings us to the cliff houses, latterly the 
 subject of confused exaggeration and absurd con- 
 jecture. 
 
 It is well known that the first foreign invasions 
 were by far the most merciless, and it appears 
 reasonable that hunted natives made a hiding- 
 
Histof'in. 29 
 
 place in these fastnesses ; that there they alhed 
 themselves with the Navajo, who, from a remote 
 period, had dwelt in the northern plains, beat 
 back the enemy, and, as Spanish rigor relaxed, 
 returned from exile to their fields and adobe houses 
 as before. Mud v/alls had been proof against arrow, 
 spear, and battle-axe, but could not withstand 
 the finer arms of the fairer race. The cave or 
 cliff-dwellings of Utah, Colorado, and Arizona are 
 exact copies of the community tenements of 
 Southern and Moquis pueblos, varying with situa- 
 tion and quality of material used. The architec- 
 ture of these human nests and eyries — in some 
 places seven hundred and a thousand feet from 
 the bottom of the canon — has been magnified out 
 of all bounds. Eager explorers, hurried away by 
 imagination, have even compared the civilization 
 which produced them vv^ith 
 
 " The glory tliat was Greece, 
 The grandeur that was Kome. " 
 
 I found nothing in them to Avarrant such flights 
 of fancy, and, like all castles in air, they lessen 
 wofuUy at a near view. Those along the Rio 
 Mancos and Du Chelly are mere pigeon-holes in 
 the sides of caiions, roofed by projecting ledges 
 of rock. The walls, six or eight inches thick, 
 are built of flat brook-stones hacked on the edge 
 with stone hatchets, or rather hammers, to square 
 angles; in some cases they are laid in mud mor- 
 tar and finished with mud plaster, troweled, Pueblo 
 fashion, with the bare hand. Certainly, mortal 
 never fled to these high perches from choice, or 
 failed to desert them as soon as the danger 
 passed. Whether we believe that the hunters 
 were Christian or heathen, we must admit that 
 this was a last refuge for the hunted, made desper- 
 ate by terror. The masonry is smoothed, so 
 none but the sharpest eyes can notice the differ- 
 
30 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 ence between it and the rock itself, and in no 
 instance is there trace of chimney jr fire-place."^ 
 The whole idea of the work is concealment. 
 
 One might well ask, with sight-seeing Niza 
 strolling through fabled Cibola, *' if the men of 
 that country had wings by which to reach these 
 high lofts." Unfortunately for the romancers, 
 "they showed him a well-made ladder, and said 
 they ascended by this means. " And well-made 
 ladders the cliff dwellers had — steps cut in the 
 living rock of the mountain, and scaling-ladders 
 stout and light. 
 
 The solitary watch-towers along the McElmo, 
 Colorado, and wide-spread relics of cities in the 
 canon of the Hovenwap, Utah, near the old 
 Spanisli trail through the mountains from Santa 
 Fe to Salt Lake, are built on the same general 
 plan, and divided into snug cells and peep-holes, 
 averaging six by eight feet. Perpendiculars are 
 regarded; stones dressed to uniform size are laid 
 in mud mortar. A distinguishing feature is in 
 the round corners, one at least appearing in near- 
 ly every little house. " Most peculiar, however, 
 is the dressing of the walls of the upper and 
 lower front rooms, both being plastered with a 
 thin layer of firm adobe cement of about the 
 eighth of an inch in thickness, and colored a deep 
 maroon red, with a dingy white band eight inches 
 in breath running around floor, sides, and ceil- 
 ing" t — ideas of improvements probably deri- 
 ved from their enlightened conquerors. There 
 is a story that a hatchet found there would cut 
 cold steel, but I have not been able to learn its 
 origin or trace it to any reliable authority. 
 
 In every room entered was the unfailing mark 
 
 * Canon du Clielly, in Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation, is a 
 passage tlirougli a mountain range, twenty-tive miles in length, 
 from one hnndred to five hundred yards in width, and is perhaps 
 the strongest natural citadel on tlie earth. There is but one 
 narrow way by which a horse can ascend its height, where a squad 
 of soldiers could defy the cavalry of the world. 
 
 t Hay den's Survey, 1874. 
 
Historic. 31 
 
 of the Pueblo — pottery glazed and streaked, as 
 manufactured by no other tribe of Indians, and 
 invariably reduced to fragments, either through 
 superstition or to prevent its falling into the 
 hands of the enemy. No entire vase or jar has 
 appeared among the masses strewed from one 
 end to the other of their ancient dominion. I 
 have picked up quantities of this pottery near 
 old towns, where it covers the ground like broken 
 pavement, but have not seen one piece four inches 
 square. 
 
 After their first experiments the Spaniards saw 
 the policy of conciliating a confederation so 
 numerous and powerful as the Pueblos, and as early 
 as the time of Philip II. mountains, pastures, and 
 waters were declared common to both races ; 
 ordinances were issued granting them lands for 
 agriculture, but the title in no instance was of 
 higher grade than possession. The fee-simple 
 remained in the crown of Spain, then in the gov- 
 ernment of Mexico, by virtue of her independ- 
 ence, and under the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidal- 
 go, February 2, 1848, passed to the United 
 States. 
 
 When General Kearney took possession of the 
 country the Pueblos were among the first to give 
 allegiance to our government, and, as allies, were 
 invaluable in chasing the barbarous tribes — their 
 old enemies, whom they tracked with the keen 
 scent and swiftness of blood-hounds. They now 
 number not less than twenty thousand peaceful, 
 contented citizens, entitled to confidence and 
 respect, and by decree of the supreme court 
 (1871) they became legal voters. 
 
 Without written language, or so much as the 
 lowest form of picture-writing, they usually speak 
 a little Spanish, enough for purposes of trade, 
 and, less stolid and unbending than the nomads, 
 in manner are extremely gentle and friendly. 
 
32 The Liiftd of the Pueblos. 
 
 Their quaint primitive customs, curious myths, 
 and legends afford rich material for the poet, and 
 their antiquities open an endless field to the delv- 
 ing archaeologist. 
 
 Nominally Catholics, they are really only bap- 
 tized heathen. A race so rigidly conservative 
 must by very nature be true to the ancient cere- 
 monials, and their religion is not the least attract- 
 ive study offered by this interesting people. Even 
 the dress of the women (oh, happy women !) has 
 remained unchanged, — the same to-day as de- 
 scribed by Coronado's secretary in 1541. 
 
 There passes my window at this moment a 
 young Indian girl from Tesuque, a village eight 
 miles north of Santa Fe. Like the beloved one 
 of the Canticles, she is dark but comely, and 
 without saddle or bridle sits astride her little 
 burro in cool defiance of city prejudice. Always 
 gayly dressed, 'with ready nod and a quick smile, 
 showing the whitest teeth, we call her Bright Al- 
 farata, in memory of the sweet singer of the blue 
 Juniata ; though the interpreter says her true 
 name is Poy-ye, the Rising Moon. Neither of us 
 understands a word of the other's language, so I 
 beckon to her. She springs to the ground with 
 the supple grace of an antelope, and comes to 
 me, holding out a thin, slender hand, the tint of 
 Florentine bronze, seats herself on the window- 
 sill, and in the shade of the portal we converse 
 in what young lovers are pleased to call eloquent 
 silence. Her donkey will not stray, but lingers 
 patiently about, like the lamb he resembles in 
 face and temper, and nibbles the scant grass 
 which fringes the acequia. I think his mistress 
 must be a lady of high degree, perhaps the ca- 
 cique^s daughter, she wears such a holiday air, 
 unusual with Indian women, and is so richly 
 adorned w^ith beads of strung periwinkles. She 
 wears loose moccasins, '* shoes of silence," which 
 
Flistoric. 33 
 
 cannot hide the dehcate and shapely outUne of 
 her feet, leggins of deer-skin, a skirt reaching 
 below the knee, and a cotton chemise. Her head 
 has no covering but glossy jet-black hair, newly 
 washed with ainol'e, banged in front, and '* is 
 tricked off behind the ears in the shape of a 
 wheel which resembles the handle of a cup" — 
 the distinguishing fashion of maidenhood now as 
 it was more than three hundred years ago. Tied 
 by a scarlet cord across her forehead is a pend- 
 ant of opaline shell, the lining of a muscle shell, 
 doubtless the very ornament called precious 
 pearl and opal which dazzled the eyes and stir- 
 red the covetous hearts of the first conqiiistadores. 
 Our Pueblo belle wraps about her drapery such 
 as Castenada's maiden never dreamed of, — a flow- 
 ing mantle which has followed the march of 
 progress. Thrown across the left shoulder and 
 drawn under her bare and beautiful right arm is 
 a handsome red blanket, with the letters U. S. 
 woven in the centre. 
 
 One secret cause of the Pueblos' ready adher- 
 ence to our government is their tradition that, 
 
 "Far away 
 In the eternal yesterclaj'." 
 
 Montezuma, the brother and equal ot God, 
 built the sacred city Pecos, marked the lines of 
 its fortifications, and with his own royal hand 
 kindled the sacred fire in the esttifa. Close 
 beside it he planted a tree upside down, with the 
 prophecy that, if his children kept alive the flame 
 till his tree fell, a pale nation, speaking an 
 unknown tongue, should come from the pleasant 
 country where the sun rises, and free them from 
 Spanish rule. He promised the chosen ones 
 that he would return in fullness of time, and then 
 went to the glorious rest prepared for him in his 
 tabernacle the sun. 
 
 I have seen the remains of that forsaken city, 
 3 
 
34 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 once a mighty fortress, now desolate with the des- 
 olation of Zion. Thorns have come up in her pal- 
 aces, nettles and brambles in the fortresses there- 
 of. It is a habitation for dragons and a court for 
 owls. The site, admirably chosen for defense, is 
 on a promontory, somewhat in the shape of a 
 foot, which gave a broad lookout to the sentry, 
 In the valle)' below, the waters of the river Pecos 
 flow softly, and park-like intervals fill the spaces 
 toward foot-hills which skirt the everlasting 
 mountain walls. The adobe houses have crumb- 
 led to the dust of which they were made, and 
 heaped among their ruins are large blocks of 
 stone, oblong and square, weighing a ton or 
 more, and showing signs of being once laid in 
 mortar. 
 
 The outline of the immense estiifa, forty feet 
 in diameter, is plainly visible, sunken in the earth 
 and paved with stone ; but all trace of the upper 
 story of the council chamber has vanished. On 
 the mesa there is not a tree, not even the dwarf 
 cedar, which strikes its roots in sand, and lives 
 almost without water or dew ; but, strange to see, 
 across the centre of the cstiifa lies the trunk of a 
 large pine, several feet in circumference — an 
 astonishing growth in that sterile soil. The Indian 
 resting in its fragrant shade, listening to the nev- 
 er-ceasing west wind swaying slender leaves that 
 answered to its touch like harp-strings to the 
 harper's hand, clothed the stately evergreen with 
 loving superstition, which hovers round it even 
 in death ; for this is the Montezuma tree, planted 
 when the world was young. 
 
 When Pecos was deserted the people went out 
 as Israel from Egypt, leaving not a hoof behind. 
 They destroyed everything that could be of ser- 
 vice to an enemy, and the ground is yet covered 
 with scraps of broken pottery marked with their 
 peculiar tracery. 
 
Historic. 35 
 
 The Oriental Gheber built his temple over deep 
 subterranean fires, and the steady light shone on 
 after altar and shrine were abandoned and for- 
 gotten ; but the fire-worshipers on the stony mesa 
 at Pecos had a very different work. The only 
 fuel at hand was cedar from the adjacent hills; 
 and, shut in the dark inclosure, filled with pitchy 
 smoke and suffocating gas, it is not strange that 
 death sometimes relieved the watch. When the 
 chiefs, who had seen the kingly friend of the red 
 man, grew old, and the hour came for their 
 departure to their home in the sun, they charged 
 the young men to guard the treasure hidden in 
 the silent chamber. Another generation came 
 and went ; prophecy and promise were handed 
 down from age to age, and the Pueblo sentinel, 
 true to his unwritten creed, guarded the conse- 
 crated place beside the miracle-tree, daily climbed 
 the lonely watch-tower, looked toward the sun- 
 rising, and listened for the coming of the beauti- 
 ful feet of them that on the mountain-top bring 
 glad tidings. Their days of persecution ended, 
 they no longer ate their bread with tears, and a 
 century of prosperous content went by. Then 
 they were shorn of their strength, and their 
 power was broken by inroads of warring nations. 
 The cunning Navajo harried their fields and 
 trampled the ripening maize ; the thieving and 
 tameless Comanche carried off their wives, and 
 sold their children into slavery, and their num- 
 bers were so reduced that the warriors were too 
 feeble to attempt a rescue. Hardly enough sur- 
 vived to minister in the holy place ; hope wa- 
 vered, and the mighty name of Montezuma was 
 but a dim, proud memory. 
 
 Yet the devoted watchmen dreamxcd of a day 
 when he should descend with the sunlight — 
 crowned, plumed, and anointed — to fill the dingy 
 estufa with a glory like that when the Divine 
 
36 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 Presence shook the mercy-seat between the 
 cherubim. The eternal fire flickered, smouldered 
 in embers, but endured through all change and 
 chance, like a potent will ; it was the visible 
 shadow of tlie Invisible One, whose name it is 
 death to utter. Sent by his servant and law- 
 giver, his word was sure ; they would rest on the 
 promise till sun and earth should die. 
 
 At last, at last, constant faith and patient vigil 
 had their reward. On the wings of the wind 
 across the snowy Sierras was heard a sound like 
 the rushing of many waters — the loud steps of 
 the promised deliverer. East, toward Santo 
 Domingo, southward from the Rio Grande, there 
 entered Santa Fe an army of men with faces 
 whiter than the conquered Mexican. Their 
 strange, harsh language was heard in the streets; 
 a foreign flag bearing the colors of the morning, 
 white and red, blue and gold, was unrolled above 
 the crumbling palace of the Pueblos. The 
 prophecy was fulfilled, and at noon that day the 
 magic tree at Pecos fell to the ground. 
 
 After the American occupation, the remnant of 
 the tribe in Pecos joined that of Jemez, which 
 speaks the same language. It is said the cacique, 
 or governor, carried with him the Montezuma 
 fire, and in a new estiifa, sixty miles from the one 
 hallowed by his gracious presence, the faithful 
 are awaiting the second advent of the beloved 
 prophet, priest, and king, who is to come in 
 glory and establish his throne forever and ever. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 LAWS AND CUSTOMS. 
 
 The number of Pueblo or Town Indians of 
 New Mexico and Arizona has been variously 
 estimated at from sixteen to twenty-five thousand. 
 The dumb secrecy of the red race makes it diffi- 
 cult for the census-taker to reach correct 
 figures among them. They have a suspicion 
 that the Sagamore with medicine-book, ink and 
 pen has come to question them with wicked in- 
 tent; that numbering the people means plotting 
 for mischief; and they secrete their children and 
 give false figures, so it is impossible to arrive at an 
 accurate estimate of their numbers. In the cul- 
 tured East there is a popular superstition that 
 the noble aboriginal soul disdains artifice, and is 
 open as sunlight to the sweet influences of truth 
 and straightforward testimony : — an illusion ris- 
 ing from the misty enchantments of distance. 
 Come among them, and you will soon learn to 
 make allowance for every assertion; and as for 
 vanity and self-love I have never seen any equal 
 that of the children of nature debased by contact 
 with the white men. They cannot be instructed, 
 because they know everything, nor surprised, 
 because their fathers had all wisdom before you 
 were born. Show them the most curious and 
 bea,utiful article you possess ; they survey it with 
 stolid composure as an object long familiar. I 
 once saw an officer, thinking to floor a Cacique^ 
 unfold the wonders of a telescope to the untu- 
 tored mind, and explain how, by bending his 
 beady eyes to a certain point the child of the 
 sun might see the spots on his father; when the 
 blanketed philosopher coolly observed that he had 
 
 27 
 
38 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 often looked through such machines. We then 
 gave it up. Like the Chinese they so closely 
 resemble, nothing can be named which they did 
 not have ages ago ; and having so long possessed 
 all knowledge, they steadily resist your efforts to 
 show them their ignorance. They think them- 
 selves the ^wvy of the civilized world. Among 
 such a people one soon learns to repress assump- 
 tion of superiority or effort to imipress the calm 
 listener with your grammatical sentences. The 
 poverty of their language is indescribable. 
 Where there is no writing, and of course no 
 standard of comparison, the change in the sound 
 of words goes on rapidly, while the great princi- 
 ple of utterance or general grammar remains. 
 Mere change of accent under such circumstances 
 produces a dialect. It is not easy to catch the 
 lawless Indian tongues ; those of the wandering 
 tribes are peculiarly unmanageable, and it is 
 wise to have a common meeting-place in the 
 little Spanish which they pick up. They have 
 no preposition, article, conjunction, or relative 
 pronoun, and to a great degree lack the mood 
 and tense of the verb. A dual and negative form 
 runs throughout the languages, and sentences 
 are often composed, not of the words which the 
 objects mentioned separately mean, but of words 
 meaning certain things in certain connections. 
 The disheartened student, groping in the dark for 
 signs and rules, and finding none, is glad to turn 
 from his bewildering labor to the interpreter who 
 has learned by ear. 
 
 The Pueblos have nineteen different villages in 
 New Mexico, numbering in all nearly ten thous- 
 and souls. The towns are evidently smaller 
 than they were formerly, as is plainly proved by 
 ruins of houses throughout theirancient dominion, 
 and old worn foot-paths, abandoned or almost un- 
 trodden, that lead from town to town, beaten by 
 
Laws and Customs. 39 
 
 centuries of wayfaring in some period whereof 
 there is no history. 
 
 They are slowly decreasing in numbers, and, 
 says a gentleman resident among them ten years, 
 "why they should gradually disappear like the 
 nomadic and warlike tribes, is a question not 
 easily solved except by the hypothesis that their 
 time has come. Their great failing is lack of 
 self-assertion. Conquered and brought down 
 from freedom and peace two centuries ago, to a 
 condition of servitude and an enforced religion, 
 the power of 'The Fair God ' has rested heavily 
 on them ever since." 
 
 There are singular characteristics among these 
 Pueblos. Each village is a separate domain or 
 clan, self-supporting, entirely independent of the 
 government of the other Pueblos and the great 
 Vv^orld in the country across the Sierras where the 
 sun rises. There is no common bond of union 
 among them, and so little intercourse have they 
 with each other that their language, everywhere 
 subject to great mutations, is so altered that 
 they communicate when needful through the 
 Spanish, of which most Indian men understand 
 enough to make their wishes known. There are 
 three dialects among the tribes of New Mexico, 
 and three or four more among those of Arizona. 
 Few Indians understand more than one. In the 
 seven Moqui villages of Arizona, within a radius 
 of ten miles, three distinct tongues are spoken. 
 The inhabitants are identical in blood, manners, 
 laws and mode of life. For centuries they have 
 been isolated from the rest of the world, and it is 
 almost incomprehensible to the restless, aggres- 
 sive, fairer race how these Pueblos refuse any 
 inter-communication. Tegua and the two adja- 
 cent towns are separated by a few miles from 
 Mooshahneh and another pair. Oraybe is not a 
 great distance from both. Each mud- walled 
 
.40 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 community-house has so Httle interest in the 
 others that there is neither trade nor visiting be- 
 tween them. One might think the women, at 
 least, would sometimes pick up their knitting 
 and go out for a little social enjoyment and the 
 friendly gossip so dear to the feminine heart, or 
 that crafty hunters, tracking deer and coyote, 
 would follow the abandoned trails of the fore- 
 fathers winding among the towns, but they do 
 not; they are too sluggish and dead, and it is the 
 rarest thing for a man to marry outside of his 
 own little tribe. I have heard the assertion that 
 so far from dying out before the march of civili- 
 zation the increase goes steadily on — not in all the 
 tribes, but in the aggregate. It is not true. The 
 prehistoric ruins plainly prove that in long for- 
 gotten days the Pueblos were numerous and 
 powerful ; a nation and a company of nations. 
 The Rio Grande valley was then dotted with 
 clusters of towns, and Santa Fe was the centre of 
 four confederacies, and among the most populous 
 of cities. Down the little Rio on both banks are 
 remains of villages, heaps of crumbling adobes, 
 and the unfailing sign of fleeing tribes, scraps of 
 broken pottery, glazed and painted with their 
 peculiar markings. Thinking of the bold 
 theories about population, one naturally asks, Who 
 took the census when De Soto went wandering 
 up and down the everglades of Florida seeking 
 the alluring, ever vanishing Fountain of Youth. 
 
 Every Pueblo, or village, has its own officers 
 and government independent of all the others, 
 and exactly the same and according to the 
 ancient customs. First there is the Cacique^ 
 chief officer of church and state, priest of Monte- 
 zuma, and director of all temporal affairs of the 
 pueblo. It is not known how the Cacique was 
 originally installed in his office, he alone having 
 power to appoint his successor — which duty is 
 
Laws and Customs. 41 
 
 among the first he performs after succeeding to 
 his office ; nor can the most inquiring mind of 
 the most energetic newspaper correspondent dis- 
 cover the origin of their judicial system. 
 
 The Cacique, aided by three Principalcs, se- 
 lected by himself, appoints the Governor "and all 
 the officers." The appointments are communi- 
 cated to the council of Principales, and then pro- 
 claimed to the people. No matter how weak 
 and shrunken in numbers the tribe, it still has its 
 full corps of officers, all sons of Montezuma, 
 though evidently many generations removed 
 from the conquering chiefs who reveled in the 
 jeweled halls of their illustrious ancestor. 
 
 The Governor is appointed by the Cacique for 
 one year, and is the executive officer of the town. 
 He is chief in power and nothing can be done 
 without the order of the Governor, especially in 
 those things relating to the political government. 
 The position is purely honorary as regards salary^ 
 and the honors do not cease w^ith the office, for 
 the dignified place of Principal is awaiting him 
 at the close of his term, and there is no anti-third 
 term rule to prohibit his holding the place many 
 times during his life. 
 
 Immediately after the Governor succeeds ta 
 his office he repairs to Santa Fe and seeks the 
 agent for the Pueblo Indians to receive confirma- 
 tion. This is an empty ceremony, the agent 
 being without the authority to object or remove, 
 but it isfollowed in obedience to precedent and 
 custom, and there is no harm in humoring the 
 ambition of the gentle wards of the government. 
 On such days of lofty state the happy fellow, in 
 paint and solemn dignity, brings a silver-headed 
 cane, and hands it to the agent, who returns it to 
 the Governor, and the august inaugural ceremony 
 is ended. Under the Mexican rule, it is said, 
 the new incumbent knelt before the Governor of 
 
-42 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 the Territory, and was confirmed by a process of 
 laying on of hands, and some sim^ple formula of 
 Spanish sentences. 
 
 The Principales, or ex-Governors, compose a 
 •council of wise men, and are the constitutional 
 advisers of the Governor, deciding important 
 questions by their vote. 
 
 The Algiiacil, or Sheriff, carries out the orders 
 of the Governor, and is overseer and director of 
 the pubHc works. 
 
 The Fiscal Mayor attends to the ordinary re- 
 ligious ceremonies. 
 
 The Capitan de la Guerre y captain of war, with 
 his under-captains and Heutenants, has very light 
 ■duty to perform in these piping times of peace. 
 He is head of the ancient customs, dances, and 
 whatever pertains to the moral life of the people. 
 The several priests acting under him order the 
 dances, and enforce special obedience of those 
 dedicated to any particular god or ancient order. 
 Each of the officers has a number of lieuten- 
 ants under him. 
 
 This is a gallant array of officials for such a 
 tribe as Tesuque, numbering less than a hundred, 
 or Pojouque, in all twenty-six, or Zia fifty-eight 
 haughty aborigines. I have not been able to find 
 if they have badges and insignia of office, but I 
 do know they strut along the streets of Santa 
 Fe as though they were at the head of tribes like 
 the sands of* the sea-shore, like the leaves of the 
 forest, the stars of heaven, according to the 
 .swelling sentences of the proud speeches which our 
 early friend J. F. Cooper gave his heroes. The 
 uniform worn is usually buckskin pants, fringed 
 leggins, moccasins, and, in lordly defiance of the 
 prejudices of civilization, with untaught grace 
 the Cacique wears his pink calico shirt outside his 
 pantaloons. It breezily flutters in the eternal 
 west wind, but the sun is his father, the earth 
 
Laws and Customs. 43, 
 
 is his mother ; he heeds not that cold breath 
 though it blow from heights of perpetual 
 snow. The tenderness of romance invests the 
 degraded descendant of the noble Aztecan, and 
 wherever he turns, the shades of Cooper and 
 Prescott attend him. 
 
 As a class the Pueblos are the most industrious, 
 useful, and orderly people on the frontier ; at 
 peace with each other and the surrounding 
 Mexicans. They raise large crops of grain, 
 ploughing with a crooked stick, the oriental imple- 
 ment in the days of Moses, and frequently stir- 
 ring the soil with a rude hoe, for where irriga- 
 tion is necessary constant work is required. 
 Threshing is done by herds of goats or flocks of 
 sheep, the floor being a plastered mud ring en- 
 closed in upright poles. The wheat is piled up 
 in the centre, the animals are turned into the 
 pen, and driven round and round until the grain 
 is all trampled out. Then the mass is thrown 
 into the air; the wind carries away the broken 
 straw, leaving the grain mixed with quantities of 
 gravel, sand, etc. It is washed before being 
 ground, but the flour is always more or less gritty. 
 They raise corn, beans, vegetables, and grapes, 
 the latter rich and sweet, and own large herds of 
 cattle and sheep. They possess in common much 
 of the best land of the Territory which, for culti- 
 vation, is parceled out to the various families 
 who raise their own crops and take their pro- 
 duce to market. 
 
 Paupers and drones are unknown among them, 
 because all are obliged to work and make con- 
 tribution to the possessions of the community to 
 which they belong. 
 
 At Taos nearly four hundred persons live in 
 two buildings over three hundred feet in length, 
 and about a hundred and fifty feet wide at the 
 base. They are on opposite sides of a little 
 
44 The La7id of the Pueblos. 
 
 creek, said to have been connected in ancient 
 times by a bridge, a grim and threatening fort- 
 ress of savage strength, many times attacked by 
 the Spaniards but never captured. If there are 
 family feuds and quarrels, the outside world has 
 no knowledge of them ; men, women, and child- 
 ren, mothers-in-law and all, live together in abso- 
 lute harmony. On the highest story a sentinel 
 is posted. One might think this ancient custom 
 could be dispensed with in the generation of 
 peace since the American occupation, but they 
 hold the wise Napoleonic idea, if you would have 
 peace be always ready for war. 
 
 Each Pueblo contains from one to seven estti- 
 fas, used as a council-house and a place of wor- 
 ship, where they carry on their heathen rites and 
 ceremonies, and deliberate on the public weal ; a 
 consecrated spot to which women are not admit- 
 ted ; a senate-chamber where long debates on 
 public affairs are maintained, and the business of 
 the tribe transacted by the council of wise men, 
 •cunning prophets, and able warriors, whose duty 
 it is to manage the internal affairs of the town. 
 The Governor assembles his constitutional ad- 
 visers in the lodge, where matters are discussed 
 and decided by the majority. One of their wise 
 regulations is a secret police whose duty is to 
 prevent vice and disorder, and report in the un- 
 der-ground estiifa the conduct of suspected per- 
 sons. The dingy little ''temples of sin," as the 
 old Catholics call them, are hung round with dim 
 and fading legends and shadowy superstitions. 
 Their worshipers have not the slightest approach 
 to music in the horrible noises they make there — 
 a kind of sledge-hammer beating on rude drums 
 and blowing of ear-splitting whistles — nor have 
 they any idea of rhythm or poetry. No correct 
 tradition is kept without one of these arts, and 
 in the absence of all recorded law a perfect devc- 
 
Laws and Customz. 45 
 
 tion to custom carries their poor civilization for- 
 ward as it was in the beginning. It keeps the 
 Pueblos a separate and distinct people, bounded 
 by a dead wall of conservatism to this day. 
 Says the Rev. Dr. Menaul of the Taguna mission, 
 *' Religion enters into everything they do, i. e. 
 everything is done according to ancient custom. 
 The new-born babe comes upon the stage of life 
 under its auspices, is fed and clothed, or not 
 clothed, according to custom. It is hushed to 
 sleep with a custom-song, gets custom-medicine, 
 and grows up in the very bosom of religious cus- 
 tom. The father plants and reaps his fields, 
 makes his moccasins, knits his stockings, carries 
 the baby on his back, in fact does all that he does in 
 strict conformity to custom. The mother grinds 
 the meal, makes the bread, wears her clothing, 
 and keeps her house, makes her water-pots, and 
 paints them with religious symbols, according to 
 custom. The whole iimer and outer life of the 
 Indian is one of perfect devotion to religious cus- 
 tom, or obedience to his faith." And this adora- 
 tion of the past makes them the miost difficult 
 of all people to be reached by outside influence, 
 a rigid unbending adherence to old time observ- 
 ances sets their faces as a flint against everything 
 new and foreign, and our mission-work seems 
 dashing against a dead wall. Nothing is subject 
 to change among them except language ; they 
 have the most shifting forms of human speech, so 
 the students tell us, and desiring no improve- 
 ment or alteration, how can we influence them by 
 religious teaching? How plant new ideas where 
 there is no room to receive them ? 
 
 Of all the millions of native Americans who 
 have perished under the withering influence of 
 European civilization, there is not a single in- 
 stance on record of a tribe or nation having been 
 reclaimed, ecclesiastically or otherwise, by arti- 
 
46 The Land of the Pueblos^ 
 
 fice and argument. Individual savages have been 
 educated with a fair degree of success, but there 
 is no tribe that is not savage. The Koran says, 
 " Every child is born into the religion of nature ; 
 its parents make it a Jew, a Christian, or a 
 Magian." These North American Indians are 
 more alike than the children of Japhet. Our 
 culture is a failure offered to them, unless one can 
 be detached from his tribe ; return him to his 
 people, and he goes back to the dances and in- 
 cantations, the mystic lodges and time-hallowed 
 ceremonials of the fathers. It seems as difficult 
 to train him as to teach the birds of the air a 
 new note, or the beaver another mode of making 
 his dam ; we cannot re-create the head or the 
 heart of the red man He wants his freedom, 
 his tribe, his ancient customs ; he desires no 
 change, and his sense of spiritual things is in- 
 stinctive like a child's. 
 
 This rigidity of organism makes sad waste of 
 religious teaching. Catholic and Protestant have 
 been alike unsuccessful. Jonathan Edwards fail- 
 ed as signally, as the missionaries of the Territories 
 who have lived among them for generations. 
 There is a scarce perceptible progress. The 
 young men have no wish to be better or different 
 from their fatliers, and they are sHghtly changed 
 (can we say for the better ?) since Columbus gave 
 to Spain the gift of the New World. 
 
 Hardest of all is it to teach the Indian how di- 
 vine a woman may be made, and it is argued that 
 women are best fitted to reach the burden-bearing 
 sisters of the red race. The Quakers succeeded 
 no better than the Puritans, and St. Mary of the 
 Conception was not more discouraged than the 
 self-sacrificing bride from New England, who 
 comes to the land of sand and thorn to teach the 
 dusky mothers how to sing and sew, and broken 
 in health and spirit, returns to her native hills again. 
 
Zuni War Club, Dance Ornaments, etc. 
 
Laws and Customs. 47 
 
 In winter the main industry of the Pueblos is 
 practicing for the pubHc dances, a training pur- 
 sued with anxious care by the priesthood dedi- 
 cated to the duty, as by the ambitious danseuse 
 who fain would copy the famous winged sylphide 
 leap attained by the lithe limbs and flying feet of 
 Taglioni. 
 
 Their Te Deum after victories, and most 
 sacred and beloved rite, is the cacliina 
 dance, which they celebrate at certain seasons of 
 the year with great rejoicings. I have never 
 seen it but am told it is full of contortions and 
 fantastic leaps, ending in a jerky trot, unlike 
 polka or mazurka, and still less resembling the 
 gliding, sinuous action of the world-old Teutonic 
 waltz, most delicate modulation of graceful move- 
 ment vouchsafed the children of men. 
 
 When the Spaniards first conquered this 
 country and imposed their religion on the natives, 
 the idolatrous cachina was prohibited on pain of 
 death. History records the natives held it so 
 cruel a deprivation, that the interdict was one of 
 the main causes of the great rebellion of 1680, 
 when Don Antonio de Oterim was Governor and 
 Captain General of Nueva Espagna. Many of 
 the night dances are held in the deepest secrecy; 
 of these the uninitiated may not speak ; but other 
 holy days commemorative of abundant harvests 
 are high festivals to which citizens of Santa Fe 
 are cordially invited. You-pel-lay, or the green 
 corn dance, is a national thanksgiving involving 
 the deepest interest and mighty preparation, be- 
 sides fasting and purification. Some weeks be- 
 fore the carnival we accepted an invitation from 
 the Cacique of Santo Domingo, where unusual 
 pomp and circumstance attend the celebration of 
 this harvest home. 
 
 It was in the mild September. Our ambu- 
 lance was roomy and comfortable, the mules 
 
48 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 were fresh, the party just such as the dear reader 
 loves, the breeze sweet as the unbreathed air of 
 Eden. I will not tire your patience with raptures 
 about Rocky Mountain sunHght and scenery ; 
 the glorious peaks are always in sight, the aerial 
 tints from the hand of the great Master are shift- 
 ing and changeable as eastern skies at sunset — 
 floating veils of exquisite hue hinting of a view- 
 less glory beyond. The wagon road is always 
 good, and with song and story we beguiled the 
 way and listened with eager interest to a delight- 
 ful legend, prettily told by a reporter from St. 
 Louis, which he said he had from one of the 
 medicine men of the Pueblos. All about "a 
 spirit yet a woman, too," who with bright green 
 garments and silky yellow tresses flits above the 
 maize fields, and in the night, robed with darkness 
 as a garment, draws a magic circle round them 
 to keep off blight and vermin. 
 
 It had rather a familiar air and flavor, and 
 when the story was ended, one of the audience 
 dryly inquired if the narrator had ever heard of 
 Longfellow. St. Louis then came down reluct- 
 antly and confessed to having stolen the tradition 
 from Hiawatha. 
 
 We missed our way, and in consequence had 
 to jolt over one bad hill, so steep and cut with 
 steps it reminded me of the gigantic precipitous 
 stairs in the flight of Israel Putnam, a blood- 
 curdling picture of affrighted rider and steed, the 
 delight and terror of my childhood. But this 
 was a mighty hill of adamant, on which the flood, 
 earthquakes and the centuries counted only in 
 heaven have beaten and spent their strength in 
 vain. We did not care for delays. Time is no 
 object on the frontier. We lag along with exas- 
 perating slowness if you want to get through ; 
 are not expected at any place, sleep where the 
 pight overtakes us, and loiter at will in no fear of 
 
Laws and Customs, 49 
 
 being behind time or caught in a shower, a hap- 
 hazard, good-for-nothing way of travel which 
 gives a mild, game flavor to the journey. If you 
 have a drop of gypsy blood in you it will come 
 to the surface, strawberry-mark and all, in New 
 Mexico. 
 
 As we neared the village we passed pilgrims 
 going up to the jubilee: men, women, children in 
 holiday attire, for once moved out of their stony 
 rigidity of face and mien, smiling back to their 
 last white molars in answer to the courteous salu- 
 tations exchanged by wayfarers everywhere in 
 that Territory. The natives step with an easy 
 swinging gait, apparently uiitired at the end of a 
 day's march as in the first hours of the morning. 
 Their figures in motion are n t without artistic 
 grace, expressing strength and fleetness ; and 
 when interested an alert intelligence lights the 
 face, but ordinarily the cold, stony apathy of the 
 race is its ruling characteristic. One Pueblo 
 marching beside us that day I shall never forget. 
 He was a very model of sinewy strength, a per- 
 fect mountain prince, erect and stately in his 
 crown of green leaves, and striped Navajo blanket 
 draping his shoulders, held in place by one sym- 
 metric hand. The noblest Roman wore his im- 
 perial mantle with no better grace. The attri- 
 tion of civilization fails to make our aborigines at 
 all like "the white brother." These peace-loving 
 Pueblos, a pastoral people pursuing their simple 
 industries and trudging to market with their poor 
 products, are as thoroughly Indian as the wildest 
 Apache, with brandished knife and dripping 
 scalp in hand, dancing on the battle field and 
 whooping in triumph over the banquet of blood. 
 
 After leaving the Israel Putnam hill we crossed 
 a mesa or table-land, and, descending into the 
 valley of the Del Norte descried the village of the 
 Santo Domingo, a tribe which numbers in all 
 
5© The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 1,129 souls. A little way off the main road, on 
 the bank of the river, are the adobe houses, two 
 stories high with the usual terraces. The roofs 
 are supported by pine logs, are nearly flat and 
 covered with bark and earth. A few miles away 
 are the ruins of ancient Pueblos, crumbling walls 
 whose thickness attests their age. Like all the 
 prehistoric buildings, they are on a high bluff 
 two hundred feet above the water. All ruins 
 have a certain pathetic interest, but we did not 
 turn aside to visit these, knowing it would be 
 only a repitition of arrowheads, stone hatchets 
 and the tiresome pottery fragments. The old 
 arrowheads are mainly obsidian, {istli) usually 
 black, sometimes a smoky or brown tint. They 
 are strewed through the earth wherever graves of 
 men have been found. To borrow the forcible 
 sentence of Hohiies, ''Whether the arrowheads 
 are a hundred or a thousand years old who 
 knows, who cares? There is no history to the 
 red race, there is scarcely an individual in it. A 
 few instincts on legs and holding a tomahawk; 
 — there is the Indian of all time." 
 
 We saw a party that day hunting rabbits with 
 clubs which they throw, making a whirring sound 
 like the boomerang of eastern savages. It is tlie 
 one sport in which women are allowed to take 
 part. If in v/hirling his missile a warrior misses 
 a rabbit, which is finally killed by a squaw, he is 
 obliged by law or custom, which is equally strong, 
 to change clothes with her, and they return to 
 the pueblo, or village, in that guise; Hercules 
 and Omphale. He must also keep her in fresh 
 meat during the next winter, serving out his 
 term of degradation in feminine belongings, a 
 target for aboriginal wit, and, for the season, the 
 village fool. Under such humiliating penalty for 
 failure, we may imagine the experts throw the 
 club with wondrous care and skill when women 
 join in the chase. 
 
Laws mid Customs. 5 1 
 
 This joke is immemorially old, handed down 
 from the ancients or fathers, and is immortally 
 fresh and delightful, tickling the fancy of the red 
 man. 
 
 On both sides of the river run chains of hills, 
 those on the west side extending inland in ex- 
 tensive mesas; and not very far away to the 
 southeast we trace, in aerial tints of supreme 
 beauty, the serrated ridges of the Sandia moun- 
 tains. 
 
 Properly speaking there are but two valleys in 
 New Mexico ; the Rio Grande and the Pecos. 
 Should either stream go dry, starvation and fam- 
 ine would follow. They flow nearly parallel, from 
 north to south, fifty and sixty miles apart, till 
 they reach Texas. Skirting their banks are the 
 cultivated fields, making a garden beauty with 
 their tender verdure in contrast with the dull 
 green of dry plains. 
 
 By the city of the saint sat a feminine mummy 
 selling grapes. Her head was dressed by the 
 hands of time and nature after the style of Elisha, 
 which so diverted the bad boys of Bethel, and 
 she looked immovable as the dead. 
 
 She and her store of fruitage, were sheltered 
 from the sun blaze in a booth of pine boughs ; 
 a little green bower called by the orientals 
 sticcoth, a refreshment to the eyes in the shade- 
 less stretch of the parched valleys. The wattle 
 of twigs and leaves is such as Israel made for 
 himself in Canaan, and men of Galilee wove 
 together of thick foliage on the pleasant skirts of 
 Olivet, when they came up to Jerusalem at the 
 feast of the Passover; such as the Sharon peasant 
 yet builds for his family at the Jerusalem gate of 
 Jaffa. There was much beside this shady spot to 
 remind us of Bible pictures ; the low adobe houses, 
 the flocks with the herdsman coming to drink at 
 the shallow stream, the clambering goats in 
 
52 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 scanty pastures high up the rocks, shaking their 
 beards at the passing strangers, the kids bleating 
 by their mothers, the Mexican women, straight 
 as a rule, carrying water-jars on head or shoul- 
 der, like maidens of Palestine. Now and then 
 an old black shawl, melancholy remnant of the 
 gay rebosa, shrouding an olive forehead, sug- 
 gested the veiled face of the gentle Rebecca. 
 The lofty presence, the high eagle features of the 
 Jewish race, the lustrous eyes of the Orient are 
 not here, nor is the barren magnificence of New 
 Mexico more than a suggestion of the land once 
 the glory of all lands, with its verdure of plumy 
 palms, beauty of olive orchards, the dark foliage 
 of cypress trees, and white and scarlet blooms of 
 orange and pomegranate. 
 
 These thoughts pass through our mind as we 
 wait in the wagon while the driver, a Mexican 
 boy, bargains with Pharoah's daughter for the 
 day's supply of grapes. We get three fine 
 bunches for five cents, rich and nourishing, 
 grown in sandy river bottoms irrigated with al- 
 kali water. They are sweet as the ripest Italian 
 vintage in terraced vineyards, warmed by the 
 volcanic heat throbbing in the fiery heart of Ve- 
 suvius. 
 
 For market, the purple clusters are laid lightly 
 in crates made of pine branches thick as your 
 thumb, bound together by green withes of bark, 
 lined with fresh leaves and packed on the backs 
 of burros, the scriptural ass. The vine is not al- 
 lowed to run, but is kept trimmed close to the 
 ground. Every year the branches are cut near 
 to the parent stock, which is rarely more than 
 four feet high. 
 
 The forlorn little town, built round a central 
 plaza, was swept and garnished ready for the 
 holiday, and having shaken off its usual drowse 
 appeared quite lively. We were escorted with 
 
Laws and Customs. 53 
 
 much dignity to an honored seat on one of the 
 flat roofs reached by a rickety ladder. There 
 the ancient patriarchs of the tribe, too old to take 
 the field, were gathered, and with them old 
 witches without witching ways, wrinkled, with- 
 ered, graceless, seated in the favorite aborgi- 
 nal pose on their heels. The preliminary cere- 
 mony was held a few days before, when the first 
 ears of corn began to ripen. They were gathered 
 by the women, and, like the Jewish first fruits, 
 the wave-offering in the temple, were brought 
 with solemn reverence to the high priest, who 
 alone has the right to husk them for ascertaining 
 if the promise of a fair harvest is assured. This 
 done, criers were sent through the town an- 
 nouncing to the people that, from his bright sun- 
 house the god of the Pueblos had smiled upon 
 his children in bountiful crops, and they must 
 meet at high noon on a certain day and render 
 unto him thanksgiving and praise. 
 
 The burning sky of noon, where no cloud 
 flings a cooling shadow, scorches the valley with 
 tropic fervor, but these children of the wilderness 
 love its parching heat and open the solemnities 
 when the flooding light is at meridian. 
 
 In the centre of the open plaza four large 
 camp-kettles of boiling corn were swung gypsy 
 fashion over separate fires. The tops of the 
 poles were adorned with twelve ears of corn rep- 
 resenting the twelve months of the year. Each 
 one was watched by four men, naked to the 
 waist, with bodies painted white, red, green, and 
 blue. They are the four seasons, and are elected 
 for their skill in singing and great powers of en- 
 durance. Their duty was to dance round the 
 kettles, keep up the fires, and sing songs to Mon- 
 tezuma and the unnamed god, keeping time with 
 a cornstalk on the edge of the kettle. Did my 
 reader ever hear Indian singing? He need never 
 
54 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 want to. It is a long-continued strain of un- 
 earthly howls and yells of the sort to drive one 
 crazy, to make your flesh, aye, the very marrow 
 of your bones creep. 
 
 At exactly noon the grand procession moved, 
 led by three Sagamores, holy heralds marching 
 ahead, solemn and still as sphinxes. Then came 
 thirty-five men, the dancers proper, naked except 
 a small embroidered blanket, but appearing clad 
 by reason of a coating of white paint barred with 
 blue. Their legs and arms were striped with 
 red, white, and blue ; green hemlock wreaths 
 mixed with red berries of the mistletoe circled 
 their arms above the elbow. 
 
 The same ornamentation served as bracelets, 
 anklets and necklaces, and resting on the thick 
 black locks, newly washed with amole and glossy 
 as a blackbird's throat, were crowns of gray eagle 
 plumes. The effect of this adorning was that of 
 a festal robe, unique and strikingly picturesque. 
 Around the knees of the main actors were bands 
 of red cloth to which hung small shells of the 
 ground-turtle, eagle claws, and antelope hoofs; 
 and dangling from the back at the waist was a 
 fox tail or a fur robe, the skin of such wild ani- 
 mals as were killed by the wearer during the 
 year. They walked in Indian file, each appear- 
 ing to tread in the same track, bending forward 
 as if weighted down with corn, which fiction is 
 part of the play. 
 
 The musicians were placed in a conspicuous 
 part of the plaza in the chief seats of the syna- 
 gogue such artists love. One had a drum, {tombe) 
 which he beat unmercifully, another clashed 
 clanging, banging things like cymbals, and a cas- 
 tinet player dextrously rattled deer hoofs after 
 the manner of the jolly end man, our friend and 
 brudder Bones. One ambitious artist performed 
 on an ornamented whistle made from the bone of 
 
Laws and Customs. $$ 
 
 a wild turkey's wing, blowing shrilly with unlim- 
 ited breath, as St. Louis observed, sotto voce, loud 
 enough to split the ears of corn. There was, be- 
 sides, a heathenish intrument of torture, whose 
 name I failed to obtain, consisting of half a gourd 
 with the convex side up ; on this was placed with 
 the left hand a smooth stick and across it the 
 right hand drew backward and forward a notched 
 stick in a sawing manner, making a sound like 
 the grinding of corn in the metate. Luckily this 
 machine does not make much racket, but what 
 there is, is of the quality calculated to turn one 
 goose-flesh. The sound of filing saws is rich 
 melody in comparison. 
 
 The three sphinxes, members of the council 
 who headed the procession, made a short speech 
 before each house, the occupants being outside 
 and waiting. At special places they joined the 
 choral howling of the trains, which proceeded 
 with the dire monotony of everything Indian. 
 Thus they went from house to house till every 
 one was serenaded, and from each roof corn was 
 handed and added to the common stock. My 
 knowledge of San Domingan being rather lim- 
 ited, I am unable to furnish a correct report of the 
 brief speeches. Doubtless they were like white 
 men's public occasions ; carefully prepared im- 
 promptu. These ended, they sung and danced 
 to the plaza, circling round the boiling kettles, in 
 one hand rattling a sacred gourd containing 
 grains of corn, and covered with tribal symbols 
 and ancestral totems marked in red paint ; in 
 the other swinging a quantity of tortillas (rolls of 
 corn bread) tied together with thread, like a 
 bunch of cigars. 
 
 The corn is a species of the very hard flint. 
 The grains yellow or bluish black and red, some- 
 times all three on one cob. The stalk is perhaps 
 four feet high, the ears growing near the ground. 
 
56 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 Thill corn cakes, tortillas, are the principal lood 
 of Mexican and Indian, and the women pride 
 themselves on the skill and speed with which 
 they make them. The shelled grains are boiled 
 in water with a little lime to soften the skin so 
 that it can be pulled off, then it is ground into 
 meal by mashing with a long round stone, like 
 our rolling-pin, against an oblong, slightly hollowed 
 stone called a metate. A little water is added, 
 making it the consistence of gruel, and it is 
 baked in thin cakes on hot stones or griddles of 
 tin or copper. When done they are the color of 
 a hornet's nest and tasteless as white paper. 
 Once accustomed to them strangers become very 
 fond of tortillas. 
 
 At an appointed signal the corn was taken 
 from the kettle, burnt in the consecrated fire, and 
 the ashes sprinkled over the fields to insure a 
 good crop next year ; then another fire was 
 kindled, and kettles re-filled with corn, and when 
 boiled freely distributed to all the people, who 
 heartily enjoyed the banquet. 
 
 Such is the green corn dance ; a yearly de- 
 light celebrated in the changeless fashion set be- 
 fore these people in the primeval years. New 
 and startling figures are not in the program. 
 Their ambition is to do all according to the tra- 
 ditions of the elders. As the day advanced the 
 ecstacy increased, the dancers shuffled and hopped 
 as if they would shuffle off this mortal coil. 
 Convulsive stamping and leaping made with fran- 
 tic gestures ; the din of savage minstrelsy ; the 
 guttural, unrhythmed voices and the hideous 
 'Hombe^' a hollow log covered at the ends with 
 dried hide, made a barbaric uproar that lingers 
 long on senses attuned to harmony. 
 
 I must not close without mention of the dogs 
 of You-pel-lay. Admitted to that equal sky, 
 they were given the right to a voice in the mat- 
 
Laws and Customs. 57 
 
 ter and toward evening they embarked in a 
 tumultuous, unearthly fantasia. As we scaled the 
 Israel Putnam hill the soft night wind fell on our 
 hot, tired faces like the cool touch of holy water, 
 and floated after us the farewell symphonies of 
 the revelry. And they were all pow-wow and 
 bow-wow. 
 
 Perhaps the classic reader, if I am so fortunate 
 as to have one, may be reminded in this festival 
 of the haunted vale of Enna and its lovely fables ; 
 mythic stories filled with hidden meaning veiled 
 by the splendors of the Eleusinian mysteries. It 
 is the instinctiv^e spirit of gratitude to the Lord 
 of the harvest, the keeper of the destinies ; and 
 the poverty of this race and their rude rites are 
 to the genius and varied wealth of ancient Greece 
 only the difference of blood and civilization 
 everywhere between the Old World and the New. 
 
 The squaws wear no wreaths and have no share 
 in these ceremonials, but adoring women are the 
 same the world over, and out of their own hearts 
 create the glory and beauty of the shrines where 
 they burn precious incense and kneel for wor- 
 ship. They looked on in secret rapture with 
 love-light in their eyes, an expression I have 
 seen in the face of a listening wife in the senate 
 gallery, when the man foremost of all the world 
 to her speaks the words which thrill the crowd to 
 silence. In Santo Domingo there is no noiseless 
 telegraphy of swimming eye or waving hand. 
 Little does the sullen red sachem care for the 
 subtle flattery of loving admiration. 
 
5^ The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE CITY OF THE PUEBLOS. 
 
 Ten generations of men have come and gone 
 since Don Antonio de Espego distilled a subtle 
 Spanish essence in El Palacio ; and you may 
 break, you may shatter those walls, if you will, 
 but the scent of Espagna will hang round it still. 
 Under the witchery of that fast-fading charm, a 
 troop of attendant graces hover about its portal. 
 They bear musical names of sweet meaning, as 
 the discreet damsels who welcomed pilgrims to 
 the blessed rooms in the House Beautiful. Per- 
 fectio (perfection), a worthless peon, in Navaho 
 blanket, sweeps the sidewalk ; Benito (the good), 
 a shambling Mexican boy, watching his chance 
 for a spring at the spoons, brings the daily mail ; 
 Mariposa (butterfly), the silliest of Slowboys, 
 pushes the baby-wagon; while Angellus, an 
 angel whose form has lost its original brightness, 
 lazily watches her. Three old witches, whom we 
 familiarly call the Macbeths, were baptized some 
 centuries ago Feliciana, the Happy ; Rosita, little 
 Rose; Hermosa, the Beautiful. 
 
 It is the month of July, and the cotton-wood 
 trees of the Plaza are a mass of'tender leafage in 
 restless flutter, giving color and cool sound, most 
 grateful in a land where sterility is the rule, fer- 
 tility the rare and marked exception. The 
 acequias are open, and they moisten earth and 
 air in the square of alfalfa, or Spanish clover, 
 knee-deep. 
 
 Quite out of reach of the shady trees, in the 
 fiercest blaze of the sun, sitting on a fragment of 
 the Rocky Mountains, is a statuesque figure, 
 which might represent the oldest of the Fates, 
 
The City of the Pueblos, 59 
 
 the most furious of the Furies. It is Blandina, 
 the fair one, the soft one, of Santa Fe. Her face, 
 hkeone of her own foot-hills, is worn into gutters 
 and seams. Not like them so moulded by the 
 action of water, but by exposure to sharp sun- 
 light and withering wind, destructive to beauty, 
 which make even young persons appear old. 
 Her skin is a parchment, which looks as though 
 it might date back to — I was about to say the 
 Flood ; but that would imply that at some pre- 
 historic era she had felt the sanitary influence of 
 a shower-bath, and I would not harm an inno- 
 cent fellow-creature by such an unjust suspicion. 
 Herdraperiesarea mere dissolving view. There 
 sits the Mexican woman, day after day, not 
 begging, nor even reaching out her hand, but 
 following the passer-by with beseeching eyes, 
 haunting as the eyes of the dead. Like all the 
 very poor, she keeps a dog and smokes inces- 
 santly. 
 
 The great mass of population here is very 
 swarthy, and there are but few who have no 
 Indian blood in their veins. The traveller in New 
 Mexico may breakfast in a ranche where the oc- 
 cupants have the clear cinnamon hue; dine at 
 another where the faces are ashen, like the 
 Malay's ; and pass the night at a third where 
 the courteous host will show the deep Vandyke 
 brown of the Negro. The explanation is easy. 
 The different inhabitants of the several places are 
 sprung from various tribes. The Ute has a dingy, 
 tallow complexion, the Apache is a dirty ashen 
 gray, while the Mohave girls have cheeks of 
 almost Spanish transparency. 
 
 Besides the luxuries and refinements of the 
 furthest East, the Moors left behind them in 
 Spain many descendants, the children of Spanish 
 marriages. Some of these were among the 
 dauntless adventurers who came to Nueva Mejko 
 
6© The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 in the XVIth century. They intermarried with 
 the Indians, minghng three strains of blood, 
 which mixture is called Mexican. The conquer- 
 ing foreigners were not all olive-skinned. Some 
 of the first who sailed the sea boasted, and evi- 
 dently were, of the sangre azul, brought into 
 Spain by the wild Goths. The lover of Prescott 
 will remember his description of the watchful 
 gray eyes of Cortez,and the clear blue eyes of 
 Alvarado, whose yellow locks, fair forehead, and 
 beard yellow as gold, gave him a peculiar expres- 
 sion of sunniness, from which the Aztecs called 
 him Toiiitiah — "Child of the Sun." Scattered 
 at long distances through New Mexico are a few 
 ricos, of almost Saxon fairness, remote descendants 
 of the people who brought the exquisite archi- 
 tecture of Asia to perfect flower in the shades of 
 the Alhambra — departing traces of the northern 
 tribes to which southern Europe owes some of 
 its best elements of strength. Their blue eyes, 
 glancing from under the slouched sombrero, and 
 sunburnt hair, stringing down the scrape, affect 
 one strangely. It is like finding Albinos among 
 the Zuiii and Moqui Indians, and involuntarily 
 we ask: "What manner of men are these?" 
 Tawny color is seen in every grade of society and 
 some of the highest citizens are plainly of Indian 
 extraction. The restless energy of the Spaniard, 
 the quick preception of the Moor, even the cun- 
 ning of the roving Apache, appear to be lost in the 
 sluggish current which lazily beats in the pulses 
 of the modern Mexican. 
 
 Among the common people is one distinguish- 
 ing trait, the utter lack of beauty. I have fre- 
 quented every day crowds, and haunted churches, 
 where they are to be seen at their best, and have 
 found not one attractive face. Nowhere on earth 
 comes age so fast or in such repulsive shape. A 
 lovely baby changes to the plain young girl, 
 
The City of the Pueblos. 6i 
 
 somewhat comely, at fifteen. At twenty-five not 
 a vestige of freshness remains ; not a Hne to re- 
 mind one of beauty vanished forever. And oh ! 
 the hideous hags squatted against the walls ! 
 There is no speculation in those eyes, fixed as 
 the eternal gaze of the Sphinx. They look old 
 as that grim female, and I would as soon think 
 stone lips could part into a company smile, dis- 
 playing false teeth, as that these could break into 
 laughter or song. I wonder what they are 
 thinking about, if they think at all, or if an earth- 
 quake would make them jump. Assuredly, they 
 are the most opaque of terrestrial bodies, and, 
 under the old black shawl, they sit immovable, 
 as though all the forces of the universe (rarely 
 heard from in Santa Fe) could not start them 
 from their secure poise. 
 
 Dr. Holmes says " the finest human fruit, and 
 especially the finest women, we get in New Eng- 
 land are raised under glass. Protection is what 
 the transplanted Aryan requires in this New 
 England climate." I fancy "protection" is what 
 the women needs in the ''excessive," the terri- 
 torial climate analogous to that of Central Asia. 
 On this bleak, elevated plateau, where the dry- 
 ness is so intense that meat is cured without 
 smoke or salt, the juices of the human body evapo- 
 rate, leaving early wrinkles. I have seen men 
 in high health return from a month of camping 
 among the Rocky Mountains with crow's feet 
 wofully deepened and the appearance of having 
 " aged " in a very short time. 
 
 Perhaps dirt and low diet have helped to finish 
 the completed ugliness of the Santa Fe witches ; 
 but we know extremes of every sort waste ner- 
 vous force, and hasten the steps of the common 
 enemy, who sharpens his scythe for the faces of 
 women, and shakes the sand in the glass when he 
 measures their years. 
 
62 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 Moisture, when it does come, is not the gentle 
 rain from Heaven, swelling bud and flower, as 
 well as human hearts, to thankfulness. There 
 is no dew ; nor is there showering mist, like that 
 which went up from the earth and watered the 
 garden eastward in Eden. We have, instead, 
 high wind-storms, rain streaming in torrents, pre« 
 ceded by an atmosphere where men and animals 
 are acting lightning-rods for electric currents ; 
 keen, close lightning and the " live thunder " of 
 which Byron sung. Suddenly the mighty music 
 stops. The sun flashes out in unveiled splendor, 
 flooding the world with blinding light, and we 
 are tempted to tread a sun-dance in worship of 
 the glittering God of the Pueblos, who inhabits 
 eternity, lord of Heaven and earth, son of the 
 mornmg and father of all the days. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MEXICAN COTTAGES. 
 
 Across the way are a dozen Mexicans, wrapped 
 in greasy old blankets, sitting like four-and- 
 twenty blackbirds all in a row. I know their 
 faces, and have not missed one in a month. 
 They live in condition of body and mind hard 
 for an American to realize, A kind of present 
 existence, without loving reference to the past; 
 a passive waiting for the future, without an in- 
 quiry or a wish, a fear or a hope. Small, lank, 
 dark-brown fellows ; eight with high cheek- 
 bones and thick lips, betraying Indian blood; 
 hair long, straight, black ; eyes dark, suspicious, 
 wavering ; habitually silent ; when speaking, 
 
Mexican Cottages. 63 
 
 with gloomy indifference, in a voice sad as mem- 
 ory. Elsewhere they would go as tramps ; but 
 tramping is a grand fatigue. They prefer to sit 
 round, instead. 
 
 It is said this is the bearing of every con- 
 quered race ; but such is the average Mexican 
 wherever he is found. About the hill of royal 
 Chapultepec, at the base of the pyramid of 
 Cholula — last vestige of Aztecan grandeur — he 
 basks in the sun with the chameleons and lizards, 
 docile in temper, patient under abuse, idle as the 
 wind that lifts his long, black locks. Think you 
 such men care for advantages, natural or politi- 
 cal — They know the joy of a splendid destiny ful- 
 filled or the anguish of such a destiny lost? 
 They come of brave blood — Spaniard, Moor, 
 Indian — and how well they fight for their own, 
 the United States, France, and Austria may tes- 
 tify ; but to us never did life appear so empty, 
 aimless, and joyless as the life of these sitters in 
 the sun. 
 
 The puzzling question of to-day is : How do 
 they keep soul and body together ? Let us find 
 one in his home, if the dingy den he inhabits 
 may be called by that dear name. Leaving the 
 Plaza, where vagrants most do congregate, we 
 pass the cottages of'' the military " (on whose 
 heads be the blessing of those who entertain 
 strangers), cross a sandy arroya, through which in 
 the rainy season a mountain torrent sweeps roar- 
 ing. Westward the straggling suburb stretches 
 toward the foothills, and, stumbling along a stony 
 path, we suddenly come up against a wall. It 
 is about six feet high, made of mud mixed with 
 ashes, coal, cow-horns, hoofs, mule-bones, barrel- 
 hoops, the wheels of a baby- wagon, cans, broken 
 bottles, boots, curry-combs, every refuse sub- 
 stance that may swell the mass in a treeless re- 
 gion. The top of the wall bristles with scraps of 
 
64 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 tin, which make it hard to climb. I doubt if 
 Romeo would try it, even to seize the white 
 wonder of Juliet's hand. The gate is made of 
 upright posts of dwarf cedar, thick as a man's 
 wrist, bound together by rawhide strings, and 
 groans and creaks in a dismal note as we push 
 it on wooden hinges. Not a trace of iron is to 
 be seen. 
 
 This formidable outwork encloses three pup- 
 pies, of the breed called cast-iron, which look 
 like magnified rats and act wonderfully like cats. 
 The proprietor of the estate and his spouse, in 
 the doorway, sit in the artistic pose called squat, 
 at leisure profound, if not elegant. He is evi- 
 dently made of the same clay as his wretched 
 mud shanty ; might have sprouted up from the 
 ground or dropped down from the eaves. 
 
 As we enter, they rise in unembarrassed polite- 
 ness. He removes his slouch of a hat with de- 
 corous gravity, and the wife entreats us to enter, 
 saying, with the air of a princess in exile, we do 
 her great honor. The Spanish flavor is strong 
 here, which may be the reason she wears drag- 
 ging bright calicoes all the year, and sits in the 
 door even v/hen the snow falls. Her raven black 
 hair and large, full eyes hint of by-gone beauty ; 
 but it is by-gone. Premature wrinkles are worn 
 deep by the shriveling wind, her skin is swart 
 and sunburnt, and the roses in her cheek are 
 only ashes of roses, 
 
 "Would she give us a drink of water?" 
 
 " With much pleasure, Seriora'' 
 
 She diffuses an air of elegance over her pink 
 calico toilet by throwing a dreary old black shawl 
 round her head ; and, scorning to lift her volumi- 
 nous train (twelve yards for a dollar), hastens to 
 the nearest accqiiia, or irrigating ditch, fills a mug 
 of Indian pottery, and offers it with sweetness 
 and grace. No new country exuberance about 
 
Mexican Cottages. 65 
 
 her, nor revelling imagination, like Dick Swiv- 
 eller's ; but a power of enchantment and a lofty 
 self-poise which no surprise can startle or disturb. 
 It is found alike in splendor or in squalor, the 
 << grand air" of Old Spain, descended to all who 
 have a dash of her blood. 
 
 My hostess regrets the water is not wine, and 
 so catching is the fine charm that, ensnared and 
 deluded, I am hardly sure it is not wine, and 
 drink their health in the miserable ditch-water 
 and am cheered by responsive gracias. I try to 
 explain that I am under silken bonds — ribbons 
 red, blue, white — not to look upon wine when it 
 is red ; but it is their first hearing of temperance, 
 and they do not understand. She invites me to 
 a seat on the cold ion — a wool mattress folded 
 against the wall and covered with a blanket, 
 which serves the double purpose of bed by night 
 and sofa by day, an Oriental custom, come down 
 to them from the Moors. I excuse myself, being 
 in mortal fear of old settlers in the mattress. 
 There a lovely baby, with no dress to speak of, 
 is tossing up its heels. I ask some questions, 
 thinking of bright eyes far away ; and she pret- 
 tily says baby has no year yet, and her name 
 is Lola Juanita Eloisa. 
 
 The earthen floor is swept with a bunch of 
 broom, without handle, leaning against the mud 
 fireplace in the corner of the room. There are 
 no andirons, shovel, or tongs, and when fire is 
 made the wood is placed on end against the back 
 of the fireplace. A chest, a few pieces of crockery 
 on a pine table, complete the furniture. Can you 
 imagine love in such a cottage ? Undoubtedly 
 there is love, and in the poorest jacal there is no 
 brawling man, scolding, slapping wife, or crying 
 baby. If the walls crack, they are daubed by 
 Magdalena Rosalia with a fresh plaster of yeso, 
 or gypsunl, put on with a glove of sheepskin. If 
 
66 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 the outside flakes and cracks too badly, it is 
 smeared with a new coating of soft mud. In the 
 spring the ground floor has another layer of clay, 
 the fireplace a thin coating of tierra amarilla, or 
 yellow wash, and house-cleaning is ended. Does 
 the roof leak, a dab of mud is slapped on. Is 
 the outer wall in holes, a lump of clay will stop 
 the wind away. There is no window, and when 
 the door is closed the house must be dark and 
 stifling as a dungeon. Above the fireplace, done 
 in hectic chromo and framed in tin is a copy of 
 the divine Madonna in the Louvre, named " Queen 
 of Heaven"; a band of blue stars across her 
 forehead, a tinsel crescent under her feet. Hang- 
 ing below it is a plaster crucifix, under glass. 
 When the bell chimes, Magdalena Rosalia will 
 seek the old cathedral, whose vaulted interior is 
 filled with shadows and silence — among them a 
 few figures, motionless as the dead asleep under 
 the floors — say her prayers across the rosary, 
 confess, and be absolved. But Trinidad Gonza- 
 lez Ribera, in the gauzy blanket and vanishing 
 pantaloons, will sit dozing in the sun, deaf to the 
 ringing music, unmindful of bell, book, or candle. 
 I pass from under the hospitable mud roof with 
 . repeated adios and a feeling of unreality. I look 
 for a garden. There is none. There are no 
 chickens, no pig, no cow, no grass within the 
 gravelly enclosure. 
 
 The only sign of life is a famished donkey, 
 browsing on the strip of grass which borders 
 the acequia by the roadside. He is the property 
 of our new friends, and occasionally the man of 
 many names takes him to the mountains, loads 
 him with limbs of dead piTiones, and sells them for 
 twenty-five cents a backload. Stopping on the 
 plain, he digs a few roots of ainole\ or soap-weed ; 
 the yucca aloifolia, which we cultivate for its rich 
 cream -white blossoms. This is for the washing 
 done by Magdalena Rosalia. 
 
Mexican Cottages. 67 
 
 Do not think she briskly knocks so early Mon- 
 day morning or comes Sunday night for the 
 clothes, as wicked Protestants have been known to 
 do. No ; this daughter of a proud line will not 
 shame her high ancestry by vulgar haste. She 
 saunters along about noon, seats herself at ease, 
 makes affectionate inquiries as to every member 
 of the household, with a gift of continuance and 
 native talent for rigmarole which would do honor 
 to a legislative body. She deliberately ties the 
 bundle of clothes, balances it on her head, and 
 departs with sweeping courtesy and majestic flirt 
 of pink calico train. 
 
 After walking a few blocks, she stops for a rest, 
 adjusts her bundle into a cushion on the ground, 
 takes from her pocket a little package of corn- 
 husks, fills one with fine-cut tobacco from a paper 
 box, rolls it into a cigarritOt and enjoys a smoke. 
 A Monday picture in Santa Fe is the long row 
 of wash-women, with the everlasting black 
 shawls over their heads, sitting in the shade of 
 mud walls, quietly gossiping and smoking. To 
 get the clothes home is exertion enough for one 
 day. 
 
 Tuesday she repairs to the Rio Santa Fe weak- 
 ened by irrigating ditches to a shallow brook, and 
 on its sandy bank makes a little fire for washing. 
 Her machine is one bucket and a square tin box. 
 She pounds the clothes between two stones. Flan- 
 nels full, buttons fly, embroideries are a dream of 
 things that were. She boils them in the box, 
 set on granite ; rinses in the pure snow-water 
 of the Rio ; and spreads them on the rocks to 
 dry, as the young Roman girls do along the 
 Tiber. Friday, in comes Magdalena Rosalia, with 
 all beautifully white, folded in an Indian bas- 
 ket shaped like a deep saucer. 
 
 The proceeds of this labor buy a bag of blue 
 corn-meal and the necessary tobacco. Twice a 
 
68 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 week they can afford a stev/ of chili con came 
 (our old friend hash, made fiery hot with red 
 pepper) and the hving is made. As respects 
 worldly goods, come he soon or late, Death will 
 find this pair exactly as they entered life, exactly 
 as their fathers lived and died, in the peaceful 
 depths of contented poverty. Magdalena Rosalia 
 walks as though she was born in the purple, to 
 Hve like the lilies who toil not neither do they 
 spin ; and Trinidad Gonzalez Ribera is free of 
 care as though his olcf Navajo blanket was a 
 king's coronation robe. At the grave's edge it 
 not unfrequently happens that his mourning 
 friends, too poor to spare his blanket, strip it 
 from his body, and lay him away in the dust from 
 whence he sprung, shroudless and uncoffined. 
 
 These are the happy people sighed for by weary 
 poets in all the ages. Simple souls who love the 
 sun, live close to Nature, and in the dirt house, 
 to which nothing is added, where nothing is 
 repaired except by additional dirt, are serene as 
 summer, filled with a measureless content. Can 
 we say so much for the eager, ambitious con- 
 queror in a struggle, a battle, and a race ; always 
 getting ready to live, looking to the future when 
 he may have time to rest and enjoy ? 
 
 The Mexican does not wait for better times. 
 There is no day but this. He begins now and 
 the future takes care of itself. 
 
 Oh ! tired woman of '' the States," running on 
 your nerve, trying to do all the public demands 
 of you and all you require of yourself, leave the 
 place where the door bell rings every half hour. 
 Quit worrying over goose-parties for the Sunday- 
 school, Jarley's Vv^ax-works for the firemen ; slip 
 away from strawberry parties for the Gaboon Mis- 
 sion ; slacken the fevered rush ; loosen the strings 
 at concert pitch and ready to snap ; go to the 
 Mexican woman, consider her ways, and learn 
 how to rest. 
 
lo the Turquots Mines. 69 
 
 Of course, you, my precious reader, know 
 many things she does not. There never has 
 been a woman's meeting in this territory of 
 207,000 square miles ; and, in consequence, the 
 weak-minded creature is not aware that men are 
 great rascals, rob women of their rights, and bar 
 the avenues to wealth and fame against them. 
 Sing the Iliad of your w^oes, and it will fall on 
 heedless ears. And, though you harp how 
 Juliet's poetry flew up the kitchen-chimney and 
 Portia's eloquence burnt out over the gridiron 
 where her 
 
 " red right hand grew raging hot, 
 
 Like Crannier's at the steaky 
 
 she would quietly adjust the old black shawl 
 (final remnant and melancholy reminder of the 
 gay rebosa) and count the days till the next 
 fiesta. 
 
 There are heights beyond her reach, and beyond 
 your reach too, in spite of mighty purpose. She 
 does not strain after them, wearing herself to skin 
 and bone. While you, who have tasted bitter fruit 
 from the tree of knowledge, are ready to die in a 
 losing struggle for the unattainable, she loiters in 
 happy valley, by good spirits tenanted, and in 
 her easy shoe wears the four-leaved clover of 
 perpetual content. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 TO THE TURQUOIS MINES. 
 
 Reader, are you the sort of person who rushes 
 through life the first passenger on the earliest 
 train ; who hires the fastest coach at Niagara, to 
 exhaust the Falls, the Whirlpool, and Lundy's 
 Lane in half a day, and are then ready to whiz off 
 
70 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 ill the night express? If you are, then are we 
 no company for each other, and may as well part 
 at once. You are entirely unfit for frontier travel 
 and may go this minute. Adiosf Adios! 
 
 But you who lingered by the Rapids; who 
 have a kindly glance for the smutty sentinel at 
 the brake ; who do not threaten to die when the 
 gentlemanly conductor fills the car full and corks 
 it tight as a champagne bottle, but live on in 
 order to cheer a gasping fellow-martyr; who 
 help the mediaeval lady, of convex outline, trav- 
 eling with two geraniums and a canary bird, yet 
 keep a sympathetic eye for the young pair in the 
 new of the moon, murmuring, as they pass, I 
 too have dwelt in Arcadia. — You are the one I 
 love. Yours are the feet, beauteous on the 
 mountain-top, that go gypsying with me through 
 this New World, which Agassiz tell us is the 
 Old. 
 
 We travel in a hap -hazard way, varied with 
 many a digression, following no train but our 
 own fancies. We stop to speak with the natives 
 by the way, try to sketch a Gifford sunset on a 
 gritty scratch-book, and stray from the road for 
 bits of cheating mica, and for flowers which wilt 
 in the gathering, and change in our hands to dry 
 stalks and grasses. 
 
 The mountains are eternally beautiful, always 
 changing, forever new, and all about us is picture. 
 Walking for rest, the grama grass is soft and pleas- 
 ant under the pilgrim's feet; the sun always 
 shines ; the days are like the enchanted rooms in 
 the fairy castle, each more beautiful than every 
 other; the air is balm, and oil, and wine. 
 
 There is nothing pleasanter than such travel, 
 unless it be to float between blue and blue among 
 the Cyclades, and idly drift along the tideless 
 sea, to catch the far echo of the syren songs that 
 wooed the wandering Ulysses. 
 
To the Turquois Mines. 71 
 
 And now for the Turquois Mines. 
 
 To one who was an early and ardent admirer 
 of Lalla Rookhy the word turquois brings up 
 memories of old or, rather, young days among 
 fragrant orchard trees, meadows pink and white 
 with clover-blooms, and a certain fine-printed, 
 sight-destroying volume of the poet whose hun- 
 dredth birthday we have just celebrated. It is 
 like a fading dream to look from the shadowy 
 half-way house at the girl embowered among 
 singing birds, reading, with dazzled eyes, of 
 swords inlaid with rich marquetry, talismans, and 
 characters of the scimitar of Solomon. Arms of 
 
 " The wild warriors of the Turquois Hills," 
 
 who rallied to the white veil and glittering banner 
 of the False Prophet. 
 
 The perfumed and sparkling poem which 
 thrilled so many soft hearts at life's morning is 
 not loved by lovers of this age. Only the setting 
 generation — -and they mainly for the sake of old 
 times — read "The Veiled Prophet of Khorassan," 
 and in the twilight pensively sing "Araby's 
 Daughter," with voice not altogether fresh. In 
 the days when that fond farewell was first sung it 
 was taught that turquoises belonged chiefly to 
 the Turkish and Persian Empires. Since then 
 the ceaseless delving of the antiquary has given 
 to the world such treasure far removed from the 
 Shah's dominions. There are mines of high 
 antiquity in Mount Sinai, and a bronze finger- 
 ring, of unique pattern, set with turquoises, has 
 been discovered in the Wady Meghara of that 
 peninsula. It dates back to the vague, unreal 
 period of the Fourth Dynasty; and amulets of 
 the same material are unearthed in the ruins of 
 ancient Egyptian towns. They are found in 
 Arabia Petrea, in a stratum of red sandstone, of 
 finer blue and darker shade than the Persian, and 
 
72 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 the visitor of Roman museums sees antique 
 cameos and intaglios carved in Arabian turquois, 
 sadly faded and tarnished by long burial. Only 
 a few in the Vatican still retam their color. 
 
 Those of Khorassan are sold in Russia on 
 sticks, tied in bunches like quills, and are in de- 
 mand by jewelers of St. Petersburg, for enriching 
 sword-hilts, handles of daggers, belts, pipes, etc. 
 The Shah is reported to have in keeping all the 
 finest gems, allowing only the inferior grades to 
 leave the country. 
 
 In a curious old treatise on precious stones 
 the turquois is described as a delicate and sen- 
 sitive jewel, which has an affinity for its owner, 
 changing color with his health and varying for- 
 tunes. The fact that they do change color in a 
 wholly unaccountable manner may explain the 
 fanciful notion. Human hearts are the same 
 everywhere and in all ages, and many a myth 
 and superstition of the East is reproduced in 
 Mexico — plain testimony that Orientalism dwells 
 not alone in its sky and the palm trees of the 
 valley. 
 
 It interested me greatly to find that the pretty 
 legend of the Orient attaches to the turquois 
 of the New World, called by the ancient Aztec 
 clialchidte (pronounced chal-chew-e-te). 
 
 Like the Asiatic, the Aztecan believed it 
 brought good fortune to the wearer, glowed in 
 sympathy with the healthful beating of his pulse, 
 and ominously paled in prophecy of a coming 
 misfortune. The power of the Montezumas was 
 absolute, as their dominion was vast ; and wher- 
 ever the green banner of the king marked the 
 limit of his realm, the cJialchuite was, by imperial 
 decree, forbidden to the commonalty — the jewel 
 sacred to the royal house. When the five am- 
 bassadors from Totonac came to the tent of 
 Cortez, at Vera Cruz, they defied the law (being 
 
To the Turqiiois Mines. 73 
 
 then at war with the fierce and bloody Aztec), 
 and wore the proscribed jewels — *'gems of a bright 
 blue stone, in their ears and nostrils."'*' 
 
 Readers of Prescott will remember his pictur- 
 esque page describing the city of Tezcuco, where 
 North American civilization reached its height. 
 In the royal palace was a hall of justice, called 
 the '' Tribunal of God," where the judge decided 
 important causes and passed sentence of death, 
 seated on a throne of pure gold, inlaid with the 
 consecrated turquois. 
 
 The art of cutting gems was carried to high 
 perfection by the Aztecs, and the carved chal- 
 cludte is noted by every writer on the Spanish 
 Conquest. 
 
 Father Sahagun calls it a jasper of very green 
 color, "or a common smaragdus," so precious to 
 the infidel that the use of them was prohibited 
 by royal edict to any but the nobility. " It rep- 
 resented to them everything that was excellent 
 in its kind ; for which reason they put such a 
 stone in the mouth of distinguished chiefs who 
 died," like the coin poetry offered to the grim 
 ferryman of the souls of the Greek dead.f They 
 were valued by the heathen above all earthly 
 possessions, and, therefore, at first held in great 
 estimation by the Spaniards. The art of polish- 
 ing them came from Heaven, the gift of the god 
 Quetzelcoatl, a gentle deity who instructed the 
 Aztecs in the use of metals, agriculture, and the 
 arts of government. It was in the golden age of 
 Anahuac, when an ear of Indian corn was as 
 much as one man could carry, when the air was 
 filled with the melody of birds, the earth with 
 flowers, and cotton in the field took of its own 
 
 *Prescott's History .of the Conquest of Mexico, Vol. I. 
 ' t Father Sahagun thus describes these precious stones: "ia* 
 chalchuUes son rerdes y no transparentes mezcladas de bianco, 
 usanlas, mucho^aa j^rinciiJales trayendolas las munecas atadas en 
 hilo, y aquello es sencU deque esijersona noble el que las traey— 
 Hist, de Nueva Espaila, Lib. ii. chap. 8. 
 
74 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 accord the rich dye of cochineal. Chohila was 
 his favorite city, where the massy ruins of the 
 temple dedicated to his worship form one of the 
 most interesting relics of ancient Mexico. By 
 command of the superior deities, he took leave 
 of his worshipers on the shores of the Mexican 
 Gulf, under promise to return, and, entering his 
 wizard skiff, made of serpents' skins, sailed away 
 to the blooming shores of happy Tlapallan. 
 
 The earliest mention of this historic gem is 
 made by the honest old soldier, Bernal Diaz. 
 Four chalcl mites, counted the most precious offer- 
 ings from his treasury, were among the first pres- 
 ents sent by Montezuma to Cortez. " A gift to 
 our emperor, designed as a mark of highest 
 respect, as each of them, they assured us, was 
 worth more than a wagon-load of gold." The 
 covetous Spaniard was enraptured with the gold- 
 dust and jewels, and gave in exchange — a sorry 
 return for the munificence of the imperial present 
 — a few Holland shirts, and a string of trumpery 
 beads, strongly perfumed with musk. 
 
 On sending the priceless Aztecan diamonds, 
 '* worth four wagon-loads of gold," to ValladoHd, 
 it turned out, rather awkwardly for the Spaniards, 
 that they were not worth so many wagon-loads of 
 earth. 
 
 The gossiping Her odotus of the New World 
 alludes to the chalchidte again in his narrative of 
 the first meeting of Montezuma and Cortez, on 
 the Causeway, at the entrance to Mexico, city ot 
 enchantment. That fatal day, when the force of 
 his own genius brought the representative of the 
 strongest empire of the Old World face to face 
 with the mightiest monarch of the New, its pale 
 lustre shone dimly in the fringe of the canopy 
 held by the Caciques above the hapless mon- 
 arch's head. " A canopy of exeeding great 
 value," says the quaint chronicler, " decorated with 
 green feathers, gold and silver, chalchuis stones 
 
To the I'urquois Mines. 75 
 
 and pearls, which hung down from a bordering 
 altogether curious to look at." 
 
 Its delicately-traced veins, occasionally of 
 greenish hue, betray a near kinship to malachite. 
 This rich-tinted mineral is finer than the dark- 
 colored stone of Russia, and though by no means 
 costly as Shylock's turquoise, the chalcJmite still 
 holds its high repute among the various tribes of 
 the red race. 
 
 It is valued by the Navajo beyond the garnets 
 and beryls of his own country, and is used as 
 currency among the half-civilized Pueblos of New 
 Mexico and Arizona. The Indian girls along the 
 Colorado wear it is as a love-token in their neck- 
 laces ; the roving and tameless Apache covets a 
 blue bead as an amulet ; the degraded Ute loves 
 its soft glimmer ; and when a Mohave chief would 
 assume regal splendor, he sticks a three-cornered 
 piece of chalcJmite in his royal nose. 
 
 Such associations fresh in mind, it was with 
 extreme pleasure I prepared for an excursion to 
 Los Cerillos, where these blue-eyed gems are 
 found, the only mines as yet discovered this side 
 the Russian seas. Twenty -six miles southwest 
 of Santa Fe are the long, narrow ranges of gold 
 and silver-bearing mountains — Placer, Sandia, 
 Manzana, etc. — which form an unbroken chain 
 on the eastern side of the Rio Grande. Among 
 them are three turquoise mines, which anciently 
 supplied the Indian market of North America. 
 
 A roomy ambulance, drawn by four mules ; 
 various delights, liquid and sohd, in a mess-chest ; 
 a party of choice spirits, like my reader ; and a 
 morning such as breaks nowhere but over the 
 hills of Paradise and New Mexico — this was our 
 start. 
 
 Our driver was a young Mexican, bearing a 
 lengthy and musical name, with which I shall not 
 serenade you. Juan Fresco (Cool John) is a 
 
^6 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 minute fragment of it. He was very spruce in a 
 brand-new suit of kerseymere, of the sort sold 
 throughout the frontier by Israehtes in whom 
 there is much guile ; a handsome Navajo blanket 
 closely woven and brightly striped ; and was 
 happy in possession of a limitless supply of corn 
 husks and powdered tobacco, which he rolled 
 into cigarettes and smoked, without so much as 
 saying, By your leave. Had he known it was 
 impolite, he would have implored pardon, with 
 many sweet-sounding words. Mexican women 
 smoke constantly, as men do, and he does not 
 know better. He can live and does live on a 
 dollar a week ; and, with tortillas, onions, red 
 pepper, and once in a great while a mutton stew, 
 thrives and drives the ambulance. They say that 
 there is Indian blood in him; that he is cold as 
 death and treacherous as a tiger-cat ; but I do not 
 believe it. 
 
 In this high, dry country, corresponding with 
 Western Asia, the tendency of the human body 
 is to Arab leanness, and Juan Fresco, who grew 
 to man's estate under this fierce Syrian sun, sit- 
 ting against the mud wall of a Syrian hut, has a 
 soft Syrian face. No positive beauty (I have 
 never seen out-door people except Arabs who 
 have), but comely features, unchanging, melan- 
 choly eyes, and a gentle, passive voice, very 
 winsome. 
 
 The festal day found Juan Fresco highly em- 
 bellished with a yellow sash tied tightly around 
 his waist, securing a long knife (iiavajci) in its 
 folds. Every Spaniard can use the knife with 
 skill, and in his hands it becomes a dreadful 
 weapon. He can cast it with exact aim and un- 
 erring certainty into a post or into the heart of 
 an enemy at a considerable distance away ; and 
 wherever there is Spanish blood the navaga is 
 the favorite weapon, not always concealed about 
 
To the Turquois Mines. 77 
 
 his person. Our muleteer took his pleasure sadly 
 as any Englishmen ; but his sadness is only for 
 strangers. He is leader of the band which goes 
 from house to house playing under the windows 
 — the sweet Spanish invitation to the ball ; gayly 
 thrums the guitar at the light fandango ; and can 
 dance till morning as well as hold his own in any 
 affray that may grow out of the wild license of 
 the baile. 
 
 Occasionally he leaped from his seat for a pock- 
 etful of stones, gathering them as the wagon 
 moved on, and throwing them at the heads of the 
 mules ; at the same time muttering, on the ledger 
 lines below, sacred words mixed with names of 
 saints. The Mexican insists a mule cannot be 
 made to understand without such urging; and they 
 have a proverb: "An ass's ears are made long 
 in order to catch oaths." 
 
 [N. B. — There is reason to believe that a like 
 superstition attaches to the Army of the United 
 States.] 
 
 Leaving the venerable city of the Pueblos, we 
 crossed the Santa Fe River, which in Indiana 
 would be called a spring branch. I have often 
 gone over it dry shod. But the poverty of the 
 Spanish language allows only one word for run- 
 ning water — Rio, translated river. The Santa Fe 
 Mountains round about us are a part of the great 
 Rocky Mountain system, connecting on the north 
 with the Spanish Peaks and Raton Mountains, 
 including many whose summits are silvered with 
 perpetual snow. A series of high, picturesque 
 chains, in the morning-glow robed with a trans- 
 parent purple haze, of such exquisite tint one can 
 hardly realize those airy pyramids in a fair bor- 
 der-land- between us and heaven are, indeed, up- 
 heavals of earth, veined with quartz and based on 
 coarse red granite. 
 
 Words cannot picture aught so fair. The 
 
yS The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 faintest violet, the softest heliotrope are coarse 
 and hard beside the dreamy, poetic color, which 
 appeals to the eye as dim aeolian soundings touch 
 the ear, charming the fancy with vague ideas of 
 a viewless beauty within the floating veil. 
 
 I cannot make you understand. Come and 
 see the transfiguration which makes rock-ribbed 
 hills appear like tents of light, lovely enough for 
 angels to rest in on their upward flight. 
 
 The plain was smooth as a prairie, and our 
 road free of stone. The reader must not imagine 
 it lay among Alpine scenery, with huge peaks 
 towering to the sky, forbidding our advance, 
 yielding at last to reveal smiling valleys and hid- 
 den hamlets, nestling close to the hillsides in 
 narrow glens. Here all is on the same magnifi- 
 cent scale. The plains are broad as the sum- 
 mits are high ; the refined atmosphere so intensely 
 clear the light is like a reflection from snow. No 
 such extensive views are in Europe or any 
 country where the air holds moisture, and some- 
 times the landscapes seem absolutely limitless. 
 
 The Sierras are short, uneven spurs from the 
 main line. They have disturbed the overlying 
 strata in the shape of mesas (tables) of solid rock, 
 which are a distinguishing feature of Rocky 
 Mountain scenery, giving it a grotesque, fantas- 
 tic beauty. The process of erosion has formed in 
 colossal size copies of the grandest structures of 
 man's art, and towering columns, temples with 
 sharp pinnacles, scattered pillars rise abruptly 
 from the centre of plains desolate and forsaken 
 as the wilderness of Engedi — strange and solemn 
 sights. In the Painted Desert are snow-white 
 mesas^ the craie blanche composition of the chalk 
 clifls on the south coast of England, which dazzle 
 the eye, reflecting the sunlight like palaces of 
 alabaster or of ice. The stone corridors of Kar- 
 nak and Philae are the work of pigmies com- 
 
To the Turquois Mines. 79 
 
 pared with this noble architecture, wrought by 
 slow processes in secret places, 
 
 "Made by Nature for herself." 
 
 Sometimes the mesa shapes into a rose-red wall^ 
 with fluted columns that uphold the sky. Again 
 it is a group of gray pyramids, a thousand or 
 twelve hundred feet high ; or an isolated, broken 
 dome, worn smooth by the weather, picturesque 
 in the extreme. 
 
 Nothing affords such changes of coloring as. 
 the variegated marls, lying in regular bands of 
 red, orange, green, blue, of rainbow hue, striped 
 and interstratihed with belts of purple, bluish 
 white, and mottled veins of exceeding richness. 
 
 Strangely enough, the traveler occasionally 
 finds himself riding above these singular forma- 
 tions, and lookmg down on the " Painted Rocks.'" 
 
 The sheer sides of a mesa of gray limestone,, 
 mixed with blue clay and capped with a rim of 
 pillared basalt, are singularly like fabrics of hewn 
 stone. I have seen low walls of even height 
 reaching long distances, precisely like field-walls, 
 laid by skillful masons. These, in the neighbor- 
 hood of stately /^m^^.f, with the fair finish at the 
 top, explain how an explorer, afraid to make 
 near approach, should go away and give accounts 
 of vast cities, with gallant banners on the walk 
 enclosed in heavy outworks. 
 
So The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 TO THE TURQUOIS MINES. 
 
 Traveling westward, there came to our view 
 the first Placer Mountain ; behind it the melon- 
 shaped Sandia, 13,000 feet in air; and far south- 
 ward the detached range of the Manzana Moun- 
 tains. A plateau, the highest of equal area on 
 the globe, varied with sterile vegas and dreary 
 sierras, which reminded the early adventurers of 
 their own Old Castile, and so like it one can 
 imagine it had once been the home of wandering 
 tribes, which have long since taken up their 
 spears, struck their tents, and sought new camps 
 in the furthest East. 
 
 The grama grass is low' and diy, like wiry 
 moss, and in the distance takes a wan, ashen hue, 
 more ghastly than white. The cactus is the only 
 shrub in sight. A gaunt, starved thing, the leper 
 of the vegetable world, forbidding our approach. 
 
 The lively prairie dog (who is no dog, but a 
 marmot) saluted as we passed. Having early 
 learned the fifth beatitude, I suppress a descrip- 
 tion of him. Nor shall we ask how he exists 
 without water, or seek to know if there is a snake 
 at the bottom of his den, and a strange bird 
 dwelling there in peace and safety. 
 
 It was June; but not the leafy month of June. 
 The only timber — dwarf cedar — which can grow 
 in this barren soil was cut away years ago ; and 
 absence of trees includes absence of birds. The 
 friendly trill and flutter heard about nests in 
 shady places are sadly missed. Now and then a 
 black wing flapped overhead, and a crow flew 
 down in the road. Living equally well on seed, 
 roots, flesh, he thrives alike in all places. And, 
 
To the Turqiiois Mines. 8i 
 
 except this one sign of life, we may journey in 
 some directions a whole day and see neither man 
 nor beast, bird nor insect. We missed the wood- 
 land scents, too ; the forest fragrance of mint, 
 thyme, pennyroyal, and the beeches, whose shad- 
 ows are the curtains of the morning, holding its 
 freshness against the power of the sun till high 
 noon. The eye soon wearies of the leaden hues, 
 and longs for the dark leafage which is the glory 
 of the Mississippi Valley. The blank, scorched 
 plain, lying stark and still in the fierce, white 
 light, brought a sense of loneliness and depression 
 impossible to shake off. There was no rest for 
 the sight or the soul. 
 
 But what is this apparition starting from a dis- 
 tant clump of greasewood — a grisly animal, 
 apparently neither brute nor human? Rapidly 
 coming toward us, we recognize a creature of the 
 genus JioiJio. <' In the desert no one meets 3. 
 friend," says the Oriental proverb ; and there was 
 a general stir for arms among the defenders, and 
 mute shaking of the head, not intended to be 
 seen, when nothing more serviceable than a cac- 
 tus cane was found in the ambulance. 
 
 Every reader knows the border is the chosen 
 field of the dime-novel hero ; a safe refuge for 
 cut-throats and desperadoes of the lowest grades, 
 who live by robbery and plunder, and that it is 
 wise for the tourist to put on his pistol with his 
 watch, or, in the expressive slang of the frontier, 
 he may be blighted by lead fever before sun- 
 down. 
 
 Outlaws from Mexico and Texas haunt the 
 mountain springs and prowl about the caiions 
 of the territories ; and, in dread of them, hunters 
 go in parties, and look well to their arms when 
 they enter narrow defiles or a dark, lonesome 
 gulch. 
 
 These vagabonds subsist on the fat of the land, 
 
82 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 where the country is most sparsely settled, and 
 are the only buyers who have credit and are not 
 crowded for payment by the Israelties who con- 
 trol the dry goods business of the territory. The 
 ranchero never refuses them milk, eggs, or mut- 
 ton ; and the dark-eyed Mexican girl serves them 
 with diligence, under promise of payment when 
 they come again. Given a voice in the matter, 
 this is not such a character as we like to encount- 
 er on an empty plain, even in broad daylight ; 
 and, as he neared us, the ladies involuntarily drew 
 close together and scanned him thoroughl)'. 
 
 A powerful fellow, of giant frame and danger- 
 ous muscle, and, though unarmed, a foe to dread 
 in any fight. He wore a shoddy coat, probably 
 bought on compulsory credit of the Wandering 
 Jew of Tularosa ; buckskin pants, with fringed 
 side-stripes of Indian work, tucked inside of heavy 
 cavalry boots, ponderous brass spurs jingling as 
 he walked ; a red cotton handkerchief knotted 
 around his throat. An imimense slouched som- 
 brero — in the style of the Mexican caballero — 
 drab, with a rosette and cord of red and tinsel, 
 covered his forehead and shaded eyes that were 
 restless and penetrating like a blackbird's. A 
 shaggy, unshorn mane, reddened with dust and 
 sunburn, fell over the buffalo neck and shoulders ; 
 matted beard, a very jungle, reached almost to the 
 cartridge-belt, and, blown aside by the wind, 
 revealed the outline of revolvers in his breast- 
 pockets. He carried a Winchester rifle easily as 
 a gentleman carries his cane ; a leather belt, 
 buckled around his waist, was filled with cart- 
 ridges, and bore a murderous-looking knife in its 
 sheath. 
 
 When this shape, of aspect threatening and 
 sinister, came within friendly hail, we bowed with 
 much suavity. 
 
 " Texas Jack ! Buenos diasT said Juan Fresco, 
 
To the Tzirqucis Mines. 83 
 
 who well became his name ; and serene as sum- 
 mer, he shifted the reins and laid his hand on the 
 navaja. 
 
 The frontiersman touched his hat-brim with his 
 big forefinger, sunburnt to a vermillion red, 
 quietly passed on toward the Galisteo, and we 
 saw him no more. When fairly out of sight of 
 the outlaw, we felt brave as lions. 
 
 '' A prospector," said one, mildly. 
 
 " Yes, and never without a prospect," said the 
 antiquarian, bringing out an old witticism. 
 
 " A black sheep A\ithout any white spots," 
 added another. "■ They always bring up on the 
 frontier." 
 
 And, very hilarious under the sense of relief, 
 we courageously debated what we would have 
 done had the robber attempted robbery and 
 ordered us to hold up our hands. The men of 
 the p^n would have been mere boys in the grip 
 of this son of th^ border ; and we cheered our- 
 selves with telling tales of how *' just such men " 
 had gone out without pistols to seek their for- 
 tunes, and had never been heard of afterward. 
 
 The weakest of weeklies is dull and insipid 
 compared with the daily experiences recounted 
 in New Mexico ; and restless souls who hate 
 tram nels, who love danger for its own sake, and 
 hive looked death in the face till they cease to 
 fear it, find a special charm in the wild " game 
 flivor" of the frontier. 
 
 The borderer who crossed our path .was the 
 sort of soldier who in March, 1862, under the 
 rebel General Sibley, came up from Texas, forded 
 the Rio Grande at a point below Fort Craig, 
 fought the Union troops under Gen. Canby at 
 Valverde, and again at Canon Glorietta, fifteen 
 miles from Santa Fe. In that narrow pass, where 
 flanking Wcis out of the question, a severe fight 
 between infantry and artillery occured, in which 
 
84 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 the rebels were victorious, and Sibley entered 
 the capital city without meeting further resis- 
 tance. 
 
 His Texan Rangers, like Texas Jack, were 
 half savage ; a desperate set, having no higher mo- 
 tive than plunder and adventure. Each one was 
 mounted (^\\ a mustang horse, and carried a rifle, 
 a tomahawk, a bowie-knife, a pair of Colt's revol- 
 vers, and a lasso for catching and throwing the 
 horses of a flying enemy. Not valuing their 
 own lives at a pin's fee, they gave no quarter and 
 expected none. 
 
 About eleven o'clock the breeze dropped and 
 the sun came up with a dry, sultry scorch, like 
 flame. Our spirits flagged, the stories ended, 
 laughter and song died away ; nor could we rouse 
 to the least interest in a herdsman's ranche — a 
 mud-built hive, swarming with Mexican drones. 
 
 " What a weary land ! " said Thalia. 
 
 " All lands are weary for women," said her 
 elder sister ; and for a time nothing v/as heard 
 but the harsh grinding of wheels in the gravelly 
 sand. 
 
 In such emptiness it was a stirring event to be 
 overtaken by a Pueblo Indian, who passed us 
 with a swinging stride, rarely seen off the boards 
 of a country theatre. This 
 
 " Wild warrior of the Turquois Hills " 
 
 is tame enough now. Always a tiller of the soil, 
 he is the original, in fact, the aboriginal granger. 
 A picturesque figure, in a handsome striped 
 blanket, with red girth around his waist and a 
 crown of green leaves, like the classic fillet, shad- 
 ing his forehead. We were fortunate, too, in seeing 
 a half-grown boy chase jack-rabbits with a curved 
 stick, hurling it with whirring sound, in the style 
 of the boomerang, till lately thought exclusively 
 Australian. The stripling appeared like the 
 
To the Turquois Mines, 85 
 
 bird-hunter of the Nile, carv^ed in basso relievo on 
 the oldest tomb at Thebes. Weapon and attitude 
 of the Egyptian are precisely the same as those 
 of the boyish red hunter of North America. 
 
 The more we learn of Eve's family, the surer 
 the proofs of a common parentage. Guided by 
 the same instinct, the tools of various nations, 
 unknown to each other, are the same and the 
 measure of their advancement ; showing how 
 little depends on accident, and how closely they 
 are connected with the organism, and, therefore, 
 with the necessities of man. So striking is the 
 parallel between aborigines in every continent 
 that with difficulty do we divest ourselves 
 o{ the idea that there must have been some direct 
 intercommunication. 
 
 A band of tender green, restful to the sight, 
 follows the course of a poor, tired, sluggish 
 stream, sixteen miles from Santa Fe ; and a mile 
 or two down its soundless current we described a 
 group of cotton-wood trees — an oasis, indeed — 
 shading alow adobe house. The green leaves in 
 restless flutter and the brook gave the spot an 
 appearance of home not often found in the square 
 of brown mud wall which makes the Mexican 
 domicile. 
 
 Along the margin of the nameless stream is a 
 border of alkali, sprinkled in patches like salt 
 over the ground. Of course, we were struck with 
 thirst at sight of running water ; but prudenth' con- 
 tented ourselves with that in our canteens, rather 
 thai risk drinking alkali, which abounds \\\ New 
 Mexico, so strong in some streams that fish can- 
 not live in them. In many places the ranchero 
 digs, to find only a mocking fluid, deadly alike 
 to man, beast, and vegetation. And we compre- 
 hend the Arabian saying : " The water provider 
 is always blest, being daily remembered in the 
 prayers of the faithful." 
 
86 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 Our road was an easy descent all the way, the 
 Cerillos being nearly 3,000 feet lower than Santa 
 Fe. The founder of the antique city (Don An- 
 tonio de Espego) described this country with 
 Spanish exuberance, in a letter to Philip Second : 
 ** The earth is filled with gold, silver, and tur- 
 quoises.'^ And the gallant adventurer threw 
 such glowing light upon it, the king at once sent 
 a thousand men to colonize and possess the pro- 
 vince. 
 
 As we quietly journeyed along, I pondered on 
 the very moderate basis the heroic Cavaliers, 
 those old Spanish filibusters, had for the brilliant 
 reports sent back to Spain. Leaving the ambu- 
 lance within a mile of the mines, we toiled wearily 
 along the mountains, well named the Rocky. 
 Their surface is strewn with fragments, broken as 
 if chipped with hammers — a ragged pavement, 
 which bruised our feet, tore our shoes, and wore 
 out our patience ; and when at last we reached 
 the first mine, we thought it but a continuation 
 of Los Cerillos, The most ancient is much the 
 largest, and to this we directed our steps. Under 
 the dizzy crags which overhang it is a sheltered 
 recess, blackened with smoke and bedded with 
 ashes made by camp-fires of Indians, who still 
 frequent the spot, in search of the precious chal- 
 chuite. With difficulty we reached this cave, and, 
 leaning over the edge, looked down and saw, not 
 a narrow, black shaft, but half a mountain cut 
 away. Undoubtedly, the mineral lay here which, 
 through countless generations, furnished the 
 Indian kings with their most valued ornaments. 
 The yawning pit is two hundred feet deep and 
 more than three hundred in diameter. Probably 
 the work of aborigines before De Soto's requiem 
 mingled with the voice of the rushing waters of 
 his burial place ; when Columbus had seen the 
 New World only in that vision of the night, 
 
To the TtirqiiGis ]\I:nes. 87 
 
 v.here the unknown voice whispered : *' God will 
 cause thy name to be wonderfully resounded 
 through the earth, and will give thee the keys of 
 the gates of the Ocean, A\hich are closed with 
 strong chains." On the walls of the great exca- 
 vation Nature has gently, patiently done what 
 she could to smooth the rugged crags, and has 
 thrown out of their fissures a scant growth of 
 shrubs, and trailed a scarlet blossom here and 
 there on a thread-like stem. At the bottom, on 
 stones crumbling with age, stained and weather- 
 worn, are dwarf pines, the growth of the centur- 
 ies. In this close amphitheatre there is no breeze 
 to stir their tops, and their motionless foliage, 
 with its somber shadows, adds to the ever-pres- 
 ent mountain-gloom. 
 
 Thousands of tons of rock have been crushed 
 from the solid mass, and thrown up in such a high 
 heap it seems another mountain, overgrown with 
 old pines and dry gray mosses. On a few frag- 
 ments we noticed the turquois stain — "indica- 
 tion " of valuable mineral. When we consider 
 that all this digging, hewing, and hacking were 
 done by hand labor alone, without knowledge of 
 domestic animals, iron, or gunpowder, the debris 
 carried away in sacks of skins, the enormity of 
 the work is the more impressive. The tradition 
 is that the chalcJiiiite mines, through immemoric I 
 ages known to the primitive race, were possessed 
 by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century. In- 
 dian slaves then worked them, under the lash of 
 the conqueror, until 1680, when, by accident, a 
 pDrtion of the rock from which we had our first 
 view fell, and killed thirty Pueblos. The Span- 
 iards immediately made a requisition on the town 
 of San Marcos for mo#e natives to take their 
 places ; when, with a general uprising, they drove 
 the hated oppressor from the country as far 
 south as El Paso del Norte. I give the tale for 
 
88 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 what it is worth. Mining atmospheres are ihe 
 favorite haunts of fable, and a spice of truth is 
 enough to flavor whole volumes of stories, charm- 
 ing but delusive. An airy legend hovers about 
 Santa Fe that two stones from " Z^ Canada de 
 las Minas'' — '' Glen of Mines" — are still among 
 the crown jewels of Arragon. But chalchintcs 
 were valueless after being once submitted to the 
 jewelers of Spain ; and the sparkling story, like 
 many another told by the camp-fire, loses its 
 original brightness when removed to the search- 
 ing light of the student's lamp. 
 
 Careful analysis shows the constituents of the 
 chalchuites are nearly the same as those of the 
 Persian turquoises, and their f-^rmation the result 
 of infiltration. Sometimes they are v/ashed up 
 by heavy rains ; but usually are discovered by 
 digging in the sandstone or are broken out from 
 the body of the rock. 
 
 Not being disposed to dig, we retraced our 
 path, and climbed around to the top of the shelv- 
 ing crag above us, and looked over the plateau. 
 Eastwardly it stretches toward Santa Fe, beyond 
 which the stony mountains lift their high heads. 
 On the southwest it opens toward the Rio Grande 
 in a measureless vista, where earth and sky appear 
 to meet. A plain, oppressive in its vastncss, 
 lying in the midst of a stone wilderness, its 
 sameness relieved by the solitary peaks, Sandia 
 and Albuquerque. In every direction stand 
 mountains grim and fixed as walls of adamant, 
 apparently immovable as the throne of God. 
 Low in the horizon one feathery cloud hung 
 moveless in a sapphire sky. The world seemed 
 stricken dead. No verdure to cool the parched 
 grass ; no water, " the ^eye of the earth " glanc- 
 ing up toward heaven ; no waving branches, 
 beckoning like friendly hands to cool shade and 
 shelter : no wagon-road or foot-path to mark the 
 
To the Ttirquois Mines. 89* 
 
 track of men ; not a sound to break a stillness- 
 which is not the hush of profound peace, but the 
 everlasting silence of death. 
 
 Save the one shining spot of gauzy vapor, the 
 blue above was without a blur. The sun was at 
 meridian, and in its hard glitter the scorched 
 summits looked like they were at white heat. 
 The sea is lonely ; but it has shifting color, 
 sound, and motion. The silence of the land is 
 deeper. If there had been the note of a bird, 
 the hum of bees, even a grasshopper's chirp, it 
 had been a relief; but in the far-reaching desola- 
 tion I alone drew breath. All else was still as 
 the breast when the spirit has fled. 
 
 The influence was benumbing to the senses, 
 and as I stood in infinite solitude, a stone among 
 stones, there came over me the feeling that this 
 melancholy waste is the skeleton of our Mother 
 Earth ; that the dust of which all flesh is made 
 has been blown away, scattered to the four winds 
 of heaven, leaving these gray old bones forlorn 
 and unburied through the long, slow centuries,, 
 till the coming of the Great Day for which all 
 other days were made. 
 
 The voices below were too remote for my 
 hearing, and (how absurd it now appears) it was 
 "company "to spy a speckled chameleon, sun- 
 ning himself on a rock ; and, as he quickly slipped 
 between its cracks and vanished, I was left the 
 more alone. Listening to silence, as it were, 
 there swept across my memory the words of the 
 hymn familiar in childhood as the dear face which 
 bent above my cradle : 
 
 " O'er all these wide-extended plains 
 Shines one eternal day." 
 
 If the singer had ever faced the blinding glare 
 of high noon on the wide-extended plains of the 
 Rocky Mountains, he would have tuned his harp 
 anew, and hymned the rivers of waters in a dry- 
 
'9© The Land cf the Pueblos. 
 
 place, the shadow of a great rock in a weary 
 land. 
 
 1 soon sought that refuge from the desert 
 scorch, and, snatching at shrubs to keep from slip- 
 ping, scrambled down the mountain by a dizzy, 
 winding way, the loosened stones rolling after me 
 to the bottom of the mine. How pleasant the 
 smoke of the camp-fire ! Its leaping flame and 
 •crackle were a welcome back to life again. And 
 never till then did I know how much sweeter than 
 harp or horn the sound of human voices can be. 
 
 Long before I joined my companions I had 
 heard shouts of exultation, and, wondering what 
 prospector had '* struck it," I learned that a piece 
 of chaldiuite had been brought out of the lining 
 of a seam where it had lain under the roots of a 
 -stunted shrub, in appearance not unlike spice- 
 wood. It was near an inch in length, by half an 
 inch in thickness ; a large and lovely specimen, 
 the color sea-green, delicately shaded into blue — 
 the latter the result of decomposition, so the 
 scientist said. 
 
 The owner of this " regular bonanza " was our 
 driver. He made no effort to conceal his delight ; 
 and with reason, for it was a rare piece of min- 
 -eral, and he a lucky miner to obtain it with so 
 little trouble, or even to get it at all. Such a 
 stone the gentle and gracious Montezuma might 
 have worn in his signet-ring or set in the clasp 
 of his green mantle of feather-work. Such a gift 
 would have made still brighter the bright eyes of 
 his daughter, the laughing Princess Nenetzin, the 
 spoiled darling, whose death was the crowning 
 horror of the Noche Triste. 
 
 I had sniffed coffee from afar, and now we 
 were ready to pass the cup that not inebriates, 
 sung by the temperate Cowper. Our cloth was 
 laid on a table-rock, the feast was spread, we ate, 
 drank, and were merry. The dumb spell of the 
 
To the Turquois Mines. 91 
 
 desert snapt, only the peace of the perpetual hills- 
 remained. Resting in the fragrant shade of the 
 pines, we talked of Montezuma, the saddest^ 
 proudest chief of Indian history, whose name is 
 still a majestic memory among the degraded,, 
 broken-hearted Pueblos. 
 
 Beautiful beliefs they cherish regarding him — 
 the peculiar friend of the red race, shadowy above 
 all things, yet real above all things, who dwelt 
 among them as a god, yet a familiar friend. He 
 was the brother and equal of the Unseen One 
 whose name it is death to utter ; and the chiefs 
 still watch for him at sunrise beside the sacred 
 fire in the estiifa, claiming his promise to come 
 again from his throne in the sun, and bring back 
 the faded glories of his fallen people. All their 
 traditions point to the second advent of their 
 beloved prophet, priest, and king, who disap- 
 peared from the earth when it was young, and 
 who will not fail, in the fullness of time, to redeem 
 the promise made to his red children. 
 
 The ground was strewn with fragments of 
 broken pottery, the unfailing sign of the ancient 
 Pueblo, the rightful owner of this soil. They 
 were colored maroon red, light clay, and dark 
 brown, with markings of black. At sight of them 
 the antiquarian fell to wandering among tombs, 
 discoursing on fallen kingdoms, extinct races, 
 wrecks of empire, and columns voiceless as the 
 gray stones of Paestum. He was learned and 
 eloquent; but none of these things move me. 
 Our little scraps were but the elder and better 
 counterparts of the poor potteries the Pueblos 
 make at this day ; and merely prove, what I 
 believe has never been disputed, that North 
 America has been inhabited from a remote period. 
 I know there are enthusiasts who insist there was 
 a prehistoric race, displaced by what we call 
 aborigines, which had a civilization comparing^ 
 
92 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 favorably with those of the Old World. What 
 that civilization was, let the stone hatchet, and the 
 dingy pottery with its graceless tracings testify, 
 when laid beside relics from Eturia the Beautiful, 
 The Western fragments are in beggarly contrast 
 with the exquisite vases and jewel-work which 
 are the model and despair of the modern artist. 
 
 Several inferior bits of clialcJuiite were dug out 
 of the ancient wastage ; but the color was faint, 
 as if they had not lain long enough for a thorough 
 dyeing. We added to our collection an arrow- 
 head of jasper and one of obsidian, nicely flaked 
 and pointed ; and gave a dollar for the largest 
 Indian hatchet I have ever seen, brought up b}" 
 the enterprising Juan Fresco from an abandoned 
 silv^er mine hard by. It was roughened and 
 "time-worn, and had lain there how long — ah [ 
 Qiden sabef 
 
 It may interest some believer in the perishing 
 theory of " Ages" to know the Stone Age is not 
 •ended in New Mexico. Within the present gen- 
 eration, it is said, remote tribes have used as a 
 weapon, offensive and defensive, the stone 
 hatchet, tied by a thong of deerskin to a wooden 
 handle. As Sir John Herschel said of something 
 else, this is one of those things which, according 
 to received theories, ought not to happen. 
 
 We lingered under the solemn pines, groping 
 with shadows, visible and unseen, loth to leave. 
 The hoary hills, so lone and untrodden, began to 
 be possessed of strange enchantment. The place 
 was ours by right of discovery. We were a band 
 of explorers, the first to break a silence lasting 
 •since the morning stars sang at creation's dawn. 
 Perhaps the witchery was a variation of the preva- 
 lent miner's fever, for the day was waning when 
 we reluctantly gave over our search for precious 
 mineral. 
 
 In the shining of the loveliest afterglow this side 
 
To the Turqiiois Mines, Ccntiniied. 93 
 
 of Heaven, we sought the wagon, standing in the 
 level expanse, like a ship at anchor. A freshen- 
 ing breeze blew cheerily, and, turning back as we 
 drove away, we watched the swift-coming Night 
 gather the mountains tenderly, one by one, into 
 her bosom, and touch their scarred, stern faces 
 with ineffable beauty. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 TO THE TURQUOTS MINES. 
 
 {CGntinued.) 
 
 North of the Placer Ridges and divided from 
 them by the intervening valley of the Galisteo, 
 are bold bluffs of trap, the cut edges of a plateau 
 forming a vicsa, from which rise the volcanic 
 cones of Los Cerillos. From these hills rushed 
 the fiery lava-flovv^ widespread over the country, 
 giving it a worn-out look, desert-like and depres- 
 sing to the last degree. Geologists assert that, at 
 a very recent period in the world's changes, fire, 
 ice, and water have, with tremendous subter- 
 ranean forces, left here marks of a storm more 
 terrible than our conceptions of the Deluge. The 
 hot springs, now slowly dying out, are the last 
 of the series of events once performed on 
 a scale which almost baffles human concep- 
 tion. The faint departing remnants of once 
 terrific forces point to something which must be 
 described by a broader word than earthquake — a 
 fiery convulsion, that altered the whole face of 
 the country, if we may judge by the marks the 
 jstorm has left. 
 
 In order to avoid a rocky unheaval, thrown out 
 by the expiring energies of the volcanic epoch, 
 not yet closed, we started back to Santa Fe by a 
 circuitous route, and soon came on signs of a 
 
94 'J^he Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 camp — heaps of white ashes, circled by burnt 
 and blackened ends of pinon chips. The vega 
 is sere and parched as the plains of Arabia, and 
 in dreamy mood we could easily fancy the last 
 tent of the Moslem had just been struck, the 
 heavy standard folded by slim figures in sweep- 
 ing burnous; and we glanced along the horizon 
 for a gleam of slender spears, and the long cara- 
 van, made spectral by distance, slowly vanishing 
 into the mystic silence of the desert. 
 
 Involuntarily we looked for valuables dropped 
 by Haroun and Mohammed, as they untethered 
 the camels and packed the hampers ; scattered 
 spices ; a jeweled cup of gold, with the lump of 
 ambergris at the bottom; a white turban; a 
 shawl of price. 
 
 No such thing. 
 
 There lay on the ground, instead, a battered 
 sardine-box, a sliver of wagon-tongue, the broken 
 end of a saw (pocketed by Juan Fresco), four 
 greasy cards (also appropriated by Cool John), 
 two used-up paper collars, and an empty black 
 bottle. Strong testimonials to the high superior- 
 ity of our arts, and the refinements of our boasted 
 civilization. 
 
 A little way from the road, fastened to a 
 scrubby piiion tree, was a fluttering white signal ; 
 and, thinking it might be a sign of distress, we 
 stopped the wiUing mules, and all got out to see 
 what was the matter. With the help of a match, 
 we made out a rudely penciled hand on canvas 
 of flour-bag, pointing in the direction of Los 
 Cerillos, and below it read the bold legend, — 
 
 "Sweet Home Saloon." 
 
 Looking ahead, we hailed Sweet Home itself. 
 A roofless pen of pine boughs, fencing in narrow 
 shelves of black bottles, and a camp-stool — a 
 dark puzzle made of mule-bones and cowhide, 
 
To the Turqiiois Mines, ConfinueiL 
 
 pronounced a relic of the palaeozoic age by the 
 geologist. The establishment was guarded by a 
 wolfish dog, which the bravest of us did not care 
 to examine ; so we hurried back to the ambu- 
 lance, regardless of prickly pear, and in the 
 valley's edge passed the white tents of the van- 
 guard of civilization — an army of laborers, work- 
 ing day and night on the railroad track. They 
 will not march till they have broken the fascinat- 
 ing spell, the poetic glamor which the romantic 
 Espego threw over Nueva Espagna three hundred 
 years ago, and which has rested on it like an 
 alluring mystery ever since. If you would dream 
 dreams and see visions, now is the time to come. 
 If you would taste the wild charm, hasten to 
 catch it before the wear of every-day travel 
 tramples out the primitive customs. It is still to 
 a good degree a country apart from the rest of 
 the United States ; mountain-locked and little 
 knovv^n, severed, as it has been, from the great 
 highways of commerce. Its history is a romance 
 and a tragedy, and, as in every country imper- 
 fectly explored, it holds more or less of the 
 mysterious. Here are extensive ruins ; unpar- 
 alleled natural phenomena; mountains, ''flaunting 
 their crowns of snow everlastingly in the face of 
 the sun," that bear in their bosom undeveloped 
 mines, dazzling the imagination ; cafions with 
 perpendicular sides a mile in height ; savages 
 merciless and bloodthirsty, who in undying hate 
 still dispute the progress of foreign civilization. 
 But the civilizer is coming ; is here. The waste 
 lands of the wandering tribes will be divided and 
 sold by the acre, instead of the league. The 
 dozing Mexican will be jostled on the elbow, and 
 will w^ake from his long trance to find himself in 
 the way. 
 
 A procession of phantoms is flying along "-£/ 
 Camino del few o carriV ; whispering voices are 
 
96 The Land of the Pneblos. 
 
 drowned in the hiss of steam ; and the midnight 
 hush of the black caiion is stirred by the whirr 
 of beautiful wings, unheard save by ears attuned 
 to finest harmonies. By the time this letter 
 reaches the eyes so dear to the writer, there will 
 be no haunted solitudes along Los Cerillos. The 
 pick and shovels of Mike Brady and the O'Flan- 
 negans will have put to flight the finer fancies of 
 musing antiquary and dreaming pilgrim. You 
 know certain boundaries mark the limit of every 
 created thing, be it real or imaginary. 
 
 Fairies never trip it on pavements. They are 
 too delicate for such footing. Ghosts haunt only 
 houses where men have lived and died ; and the 
 epic of history cannot abide the screech of the 
 locomotive nor its penetrating headlight. It 
 requires broken, disconnected threads, doubtful 
 testimony, dim lights — above all, the mist}- lines 
 of distance The locomotive brings the ends of 
 the earth together, and dashes into nothingness 
 delicate tissues woven in darkness, like certain 
 delicate laces, whose threads break in the weaving 
 by day. 
 
 And here is something brought by the loco- 
 motive. 
 
 In the luminous haze of the paling twilight 
 appeared a peddler, lying beside his pack, shel- 
 tered by a rock, under which he had crept, which 
 looked as though it might fall any moment and 
 crush him to atoms. On nearer view, we discov- 
 ered, instead of peddler and pack, the pioneer 
 organ grinder, the first to set foot in New Mexico. 
 His shoes were ragged and travel-worn. He wore 
 a cast-off uniform of army blue, and a red hand- 
 kerchief knotted round his throat. Sun-scorched 
 gray hair straggled round the edge of his black 
 skull-cap, and mingled with the dust of the 
 ground. Overcome by heat and fatigue, he was 
 dead asleep, one hand resting on the rusty green 
 
To the Tii7'q2iois Mijies, Co?ifmued. 97 
 
 curtain which draped the organ, the other hold- 
 ing the neck of a httle brown dog, about the size 
 of a pinch of snuff, curled up in his bosom. In 
 the emptiness of the desert every peaceful thing 
 is welcome. We stopped, as a matter of course. 
 
 " A bad place for a tramp, unless he can eat 
 rock and drink mirage," said our polyglott anti- 
 quary, as he jumped from the ambulance. He 
 shook the sleeper gently, and addressed him in 
 Italian. The man slowly rose to his feet. " Ah ! 
 excellenza," said he, in the spoken music of 
 Southern Italy, '' your voice is like the sound of 
 fountains in the ear of the thirsty. Tell me, is 
 there no water in this land ?" 
 
 *'I^one within six miles; but we have a can- 
 teen left, which you may have," and the kindly 
 antiquary produced the dirty frontier flask, sewed 
 up in flannel, to keep its contents cool — which it 
 never does. 
 
 The musician unscrewed the lid, and took a 
 long draught. 
 
 ** It is better than wine," he said, " for Victor 
 can drink it too," and he poured the precious 
 liquid in a tin cup. The little brute, who was pretty 
 much all tail, gave a friendly bark, and wagged 
 himself almost to pieces as he slaked his thirst. 
 
 " Where are you going? " we asked. 
 
 " To Albuquerque, to Bernalillo, to Las Lunas " 
 — and he named the various towns and stations 
 on the route to Old Mexico. 
 
 '' The country is overrun by Apaches — 
 Indians who will torture you and then kill you." 
 
 "■ The banditti will not hurt," said the old man, 
 simply, *' when I give them this." 
 
 He lifted the box to its one leg, raised the cur- 
 tain, turned the crank ; a warning click, and lo ! 
 " Hear me, Norma." How strangely the familiar 
 air sounded across that plain, so wide, so dim, so 
 still ! Through a floating mist, not of the earth 
 7 
 
98 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 or of the sky, I saw, not the wanderer and his 
 wretched instrument, but a radiant vision of gHt- 
 tering Kghts, the brilliant crowd in the horseshoe 
 curve, hanging breathless on the voice of the 
 divine singer, now leading the starry choir of 
 Heaven. 
 
 Surely, there is not another place in the world 
 where a party of sensible people would fool away 
 an hour on an organ-grinder. Every well-regu- 
 lated mind (and I address no other) will perceive 
 the absurdity. But it was so long since we had 
 heard one, he was such a delightful reminder of 
 bright days and brighter nights, that over and 
 over again we made the drowsy player drone his 
 dull tunes. They brought us serene and golden 
 Italy, the racing shadows and glancing sumbeams 
 of the far Campania ; and, best of all, the love- 
 songs of home — that sweet spot, toward which I 
 look as the first woman, exiled forever, must 
 have looked toward the barred gates of lost 
 Paradise. 
 
 When the wheezy machine rested, we gave the 
 player a small (very small) fortune in loose 
 change and the remnants of our lunch. He had 
 only a cracker and two onions in his wallet, and 
 the wayfarer would have knelt for gratitude, had 
 we allowed it, while he rained blessings on our 
 heads, in the name of the Queen of Heaven, the 
 saints, and all the angels. 
 
 " Where do you camp? " asked the antiquary, 
 when the benediction slacked. 
 
 "Wherever the night finds me. I have a 
 blanket, Victor is company, and the sky is my 
 tent." 
 
 There was infinite pathos in the words and his 
 glance up to the arch overhead. The flash of 
 hero's armor in the changeful curtains of the 
 glorious tent warned us to go on ; but we were 
 slow to leave the stranger, and would have taken 
 
To the Turqucis Mines, Continued. 99 
 
 him with us, but the ambulance was already 
 ov^er-loaded. 
 
 He stood bareheaded long as we were in sight, 
 lazily grinding " The Last Rose of Summer," as 
 though he was falling asleep. Faint and clear 
 the music drifted after us, by distance mellowed 
 into sweetness. Miles away, now lost in the 
 valley, now low on the hills, floated 
 
 '•Tufts of tune like thistle-down," 
 
 wafted along by the soft night-breeze. When 
 the last wandering note died away we took up 
 the refrain "■ Oh ! who would inhabit this cold 
 world alone ? " and, looking at the sentinel stars, 
 thought pityingly of the exile, alone in his tent 
 — a mighty pavilion of royal purple, which deep- 
 ening shadows widened into a solitude vast as 
 eternity, mysterious as death. 
 
 The singing was very soft, for Thalia was cry- 
 ing, as we discovered by tiny sniffs muffled 
 behind her hankerchief, and you know how con- 
 tagious home-sickness is, and the sweeping gloom 
 was oppressive even with the best company. 
 The cheerful day, with all its trailing splendors, 
 was dead ; the fine gold of sunset became dross. 
 A pale, white shining in the east announced the 
 rising moon, and in its mystic glow the moun- 
 tains put on spectral shapes and journeyed with 
 us. A solemn stillness filled the night and rested 
 on the party which had set out so gayly in the 
 morning. One by one the voices hushed, and 
 silence followed, so intense it was almost painful. 
 
 We will anticipate, as our friends the novelists 
 say, and follow the march of the minstrel — one 
 of the last of the gentle race of troubadours. 
 We heard of his safe arrival at Albuquerque and 
 at Bernalillo. Two days' journey southward, the 
 mail-boy reported having seen him, moving in a 
 dazed, bewildered way, mourning for the little 
 
loo The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 doggie, which was missing. '* There are no 
 sausage factories here," said our informant, with 
 a smile of ghastly significance. "■ But a big 
 Mexican dog could swallow that pup like a pill." 
 
 A lively letter from a friend in Silver City re- 
 corded his passage through the lower country. 
 The Pueblo Indians gave him of their poor sub- 
 stance, and made him at home in their mud 
 hovels, regarding him as a great medicine-man, 
 with a magic box. In their childish curiosity, 
 they wanted to chop open the cage and see the 
 singing-birds inside. At a little village, whose 
 name I do not now recall, the whole population 
 flocked round the itinerant. He was a choice 
 item for the local editor of the Pharos of the 
 Occident, a miner living on imagination, who 
 fancied himself a brilliant writer and financier, 
 and in a lurid editorial he hailed the musician as 
 the forerunner of Thomas and Mapleson, and 
 hinted it was high time to form a stock company 
 for the purpose of building an adobe opera- 
 house. Everywhere the player was well receiv- 
 ed, till he reached Socorro. On the edge of the 
 Jornado, from immemorial ages overrun by the 
 Apache, the Western Bedouin, every trace of him 
 was lost. 
 
 The tameless warriors of Victorio's band are 
 deaf to " Hear me, T^orma," and I greatly fear 
 the gray scalp of the minstrel is a trophy in the 
 belt of the red chief, and that his poor old bones 
 lie unburied in the treeless, waterless, wind-swept 
 desert, truly named, by the first Spaniard who 
 dared its perils, Jornada del Muerto — Journey of 
 Death. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 TO THE TURQUOIS MINES, 
 
 (Continued.) 
 
 At evening the gentle shepherd of New 
 Mexico leads his flock from high pastures, 
 where the precipitation of moisture is greatest 
 and, therefore, grass is freshest, to the fold, 
 or corral, in the valley. It is precisely the 
 pattern of fold abounding in Palestine and still 
 to be seen on the outskirts of Alexandria — an 
 enclosure made by crooked stakes driven in the 
 ground, poorly held together by strips of raw- 
 hide. No two are of the same length. All 
 were twisted and gnarled in the growing, and 
 lean out of the perpendicular. A shabby fence, 
 uglier than everything except a mud fence, which 
 the reader knows is the superlative ugliness. By 
 the light of the moon we noted the fashion of 
 the shepherd's Cain-and-Abel suit of goatskin ; 
 and, instead of the classic crook, wreathed with 
 garlands gathered in flowery meadows, the Rocky 
 Mountain Endymion guarded his flock with a 
 shotgun and bowie-knife, less fearful of the wolf 
 than of his own thieving countrymen. 
 
 We observe another Asian custom here, that 
 of sleeping on the roofs in summer. The heavenly 
 nights invite one out, and the flat housetop is a 
 much pleasanter place to make one's bed than 
 the cellar-like interior, with its earthly scents. 
 The sluggard Mexican, who has killed the long 
 hours of the common enemy by dozing in the 
 sun, rouses toward sunset and spreads out the 
 colchon, or wool mattress, if they are very poor, 
 or a bed of skins. The stairway is a rickety 
 ladder, leaning against the outer wall of the mud 
 house, and the rapidity and ease with which the 
 
 lOI 
 
I02 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 natives go up and down is surprising. I have 
 s>^t.\\. women carry jars of water on their head, 
 not spilHng a drop, as they ascend the ladder, 
 touching it only with their feet. The old people — 
 mummies of the time of Cheops — go to bed at 
 sunset ; a little later the children and chickens 
 hop up the loose rounds ; then the lord of the 
 estate, and his dusky spouse, with her cat ; and 
 lastly the ratty dogs, moving nimbly, as the 
 trained ones of the circus. Haul up the ladder, 
 and the castle is secure. There is no fear of 
 rain. There is no dew, no fog or mist, to blur 
 the clear shining of the stars above. The low 
 wind is the very breath of heaven ; the bright 
 night is filled with sleep. 
 
 So slept the Saviour of the world on the 
 housetop of Lazarus, at Bethany, whither he 
 had walked in the cool of the day. Looking 
 from that lowly bed toward the many mansions 
 of his Father's house, well might the homeless 
 guest utter the pathetic cry : " The foxes have 
 holes and the birds of the air have ncste ; but 
 the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head." 
 
 Near the City of the Pueblos, within sight of 
 the graceful spire of the Sisters' Chapel, was a 
 coyote tearing a stray lamb to pieces. We had 
 met the ninety-and-nine an hour before, return- 
 ing to the fold from the river. The wild, tame- 
 less creature there was in perfect keeping with 
 the continued newness of a country where white 
 men have lived nearly three centuries. He 
 started, looked fearlessly out of the sage-bush, 
 and the clear moonlight outlined the true wolf's 
 head, with its fox-like muzzle and sharp, forward- 
 pointed ears. He glared at us a moment, and 
 then quietly and leisurely stalked away, amid a 
 general lament that we had neither gun nor pistol 
 at hand. The beast was of the " ^sop's Fable " 
 breed — a large, handsome fellow, whose pictorial 
 pelt would have made an elegant foot-rug. 
 
To the Turquois Mines, Ccntinued. 103 
 
 Let me not close without telling what became 
 of the " regular bonanza." The day after our 
 return to Santa Fe, the many-named Mexican 
 called, bringing his fine cJialchiiite. He explained, 
 with impressive gesture and rhetorical flourish, he 
 was too poor to own so rich a jewel, fit for the 
 king's son, and would sell it, if la Senora would 
 pay him — naming the price. At first I was 
 appalled at the magnitude of the sum ; but the 
 stone of inimitable hue, lying in the lean, brown 
 hand, had a sort of magnetism. The familiar 
 tint was charming, matching as it did a tiny ring 
 long worn for remembrance, and with much 
 cracked Spanish and broken English, a bargain 
 Avas made, and we parted, with many a cordial 
 adios. No, not even in the close confidence of 
 print will I tell you, beloved, the price of the 
 princely jewel. The secret will go v/ith me to 
 the grave. Enough that it was exhaustive. I 
 am blushing over it yet. 
 
 The following week I heard a low whisper that 
 Juan Fresco did not find the turquois at Los 
 Ccrillos ; but got it in a trade with a wild savage, 
 ignorant of its worth. A Navajo, allowed to 
 leave the Reservation, under protection of a pass, 
 and pay a stealthy visit to his own hunting- 
 grounds, had let it go for four yards of red flan- 
 nel. Cool John had slyly arranged the whole 
 affair, and whisked the stone out of his sleeve in 
 the very nick of time. Fortune turned his head, 
 as she has many a stronger one. He retired from 
 the box, and set up a saloon, the " San Francisco," 
 under a bower of cedar boughs, in the near 
 mining camp. Being of a convivial turn, in 
 spite of mournful eyes and voice, at last accounts, 
 Juan Fresco was his own best customer at the 
 bar. 
 
 However, I had my costly prize, and in the 
 seclusion of my own room gloated over it, and fear- 
 
I04 The La7id of the Pueblos. 
 
 ful of burglars, hid it at night under the edge of the 
 carpet behind the bureau. After much dehbera- 
 tion regarding the shape in which it would best 
 appear, I sent the cJialchidte to the leading jewel- 
 er of New York. Too precious for the mail, it 
 went express, and I carefully held a receipt 
 for its full value. In good time the little lavender- 
 box returned by mail. I untied the string with 
 nervous haste and lo ! my pattern locket 
 lapped in red cotton, and the " regular bonanza." 
 
 A brief note explained Messrs. B. & B's '* regret 
 to state the sample of turquois will not endure 
 polish or cutting. The color is a mere surface 
 stain on gneiss, and easily scales off, exposing 
 the brown stone, as you may readily discover by 
 trying it with your scissors-point. We have re- 
 ceived several such specimens from New Mexico. 
 They have no commercial value. This has none 
 whatev^er, except to its owner." 
 
 Then I felt like the tender poet who sends off 
 a song that is his heart's delight, and receives 
 next week a very precious letter, in familiar 
 handwriting, accompanied by a printed circular, 
 bearing the awful words," Declined, with thanks.'* 
 
 Yesterday I examined a collection of relics — 
 not exquisitely beautiful, but exquisitely old 
 — from various points along the valleys of the 
 San Pedro, the Gila, and the Rio Grande. They 
 were mainly broken potteries, a few sacred 
 whispering-stones from old estufas, rude arms of 
 iztli, and the familiar flint arrows, such as have 
 been discovered in every portion of the globe 
 where there are graves of men. Among many 
 trinkets offered, I chose a little looking-glass of 
 iztli^ and an amulet of chalchuite from the ruins 
 of a prehistoric city near El Paso. It was close 
 to the Texas line, and within the limit of the 
 mound-builders' region. I selected these trifles 
 
To the Turqiiois Mines, Cotttiniied. 105 
 
 because they were feminine belongings, and 
 brought me nearer than the pipes and hatchets 
 could bring me to my dead and gone sisters. 
 The mirror, about half the size of your hand, is 
 made of iztli, or obsidian, an exceedingly hard, 
 vitreous substance, plentiful in volcanic countries, 
 of smoky tint, and capable of high polish. The 
 art of working this intractable material is prac- 
 tically lost in our times, but when wrought by the 
 Indigene was useful as iron or tempered steel.* 
 
 The amulet and twenty beads of cJialchuite 
 were hidden in a black glazed jar, of the shape 
 made by natives to-day, buried in a cave many 
 feet below the surface of the ground. It was 
 accidentally opened, in 1878, by a party of miners 
 digging for silver. Probably a treasure-house, 
 abandoned at the last moment, when the besieged 
 inhabitants fled before a victorious army. Stone 
 hammers were found near the cave, arrow-heads, 
 hatchets, serrated swords of iztli, like the Aztecan, 
 and half a human skull, evidently broken by a 
 blow of the hatchet or tomahawk. 
 
 The amulet is perhaps half an inch long, one- 
 eighth of an inch thick — an irregular square, 
 rudely carved and smoothed, probably by rub- 
 bing with another stone. The veining on one 
 side gives the semblance of a star. A hard tool 
 and patient hand must have been required to 
 drill a hole through this stubborn stone. The 
 string which threaded it has gone to dust ; the 
 hand which carved it and the race of which it is 
 a faint trace are vanished into the voiceless past. 
 Long lines of prostrate walls, miles of acequias^ 
 or irrigating ditches, broken potteries, profusely 
 scattered, indicate a dense population once held 
 the valley near El Paso, and lived in cities con^ 
 
 * It is said by Pliny to have been discovered first in Ethiopia, by 
 a man named Obsidius. Hence the name. Gems and whole statues 
 were made of it. He also speaks of four elephants of obsidian 
 dedicated by Augustus in the Temple of Concord. 
 
lo6 The Land of tJie Pueblos, 
 
 taining twenty thousand or thirty thousand souls. 
 There is no reason to believe the modern inhab- 
 itants of this country belong to a proud Hne, 
 shorn of its ancient splendors. They have no 
 sort of history, and among a people without 
 written language, poetry, or music, tradition soon 
 becomes confused. All their remains and three 
 hundred years of continuous history show they 
 have steadily declined in power and numbers ; 
 but they are and have always been miserably 
 poor. Their fabrics, arms, architecture are of the 
 coarsest, most primitive description. 
 
 The vessels of silver and of gold described by 
 early explorers to a waiting and expectant world 
 liave not been found in this or any other spot in 
 New Mexico. They existed only in the fevered 
 fancies of adventurers, blinded by their own im- 
 aginings, drunk with their own conceits. If 
 metals we count valuable were concealed in the 
 ancient treasure-house, they are lost in the deep 
 grave with the dead centuries. Only these trifling 
 memorials have escaped the common doom. 
 
 My amulet is a sorry love-token ; yet, for the 
 sake of the soft meaning it once bore, I touch 
 the trinket lightly. Rude in outline, utterly lack- 
 ing in grace and luster, it represents a Western 
 idyl. 
 
 Young were the lovers, I knov/ (for love is 
 ever young), and to eyes beloved each was beau- 
 tiful and true. Perhaps she stood like Ruth 
 among the corn, as the warm blood flushed his 
 face, when he bound it with his love as a crown 
 unto her, fastening it with vows, and promises, 
 and never-ending kisses. Or did he set it as a 
 seal upon her arm, making its pulses beat fast to 
 •a new music, under the secret magic of its circle? 
 Or was it hung on her neck, above the heart 
 which fluttered like a caught bird at its touch, in 
 the hour which comes but once in a Ufetime ? 
 
To the Turquois Mities, Continued. 107 
 
 Ah, well you know, gentle reader, how she cher- 
 ished the keepsake, and pondered it over when 
 his face was not there, little dreaming how one 
 of a race unheard of should, centuries afterward, 
 dream over it too, and call back her spirit from 
 out the unrecorded past, her gracious presence 
 and tender words. 
 
 All, all gone now. My young mound-build- 
 ers — if mound-builders they were — sleep with the 
 primeval giants. And, while a thousand wonder- 
 ments hover about the poor keepsake, this only 
 we do know : that they walked blindly along the 
 path we call life ; slowly, and with many a failure,, 
 worked out their destiny. They loved, sinned 
 and suffered, died, and were forgotten. The sur- 
 face of the country is altered since that old love- 
 making. Strong cities are leveled with the 
 plains, tribes are scattered, languages lost, whole 
 races are extinct ; but humanity remains the 
 same — the one thing that will outlast the world. 
 These dead-and-gone tribes were not foreign to 
 us. They were of our own blood, our elder 
 brethren; and as their names and deeds are blot- 
 ted out, leaving not a memory, so we are moving^ 
 forward in the resistless march, holding in our 
 hands messages appealing to futurity — messages 
 addressed to darkness, dropped into oblivion. 
 
 The relics from the Rio Grande were buried 
 down deep. Perhaps my young lovers whispered 
 the sweet words which made Eden Paradise, be~ 
 fore the witching eyes of Marie Stuart turned the 
 hearts of men ; before Cleopatra shone ; before 
 Lucretia spun. The chalchinte m.ight lie in this 
 rare, dry air till the crack of doom and suffer na 
 change, as our old earth swings through the con- 
 stellations, year by year. Possibly, its wearer 
 was contemporaiy with the man of Natchez^ 
 whose bones were exhumed not long ago, under 
 the Mississippi bluffs, in strata said to prove him 
 not less than one hundred thousand years old. 
 
io8 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 If the story were told, we might not care to 
 know what manner of man the bygone mound- 
 builder was. His history must have been one of 
 wars, and the struggles of the chiefs were trivial 
 and petty to that of mighty Hector and Aga- 
 memnon, if we accept the testimony of the re- 
 mains which still exist. Let us believe we lost 
 no grand epic in the Iliad of the lost race. 
 
 The great historian wisely says : " The annals 
 of mankind have never been written, can never 
 be written, nor would it be within the limits of 
 human capacity to read them, if they were writ- 
 ten. We have a leaf or two torn from the great 
 book of human fate, as it flutters in the storm- 
 winds ever sweeping across the earth ; but we 
 have no other light to guide us across the track 
 which all must tread, save the long glimmering 
 of yesterdays, which grows so swiftly fainter and 
 fainter, as the present fades off into the past." 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 AMONG THE ARCHIVES. — THINGS NEW AND OLD. 
 
 North of El Palacio, is a waste spot of 
 earth, covering perhaps half an acre. It contains 
 neither grass, weeds, itor moss, not even a strag- 
 gling sage-bush or forlorn cactus ; nothing but 
 bare desert sand and a solitary cotton- wood tree, 
 whose luxuriant leafage gives no sign of its 
 struggle for life in a region waterless ten months 
 of the year. High adobe w^alls bound the sterile 
 enclosure on two sides ; the third is occupied by 
 government buildings ; and the fourth is partly 
 wall and partly abandoned offices, always locked 
 and unused since the brave days when the Span- 
 iards lorded it like princes in ^'The Palace." 
 
Ainoitg the Archives. — Thi?tgs New and Old. 109 
 
 Ever a lover of lonesome places, I had often 
 wistfully eyed these mysterious apartments ; and 
 one day, being sadly in want of entertainment, 
 hunted up the keys and sallied across the back 
 yard, determined to explore the secret places. 
 The first door I tried to open was m.ade of heavy 
 double plank, studded with broad-headed nails. 
 I fitted a key into the rough, old-fashioned lock, 
 and, pushing with all my strength, it slowly 
 sv/ung on rusty hinges, into a room, perhaps 
 seventeen by twenty feet in size, barely high 
 enough for a man to stand upright in. As I 
 stepped on the loose pine boards of the floor, a 
 swarm of mice scampered to their burrows in 
 the walls, and the deathlike smell of mildew and 
 decay smote the afflicted sense. Well for the 
 chronicles is it there are no rats in the territory. 
 Involuntarily I paused at the entrance, to let the 
 ghosts fly out ; and several minutes passed before 
 my eyes, accustomed to the darkness of this 
 treasure-house, could see the shame of its 
 neglect. 
 
 I had entered the historic room of New Mex- 
 ico ! Tumbled into barrels and boxes, tossed on 
 the floor in moist piles, lay the written records 
 of events stretching over a period of more than 
 three hundred years, the archives of a Province 
 known as Nueva Espagiia, large as PVance. In 
 an atmosphere less dry than this they would 
 have rotted ages ago. Nothing but the extreme 
 purity of the air saved them from destruction. 
 
 It was mid- winter, and melted snow slowly 
 trickled through the primitive roofing of mud 
 and gravel. The sun shone brightly, and, though 
 days had passed since the last white spot disap- 
 peared from the surface of the earth, still a 
 hideous ooze filtered through the ashes and clay 
 overhead, and dripped in inky streams down the 
 pine rafters and walls. I am told the house was 
 
no The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 anciently used as a stable. If the first Spanish 
 commandants and governor-generals kept their 
 horses in this windowless cave, sony am I for 
 the gallant steeds they professed to love next to 
 their knightly honor and the ladies. 
 
 The names of some of the Conqiicstadores 
 have faded from history, and others live only in 
 tradition. Nearly all the earlier important records 
 have been destroyed. They accumulated rapidly 
 in immense masses, and the heavy lumber was 
 shifted from place to place by officials, to make 
 room for things more valuable. Careless hands 
 and the slow v/ear of time were not as effectual 
 in blotting them out as a certain chief executive 
 — a lineal descendant of Genseric, appointed 
 by President of the United States — who made 
 his administration memorable by building a bon- 
 fire of parchments and papers, filled with price- 
 less material, never to be replaced. He also sold 
 a quantity as waste paper. By happy accident, 
 a portion of this merchandise was afterward 
 recovered, though one might think it as well 
 employed in wrapping tea and sugar as going to 
 decay in this neglected den. We grow indignant 
 over the spirit which could not spare one reader 
 of the picture-writing of the Aztecs or the qitip- 
 pus of Peru. What shall we say of the man in 
 authority who, in the best age of culture and 
 research, abuses a trust like this, who deliber- 
 ately fired whole wagon-loads of manuscripts of 
 the deepest interest to the arch^ologist, the his- 
 torian, and student. 
 
 He had not even the excuse of the first Arch- 
 bishop of Mexico, who burnt a mountain of manu- 
 scripts in the market-place, stigmatizing them 
 as magic scrolls ; and was more guilty than Car- 
 dinal Ximines, who in the trial by fire alone 
 could exercise the sorcery concealed in the Arabic 
 manuscripts of Granada. 
 
Among the Archives. — Things New and Old. iii 
 
 The delusions of fifteen hundred years are not 
 easily put to flight, and there might be a drop of 
 charity for the bigotry and intolerance of the 
 Spaniard ; but the destroyer of history in New 
 Mexico has no defense. I suppress his name. 
 An archaeologist from New England is now busy 
 among a heap of the sold documents, piled away 
 in the back room of an old shop by a citizen of 
 Santa Fe, who forsaw that they might one day 
 be of interest, possibly of value. 
 
 It was my pleasant work to help in overhauling 
 the state papers, and the quiet hours of careful 
 work were well rewarded. All sorts of papers 
 were tossed together in the cavernous hole. I dug 
 out quantities of printed matter of recent date, 
 mixed with the old and weather-stained official 
 documents, letters, copies of reports and dis- 
 patches, marking political changes from 1580, 
 when Santa Fe was founded by Don Antonio de 
 Espego, to the year 1879. The province at first 
 was ruled by military governors, appointed by 
 the viceroys of Mexico, and communication with 
 them and with Spain was so rare they reigned as 
 despots, in haughty pride of place, and bitterly 
 abused their power to kill, enslave, plunder, and 
 subdue the heathen claimed for an inheritance. 
 
 The first MS. opened bore the date 1620. It 
 was illuminated with heavy seals and signed with 
 strange, puzzling rubricas ; but the signature 
 was completely effaced. It was part of a frozen 
 chunk, tied with hempen cord, and peeled off a 
 block wet through and through. The excellence 
 of the parchment-like paper kept it from dissolv- 
 ing into a lump of sticky pulp. 
 
 Some papers were soaked so it was necessary 
 to spread them on boards, to be dried in the sun, 
 before being deposited in a place of safety. Rich 
 treasure for the mining of the future historian. 
 The eternal west wind fluttered mockingly among 
 
112 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 crumpled leaves torn from the book of human 
 fate, and a sudden gust whirled a yellow scrap 
 high up in the branches of the cotton-wood tree. 
 With the help of a Mexican boy, 1 rescued from 
 ruin what proved a portion of the journal of 
 Otervin, military commandant of Nueva Espagna, 
 who undertook to reduce the Pueblos to subjection 
 in 1681, and found them too many for him. 
 
 Mixed with high heaps of worthless trash 
 were worn and water-stained fragments, precious 
 as the last leaves of the Sybil. These, pieced 
 together, were smoothed with care and laid by 
 for after reference. Poor, perishing records of 
 ambitions baffled and hopes unfulfilled ; and, 
 dreaming over the names of men who sought 
 immortality on earth and now sleep forgotten, I 
 deeply felt their teaching — the law that any last- 
 ing condition is impossible in the hurrying march 
 we call life, where nothing is constant but change, 
 nothing certain but death. 
 
 Through the lazy Mexican afternoons T groped 
 along the musty annals with steady purpose, and 
 in the shadowy history wandered JDack two cen- 
 turies. Among the MSS. T lived in the days 
 when William of Orange fought the grand battle 
 which decided the fate of the Stuarts and estab- 
 lished English dominion over the seas ; when the 
 sun of Poland was sinking in endless night with 
 the dying Sobieski, our patriot hero of early 
 romance, whose name, consecrated by poetry and 
 heroism, dwells in memory with Emmet and 
 Kossuth ; when Madame de Maintenon, at the 
 court of the king, who was worshipped as a demi- 
 god, was writing long letters of the fatigues of 
 court, and how she worried from morning till 
 midnight, trying to reconcile the irreconcilable, 
 and amuse the old tyrant, who was past being 
 amused. Spain had been shaken by desperate 
 wars, and out of armies nursed in victories came 
 
Among the Archives. — Things New and Old. 113 
 
 a host of adventurers to the New World, where 
 glory and fortune were reported as waiting for 
 every newcomer. They were not colonists, 
 emigrants, as with us, who had everything to 
 gain and nothing to lose ; but men of the sword, 
 used to command, who loved no music so well as 
 trumpet and drum, the rattle and clang of arms. 
 Reckless gamblers as Spaniards have been in all 
 ages everywhere, they were ready to stake vast 
 possessions on a venture in mines reported richer 
 than ancient Ophir, and to risk assured fame 
 for possible conquest, among nations whose walled 
 cities were described as equal to the best strong' 
 holds of Islam. The rich mediaeval glow en- 
 veloping some of the reports charms the literary 
 forager, not overfond of statistics, who loves no 
 figures so well as figures of speech. Men in 
 their summer prime organized roving expeditions 
 in quest of fortune, gallant freebooters, made 
 ferocious by greed of gold, who started gayly, as 
 to a regatta, for the unexplored province of 
 Nueva Espagiia. 
 
 They found the Promised Land one of which 
 the greater part must forever remain an uninhab- 
 itable magnificence. Yet everything reminded 
 them of old Spain, especially of the Castiles. 
 The chain of snowy peaks, accessible only to the 
 untamable Apache, projected against the speck- 
 less blue the blade of white teeth which suggested 
 the name of Sierra Nevada. The dry, scorched 
 table-lands, league after league, stretching away 
 under the blazing sun a shadeless desert, were 
 like the mesas in the dreariest portions of the 
 kingdom of Philip — and the mud hovels of adobe, 
 with open apertures for windows, were a perpet- 
 ual reminder of the homeless habitations of the 
 Castilian peasantry. 
 
 The few rich valleys [pasturas) capable of cul- 
 tivation by irrigation were not unlike the vegas 
 8 
 
114 The La7td of the Pueblos. 
 
 of the East, and little streams of melted snow- 
 water, filtered down from the •' iced mountain- 
 top," cold as snow, clear as glass, still bear the 
 lovely names of the rills sparkling along the 
 Alpujarras, 
 
 The old hidalgoes looked for better things than 
 half-naked savages, mud huts, and stunted corn- 
 fields. Sterile and forbidding as the country ap- 
 peared, they believed an inheritance was reserved 
 for them behind the gloomy mountain walls, be- 
 yond the awful caiion, where the black, rushing 
 river is shut in by sheer precipices fifteen hundred 
 feet high. Sustained by a faculty of self-persua- 
 sion equaled by no other people on the face of 
 the earth, they pushed on and on through the 
 very heart of the wilderness, nearly to the present 
 site of Omaha. This was more than three hun- 
 dred years ago ; yet are the novel-writers com- 
 plaining that v/e have no antiquity, no mystery, 
 no dim lights and deep shadows, where the 
 imagination of the story-teller may flower and 
 bear fruit. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 AMONG THE ARCHIVES. A LOVE LETTER. 
 
 One day, while mousing or, as President Lin- 
 coln used to say, browsing among the manu- 
 scripts, and musing about the dead and-gone 
 heroes, and how times have altered since they 
 rode out like Paladins of romance to tempt Fortune 
 in her high places, I came on a letter which dif- 
 fered from the commonplace documents littered 
 about, and was not emblazoned with the splash 
 of any great seal. It was very yellow and musty, 
 stained in one corner by a blue book thrown on 
 it in the time of President Johnson. It required 
 
Among the A^r hives. — A Love Letter. 115 
 
 the daintiest handling. Carefully I unfolded the 
 sheet, almost thick as vellum and in danger of 
 dropping to tatters, and marked a spot oner 
 sealed with wax, flaked off long ago. The 
 address was Antonio Eusebio de Cubero, Secre- 
 tary of Gen. Don Diego de Vargas, Governor of 
 Nueva Mejico. I opened the quaint missive, and 
 lo ! a love-letter, dated Seville, November, 1692. 
 It began with stately, sweet salute : " To my own 
 true love and faithful knight, from his Rosita de 
 Castile." Like the Dantean lovers, 
 
 " I turned no further leaf." 
 
 Nearly two centuries the antique billet had 
 lain entombed in this earthy sepulchre ; now 
 would I bring it to the light again, and, tenderly 
 folding the sheet, I bore it to the quiet of my 
 own room, for reading at leisure. 
 
 This is the way it runs, written in diminutive 
 hand, indistinct at the beginning, now almost 
 illegible. With tender words, not ahvays in cor- 
 rectest spelling, the little Rose of Castile writes to 
 Eusebio Antonio, that her father and big brother 
 wage war in Algeria. She had just learned to 
 sing, with her mandolin, a madrigal, which she 
 quotes at length and will not bear translation. I 
 cannot catch the subtle essence, the exquisite 
 Spanish-Arab perfume and prison it in harsh 
 English. I know nothing in our language so 
 nearly approaching the dainty love-ditty as the 
 song of Burns, which will live till the last lover 
 dies : 
 
 "Had we never loved so kindly, 
 Had we never loved so blindly, 
 Never met and never parted, 
 We had ne'er been broken-hearted.' 
 
 She told how, when the j^oung moon was shin- 
 ing, and the fat, cross duenna was fast asleep, 
 she had crept from her side and out of reach of 
 
Ii6 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 her snoring, to wander along the Guadalquiver, 
 where the citron shade is deepest and the silver 
 lIHes shadow singing waters. She was tired of 
 dances and of flattery, and that odious Manuehta, 
 and, hghted only by the moon and the glow- 
 worm, the maiden lingered by the fountain till 
 the bell in the tower rang two. '* There, by the 
 bed of sweet basil — dost remember Eusebio 
 caro ? '' 
 
 And what for, lady fair ? Ay dc mi ! Is there 
 a reader so dull as not to know, without telling, 
 'twas to dream, and to dream, and to dream ? 
 
 Easy to picture her in graceful youth and all 
 beautiful. The delicate Murillo head ; the An- 
 dalusian eyes glancing this way and that from the 
 arched window Moresque ; shyly she flitted out 
 the barred gate among the myrtles, stepping so 
 lightly she scarcely startled the dove who stirred 
 in her nest ; the flower-like face draped by the 
 veiling, envious rebosa, held close by the rose- 
 leaf hand ; the one bright circlet shining on the 
 taper finger — can you not see her stealing along 
 through the golden orange orchard, the almond's 
 snow-white glitter? There, with infinite love 
 and longing, with lips waiting to be kissed, she 
 listened to the nightingale's song to the rose, 
 starting at the silken rustle of her dress ; and as 
 the strokes of the bell shook the giant pillars of 
 the cathedral, fleeing like a guilty thing back to 
 the snoring, fat aunt. Only she lingered a 
 moment to look up at the indigo sky and the 
 slim Giralda tower, there by the bed of sweet 
 basil — "■ dost remember, Eusebio caro ? " 
 
 Such was the soft Rosita de Castile, and she 
 asks the old question : When dost thou dream of 
 me, dearest ? It is a sort of treachery to publish 
 the deep secret, and I beg pardon of the shade 
 of the gentle lady, if it lingers round the hard 
 clay of which these walls are made. tender 
 
Among the Archives. — A Love Letter, 117 
 
 love ! O fond young heart, that stopped beating 
 nearly two hundred years ago ! I fear Don An- 
 tonio Eusebio was hardly so true as thou wast. 
 Knights-errant, tilting through the New World, 
 had no such quest as the blameless Sir Galahad, 
 though they pushed the '' pundonor " to the very 
 verge of nonsense. Cortez set an example which 
 his successors were quick to follow. Under the 
 garb of gallantry, they wedded paramour^ and 
 with high Castilian pride proclaimed their honor 
 bright when they were ready to fight dragons 
 and die in steel harness full knightly. 
 
 You remember, reader dear, Millais's " Hugue- 
 not Lovers "? Of course, you must, for you have 
 often seen it, and even the poor prints retain some 
 liintof the lovely original. In all her long gal- 
 leries Art has no fairer creation. It is loveher 
 even than Ary Scheffer's *' Marguerite," than the 
 fallen "Francescadi Rimini." The loving arms 
 clinging to the handsome youth; the wistful, 
 upturned face, so anxious, pale and tearful, on 
 the eve of parting, which her fears make sad as 
 St. Bartholomew's — such charm was in the face 
 of my Rosita de Castile ; mine by right of adop- 
 tion, though she died more than a century before 
 I was born. 
 
 How he looked we know by the portraits of 
 Velasquez. Tall and stately was he, lithe and 
 sinewy as one skilled in arms, manly sports, and 
 fond of hounds and hunting; a long lean hand, 
 with blazing jewels — one a precious fire-opal, the 
 Girasol of Zimapan ; olive skin and heavy brows ; 
 eyes like sharp stilettos ; peaked beard, curled 
 mustachios, trimmed and perfumed ; black dress- 
 coat, silken hose, silver shoe-buckles, spotless 
 neck-ruff; chains and ribbons of honor; golden 
 cross richly broidered on his mantle; jingling 
 spurs, the mark of knighthood — this was Don 
 Antonio Eusebio de Cubero, who thought to 
 
Ii8 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 swell his fortune and fill the measure of his fame 
 under the royal banner upheld by Governor- 
 General Vargas. 
 
 Nor must we forget to name the good long 
 rapier, worn yet in old Spain, where the sword 
 forever stays the scepter. Add to this pictorial 
 dress the graces which wait on youth — refined 
 courtesy and lofty presence, come of the habit of 
 command — and you have the secretary of the 
 hero who went, saw, and conquered Santa Fe for 
 the crown of Spain. 
 
 The beloved Eusebio Antonio kept no copy of 
 his vows and promises ; but I warrant, when 
 there were none but the angels to hear, they were 
 given — made binding and strong. In fair Seville 
 the young lovers stole from the lights and the 
 dancing, down by the bed of sweet basil^ to seal 
 their contract with solemn oaths. 
 
 " Mixed with kisses, sweeter, sweeter 
 Than anything on earth." 
 
 The dear Eusebio was lured away from Rosita's 
 bower to that New World which is the old. 
 Across the sea had floated, faint and far, like 
 dying echoes coming near, stories of a land of 
 wild men and beasts, strange birds, and hissing 
 serpents ; of mountains of rock inscribed with 
 mystic hieroglyphs, and terraced pyramids, up- 
 holding undying fires — temples the incense of 
 whose altars ascended forever into a sky of 
 speckless sapphire. These were the regions of 
 finest furs, of gold-dust and ivory, of silver, pearls, 
 and precious stones, all to be had for the gather- 
 ing. Such tales were as singing sirens, as airy 
 hands beckoning in the shadowy distances of 
 dim and unknown shores. 
 
 What wonder the young men were fired with 
 the idea of enriching impoverished estates by the 
 plunder of opulent cities, and old men approved 
 their resolution to grasp some portion of this 
 
Among the Archives. — A Love Letter. 119 
 
 wealth, tc march with triumphant banners 
 through the length and breadth of the land, all 
 the while striking stout blows for Holy Cross ? 
 
 In that age of few books, when writing was a 
 clerkly accomplishment, there had come down 
 from the fathers many traditions of the hero who 
 had wrested the scepter from the hand of Ata- 
 hualpa on the heights of the Andes. The dis- 
 coverer of the Mississippi was a century asleep 
 under its rushing waters. They had heard the 
 name and fame of the peerless Englishman — sea- 
 man, soldier, courtier, poet, historian — who 
 souglit a city of gold on the banks of the Oronoco. 
 Nor could they believe that genius and valor died 
 when the aged paralytic, beggared and heart- 
 broken, laid his head on the block, saying : " It 
 matters little how the head lieth, so that the 
 heart be right," the noblest head that ever rolled 
 in English dust 
 
 The supernatural swayed men's minds in those 
 days, and myriads of imaginary foes were to be 
 fought, besides the beasts in their dens and the 
 naked, painted savage. No doubt that Antonio 
 Eusebio de Cubero felt equal to every danger he 
 must face — the perilous voyage, and the many 
 miseries which Rosita's fears magnified out of all 
 bounds. 
 
 The parting for years so weary shook the heart 
 of the little Rose. Better than I can tell, my 
 reader knows it. The lingering clasp of hands, 
 the yearning gaze, the tears, the vows, the pray- 
 ers ; the slow ship (there was no steamer then), 
 with gay pennons and fluttering signals, sailing 
 straight into the sunset, into eternity, away, away 
 out of the world ; a fading sail on the flushed 
 water, a speck on the horizon's edge ; he is gone, 
 taking with him her happiness, her smiles, her 
 passionate young heart. 
 
 But they would return, those Caballeros on the 
 
120 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 deck of the ''Columella," heroes every one, 
 bringing the wealth of Pizarro and the glory of 
 Cortez. ' The thought was cheer and comfort to 
 Rosita in the long, slow waiting — one of the 
 hardest things to be learned in the lesson of lov- 
 ing. Men have a thousand objects to live for — 
 the whole world is theirs, and in their changeful, 
 many-colored life love is only one slender, shin- 
 ing thread ; women have nothing but their hearts. 
 He went out to a field of limitless possibilities, 
 filled with the charm of novelty, variety, adven- 
 ture; she to her maiden bower, her lute, her 
 embroidery, to dream over the love-words till his 
 very name would thrill and send the blood danc- 
 ing through her veins ; to wait through the dull 
 sameness of empty days, dropping one by one 
 into weary, silent nights; to watch the last light 
 against the towers, the last sparkles on the sea, 
 making it a sea of glass mingled with fire, and 
 entreat the Mother of Sorrows with piteous 
 prayers for the wanderer in the vague, far-off 
 country beyond them; to sicken for gracious 
 messages and letters that do not come, and yet 
 be loyal in the belief they have been written, 
 they are somewhere — this is the sweet patience 
 born of woman, the brave, persistent faith, almost 
 a religion. 
 
 It is the one who sails away who forgets; the 
 one who stays at home who remembers. He 
 was a false teacher who said Paradise is in the 
 shadov/ of the crossing of cimeters. You and I 
 know, dear reader, and our little Rose of Seville 
 knew, it is in the shadow of the one we love. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 AMONG THE ARCHIVES. 
 
 (Contimied.) 
 
 From the journal of Capitan-General Don 
 Domingo Jeronso Petriz de Cruzate (what a 
 Spanish ring there is in that name!), who was 
 governor and military commandant of Nueva 
 Mejico from 1684 to 1689, we can form some 
 idea of the state of affairs in the province. But 
 a few detached pages of this important document 
 survive. They appear the clearest where all are 
 confused 
 
 The Spaniards had been driven from the coun- 
 try as far south as the Texan line. Cruzate's 
 little army failed in the reconquest of the liberty- 
 loving Pueblos, and the service was finally en- 
 trusted to General Vargas, or, as it was anciently 
 written, Bargas, to whom the faithful knight and 
 true love was secretary. 
 
 The chronology of this period is some times 
 in a hopeless tangle; but the march of Governor- 
 General Don Diego de Vargas is pretty well con- 
 nected. He lives in history as one of the most 
 bigoted and brutal of the Conquistadores. As 
 has been written of the Duke of Alva: " His 
 vices were colossal, and he had no virtues." 
 From shreds and patches of mouldy MSS. his 
 march is traced with tolerable clearness, and the 
 conduct of the foreigners was so nearly alike 
 that their stories are much the same. 
 
 By and with consent of the royal audience, he 
 :eft home and pleasures in the City of Mexico 
 for El Paso del Norte, to organize one hundred 
 Mendly Indians and less than two hundred 
 mounted men. Among the latter was the secre- 
 tary, Antonio Eusebio de Cubero^ who on fiesta 
 
 121 
 
122 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 days wore a light glove on his casque, a love-knot 
 on his spear. 
 
 The country swarmed with a numerous and 
 enraged enemy, and every league of ground was 
 contested. Vargas seemed awake to the perils 
 of the situation, and to have a wholesome fear of 
 public opinion besides, for on the night before 
 marching he wrote to Count Galvas, Viceroy of 
 Mexico- "I have determined to risk life and all 
 in the attempt, and am prepared rather to be 
 considered rash to being looked upon as a map 
 of too much caution, thereby exposing my repu- 
 tation to remarks." He was successful from the 
 very outset. The reader will remember that the 
 Pueblos lived in community houses, built in a 
 hollow square. A whole tribe sometimes inhab- 
 ited one house, and one after another they were 
 reduced to submission. 
 
 The invading army found game in abundance; 
 but the blessing of the early and the latter rain 
 is not for New Mexico, and the scarcity of water 
 made great suffering. " In roasting-ear time " 
 the bold land-robbers feasted in the cornfields ; 
 " hares like those of the Castiles " furnished nour- 
 ishing food; and in all their journeying simple 
 natives gave the fair visitants their choicest stores, 
 for paltry trinkets of glass pewter, and tinsel. 
 The blaze of their camp-fires attracted large num- 
 bers of rattlesnakes — " the serpent with tiger-col- 
 ored skin and castanets in its tail;" the moun- 
 tain cat's green eyes glared at them from the 
 black rim of the illuminated circle; and lovely 
 gazelles shyly approached the springs, where they 
 had hitherto drank undisturbed, to sniff the tainted 
 air and gaze at the strangers. 
 
 There survives one description of a large torpid 
 lizard the explorers encountered, striped with red, 
 white and black bars — a hideous creature ; and a 
 horned snake, kept in spirits, to be sent the 
 
Among the Archives. — Cuntinued, 123 
 
 viceroy. Here, too, we hear first of the won- 
 derful traveHng stones that within the distance of 
 a few feet of each other seek a common centre, 
 roll together, and lie close like eggs in a nest. 
 They were in the bottom of shallow basins in the 
 levels, and their magnetism was a source of won- 
 dering awe to the superstitious soldiery. The 
 reporter, a naturalist of some sort, whose name is 
 lost, begs a moderate subsidy, that he may em- 
 ploy natives to help capture the venomous beasts 
 and assist in making collections. The barbarians 
 refused tc work, even with wages, and thus writes 
 Vargas : " I have been obliged to raze whole 
 villages to the ground, in order to punish their 
 obstinacy." Possibly here we have the secret of 
 the uninscribed ruins now slowly crumbling down 
 in the valleys by the narrowmg waters of the 
 Pecos and the Rio Grande. 
 
 The chief burden is the Indian. The chroni- 
 cles are heavily laden with details of grievances 
 the conquerors were obliged to bear from him. 
 How he refused to accept slavery as his best 
 estate; and, worse than that, how he rebelled 
 against the power which would force him to 
 worship the unknown, unseen God. whose sign 
 was the red cross, whose ambassadors' march was 
 tracked by the smoke of cities sacked and burnt, 
 lands made desolate, the widow's cry, the orphan's 
 wail. 
 
 The Spaniards were disciples of the school of 
 Narvaez, who on his death-bed, being urged by 
 his confessor to forgive his enemies : said "Bless 
 your heart, Father, I have none. I have killed 
 them all." In those good old times — for as the 
 poet sings, 
 
 " All times when old are good"— 
 the religion of the governor must be the relig- 
 ion of the governed. The Pueblos were and 
 still are sun worshipers ; and every day their 
 
124 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 deity — the peculiar friend of the red race — rose 
 with unveiled face, rejoicing the eyes and cheer- 
 ing the hearts of his children. Why should they 
 believe in One whose followers taught that sul- 
 phurous flames were in waiting for all who had 
 not money enough to pay for certain mystic rites 
 held over the dead body ? Whenever there was 
 chance of escape, the Indians fled before the 
 mailed and mounted warriors fast as their own 
 mountain antelopes, and the Pueblos were rapidly 
 brought to submission. To perfect the surrender 
 of soul and body, after a city was taken, Father 
 Francisco Corvera baptized by thousands at a 
 time. He was attended by several Franciscan 
 priests, charged with the reconversion of those 
 fallen from the true faith. They were forced to 
 assemble before a large cross in the plaza. There 
 the red sinners were absolved from their sins, and, 
 on pain of death, forbidden their idolatrous dances, 
 especially the cachina, the delight of the aborigi- 
 nal heart, and, as the old MS. words it, "were 
 to be obedient to the divine and human majesty." 
 
 Very devout was this Vargas. After the re- 
 duction of Jemez, he reported to the Viceroy of 
 Mexico, Count Galvas : " This action having been 
 fought the day before Santiago Day, I believe 
 that glorious apostle and patron saint interceded 
 in our behalf, and which was the cause of our 
 signal success." 
 
 Here are some of the mild requirements laid 
 on the baptized heathen by his order : 
 
 ''They must keep crosses over their doors; 
 treat ministers with love and reverence ; and, 
 whenever they meet them, kiss the hem of their 
 habit, with submission and veneration. They 
 must have their bows in order and ten arrows, to 
 offend and defend ; and none shall dare use the 
 arms of the Spaniards, for the reason they are 
 prohibited by the royal ordinances.'- 
 
Among the Archives. — Continued. T25 
 
 Fighting his way northward, near Zuni, he 
 leveled a large pueblo, *' the iizc of a long horse- 
 race ; " but how long the horse-race was in that 
 time your correspondent has no means of know- 
 ing. By his own autograph on the everlasting 
 hills we know when and in what spirit the 
 haughty hidalgo passed that point for the recap- 
 ture of La Villa Real de Santa Fe, then in the 
 hands of its rightful owners. 
 
 One hundred and ninety miles southwest of 
 Santa Fe, ten miles from the Arizona line, fifty 
 miles west of the dividing ridge of the continent 
 — called, in consequence, Sierra Madre — is an- 
 tique Zuni, a city of memory. It is one of the 
 seven vanishing cities sought by Coronado in 
 1 540, and by wandering knights from Spain and 
 Portugal in the time of Philip Second. Capital 
 of the fabled kingdom of Cibola, it is the most 
 ancient and most interesting, because the least 
 changed, of all the pueblos of New Mexico. 
 
 When Governor-General Vargas and his gallant 
 little army reached this pueblo, they halted for 
 rest and recruiting, before pressing on to the City 
 of Holy Faith. The General was accompanied 
 by his secretary, the beloved Antonio Eusebio, 
 and they must have looked with the deepest con- 
 cern at the stout walls of the strange fortress. I 
 have not been able to learn whether he attacked 
 it or not. Even a successful and intrepid leader, 
 with the help of the red allies, used to savage 
 warfare, would deliberate well before besieging 
 that city set on a hill, which must be carried by 
 assault, in the face of arrows slings, lances, huge 
 stones rolled from above, and burning balls of 
 cotton dipped in oil. The modern Zuni, a com- 
 pact town of fifteen hundred souls, stands in the 
 centre of tl\,e valley of the Colorado Chichito 
 (Little Red River); but ancient Zuni, now in 
 ruins, was several miles away, on the top of a 
 
126 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 mesa, or precipice, one thousand feet high, almost 
 inaccessible from the valley. It was built in five 
 stories, with thick walls of stone laid in mud 
 mortar, terraced from without and fortified by 
 towers. A formidable citadel. 
 
 The camp of the victorious army was probably 
 in the present camping-ground, a choice spot, 
 where grass grows with tint of richest green, 
 lovely to the eye as fresh lilies — a garden beauty, 
 skirting the spring of cool, sweet water, about 
 fifteen miles from old Zuni. To reach it from 
 Santa Fe, the traveler of to-day crosses a country 
 very beautiful and fertile, where rapid change of 
 geological structure makes varying change of 
 scenery. Maize grows in the valley without irri- 
 gation — not an acequia in sight; and peaches, 
 planted by the Jesuit Fathers, are deliciously 
 sweet. After straining over sand and rock, in the 
 hot, white sun-glare, with the fever-thirst which 
 comes from drinking alkali water, it must have 
 been a deep pleasure for the soldiery to leave the 
 trackless plain, and lie in the cool, rich grass, 
 restful alike to jaded steed and war-worn rider ; 
 to feast their eyes on the delicate enamel of green 
 — the setting of this Diamond of the Desert ; 
 and watch, as we have, the birds of strange note 
 and plumage coming and going, with merry 
 twitter, flirt and flutter, to bathe and drink in the 
 sparkling fountain. 
 
 Enchanting effects of light and color vary the 
 passing hours. A rose-blush of exquisite haze 
 greets the rising sun ; and the mirage — most 
 marvelous of Nature's mysteries— often swims in 
 mid-air in early morning, when the first warm 
 flush has faded. The perfect blue, curtaining the 
 valley, is jeweled with opal and turquoise. That 
 ethereal brilliance allows no " middle tones." 
 The sun sets as on the Nile, and when the flaring 
 disc sinks low suddenly the hidden splendor is 
 
Among the Archives. — Continued, 127 
 
 unveiled — -''a vision sent from afar, that mortals 
 may feebly learn how beautiful is Heaven." 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 AMONG THE ARCHIVES. 
 
 {Continued.) 
 
 From Zuni dispatches were sent back to Count 
 Galvas by a line of swift runners reaching to 
 Mexico. Perhaps a letter to Seville from the 
 faithful knight, who now had time for sweet 
 thoughts of love, without which this were the 
 wilderness without the manna. I hope the reader 
 does not forget my young hero ; for I love him 
 dearly, and mean to stand up for him to the last, 
 through evil as well as through good report. 
 Skillful furbishers did what they could to restore 
 the original luster to dulled and dinted armor, 
 and in the idlesse of camp the secretary must 
 often have looked up at tv.o enormous pillars of 
 sandstone towering high on the sides of the 
 inesUy appearing chiseled into human figures of 
 colossal size, fixed, immortal as the statues of 
 Aboo Simbel. At evening, while my Rosita 
 walked through the drowsy Spanish city, 
 
 " Guarded by the old duenna, 
 Fierce and' sharp as a hyena, 
 With her goggles and her fan 
 Waving off each wicked man," 
 
 and Antonia Eusebio was smoothing his draggled 
 plumes, he probably heard from friendly Indians 
 the wild legend still told there by the red light 
 of the camp-fires. The tradition runs that Zuni 
 
128 The Land of the Piteblos. 
 
 is the only city on the earth which bore the 
 weight of the Flood. Ages ago, an eternity be- 
 fore white men came, rain fell in streams from the 
 sky ; adobe houses melted away, and the whole 
 world and everything in it was fast sinking from 
 sight. The neighboring tribes escaped from the 
 rushing waters to the top of this mesa; but the 
 waves rose so fast nearly all perished before 
 reaching the summit of the cliff. In the midst of 
 their distress a black night {iioche triste) fell on 
 the land. Their God had forgotten them, the 
 sun turned his face away from his children, and 
 " darkness was the universe." Still the waters 
 rose higher and higher, incessant, undiminished ; 
 still the people in blind panic pressed to the top- 
 most foothold, threatened with the fast-rising 
 overflow. Above the black abyss no light of sun 
 or star, sign of promise, dove, or olive. In des- 
 perate extremity, they sought to avert the curse 
 by sacrifice. No time was there for song or 
 prayer, altar-fire or incantation. They snatched 
 the children of the cacique (a daughter lovely as 
 light, a smile of the Great Spirit, and a son beau- 
 tiful as morning), adorned them with a few gay 
 feathers, and hurled them from the steep into the 
 boiling abyss — an offering to an offended Deity. 
 The waters were surging within a few feet of the 
 top of the mesa. There the proud waves were 
 stayed. The victims were changed to the stone 
 columns, a sign from Heaven marking the moun- 
 tain of refuge where the propitiatory offering was 
 accepted, and everlastingly commemorating the 
 Deluge. 
 
 The mesa is a mile across ; an irregular figure, 
 defined by abrupt bluffs, almost perpendicular. 
 On it are the remains of two pueblos, whose out- 
 lines are clearly traceable — the dimensions of 
 rooms and inner v/alls. Like all ancient towns, 
 they were fortified with an outer wall in the shape 
 
Among the Archives. — Contmued. 129 
 
 of the letter V, to resist invasions of warlike tribes, 
 and watch-towers were placed at regular intervals. 
 Crumbling walls, made of little blocks of stone 
 laid in mud-mortar, are scattered over the ground 
 in heaps from two to ten feet high. Here the 
 fox and coyote prowl by night, and the antiqua- 
 rian haunts it by day. After careful investigation^ 
 with Indian guides, they report the standing walls 
 rest on ruins of still greater age. The primitive 
 masonry must have been about six Teet thick. 
 In the more recent buildings the walls are not 
 over eighteen inches thick. The small sandstone 
 blocks are laid with neatness and regularity. 
 Broken pottery is strewn about, and arrow-heads 
 of obsidian, flint, and jasper. 
 
 After the Deluge, when the waters abated off 
 the face of the earth, the tribes abandoned the hill 
 city, and lived in the pleasant valley till the Span- 
 ish invasion, when they again fled to the top of 
 the iJiesa. They turned at every place possible 
 and fortified strongly the two approaches by 
 which the outworks could be assaulted, and held 
 out against the foe a long time. At last the 
 hights were scaled. The mail-clad warriors, with 
 their swords of matchless temper, triumphed over 
 the rude arms of the feeble natives. From the 
 highest watch-tower the banner of the Cross was 
 unfurled against the brilliant sky, unflecked by 
 cloud or shadow; and sun -lighted spears ghttered 
 in the narrow streets of the devoted, the Holy 
 City. 
 
 Imprinted in the solid rock, as in clay, is shown 
 and may be seen this day the foot-print of the 
 first white man who reached the summit. When 
 you visit Zuni, the old guide, if you happen to 
 get the right one, will repeat this story, for a 
 slight consideration. 
 
 The Zunis are the Yankees of the Pueblos — 
 self-supporting, keen at a bargain, thrifty, orderly, 
 9 
 
13© The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 clean ; that is, clean for Indians. I presume 
 every head in the Holy City could furnish num- 
 berless offerings such as Diogenes (oldest of 
 tramps) cracked on the pure altar of the chaste 
 Diana. 
 
 What Cholula was to the Aztec, Zuni is to the 
 Pueblos ; sacred as the City of David to the sons 
 of Israel. Touching the religion of this people 
 opens a subject so broad and so charming I am 
 tempted to give it more than a passing glance, 
 but space forbids. They are pantheists in the 
 fullest sense of the word, and, though missions 
 have been established among them three hundred 
 years, they, like all aborigines, set their face as a 
 flint against change, and still keep to the ancient 
 beliefs and customs. They worship the Supreme 
 One, whose name it is death to utter ; Mont- 
 ezuma, his brother and equal ; and the Sun to 
 whom they pray and smoke, because his eye is 
 always open and his ear attends the prayers of 
 the red men. The Moon is the Sun's wife, and 
 eclipses are family quarrels, that will result in dis- 
 aster to the world if they are not soon reconciled. 
 The stars are their children ; the largest is the 
 oldest. 
 
 Besides these superior deities, there is the 
 great snake, to which they look for life, by com- 
 mand of Montezuma. 
 
 Like our sea-serpent on the Atlantic Coast, he 
 glideth at his own sweet will, is seen at unex- 
 pected places, as suits his pleasure, is longer than 
 the tallest pine, and <' thick as many men put 
 together." ^ 
 
 It has been well said the barbarian is the most 
 religious of mortals. His dependence on the ele- 
 ments for food and comfort makes the primitive 
 man regard Nature witli eager interest. Power- 
 less against her forces, if there be something mys- 
 terious, threatening, the untutored soul supplicates 
 
Zuni Basketry, ana Toy Cradles. 
 
Among the Archives. — Continued. 131 
 
 it in prayer, with the inborn faith down deep in 
 every breast that behind the visible hes close the 
 Invisible, the Creator, who rules the world he 
 made. 
 
 They adore the rainbow, bright headband of 
 the sky, rivers, mountains, stones, trees, bears, 
 and other animals. Their fables appear mean- 
 ingless to us ; but we must not despise them, for 
 many of our beliefs are equally so to them. The 
 aboriginal brain can never comprehend why 
 white men worship a sheet of bunting — white, red, 
 spangled blue, with the eagle totem — suffer for it, 
 fight for it in armies numberless as the sands of 
 the desert, and die for it without murmur. 
 
 The myths of the furthest West are wonderfully 
 like the myths of the furthest East. Studying 
 them, one cannot fail in the conviction that 
 humanity, in all the ages and races, is the same, 
 formed on one model, unfolding under the influ- 
 ence of the same inspiration ; that, left to their 
 own will, men do like things under like condi- 
 tions, and that certain religious ideas are born in 
 every heart, sage or savage, making worship a 
 human necessity. Here, as in ancient Thessaly, 
 the powers of Heaven have haunts in the echoing 
 mountain-sides, by pebbly springs, in the gloomy 
 shades of the whispering pines, and under the 
 rushing river and cataract. 
 
 In New Mexico, where the food supply depends 
 so largely on the winds and the uncertain rainfall, 
 the savage is most anxious to conciliate the gods 
 who preside over these forces. There are altars 
 for their worship, mystic stones among the 
 gnarled cedars of the Zuni mesa, and a spring of 
 sweet water, sacred to the rain god, rimmed with 
 pebbles precious as the oracular jewels on the 
 breast of the Jewish high priest. No animal is 
 allowed to drink of the holy waters, and they are 
 purified every year, with vessels dedicated to the 
 
132 The Lajtd of the Pueblos. 
 
 service — most ancient jars, handed down through 
 the generations since the evening and the morn- 
 ing were tlic first day. No Zuni drinks from the 
 consecrated ollas, for the spirit of the spring is 
 always watching, and will avenge the indignity 
 with instant death. Once a year, in August, the 
 cacique, with his chief counselors, visits the spring, 
 and washes its walls, with the elaborately-tinted 
 vases, which were hallowed by the first high priest. 
 The jars are ranged in order on the rim of the well. 
 The frog, the rattlesnake, the tortoise are painted 
 on them, animals sacred to the presiding deity. 
 Woe to the offender who shall profane them by 
 a touch ! A fate awaits him like that of Uzza, 
 when he put forth his hand to hold the ark in the 
 threshing-floor of Chidon. The lightning of the 
 dread god of storms will strike the sinner dead. 
 
 Somewhere near is a mysterious divine bird, 
 kept in a secret shrine. As Herodotus says of 
 the Phoenix : " I have never seen it myself, except 
 in a picture." 
 
 Like the old Greek, the Pueblo looks up and 
 sees the dead among the stars. When the 
 Aurora flashes a strange, flickering light along 
 the northern sky, it is the mustering of the spirits 
 of the mighty warriors, whirling their spears and 
 marching with proud steps, as the shade of 
 Agamemnon strode across the fields of Asphodel. 
 The earthquake's rumble is the groaning and 
 turning in sleep of a big old giant, with voice of 
 thunder eyes of fire, and breath of flame. He 
 was so immense that he sprawled across the 
 whole plain, and so powerful the immortal gods, 
 finding they could not kill him, tore up a high 
 mountain and laid it on him, to keep him quiet. 
 What is this but Enceladus ? 
 
 " Under Mount Etna he lies. 
 
 It is slumber, it is not death ; 
 For he struggles at times to arise, 
 
 And above him the lurid skies 
 Are hot with his ftery breatli. 
 
Zufii Water Vases. 
 
Among the ArcJnves. — Continued. 133 
 
 "The crags are piled on Ins breast, 
 
 The earth is heaped on his liead ; 
 Bnt the groans of liis wiki luirest, 
 
 Thougli smothered and half-suppressed, 
 Are heard, and he is not dead." 
 
 The best hope and strongest faith of the 
 Pueblos are in the second coming of the great 
 King, who is to raise the dead, judge the world, 
 and reign in peace and righteousness. Strug- 
 gling with shadows and weird imaginings, work- 
 ing out their destiny with many a bitter failure, 
 in anguish of heart they instinctively reach 
 through the darkness for the almighty hand of 
 the unseen helper. The sons of Montezuma, as 
 they love to call themselves, believe the fullness 
 of time is come, and the return of their Messiah 
 at hand. He will leave his bright sun-house, to 
 right the wrongs and heal the woes of the race 
 so mercilessly stricken down by the Spaniards, 
 Then there will be no more death, neither sorrow, 
 nor crying ; neither shall there be any more pain. 
 Their ideas are vague and dim. Legends trea- 
 cherous as memory, and growing fainter from 
 generation to generation, for their wise men are 
 without open vision, and their sagamores have 
 neither written prophecy nor guiding stars. 
 
 The view from the top of the mesa is unspeaka- 
 bly beautiful. Twined among multitudes of 
 peaks, like tangled ribbons, are streakings of 
 azure and purple, beneath which, as we know by 
 experience, are out spread valleys, broad, treeless, 
 scorched with a tropic heat, which at noonday 
 seems like quivering flame. The pre-historic 
 ruins cover about thirty acres, and are scattered 
 in confusion on the level plateau under the wind- 
 whipped cedars. Here, until within a few years, 
 was kept the consecrated fire burning for cen- 
 turies — the Montezuma fire ; but time fails to 
 tell it all. Another day we will come again, and 
 hear the fanciful traditions, the misty old super- 
 stitions which hover about the neglected shrines. 
 
134 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 They are given with an opulence of fancy which 
 throws mists before your eyes. In the hush of 
 solitude, the effect of the place is mysterious, 
 and reflection drops easily into belief. Few 
 worshipers now sacrifice in the primeval temples, 
 where of old they must have flocked by hundreds, 
 cherishing the promise of the second coming of 
 Montezuma from the pleasant land where the sun 
 rises. The chiefs crouch with faces toward the 
 east as the morning star goes softly out, and the 
 gray dawn melts into the light of day, yearning 
 as human hearts have yearned in all ages, seeking 
 a sign from Heaven. The legend runs that he 
 who shall first behold the King in his beauty 
 shall receive some great favor at his hand. Some- 
 times they wait in silence ; again they chant a 
 hymn to their god, watching till he shakes his 
 " plumes of fire " above the mountain-tops and 
 shoots his radiant spears across the roseate sky. 
 But the oracles are dumb. Well are they keep- 
 ing the mighty secret ! 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 AMONG THE ARCHIVES. 
 (Cow^ewwecZ.) 
 
 A FEW miles from Zuni, as we move eastward, 
 there gradually comes to view a bold, high, sand- 
 stone rock, a quadrangular wall, white, veined 
 with yellow, named Inscription Rock. It is 
 nearly a mile in length and more than two hun- 
 dred feet in hight. Approaching it, tower and 
 turret, architrave and pillar rise slowly into view. 
 We see a mighty structure Nature has wrought 
 in noble architecture, and that no extravagant 
 coloring gave it the old Spanish name El Moro 
 — The Castle. The surface of the mountain- wall 
 
A7nong the Archives. — Continued. 135 
 
 on the north and south faces is written over with 
 names otherwise lost to history, records that light 
 the dark way like shining torches. Some are 
 deeply and beautifully cut into the plane surface 
 and reach back more than three hundred years. 
 The older inscriptions are Spanish, carefully 
 graven upon the vertical faces, about the hight 
 of a man's head from the ground. Usually a 
 date, a brief memorandum of the purpose and 
 line of march of the Castilian soldiery, the names 
 of travellers exploring the country, or Franciscan 
 friars going into the wilderness in search of the 
 lost tribes of Israel. 
 
 At the foot of the towering steep is a gushing 
 spring of sparkling water, and fresh grass, such 
 as is not often seen except in narrow valleys 
 among the arid plains of the territories. After 
 rest, food, siesta, the traveler, looking up to the 
 immense table of stone before him, naturally adds 
 his own name to the constantly-increasing list on 
 the written mountain, which has now grown into 
 a confused mass of hieroglyphs — Indian signs, 
 the favorite being the track of a moccasin, indi- 
 cative of marching; decayed and decaying in- 
 scriptions, and names of old adventurers. Let 
 us loiter awhile and read, for it is not often such 
 a register is laid open to any tourist. 
 
 Close to the left corner, almost hidden by 
 brushwood, is the oldest date, engraved in the 
 rock nearly a century before the landing of the 
 Pilgrim Fathers — Don Jose de Basconzales, 
 1526. This is the sole record of his expedition, 
 at once his history and his cenotaph. He went 
 with an exploring party from the City of Mexico, 
 and never returned ; nor were they heard of after 
 leaving Zuni. Whether they perished in secret 
 defiles, cut off by the skulking Apache, who 
 dogged every step of the invader, or gave out 
 through fatigue and thirst in the deep caiions and 
 
136 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 sterile vegas, belongs to the voiceless past. In 
 some unnamed spot he sleeps with the silent 
 majority — a mighty company. 
 
 In the moist air of England these letters would 
 be mossed over and wholly illegible ; but the dry, 
 dewless air of New Mexico holds decay in check, 
 and in this regard almost equals the atmosphere 
 of Egypt. Among recent inscriptions appear the 
 autographs of the United States explorers — 
 Whipple, Simpson, and others; and still nearer 
 our day the signs manual of the Smiths, Joneses, 
 Browns, and the rest. The sixth name on the 
 list is the one whose fortunes we are trying to 
 trace out and follow, less for the sake of his king 
 and country than because he was attended by the 
 true love and faithful knight of the little Rose of 
 Castile. 
 
 It runs : Here passed Don Diego de Bargas, 
 to conquer Santa Fe for the royal crown, New 
 Mexico, at his own cost, in the year 1692. 
 
 Many secrets we cannot guess are hidden in 
 the silence there, with the sands of ages drifted 
 above them; but it is plain to see Vargas was in 
 high feather when he made his proud record on 
 the wall of El Moro. Observe the pert little 
 crow, ''at his own cost." 
 
 Luckily, there is still extant a number of docu- 
 ments bearing on his administration among the 
 state papers at Santa Fe, or we might think the 
 princely fellow, going out conquering and to con- 
 quer, scattered commissions and victories with a 
 free hand. 
 
 How La Villa Real de Santa Fc was lost and 
 won is an old tale and often told, and details of 
 battles, at least of Indian fighting, are not inter- 
 esting. Enough that, after the summer camp at 
 or near Old Zuni, Vargas with his army pressed 
 on to the siege of the Capital. The slayers were 
 a few hundreds of white men, with red allies ; the 
 
Among the AirJiives. — Continued. 137 
 
 slain were of a number that has never been 
 reckoned. 
 
 Father Francisco Corvera administered absolu- 
 tion to the entire command before battle, and, as 
 the foreign army was preparing for a general 
 onslaught, the Pueblos stole out in the night, 
 leaving the city in possession of the fair race 
 which left nothing but desolation in its track. 
 
 The brutal instincts of this Vargas (whom I 
 hate, and the judicious reader must hate too) 
 hardened and intensified with increasing power 
 and advancing years. One of the worst of his 
 bad race, he labored unceasingly for the conver- 
 sion of the aborigines. His position allowed 
 immeasurable sweep for cruelty which we may 
 be sure he enjoyed to the utmost, and the cross 
 became the object of bitter hatred to the heathen 
 he claimed for an inheritance. He it was who 
 wrote to the viceroy of Mexico, applying for more 
 troops to carry on the crusade: "You might as 
 well try to convert Jews without the Inquisition 
 as Indians without soldiers." 
 
 Notwithstanding his religious zeal and boast 
 recorded on Inscription Rock at Zuni, Vargas 
 missed the high place at which he aimed, not, like 
 Columbus and Cortez, because he deserved too 
 greatly, but because the regiment in garrison and 
 the corporation of Santa Fe, in 1695, presented 
 charges to the viceroy. Count Galvas, against him 
 for peculation. He was accused of using public 
 -money for private purposes; of drawing on the 
 public treasury for purchase of corn, mules, etc. 
 for settlers, and of selling them and pocketing 
 the proceeds. ''Also of having drawn drafts 
 and received moneys for expenses never incurred." 
 
 He was removed from office 1697, and with 
 him, doubtless, the faithful knight and true love, 
 Don Antonio Eusebio de Cubero, who we will 
 believe had the soul of a true knight, and no part 
 or lot in these ignoble transactions. 
 
138 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 Whatever he was, Rosita saw him with eyes 
 anointed ; from the beginning a hero predestined 
 to triumph on every field he might enter. I do 
 beheve that, in the rough campaigning through 
 the land of sand and thorn, he kept her lovely 
 face — the Millais face — in his heart of hearts. 
 That he never vowed a vow nor kissed a kiss that 
 was not hers, and, loyal to his own Rose of Cas- 
 tile, as he was to his king, he marched in the 
 triumph through the streets of Seville. There 
 ministrels and troubadours hymned high praises 
 (romances they were called), and bright lady-loves 
 waved silken scarfs to the conquistadores, home 
 from the far New World. They were men in 
 the bloom of youth, the very flower of the 
 Peninsula, and Antonio Eusebio de Cubero was 
 proudest and noblest where all were proud and 
 many noble. 
 
 From the arched window, set in quaint fret- 
 work and arabesques, Rosita looked out and the 
 banner over her was love. Perhaps the Millais 
 face — that eager, anxious, haunting face — flushed 
 a little at sight of the grand parade in the pomp 
 and circumstance the old Spaniard loved so well. 
 The soft, dark eyes were not bewildered by the 
 rich confusion of color, the far-floating flags, the 
 dazzle of steel and of silver. Swift glances 
 singled out one beneath the wavy folds of the 
 royal standard, brave as he was beautiful, whose 
 prancing steed, flashing arms, crest, and plume 
 were familiar, whose sash her own soft hands 
 embroidered. 
 
 Let us picture reunion after years of separation, 
 joy after anguish, the rapture of rescue from 
 peril, and so leave them, walking with happy 
 feet by the bed of sweet basil, as the first lovers 
 walked in the cool of the day under the palms 
 of Paradise. 
 
 While I write, the letter of the dear, dead 
 
Among the Archives. — Cojitinued. 139 
 
 woman lies on the table before me ; the fading 
 sign from a rose-leaf hand that has been part of 
 the dust of old Spain so many and many a year. 
 Frail thing, most perishable, outlasting kings, 
 thrones, the wrecks of states, the decay of ages! 
 Closing day finds me dreaming over it in the 
 waning light. I look to the purpling hills. As 
 the sun sinks, they change to fairy tents, under 
 a line of exquisite color, pink, orange, pale sea 
 green, the changeful fringe on the banner of 
 night, ending far up the zenith in a field of spot- 
 less azure. In the farness of the distance the 
 cold, white peaks of the Stony mountains warm 
 for one supreme moment in the solemn beauty 
 of the after-glow, their summits clear-cut against 
 the rainless blue. 
 
 Rapidly the shadows deepen. Violet changes 
 to leaden hues, rose dims to pearl gray, the 
 flushed white foreheads pale, the fires of sunset 
 burn out, and the short twilight, ending in gloom, 
 is the day's burial. 
 
 Human phantoms flit across the dusky spaces. 
 King and priest, savage and Christian, knight 
 and lady, shadows all, passing within the mighty 
 shadow. Under the low window I hear the 
 tramp of feet pacing to and fro like the ebb and 
 flow of the tide. The hurrying feet are ghost- 
 like, too, chasing the flying specters' gold and 
 fame. History is but repeating itself. The rest- 
 less, dissatisfied souls of the New World are the 
 same brotherhood as those of the Castiles; the 
 same as when Solomon sent ships from Tarshish 
 to bring back gold of Ophir ; the same jealous 
 souls as when the king was wroth because the 
 people shouted, Saul has slain his thousands and 
 David his ten thousands. Now, as then, morn- 
 ing and evening bring their old beauty, the cool-^ 
 ing balm of the breeze follows the burning day. 
 The west wind cools no fever of heart or brain ; 
 
140 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 still are men searching for signs of gold and 
 fighting the old battle against oblivion, and still 
 do loving women sit by solitary fires and wait for 
 them to come. These things have not changed ; 
 they will never change. Humanity remains the 
 same. 
 
 The foreign charm which was the dower of the 
 historic city is dying fast, but not quite dead. 
 The spell, long lingering, is slow to pass away, 
 though student and antiquary are blowing the 
 dust from the books of Chronicles and letting 
 the white light of day into obscured and dark- 
 ened chambers. 
 
 In this dimness once glowed the poetic coloring 
 of romance and chivalry, in which the valorous 
 Espego and his knights founded the City of Holy 
 Faith. If the ghosts of the venturesome heroes 
 revisit the field of their victories, they may yet 
 be reminded of soft Andalusia. There is a hint 
 of Castilian grace in the vanishing sombrero, in 
 the folds of the ever-falling but never-fallen rcbosa, 
 a touch of passing sweetness in the prolonged 
 adios. Blent with the familiar benediction, now 
 in my ear, "■ Vago listed con Dios que listed lo pase 
 bieti'' C' May you depart with God and continue 
 well "), the hovering shades might hear the 
 dreamy plash of bright fountains and the light 
 love song under the barred windows of fair 
 Cordova. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE JORNADA DEL MUERTO. 
 
 Near the southern boundary of New Mexico 
 the Spanish explorers were opposed by a barrier 
 of all on earth most to be dreaded — a shadeless, 
 waterless plateau, nearly one hundred miles long, 
 
The Joimada Del Muerto. 141 
 
 from five to thirty miles wide, resembling the 
 steppes of Northern Asia. Geologists tell us this 
 is the oldest country on the earth, except, per- 
 haps, the backbone of Central Africa; at least 
 the one which has longest exhibited its present 
 conditions, the one longest exposed to the influ- 
 ence of agents now in action, and. hence, bearing 
 the most deeply-marked records of their power. 
 
 The portion I speak of appears to have served 
 its time, worn out, been dispeopled and forgotten. 
 The grass is low and mossy, with a perishing 
 look — the shrubs, soap-weed, and bony cactus 
 writhing like some grisly skeleton; the very 
 stones are like the scoria of a furnace. You 
 vainly look for the flight of a bird, such as 
 cheered the eyes of Thalaba in the desert; no 
 bee nor fly hums the empty air; and, save the 
 lizard (the genius of desolation) and horned frog, 
 there is no breath of living thing. 
 
 Certain tribes of Arabia have no name for the 
 sea, and, when they first came to its shore, they 
 asked, with a sad wonder : '• What is this strange 
 desert of water, more beautiful than any land ? " 
 Standing on the edge of the measureless waste, 
 which is trackless as water, the first explorers 
 might ask: " What is this strange ocean of sand, 
 with its stillness more awful than any sea? " 
 
 In places the dead level of the plain sweeps 
 with the exactness of a sheet of water, encircling 
 as with a shore-line mountain-walls which on the 
 west shut off the Rio Grande, and frequently 
 insulating whole peaks and ridges. Friendly 
 showers fall there two months in the year, and, 
 instead of storms of rain, in spring it is burned 
 by those of dust and sand They are caused by 
 winds coming mainly from the northwest, carry- 
 ing before them, like mist, clouds of pulverized 
 sand and dust, and piling them in drifts when 
 checked in their course. You can watch their 
 
142 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 progress as they approach, beginning in a thin 
 haze along the horizon, for hours beforehand ; 
 and when they reach you the dust penetrates 
 everything. You eat it, you drink it, you breathe 
 it, you wear it Hke a coating, and the last hand- 
 kerchief at the bottom of the box in your trunk 
 is gritty and smells of alkali. The sand-storms, 
 as they are called, usually last one, sometimes 
 three days. Occasionally they appear a proces- 
 sion of whirlwind columns, such as are seen in 
 autumn leaves, slowly moving across the desert 
 in spectral dimness. Rejoice and be thankful if 
 the tempest passes without striking. It will beat 
 the mules without mercy and lash your face like 
 a whip, if it reaches you. 
 
 Stories are told how, after a day of intense heat 
 and lifeless silence, a dark cloud rapidly lowers 
 from the sky of molten brass, and a sudden wind 
 whirls the sand in mounds, and so shifts it from 
 place to place. Horses and mules fall flat, with 
 their noses to the ground; men lie down under 
 blankets, from which the sand must be shaken 
 occasionally, to escape being literally buried 
 alive. Storms of such violence are rare, but every 
 old frontiersman can tell you of more than one. 
 The early Spaniards called the desert hot wind 
 soiana, in memory of Mancha and Andalusia. It 
 heats the blood terribly, produces the utmost dis- 
 comfort and nervous irritation. Hence the Cas- 
 tilian proverb: ''Ask no favor while the solana 
 blows." 
 
 A variation of the simoom of the Orient, it 
 cracks the skin, creates consuming thirst, and has 
 been known to produce death. 
 
 The reader need hardly be reminded that the 
 destruction of Sennacherib's host is supposed to 
 have been caused by the simoom. Undoubtedly, 
 Byron had it in mind when he wrote the Hebrew 
 melody, which has the majestic thunder-roll of 
 organ music, 
 
The Jornada Del Muerto. 143 
 
 " The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold." 
 
 Once feel the parching, torrid heat; once face 
 that suffocating desert-wind, and you readily 
 comprehend death was instantaneous. There 
 was no waste of miraculous force in the power 
 which destroyed all the mighty men of valor, and 
 the leaders and captains, in the camp of the king 
 of Assyria 
 
 "For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, 
 And breathecl in the face of the foe as he passed ; 
 And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill, 
 And their"hearts but once heaved and forever grew still." 
 
 The spot I am trying to describe is the battle- 
 ground of the elements. In winter it is made 
 fearful by raging storms of wind and snow. 
 There men and animals have been frozen to 
 death, their bodies left the lawful prey of the 
 mountain wolf. From the primeval years the 
 Apache has harried the hungry waste, hunting 
 for scalps; and, besides the savagest of savages, 
 it is now the favorite skulking-place of outlaws, 
 an asylum for fugitives escaping justice in old 
 Mexico and Texas. 
 
 In our times many a party cut off and many a 
 traveler murdered makes good the name it bears, 
 given by the first white men who dared its perils : 
 Jornada del Muerto — "Journey of Death." 
 
 Reports of sun-scorch and lava beds, sand, 
 sirocco, maddening thirst, and cheating mirage 
 did not daunt the bold land-robbers from Spain. 
 They were pledged to wrest their secrets from 
 the mountains, and bring them to lay at the feet 
 of their imperial master. Disciplined in the 
 hardships of foreign wars, they lived for glory 
 and worshiped Fortune. They had seen service 
 in almost every clime. Some had tilted with the 
 Moor; some had fo-jght the infidel on the blue 
 Danube, and hunted the Carib in Hispaniola; 
 and later came captains whose waving plumes 
 had been the colors to rally on when the royal 
 
144 1^^^^ Laftd of the Pueblos. 
 
 standards were fallen. The mysterious country, 
 mountain-locked and guarded by savage sentinels, 
 who seemed to require neither rest, food, nor 
 sleep, and were so fleet of foot they could out- 
 march the best cavalry horses, was a high stake, 
 involving heavy risks and not to be lightly won. 
 From accounts of Jesuit missionaries, who went 
 with the cross, ready to die for their faith, the 
 heroes of the seventeenth century learned that 
 Nature in Nueva Espagiia was not always in 
 stormy mood. The fiery solana spent its strength 
 in three days, and the lull following it was like 
 clear shining after rain. If the snow of winter 
 was deep, it was not lasting (only a Christmas 
 storm) ; and friendly natives taught them that the 
 stony Sierras could be brought to yield gold, 
 silver, copper — all the precious metals. 
 
 Along their sides were sparkling springs, and 
 at their feet green valleys, where Summ.er nestled 
 long and lovingly — pastitras in which an abiding 
 June encamped and ruled the year. They were 
 tufted with the short, delicate buffalo grass^ lovely 
 with its strange clusters of pistillate flowers and 
 bunches of rosy stamens, and so strongly and 
 closely matted it could well bear the tread of the 
 monstrous Cibola (buffalo). Over all, like the 
 purple mountain veils, threaded with fire, hung 
 a delicious mystery. 
 
 The old-time heroes were deeply superstitious 
 and well versed in legendary lore. As they 
 penetrated the Jornaday spectral illusions haunted 
 them. Demons lurked in the tall soap-weed, 
 and glared over their tops, grimacing threaten- 
 ingly. 
 
 When, weakened by long fastings, the sky 
 spun round, goblins, " with leathery wings like 
 bats," filled the air, and foul fiends, which could 
 be exorcised only by prayer, made every step a 
 terror. Fearless leaders, who regarded enterprise 
 
The Jorvada Del Muerto. 145 
 
 ill proportion to its peril, and had 
 looked death in the face as if they loved it, 
 quailed before the undiscovered country, the 
 pathless Jornada. 
 
 In bivouac at sunset, there was much crossing 
 of forehead and breast, murmur of aves and 
 amens ; not whispered, but outspoken, as became 
 the " Swords of the Church." 
 
 They set up their swords in the sand, knelt 
 before the blessed sign on their hilts, and fervently 
 prayed the Holy Mother's protection. So com- 
 forted, they slept, perchance to dream of cool 
 fountains in far plazas ; of glassy ponds, with 
 white-breasted swans asleep among the reeds and 
 rushes on the margin ; of rushing books, shaded 
 by dripping willows ; and the low undertone of 
 of the halcyon sea, whose soft-beating surf breaks 
 on the shores of old Spain. 
 
 It is amusing to read of their superstitious 
 dread of horned frogs, which hopped out of the 
 way, then '' turned and faced them with basilisk 
 eyes." The sameness of the scenes was sicken- 
 ing ; the glare of the fierce sunshine blinded 
 them ; and, with cracked lips and burning eyes 
 they hailed the mirage with shouts, and, horse 
 and rider seeing eye to eye, they dashed away 
 for the mocking lake, to curse the cheat and 
 thirst the more. 
 
 Traversing the desert is not now what it was 
 in the age of fable. The delusions of the past 
 vanished with the darkness to which they 
 belonged. We are living in better times. Sum- 
 mer, winter, moonbeam or starbeam will never 
 shine on goblins more. The " leathery wings " 
 have floated away from cactus thicket and mez- 
 quit jungle ; ghost, fairy, demon, genii all have 
 fled into the listening silence. They were 
 phantoms following the century of credulity, 
 whose foremost man, clear-eyed and conscien- 
 10 
 
146 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 tious, aimed his inkstand at the Devil, and whose 
 veteran campaigner from the siege of Granada 
 went wandering up and down the everglades of 
 Florida, seeking an enchanted fountain — an ever- 
 flowing spring, of which one draught would 
 restore to his war-worn body the freshness of 
 youth, and add to his term of life years enough 
 to discover and conquer a third world. 
 
 The Jornada still has its alarms ; but men of 
 the nineteenth century see no angry eyes in the 
 red glow of sunset ; overhead hovers no evil 
 spirit of earth or air, under cover of night's blue 
 and starry banner. 
 
 The centre of the ninety- mile desert is now 
 broken by a watering-place, the cheering oasis 
 which relieves the long strain on body and soul. 
 In 1 87 1 Major John Martin dug one hundred and 
 sixty feet, and struck a sweet, abundant fountain, 
 deliciously cool, soft, with a slight taste of 
 sulphur. Its depth is forty feet, and the heaviest 
 draughts have never lessened the supply. It is 
 pumped by a windmill, which the wind some- 
 times makes his own ; and the gurgle and plash 
 as the stream falls into the huge tanks, is a sound 
 in the ear of the traveller sweet as his first hearing 
 of the nightingale. Before the well was made 
 water was hauled in barrels to the station from 
 the Rio Grande, fifteen miles away. The nearest 
 fuel at that point is eighteen miles distant. 
 
 At Fort Craig, the southern terminus of the 
 solitary place, the modern tourist fills his water- 
 kegs and canteens, tightens his cartridge-belt, 
 and looks carefully to the condition of his animals. 
 The loss of a breast-strap or horse-shoe would 
 be a hindrance not easily overcome, and supplies 
 of every kind must be carried. The road is 
 excellent, and, if there is no accident, the well 
 may be reached in one day's journey. Even in 
 its best aspect it is entered the first time with 
 
The Jo7'nada Del Muerto. 147 
 
 forebodings, a vague dread., like pushing out into 
 an unknown sea. The sun-glare is so hard to 
 bear that night is often the accepted time for the 
 mournful crossing. As the sun declines, the 
 lonesome dark falls like a drop-curtain. The 
 stars flash out ; the sky above, intensely clear, is 
 a steel-blue shield, set thick with diamonds. A 
 tropic brilliance fills it with a glow like the mild 
 twilight of other latitudes, and the moon's splendor 
 makes beautiful even the seared and jagged cliffs 
 of the Sierra de los Organos. Three thousand 
 feet above the level of the river are their shafts, 
 pale gray in the silvery light ; masses of granite 
 up-heaved in some mighty convulsion, long 
 stilled, standing against the rainless blue like 
 tombstones over a buried world. 
 
 If there is talk in the ambulance, it is in 
 subdued tones. The assumption of cheerfulness 
 by humming snatches of old songs is a dreary 
 impertinence. Hour after hour we travel in 
 silence, unbroken but by the grind of wheels 
 plowing through the sandy soil. In answer to 
 your utmost listening, you may catch the yelp 
 of the red fox, or from the far-off mountain the 
 coyote's shrill cry. Sometimes the driver drops 
 to sleep, and the wagon stops. Lift the canvas 
 curtain, and look out. The soft wind blows in 
 even cadence and swell, but meets only the 
 hushed night and its burning lights. The Milky 
 Way is a solid white gleam, where the invisble 
 gods are walking. The missing stars are here. 
 How low they swing in their serene and silent 
 spaces. Beneath the solemn grandeur of the 
 heavens, the work of Him in whom is no haste, 
 no rest, no weariness, no failure, we bow in awe. 
 What a little speck is our wagon-train ; what an 
 atom is self, the object round which our weak 
 thoughts revolve. 
 
 The mountain-rim is restful to the sight. 
 
148 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 There are the gushing springs, cool as snow ; 
 and the shady pines, \yhose never ceasing song 
 we cannot hear. How still it is ! No ripple of 
 water, no stir of leaf or bough, grass or blossom, 
 or any green thing. Ominous crosses by the 
 wayside mark the graves of travellers, scalped, 
 tortured, and mangled. The weight of the 
 tragedy is on us. We feel a near kinship to the 
 sleepers below, and would not tremble to see 
 them rise and shake their gory locks at us. The 
 vacant space lies stark and unmoved, as it lay 
 centuries ago, when the first gold-hunters, in 
 fear and yet in triumph, braved its unknown 
 depths. The prostrate plain, the rigid outlines 
 of the naked landscape, the intolerable dumb 
 lifelessness are indeed dd Mtierto. 
 
 And here I pause to describe the weapons used 
 by wild tribes of Indians who infest the Jornada. 
 On my wall, beside a victorious banner furled 
 and bruised arms hung up for monuments, are 
 the full equipments of an Apache chief, killed 
 near Fort Stanton, New Mexico. The shield, 
 made of thick, tanned buffalo hide, is stiff and 
 hard, and resounds under your knuckles like a 
 drum. In being made it was stretched over a 
 light frame of basket-work and dried. It is 
 twenty inches across, and as round as the shield 
 of the elder Ossian. 
 
 An outer cover of dressed deer-skin envelops the 
 buffalo hide, drawn smooth and gathered round 
 the edge on the under side with a leather thread. 
 Traced in blue-black ink on it are round figures, 
 which may represent the sun or a spring, and 
 zigzags, which by straining one's fancy may be 
 imagined to represent mountains. 
 
 At the upper rim of the shield are the decora- 
 tions; three pea-fowl feathers, probably amulets, 
 and a medicine-bag of black muslin containing a 
 dry powder which the warrior rubs on his heart 
 
The Jornada De^ Muerto. 149 
 
 beiore going into battle, '' to make it big and 
 brave." 
 
 A scrap of iridescent shel) is fastened to the 
 centre, and there on occasion, and around the 
 edge, dangle bloody tufts, the reeking scalps of 
 the enemy. It was carried on the left arm by 
 two straps slipped over the hand, and was kept 
 in motion while in action, by which means the 
 hostile arrows glanced off. 
 
 But it was not proof against the mightier arms 
 of the white race, and two bullet-holes through 
 the shield show how the red chief came to his 
 death. 
 
 The spear is an ugly weapon six feet long, 
 about as thick as a broom-handle, and made of 
 an extremely light wood, to me unknown, painted 
 red in one band three inches wide near the head. 
 The point is a piece of iron, probably an old 
 Mexican bayonet, twenty-two inches long, 
 socketed into the pole, and further strengthened 
 in its place by a cord of deer-skin wrapped tightly 
 round it many times. 
 
 Before Indians knew the use of iron, the spear, 
 or lance, as it is usually called, was pointed with 
 obsidian, or some other flinty substance, ham- 
 mered and ground to a sharp edge. Sometimes 
 the heel of the shaft is balanced with eagle 
 feathers, while others are caught along the shaft, 
 giving steadiness to the flight and gratifying the 
 taste of the owner. 
 
 The quiver is twenty -seven inches long, is 
 made of white cow-skin tanned with the hair on, 
 sewed with a thread of deer-skin, and is large 
 enough to contain a sheaf of two dozen arrows. 
 A fringe of the same material dangles at each 
 end of the quiver and adorns the waist-belt> 
 When it was in use a band of cow-skin, four 
 inches wide, held it across the shoulder. 
 
 The arrows are shafts two feet long, made of 
 
150 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 a species of yucca, tipped with hoop-iron and 
 old knife-blades, which are roughly ground on 
 each side, sharply pointed and edged, probably 
 by rubbing with stone. They are winged with 
 three feathers of the wild turkey, stripped from 
 the quill and tied round the shaft at equal dis- 
 tances with very fine tendons, like the E violin 
 string. The iron points are all that betray in- 
 tercourse with white men, and were probably 
 stolen from the refuse of some camp. 
 
 An Apache boy, of ten or twelve years of 
 age, will strike a cent three times out of five at 
 a distance of fifteen yards. Practice of bow- 
 shooting begins as soon as these boys are old 
 enough to hold the weapon, and ends only with 
 death. 
 
 At fifty yards the well-ponted iron arrow is 
 dangerous and sure, and the strong-armed In- 
 dian easily drives it through a two-inch plank. 
 He can fire it more rapidly than an ordinary 
 revolver, and even though he possesses **a heap 
 firing-gun," as he calls a repeating rifle, he is 
 never without the silent, unerring and deadly 
 iron-headed arrow. 
 
 It is far superior to the gun for night-sur- 
 prises and taking off sentinels, and on the hunt 
 half-a-dozen animals may be killed before the 
 rest of the herd are alarmed. It is to be re- 
 lied on when ammunition fails, and so light as 
 to be worn without the least encumbrance. 
 
 The wary Indian is careful of his arrows, al- 
 though he has many, wasting none in random 
 shots, and keeping his quiver well filled. 
 Sometimes a thousand arrows are buried in 
 the grave of a chief, a sign that his death will 
 be avenged by his tribe. 
 
 A narrow band of red on the feathered end 
 of the shaft is the only attempt at ornamen- 
 tation. 
 
The Jornada Del Muerto. 1 5 1 
 
 A fringed leather arm-guard, or bracelet, is 
 worn round the left wrist, to defend it from the 
 blow of the bow-string. Sometimes it is made 
 of gray eagle feathers and the vari-colored tips 
 of humming-birds' wings. 
 
 In shooting-matches the contest is carried 
 on by men and boys ; betting is high and 
 exciting, and sometimes entire fortunes such 
 as a pair of moccasins, a pink calico shirt and 
 blanket, are staked upon the hazard. The 
 whole tribe, men, women and children, turn 
 out as spectators. A bad shot is received 
 with yells of derision, though failures by ex- 
 perts are rare. Tf the slender white wand 
 aimed at is not touched, the shaft generally 
 lodges in the circle of loose earth thrown up 
 about the target to catch the arrows and pre- 
 vent their blunting. 
 
 Said an old frontiersman to me, "I have 
 never yet seen the Indian bow I could not 
 break across my knee." I doubt if he could 
 crack the one now before me. Many a hand 
 has tried to string it and failed, completely as 
 the suitors in the classic story. It is of Osage 
 orange forty-two inches long, bent in the 
 graceful curvature poetry assigns to the bow 
 of the god of love. 
 
 Formerly to this ornament the wild tribes 
 added a mighty war-club of mezquit wood, flat 
 and crescent-shaped, with a round ball at the 
 end. 
 
 In all the Indian weapons there is no sense 
 of grace in outline, except the curved bow, no 
 elegance in the winging, no brilliance in the 
 rough stains of poor color. They simply 
 mean business ; the effect of the group now 
 before me is savage in the extreme. 
 
 Arm the warrior with them, mount him on 
 a half-wild mustang which he guides with the 
 
152 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 knee, and he is a king of men. Place on his 
 neck as a crowning garniture the ornament 
 taken from the body of the fallen chief, and 
 round his neck put a piece of doubled horse- 
 hide, with two rattle-snakes' tails, each con- 
 taining eleven rattles dangling from it. 
 Imagine the brutish face painted in hideous 
 stripes, vermilion and blue ; the buffalo-robe 
 blanket, the wild hair flying, the long lance 
 whirling, brandished in air, and add, if you 
 can, the war-whoop, a yell — 
 
 —"As if the fiends from heaven that fell 
 Had pealed the banner cry of hell." 
 
 Then you will have a picture of an Apache 
 Indian. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 SOMETHING ABOUT THE APACHE. 
 
 The chase is the natural outlet for much 
 savagery ; but the wild tribes of North America 
 are more hardly driven now than ever before, 
 owing to the rapid disappearance of game, espe- 
 cially the buffalo. Time was when the cibola, as 
 they called him, fed, warmed, and clothed the 
 nomads. Indians are now moved about as far 
 west as they can go, and the buffalo goes with 
 them, but is disappearing much more rapidly 
 than the Red Man is. 
 
 The narrowing limits of his range make many a 
 chase barren as that of the English party in the 
 Catskills, gayly hunting the great American 
 bison in the Summer of 1876. 
 
 He once ranged as far east as the Atlantic 
 
Something About the Apache, 153: 
 
 seaboard in Virginia and the Carolinas. From 
 Catesby we learn that, about the year I7i2,herds 
 of buffalo were seen within thirty miles of 
 Charleston, South Carolina. The decrease of 
 their main reliance for food and clothing alarmed 
 the tribes years ago ; and in the last generation 
 they brought forward the fact in their pow-wows 
 with commissioners : "The cibola is dying, and 
 the red brother must keep peace with the pale 
 face, and eat his spotted buffalo." (Indian for 
 domestic cattle.) Such was the peaceful and 
 alluring speech of the war chief of the Apaches ; 
 but the promise of peace was never kept. To 
 steal and murder, and, under the show of friend- 
 ship beat out the brains of unsuspecting men ; 
 to carry off to captivity worse than death the- 
 women and larger children, was merely a question 
 of opportunity. 
 
 The ''spotted buffalo of the white brother" 
 is hardier than the ancient and lawful game which 
 ranged in such vast herds along the Arkansas,. 
 Republican and Platte Rivers, and the future 
 geographers will not regale ingenuous American 
 youth with that blood-curdling, hair-whitening 
 picture of the shaggy and ferocious beasts rush- 
 ing to suicide over an awful precipice overhang- 
 ing a bottomless abyss. The bison will rather 
 tike his place in natural history with the extinct 
 d3do and the out-going cassov.^ary. 
 
 The tanned skin of the buffalo is the best 
 material for the manufacture of " tepes," and the 
 *' bois de bache " is as good fuel as the Indian 
 desires. It has been erroneously stated that only 
 the white man kills and wastes buffalo. They are, 
 or have been frequently killed by war parties, 
 who take what may be needed as food ; but the 
 rest of the carcass falls to the portion of wolves 
 and ravens, never far off. Young buffaloes fall a 
 prey to the hungry gray wolf and coyotes, and 
 
154 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 a sick or wounded buffalo has a long train 
 attendant of wolves, thirsting for his blood. 
 
 Coronado, the old Spanish explorer who crossed 
 the Gila in 1540, wrote a curious and accurate 
 description of the cibola, of which I copy a por- 
 tion : ** These oxen are the bigness and color of 
 •our bulls ; but their horns are not so great. They 
 have a great bunch upon their fore shoulders, and 
 more hair upon their fore part than on their 
 hinder part; it is like wool. They have, as it 
 •were, a horse's mane upon their back-bone, and 
 much hair and very long from the knee down- 
 ward. They have great tufts of hair hanging 
 down their foreheads, and it seemeth they have 
 beards, because of the great store of hair hang- 
 ing down at their chins and throats. The males 
 have very long tails, and a great knob or flock 
 at the end ; so that, in some respects, they resem- 
 ble the lion, and, in some, the camel. Their 
 masters have no other riches or substance; of 
 them they eat, they drink, they apparel, they 
 shoe themselves ; and of their hides make many 
 things, as houses and ropes ; of their bones they 
 make bodkins ; of their sinews and hair, thread; 
 of their horns, maws and bladders, vessels ; and 
 of their calf skins, buckets, wherein they draw 
 and keep water." 
 
 The whole living of the roving tribes is thus 
 cut off with the buffalo. The Apache love of 
 meat is not fastidious, and they are fond of mule 
 and horse flesh. Deer, antelope — whatever the 
 game may be — every portion, except the bones, 
 is consumed, the entrails being an especial 
 delicacy. They partially cook it, generally eating 
 it extremely rare ; that is, about half raw. 
 Fertile valleys in the territories bear a small 
 proportion to the extent of arid deserts, lava 
 beds, and plains of sand. Isolated peaks contain 
 wood and springs, thus affording protection for 
 
Navajo Indian with Silver Ornaments. 
 
Somethmg About the Apache. 155. 
 
 the sure-footed savage, who can outmarch our 
 -"st cavalry horses. The scant grass is soon 
 exhausted, so he must move from place to place, 
 or starve, and thus necessity is added to inclina- 
 tion ; and they roam over immense tracts of 
 country, seeking what they may devour. 
 
 They have smoke signals by day and fire 
 beacons at night, and systems of telegraphy 
 understood only by themselves. The displace- 
 ment and overturning of a few stones on a trail, 
 or a bent or broken twig, is a note of warning 
 like the bugle call to disciplined troops. They 
 cross the Jornada del Mucrto, ''journey of 
 death," as the ninety mile desert was called by 
 the Spaniard, with an ease and fleetness no white 
 man can imitate, and, swooping down from 
 refuges in the natural fortresses of the mountains, 
 pounce upon the travelers. The many crosses 
 dotting the roadsides of Southern Arizona and 
 New Mexico mark the graves of murdered men ; 
 indeed, the country seems one vast graveyard, if 
 we may judge by the frequency of these rude 
 memorials. Trained by their mothers to theft 
 and murder from childhood, they are inured to 
 all extremes of heat and cold, hunger and thirst. 
 They are cunning as the red fox and insatiate 
 as tigers, so ingenious in preparing for surprises 
 that they will envelop themselves in a gray 
 blanket, sprinkle it carefully with earth, to 
 resemble a granite bowlder and be passed within 
 a few feet without suspicion. Again, they will 
 cover themselves with fresh grass, and, lying 
 motionless, seem a natural portion of the field, 
 or hid among the yuccas, they imitate the 
 appearance of the tree, so as to pass for one of 
 the plants. 
 
 Three-fourths of the Apache country consists 
 of barren volcanic rocks and sterile ridges, 
 where no plow can be driven and no water 
 
156 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 found, and campaigning in their country is 
 'exposure to severe privations and dangers, 
 aside from the attacks of the natives. There 
 is no hope of glory to cheer the soldier who 
 upholds our flag in that dreary field ; there is 
 no stimulus but duty. If he succeeds, the 
 feeblest echo reaches the ears of friends in 
 the states ; scant mention is made in the pa- 
 pers ; there is small honor in killing an Indian, 
 still less in falling before one. And the work 
 is endless, fruitless. It is to be recommenced 
 every Spring, and as regularly stopped in the 
 Fall by the snows of Autumn. A passing in- 
 terest is roused ; but it is brief, because the 
 atrocities are so frequent and monotonous ; 
 always the same tale of insult, torture, death ; 
 and every year the same inquny is made at 
 Washington, and runs along the frontier. What 
 can be done with the Apaches ? 
 
 They should be exterminated, you say. 
 
 Yes, dear reader; but, unfortunately for our 
 gallant army, extermination is a game two 
 •can play at. 
 
 Very few know, or care to know, that in the 
 Apache War, ending October, 1880, more than 
 four hundred white persons were scalped and 
 tortured to death with devilish ingenuity. The 
 war began on account of the removal of about 
 four hundred Indians from their reservation a'- 
 Ojo Caliente (warm springs). New Mexico. 
 This is the ideal of a happy hunting ground. 
 Standing on the parade ground at Fort Craig, 
 you look toward the Black Range mountains, 
 clad in pine groves, abounding in game and the 
 precious stones so rare in New Mexico and 
 Arizona. Morning and evening wrap them in 
 aerial tints of surpassing loveliness ; and one can 
 well imagine such a spot would be very dear 
 to any one calling it home, be his color what it 
 
Something About t/ie Apache. 157 
 
 may. \\^hen the news came, the Indians re- 
 ceived the announcement with deep grief and 
 bitter curses. The reason assigned by our 
 Government for the removal from this spot to 
 the arid, volcanic mesa of Arizona was that 
 two agencies might be consolidated, and the 
 expense of maintaining them lessened. They 
 went unwillingly, because this beautiful coun- 
 try was the land of their fathers, and because 
 they could not live peaceably with the Indians 
 of the San Carlos reservation, and only at the bay- 
 onet's point would they march. Their war chief 
 was Victorio, successor to the renowned Magnus 
 Colorado, who was the most influential and 
 successful statesman and warrior the Apaches 
 have had for a century. They left Ojo Caliente, 
 with its green fields and glorious mountains, 
 in the Spring of 1877. In September, of the 
 same year, Victorio and his people stole away 
 from San Carlos, saying they would rather die 
 than live there. They were pursued by our 
 cav^alry, overtaken, and several of them killed ; 
 many women and children were taken prisoners. 
 The rest under Victorio, escaped, went to Fort 
 W^ingate, and surrendered. They were sent back 
 to Ojo Caliente, and held as prisoners of war 
 until the order came from Washington for them 
 to return to Arizona. Then they stole the 
 cavalry horses and started on the war-path. 
 
 The war was a series of ambuscades and re- 
 treats, lasting a year and a half. The details 
 of Indian fighting are much the same every- 
 where ; but Apaches surpass in cunning, 
 stratagy, secrec}^ all the sons of men. They 
 are an enemy not to be despised, and as friends 
 are never to be trusted. Their signal s}'stem 
 is so perfect that by it they act in perfect 
 concert, and bands of fives, tens, and twen- 
 ties, separated from each other by twenty, 
 
158 The Land oj the Pneti'ios. 
 
 thirty, even forty miles, manage to maintain 
 a perfect police intelligence over the vast 
 region once their own territory. 
 
 Victorio had one son named for the man 
 who, beyond all men of the civilized and 
 even savage world, has had the confidence of 
 his kind, Washington ; the one white man 
 Indians admit to a place in their land of happy 
 spirits. He was shot near Fort Cummings, 
 and his death was a heavy blow to the chief, 
 whose fame and blanket he was to inherit, 
 whose pride was centered in his son. In the 
 Fall of 1879, Washington's body lay un- 
 buried in the deep defile where he fell ; the 
 long hair matted and dried with blood, the 
 flesh shrunken and skin tanned like old leather. 
 In the dry, dewless air of New Mexico, bod- 
 ies are not subject to decay as in the East, 
 and will shrivel like a mummy by exposure 
 to sun and wind. Long before this time the 
 flesh of the chiefs son has probably been 
 gnawed clean from the bones by the ravening 
 mountain wolf 
 
 Washington had but one wife, contrary 
 to the usual custom of his tribe, and at twenty, 
 wooed and won the ''Princess," as we used to 
 call her, because she was of the royal family 
 of the illustrious Magnus Colorado. She was a 
 comely damsel, very young, who assumed some 
 dignity and state because of her high blood, and 
 she never forgot the ancient splendors of her line. 
 
 Victorio and his band were surrounded and 
 killed in the Castillos Mountains of Mexico, by 
 troops under General Terassas (Mexican), and 
 the war ended with a grand parade in the city of 
 Chihuahua. Cathedral bells rang, bands played, 
 and the victorious column marched the street 
 amid rousing cheers. Following General 
 Terassas and his command came prisoners, 
 
Something About the Apaches. 159 
 
 women and children on mules and ponies; they 
 were to be given away and find homes among their 
 conquerors. Behind them were seventy-eight 
 Mexicans, carrying poles twenty feet high, on 
 which were scalps dangling like waving plumes. 
 The whole head of hair was torn off instead of 
 one tuft, and the slayer of Victorio, a Farhumara 
 Indian bore aloft with pride a pole on which 
 hung the gray scalp of the dead chief. At sight 
 of it the cheers of the Mexicans were redoubled, 
 and I could but think so barbaric a procession is 
 rarely seen in one of the oldest and wealthiest 
 cities of the North American Continent. There 
 was great cause for rejoicing; the bravest and 
 wiliest of the Apaches was dead, and he had no 
 son to succeed him, for with Victorio's death the 
 cause was lost. His wife cut off her hair, as the 
 old Greek wives used to, and buried it, an offer- 
 ing to the spirit of the fallen chief to whom 
 she was devoted, yet said to be less slavish than 
 most Indian wives. 
 
 Victorio's band were all stout fighters and 
 dtvilisli when under the influence of whiskey or 
 tisiuin, an intoxicating drink made from corn. 
 One of them, Rafael, split his child's head open 
 with an ax, when drunk ; another time stabbed 
 his wife so that she died. He was then over- 
 come by penitence, sacrificed all of his beads 
 and most of his clothes to the dear departed, cut 
 his and children's hair short, and sheared the 
 horses' manes and tails. These manifestations of 
 anguish over, he went up into a high hill, and 
 howled with uplifted hands. That shape, out- 
 lined against the intense azure of the sky, was a 
 most ridiculous sight. The funeral dirge was a 
 long, slow, horrible wail. There is no Apache law 
 to touch suph a criminal; and this case is less dis- 
 tressing than one other which came under my 
 notice in New Mexico. An old Indiap. bought a 
 
i6o The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 young girl of her mother, paying her price in 
 ponies and blankets — much against her will — 
 she, like a sensible girl, preferring a younger 
 man. She ran away, and hid in dark canons and 
 pine woods, but the bridegroom tracked her and 
 beat her on her head with his gun for running 
 off; and, worst of all, her mother thought the 
 son-in-law was exactly right in the matter. 
 Finally, when her skull was nearly broken, her 
 spirit was entirely gone, and she yielded to the 
 inevitable, as so many women of the higher 
 grade have done, and silently took up the heavy 
 burden of life alotted the wife of the most bar- 
 barous of barbarians. Women are of so little 
 account with these people that few of their 
 daughters are given a name, and even their 
 mothers often mourn at their birth, regarding 
 them merely as an incumbrance on the tribe. 
 They are pretty as children, but the exposure 
 and hard work of their lot change them to 
 wrinkled, muscular hags at thirty, and when 
 they die the Apache chief merely says: *'It was 
 only a woman; no loss." 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 OLD MINERS. 
 
 Oblivon scattereth her poppies even in 
 guarded chambers where the Muse of History 
 holds sleepless watch, and the broken, disconnected 
 annals of New Mexico in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury are like dreamy legends or misty fables of 
 the heroic ages. 
 
 The avaricious and despotic governors of the 
 province made no secret of their odious laws, 
 and apailing atrocities are put on record 
 
Old Miners. i6i 
 
 in business manner, without concealment or 
 attempt at palliation. Many details are trivial 
 and there are long catalogues readable by no man 
 but Dr. Dryasdust. Running through dispatches 
 is an appeal for money, petitions for appropriation 
 the keynote of official song, from the Empress of 
 India down to the lowest official of the youngest 
 republic. How could the commandants open 
 mines, develop the resources of Nueva Mejico, 
 even with slave labor, without money or its equi- 
 valent ? Beside this familiar wail are found 
 meager and detached accounts of long marches 
 among the peace-loving Pueblos, who hailed the 
 fair strangers as gods, and their horses as beauti- 
 ful, immortal animals, tamed for the service of 
 their celestial visitants. These 
 
 " most Gothic gentlemen of Spain" 
 
 were no believers in the rolling-stone theory. 
 We think of them as filled with restless energy ; 
 but in a half sheet of ancient MS. I find this 
 item, made probably by a peevish Churchman, 
 soured because he missed promotion : " Our 
 captains were great enemies to all kinds of labor. 
 They taught that gold was good for sore eyes 
 and disease of the heart. Their desire for it 
 was such they would enter into the infernal 
 regions and cross the three rivers of hell to obtain 
 it." One Captain Salazar, in the Valley of the 
 Del Norte, caught a cacique [chief] and chained 
 him, to make him tell where certain treasure 
 was hidden. After holding the savage in 
 confinement several months, the Christian put 
 him to torture ; but without avail. "We then let 
 him go," said the historian, dryly ; "for the miser- 
 able heathen could not tell what he did not know." 
 ThebloQdof the Christian of that age ran riot 
 with the lust of gold and power ; the two pas- 
 sions swaying men of mature years, tempered in 
 II 
 
1 62 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 youth by the soft influence of love. It is easy to 
 understand that the Pueblo Indians, who were 
 making some approaches to civilization in the 
 midst of savagery, then wore a yoke to which 
 the iron collar of thrall worn by Gurth, the 
 swineherd, was light as a lady's necklace. 
 
 History holds no deeper tragedy than the 
 record of foreign invasion in North America. The 
 man on horseback assumed that slavery was nec- 
 essary, therefore right, therefore just ; and by the 
 grace of God (which meant the iron hand in the 
 glove of steel) he rewarded captains and corpor- 
 als with lands wide as whole counties, as yet 
 unmapped and unsubdued. His first object was 
 to pile high and yet higher the riches which main- 
 tained the splendor of his house. The old Cas- 
 tilian had the psychic identities of the modern 
 one — pride, vanity, intolerance, egotism, hatred 
 of labor, and fondness for bloody sports. In the 
 irresponsible positions held by the local tyrants 
 in Nueva Espagna there Avas boundless sweep 
 for gratification of these traits. Whatever was 
 not Romish or Spanish they regarded with haugh- 
 ty scorn. Adventurers those colonists were, but 
 adventurers of no common order. The spirit 
 of Crusades was yet alive, and each man felt him- 
 self a champion of the Cross, and with his sword 
 of matchless temper vowed to strike a blow for 
 Holy Church. Conversion was ever a prime ob- 
 ject with the Conquistador, The saintly Isabella 
 had it always at heart, and one of the latest acts 
 of her reign was to commend to the fathers the 
 souls of her unbelieving subjects across the sea. 
 The fanatic zeal of the padres reached through 
 every grade, and the hidalgos gloried in the title 
 '' Swords of the Church." The temples of sin, 
 as the little mud esttifas, or chapels, of the Indians 
 were called, must be leveled, false gods and altcr- 
 fires overthrown, and the heathen brought to the 
 
Old Miners. 1 63 
 
 true faith, under their converting steel. The ear- 
 hest revolt of the Pueblos, after the first conquest, 
 grew out of the whipping of forty natives, be- 
 cause they refused to accept the new religion and 
 bow to the hated cross of the unseen God of the 
 stranger. 
 
 The early colonists were all miners ; but, ow- 
 ing to the care taken in concealments of them by 
 the natives, little is left to indicate operations, 
 except miles of earth cut into running galleries 
 and driven tunnels. Slavery everywhere, when 
 applied to field labor, is destructive to human 
 life. What must it have been when directed to 
 mining, under taskmasters who did not value one 
 life at a pin's fee ? 
 
 Even with the aid of science, machinery, and 
 the many humanities of the nineteenth century, 
 it is still the most melancholy of trades. The 
 task of him who ''hangs in midway air" to gather 
 samphire is not half so dreadful as work done in 
 danger from every element. 
 
 The ruins of a large prison among the placers 
 of the Miembres Mountains, abandoned mines 
 reopened, and traditions of Indians clearly show 
 that the conquered races were treated as though 
 they did not belong to the human family. There 
 is infinite pathos in the banishment of the un- 
 tamed Indian from the free Sierras and the glad 
 sunshine to gloomy caverns, where thousands 
 were actually buried alive. They were driven 
 to toil under the lash and at the bayonets' 
 point; in peril from falling walls, deadly gas, 
 sudden floods, and the work was done by manual 
 labor alone. They broke the rocks with misera- 
 ble tools and insufficient light, and mixed the ores 
 slowly and painfully with naked feet. Quartz 
 was ground in rude arrastres, or mills to which 
 men and women were yoked like cattle. Every 
 ounce of precious metal was literally the price of 
 blood. 
 
164 ^'^^' Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 So changless are the Spaniard and the Indian 
 that the description of a miner near Chihuahua, 
 written last year, will do tolerably well for the 
 Pueblo of the seventeenth century. Then, as 
 now, the Spaniard was the overseer. The peon 
 is the slave of to-day. As a rule, Mexicans, 
 however intelligent and educated, have no genius 
 for machinery. They blow, crush , and drill as their 
 fathers did before them, and for transportation 
 of ore they prefer a train of mules to a train of 
 cars. The miner in the sepulchral shades of San 
 Domingo has never heard of crushing-mills or 
 cars. A yard-square piece of untanned hide, 
 stretched on two sticks, is his wheelbarrow. 
 The drill, the pick, the crowbar are his only tools. 
 Out of the black door of the mine he steps 
 quickly, lightly, though weighted by a sack con- 
 taining a hundred and fifty pounds of ore. A 
 broad band of rawhide attaches the burden to 
 his forehead. He is naked ^ as Avhen he came 
 into the world. His neck and limbs are like a 
 prize-fighter's. The perspiration streams from 
 his sooty face and body, and his breast heaves 
 spasmodically. There are no air-shafts, and for 
 two hours he has been down in the liydrogen of 
 the mine. The path he has travelled, in ascending, 
 winds hither and thither ; now up, then down ; 
 now in a chamber of whose extent he has no 
 conception ; now through a gallery narrow as 
 the cavity of a sugar hogshead — so narrow that, 
 to bear his cargo through, he must double and 
 crawl like a panther ; now along a slippery 
 ledge, where the slightest error in the placement 
 of a hand or foot is instant death, because on 
 one side is an abyss which for the matter of vis- 
 ion might as well be fathomless. Now it turns a 
 sharp corner ; now it traverses rough masses of 
 rocks, which are not all dchris from blasting, for 
 some of them have tumbled from the roof, and 
 
Old Miners. 165 
 
 may be followed by "companion pieces" at any 
 moment. Woe to him whom they catch ! Thus 
 for more than half an hour the poor wretch has 
 come. To such a feat, performed regularly six 
 times a day, what is crossing the rapids of Niag- 
 ara on a wire? What wonder that the breast 
 heaves and the sweat pours ? Have you not 
 heard a man escaped from drowning tell of the 
 agony thrilling him the instant the life-saving air 
 rushed into the cells of his collapsed lungs ? 
 Something like that this poor miner and his com- 
 rades say they suffer every time they pass the 
 door of the mine, suddenly into the rarefied atmos- 
 phere of the upper world. Horrible life ! And 
 how wretchedly rewarded ! Between mining and 
 morals there is no connection, still the question 
 comes : Was it for this God gave him a soul ? 
 
 The man's first act, on stepping into daylight, 
 is to snatch the little tallow-dip from its perch on 
 his head and blow it out. It cost him a claco 
 only ; but it was such a friend down in Tartarus ! 
 Without it, could he have ever risen to the light ? 
 As its glimmer came dancing up the rugged 
 way, how the darkness parted before him and the 
 awaiting gulfs revealed themselves ! He proceeds 
 next to the door of the roofless house. A man 
 meets him, helps him unload, takes the sack to 
 a rough contrivance and weighs it, giving a ticket 
 of credit. Not a word is spoken. They are like 
 gliding ghosts. Resuming the emptied sack, the 
 naked wretch turns, walks quickly to the entrance 
 of the mine, lights the friendly taper, looks once 
 
 "to sun, and stream, and plain, 
 
 As what he ne'er might see again," 
 
 re-enters the rocky jaws, and wades back through 
 the inner darkness. Yet he is not alone. He is a 
 type. He has comrades whom he will meet on 
 the way ; comrades in the extremest pit, wherein 
 the sounds of rueful labor are blended with 
 mournful talk. 
 
t66 The Land of the Puehlos. 
 
 The friction of the coming and going of miners 
 has poUshed the sHppery floor to glassy smooth- 
 ness. With the help of guides, we descended 
 the black pit, and deep in the heart of the moun- 
 tain sought the men at work. The wretched 
 candle each one carried served not so much to 
 illuminate our way as it appeared to burn a little 
 hole in the darkness. Perspiration fairly rained 
 from us ; but we came to see, and pushed on in 
 the black solitude, till strength and courage 
 almost failed. At last we observed, far off to 
 our right, a light dimly reddening the rocky wall. 
 Miners at work ! Good ! Just what we came 
 for. Slowly, carefully, painfully we drew near 
 the beacon. There was no sound of voices, no 
 ring of hammers, nor echo of blows. A solitary 
 workman was playing the mystic art. He had not 
 heard our approach, and we stopped to observe 
 him before speaking. A little basket at his left 
 contained a few tallow dips and some tortillas 
 Close by, in position to illuminate brightly about 
 two feet of the wall directly in front of him, was 
 his lighted candle. A pile of fine crushed ore, 
 the result of his labor, covered the floor to his 
 right, and on it lay an iron bar and a pick. 
 Above him extended a vault in the darkness 
 without limit. He had come there about the 
 break of day in the upper world. He came 
 alone, and alone he had remained. Not a word 
 had he heard, not one spoken. The candles not 
 merely lightened his labor : but, since each one 
 would burn about so long — a certain number 
 exhausting by noon, another bringing the night 
 — they also kept his time. The solitude was 
 awful ! In the uncertain light the naked, crouch- 
 ing body seemed that of an animal. We spoke 
 to him. The voice was kindly, yet it sounded 
 in his ears, so long attuned to silence, like a 
 pistol-shot. He started up in attitude of defense. 
 
Th'> Neib Miners. 167 
 
 1 Ic may be squatted at the base of the same 
 wall to-day. Pity for him, wherever he is ! Pity 
 for all of his craft ! '' 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE NEW MINERS. 
 
 The modern Mexican is true to the traditions 
 of old Spain — jealous of foreigners, opposed to 
 change, ever copying the past. 
 
 There is a legend across the waters that one 
 morning, not a great while ago, the glorious 
 angel who keeps the keys of the viewless gate 
 gave Adam permission to come back and look 
 after his farm. Watched by Gabriel, chief of 
 the guard angelic, the spirit (oldest of all created, 
 yet forever young) dropped through the silent 
 starry spaces, among rushing planets and blazing 
 suns, numbered only in Heaven, poised above 
 the Alps, and looked over Germany. The men 
 were smoking meerschaums, drinking beer, and 
 talking metaphysics. Disgusted, he fled in swift 
 flight toward France. There he saw nothing but 
 polite frivolities. The soul of our common 
 ancestor was saddened. France was even worse 
 than Germany. He did not linger. Taking 
 wing while morn still purpled the east, he crossed 
 the mountains into Spain, and, resting incumbent 
 on air, surveyed the kingdom. One glance across 
 it sufficed. The spirit folded his radiant wings. 
 "Ah!" he cried, enraptured. "Home again! 
 Here all is just as I left it." This old story well 
 illustrates the influence of Iberain aversion to 
 change, which has been felt wherever Spain has 
 had a lasting foothold in the New World. The 
 antiquated mining implements of the by-gone 
 
1 63 Th" Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 generations of New Mexico are the queerest 
 things in the world to the Leadviller, used to the 
 ponderous quartz mills, driven by invisible power, 
 moving like a free intelligence. 
 
 When the mines in the Placer Mountains, thirty 
 miles southwest of the City of Holy Faith, were 
 in operation, they were worked by the old-fash- 
 ioned Spanish arrastre, the rudest, most wasteful 
 of mining machines. It consists in nothing more 
 than two large flat stones, attached to a horizon- 
 tal beam and drawn around by a mule (in the 
 days of slavery by men and women), upon a bed 
 of flat stones. The process of grinding the ore 
 was slow, the amalgamation imperfect, and not 
 more than one-third of the gold could be separ- 
 ated from the quartz. 
 
 There is good reason for believing that mines 
 near Santa Fe were worked in this way before 
 Hudson entered the river which bears his name. 
 They were probably en bonanza in the years 
 when the great Queen, steering the English ship 
 through stormy seas, paused amid the breakers 
 to listen to the wooing of Robert Dudley. 
 
 The Spaniard in that day mined with stone 
 hammers, and it is surprising to us they could 
 sink deep shafts with such wretched appliances. 
 They were ignorant of carbonates of silver, and 
 took nothing but the argentiferous galena from 
 the vein, throwing away nine-tenths of the best- 
 paying mineral. There is little statistical know- 
 ledge of the working of any one mine in this ter- 
 ritory, but old Church records are said to show 
 that the ten per cent, in tithes collected for it 
 amounted to about ten millions. This was real- 
 ized from mines adjacent to Santa Fe. In each of 
 the ravines running into the Caiiada de las Minas 
 (Glen of Mines) more or less of "float" is found. 
 This is silver-bearing galena ore, washed from 
 lodes crossing the ravines, and is certain indica- 
 tion of silver leads in close vicinity. 
 
Tht New Miners. 169 
 
 In 1846, when Gen. Kearney took possession 
 of Santa Fe, nearly all the miners left the placers, 
 never to return. Many reasons are giver for 
 their hasty flight, one of which is that, being 
 Mexicans, they feared impressment into the 
 American service, and escaped while they could. 
 It is believed that mining operations in the hight 
 of prosperity then suddenly stopped, as the 
 abandoned and decaying town of Francisco near 
 by shows; and but little has since been done to 
 revive the business until within the last few 
 years. 
 
 Los Cerillos Mines, now being rapidly opened 
 up, are in a chain of low conical mountains north 
 of the Galisteo, twenty miles from the capital 
 city. In these ranges are found syenitic rocks, 
 carboniferous limestone and sandstone formations, 
 the latter containing coal. They are traversed 
 for thirty or forty miles with valuable lodes, the 
 veins running from the northeast to the southwest, 
 and almost daily fresh "Spanish traces," old 
 workings, come in sight, to cheer the heart of 
 the prospector. After the rebellion of 1680 the 
 Indians returned to their pueblos and submitted 
 to the foreign yoke, on condition that mines 
 should not be reopened. It would appear the 
 treaty was kept in good faith, and that the very 
 ancient mines remained untouched during the 
 subsequent period of Spanish rule. Some of 
 these old diggings in Los Cerillos have been so 
 carefully concealed that it requires the keenest 
 scrutiny to find them. The shaft of the Santa 
 Rosa Mine, on reopening, was found to have been 
 sunk fifty-five feet. One shaft is one hundred 
 and sixty-five feet to water. How much deeper 
 no man can teh. The debris and precious mineral 
 were carried up on the backs of peones, and the 
 notched cedar trees which were their only ladders 
 two hundred years ago are still the means of 
 
1 -JO The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 descent to the venturesome traveler, exploring 
 the rediscovered galleries. 
 
 The early proprietaries followed no rules in 
 prospecting. They were led by whim, or most 
 frequently by dreams, the medium of communica- 
 tion preferable to the patron saints. The most 
 prejudiced observer can not help admiring the 
 boldness and energy of their movements. And 
 the fields are just as rich to-day. If they paid 
 under such feeble, unskilled management, they 
 must be much more profitable now, with the help 
 of science and delicate machinery. For three 
 hundred years and more the sands have been 
 washed out at the base of Los Cerillos ; but not 
 until very recently have those washing for precious 
 grains of metal thought of looking to the source^ 
 the core of the mountains, for the best deposits. 
 This was the process of experiment and experience 
 in the great California Gulch at Leadville. 
 
 In these volcanic hills, still bearing marks of 
 the fiery lava flow, are the Montezuma Turquoise 
 Mines, which are marvels of deep excavation. 
 In one instance half a mountain is cut away by 
 Indians of the pre-historic period, in their search 
 for the coveted, the priceless chalchuite, the 
 Aztecan diamond. 
 
 The tradition runs that anciently the gold and 
 silver-bearing ores were borne on the backs of 
 burros to Chihuahua, Mexico (six hundred miles 
 away), for reduction; that long trains of the 
 patient creatures, lean, thirsty, and beaten with 
 many stripes, were perpetually coming and going 
 along the Valley del Norte, curtaining it with 
 clouds of yellow dust. 
 
 It seems a baseless tradition. If the gold- 
 hunters could reduce their ores in Chihuahua, 
 why not in Santa Fe as well? In 1867 the larger 
 portion of El Palacio, then standing, was cleared 
 away, and, among many curious relics brought to 
 
The New Miners. 171 
 
 light, after long burial, was a clumsy smelting 
 furnace, thoroughly bricked up on every side and 
 worn with long and hard usage. From its ashes 
 were taken out bits of charcoal, showing clearly 
 that ages ago, time out of mind, the Spaniards 
 discovered and used it in smelting their ores. 
 
 The ancient method of washing for silver was 
 a very simple process. The operator required 
 nothing but a crowbar, a shovel, and a tanned 
 skin. This last he fashioned into a water-tight 
 basin by stretching it upon a square frame. Fill- 
 ing it with water, he stood over it, rocking in it a 
 little tub holding sand and grit, from which, 
 washed free of clay and earth, he separated the 
 worthless pebbles, and selected the valuable par- 
 ticles. 
 
 In old ranches through the country we occa- 
 sionally see an antique candlestick of beaten sil- 
 ver, or a salt-cellar of hammered plata — heirlooms 
 proving that in long-gone generations silver was 
 found and in quantities. 
 
 Ask how old they are, and the ever-ready 
 •* Quien sabe " is the answer. 
 
 From the beginning of the seventeenth till the 
 eighteenth century there was a rapid succession 
 of rebellions and civil wars, with Santa Fe as 
 the field and the important strategic point. In 
 1680 the Pueblos allied with the Teguas — 
 described as a nation of warriors — and routed the 
 Spaniards, driving them from the land as far 
 south as El Paso del Norte. 
 
 Another army was mustered and sent up from 
 the City of Mexico, but feared to take the offen- 
 sive, and for twelve years the land had rest, was 
 quiet, as before the foreign invasion. It was in 
 this interval of twelve years that the ancient mines 
 were hidden. All the old mineral w^orkings were 
 covered and carefully concealed, and death was 
 the penalty for any who should reveal to white 
 
»72 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 men where precious metals or stones were to be 
 found. After 1692 mining in the province was 
 abandoned, and to this day it is the rarest thing 
 for a Spaniard or an Indian to engage in mining. 
 They seem to have torsaken it forever. 
 
 It is said that in the whole compass of East 
 Indian literature there is not a single passage 
 showing a love of liberty. The millions appear 
 created for the gratification of one man. If the 
 West Indian be, indeed, his brother, then were 
 brothers never so unlike. To the North Ameri- 
 can, freedom is the very breath of his nostrils, and 
 the degradation of slavery worse than slow tor- 
 ture or sudden death. 
 
 In irrepressible yearning for liberty the Pueblos 
 escaped from mines, such as I have attempted to 
 describe, to inaccessible mountain fastnesses, the 
 steeps of distant caiions and hiding-places iia 
 dens of animals. How many perished in theie 
 realms of silence and despair none but the record- 
 ing ange^ can testify. The polished armor of the 
 invaders covered hearts hard as triple brass, and 
 silken banners floated over knights whose avarice 
 was equalled only by their cruelty. The fugitives 
 were tracked and hunted down Avith bloodhounds, 
 as though they were beasts of prey. 
 
 As has been written of the same tragedy then 
 being enacted in Peru : ''It was one unspeakable 
 outrage, one unutterable ruin, without discrimina- 
 tion of age or sex. From hiding-places in the 
 clefts of rocks and the solitude of invisible caves, 
 where there was no witness but the all-seeing sun, 
 there went up to God a cry of human despair." 
 The Bishop of Chiapsa, himself a Spaniard, affirms 
 that more than fifteen millions were cut off in his 
 time, slaves of the mines. On the Northern Con- 
 tinent history is but an imperfect guide. That 
 the rich valleys of the Rio Grande and the Pecos 
 cnce held a dense population is plainly proved 
 
The New Miners. vn 
 
 by the ruins of cities slowly crumbling away. We 
 have only dim glances into long, dark spaces ; but 
 there is light enough to see the conqueror's daily 
 walk was on the necks of the conquered natives, 
 who swiftly declined to an abject and heart- 
 broken race. 
 
 So great was the horror of the first conquest 
 that the memory of it has been kept alive through 
 ten generations. The Pueblo mother still shud- 
 ders as she tells the story of ancient wrong and 
 woe to her children ; and the unwritten law yet 
 binds the red race to secrecy, and is a hindrance 
 in the opening of mines in the territories. 
 
 Princely fortunes were made, and, if tribes, 
 whole nations, were swept off the face of the earth ; 
 they were but so many heathen less to cumber 
 the ground and drag the march of conquest. To 
 understand how valueless human life was then, 
 look down the steep sides of the old mines reop- 
 ened. Rows of cedar pegs serve, you see, as lad- 
 ders along the black walls, from the bottom to the 
 entrance. Imagine a man climbing up, weighted 
 with a sack containing a hundred pounds of ore, 
 fastened to his back by a broad band of raw-hide 
 across his forehead. The slightest error in the 
 placement of hand or foot must miss the hold, and 
 the burden-bearer be dashed to pieces ; but it 
 could have been no loss, else better means would 
 have been provided. There must have been hun- 
 dreds at hand to take his place. 
 
 When did Spain stretch forth her hand, except 
 to scatter curses ? It is part of my faith, derived 
 from the study of history — in fact, it is the great 
 lesson of history — that nations are punishable, 
 like individuals, and that for every national sin 
 there is,' soon or late, a national expiation. Does 
 not Spain place the doctrine beyond question ? 
 No European power has had such opportunities 
 for noble achievement ; yet what good has come 
 
1/4 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 through her ? What grand idea or benign prin- 
 ciple, what wholesome impression upon mankind? 
 She was the Tarshish of Solomon ; her mines 
 were the subject of quarrel between the Roman 
 and Carthagenian ; in the day of Christ she still 
 supplied the world with the royal metals. Such 
 were her resources in the beginning. Afterwards, 
 when commerce reached out through the Pillars 
 of Hercules and drew the West in under its influ- 
 ences, a people of masterful genius, sitting where 
 Europe bends down so close to Africa, would 
 have stretched a gate from shore to shore and by 
 it ruled the earth. 
 
 Yet later she received the gift of the New 
 World. Where is the trophy marking her 
 beneficent use of the gift? She had already 
 ruined the civilization which had its seat in the 
 pillared shades of the Alhambra. In her keeping 
 were placed the remains of the Aztec and the 
 relics of the Incas, only to be destroyed. Drunk 
 with the blood of nations, she who ruthlessly 
 subjected everything to the battle-ax, the rack, 
 and the torch is now dying of slow decay. 
 
 Could the breath blow from the four winds and 
 breathe upon the Indians, reckoned by millions, 
 who perished under Spanish rule; if their dust 
 could but come together, and all those slain live 
 again and testify, alas ! for Castelar, wisest of 
 visionaries, awaiting the Republic of Europe to 
 bring about the resurrection of his country." 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE HONEST MINER. 
 
 The man on the frontier who has no speculation 
 in his eyes is dead as Banquo. The contagion 
 of soul, says the ancient philosopher, is quicker 
 than that of the body, and I have yet to see the 
 one with soul so dead as to refuse a venture in 
 mines, and wholly resist the fever which spares 
 neither age nor sex, yet is not fatal or even 
 unpleasant. While the craze lasts, it affects the 
 brain, quickening the imagination and distorting 
 the vision. Under its powerful alchemy discolored 
 stones by the wayside become bowlders of ore, 
 it seams bare cliffs with veins of gleaming metal, 
 plants mines in impossible places, converts vertical 
 strata into immense deposits. All the way it 
 silvers the dreams of night and lengthens them 
 unbroken into the day. Knowledge comes to 
 the fever-smitten without study. One glance at 
 a lofty mountain-range is sufficient to determine 
 if it be metalliferous, and, balancing a lump of 
 ore on his gritty forefinger, he can tell its exact 
 per cent, of silver. 
 
 The victim of the epidemic carries scraps of 
 grimy stuff in his pockets, wrapped in dirty 
 cloths, and a small magnifying glass, into which 
 he puckers his fevered eyes many times in the 
 tv/enty-four hours, and surveys his uncoined 
 treasure with doating glances. He unselfishly 
 allov/s confidential friends to look through the 
 lens, and expects enthusiastic admiration in return 
 for the privilege. Unless the confidential friend 
 is an enemy in disguise, he will gloat over the 
 earthy specimens too. He talks little, if at all, 
 apparently in a generous burst of feeling about 
 
 175 
 
1 76 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 bonanzas. En bonanza means literally snioulh 
 sailing, a fair breeze, etc. , and is used by Mexican 
 miners, applied to exceedingly rich ores or 
 "shoots." Free translation, ''booming." His 
 voice is pitched in a low key — a loud, impressive, 
 I may say distracting whisper. The delirium is 
 pleasurable, for the man's hopes are indomitable, 
 and a secret trust covers a dark stratum, so to 
 speak, of fear ; but he is reticent, grave as though 
 his shafts had pierced to the very center of 
 gravity. 
 
 The arithmetic man, who loves figures, has 
 estimated that in the flush times of Colorado the 
 successful were one to every five hundred honest 
 miners. He has not brought in returns from the 
 territories, and there is, in consequence, broader 
 sweep for imagination in the undeveloped regions, 
 where mining is yet partly experiment. 
 
 The fortunes of two or three millionaires 
 balance the losses of thousands, like the many 
 deaths which go to make up a victory. Are you 
 the five hundredth or eight hundredth happy 
 child of Destiny, the victorious captain for whom 
 the unnamed heroes fell ? You ? Of the bonanza 
 king we daily hear by telegraph, photograph, 
 autograph. Of the vast army of the defeated — 
 nothing. Singly they tramp back home, steal in 
 darkly at dead of night, ravage the pantry, and, 
 having slept off fatigue, are ready to deny having 
 thought of Leadville and Golden. 
 
 One of the cheapest and easiest ways of reach- 
 ing a mine is by a " grubstake." This euphonious 
 word means a certain sum (say one hundred and 
 eighty dollars) advanced to a man by another, 
 with more money and less time, and the pros- 
 pector has an interest in whatever he may find. 
 You meet him on every road, every highway, 
 every by-way, and where there is no way in the 
 territories. The prospective millionaire gener- 
 
The Honest Aliner. 177 
 
 ally wears an umbrageous hickory shirt, sleeves 
 usually rolled to the elbow, exposing arms not the 
 fairest, buckskin or brown duck pants, or a ready- 
 made suit, ready to be unmade at the seams, and 
 a hat of superlative slouch. His head is shaggy 
 as a buffalo's, with sun-scorched hair, and his face, 
 lined with fierce sunbeat and wrinkling wind, is 
 a glossy red, as though it had been veneered, 
 sand-papered, and varnished. He carries a strik- 
 ing hammer, weighing from five to eight pounds. 
 Does it look like an enchanter's rod ? In his 
 hand it may prove a fairy wand, potent as the 
 double-headed hammer of Thor. His burro, or 
 donkey, is not much larger than a sheep, yet able 
 to bear three hundred pounds' weight. On the 
 patient, long-suffering brute is strapped a blanket. 
 Above it are piled rations of bacon, sugar, crack- 
 ers, a pick and shovel, and a tin pot for boiling a 
 coarse brown powder, called in bitter (very bitter) 
 sarcasm coffee. In seeking claims, he is oftenest 
 attended by a partner, familiarly and affection- 
 ately called " my pard." In this land of sudden 
 death, where every man carries pistols and loves 
 to use them, one lone prospector may be picked 
 off almost anywhere, and his bones left in deep 
 canon or lonesome gulch, and no questions asked. 
 It is best to hunt in couples. Like the inteUi- 
 gent and reliable contraband of other days, the 
 honest miner is forever bringing in good news. 
 '* Lee is just where we want him !" " The latest 
 find is prodigious, the best thing yet, and lacks 
 nothing but capital for development to equal any- 
 thing in the Comstock Lode or Santa Eulaha ! " 
 This last is a mine worth having, where the early 
 diggers set no value on common ore, but sought 
 •' pockets," rich with silver; a soft yellow clay, 
 scooped out rapidly and easily with horn spoons. 
 Sometimes they were of immense extent, require- 
 ing years to exhaust. 
 12 
 
178 The Limd of the Pueblos. 
 
 I have not been able to learn why the miner is 
 always named the honest miner ; but such is the 
 fact. To this well-worn adjective are sometimes 
 added reticent and successful, when the speaker 
 wishes to be unusually impressive. It has been 
 written that mining speculations, like transactions 
 in horse-flesh, have a tendency to blunt moral per- 
 ceptions, and soured politicians insinuate it was 
 first phrased by ambitious patriots who were anx- 
 ious to secure his suffrage. Be that as it may, 
 the honest miner is our man now. Though he 
 does not pretend to be a poet, his is the vision and 
 faculty divine. He is attended by presences to 
 other eyes unseen, like the inspired sculptor, who 
 in a heavenly fervor of inspiration hewed the 
 rough block of marble by the roadside and let the 
 prisoned angel out. By break of day, while the 
 warm valley still holds the night in its bosom, he 
 is up and on the march. The shadow of a great 
 rock or a sighing pine has been his shelter, the 
 overarching blue canopy his tent, the world is his 
 field. For his unfailing appetite there are crack- 
 ers, bacon, and ct)ffee. Like Macaulay's fellow- 
 traveler, he breakfasts as if he had fasted the day 
 before, and dines as though he had never break- 
 fasted. His burro is happy as that melancholy 
 beast can be on a little grama grass {y^theronia 
 oligistarchori) or twigs and leaves of scrub oak. 
 He wanders from the borderline northward, among 
 cold, sharp, icy crags, where desolation dwells in 
 matchless state; where, among treeless, bald peaks, 
 she holds and guards her Paradise, perfect even 
 to the grim, painted savage, who, with scalping- 
 knife, instead of flaming sword, does the duty of 
 the sentinel-angel at the gate. Lava-beds do not 
 stop him, nor chaparral, mezquit, or cactus jungle, 
 or the pricking *• Spanish bayonet." In wither- 
 ing wind, in blinding snow and drifting sand, the 
 undaunted fellow pushes his search for rich leads. 
 
The Honest Miner, 1 79 
 
 Such persistent energy directed to any other bus- 
 iness would command success ; but will it in pros- 
 pecting? That depends. If he fails in finding 
 a good thing (say a lode worth a million or so) in 
 a given district, it does not shake his steadfast 
 confidence. He makes a new deal, and begins 
 again, for he ** is bound to spot the treasure.'' 
 
 The claim-stake is usually a pine board, marked 
 with certain inscriptions in pencil, which ooze 
 from within glazes over and makes indelible. 
 Pleasant and consoling to him is it to know that 
 no wise man from the East — no scientist, no geol- 
 ogist — has ever found a valuable mine. '* Them 
 literary fellows have to take a back seat " when it 
 comes to locating a claim. Luck, chance, acci- 
 dent, and the prospector are the powers to be 
 depended upon then. But when he does strike 
 the big lead, and the crumbly ore, with its glitter- 
 ing white-and-yellow streakings, is reported inex- 
 liaustable, then these wholesome adages floor the 
 honest miner. A man cannot see very far under- 
 ground. It takes a mine to work a mine. Luck 
 may find the lead, but science molds the silver 
 brick ; and to these precious truths are added the 
 proverb so dear to gentlemen of the profession of 
 the renowned Oakhurst : "There's nothing cer- 
 tain about luck, except that it's bound to change." 
 
 The old Spaniards had the national love of gam- 
 bling — the gambler's unreasoning hope and his 
 blind belief in luck. If Fortune frowned to- day, 
 she would brightly smile across the green cloth 
 to-morrow. If gold is not in this glittering, cheat- 
 ing mica, it is hidden elsewhere, awaiting him 
 who is bold enough to risk the chances of win- 
 ning. The same trait is deeply marked in the 
 American of our generation. Mining is a busi- 
 ness to. which all other occupations are dull and 
 tame. The lumps of soft, blue-looking rock, not 
 much harder than clay, streaked and spangled 
 
J 86 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 with shining threads, are dear to the American 
 as they were to the Castihan heart and eye. 
 
 A man undertaking a scheme in which the 
 odds are five hundred to one against success 
 might be considered a simpleton elsewhere ; but 
 not so on the frontier. Thousands, armed with 
 pretended stoicism, fevered with anxiety, rush 
 West, " to look into mines a little," dig deep, and 
 find at the bottom of the shaft what the gods of 
 Olympus sent as underlying all the ills — Hope. 
 
 It is as certain as the sun rises and sets that the 
 gambHng and not the commercial instinct pre- 
 dominates in mining transactions. The fascina- 
 tion is in the hazard. The spell, so binding 
 usually, is not of avarice, but lies in that delicious, 
 feverish, intoxicating charm of cliancc. To bor- 
 row the words of one who has tried it : " There 
 is a dehght in its agony, a sweetness in its insan- 
 ity, a drunken, glorious intensity of seitsation in 
 its limitless swing between a prince's treasures 
 and a beggar's death, which lend life a sense 
 never known before ; rarely, indeed, once tasted, 
 ever abandoned." 
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE ASSAYERS. 
 
 A CERTAIN room in El Palacio is devoted to 
 assaying the precious ores. Its blackened, 
 time-stained rafters look as though they might 
 fall any moment; but believers in luck rest in 
 calm assurance that the catastrophe will not occur 
 in their time. Vainly is the tale told how the 
 very day Governor Merriwether took possession 
 of the Palace, to assume the executive duties of 
 the territory, the roof of the room in which he 
 
The Assay ers. i8l 
 
 had once been a prisoner fell in. Nobody scares 
 at that old story now. The slanting beam over- 
 head will not drop till we are out of the way; 
 the crumbling adobes will hold together awhile 
 yet. No use running till you are hurt. There 
 is too much actual danger about us to allow the 
 sensationalist a chance to waken fears. 
 
 The mud walls of the room I speak of were 
 once papered; but the hanging has flaked off, re- 
 vealing the brown ground, making splotches here 
 and there, like a disease. Cobwebs of pre-historic 
 antiquity hang in lines, like ropes of dirty rags. 
 The one north window is obscured by dust and 
 fly-specks, the dull panes and deep walls letting 
 in a dim and not religious light. It was formerly 
 a bedroom, I believe. Of the living things which 
 still may burrow in the walls, as the French 
 women say, I beseech you to suppose tliem. 
 The bare floor is dusty and gritty with sand. In 
 one corner is a barrel of charcoal; beside it pine 
 kindling and old newspapers. A long pine table 
 holds the assayer's tools — the many contrivances 
 necessary to his vocation. Scales that weigh 
 with the delicate nicety of Portia's, blow-pipes, 
 bottles of acids, mortar and pestles, little hammers, 
 and sieves, beside waiting specimens, done up in 
 muslin, carefully separated and labeled. Such 
 stones come in every mail, every train, every 
 ambulance, every pocket. "Blossom rocks" 
 adorn window-sill and mantelpiece, street-corners 
 and counters, serve as paper-weights and door- 
 props, and are a stumbling-block and rock of 
 offense along the sidewalks. 
 
 I am not here to talk of chlorides, pyrites, 
 sulphurets, silica, and manganese ; but only to 
 remark, en passmit, that free gold and ruby silver 
 are pretty terms — very pretty, indeed — and easily 
 understood by any lady in the land. 
 
 At this table presides the refiner and purifier 
 
182 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 of silver — the Man of Destiny. It may be a 
 Freiburg professor, with flowing beard and a 
 name in harsh discord with the meUifluous Spanish 
 titles, or a graduate of a New York school of 
 mines. No matter. He understands his business 
 and on his fiat hang hopes high as the sky, for to 
 him are submitted samples of raw ores believed 
 valuable, and now comes the question : Is the 
 deposit represented rich enough to justify deep 
 digging — in other words, to make a mine of? 
 The honest miner's flush of hope and sinking of 
 fear are comparable only to the tremor of the 
 quivering aspirant for literary fame, who, with 
 darling MS. in hand, respectfully addresses the 
 torturer, and withdraws to await his doom. 
 
 The small, square furnace glows with fervent 
 heat, and the room is suffocating. With, beaded 
 forehead and dripping chin, the assayer weighs, 
 pulverizes, sifts the fine dust in the cupels, to 
 undergo the only sure test, the trial by fire. His 
 hidden power revives the old romantic ideas of 
 scholars, to whom the ancient and secret science 
 of alchemy was a religion, part of the sublime, 
 cabalistic wisdom revealed unto Adam, to console 
 him for the loss of Paradise ; for which study 
 philosophers shut themselves up to lifelong toil 
 in cells and caves. He is of the order of mystics, 
 who grew lean and pale pondering brass-bound 
 volumes of wicked-looking hieroglyphs; who 
 understood the charm of the burning belt and 
 the ciphered girdle. He deals with strange 
 crucibles and subtle compounds; by a wizard 
 spell masters the forces of the earth, the 
 transmutation of metals, and by magic numbers 
 discovers the golden secrets of Nature. While 
 the cabala combination is being applied, that 
 laboratory is the center of many hopes. 
 
 How often, ah! Jioiv often does it prove the 
 gold is dull lead, the silver is become dross. The 
 
The Assay ers. 183 
 
 waiting miner is " not in harmonization with his 
 environments." He hovers about the Palace, 
 trying to cover his eager anxiety under the 
 studied stoicism of the frontiersman. Sometimes 
 the sun looks down upon him, as it rises, and 
 finds him a patient watcher, waiting for the cool- 
 ing of the metal. He has silently outwatched the 
 stars, only to learn that specimens believed very 
 rich (his darling promises) are worthless — not a 
 speck, not a pinhead of precious mineral to be 
 seen in a dozen cupels. What he held was so 
 much fairy gold that turns to dust and dross. 
 
 The gold-seeker, in the first chill of disappoint- 
 ment, refuses to credit the report; but the re- 
 finer's furnace has spoken with tongues of fire. 
 There is the evidence of his own senses ; he can- 
 not doubt the testimony. He quickly recovers 
 his stolid composure, takes a square meal, pos- 
 sibly a square drink, and, led by the spirit of un- 
 rest, is ready to face the inevitable hardships of 
 another long search for rich leads. 
 
 He rises, after an adverse stroke of fate, buoy- 
 ant as ever with irrepressible hope — as Dr. John- 
 son says of second marriages, "the triumph of 
 hope over experience." In the morning the dis- 
 appointment seems like something belonging to 
 the vanished night. Five, eight, ten years may 
 have brought nothing but anxiety, excitement, 
 ill-luck; but his superior sagacity and daring 
 must win at last. 
 
 Away he goes, with btwro and ''pard," off on 
 another prospecting tour, across unmeasured 
 wastes of sand, under a brassy sky, over alkali 
 plains, lava-beds, and waterless pasturas, which 
 lead to springs that may be poison. 
 
 A childish credulity weakens the judgment of 
 the honest miner. He accepts without reserve 
 the pleasing myths which form a sort of legend- 
 ary history; the unwritten annals of gold and 
 
184 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 silver-bearing mountains. Airy fables, poetic 
 traditions are received as authentic records. 
 There are delightful touches in these tales, with 
 which I should love to embellish and enrich my 
 page ; but not to-day. They belong to the mys- 
 teries and subtleties known only to the elect — 
 the chosen few who see behind the cloud spanned 
 with promise, iris-hued and glittering, the prize 
 awaiting the venturesome Argonaut. 
 
 The pay-streak is possibly in a vega of sea- 
 like vastness and level ; but more likely in the 
 stony mountain heart, threaded by shining lines, 
 as the crimson veins warm ours. Wherever it is, 
 he is the man to strike it. And this conviction 
 abides with him, a constant happiness, as he tra- 
 verses the length and breadth of the mineral 
 region. 
 
 Do you laugh at his fond delusions ? 
 
 The mania for precious metals is not a modern 
 craze. It is older than the Pyramids. 
 
 Is he chasing a chimera ? 
 
 No, dear reader, he is feeling his way in the 
 checkered path which all men at some period of 
 their lives have sought ever since the first pros- 
 pector groped along the strand down by the 
 storied Euphrates, that dim and shadowy river, 
 winding between myth and history, which waters 
 the old, old land Havilah, where there is gold. 
 
 If a cold-blooded newcomer advises the hon- 
 est miner to settle down to some good, steady, 
 legitimate business, he rejects the idea with 
 lofty scorn. That is well enough for the cautious 
 idiot, who does not know a true fissure-vein when 
 he sees it. The every-day trades, the tame, 
 beaten paths are not in the prospector's line of 
 march. He is for the short cut to fortune. 
 Familiar with dangers, there is one foe he can- 
 not fight. In lone hillsides and desolate caiions 
 there is lying in wait for him an enemy more 
 
The Assay ers. 185 
 
 deadly than the skulking Apache — a pecuHar 
 form of intermittent fever, called mountain fever. 
 It lurks in the air, ready to lift the dread cloud 
 hiding the mystery which forever enshrouds the 
 Unseen World. 
 
 The human race is nomadic, and the old Aryan 
 blood is strong, and crops out on the vcgas of 
 the Rocky Mountains clearly as on the arid plains 
 of Mesopotamia. To be sure, in Adam we are 
 all one, and he was a quiet citizen of the world. 
 In Noah we are all three, and after the Deluge — 
 but this is getting into deep water. 
 
 Revenons. Occasionally it happens that a 
 sample of ore, *'the queer-looking stuff" on 
 which moderate expectation is based, is brought 
 out of the furnace, and the button in the cupel is 
 not silver, but a lump of pure gold. O raptur- 
 ous moment known to the few, the beloved chil- 
 dren of Fate ! O day to be remembered under 
 the coffin-lid ! The owner of such returns (not 
 larger than a pea) treads on air. He tries to 
 hide his exultation ; but the secret will out. He 
 plans ; he builds. He is going to sail the seas ; 
 to start before many days to hear the syrens of 
 the Mediterranean ; to visit the abiding-places of 
 poetry and history, the lands of undying sum- 
 mer : to see the kingdoms of the earth and the 
 glory of them. And well may he dream dreams 
 and see visions ! Money is but another name for 
 freedom. He who holds it has all the world be- 
 fore him where to choose his place of rest. 
 
 My reader, familiar with '* The Last of the 
 Barons," may remember the picture of Adam 
 Warner endeavoring to turn copper into gold. 
 In the solitude genius everywhere creates for it- 
 self, by night and by day, hanging over the burn- 
 ing Eureka, stinting himself and child to feed 
 the devouring furnace, asking no sympathy in his 
 lonely chamber, living apart with his works and 
 
lS6 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 fancies, like a god amidst his creations, and com- 
 ing very near the grand discovery concealed for 
 a later generation to penetrate. The fascination 
 of mining is what those elder sages experienced 
 in a lifelong witchery over minds bent to the 
 study of alchemy. What wonder men were de- 
 voted to a pursuit, in which even Bacon and 
 Newton wasted precious hours, which promised 
 results so august? Besides costly chemicals, 
 there were thrown into the crucibles youth, 
 health, hope, love, yes, life itself, to vanish as 
 vapor, slowly, slowly, surely, surely. 
 
 The worst thing about mining, as formerly 
 about alchemy, is that it allures on its victims to 
 destruction. One gets near and ever nearer 
 the object ; so trifling a sum additional will com- 
 plete the work and secure the promise. Time, 
 toil, expensive appliances are demanded ; but the 
 glorious result justifies all these, and many 
 another risk more fearful. 
 
 Nature has done in the Rocky Mountains pre- 
 cisely what the ancient sages tried to do. Here 
 the last secret combination has produced the 
 medium ; the striking hammer is smiting the 
 rocks ; in the death-like stillness of remote soli- 
 tudes the blow reverbates, and at its compelling 
 stroke the earth opens, and lo ! the philosopher's 
 stone is discovered. Prospero's wand was not 
 mightier. 
 
 At night the clear, red glow of the furnace 
 reddens the walls of the assayer's room, coats 
 with bright gilding gloomy rafters overhead, and 
 lends a sickly light to the flickering flame of the 
 coal-oil lamp. Then the place is suggestive of the 
 great centre of the earth, where doomed souls go 
 wandering up and down in a joyless, endless 
 wrestling with fire. The sitent men are like dis- 
 mal ghosts. If they speak, it is in repressed 
 tones. Their low voices, the obscurity of the 
 
The Assay ers. 187 
 
 room, the intense heat, the air of secrecy and 
 mystery give the feeUng that some agony is con- 
 ducting — a battle, a fire, a drama involving high 
 interests. The mighty cause is a tragedy ; pos- 
 sibly a crime. 
 
 Sometimes a woman, a girlish shape, looks in 
 with innocent eyes, as though she thought the 
 assayer in woeful peril. She flits away like a 
 spirit blest, wandering from the cool, sweet fields 
 Elysian, to pity for one moment the sad dwellers 
 in the near purgatory. 
 
 Souls in torment are here, in fact, when " speci- 
 mens" on which star-high hopes were grounded 
 prove to be fire-clay and galena, and the long, 
 slow dream is as a vision of the night. 
 
 The conduct of some " miner men," after a 
 claim has been located, and the one hundred 
 dollars' worth of work which the law exacts is 
 done, is a study. In this age of doubt and ques- 
 tion, their unwavering faith gives us fresh confi- 
 dence in skeptical, sorely-tried human nature. 
 They gaze into narrow prospect-holes, about the 
 size of a seventy-five barrel cistern, with a depth 
 of trust, an immovable resting on the promise in 
 the future comparable with nothing I know, 
 except the serene complacency of the setting hen. 
 She feels the stir of life beneath her brooding 
 wings, and he has visions 
 
 "impalpable and unperceived 
 
 Of other's sight." 
 
 You see only a hole in the ground ; a shallow 
 cistern which holds no water. Nature has re- 
 vealed her secrets to him, as she does not to the 
 unbeliever. Hence his robust faith. 
 
 From that prospect-hole riches will roll up by 
 the bucketful. 
 
 '' How will they get up ?'' asks the uninspired 
 tourist, heartlessly. 
 
 Honest miner, teetering a scrap of galena on 
 
1 88 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 his forefinger, stares steadily at the faint 
 mountain-Une and murmurs: " Oh ! I must bide 
 my time. One of these days capital will come 
 along — capital will come along — come along — 
 along." 
 
 It must be admitted that capital is often a good 
 while on the road. This hour, scores about us 
 are prospecting, opening abandoned workings, 
 following the ancient Tegua-Spanish traces, with 
 hopeful hearts. They are enchanters. Hear 
 them talk, and you behold the beauty of which 
 they dream. They have neither crucibles nor 
 carpet, nor do they pour ink in your palm, as 
 Hassan did ; yet are they prophets and seers, and 
 their visions all foreshow another Leadville. 
 
 The Lodestone Rocks are not far off. Come 
 not near, unless you are ready to be dashed 
 against them. 
 
 Only fifty dollars laid out in work, and a mine 
 possibly worth thousands. Qtiien sabe? ''Who 
 knows ?" ** Who knows ? " 
 
 Taking a stern Methodist view of the business 
 as now proceeding in the territories, I should call 
 mining a game of chance — exciting, fascinating, 
 bewildering — which defrauds no one but your- 
 self. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE RUBY SILVER MINE. A TRUE STORY. 
 
 Mining atmospheres are rife with stories, mar- 
 velous, startling, that would be incredible, did 
 we not know it is always the incredible which 
 happens. Of the many tales floating about Santa 
 Fe, 1 give one to you, beloved, which shows how 
 strangely things come round in this round world 
 of OUl'S. 
 
The Ruby Silver Mines, — A True Story. 189 
 
 The patient reader who has graciously followed 
 my rambling, scrambling steps through New 
 Mexico may possibly remember that a large 
 portion of the MSS. comprising the archives of 
 the territory, was sold as waste paper and found 
 way into the various shops of the city. Santa 
 Fe being the largest town and commercial center 
 of New Mexico, from it they were widely dis- 
 persed in every direction, and on this accidental 
 scattering of leaves hangs my story and a fortune. 
 
 One night in the Autumn of 1879 I sat boring 
 myself into inanity over the Pharos of the Occi- 
 dent (which is a misnomer, the newspaper being 
 anything but light reading), when a visitor was 
 announced. 
 
 " Me parece tin miner 0!' said Dolores Lucia 
 Marina Feliciana Flores. 
 
 I was pleased at the thought of a visitor, even 
 on business, and, in dread of being left alone with 
 The PJiaros, insisted el ininero should not be 
 interviewed in the Assay Office, but here. The 
 '• Palace " halls are neither long nor lofty, being 
 the length of two moderate rooms on the ground 
 floor, and in a few minutes there stood in the 
 deep doorway a figure, as revealed by the shaded 
 student's lamp, unmistakably that of a miner. 
 His face was sunburnt to a vermeil red and made 
 prematurely old by exposure. Wrinkled by dry- 
 ing wind and pitiless sunbeat, his appearance was 
 weather-worn, showing days of wanderings with- 
 out shelter and lodgings on the cold, cold ground. 
 
 The contagion of good manners is a happy 
 thing. In Spanish-speaking countries, though 
 all else be lacking, there is ever the most 
 exquisite politeness, and the man removed his 
 slouch of a hat with a profound and sweeping 
 bow. His uncovered head was thatched with a 
 thick shock of carrot-colored locks, which are 
 the inheritance of " the sandy complected," to 
 
I go The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 speak after the manner of the poke-berry districts 
 of our own Indiana. The strip of forehead 
 shaded by his hat was dotted with large, asser- 
 tive freckles, which in the exposed portion of his 
 face were " in one red burial blent." He closed 
 the door carefully and, with an air of secrecy, 
 dropped his voice to a certain loud whisper, 
 peculiar to sick-rooms and miners in confidence, 
 and his whisper gradually sank to the ledger 
 lines below, as he made his report ; for, though 
 rather untimely, his call was not unexpected. 
 
 I spread The Pharos on my table, and he 
 slowly proceeded to unload his pockets and his 
 red handkerchief, and empty on the paper 
 various ores, kept separate, tied in rags and 
 marked. To him they represented all precious 
 things, besides gold and silver; to me they 
 appeared formless, jagged lumps of dull-looking 
 stone. 
 
 The story of the Argonaut was long — too long 
 for any but a frontiersman, with plenty of leisure 
 to speak and to hear — and was given in the style 
 of oratory perfected by the Cousin of Sally Dil- 
 lard. 
 
 He could not sit still, but started every few 
 minutes, as at a calling voice, and strode hur- 
 riedly up and down the room, restless, eager, 
 nervous, like one who, after long and exhaustive 
 strain, suddenly slackens the tension. With the 
 utmost minuteness he gave the history and 
 described the locaHty of each particular sample, 
 and tied them again, one by one, each in its own 
 grimy cloth and label. This done, he hesitated, 
 cleared his throat, rose from his chair, apologized 
 for trespassing upon our valuable time (as though 
 we had anything but time), opened the door, 
 looked up and down the hall, as if he feared 
 some ear was airing at the key-hole. Satisfied 
 with the reconnaissance, he closed it again and 
 
The Ruby Silver Mines. — A True Story. 191 
 
 with stealthy step returned to the table. Evi- 
 dently two hours of rigmarole had failed to free 
 his soul. There was something still unsaid. We 
 silently awaited the revelation. ♦' There is one 
 specimen left," he began, doubtfully, and looked 
 at m.e much as to say : Can a woman keep or be 
 trusted with a secret ? Perhaps he read 
 assurance in my face, for he fumbled in his vest 
 (from the Semitic shop hard by, painfully new 
 and pathetically cheap), and out of its deepest 
 corner produced a little bag of buckskin, tied with 
 a leather string. He untied it with nervous 
 haste, and his wistful light blue eyes, burned in 
 deep hollows with miner's fever, brightened as he 
 spoke, scarcely above his breath, in an awe-inspir- 
 ing whisper : " Here we air. Here's the richest 
 thing yet." Shaking the bag, there dropped into 
 the palm of his left hand a reddish purple stone, 
 without streakings or glitter. " Ruby silver," he 
 said, softly. '* Ruby silver, and plenty of it. 
 There's no end to the lead." 
 
 He reached it to me tenderly, as though it 
 could break at a touch. I did as was expected 
 of me — scraped the fragment of mineral with 
 a pen-knife, peered at it through the magni- 
 fying glass, hefted it on my forefinger, and made 
 the sagacious observation : " It looks well. I 
 should say a very rich specimen." 
 
 " It's from the Caiion de los Angelos," said the 
 miner. 
 
 I remembered it as a dismal gorge, torn up 
 and riddled by volcanic action, a blasted wilder- 
 ness of gashed and riven stone peaks, bearing 
 aloft gnarled and twisted firs, their utmost sum- 
 mits a region of ice, lifted above the hmit of 
 life. The silence unbroken but by the howl of 
 wild beasts and the war-whoop of the savage ; 
 where only fresh mountain-heaps of piied-up 
 lavas, marking the throes of the earthquake, vary 
 
192 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 the forbidding gloom which baffles the traveler, 
 entering it with a sense of approaching the Valley 
 of the Shadow of Death. As soon expect water 
 in desert-sand as gold in that lava-flood, silver in 
 those melted rocks ! 
 
 " How did you come to prospect in that dread- 
 ful canon ? " I asked. 
 
 "The strangest thing in the world," said the 
 miner, "how I first lighted on it. I bought a 
 plug of tobacco (it was six years ago), and car- 
 ried it home in a piece of an old letter, dated 
 sixteen hundred and something. I disremember 
 the year. It was writ on thick yellow paper, to 
 one of the Spanish governors, when Arizona and 
 New Mexico was one. My wife was a-studyin* 
 Spanish (you can't git along here without some), 
 and she brought the dictionary to bear and spelt 
 the thing out. It told about a rich lead in the 
 Caiion de los Angelos ; but the paper was tore 
 off in the very place I most wanted, so I couldn't 
 exactly spot it. For nigh onto five years I've 
 prospected. I've hunted off and on, in hot and 
 cold, wet and dry. I've been hungry and 
 thirsty. I've scorched and I've froze. Oncet I 
 was nearly drowned by a sudden rise at night, 
 when I camped in an arroya. One winter I was 
 snow-blind. Many and many's the week I've 
 heard no voice, nothing but the yelp of the coyote 
 and the wind among the pines. Many and many 
 a time I've smelt the grizzlies ; but, as luck 
 v/ould have it, I never run onto one. A lion or 
 a panther will run when he's hurt and roar ; but 
 a grizzly doesn't, and, after bein' hit, shot 
 through the heart, instead of dyin', he lives long 
 enough to chaw up the hunter." 
 
 Dear reader, beware of starting the Rocky 
 Mountaineer on bear stories. You will feel the 
 daisies growing over you before he slackens the 
 strain of his eloquence. 
 
'///<? Ruby Silver Mine. — A Tuie Story. 193 
 
 *• Did you spend all these six years in the 
 Caiion ? " I inquired, by way of bringing the 
 prospector back to the subject in hand. 
 
 "Oh! no. By spells I went at other bizness ; 
 but the idee of a fortune a-waitin' for me in Los 
 Angelos, and that old Spanish letter made me 
 sour on everything. You know it is in Valencia 
 County." 
 
 I did not, but made an amiable effort to look 
 as though I did. 
 
 " There's curious old things down there in 
 them old lava-beds." 
 
 " What things ? " I asked, for the first time 
 rousing to any interest, for my antiquarian blood 
 began to stir. 
 
 '< Heaps of ruins, cities, ragged walls, sixty 
 feet high and ten feet thick, scattered over miles 
 and miles. The rafters air charred with the 
 banked-up fire of the volcano ; but I see one 
 beam as sound as the day it was laid up." 
 
 " And how did the timber appear ? " 
 
 " 'Twas piiion, squared with a stone hatchet or 
 hammer and covered with markings — Indian 
 signs, maybe — furrowed with a stone gouge. 
 Then there was a drawin' of the sun, and a sort 
 of a 7ieye ; the lava had buried deep, and people 
 who like old potteries can get a wagon-load 
 there. About four feet down I struck a room, 
 about ten feet square, where there was a big fire- 
 place ; and in it was a crane, with a clay hook, 
 and on the end of the hook was a bone. By the 
 side of the fire was a skeleton — the old man 
 a-watchin' his bone a-roastin' on the hook, when 
 here comes the lava and seals him up tight. 
 Ov^er yonder, at the Fonda, I've got his skull ; 
 and here " (he opened the revolver-pocket this 
 time) — " here's the old fellow's finger-bone. I've 
 lots of the same old arrowheads and a flint 
 tomahawk." 
 
194 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 I was greatly interested in the still relics of 
 remote generations ; but we had not reached the 
 mine, and the evening was far spent. " These 
 were near your ruby silver mine ? '' I said, sug- 
 gestively. 
 
 '' Oh ! no. As I was sayin', I found the bones 
 of a dog close to a spring of sweet water, and I 
 knowed then I was a-gettin' warm. My time 
 was pretty nigh out. The snow was so deep I 
 hid my tools, and give up for the winter and 
 hired out to the freighters. As soon as winter 
 broke I lit out one moonshiny night. Somehow 
 the prospectors in Santa Fe got wind of my moves. 
 I don't know how, unless I told in my sleep, for 
 I kept dumb as the dead, and I was afeered 
 they'd track me, I hunted round that Spring in 
 a ring of five miles. First, I found the aceqiiia 
 which kept the buried city in water. I followed 
 it in a blind lead for three-quarters of a mile, to a 
 broken dam. The trail to the dam came next 
 When I tell you cedars thick as my body air 
 growin' on that trail, you have an idee how long 
 it's been since tracks has been made in it." 
 
 Just there I think the prospector drew on his 
 imagination for his facts ; but his audience held 
 their peace, and he continued : 
 
 *' It was a mighty poor zigzag ; but it led to 
 smelters." 
 
 " To smelters ! " we both exclaimed, in a 
 breath ; then followed a thrilling pause. The 
 prospector had reached his climax, and he 
 walked up and down the floor excitedly, tossing 
 the ruby silver back and forth in his hands, like 
 the hands of Esau. 
 
 ''To old smelters ! " he repeated, with empha- 
 sis. He struck the Colossus-of-Rhodes pose on 
 the wolf-skin rug and continued : 
 
 " They was made of adobes, and was raised 
 some twenty foot above the ground, and had saw 
 
The Ruby Silver Mine. — A True Story. 195 
 
 hard service. I prowled around there a full 
 month, hackin' and diggin' alone ; for I dassent 
 tell anybody but a Pueblo Indian, and threatened 
 to kill him if he ever made sign to white man. 
 It was my last throw. I was hard up. My old 
 pard v/as dead, give out with rheumatism. My 
 wife had went back to the States. My credit 
 (never anything to brag on) went after my wife " 
 (he smiled, for the first time), " and I see plain 
 luck must come soon or never ; but I never lost 
 my grip. I knowed I was a-gittin' warm. There's 
 no sign like the buried towns. It's certain indi- 
 cation of diggin's not far off. It's the rule all 
 over the territories. I lived on venison, venison, 
 till it was worse than old mutton. About three 
 mile away was a lake, w^here I scooped up salt 
 with my hands ; but venison and salt gets 
 monotonous week in and week out. There was 
 plenty of charcoal (had been used by the min- 
 ers, whoever they was), and I made out that the 
 dam led the water of the Abo to the works. 
 From the old furnaces I found another over- 
 grown trail, that run to this mine." 
 
 •' What sort of mine is it ? " 
 
 '' One of the covered-up ones. It's certain hun- 
 dreds of years old, buried under felled timber. 
 Some of it had rooted. I was a month gettin' 
 through, and it took a sharp eye to sight it." 
 The speaker modestly blinked the milky orbs 
 under their pink lashes, and continued : " The 
 shaft is eighty feet deep or m.ore, walled up with 
 pine, and drifts runnin' to the right and left a 
 hundred feet or so. I've set my stakes and the 
 papers is all made out. It's mine, and no divide, 
 and not a soul on earth knows about it except 
 you two and me." 
 
 I have seen so many ruined prospectors hunt- 
 ing mines that are nothing but myths, it was 
 
Tg6 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 cheering to learn there could be no mistake about 
 this discovery. 
 
 " You have fairly earned all you have found," 
 I said, in sympathy. 
 
 " Gvacias, SeTiora^' said the rich man, dramat- 
 ically waving the Esau hand, evidently enjoying 
 his Spanish. 
 
 ''You see this specimen will run twelve hun- 
 dred to the ton, and there's no end to the lead." 
 He teetered the stone on his trembling forefinger. 
 •' I've had a hard time ! My wife never got done 
 mournin' she ever spelt out the old letter. She'll 
 feel better now. I've struck it, and I guess I've 
 struck it rich." 
 
 And he had. With a farewell toss up of the 
 ruby silver specimen, till it struck the muslin 
 ceiling overhead, the fortunate man, haggard 
 and shaken, yet hilarious, took his leave. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE RUBY SILVER MINE. {CouHnUed) 
 
 Six months later, in the shade of a Hght um- 
 brella, I sauntered along the beach at Cape May. 
 Down by the summer sea, where lovers walk 
 with lingering step, rapt, heedless as the dead, of 
 aught but tender glances and soft words whisper- 
 ed under the sound of the surf. After the desert 
 silence and parching dryness of the territories, it 
 was a deep pleasure to breathe once more the 
 salt, moist air, to hear the mighty monotone, and 
 watch the restless play of light and color on 
 breakers rolling in from the far Bermudas, beat- 
 ing against the shore like the tireless heart of 
 earth. 
 
 Thinking upon nothing but simple enjoyment 
 
The Ruby Silver Mine. — Continued. 197 
 
 of earth, sea, and sky, I strolled in quiet sym- 
 pathy with the unknown crowd, when suddenly 
 an open carriage, drawn by two horses, stopped 
 near us. It was light as a wicker toy, the airiest, 
 fairiest thing manufactured since the night Cin- 
 derella rode to the ball. So slight in construction 
 one miglit think it would scarcely bear the 
 weight of one person, had we not seen that every 
 portion was perfectly wrought. The tempered 
 steel and light wheels would endure a severe 
 strain. Ornate as burnish could make it, gilding 
 and varnish sparkled in the sunlight, gay rosette 
 and flying ribbon were not lacking. Instead of 
 cloth, the lining was plaited violet satin, of ex- 
 quisite tint. I have never seen so elegant a turn- 
 out elsewhere. The cushions were fit for an em- 
 press' laces and velvets to trail on, a seat where 
 a king might rest and keep the soil from the 
 ermine and velvet of his coronation robe. 
 
 The small horses seemed made for the fairy 
 carriage. They were coal-black, perfectly match- 
 ed, without a white hair on them. Your corres- 
 pondent knows precious little about horses, ex- 
 cept one ancient pony, which lost an eye in a 
 pre-historic raid on a corn-crib ; but ignorance 
 itself could see these were of no common blood. 
 The broad faces and delicate ears, the luminous 
 eyes, soft as an antelope's, the arching necks, 
 veiled with silken manes like the fluffy hair of 
 young girls, come of no menial race, such as 
 haul drays and drop on pavements in the streets. 
 The mettlesome, high-bred beauties, pawing im- 
 patiently with hoofs like polished ebony, were 
 such steeds as dash through the Ouida novels or 
 come home at the masters' call under the black 
 tents, the Arab houses of hair. We had started 
 for the light-house, three miles away, and in the 
 dazzle of all that luxury and ease the brightness 
 went out of the day. My walk suddenly became 
 
198 he Lcvrid of the Pueblos. 
 
 hard and long. It required the entire skill and 
 strength of the liveried driver to manage the 
 reins, while the occupant within leaped nin,bly 
 out to adjust some portion of the harness. He 
 was dressed in garments of finest fabric and fresh- 
 est cut, in which the tailor had missed the easy 
 fit so coveted by gentlemen. A Pactolian watch- 
 chain streamed across his breast, .and lightish 
 gloves on massive hands gave the wearer the as- 
 pect of being pretty much all gloves. A host 
 of idlers gathered in a moment, and, with them, 
 I stopped to admire the equipage, perfect in 
 make and ornament, costly as money can buy, 
 and then and there broke the tenth command- 
 ment. 
 
 Evidently the envied man felt fussy and grew 
 fidgety under all those staring eyes. I rubbed 
 mine (not so young as they once were), to clear 
 a confused, bewildering recollection. Could it 
 be ? No ! impossible ! To reassure myself, I 
 looked toward the sea, then back again to the sky, 
 the town. It w^as no spirit of earth or air, no cheat 
 of vision or brain. The territorial sunburn had 
 faded from his face, but lingered in the scorched 
 carrot hair, and Rocky Mountain wTinkles are 
 not easily ironed out. Well I knew those early 
 crow's feet at the corners of the milky blue orbs. 
 The owner of the princely establishment, wath its 
 rare belongings, was none other than our frontier 
 friend, once sole proprietor of the Dives Mine, in 
 the Canon de los Angelos, which sold for eighteen 
 hundred thousand dollars. 
 
 The golden key opens many doors ; but it takes 
 time and some skill to fit it into the lock. The 
 lavender kids split as the Dives miner hastily 
 jerked them off, to fasten a harness-buckle ; the 
 flash of a superb diamond ring follow^ed the 
 movement. He threw the delicately tinted gloves 
 on the ground, with words more emphatic than 
 
The Riiby Silver Mine.—Contmned. 199 
 
 correct, muttered under a scant fringe of pink 
 moustache, then turned a deprecating, apologetic 
 glance toward the crowd. 
 
 An instant the ancient prospector held me 
 with his glittering eye. It said, plainly as 
 whisper in my ear : I beg you do not tell on me. 
 
 I did not. He hurried back to his place". The 
 Esau hand, with its blazing diamond, closed the 
 door with a heavy slam. It did not hold. He 
 banged it again, and yet once more, growing ver^^ 
 red in the face, before he could lean away from our 
 gaze back on the violet cushions. From that 
 soft recess he called loudly to the driver to '' git." 
 There were a few significant nods as the night- 
 black steeds sped with swift grace over the wet 
 beach, but nothing was said except by a very 
 charming young lady, fresh from Ollendorf. She 
 released a loving arm to bend forward a moment 
 and wave her fine little handkerchief at the van- 
 ishing show, exclaiming : '* Adieu, monsieur 
 le nouveau riche!' 
 
 The sweet girl graduate had taken the sense 
 of the meeting. When the purple and gold 
 passed from sight, the throng fell into line as 
 before the interruption, and in placid enjoyment 
 yielded to the dreamy spell of vesper sunlight 
 and lulling sound. All was refined, serene, 
 restful. 
 
 The mild ripples, changeful as the hues of 
 the dolphin, came and went, leaving their 
 slight tracery in the sand, secret messages from 
 hidden depths far away. The blue waters mur- 
 mured mystic music to fair and gracious maidens 
 and youths of gentle, graceful mien ; tender 
 cushats, cooing and wooing and sighing, but not 
 for the touch of vanished hands. The rhythmic 
 ebb and flow charmed the sense with hints of 
 warbling peris and dying cadences of mermaids' 
 songs. Earth and ocean in perfect tune, the 
 
200 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 very air tlirilled with a tremulous harmony, 
 while youth and beauty wove their low, sweet 
 idyl. Lapwings glided along the sands, where 
 the sick lady rested in her invalid chair, under a 
 gayly-striped awning. White gulls screar.ied 
 and circled round a ship lying at anchor in the 
 shining bay, her flag a wavy line of brilliant 
 color against the pale horizon. Beyond it, in 
 dim perspective, a long procession of vessels 
 slowly sailing. An endless picture, suggestive 
 of famous places and unknown nations, gathered 
 treasure of pearl and amber, spicery and silks, 
 and happy home, coming from voyages through 
 halcyon seas, by distant fragrant shores. The 
 wind was warm, its breath was balm, the world 
 was lulled to rest. 
 
 A flush of pink fell from out the tranquil sky. 
 It dropped fresh roses on faded cheeks, and in 
 its blush I saw the young face beside me as it had 
 been the face of an angel. Then I thought the 
 beautiful is wealth, the world over. My darling 
 holds in her slender hand the keys of the pal- 
 aces. 
 
 The walk to the light-house was not so bad, 
 after all. 
 
 My holiday ended, I returned to the City of 
 Holy Faith, and exactly a year from the date of 
 this story took my constitutional walk in the 
 splendor of sunlight such as never falls on land 
 or sea east of the Rocky Mountains. No fear 
 oi rain to drive me indoors, no speculations about 
 clear or cloudy to-morrows, we know a radiant 
 shining will lighten the coming morning, just as 
 it filled the sky of yesterday. With the Pueblos, 
 I am a devout sun-worshipper and love at his ris- 
 ing to salute the lord of light and life, and again 
 " under the sad passion of the dying day " to 
 watch his departure. Returning from my invisi- 
 ble altar on old Fort Marcy, I threaded my way 
 
4i\0»^^ 
 
 ^;jf^^ 
 
 Zufii Effigies, 
 
The Ruby Silver Mine, — Continued. 201 
 
 through cramped and crooked streets, and, mak- 
 ing the round of the Plaza, saw beside the gate a 
 burro being loaded with a miner's outfit. He 
 was not much larger than a dog ; beyond com- 
 pare the most wretched of his miserable race, a 
 pitiable wreck. He was mangy and sore-eyed, 
 his tail tapered to a stumpy point, the tuft at the 
 end fallen beyond the reach of any " restorer." 
 Patches of hair worn off in various portions of 
 his body exposed wrinkled, leathery hide, and the 
 dark cross over the shoulders was pitted with 
 scars, like marks of small-pox. There was not 
 enough flesh on those protrusive bones to make 
 one meal for the ravening mountain wolf, or 
 a respectable lunch for half a dozen carrion crows. 
 Arid and dusty, the creature looked like the 
 mummy of some antediluvian animal. Easy to 
 see his portion had been kicks, scourge, goads, 
 abuse; no champagne savannah, no green meadow 
 or lush blue grass in his line of travel ; but life- 
 withering marches in snowy and sandy desert, 
 where scant herbage and meagre shrub were 
 enough for the starving slave. 
 
 Yet the sorry beast was not senseless nor alto- 
 gether broken in spirit. A train of mules went 
 by. Among them he recognized an old acquaint- 
 ance, a fellow- sufferer. He lifted his head and 
 plucked up heart for a passing salute, essaying a 
 feeble bray. The unwonted sound was too great 
 an effort for the gaunt throat. It died in a hoarse 
 rattle and was buried in a succession of notes, 
 the strangest mortal ear has heard since that old 
 day Jubal first struck the gamut. 
 
 Pick, shovel, bags of crackers, blanket, and 
 coffee-pot were piled high on the tough burden- 
 bearer, and, watching the loading done by a 
 Mexican boy, a tall man lazily leaned against the 
 diminutive brute, apparently reckless of the dan- 
 ger of upsetting donkey and cargo, and sending 
 
202 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 them sprawling across the sidewalk. There was 
 nothing to draw attention in his familiar uniform 
 — high-top boots, cactus-proof buckskin pants, 
 hickory shirt, red neck-handkerchief; but under 
 the broad slouch hat were straggling locks that 
 caught my eye — a peculiar tinge of reddish 
 bronze, the cabello del oro of the Argonaut 
 
 of '79. 
 
 The never-resting wheel of fortune had made 
 the downward curve. The Dives miner had 
 summered in Saratoga, betting on cards and 
 horses, had staked tens of thousands on the haz- 
 -ard of a dicer's throw, lost everything, and now 
 was back to the starting-place, ready to try 
 again. I remembered the purple and gold, the 
 •dash and glitter of the rich man at Cape May. 
 The apparition of prancing steeds of matchless 
 beauty, with dainty limbs, too dainty for the sand 
 they touched but to spurn, flitted before me. 
 
 Gambler though he was and deserved it, the 
 foriornness of the change would touch a harder 
 heart than yours or mine, dear reader. I 
 stepped toward the gate. At that moment 
 Dives — perhaps I had best say Lazarus — poked 
 the poor hirro with a sharp stick and, in a high, 
 gay voice, struck up : 
 
 " Of all the wives you e'er can know, 
 There's none like Nancy Lee, I trow." 
 
 Then, as Bunyan hath it, he went on his way 
 and I saw him no more. 
 
 This story sounds like a pure invention. Does 
 it not ? I confess to trifling attempts in decora- 
 tive art, a tiny dash of color, the least bit of 
 embroidery, just to round a corner and give a 
 little life to dullness, you know, but not now. 
 My hero is to-day a day-laborer, working in the 
 great King Henry lead in the Shakespeare dis- 
 trict of New Mexico — the man who for one 
 
Mine Experience. 205. 
 
 brief summer reckoned his money by hundreds 
 of thousands. You can see him when you go. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 MINE EXPERIENCE. 
 
 The reader who graciously follows me to the 
 end of this brief history will readily comprehend 
 why it must be somewhat obscure. '' I could a 
 tale unfold " better worth the hearing, but like 
 the poor ghost I am forbid to tell the secrets of 
 my prison house. It need harrow up no soul to 
 hint that the scene was laid and drama played 
 not a thousand miles from Tucson, Arizona. 
 
 Imagine a vega of sea -like vastness, in a rock- 
 setting of ghostly Sierras whose rent crags pierce 
 through the rich blue air far above the snowline. 
 In the primeval years the Apaches possessed the 
 country, and with the poetic instinct which never 
 quite forsakes the savagest of savages they 
 called this range the Mist-Befringed Mountains. 
 To reach the valley from the west, we leave the 
 main road and cross rough masses of lava which 
 block the way. The seeming barrier ends in a 
 narrow pass, a mile or so from wall to wall, — a 
 mighty stone corridor stately as Karnak, and 
 ■gloomy with the all-pervading silence of death. 
 At the end is a high natural gateway of red 
 granite ; passing under it we emerge into a smooth 
 expanse level as water, an amphitheatre whose 
 blank surface is relieved by scattered masses 
 of lava upheaved in some fiery earthquake long 
 stilled their rigid outlines jagged and bristling. 
 
 There is no verdure to soften the foothills so 
 savagely hacked and split in yav/ning cracks. 
 No tender moss, no shrub, no sparkling water or 
 
204 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 waving branches brighten the leaden hues of the 
 gray desert; treeless, windless, waterless. If 
 herbage ever grew there it is now overdrifted 
 with sand. The wonderful mirage — most mar- 
 velous of Nature's mysteries — swims over it in 
 the dreamy haze of early morning. A deep, 
 dark coolness follows the burning day, and the 
 jeweled sky, of opal and turquoise, I's unspeaka- 
 bly beautiful. Other change there la none. 
 
 It would seem a place for the unclean condor 
 to lay her eggs on the bare rocks, and the eagle 
 to wheel and scream and stir up her nest with 
 wings which battle the storm; but there is no 
 trace of bird or insect life, no wolf or antelope, 
 coyote or lizard. 
 
 It is the one place in which I have stood 
 where the earth is as still as the sky. Suppose 
 we call the dreary region with its adamantine 
 rocks the Foothills of the Mountains of the 
 Moon, There in the beginning silence set her 
 
 seal, unbroken till eighteen hundred and 
 
 some odd years. For reasons obvious, I cannot 
 be exact regarding dates. 
 
 In a memorable hour the death-like hush was 
 startled by the ring of a single hammer on the 
 torn mountain wall at the west end of the vega. 
 Blow on blow against the riven clefts resounded 
 through the warm blue silence. 
 
 Was it a Bostonian seeking the Infinite ? Did 
 he see beyond the verge of sight, like the young 
 Aladdin led on by the Genii of the Cave ? 
 
 All day the one man toiled, digging, hewing, 
 breaking, scraping pieces of stone with a pen- 
 knife. What he sought he evidently found, put 
 some of it in his pockets, other portions in his 
 haversack, and wound out of the cavernous 
 gloom at sunset through the narrow defile to the 
 world outside the lifeless plain. He is brave 
 
Mine Experience. 205 
 
 beyond the bravest who would stay there till 
 midnight, 
 
 "Alone in the terrible waste with God." 
 A week passed, and one crisp and clear morn- 
 ing — owing to very high altitude the nights here 
 are always cool — three men passed under the 
 rock gateway, each with tools and determina- 
 tion of iron. Steadily they worked in the long 
 hot day, stopping for lunch and a short rest at 
 noon. Only the all seeing eye was upon them, 
 no human ear was there to hear, yet at intervals 
 they looked arcund as though in an enemy's 
 country, and their rare speech was in suppressed 
 voices. They bent with faces to the ground as 
 children hunt for nuts. They peered into cracks 
 and crevices and pried up loose stones, scattered 
 debris^ broke them open, and gazed at their inte- 
 rior under a hand mirror. Occasionally the light- 
 est man, a mere stripphng, mounted the shoul- 
 ders of the other two and seized something 
 above their heads. Were they a trio of poets 
 obeying the charge of the Bard of the Sierras, 
 " Lean your ladder not against the clouds, but 
 against the solid Rocky Mountains and climb 
 there ? " They saw something which thrilled 
 their pulses, and bore off a load in sacks just as 
 the snow crowned peaks blushed with the ineffa- 
 ble beauty of the afterglow. Then darkness 
 leaped from the mountain walls and held the 
 valley, in the starry silence, lone as the land 
 Haviliah before the first gold seekers crossed the 
 river on their endless quest. 
 
 Another week brought a picnic party largely 
 composed of ladies, two gentlemen in army blue, 
 girls made of roses and dimples, curls and rib- 
 bons, young men with eager, handsome faces. 
 Rocky Mountain ladies are always well mounted 
 and are fearless horsewomen. Diana Vernon 
 might ^\\\y their dash and daring, and in this 
 
2o6 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 rarified atmosphere horses are mettlesome and 
 endure as they cannot in the low countries. 
 There was much prancing and spurring through 
 the rugged defile, and many a rider less bold 
 would have been unseated even on the sure- 
 footed ponies. They brought little twigs of 
 pinones from the caTions and made fires with 
 matches scraped on boot heels ; they unpacked 
 hampers, opened cans, played games, shouted, 
 sung, wild with overflowing spirits ; they ate, 
 drank and were merry, all the while hunting and 
 hunting. Lovers strayed in pairs to dusky 
 recesses in the mountain rim, not on purpose to 
 be lost nor to find the four-leaf clover, nor yet to 
 learn how to make love dials of daisies. They 
 sought something more than the hasty charm of 
 a stolen kiss. They looked for shining stones, 
 gleaming metal, precious clay, and every one 
 carried in a pocket handkerchief minute sec- 
 tions of the adamantine Foothills of the Moun- 
 tains of the Moon. Even uninstructed eyes can 
 trace the rust colored, red-brown lines of ** blos- 
 som rock," and it is following a captivating lead 
 to yield one's self to its beguiling ways. 
 
 One youth and maiden tracked it far up the 
 caTion to a gnarled and twisted pine which over- 
 hung the edge of a sheer crag to which it clung 
 by roots clutching like claws. In the dry, dew- 
 less air the needles of the pine lay in soft carpet- 
 ing undisturbed for ages. They sat and rested 
 beneath the skeleton tree, and listened to soft 
 aeolian airs faintly stirring the bare branches over- 
 head. Then she sang in the sweetest voice: 
 
 " Is this a dream ? Then waking would be pain." 
 
 And in answer he tossed up his cap and it 
 lodged in the pine, and they clapped their hands 
 in an impromptu chorus, '' No, no, no! a thou- 
 sand times, no ! " If there be elves in the Mist- 
 Befringed Mountains they must have laughed at 
 
Mine Experience. 207 
 
 this frolicsome glee, for such sounds are a new 
 revelation there. The young couple were not 
 crazy, they had heaved up a rough brown stone, 
 and striking it with a heavy hammer they saw — 
 ay de mi ! the electric flash of wedding rings. 
 The zigzag lines of " blossom rock" held WTeaths 
 of orange flowers, hitherto unattainable, and now 
 they felt so near their sweetness they were filled 
 with delight. The poor young things had 
 thought best to bear their poverty apart (he was 
 a second lieutenant), but now they could hear 
 marriage bells in every stroke of the magic ham- 
 mer, in every throb of their happy hearts. 
 
 A stray dove, bewildered and lost, lighted at 
 their feet, tame because ignorant of men, and 
 they hailed the gentle bird as an omen. Then he 
 called her his dove-eyed darling, talking the 
 sweet foolery my gray-haired reader laughs at, 
 but would give a year of peaceful life to hear 
 again for one half-hour. 
 
 O day of bridal brightness whose splendor 
 lives in the illuminated Book of Chronicles! — let 
 me linger a moment over its unfading beauty. 
 The lovers locked their happy arms together and 
 trod lightly over enchanted ground, in the silence 
 of perfect happiness, — all that is left us of the 
 lost language of Eden. Wherever their spark- 
 ling glances fell, myrtles sprung up. O never, 
 on land, or in sea, grew flowers like those which 
 bloomed in their foot-prints along the sandy beds 
 of "blossom rock." 
 
 The lieutenant was bare-headed, for he never 
 got his cap, though he stoned it valiantly and 
 even shot his revolver at the limb where it hung. 
 A frontier lady is full of expedients as Robinson 
 Crusoe, and the girl he loved, with deft and taste- 
 ful fingers devised a cap from her silken kerchief 
 and trimmed it with a drooping feather from her 
 own riding hat. Very proud was the face 
 
2oS The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 beneath it, and he bowed in admiration of her 
 ingenuity and murmured some soft nonsense you 
 do not care to hear. 
 
 They joined the party in the plain with an 
 assumption of indifference, transparent as mica, 
 — a flimsy ruse, old as the oldest lovers, — and 
 of course every one saw just how matters stood 
 the instant they appeared. He went to look 
 after the pony, tied by a lariat to a block of 
 stone, patted her never so gently, stroked her 
 mane, and called her " Pretty girl, pretty girl." The 
 maiden sat on a striped Navayo blanket and in 
 an arch bewitching way sang to an old Spanish 
 air full of trills and graces this song : 
 
 "QUIENSABE?"* 
 
 " The breeze of the evening that cools the hot air, 
 
 That kisses the oraii^e and shakes out thy hair, 
 
 Is its freshness less welcome, less sweet its perfume, 
 
 That you know not tlie region from whence it is come? 
 
 Whence thi^ wiiul blows, where the wind goes. 
 
 Hither, and thither, and whither— who knows? Who knows ? 
 
 Hither and thither— but whither— who knows? 
 
 " The river forever glides singing along. 
 
 The rose on the bank bends adown to its song. 
 
 And the flower, as it listens, unconsciously dips 
 
 Till the rising wave glistens and kisses its lips. 
 
 But why the wave rises and kisses the rose. 
 
 And why the rose stops for those kisses— who knows? Who knows? 
 
 And away flows the river— but wliither— who knows ? 
 
 III. 
 
 " Let me be the breeze, love, that wanders along 
 
 The river that ever rejoices in song; 
 
 Be thou to my fancy the orange in bloom, 
 
 The rose by the river rhat gives its perfume. 
 
 Would the "fruit be so golden, so fragrant the rose, 
 
 If no breeze and no wave were to kiss them ? Who knows ? Who 
 
 kiunvs ? 
 If no bi Cf ze and no wave were to kiss them ? Who knows ? " 
 
 Before the singer lay the desert grim and 
 bare, girdled by scarred, seamed mountains — a 
 boundry wall touched with purplish tints of 
 
 * I need hardly tell my reader the words " Qtden Sahe? '''— 
 •'Who knows?"— are the unanswerable answer forever on the 
 Spanish-speaking tongue. 
 
Mine Experience. 209 
 
 supreme beauty. Behind her, a dim ouUine of 
 snow and granite in the far horizon, the Sierra 
 Nevada projected against the rainless blue, the 
 blade of snow-white teeth which suggested its 
 Castilian name. The valley had a fascination from 
 its absolute loneliness. Not a cloud flecked the 
 blue above, not a breath stirred the air while the 
 song was sung. 
 
 The elders gave it a divided attention, being 
 intent on lumps of treasure which they "hefted" 
 in their palms, balanced on their forefingers, and 
 gazed at affectionately through a glass into which 
 they puckered their eyelids, making gathers of 
 the crow's feet quite frightful to see. As each 
 one passed the glass to his neighbor he nodded 
 in dumb approval, with a look of mystery smiling 
 and smiling, and the more enthusiastic winked 
 and rubbed their hands as it went the rounds. 
 
 Such witbi craft is there in one small hand 
 
 muTor 
 
 After lunch at picnics there is usually a period 
 of "nooning" while gentlemen smoke and ladies 
 recline, or seek siestas in friendly shade ; but there 
 was no quiet here and to the last no flagging of 
 the high festivity. 
 
 A rose-blush of exquisite haze, a phantasm 
 *' mystic, wonderful," floating through the vapory 
 architecture of the Sierras, seemed the very soul 
 of the halcyon day. The adorable girl who 
 turned more than one head by smoking cigarettes, 
 waved her hand at the shade and called loudly, 
 " Look, see, the day is dying, its spirit is passing. 
 Turn your faces to the west and be attentive." 
 
 Gaily they hastened to gather round the fair 
 speaker. With low mutterings and many tragic 
 gestures she drew a circle in the sand, stood in 
 the centre and blew a whiff of smoke, north, 
 south, east, west, as Moqui Indians invoke the 
 sun with their incantations. 
 
2IO The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 " Now," said the self-elected priestess, with 
 solemn accent, '• now watch without speech or 
 breath, and we will have a token and a sign from 
 the god of the Pueblos.'' 
 
 Humoring her fancy, they waited in silence 
 and lo ! before their eyes the shape darkened, 
 glowed, transmuted into a mass of glittering 
 gold. 
 
 *' The oracles have answered," she cried. 
 "Good bye, O Sun, ruler of this hour, take thanks 
 from thy white children for the golden promise 
 of to-day. Believers, salute him." 
 
 All obeyed, and with bare head and uproarious 
 cheers waved hats and handkerchiefs in good bye 
 to the day and the friendly powers that be. The 
 merry cavalcade, laughing and shouting, rode 
 straight into the golden fire and flaming snow, 
 each one carrying heavy weights of stone, every 
 heart beating lightly. 
 
 Rapidly the voices died away. The metallic 
 luster of the sky melted into opalescent pearl and 
 purple. Day and night kissed and parted. Sud- 
 denly the stars looked out in serene eternal beauty 
 on the smouldering fires, the vanishing trace of 
 man, and the vega alone with the night, — the 
 hushed desolation doubly drear for the appari- 
 tion of loveliness which endured but for a day. 
 
 The next morning brought more men with 
 picks and hammers, mules laden with kegs of 
 water, shovels and various cooking utensils and 
 traps. There was a stir and bustle, two tents 
 were pitched; a conspicuous figure was a cook 
 " come up from de Souf durin' de wah," — sign of 
 a permanent camp. Against stubborn clay and 
 quartz rock work goes on slowly, but it did go 
 on in the Mist- Befringed Mountains. It took 
 many weeks to survey a certain district and make 
 excavations, one deep as a well. They were 
 made against obstacles which daunt men of 
 
Mine Experience. 2ii 
 
 weak will ; lack of fuel, lack of water, torrid sun- 
 heat, chill, benumbing nights. The plain was 
 dotted with holes very like graves, marked with 
 little pine head-boards bearing dates and figures. 
 They have sweet names: "Baby Mine," "Golden 
 Fleece," " Sleeping Beauty," " Maud Muller," 
 " Highland Mary, " " Daystar, " ^' The Fair 
 Ophelia." This last is the deepest excavation. 
 
 Usually claim stakes, for such they are, in out^ 
 of-the-way places mark the '' Old Bourbon, " 
 " The Right Bower," " Dying Gasp," " Wake up, 
 Jake," " New Deal," " Chance Shot," "The Blue 
 Pup," and so on. The titles are indication of 
 the vein of tender sentiment which runs deep in 
 the heart of woman. Evidently gentle souls 
 fluttered about the head-boards when they were 
 set in the ground. They were standing there 
 to-day. 
 
 * * * 5fi -x- * * 
 
 That row of stars, dear reader, means, 
 
 "Thoughts which do lie too deep for tears." 
 
 Sometimes in quiet Sunday afternoons a party 
 of lovely women, the charmed number not less 
 than the graces nor more than the muses, ride 
 out from Las Lunas, through the frowning 
 avenue and lonesome gorge, and haunt the silent 
 valley as mourners are wont to linger about new- 
 made graves. To avoid trouble in remembering 
 names I group them. 
 
 Allow me to present my charming friends the 
 Pleiads. Years, tears, or study, perhaps all com- 
 bined, have dimmed the briUiance of one face. 
 They tread softly and slowly, are very depressed, 
 and appear to find a mourner's consolation in 
 reading the head-boards. Under the funeral 
 shadow cast by the overhanging pine (the Lieu- 
 tenant's cap is still there ) they sit on newly 
 spaded earth and compare experience and 
 
5i2 Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 sorrows. A dove in the skeleton tree, listening, 
 might hear subdued laments : "O why did I touch 
 the ' Sleeping Beauty ? ' " " ' Of all the sad words 
 of tongue or pen,' " " ' All that glitters is not 
 gold, ' " and as they bend above the " Highland 
 Mary," one hums an old song, beginning : 
 
 " Thou lingering star with lessening ray.' 
 
 Sung with tenderness and pathos it floats 
 through the deathlike stillness like a dirge. Can 
 it be possible these sad-eyed mourners are the 
 bright spirits of the picnic, who made that shin- 
 ing day 
 
 " a beauteous dream, 
 
 If it had been no more ? " 
 
 'Twere vain to tell thee all. 
 
 Just when it matters not, these women pon- 
 dered over maps, meaningless to them as the fif- 
 teen puzzle which has proved the streak of id- 
 iocy in the entire human family ; over Miner's 
 Handbooks, over the ''Prospector's Complete 
 Guide to Wealth." They grew familiar with 
 frightful engravings, flaming pictures of red hot 
 underground machinery, lurid as the Insurance 
 Chromo. Light literature and the newspapers 
 were forsaken, and instead their tables were lit- 
 tered with such pamphlets as " Treatises on the 
 Patent Amalgamator," ''The best method of 
 reducing Argentiferous Ores," and "The Hy- 
 draulic Ram," — a horrible subject. The femi- 
 nine mind does not readily adjust itself to this 
 sort of lore, and though novel and highly instruc- 
 tive they were forced to confess it was "trying." 
 The owner of "The Fair Ophelia" almost lost 
 her reason in a frantic and futile effort to master 
 the workings of the diamond drill, and to com- 
 prehend the advantages the double oscillating 
 cylinder engine has over the steel or percussi'/c 
 system of drilling. 
 
Mine Experience. 213 
 
 While these exhaustive studies went on, the 
 students discoursed of fissure veins, of float, 
 leads, developments, face rock, bed rock, pyrites, 
 chlorides, sulphurets. Alternating anguish and 
 ecstacy shook their slender frames; one day 
 brought a dazzling promise, the next a blank 
 contradiction which told on their nerves with the 
 force of a blow. Everything was shifting and 
 uncertain except the assessments. There was a 
 sense of security in having one thing to be 
 relied on, and they v^ere brought in with exact 
 regularity. The moon did not wax and wane 
 with more unvarying certainty, and obligations 
 of all sorts were met with unquestioning prompt- 
 ness, not to say alacrity. 
 
 How many months' pay went into these rich 
 experiences your historian is unable to record. 
 The Pleiads, though brilliant in the social circle, 
 were not trained to strict business habits, and it 
 is possible, indeed quite probable, no account of 
 expense was kept. In that time the battered 
 old pun about lying on your oars (not to be 
 despised and able to bear a good deal of abuse 
 yet) was dinned in ears to which the antique wit- 
 ticism was already familiar. The note of warn- 
 ing fell lightly as snow falls on snow, leaving no 
 imprint ; and the toilsome excavating went 
 bravely on. A judicious friend — merely a 
 looker-on — advised selling out. The old front- 
 iersman was assailed with indignant scorn. Much 
 learning had made him mad. 
 
 '' What ! sell out now, now, in the face of such 
 a prospect." 
 
 " After all this outlay ! " 
 
 "After holding on so long ! Now ! " 
 
 " Not if I know myself." 
 
 " Nor I." 
 
 " Nor I." 
 
 " Nor T." 
 
214 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 Before the seven-fold chorus and harpings the 
 dismayed counsellor hastily retreated to his 
 adobe office, and the Pleiads looked forth as the 
 morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and 
 terrible as an army with banners. 
 
 Patient investigation fails to show up (uncon- 
 sciously one drops into mining phrase in mining 
 countries) any offer to buy, but the very thought 
 of selling out was rousing — a reflection on the fair 
 owner of "The Fair Ophelia." Varying rapture 
 and despair wore those lovely women to faded 
 spectres, for the long, slow lesson of waiting is a 
 fearful strain on tense nerves. Well for their 
 balance is it that housekeeping is so difficult on 
 the barren frontier. 
 
 Despite the wholesome restraint of domestic 
 duty, the daily task of making something out of 
 nothing, they wiled away long afternoons 
 telling stories worthy the best days of Monte 
 Christo, Captain Kidd and the gallant Sinbad. 
 A childish credulity overtook them. Though 
 highly intellectual and very superior, educated in 
 modern " culture" (Boston accent), they showed 
 a capacity for belief that was amazing. 
 
 How diligently they groped along the tangled 
 lines on the agonizing maps ! How glibly they 
 talked of metalliferous foothills, of bonanza kings, 
 of "extracting" and "separating processes," of 
 running galleries and driven tunnels. You know 
 it is the amateur who is most sanguine in 
 ev^ery enterprise. The joint stock of enthusiasm 
 owned by the Pleiads lightened the way but was 
 not inexhaustible. Notwithstanding enlivening 
 converse in learned phrase — a kind of foreign 
 language — hope flickered, the fever burned their 
 eyes into hollows, and the judicious friend shook 
 his white head in secret, forecasting how long 
 this sort of thing was going to last. 
 
 When the crisis came Electra fainted dead 
 
Mine Experience, 215 
 
 away, — dropped as if shot through the heart. 
 She was a good deal reduced with study of 
 secrets hid in '< The Smelter," and the book 
 slipped from her nerveless hand as she reached 
 out to receive the dispatch. 
 
 It came at the close of the short twilight of a 
 day never to be forgotten. She was sitting in 
 the portal to catch the last rays on the printed 
 page, for her eyes are not so young as they once 
 were, and in this land there is brief margin time 
 of silver gray sky and drowsing earth. There 
 trotted along the sheep paths and through the 
 cramped and crooked streets a burro with all the 
 speed a burro can make, goaded forward by a 
 stick sharpened to that end. Mounted on him 
 without bridle, saddle, whip or spur, was a boy 
 recognized as a sort of messenger in the camp 
 of the Mist-Befringed Mountains, — a boy beauti- 
 ful as a princess' page, with real Murillo head 
 and luminous oiiental eyes beaming with steady 
 light in the olive face. There was exceptional 
 grace in the movement of his limbs as he dis- 
 mounted ; his voice is always sad, and the soft 
 ''Buenos dias Seriora,'' conveyed no hint whether 
 the bearer brought tidings good or ill. Bare- 
 headed, he yet contrived to make the courtly 
 Spanish bov/, shook back his jetty locks, and 
 bending low delivered the letter. The boy's 
 lovely name is Rafael Antonina Molino, and the 
 dispatch was a leaf torn from a scratch -book, 
 scrawled in haste with a hand that evidently 
 trembled in the writing. It ran : 
 
 Near Las Lunas. 
 
 At last! About noon yesterday the digger 
 in '< The Fair Ophelia" .struck soft carbonates 
 genuine Leadville carbonates, and are now down 
 four feet. They show up better and better. 
 
 Your own Jason. 
 
2i6 Tlte Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 P. S. — Send mc a white shirt. I am to speak 
 at the ratification meeting to-night. 
 
 A thrilhng pause — a scream, a bursting shower 
 of tears, kisses, embraces, a confusion of tongues 
 in which the word "carbonate" was the only- 
 one common to all. Such a sunshiny storm is 
 possible only to nervous women intensely 
 wrought. In the Melee a natty little jacket, 
 brought by mail from Altman's and almost as 
 good as new, was absolutely ripped to pieces. 
 When mines are en bonanza (free translation, 
 "booming") who cares for New York jackets ? 
 
 I shrink from the attempt to picture what Car- 
 lyle might call the resplendent weeks which fol- 
 lowed, while a test ton of ore was sent to Silver 
 City for reduction. Still less can I venture to 
 touch the forlorn portrait of the judicious friend 
 who advised selling out. He repented in sack 
 cloth and alkali dust, and meekly apologized 
 three times a day and again at bed time. So 
 vanquished, he kept close in his earth works and 
 hardly took courage to share the general joy. 
 They are living yet who believe there was a dash 
 of sarcasm in the withered smile with which he 
 modestly used to inquire after the wealth of 
 Denmark's daughter. Through the resplendent 
 weeks ( I love that exquisite word) the spectres 
 scarcely lost sight of each other, and they were 
 very pallid. They mooned about like young 
 lovers in a trance, and like them saw with eyes 
 anointed. A glory rested on our dull earth, ting- 
 ing it with rose-bloom and amethyst, as the win- 
 try moon, looking tlirough pictured windows, 
 warmed the snowy breast of Madeline, utterly te 
 viontee, a riotous prodigality possessed them. 
 Their bank account was a sight to see, and under 
 the sweet influence of the Pleiads the poor 
 rejoiced and beggars thrived. 
 
Mine Experience. 217 
 
 In happy nights, too sweet for sleep, they 
 gathered liUes of Damascus and draiil-: from 
 springs shaded by pkimy pahiis of Jiidea. They 
 painted birds, long legged birds on panels, and 
 sets of china containing a thousand pieces each. 
 Ever they whispered, murmured, dreamed. 
 Soon as the delirium passed and the fever cooled 
 they resolved to flee '< the finest climate in the 
 world," beloved of reporters, which every one 
 rushes away from as soon as he has the money 
 to go. 
 
 Take care ! Take care ! These are the shores 
 of doom. Among other curious formations in 
 the adamantine Foothills of the Mountains of the 
 Moon are the Lodestone Rocks. Swiftly, swiftly, 
 the ship was drawn to them. The gilded argosy 
 with its precious freightage, swelling sail and tri- 
 umphant banner went to pieces. Rosebloom and 
 violet faded into the light of common day. The 
 poor headboards beside the open graves are the 
 last of the wreck, marking the spot where hopes 
 rose so brightly they appeared sure prophesies 
 unrolled. 
 
 [Dear reader, on whom I lean in tender con- 
 fidence, forgive this secret tear over the hfeless 
 clay of *' The Fair Ophelia." I sat by its cradle, 
 I followed its hearse.] 
 
 The judicious friend ventures abroad now. He 
 smiles shrewdly and the mourners dream no 
 more. They see with cleared vision, and will 
 take one of the many roads which lead to the 
 Golden Milestone, and their dreams wih all come 
 true when galena sells for a dollar an ounce. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE RUINS OF MONTEZUMA'S PALACE. 
 
 No American antiquities except, perhaps, the 
 Old Mill at Newport, have figured so largely 
 in imagination and in print as the pre-historic 
 ruins along the Gila River, in Penal County, Ari- 
 zona. More than thirty years ago antiquarian 
 hearts were deeply stirred by accounts of trav- 
 ellers, then very rare, describing the Casas 
 Grandes as great cities of hewn stone built in 
 a rich and noble architecture like that of Egypt. 
 Rhetorical flourishes and bold flights of fancy, 
 colored the pictures drawn before the days of 
 photography. Communication with this region 
 was difficult, and travelling hundreds of miles 
 the stories naturally grew along the way, taking 
 wider outlines and warmer coloring. The gold 
 seekers of California varied their explorations by 
 ascending the Gila, almost as unknown to them 
 as the White Nile. Rapturous reports came 
 back, and for years the Caas Grandes ranked 
 with Veii and Karnak. I greatly regret having 
 no copy of those Pacific newspapers to compare 
 the impressions of the last generation, groping 
 in the misty twilight of half-seen wonders, with 
 plain facts come to actual sight and touch in the 
 light of to-day. 
 
 The walled cities, capable of holding many 
 thousand souls, were supplied with water by 
 acequias leading from the river. They were rep- 
 resented by enthusiastic Bohemians as aque- 
 ducts of solid masonry and fairly equal in dura- 
 bility and strength to the Maxima Cloaca of 
 Rome. Charming traditions embellished the 
 beguiling descriptions, lovely myths and airy fa- 
 bles floated in the warm, blue silence above the 
 218 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace, 219 
 
 House of Montezuma, whose lordly name is 
 itself a stimulus to imagination. They were the 
 work, so ran the tales, of lost races, mysterious, 
 invincible, all-conquering, vanished into the voice- 
 less past. They had reached a high civilization, 
 as the magnificent remains attest, and had passed 
 from the earth leaving no sign but colossal ruins, 
 no records but strange hieroglyphs, which, en- 
 graven on rocks in the neighborhood of the 
 Casas, undoubtedly formed their history. 
 
 These mural records are heaps of weather-worn 
 rocks and detached boulders covered with figures 
 rudely scratched or painted, bearmg signs of great 
 age. They possibly served as boundary lines, 
 the hieroglyphs being tribal signs of treaties. 
 One flighty romancer who understood his own 
 language imperfectly, testified that the " pictured 
 rocks" were written over with deeply carved in- 
 scriptions like the Hebrew, Chaldean and Gothic 
 characters. They have been foundation stones 
 for imaginary pyramids with sculptured facades, 
 which were compared to the temples of Palenque 
 and Tuloom, " made of hewn stone so admirably 
 fitted they seem * born so' and require neither 
 mortar nor clamps." Pottery was found in pro- 
 fusion, glazed and painted, always in fragments 
 too small and scattered to be fitted together. 
 Yet the visionaries likened the miserable scraps 
 to ceramics of antique India and the inimitable 
 vases of Etruria. 
 
 From the early times the Apache, savagest of 
 savages — the red man incurably wild — has swept 
 the plains and has held the mountain fastnesses, 
 carrying terror and torture from the upper waters 
 of the Pecos far into old Mexico. The shadowy 
 region, mountain-locked like some vast .strong- 
 hold guarded by naked sentinels, was a resistless 
 temptation to lovers of the tp.arvellous. The 
 deserted cities slowly crumbling down b}- the 
 
220 The Latid of the Pueblos. 
 
 shallow waters of the Gila must have been the 
 work of a people who maintained their supremacy 
 in the face of savagery. There was much to stir 
 the fancy, ever strongest of flight under skies 
 most unknown, in the idea of walled and fortified 
 cities in the centre of barbarian hordes, able to 
 withstand their warfare and beat back their 
 encroachments. Poet, sightseer, archaeologist, 
 reporter, padre, missionary, ro\'crs of every sort 
 came by turns to the Casas Grandes, and gave 
 their impressions in poetic coloring ; and over all, 
 like the dreamy mountain haze whose soft 
 radiance purples hill and plain, hung a delicious 
 mystery. Who should lift the secret veil and 
 question the past till it gave back some answer ? 
 It was an alluring borderland between civilization 
 and barbarism ; on the North American Con- 
 tinent the last footing of phantoms peopling the 
 unknown, till the whistle of the locomotive, which 
 has broken so many illusions, put the pale shades 
 to flight, and brushed away the cobweb and rose- 
 bloom of the old Spanish poets. 
 
 The Maricopa is a dreary country, arid and 
 inhospitable. Even the Mark Tapley of travellers 
 observed, while there : '' This is not a jolly place." 
 The days are hot as the desert where the White 
 Nile rises ; so hot the very lion's manes are burnt 
 off. The nights are heavenly. 
 
 The rivers are tricksy streams— sometimes 
 wet, sometimes dry — but give enough water to 
 irrigate meagre cornfields. Occasionally they 
 rise in the very centre of barrenness, flow a mile 
 or so, and are lost in the sand ; then rise unex- 
 pectedly and run again. 
 
 The season, I remember, was unusually dry. 
 Every one described by travellers and official 
 papers for whole generations contain that report. 
 From this concurrent testimony it is safe t(^ con- 
 clude that every season is unusually dry. I 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace. 221 
 
 testify that one party was made dry as mummies; 
 but, being under bonds to see all that was to be 
 seen, we were bound for the Casas Grandes. 
 
 To reach them, we must enter the fabled realm 
 of the visionaries ; where the Indian emperor, 
 garlanded by beauty, reclining on crimson and 
 gold, floated among opal mountains (the name 
 still attaches to a snowy range) and far-reaching 
 valleys, sown thick with jewels — a region fearful 
 to land in, because of the one-horned rhinoceros 
 and the monstrous Cibola (buffalo). 
 
 As we walked about while waiting for the am- 
 bulance, the Indian men tagged after us, eyeing 
 the travellers with their intolerable fixed stare ; 
 but the women sat still in their places. There 
 was no breeze to stir the air, no changing clouds 
 enlivening the bare and brilliant sky, no sound of 
 wheels, no tramp of men audible in the sandy 
 soil. The isolation was perfect as that of a reef 
 in mid-ocean. 
 
 The earth lay in stillness unbroken, and the 
 mute and moveless Indian woman was the type 
 of a deadness which rests on the land forever. 
 
 Wonderful are the works of an inspired imag- 
 ination! This is the region where the West 
 Indian king reveled as he sailed, and, like another 
 Antony, kissed away kingdoms and provinces 
 We had read the chronicles and saw that day the 
 favorite of the harem, whose voice was like run- 
 ning water in the ear of the thirsty, her step like 
 the bounding fawn, her grace like the swaying 
 reed, her smile a glance of the Great Spirit. She 
 is known in our times as the Pimo Squaw. She 
 leaned against a crazy mud wall, which she 
 appeared to prop, and was so nearly the same 
 shade of clay that at first the statuesque shape 
 seemed carved in it. A stumpy figure, nude to 
 the waist draped in one buckskin skirt. The 
 leathery skin, tanned by long exposure to the 
 
222 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 fierce sun's beat and roughening wind, was 
 darkly veined and coarse. To eyes accustomed 
 to see in woman's form the fairest of all fair- 
 ness — 
 
 " A thing to dream of, not to tell "— 
 
 the sight is not alluring. She was scarcely 
 twenty-five years of age ; but the pitiless climate 
 (which we are constantly called upon to admire) 
 had worn wrinkles in her face deep enough to 
 bury her youth in. Her small, shapely feet were 
 cased in moccasins ; the slim hands, idly resting 
 in her lap, were burnt to a mahogany color (the 
 cinnamon tint entirely lost) and knotted with the 
 hard work of corn-grinding. Her one ornament 
 was a sea-shell, tied round her throat by a deer- 
 skin string. 
 
 Nourmahal had a Mongol cast of features — 
 narrow button- hole eyes, almost no eye-brows, 
 high cheek-bones, thick lips, tattooed chin. As 
 the angelic portion of our party (delicately 
 referring to the writer) approached for nearer 
 view, she made no sign, except to turn the 
 dull Chinese eyes, which a short study of 
 inscriptions on tea-boxes would give the right 
 oblique, and fix them on us with a tireless, 
 unwinking gaze. 
 
 The ruins are twenty miles from the villages of 
 the Pimos, a branch of the Pueblo Indians, and 
 only twelve miles from the town of Florence on 
 the South Pacific Railroad. The wagon road 
 runs along the Gila Valley, a level bottom of 
 varying width with abrupt scarped banks of earth. 
 The plain is of a pale gray color, with a low mossy 
 grass, its monotony being relieved by groves of 
 mezquit, a species of acacia resembling our locust, 
 but w ith foliage more delicate and almost shade- 
 less. The stunted trees grow branching from 
 the ground so low as to be nearly trunkless ; 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace. 223 
 
 knotted, gnarled, dwarfed, black of bark, vaster 
 of root than of top, yet with a certain grace 
 derived from the small emerald green leaves del- 
 icately set on trembling fronds. Occasionally a 
 val-de-verde appears, a peculiar ai^i striking 
 growth of green body, bark, leaf and limb, never 
 very large and not over eight inches in diameter; 
 and here and there is a prickly pear, twenty 
 feet in height, loaded with red, pear-shaped 
 fruit. 
 
 The shifting outlines of the Tucson Mountains, 
 never five minutes the same, are drawn in perfect 
 relief against a sky of unrivalled brilliance; the 
 purest sapphire, free from every taint of mist, fog, 
 or vapor. The exquisite fineness of the atmos- 
 phere shows clearly the high and rugged peaks 
 of the Sierra Catarina, and one picture-like sum- 
 mit, called Pichaco, overlooks the chain of hills 
 below through a veil of dying blue. Close to 
 the river's brim the willow tosses its branches in 
 the eternal west wind, lightly as a lady's plume, 
 and bears a profusion of lilac flowers rarely beau- 
 tiful. On the sterile mesa appears the suwar- 
 row (Cereus Giganteus) of a peculiar and fantas- 
 tic shape, and a wild verbena repeats the shade 
 of the far-off hill purples. 
 
 Miles away from the dead cities we struck the 
 bed of an ancient acquia, very large and per- 
 fectly defined, the main artery by which the river 
 bottom, only a mile or so wide here, was irri- 
 gated in former times. Mezquit trees, appar- 
 ently falling into decay from age, stand in the 
 diy, abandoned ditches, whose various branches 
 may be traced in every direction, a network of 
 irrigating canals. Here and there elevations in 
 the plain proclaim the existence of fallen walls ; 
 and depressions, from which the earth was used 
 to make the adobe are close by. Nearer the city 
 of silence, imniense quantities of broken pultery 
 
224 1^^^ Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 strew the ground, an arrowhead or stone axe 
 comes to Hght, and the least excitable visitor 
 must admit that the Gila Valley, where desola- 
 tion reigns supreme, was once densely populated. 
 We have, in addition, the strong testimony of 
 adjacent artificial mounds, supposed to have been 
 burial places ; but the mythical mines of silver 
 and gold laid down on the oldest maps, referred 
 to by the oldest missionaries, do not yet appear. 
 A popular theory has been held that theCasas 
 were habitations of companies of miners who 
 worked undiscovered placers hard by. Happily 
 this conceit has been exploded. 
 
 The ruins stand on a low, broad mesa, or 
 table-land, rising slightly from the main road, 
 and are covered by a thicket of mezquit trees 
 not exceeding twenty feet in height, but conceal- 
 ing the dun-colored walls till we were close on 
 them. Passing beyond the leafy screen we saw, 
 within the space of one hundred and fifty yards, 
 three buildings. Two are battered and decay- 
 ing, so ruinous as to baffle the effort of the tour- 
 ist to form an idea of their original size, the 
 shape being, as in all these remains, a parallel- 
 ogram. Their walls were standing sufficiently 
 to trace the plan thirty five years ago. 
 
 We bent our steps to the main building, larg- 
 est and best preserved, and with a keen sense of 
 disappointment beheld the structure so dear to 
 archaeologists and known for three centuries as 
 the House of Montezuma. Though familiar by 
 picture and description, I had thought to find 
 some display of regal power in architectural 
 grace and finish ; remnants of mouldings, broken 
 lines of cornices, and at least one lofty portal 
 through which the tawny courtiers might have 
 filed in barbaric pomp to salute the Rocky 
 Mountain King. It is merely a tremendous 
 mud house, on which the centuries have spent 
 
The Kui7is of Montezuma s Palace. 225 
 
 their strength in vain, standing in the hush of 
 utter sohtude, batthng time and the elements. 
 Tiiere is nothing picturesque about it. No 
 friendly hchen, running creeper or traiHng ivy- 
 can hve in this dry dewless air and with tender 
 verdure clothe the nakedness of the ragged struc- 
 ture. Against the sand blast no wreathing vine 
 can cling, and in its embrace soften the mass of 
 ugliness harshly outlined against the bare and 
 brilliant sky, unflecked by cloud or shadow. 
 Our spirits went down, down before the legend- 
 ary Palace of Montezuma we had come so far 
 to see. For this we had strained over lava beds, 
 through the sunburnt ways of the wilderness, 
 across valleys of sand, sage desert, and grease- 
 wood plain, breathing, eating, drinking alkali, 
 and wearing its dust like a dingy travelling suit ! 
 Instead of poetry here was certainty. 
 
 The mountain rim was a refreshm.ent to the 
 vision. There the aerial hues, so like the stuff 
 which dreams are made of, gave the only ideal 
 touch to a scene forbiddingly real. No hint of 
 beauty or excellence of workmanship is found in 
 a near view of the Casa, which is entitled to 
 admiration only on account of its age, and to 
 a hold on fancy because its origin and uses are 
 unkn:)\vn. Desolate and isolated now, time was 
 when it was encircled by similar buildings 
 grouped in villages scattered broadly over the 
 wide plateau. In every direction are broken 
 lines of falle;i walls, oblong heaps crumbled 
 down to the du:st whence they sprung; and the 
 extent of irrigation must have made the valley a 
 cultivated garden, or a field of corn large enough 
 to sustain a vast population. 
 
 But there was little time for sentiment. Our 
 
 surveys must be made in haste. The walls are 
 
 entirely adobe ; in no portion is there any stone 
 
 used. Instead of the modern Spanish-American 
 
 15 
 
226 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 adobes, moulded to about six times the size of our 
 ordinary bricks, this aboriginal "palace" is built 
 of large blocks of concrete (called by Mexicans 
 tapia), three feet or more in length, by two feet in 
 width and thickness. They are of irregular size, 
 indicating that a box. or mould was used in the 
 manufacture into which the mortar was cast 
 where it was to remain in the walls ; and as it 
 dried the cases were moved along. A recent 
 chemical analysis of the concrete shows the 
 secret of its durability under the wasting and 
 wearing of ages in a structure certainly a ruin 
 for three hundred years, and with a pre-Spanish 
 existence of a century and perhaps more. Sev- 
 enteen per cent, of the mortar is carbonate of 
 lime. Probably lime was burned and mixed 
 with the sand and gravel of the country, which 
 contains a very adhesive clay, tough and lasting. 
 The walls are perpendicular within, slightly 
 tapering without, four feet thick, facing the car- 
 dinal points of the compass, almost the true 
 meridian. The building was fifty-eight feet long 
 and forty-three feet wide, the highest point of 
 the standing wall bemg thirty-five feet. It was 
 originally four or five stories high, being about 
 eight feet from floor to ceiling. In the 
 centre of each wall were narrow doors for 
 entrance into the main compartments, three feet 
 wide, five feet high, and growing narrower at the 
 top, except the one in the west front, which is 
 two feet by seven or eight. Over each door is a 
 port-hole whose dimensions I am unable to give. 
 The Indian's love of dark houses is apparent 
 here ; the only light admitted into the small 
 numerous rooms was through these holes in the 
 deep walls. The central room, with only one 
 opening, must have been as dismal as a dungeon. 
 It has been surmised that this was a sort of 
 watch-tower, eight or ten feet higher than the 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma' s Palace. 22 j 
 
 outer stories, probably one story above all the 
 rest when the Casa was entire. Some of the port- 
 holes have been filled in with mortar as though 
 the window, if window it was, admitted too much 
 light. 
 
 Father Font, who visited this ruin in 1776, 
 writes : " It is perceptible the edifice had three 
 stories. The Indians say it had four; the last 
 being a kind of subterranean vault. For the 
 purpose of giving light to the rooms nothing is 
 seen but the doors, and some round holes in the 
 middle of the walls which face to the east and 
 west, and the Indians said that the Prince, whom 
 they called the * Bitter Man,' used to salute the 
 sun through these holes (which are pretty large) 
 at its rising and setting. All the roofs are burnt 
 out except that of one low room, in an adjoining 
 house, which had beams, apparently cedar, small 
 and smooth, and over them reeds of equal size 
 and a layer of hard mud and mortar, forming a 
 very curious roof, or floor." 
 
 The different stories are easily identified by the 
 ends of beams remaining in the walls, or by the 
 holes into which the beams projected. They are 
 round rafters of cedar, or sabino, supporting the 
 floors, being perhaps six inches in diameter and 
 half a foot apart. The nearest mountain bear- 
 ing such trees is many a w^eary mile away. The 
 charred ends of beams prove that the interior 
 was destroyed by fire, but the massive four-foot 
 wall suffered no change by flaming floor, rafter, 
 or roof. The trees were hacked by a blunt tool, 
 probably a stone hatchet ; evidently iron was 
 unknown to the architect of Casas Grandes. The 
 Indigene substituted for it tempered copper and 
 tools of wrought obsidian. A few bone awls, or 
 flakers, for making arrow heads, have been dug 
 out of the gravel, and a metate, or corn grinder, 
 
228 The Land of ihe Pzieblos. 
 
 broken jars and a tomahawk of flint, have been 
 found, but there is no tracery made by iron. 
 
 Adobe walls are wonderfully durable in this 
 dry, equable climate, and with slight repairs last a 
 thousand years. Disintegration begins at the base, 
 where moisture gathers, and the walls, seamed 
 and furrowed near the earth by the action of heavy 
 yearly rains, are held together merely by their 
 great thickness. Their inner surface is smoothly 
 plastered with lime cement, little wrinkled marks 
 standing as they appeared when first dried after 
 the finish was laid on. There is no sign of 
 stairway, and ascent was probably made outside 
 on scaling ladders, as the Pueblos go up their 
 terraced domiciles throughout New Mexico and 
 Arizona. The rough coating without is flaked off 
 in some places by the continuous action of war- 
 ring winds which carry sand. Even more than 
 rain, this incessant agent is operating on the old 
 dun-colored adobes, and unless repairs are made 
 in the scarred and furrowed foundations, this 
 most interesting of antiquities must before long 
 become a shapeless wreck. There can have been 
 no considerable shock of earthquake in the 
 period during which it has been known to us ; 
 even a slight tremble would bring the time-worn 
 fabric down to hopeless destruction. 
 
 Standing on the mesa, the traveller sees in every 
 direction heaps of ruins, of which the Casas Gran- 
 des was the centre and principal. About two hun- 
 dred yards to the north-west is a circular inclos- 
 ure, also a ruin. It is supposed to have been a 
 corral for cattle, which, unless, as some assume, 
 it was used as a menagerie, would make it of 
 more recent date, as the Indians were without 
 domestic animals before the conquest. Archi- 
 tectural remains have been well called the bal- 
 ance wheels of tradition. After actual sight and 
 touch there is no room for dreams and visions. 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace. 229 
 
 Temples and towers proclaim worship, sculptures 
 hint of refinement, wealth and elegant tastes. 
 Coins tell of commerce, and frescoes like those 
 of Pompeii and Rome are illuminated books of 
 Chronicles. 
 
 This antique pile is expressive of a low condi- 
 tion of art. Its size is impressive when we con- 
 sider that it was completed without the aid of 
 domestic animals or iron, but by hand labor 
 alone. The only idea left in the mind of the 
 visitor is that it was designed to accommodate 
 great numbers of persons ; a cumbrous human 
 hive. There is no forest growth above it by 
 which to date the passage of years ; and the 
 ceaseless delving of the archaeologist has failed 
 to find a key, accepted by all as the true one, to 
 the age and purpose of so remarkable a building. 
 Excavations made on an appropriation by the 
 Legislature of Arizona resulted in nothing. A 
 citizen of Florence reports finding a piece of 
 gold resembhng coin in the debris, and it is said 
 that a hollow sound has been heard by those 
 jumping on the floor of the inner room. Part 
 of the walls have fallen, which may account for 
 the noise. That ghost is laid and no voice or 
 breath of living thing disturbs the dreaming pil- 
 grim and baffled antiquarian as in mournful pro- 
 cession they carry off their relics — bits of broken 
 plaster and pottery. 
 
 The earliest reporters describe eleven buildings 
 in close proximity to each other, and there can 
 be no reason to doubt their record, judging by 
 the high heaps of mud and gravel lying in every 
 direction about the great Casa. Compassing it 
 is a prostrate wall extending four hundred and 
 twenty feet from north to south, and two hun- 
 dred and sixty feet from east to west, which they 
 believed was a part of the Casa itself — a natural 
 
230 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 mistake which has given many a highly exagger- 
 ated idea of the structure inclosed by it. 
 
 The first recorded mention of Casas Grandes is 
 made in 1 540, by Captains Diaz and Saldibar, 
 who with twelve intrepid men marched from the 
 city of Culiacan and ascended the Gila as far as 
 Chichiticale, or Red House, on the border of the 
 Colorado Desert. They had from friendly 
 Indians glowing descriptions of the seven cities 
 of Cibola, in which whole streets were said to be 
 occupied exclusively by workers in gold and 
 silver. " They had sculptured silver and spear 
 heads and drinking cups of precious metals." 
 Fired by these beguiling fables Coronado led a 
 little army of picked men, fifty soldiers, a few 
 infantry, his particular friciv s and the monks, in 
 search of fairy land, the vanishing seven cities of 
 Cibola. His secretary records that when the 
 general passed through all the inhabited region to 
 the place where the desert begins and saw there 
 was *' notliing good," he could not repress his 
 sadness notwithstanding the marvels which were 
 promised further on. 
 
 The traveller of 1880 has much the same sen- 
 sation as that which smote the soul of the dashing 
 Coronado of 1540. In the time of the latter the 
 whole of the North American Continent east of 
 the Rio Grande was called Florida. It is not 
 surprising that much inaccurate information pre- 
 vailed regarding the geography of Nueva Es- 
 pagna, but it is easy to identify Casas Grandes 
 with the *' Red House" standing in a mezquit 
 jungle on the edge of the desert, the first ruin 
 seen on the Gila by one ascending from its 
 mouth. In certain lights the walls have a reddish 
 tint, and again appear white on account of peb- 
 bles contained in the plaster. 
 
 In 1694 Father Kino visited the Casas Grandes. 
 He heard traditions of the Pimos running back 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace. 23I 
 
 four hundred years ; it had been a ruin for ages, 
 and was destroyed by fire in the war with the 
 Apaches. '' The principal room in the middle is 
 four stories, the adjoining rooms on its four sides 
 are of three stories, with walls so smooth and 
 shining that they appear like burnished tables. 
 At the distance of an arquebuss shot, twelve other 
 houses were to be seen, also half fallen, having 
 thick walls, and all the ceilings burnt except in 
 the lower room of one house." He mentions 
 also canals for irrigation, " which had capacity for 
 carrying half the water of the river." The good 
 priest took peaceable possession of the forsaken 
 spot, set up the cross within the drear}/ w^alls and 
 made the place a holy shrine with the celebration 
 of mass. 
 
 Of the old descriptions that of Father Font, 
 who visited the scene in 17/9, is most valuable. 
 I regret not having space for a longer extract 
 from his journal : " The large house or Palace of 
 Montezuma," he says, ''according to the histories 
 and meagre accounts of it which we have from 
 the Indians, may have been built some 500 
 years ago ; for, as it appears, this building was 
 erected by the Mexicans when, during their 
 transmigration, the Devil led them through 
 various countries until they arrived at the 
 promised land of Mexico ; and in their sojourns, 
 which were ]:nj ones, they formed towns and 
 built edifices." He further speaks of ruins in 
 every direction. " The land is partially covered 
 with pieces of pots, jars, plates, etc." He was 
 the first one who discovered that the outer wall 
 was a fortification, '' a fence which surrounded this 
 house and other buildings." Within the last 
 thirty years the Casa de Montezuma has been 
 often described, and so much speculation has 
 been expended as to its origin and uses that I 
 hesitate to- push out into that dark sea. 
 
232 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 There is a succession of ruined cities, forming 
 a continuous chain of evidence, from Utah to the 
 City of Mexico. I have examined many of these 
 dead pueblos and can discover no essential in 
 which they differ from each other, from the living 
 pueblos now inhabited, or from the Casas Grandes. 
 All are community houses, where a whole tribe 
 may dwell, built of adobe in the shape of an ob- 
 long square around an open court. Inclosing 
 this was an outer wall or fortification with towers 
 at regular intervals for the posting of sentinels. 
 The old pueblos were built on a table land so as 
 to afford an outlook for sentries and an oppor- 
 tunity for watching depredations on the corn 
 lands in the valleys below ; and often at a distance 
 are found the remains of a circular watch-tower, 
 a signal station near the city. Such are the pre- 
 historic vestiges along the TvIcElmo, Colorado, 
 San Juan and the Rio Mancos, and the widely 
 dispersed remains in the Ehaco and Mancho. 
 Such is the solitary watch-tower in the Carion of 
 the Hovenweep, Utah. The north ernmostbuild- 
 ings discovered in Arizona and Colorado are 
 exact copies of the Southern and Moqui pueblos, 
 varying with situation and with the quality of 
 material used. Generally the earth of the 
 country was mixed with ashes and clay. The 
 lack of individuality in the Indian race gives you 
 the feeling that if you see one you have seen all ; 
 so it is in regard to their habitations. The same- 
 ness of the remains, and their close likeness to 
 the Casas Grandes and the modern buildings, 
 must strike the most careless observer. Yet they 
 are not more alike than the builders themselves. 
 
 There are few, if any antiquities, that have not 
 been searched through and through and reported 
 on. The hunter, miner, scout, surveyor, priest and 
 sightseer have overlooked no hill or plain where 
 there is a trace of human dwelling. Undoubtedly 
 
The Ruins of Montezuma s Palace. 233 
 
 the adobe houses wherever found are the work 
 of a semi-civihzed, agricultural [>eople with whom 
 the Spaniards came in conflict, and who are 
 described by them as Pueblo, or Town Indians, 
 to distinguish them from the nomads or wander- 
 ing tribes of the primitive race. An immense 
 amount of romance has been wasted on the old 
 mud houses, which makes them hardly less won- 
 derful than the enchanted city Tiahuanco, 
 which was built in a single night by an invis- 
 ible hand; but the time is come to put out 
 wavering lights and to banish shifting shadows. 
 
 I am convinced that the Palace of Montezuma 
 was designed as a fortress, a centre from which 
 many villages radiated and to which the inhab- 
 itants fled for refuge in a last extremity. The 
 hghtness of the floor rafters in the lower story 
 precludes the possibility that the building was 
 used as a granary. Any one of the many rooms 
 full of grain must have crushed the floors, if not 
 the Vv^alls themselves. Again, it has been declared 
 to have been a temple for the sun worshippers; 
 but the smallncss and multiplicity of the rooms 
 and the many doors and port holes oppose such 
 a surmise, though the dismal central room 
 and the circular passages between the rooms 
 might suggest priestcraft, and heathen rites and 
 sorceries. 
 
 It may have been, hke the castle of the middle 
 ages, the nucleus around which the city grad- 
 ually grew up, but more probably it rose from 
 the needs of the citizens, many of whom must 
 have toiled in its erection. For many, many 
 years the Apache has harried this land. It is the 
 Indian law to destroy all that he cannot carry 
 away, and the pottery is always broken, the 
 interiors are always fired. The builders of adobe 
 houses, wherever found, were open to incursions 
 of the same enemy which still infests the Mex- 
 
234 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 icaii border. To me these remains have no new 
 meanings. They merely prove that the North 
 American Continent has been inhabited from 
 a remote period ; something which I believe has 
 never been disputed. 
 
 The undated tradition is that the spot which I 
 am trying to describe is one of the stopping 
 places of Montezuma on his southward march to 
 Anahuac. All legends point to an emigration 
 from north to south. Coming from the ends of 
 the earth, or from fabled Azatlan, the first halt 
 the Montezumas made was at old Zuni ; this was 
 the second station ; the third was near Chihuahua, 
 Mexico, where enormous ruins, exact reproduc- 
 tions of these are standing isolated in a luxuriant 
 valley, the tottering monuments of a peculiar 
 tribe or tribes of a bygone nationality. Nothing 
 is to be learned from the natives there, who, like 
 all Pueblos, love to call themselves sons of Monte- 
 zuma, or from the Mexicans round about What- 
 ever requires a moment's thought is dismissed by 
 the ever-ready, meaningless, Qiden sabe ? " Who 
 knows ?" 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 TO THE CASAS GRANDES. 
 
 The Casas Grandes on the Laguna de Guz- 
 man in Northwestern Chihuahua are similar in 
 every respect to the ruined fortresses of New 
 Mexico and Arizona. The points of resem- 
 blance are so close and so numerous as to be 
 decisive, proving them to be the work of the 
 same people under similar, though somewhat 
 superior, institutions. On my table is an un- 
 broken vase unearthed from this most venerable 
 
Tesuke Water Vases. 
 
To the Casus Grandes. 235 
 
 ruin of North America : a veritable antique, 
 rare and valuable. It is of a light clay color, 
 glazed without and within. The shape, the 
 peculiar markings in geometrical lines, white, 
 black and maroon red, prove the hand of its 
 manufacturer. I should recognize it instantly 
 in any collection as a Pueblo Avater jar of ancient 
 workmanship, better made than any which we 
 have from the Pueblos now. It contains the fol- 
 lowing memorandum : " This olla or taiiaja was 
 excavated from the ruins of the Montezuma 
 Casas Grandes in the State of Chihuahua in the 
 year 1864, and according to Indian tradition is 
 800 years old. These Casas Grandes (great 
 houses) were reduced to ruin, by siege, in 1070." 
 This is signed, "William Pierson, American 
 Consul in 1873." 
 
 It is the only whole jar and much the finest 
 specimen I have ever seen. Still it is greatly 
 inferior to the coarsest Wedgwood china in our 
 shops. There has never appeared a monument 
 or relic proving the existence of a people of 
 more advanced culture than the red race with 
 which the European cam^e in contact. How the 
 peculiar civilization which this vase represents 
 came from the North, as every tradition declares 
 it did, is a question that has been argued many 
 times in many ways. Among a vanquished, 
 declining people, without even the lowest forms 
 of picture-writing, language rapidly alters; and 
 philologists tell us that American languages are 
 the most changeful forms of human speech. 
 Legends soon become confused; the links of 
 connection are easily lost ; and even in its best 
 estate tradition is treacherous as memory. 
 Scholars hvive held that the adobe houses are 
 traces of the Toltecs, the polished predecessors 
 of the fierce and bloody Aztecs, under whose 
 dominie n the former broke and scattered. Phusi- 
 
23^ I'he Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 ble theories, more or less conclusive, have per- 
 plexed the student of indigenous races. One 
 solution, as soon as it was suggested, touched 
 me with the force of absolute conviction, because 
 it was so direct and simple an answer to the puz- 
 zling questions following an examination of the 
 antiquities of North America. 
 
 The Pueblo or town-building Indians were the 
 skirmish line of the Aztec nation when the 
 Mexican Empire was in the height of its great- 
 ness. The Aztecs were restless, aggressive, 
 greedy of power and insatiate in their lust for 
 dominion. To rove and to conquer was the 
 national pastime. The green banners of Ana- 
 huac floated defiantly in the tropic airs of the 
 remotest provinces on the Gulf of Mexico, 
 and dauntless warriors upheld their colors in 
 pristine splendor along the extreme coasts of 
 Honduras and Nicaragua. They formed the 
 unshackled, sovereign nation, possessing the 
 highest civilization in North America, speaking 
 a language by far the most finished and elegant 
 of the native tongues, said to be of exceeding 
 richness. 
 
 The Pueblos, whom we believe to be a rough 
 off-shoot of that stock, degraded descendants of 
 haughty princes, are yet a self-sustaining people, 
 independent of the Government, the only abor- 
 igines among us not a curse to the soil. In some 
 old time whereof history is silent and about 
 which there are no traditions, nor even the airy 
 hand of a misty legend to beckon us back and 
 point the way, the half-civilized tribes of Mexico 
 must have sought fresh fields for conquest and 
 occupation. They probably marched in detached 
 clans speaking different dialects, but more or 
 less united under one central government, and 
 with the arts and means of instruction brought 
 from Anahuac they set forth to colonize outly- 
 
To the Casus Grandes. lyj 
 
 ing countries to the north. A glance at the 
 map shows only one route by which they could 
 advance. West of the Sierra Madre and up the 
 Gila and its tributaries, toward the great carton 
 of the Colorado, colonies were planted along the 
 river banks, and possibly the emigrant fraternized 
 with the native. Captain Fernando Alarcon dis- 
 covered the Rio Colorado in 1 540, and passed 
 various tribes v/ithout being able to communi- 
 cate with them, except by signs, until he reached 
 a people Avho understood the language of an 
 Indian whom he had brought from Mexico. 
 From this tribe he learned of a similar people, 
 far to the eastward, who lived in great houses 
 built of stone. From Mexico the Southerners 
 brought the art of building with adobe and with 
 stones laid in mud mortar, which alone distin- 
 guishes them from the tribes dwelling in wig- 
 wams, shifting tents and lodges of buffalo skins 
 and boughs. There was a system of communi- 
 cation between their fortified towns, worn foot- 
 paths betraying a constant coming and going, 
 and deep trails furrowed by the tread of busy 
 feet through centuries. 
 
 The ancient builders invariably chose com- 
 manding positions overlooking their cultivated 
 fields for their pueblos, and added story after 
 story to the houses, usually terraced from with- 
 out, where a few defenders could defy almost 
 any number of assailants with savage arms. 
 Apaches were treated as barbarian hordes. 
 There is no mention of these Bedouins until a 
 century after Coronado's day, from which fact 
 we may infer that they were kept at bay. 
 
 Gradually the tide of emigration pressed up 
 to the Aztec Mountains and San Francisco 
 Peaks, but there the march of the victorious 
 invader was suddenly stopped by a barrier ut- 
 terly impassable — the canons of the Colorado 
 
238 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 and Chiquito Rivers, which, united, form a gulf 
 at least 300 miles long, and which in places are 
 a mile in depth. It lay directly across their 
 course, a stupendous chasm which wings only 
 would have enabled them to cross. No sea or 
 desert could so effectually have hindered their 
 progress northward. They turned toward the 
 East, took possesion of the rich valleys of the 
 Colorado and Chiquito, where streets of towns 
 and irrigating canals are still traceable for miles, 
 and followed its branches to their sources. All 
 the towns are along the river. The bottom 
 lands are fertile with alluvial deposits. There 
 are large cotton-wood trees and impenetrable 
 thickets of arrow and greasewood among the 
 numberless lagoons and sloughs which, at the 
 annual rise of the ri/er, are filled to overflowing 
 and irrigate the soil. But no vegetation can 
 live beyond the limit of these overflows. A 
 white efflorescence covers the ground, where it 
 is useless to plant, where nothing edible for man 
 or beast will grow. 
 
 On the neighboring streams the chiefs founded 
 the kingdom of Cibola, where now we see exten- 
 .-^ive ruins attesting the size of the old towns, all 
 of which were fortified and built on the same 
 general plan. Old Tuni was the capital city, set 
 on a hill of rock and reached only by one zigzag 
 path, where a handful of soldiers could defy the 
 cavalry of the world. In a similar condition the 
 ruins of the seven Moqui villages are found, and 
 North of them is the site of an adjacent colony. 
 To the north-east they moved from the head of 
 Flax River to the southern tributaries of the San 
 Juan, the Canon de Chaco and the Valle de 
 Chelly, '* where," says Lieutenant McCormick, 
 "half a million mi dit have lived," being strewn 
 v/i'-h the ruins of dead cities. 
 
 At last, by following up the headwaters of the 
 
To the Casas Grandes. 239 
 
 Rio de San Juan to the Colorado Mountains, 
 they penetrated the Rio Grande Valley, a fertile 
 and widely extended region destined to be sub- 
 dued and colonized. From this point their 
 imperious course was down the valley from the 
 north, as all traditions point ; and, naturally, the 
 conquerors built a vast stronghold at Taos to 
 protect that beautiful valley from attacks of the 
 w^ild tribes, mainly Utes — a gloomy, forbidding 
 citadel of savage aspect, set on a hill overlooking 
 the Rio Grande. So strong a retreat is it that 
 in 1847, when the Mexicans of the modern vil- 
 lage of Taos could no longer defend themselves 
 against the armies of the United States, they fled 
 to this abandoned pueblo, a few miles distant, and 
 there sustained a protracted siege, yielding fin- 
 ally when provisions utterly failed. The grim 
 and threatening fortress was never captured by 
 the Spaniards, though many times attacked. 
 The terraces bristled with spears and battle-axes, 
 through the little windows arrows were show- 
 ered, and stones and burning balls of cotton 
 dipped in oil were hurled from slings. The 
 lower story, a well-filled granary — and the cis- 
 terns within the court, enabled the red men *' to 
 laugh a siege to scorn." 
 
 The route which we have rapidly sketched 
 was discovered and maintained by the armies of 
 many generations ; the changes described in a 
 paragraph were brought about by wars lasting 
 through ages. Well did those migratory tribes 
 know the fierce delight of battle which thrills 
 alike the blood of the white man and the red, when 
 once within the heat and fury of its deadly 
 charm. 
 
 In the course of time the entire valley of the 
 Rio Grande from latitude 37° to latitude 32°, a 
 distance of over 400 miles, was thickly settled. 
 It must have been a scene of constant activity, 
 
240 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 with its clusters of towns, whose streets are yet 
 plainly visible and may be followed for miles ; 
 and becoming the dominant nation, in the 
 main valley where the villages are nearest to 
 each other, the Aztecs found it unnecessary to 
 fortify their dwelling places. Out-lying settle- 
 ments, such as Pecos and Grand Quivira, in the 
 country swept by Comanches and Arapahoes, 
 and Laguna and Acoma, near the Navajos, were 
 defended by outworks like those in the Colorado 
 basin. 
 
 Near El Paso are widespread ruins of the pre- 
 historic epoch, and it is so short a march from 
 that crossing to the lovely and productive valley 
 of Rio Corralites and its lake, the Laguna de 
 Guzman, that it is most reasonable to suppose 
 the cases on this stream were built by a colony 
 from that region. The Indians and Mexicans 
 of our day are exactly right in asserting that the 
 ** great houses " are the work of Montezumas 
 who came from the North, and at various stations 
 fortified themselves against the roving tribes. So 
 it comes that the Town Builders of New Mexico 
 and Arizona, who are without history or hiero- 
 glyphic writing, have no record or even legend 
 of the dim and distant starting point wlien the 
 exodus from Mexico began. They brought a 
 species of civilization quite foreign to the nomads 
 who confronted them, battled for supremacy, and 
 disputed their sway. The civilization was nec- 
 essarily inferior to that of the source whence 
 it sprung. This is the condition in all migratory 
 movements. The wealthy, cultured classes are 
 conservative, slow to change ; the dissatisfied 
 spirits, adventurers with little to leave or to take, 
 strike out of the beaten paths in hope of better- 
 ing their fortunes. 
 
 The colonial beginnings were a poor represen- 
 tation of the splendors of Tezcuco where North 
 
To the Casas Grandes. 241 
 
 American civilization, under the commanding 
 genius of the second Montezuma, reached its 
 height. But the pilgrims brought with them glo- 
 rious memories. They must have seen the sacred 
 city Cholula, with its 400 temples, its huge pyra- 
 mid, wrought by the giant Haloc, nearly 200 feet 
 high, the sides measuring 450 yards at its base. It 
 was a terraced tower, a landmark, a beacon and a 
 shrine to all Anahuac, where the smoke from 
 the undying altar-fires went up as incense to the 
 gods, new every morning and fresh every even- 
 ing. There were no writhing victims on that hill 
 of sacrifice ; the gentle Quetzelcoatt delighted 
 not in blood ; his offerings were bread and roses 
 and all sweet perfumes. The townsmen in their 
 new homes built council-houses, meagre and 
 poverty-stricken compared with the Southern 
 temples, and kindled the sacred fires. Each vil- 
 lage had one or more of these estufas, where 
 holy rites were conducted in the utmost secrecy. 
 A priesthood of chosen warriors, consecrated to 
 the ministry, watched the altar-fire, and it was 
 never suffered to die out. 
 
 In all probability the later emigrants brought 
 with them the Montezuma idol. Possibly some 
 had been in the kneeling ranks of those who 
 kissed the earth at the sound of conch and ata- 
 bal which heralded the approach of the great 
 king, the child of the sun. Hardly had they 
 dared to lift their eyes, before the splendor of the 
 canopy of green featherwork fringed with spark- 
 ling pendants, which shaded his jewelled plumes. 
 They could not fail to remember the floating 
 robes of gorgeous dyes, the blazing arms making 
 the glance dizzy with the shining of precious 
 stones ; and, best of all, that princely presence in 
 the midst of worshipping subjects, who heldthcm- 
 selves but as dust beneath the golden soles of 
 the royal satidals. They could not forget the 
 
242 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 wall of orbed shields about his sacred person, 
 the keen sparkle of burnished spear tips, the fly- 
 ing flags of various colors which the Indian 
 loves so well, and the shouts of thousands on 
 thousands c-f loyal subjects who counted not 
 their lives dear unto themselves but for their 
 service to their emperor. The all- conquering 
 Montezuma was at first only a proud memory. 
 By degrees a halo and a light appeared round the 
 name of the king of kings. Men love to trace 
 their descent back to some storied greatness, and 
 all barbarous nations delight to associate their 
 origin with the deities. The yearning to be as 
 gods, is one of the instinctive impulses of the 
 human heart. It began in Eden and is as old as 
 the first man. 
 
 From reverence of the compelling spirit which 
 left its imprint on vast regions, various tribes and 
 long periods of time, it is easy to pass to adora- 
 tion. The valley of the Rio Grande was once a 
 valley of gods ; they breathed in the winds, 
 frowned in the storms; their wrath was the 
 earthquake and their smile was fair weather. 
 The central idea ceaselessly recurring in the 
 pantheistic religion of the Pueblos of the nine- 
 teenth century is the shining figure of Monte- 
 zuma, and their belief in his return is the dearest 
 of all their faiths. As in the Greek legends, we 
 cannot define the line between myth and history, 
 but we are forced to believe so widespread a 
 religion must have had a beginning remote from 
 the degraded, broken-hearted creatures who pray 
 to him daily. The dim memories of a great past 
 never quite fade away from among any people. 
 The dreamy, mythical, departed grandeur of 
 their ancestors has led the Pueblos to the hope 
 of a restoration ; for with them the vague past 
 and the indefinite future are both better than the 
 dull, tame present. The hope in every breast, 
 
To the Casas Grandes. 243 
 
 slow to die, if indeed it ever dies, looks to a regen- 
 eration, a lifting up of the bowed race so nurci- 
 lessiy stricken down by the Spaniards. The 
 caciques who guard the sacred fires watch at 
 the daybreak for the second coming of the law- 
 giver, prophet and priest, and pray with faces 
 toward the sun-house where he takes his kingly 
 rest in the abode of his fathers. In the golden 
 dawn of some morning, fairest where all are fair, 
 he shall push back the curtains of his tabernacle 
 intolerably bright, and with roll of drums, music 
 of reeds and beauty of banners shall return to his 
 own again. 
 
 It is the tendency, even in carefully recorded 
 annals, to make one man the doer of all heroic 
 deeds. The unnamed dead live in the life of one 
 king of men. The lesser lights wane and pale 
 before its splendor, and finally all mingle in a 
 resplendent focus, and one immortal stands for- 
 ever the representative of the '"poch, a sceptred 
 deity. Such are the demigods of Southern Eu- 
 rope: such is the fair-haired Odin of the mead- 
 drinking warriors in sheepskin and horsehide; 
 such is King Arthur, gone away under promise 
 to return from 
 
 The island valley of Avilion, 
 Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 
 Nor ever wind blows loudly. 
 
 And such is the Messiah of the Town Builders, 
 brother of the sun, equal of the one Omnipotent 
 God, uncreated and eternal, whose name it is 
 death to utter. 
 
 Tried by the delicate test of language, there is 
 no analogy between the modern Town Builder 
 and the Mexican of the South ; but this is not 
 conclusive. Centuries of changing environment 
 work miraculous changes in any people. How 
 much is the modern Briton like his ancestor, the 
 cave dweller, clad in skins of the beasts which 
 
244 1^^^ Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 almost shared his den, living on roots and bow- 
 ing down at strange altars ? Even in the same 
 generation, in the best age of the most enli'f^bt- 
 ened of kingdoms, how much does the liish 
 gentleman resemble his degraded tenant, the 
 peat-digger ? Nay, they can scarcely compre- 
 hend each other's speech. Of the heroes, num- 
 bered by hundreds of thousands, who upheld our 
 victorious banner during the great Rebellion, how 
 many names will remain at end of the year 2880? 
 Possibly one. The least observant traveller 
 through the country of the Pueblos must notice 
 that it has changed for the worse since the "great 
 houses" were built. They stand on the rim of 
 the Colorado Desert, and if we accept the theory 
 of the geologists that this is the dry bed of an 
 inland sea, the climate must once have been very 
 unlike what it is now — waterless ten months of 
 the year, and at summer noon as hot and as sti- 
 fling as the air of a limekiln. Scientists unite in 
 testifying that the rainfall west of the Rio Grande 
 is much less than formerly. The present streams 
 are shrunken threads of those which once flowed 
 in their channels when forests were more abun- 
 dant. Northern Arizona has hills whose bases 
 are covered with dead cedar trees, immense belts 
 untouched by fire, proving that the conditions 
 friendly to the growth of vegetation are restricted 
 to narrowing limits. Spots that have been pro- 
 ductive are barren ; springs gushed from the 
 ground which at present is dry and parched, and 
 an agricultural people has lived where now no 
 living being could maintain existence. Every- 
 thing indicates that this region was formerly 
 better watered. Many rivers of years ago are 
 now rivers of sand, and the Gila at its best, after 
 gathering the confluent streams, San Pedro and 
 Salado, is not so large in volume as an Indiana 
 creek. Ethnologists try to prove that the 
 
To the Casas Grandes. 245 
 
 Town Builders came from the extreme North, 
 perhaps originally from Kamtchatka, and that 
 the adobe houses and Montezuma worship were 
 of indigenous growth, founded by the monarch 
 who bears the proudest name in Indian history. 
 There are no Pueblos North of the thirty- 
 seventh parallel, and the decline of the race 
 began long before the Spanish invasion. It will 
 be remembered that the Casas Grandes was a roof- 
 less, crumbling ruin, without a history more 
 than 300 years ago. The Pueblos must have 
 been a mighty nation in the prime of their 
 strength, and legends of their ancient glory 
 before they passed under the hated Spanish yoke 
 are cherished among the different tribes. Re- 
 duced as they were in numbers and power, their 
 battle for freedom was a long and gallant strug- 
 gle. They were finally brought into subjection, 
 even to the Moquis who lived perched in tiny 
 houses on scarred, seamed cliffs of volcanic rock, 
 where nature's fires are burnt out, in a barren 
 country, arid and inhospitable, absolutely worth- 
 less to v/hite men. 
 
 Never was life so lonely and cheerless as in 
 the desolate hovels of the Moquis. Their land 
 is not a tender solitude, but a forbidding desola* 
 tion of escarped cliffs, overlooking wastes of 
 sand where the winds wage war on the small 
 shrubs and venturesome grasses, leaving to the 
 drouth such as they cannot uproot. A few 
 scrubby trees, spotting the edge of the plain as 
 if they had looked across the waterless waste 
 and crouched in fear, furnish a little brushwood 
 for the fires of the Moquis, who are fighting out 
 the battle for existence that is hardly worth the 
 struggle. Fixed habitation anywhere implies 
 some sort of civilization. The flinty hills are 
 terraced, and by careful irrigation they manage 
 to raise corn enough to keep body and soul 
 
246 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 together. The seven villages within a circuit of 
 ten miles have been isolated from the rest of the 
 world through centuries, yet they have so little 
 intercourse with each other that their tribal lan- 
 guages, everywhere subject to swift mutations, 
 are entirely unlike. Diminutive, low-set men 
 wrapped in blankets passively sitting on the bare, 
 seared rocks in the sun, are the ghastly proprie- 
 tors of a reservation once the scene of busy 
 activities. They number only 1,600 souls; 
 shreds of tribes almost exhausted, surrounded 
 by dilapidated cities unquestionably of great 
 antiquity. The sad heirship of fallen greatness 
 is written in the emptiness of their barren estates. 
 Fragments of pottery are profusely scattered 
 about ; and deeply- worn foot-paths leading from 
 village to village, down the river bank and wind- 
 ing up to the plain, mark the ancient thorough- 
 fares which are now slightly trodden or utterly 
 deserted. 
 
 How the Indians were enslaved and driven to 
 the mines, and how they perished there by thou- 
 sands, is a matter of familiar history. They 
 were an abject and heart-broken people after the 
 Conquest, and their decline still goes steadily on. 
 Whole tribes are extinct. Others have united 
 with each other for safety, and within the mem- 
 ory of citizens of Santa Fe the feeble remnant 
 of the tribe at Pecos joined that at Jemez, which 
 speaks the same language. 
 
 After all, the question is not so much whence 
 they come as whithei they go. The human family 
 is never at rest ; its condition is one of change. 
 From the beginning nations and peoples have 
 come and gone — vanished, where ? Who knows ? 
 Who cares ? They moved forward in the resist- 
 less march, served the end for which they were 
 created, died and were forgotten. They come 
 like shadows, so depart. Across these desolate 
 
r 
 
 Pueblo Wristlets, Moccasins, etc. 
 
To the Casas Grandes. 247 
 
 Rocky Mountain ranges a turbulent stream of 
 humanity once ebbed and flowed in perpetual 
 unrest. Then there were tribes chasing, tribes 
 fleeing, nation rising up against nation, scattering, 
 absorbing, driving each other into annihilation ; 
 and the hills echoed the triumphant music of the 
 scalp dances over the graves of slain thousands. 
 The history of those mighty turmoils and revo- 
 lutions must remain forever unwritten. The 
 present aborigines are but a forlorn wreck of 
 what they were in the long ago, when mountain 
 princes from the South were supreme rulers in a 
 realm of confederacies, whose boundaries cannot 
 be measured. 
 
 The civilization of the Town Builders is not 
 so much overthrown as it is worn out. Their 
 bows are broken, their fires burn low ; and the 
 sluggish, stolid sons of Montezuma creep at a 
 petty pace " along the way to dusty death." The 
 inroads of warring bands are not fatal as their 
 own system of communism. A closely-kept 
 people must become eflete ; and marriage within 
 the forbidden degrees, for ages on ages, produces 
 a diminutive, emasculate growth. In the tribes 
 most isolated, where race distinctions are sharply 
 drawn, this blood degeneration is most apparent. 
 Very many are scrofulous, and albinos with pink 
 ^yo:?, and wiry, white hair (strange sights !) are 
 frequent among the Zunis and Moquis. Physi- 
 cians tell us that it is a species of American 
 leprosy, consequent on the poverty of blood 
 through lack of alien infusion. 
 
 The weakening of this most interesting na- 
 tionality resembles the quiet decline of one 
 stricken in years. As in the empire, so in the 
 individual ; according to the predetermined doom 
 it cannot last, another must have its place. A 
 peculiar people, utterly lacking in self asser- 
 tion, through* whole decades living in servitude 
 
248 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 under an enforced religion, they have run their 
 race, worked out their destiny, and in the de- 
 crepitude of extreme old age, ruins and tribes, 
 the dead and the dying, are crumbHng away 
 together. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVL 
 
 A FRONTIER IDYL. 
 
 Our picnic was in the month of May and we 
 started from Santa Fe in the early morning. On 
 three sides the drowsy old town is guarded by 
 mountains royal with purple and glittering with 
 gold. Thirty miles away one snowy peak 
 seemed an airy tent let down out of heaven, and 
 across it the breeze blows as freshly as airs 
 across Eden when the world was young. 
 
 The road wound beside the little river Santa 
 Fe, whose waters go softly, after rippling down 
 in icy cascades from a lake pure as Tahoe, 
 formed by melting snows from the mountain top. 
 Along its margin the red willow tosses its 
 branches lightly as a lady's plume, and back in 
 the hill country the pine-trees sigh to each other 
 their never ceasing song. Over the rocks 
 clambering goats look down and shake their 
 beards at the traveller, and the tinkle of a bell 
 falls pleasantly on the ear as Mexican boys drive 
 their flocks to the river ; and where the sheep 
 are drinking an Indian woman carrying a black 
 jar on her head, erect and stately, comes to wash 
 her poor rags in the stream. 
 
 It is all like the old Bible pictures. The 
 somber landscape though sadly lacking color is 
 serene and pastoral, — so filled with the beauty 
 of peace and restful silence we thought of the 
 
A Frontier Idyl. 249 
 
 ancient pilgrims journeying in the shining white 
 light of the Delectable Mountains, and their talk 
 with loving shepherds by the wayside. No fear 
 of rain to spoil our pleasure ; there will not be 
 one drop, nor is there even dew. Yesterday we 
 breathed balm and incense ; to-morrow we know 
 will be just like to-day. The south wind has 
 " quieted the earth," and the blue overhead is 
 v/ithout spot of cloud, vapory mist or fog. 
 
 Our party was quite large. In advance a well 
 mounted Lieutenant, in the glory of his first 
 shoulder straps, rode close to the bridle rein of a 
 young girl whose flying veil gave short glimpses 
 of a beautiful face lighted with eyes of radiant 
 hazel and the brightest- smiles. They were a pair 
 of lovers, loved by us at first sight. In an 
 ambulance came a stout lady with color rather 
 high than delicate, whose unhappy bonnet would 
 not stick to her head but kept slipping down her 
 back. Beside her sat a weak woman from Illi- 
 nois, born tired and unable to find time to rest 
 since that wearisome date, having barely life 
 enough to be proud of her ten-year-old Rosa as 
 though children were the rarest things in the 
 world. On a little burro, or donkey, was a 
 school teacher without special escort, but looked 
 after by a dry old bachelor who had one romance 
 in his life and still wore the miniature of a face, 
 dearly loved and early lost, which has been only 
 dust thirty years. For the old love's sake he 
 treated all women with delicate reserve, seeing 
 in them kinship to the lost ideal they in some 
 sort represent A dream unbroken, for where 
 death sets his seal the imprint is eternal and 
 endureth forever. Then there rode along a 
 blonde and pensive artist, the author of many 
 rejected manuscripts, who carried sketching 
 paper and a neat box of pencils. He wore his 
 hair long and boots small, smoked cigarettes in- 
 
250 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 cessantly, and eyed the gay Lieutenant in bitter- 
 ness of soul. Several light carriages whirled 
 past us ; and Brown, the photographer, dashed 
 by on his own buckboard drawn by gallant gray 
 mules. I had only time to notice the stranger 
 beside him had the blackest eyes and wore a 
 diamond ring of unusual size and brilliance 
 which blazed in the sunlight as he courteously 
 lifted his hat. Among the last to appear was an 
 alumnus from Colorado College, who had elec- 
 trified the whole board of trustees with his 
 graduating speech entitled, " The Centennial 
 State — a Nation's Benediction." This callow 
 youth had made the eastern tour, had a nodding 
 acquaintance with the crowned heads of Boston, 
 "and in conscious superiority overshadowed his 
 companion, the Baptist minister, one of the 
 meekest spirits that ever starved its way to 
 heaven. 
 
 The army ambulance moved slowly through 
 the sandy red soil but we did not care; the 
 mountains — how grand they are ! — were a per- 
 petual delight. The fineness of the atmosphere 
 gave exquisite tints to the near foothills and the 
 vast horizon. Clusters of wild verbenas purpled 
 the plain — a deeper shade of the far away hill 
 purples — and strange flov/ers, yellow and pink, 
 nestled in the short, moss-like grass. They 
 never felt dew or rain, yet they did not appear 
 stunted or starved, but looked up brightly in the 
 sterile sand as from a garden bed. 
 
 Now and then a Pueblo Indian strode silently 
 across our way, and a Mexican in picturesque 
 striped blanket saluted us in Spanish fashion 
 v/Ith a " Buenos dias scnorasl'' as he drove his 
 cruelly loaded donkey toward the city. Lazy 
 Mexicans squatted in rows sunned themselves 
 against the low walls of their houses ; and on a 
 chimney a flock of pigeons tamely perched, and 
 
A Frontier Idyl. 251 
 
 watched the movements of a mower cutting the 
 grass which grew scantily on the flat mud roof of 
 his miserable hut. 
 
 When we reached the chosen ground a fire 
 was already kindled from the resinous boughs of 
 the pinon, and lovers were straying off in shady 
 places to find out what words the daisies are 
 saying to youth and beauty. 
 
 Brown, the photographer, introduced his guest, 
 a fine old Spaniard named Oreto. Fie wore the 
 easy air of a man familiar with good society, and 
 the lofty courtesy which marks the true Castilian, 
 I may say the true gentleman, anywhere. He 
 claimed to be hidalgo — literally, son of a Goth — 
 by which is meant pure Catholic Spanish blood, 
 without a taint of Jew or Moor ; was educated 
 at Salamanca, and by training conservative was 
 quick to denounce Castelar and his politics as 
 highly pernicious. In a quiet way he was a 
 great talker ; the flashing e\'es alone betrayed 
 the intensity of his feeling, and as no one entered 
 into debate with him, he fell to extolling the 
 glory of old Castile. Gradually the whole party 
 was attracted to him, and he became the centre 
 of a circle of interested listeners. 
 
 The fair rider with fluffy curls blown by the 
 mountain breeze against the arm she leaned on, 
 bent forward and asked, " Why leave your OAvn 
 country for this wild New World? " 
 
 " It is long to tell the state troubles which 
 drove me from home and made me a wanderer, 
 for out of Spain every land is exile ; too long for 
 even a summer day." 
 
 *' But not too long for our interest," she 
 answered with a charming animation ; " you are 
 alone in life," she added with a glance at the 
 band of mourning crape on \\\s sombrcj'o. 
 
 " Catalina and my niiiita are with the saints," 
 — he crossed his breast reverently. " When I 
 
252 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 laid them in the vault at Valladolid my heart 
 felt heavy and cold. I thought the long voyage 
 and sight of new places might warm it, and I 
 might find some diversion, or as our neighbors 
 over the Pyrenees say ' distraction,' by imitating 
 my ancient countryman in a chase after * the 
 fountain of youth. ' " 
 
 " That is in our own hearts." said Romeo, 
 with an arch glance at Juliet. 
 
 " Yes, so experience teaches. I am last of my 
 name and house, and" — his voice sunk mourn- 
 fully — " I had buried the v/ife of my youth, whom 
 I loved with a great love, after we had lived 
 together twenty years." 
 
 He sighed and turned his eyes toward the 
 mountain-top shining like silver in the keen, 
 clear light, and the artist fell to sketching Oreto's 
 profile. 
 
 '* Time is the great consoler," said the languid 
 lilinoisian, trying to adapt her harsh English to 
 the spoken music of the stranger. A southern 
 sky makes a gentle voice, and the Spanish tongue 
 has a matchless trick of melting all it touches 
 into a melody. 
 
 ^^La SeTiora is most kind, but it is too late ; 
 the heart has no second spring. Do you see the 
 white line down the mountain-side? " he asked, 
 abruptly changing the subject evidently painful 
 to dwell upon. 
 
 " Yes, it is a brook rising in a spring, cold as 
 ice, clear as glass." 
 
 " Then, instead of my dull, sad story let me tell 
 you the tradition of the Blue Fountain, the name 
 of the spring, — Fontaine- bleu ^ as the French 
 Fathers used to call it." 
 
 *' By all means; a story, a story ! " the ladies 
 cried in chorus. 
 
 *' You do me proud," said Oreto with a sweep- 
 
A Frontier Idyl. 253 
 
 ing bow, " and since you honor me with your 
 attention I promise not to weary it." 
 
 We disposed ourselves in various attitudes 
 about the speaker. The rising generation gath- 
 ered in graceful groups under the stunted pines, 
 and the setting generation sat on buffalo robes 
 and cushions against the gnarled and twisted 
 trunks of the piTwnes. Little Rosa was coaxed 
 to her mother's lap, and the stout lady reclined 
 on the back seat of the ambulance, loosened her 
 bonnet strings and made herself extremely com- 
 fortable while we listened to the 
 
 LEGEND OF THE BLUE FOUNTAIN. 
 
 ^'Once upon a time," the Spaniard began, with 
 his grave smile, "away to the North in the 
 country you call Montana lived a young Indian 
 hunter, tall and straight and very handsome. 
 From boyhood he had heard stories of happy 
 hunting-grounds where the pastiiras were always 
 fresh and game was always in sight. So one 
 bitter cold morning he put on his snow-shoes 
 and fur mittens, wrapped himself in his warmest 
 bearskin, and struck southward, following the 
 stony mountain ranges till he reached this lone- 
 some region." 
 
 " Did he travel all alone ? " asked little Rosa. 
 
 " Only the travelling winds went with him. 
 But he did not know what fear is, though at 
 night he heard the coyote's cry, the bellowing 
 of the bison and the huwl of the prairie wolf 
 The sun, which he worshipped, shone friendly all 
 the way ; gradually the breeze blew softer, the 
 earth .grew warmer and greener. After one long 
 day's march he drank deep of the spring in yon 
 hillside, laid his bent bow and quiver of arrows 
 on the rock, and went to sleep in the soft warm 
 sand by the Blue Fountain, 
 
254 The Land of the Pueblos, 
 
 "An Indian warrior sleeps lightly, and in his 
 slumber appeared a form — a woman's, such a 
 shape as is seen nowhere but in dreams and 
 Andalusia." The stranger paused and looked 
 dreamily on the ground like one busy with 
 memory, and in sympathy I thought of the lost 
 Catalina and the little one lying in the gloomy 
 vault of Valladolid. We respected his silence, 
 and after a moment he continued : 
 
 " The spirit spoke to the dreamer in words of 
 infinite tenderness, and appeared to watch and 
 guard him. On waking he took a long draught 
 of the cool snow water, and gazed searchingly 
 into its blue depths." 
 
 "Was it really blue ? " broke in Rosa. 
 
 "Sky blue and silver," said the Castilian, 
 adding one of the endearing diminutives in which 
 his language is so rich and which I did not quite 
 comprehend. " Many times he tried to catch a 
 glance of the fairy face which came into his sleep, 
 making it better than any waking. Long he 
 gazed into the watery mirror; it reflected only 
 his own tawny face and the spotless sky above 
 it. The white sand boiled from unknown depths 
 below, bubbles came to the top and broke on 
 the stony brim, but the ceaseless gush and flow 
 of the waters was a chime in his ears without 
 meaning. 
 
 " He lingered about this spot, so runs the tale, 
 many weeks, praying for the appearance of the 
 water maiden. She came into his sleep but 
 never blest his waking eyes, and when the rainy 
 season, which is so very di^ary, set in, the disap- 
 pointed youth went back to his tribe. The 
 vision haunted him ; in vain he tried to 
 shake it off; the vega, so lone, so dim, so untrod- 
 den, was filled with strange enchantment. The 
 brook went flowing through his memory, glanc- 
 ing now in sun, now in shad®w, as it gushed 
 
A Fro fitter Idyl. 255 
 
 from the mountain side, vanishing at last like 
 fairy gold in the sand.. The laughing girls of 
 the tribe tried to rouse him from indifference, 
 but could not stir him to join in their songs and 
 games. In the time of the corn harvest the 
 present of a blood-red ear, the Indian's rose 
 d'amour, did not move him to any feeling, and 
 he turned with glance averted from the flying 
 feet in the bewitching cachina dance. 
 
 " ' He is moonstruck,' said the girls ; 'give him 
 the crooked ear, for the fool is fit for nothing 
 but to sit in the sun with the very old men.' " He 
 heeded neither jest nor laugh, and determined 
 to come back to the Blue Fountain. When he 
 set out an airy figure seemed to go before and 
 beckon him on, as the swan maidens of the 
 German lakes beckon young knights into their 
 little boats drawn by snowy swans harnessed 
 with silver chains. 
 
 " Southward, southward he strode, following 
 the ancient march of Azatlan, and, in sight of 
 the beloved spring, he climbed the steep, fleet 
 and untired as the red deer, to find the same 
 sparkling fountain, and the shining brook below 
 it running into the valley as it will run on for- 
 ever. 
 
 "Again he lay down on the soft, warm sand, 
 and once more the delicate phantom appeared to 
 his closed eyes, whispered gently in his ear, and 
 bent above his head as i) to kiss him." 
 
 Here the lovers " changed eyes," leaned a 
 trifle closer together, and I saw Romeo pick up 
 a blue ribbon dropped from Juliet's sleeve and 
 slip it into his watch pocket. 
 
 " Then a frantic love took possession of the 
 hunter. Day after day, night after night, his 
 wasting form was laid beside the singing cas- 
 cade; ever he sighed, murmured, dreamed. The 
 strength left^ his limbs, his blood beat hotly; 
 
256 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 summer waned and cold winds blev/, but never 
 cooled the fever of his brow. Sometime? after a 
 day's hunt, returning at evening he fancied he saw 
 a misty outline against the dark steep, but it melted 
 away as he neared it and instead of a living woman 
 he reached out to clasp the empty air. Then the 
 warrior began to understand this water spirit 
 was of the race of Souls, and as such could not 
 wed a mortal; to possess her, therefore, he must 
 be like her — must die. Sc one day when the 
 world was all bright and his soul all dark, while 
 she sung a song of wonderful music he stretched 
 his arms to reach the shadowy siren and plunged 
 from the black ledge you see yonder into the 
 unknown depths below." 
 
 " And was he never heard of afterward ? " 
 asked Juliet, while the roses on her cheek deep- 
 ened in betrayal of her thoughts. 
 
 " Never, hermosura,'' said the Spaniard with 
 an admiring gesture, "but old Pueblos about 
 here say two shapes rise out of the spring where 
 there used to be but one, float in the air and 
 hover above it. They are oftenest seen about 
 dusk in the rainy season. I have never seen 
 them myself" 
 
 " I wonder if they do show that way," said 
 Rosa with a puzzled face. 
 
 " Qidcn sabe^' said Oreto mysteriously, at the 
 same time handing her the kernel of a piTion nut 
 which he cracked in his white front teeth. 
 
 And here let me record that the words ''Quiai 
 sabe,'' " who knows," are the end of controversy, 
 the finish of debate, the limit of human under- 
 standing, having a very different meaning accord- 
 ing to the persons speaking. With Oreto it was 
 as much as to say, there is room for argument 
 on both sides. 
 
 All this time our stew had been simmering, 
 gypsy fashion, over the fire, keeping a friendly 
 
A Frontier Idyl. 257 
 
 and impatient knocking at the pot lid, and wa? 
 now pronounced done. The stout lady roused 
 up from her nap, set her bonnet bias across her 
 eyebrows, said she was glad the young Comanche 
 came to his senses at last, and then addressed 
 herself to the making of coffee. 
 
 I met Oreto frequently, and never saw him 
 unbend from the Hamlet air — " Man delights 
 not me, no, nor woman either," — except on this 
 one holiday. So to speak, he flavored the whole 
 picnic. He gayly insisted on seasoning every 
 dish. *'Iwill not ruin the olla for Am.ericans, 
 with too much red pepper," he said ; " the 
 merest soupcofi, as the French put it." Then he 
 contrived a nice, cool-looking salad from some 
 crisp leaves, to me unknown, and served it with 
 a deftness and tact that would have graced a 
 courtier. To tell the whole truth, the elegant 
 Castilian had so much manner it was rather 
 fatiguing to keep up with him. 
 
 Dinner over, he took a large silk handkerchief 
 and showed how two prisoners of the Inquisi- 
 tion were once knotted together with ropes, and 
 allowed their freedom if they could untie them, 
 trying the puzzle on the lovers, who, of course, 
 struggled violently to be free, — I need hardly 
 add without success. Had he experimented on 
 some of the married couples possibly the result 
 might have been different. Following this was 
 a gay barcarole about strolling on the Prado, 
 glancing eyes, winged feet and envious veils. 
 *' It should have castanets in the chorus ; if Seiior 
 Brown will lend me his hat it will answer." 
 
 Thus appealed to, the photographer could not 
 choose but offer his brand new stovepipe to his 
 guest,, who thumped it vigorously, greatly to 
 Seiior Brown's annoyance, who stood looking 
 foolish, bareheaded in the sunshine. And again 
 17 
 
258 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 I marked the size and lustre of the diamond 
 ring. 
 
 The singer's voice was a trifle cracked, but 
 we were not fastidious, the ladies hung on every 
 word, and when the song ended, the applause 
 was hearty and genuine. The blonde artist pro- 
 duced a flute which luckily for us had a missing 
 joint, and insinuated he could be prevailed upon 
 to sing; but we knew "The Raven" would be 
 his doleful strain and upon the hint no one 
 spoke. 
 
 " Now a thousand pardons," said Oreto, " for 
 consuming your time and courtesy, I must 
 have a siesta^ without which you know a 
 Spaniard is lost forever and a day." From un- 
 der the seat of the buckboard he unrolled a 
 short cloak and threw it in Moorish style across 
 his shoulders, lifted his sombrero, revealing a 
 nobly turned head with dashes of gray in the 
 blue-black hair, and his face resumed its expres- 
 sion of habitual melancholy. As he walked ofl" 
 to the shadow of a great rock the alumnus from 
 Colorado college, who knows it all, said in a 
 loud whisper, " There goes Don Pomposo. He 
 feels like the Corliss engine at the Centennial." 
 
 The old bachelor shot the fledgling a glance 
 that should have killed him, but the youth, 
 though poor by nature and exhausted by culti- 
 vation, was wiry and did not fall asunder. In 
 fact he never flinched. My thoughts wandered 
 from the gay company and the man who had no 
 respect for " the stranger within the gates," to 
 the lone exile and the varied fortunes at which 
 he had hinted, and I said aloud, "The Senor 
 Oreto looks like a man who has a history." 
 
 And he has. 
 
 I dismiss the picnic in the brilliant periods of 
 the Pharos of the Occident. The editor-in- 
 chief, being also an insurance agent, naturally 
 
A Frontier Idyl. 259 
 
 dealt in large figures, and gave free rein to his 
 warm, not to say fiery imagination : " The picnic 
 of last week was an event long to be remem- 
 bered. The day was beautiful, nature enchant- 
 ing, woman divine. Old Baldy lifted his rugged 
 front and snowy crown before us, and the river 
 sung its sweetest cadence. Among distinguished 
 guests present we name the fascinating Gonzalez 
 Felipe Oreto, a cosmopolitan born in old Castile, 
 the friend of our artist, James Brown. For 
 aesthetic culture, refinement of manner and gen- 
 eral elegance the versatile Castilian has few 
 equals and no superiors. Rumor has it he will 
 soon lead to the altar a fair widow well known 
 to our city, and we learn with extreme pleasure 
 that he has been prevailed on to cast in his lot 
 with us and become a citizen of the most desira- 
 ble of all the territories." 
 
 From this time the popularity of the delight- 
 ful Gonzalez Felipe Oreto steadly increased. 
 The young ladies gazed at him with undisguised 
 admiration, the mothers smiled on him, but his 
 attentions were too evenly distributed to indicate 
 the least preference. One day he dashed all 
 hopes by publishing in XhQ Pharos of the Occident 
 the poem given below. He told his landlady, in 
 the deepest confidence, it was addressed to a 
 noble lady of Valencia, who had deigned to 
 give him a sweet souvenir in return for his verses 
 and present. 
 
 My reader need hardly be told it was all over 
 town before night — that pretty secret of Oreto's. 
 
 TO ISABELLA RASCON— WITH A SHELL. 
 
 The years have brought you many gifts 
 
 Since first you heard tliem tell 
 How the voice of the sea is hid 
 
 In the windings of a shell. 
 And where'er it may he exiled, 
 
 From its own warm Eastern main, 
 Bend your ear to the crystal cell, 
 
 And you hear the sea again. 
 
26o The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 I list to the murmurous sound 
 
 But it never sliapes one word, 
 I cannot guess what it would tell, 
 
 That echo always heard. 
 Does it speak of the strange, rich life 
 
 Far down in the surging waves, 
 Where purple mullet and gold fish rove 
 
 The depths of coral caves ? 
 
 Where Ocean's throbbing heart is stilled, 
 
 And wandering Peri's rest, 
 'Mid the pearl and amber jewels 
 
 He loves to wear in his breast? 
 Perchance the mellow strain was caught 
 
 From the song of mermaid fair, 
 Dreamily chanting, as she smoothed 
 
 The rings of her long, wet hair. 
 
 Or, lingering yet, the echo faint 
 
 Of a life once held within. 
 Some hidden shape that breathed and died 
 
 Afar from the breakers din. 
 Never had Sultan roof like this, 
 
 Never king such castle wall, 
 What was it wrouglit this wondrous dome 
 
 And tilled this crystal hall ? 
 
 Deserted now, but whispering low 
 
 The secret hid in the sea. 
 Ask what the mystic music means, 
 
 And it answers, ceaselessly, 
 With that weird song,— tender and low 
 
 As the voice of brooding dove 
 Who murmurs but a single note, 
 
 Keynote of life— it is Love. 
 
 Ah, when you hear that pleading sound. 
 
 Dream not of siren or sea. 
 Believe it the spirit of Love, 
 
 Forever singing— of me. 
 
 Some weeks after the picnic I sat working a 
 highly useless lamp mat in my parlor, which in 
 pleasant Mexican fashion is divided from the 
 office by a curtained doorwa}^ There passed 
 the barred window a dapper little man, whipping 
 his boot with a short riding whip as he went 
 along, whom I recognized as a government agent 
 from Los Indios. I heeded not the conversa- 
 tion, easily overheard, or rather the monologue 
 which languished, till a sudden animation of 
 voice betrayed the true purpose of the visitor as 
 he asked, " Was there a fellow hangin' 'round 
 here not long ago, calling himself Oreto ; a sort 
 of literary and sentimental adventurer, pretending 
 to be in heavy mourning ? " 
 
The Pimos. 261 
 
 " Yes, he had quite a turn for story telling and 
 amusing children. The caballero appears to 
 have fallen on evil times — a sad face, wouldn't be 
 a bad model for the Master of Ravenswood." 
 
 " Exactly ; his face is mighty sad about this 
 time. Interested friends have taken secure 
 boarding for him and relieved him of his wig and 
 big diamond ring — the property of a lady in 
 Zuloago. His real name is Gomez, a gambler 
 and murderer from the city of Mexico. He ran 
 off to Chihuahua, which soon got too hot to hold 
 him and his little games, moved on to Los Indios, 
 where he played three card monte once too 
 often for even territorial morality, and the noble 
 hidalgo is now smiling his melancholy smile 
 behind the grated windows of the county jail." 
 
 " He had rather an agreeable manner," said 
 the listener with a long yawn, " but I never took 
 much stock in the man." 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE PIMOS. 
 
 The minds of men untrained are strangely 
 alike. There is such sameness of arts, customs, 
 inventions, such likeness in their religious beliefs 
 under like stages of development, we must reach 
 the conclusions that on subjects of deep human 
 interest certain ideas are inherent in human 
 hearts, despite alien blood and long epochs of 
 separation. All barbarians have their priests or 
 medicine men and prophets, are firm believers in 
 necromancy, incantations, the power of witch- 
 craft, and have deep faith in the great Spirit as 
 the peculiar guardian of their race. Some tribes 
 have a fear of the devil who must be worshipped 
 
262 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 in order to be propitiated. With them old times 
 are best, and all traditions run back to a golden 
 age of innocency in a Region of Delight where 
 the rivers sparkled with sweet water, the maize 
 was always ripe, and high born warriors revelled 
 and feasted on the game ever in sight. There 
 was no work, no disease, no old age. This 
 Elysium was lost by crime, and the Arcadian 
 days ended forever. The sinful w^orld was de- 
 stroyed by a Flood from which only one prophet 
 and his family escaped. Every Rocky Mountain 
 tribe has its legend of the deluge and belief in 
 the second coming of the Divine Man w^ho is to 
 right all wrongs, correct all miseries and mis- 
 takes; returning some bright morning to renew 
 the dull world to youth, and then Paradise will 
 be regained. For this revelation they wait, as 
 the prophetic souls were found waiting to be 
 guided by the star which led to the divine child 
 of Mary. 
 
 The Pueblos jealously guard their wretched 
 little chapels (estiifas) from the prying eyes of 
 strangers, and the gentlest of visitors is rebuffed 
 by their dumb secrecy. In different ways I have 
 gathered many traditions. Some are childish 
 and witless to my understanding ; others wear- 
 ing symbolic veils are graceful as the Greek 
 myths, and hold a significance as rich. Fables 
 of the nomads will do for another day. The 
 Pueblos take our attention first. The great var- 
 iety of climate in North America produces 
 various habits of hfe which temper and color the 
 fables ; and I believe there is no myth without 
 some meaning. The vapory conceits we treat so 
 lightly were not empty phantasms to the brain 
 that shaped them in the beginning, and some 
 heart has thrilled to each airy, insubstantial 
 legend. 
 
 Certain old instincts run in all bloods. The 
 
The Pimos. 263 
 
 inborn desire of the soul to account for its origin, 
 to ask whence come I, what ani I, perplexes the 
 bewildered savage burrowing in his cave as it 
 did the learned questioners, a mixed multitude 
 crowding the Academy, reverently listening to 
 the wondrous maid of Alexandria — Hypatia the 
 Beautiful. 
 
 What is truth ? asked the Governor of Judea 
 as truth Incarnate stood before him in the Judg- 
 ment Hall; and men are yet demanding of 
 science, nature, philosophy, the origin of being, 
 the destinies, the soul and its limitations. Turn- 
 ing from the seen to the unseen, from the outer 
 to the inner life, from the tangible to the unreal, 
 longing to know the beginning and the end of 
 all. It is the old yearning to be as God ; old as 
 the first man. To comprehend the stirring of 
 the divinity within, which neither feeds nor 
 sleeps but lives on separate from the body, opens 
 endless questioning. This is the study of sages ; 
 about it the wisest debate and ponder, and of it 
 the savage, blanketless and naked, where the soft 
 seasons allow him to roam, asks with a blind 
 ignorance infinitely pathetic. 
 
 To him the hidden forces which rule the uni • 
 verse are divinities to be entreated by prayer, 
 propitiated by sacrifice and offerings. The sav- 
 age's whole life is penetrated by religion, from 
 the hard little cradle to which he is swathed, to 
 the shallow pit where he lies uncoffined when 
 life's struggle is over. 
 
 The tribes near Santa Feand the larger Amer- 
 ican towns of New Mexico have mixed the relig- 
 ion of Christ with the old superstitions in a 
 curious, almost painful manner. I once visited 
 Tesuque with a view to gaining some knowledge 
 of their primitive ceremonials. The usual pro- 
 tracted smoking was indulged in ; there followed 
 a stupid meaningless silence, considered the 
 
264 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 heigiit of politeness ; then we partook of cold 
 reft-eshments consisting of little apples carefully 
 wiped on the sheepskin which covered baby's 
 cradle as a blanket. We climbed the rickety 
 ladders^ admired the excellence of the bearskins, 
 counted the bags of shelled corn and rough pot- 
 teries baked in their mud furnaces, surveyed a 
 chromo in feverish colors named the Queen of 
 Heaven, and when the time was ripe I modestly 
 inquired if we might be permitted to visit the 
 estufa. The head man of the tribe (cacique) 
 whom we named Hiawatha, smiled blandly, 
 showing ivory white teeth without a flaw, and 
 said '*Si, Signora," with a cheerful alacrity quite 
 foreign to the usual aboriginal stoicism. We fol- 
 lowed him into the courtyard and Minnehaha 
 followed us and stonily stared. The dusky 
 maiden in the march of progress is escaping 
 from buckskin draperies. She wears the gar- 
 ment called by the French mtimate, skirt of 
 Navajo blanket, black ground with tracings of 
 red embroidery, not unlike the famihar Greek 
 pattern, calico shawl gay as the scarf of Iris. 
 She is without beauty of any sort ; is raw boned 
 and high shouldered, inclining to fat ; of an 
 ashy sunburnt skin, flat face, high cheek bones, 
 thick lips, mannish gait, harsh voice. She is 
 nearly akin (if there's anything in likeness) to 
 the Mongolian Ah Sin, and to ward ofl" the sun 
 that day carried a yellow parasol over her heavy 
 head. They all stared unmoved as we climbed a 
 ladder leaning against the side of a high pen 
 made of pine logs and mud plaster, — a roofless 
 enclosure perhaps eighteen feet square. As we 
 looked down, a number of birds like swallows 
 flew out, and save their mud-built nests against 
 the logs the ancient estufa was empty. The old 
 arrow-maker was joking when he conducted us 
 to the altar place ; the shrine was abandoned, the 
 
The Pimos. 265 
 
 sacred fire was dead, the secret temple with all 
 its holy and guarded mysteries was laid open to 
 women even ! It was plain the Queen of 
 Heaven had usurped the place of the lord of life 
 and light. The chief smiled broadly and Minne- 
 haha wrapped the pink calico rebosa round her 
 head and laughed as if she would die. I hate to 
 be beaten in this way, and while the gentlemen 
 went off to look at a bear skin, I approached 
 the youthful princess in the attitude of inter- 
 viewer. *' Gentle maiden," I said, mustering my 
 small stock of Spanish, '' do you remember when 
 the Montezuma fire burned in this deserted 
 estufaf' 
 
 '* Si, Signora." 
 
 " Was it many years ago ? " 
 
 " Si, sigiiora." 
 
 " Perhaps fifteen years ? " (insinuatingly). 
 
 ** Si, signora." 
 
 " Ah, can you remember so long ? What sort 
 of wood was consecrated to the shrine ? " 
 
 " Si, sigfiora. " 
 
 ** Did it flame up to the roof, or was it merely 
 a bank of coals; your mother" (tenderly) *<has 
 told you of it I know." 
 
 " Si, signora." 
 
 *' Then tell me all you know, if it will not 
 trouble you too much, and I promise you a beau- 
 tiful string of blue beads." 
 
 " Si, sigfiora." 
 
 This intellectual feast was broken up by an 
 untimely giggle from a gentle maiden not of 
 aboriginal blood, and we made our adieux. I 
 afterward learned the sweet girl was only sham- 
 ming,; she understood Spanish well enough, but 
 chose this pretense to outwit strangers. A dis- 
 tinguished success. 
 
 We were completely floored and made haste 
 to cover our retreat by leaving the mud-walled 
 
266 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 village for a nooning and lunch under a clump 
 of gnarled cedars hard by. The Indian is not 
 disappearing at a satisfactory rate before the 
 march of civilization. A swarm of children, the 
 dirtiest and raggedest imaginable, followed us 
 and held out their hands for the remains of our 
 lunch. The biscuits were snatched by a youth- 
 ful Indigene like the greedy boy of the First 
 Reader who refused to give his dear playmates a 
 crumb of his cake, and I had to fairly slap his 
 hands to make him divide. He then swallowed 
 the lemon rinds and would have devoured the 
 sardine boxes if he could. So much alike are 
 the sons of men ! 
 
 To reach the old superstitions in their purity 
 we must push away from the track of the loco- 
 motive ; far as possible from censer and cross, 
 parish priest and Protestant missionary. So we 
 set out with the determination of the mythic 
 Roton, who resolved to go till he arrived 
 at the roof of heaven ; away to the Moquis 
 of the North and the Papagos of the South. 
 Below the Gila dwell \n close neighborhood 
 the Maricopas and the Pimos, or as the old 
 Spaniards wrote it Pimas, whom they found three 
 hundred years ago irrigating the lands and rais- 
 ing two crops of corn a year, just as they do 
 now. The Coco-Maricopas are a branch of the 
 Pueblos, and these tribes inhabit a large region, 
 mostly perfect desert, between the head of the 
 Gulf of California and that extensive cordiliera 
 of which the Sierra Catalina forms the most 
 v/esterly range. A volcanic country in which 
 since the introduction of man, the surface of the 
 the earth as well as the climate has undergone 
 great changes. 
 
 After straining over scorching deserts, alkali 
 plains, sage bush and greasewood wastes, it was 
 a deep pleasure to rest our tired eyes on the 
 
The Pimos. 267 
 
 bright corn lands on both sides of the river Gila, 
 which runs through the Pimo reservation about 
 twenty-five miles. The three great aceqidas 
 with their various branches comprise nearly five 
 hundred miles, and extend over a tract of land 
 eighteen miles in length. The fields are fenced 
 v/ith crooked sticks, wattled with brush, mainly 
 of the thorny cactus and mezquit. The Salic or 
 rather Slavic law prevails among the aborigines. 
 Instead of studying graceful culture and decora- 
 tive art, the farming is done by the women. 
 When harvest time comes, the men turn into the 
 fields and help, besides lightening the labor by 
 standing around in the shade and looking on, or 
 sprawling on the floor swinging the baby as it 
 hangs suspended in a box, hanging by a cord 
 from the ceiling. Sometimes the mother carries 
 a large basket on her head and the papoose sit- 
 ting on a sort of side-bustle astride her hip. A 
 civilized baby would tumble off instantly, but the 
 native infant holds on to her smooth, shining sides 
 in an attitude wonderfully like the missing link, 
 our Simian ancestor, riding the calico pony in 
 gay circus ring. This baby does not cut mon- 
 key-shines, but stares at the stranger as stolidly 
 as his father and mother. The Pimo customs 
 are like the Coco-Maricopas in everything but 
 burial rites. They bury their dead but their 
 neighbors burn them. The Maricopa bodies are 
 placed on a funeral pyre of resinous wood and 
 utterly consumed, in classic fashion. 
 
 Reporters say the mourners go into a profound 
 mourning of tar. On inquiry I learned the 
 *♦ tar " is a portion of the ashes of the dear 
 deceased mixed with the dissolved gum of the 
 mezquit, (a species of acacia which yields a 
 concrete juice like gum arable). They smear 
 their faces with the hideous plaster, and let it 
 remain as a mark of deep grief till it wears away. 
 
268 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 A widow, the next day after her bereavement, is 
 offered in market by the town crier to any one 
 who wants a wife. If an able-bodied squaw, 
 good at hoeing, and stout enough to balance the 
 baby on top of the basket of corn overhead, she 
 is usually courted, '' wooed, won, married and 
 all " within a few days, though custom allows 
 her to continue the periodic howling and tar 
 deep-mourning several days after the new honey- 
 moon begins to shine. 
 
 I was charmed at thought of being among 
 Pagans assisting at such heathen obsequies, and 
 felt it the spot to find the ancient lore 1 sought, 
 through many a weary mile of lava bed and 
 tropic scorch. I was among the changeless, 
 unimpressible American Indians, living among 
 demons and goblins, spirits of earth, air, fire, 
 water, whose beliefs are untainted by mixture of 
 Christian ideas. Here I discovered the flickering, 
 mythic lights which produce such lovely effects, 
 changing gods to men, and making demigods of 
 heroes. Among these untutored children of 
 nature, every misty outline and vapory mountain 
 haze might be an aboriginal soul floated out into 
 the unknown dark on its wanderings toward the 
 bright sun house. In the shadows of vast canons 
 the block elves have their haunts, and lie in wait 
 for bewildered spirits, and hurl spectral missiles 
 along the pathless space surrounding •' the dance 
 house of the ghosts." The Pueblos are ail sun- 
 worshippers, and the Pimos tell us the road to 
 the sun house is beset with perils. In the dark- 
 ness of the dread mystery of death, deep waters 
 are to be crossed, many-headed monsters bellow 
 and roar, fire flames before the eyes, and whirl- 
 winds lift the affrighted spirit from his feet and 
 toss him in mid air. Four is a sacred number 
 with them, derived from adoration of the four 
 cardinal points; the soul flutters about the body 
 
The Pimos. 269 
 
 four days, and sometimes stones are thrown across 
 the warrior's grave to scare away the evil spirits. 
 In the unlighted valley the brave must be pro- 
 vided with a pipe for his solace, with weapons 
 suited to his rank, choice armor approved to fit 
 him as he enters the kingdom of souls. Lifeless, 
 he may yet grope through the cold clay, and 
 touching with icy fingers the trusted arms, will 
 not tremble in defenceless march through the 
 horror of the awful shades. 
 
 Is this not the instinct of the antique Scythian 
 buried on the field with the blade in which vic- 
 tory still lingers ? The pathos of the singer 
 breaking his heart and harp together. 
 
 " Lay his sword by his side, it liath served him too well 
 
 Not to rest near his pillow helow ; 
 To the last moment true, from his hand ere it fell 
 
 Its point was still turned to a flying foe. 
 Fellow-lab'rers in life, let them slumber in death, 
 
 Side by side, as becomes the reposing brave,— 
 That sword which he loved still unbroke in its sheath, 
 
 And himself unsubdued in his grave." 
 
 Four days the howlers howl, and further to 
 cheer the dread passage four nights a fire is kin- 
 dled on the warrior's grave to open a path for 
 the bhnded footsteps in the fearful '' dead man's 
 
 journey," and lead them to the sun, the safe, 
 final resting place. There the chief will take up 
 his weapons again and spend a blissful eternity 
 fighting his old enemies, the Yumas, and we may 
 be sure slaying his thousands and revelling in 
 blood, like the Viking in the halls of the Val- 
 halla, with his comrades hacked to pieces in 
 many a morning fight, but always ready with 
 whole limbs and flashing, undinted armor, to 
 appear at dinner. Food is placed on the fresh 
 earth, the best corn bread, flesh of antelope and 
 
 jars of water, that the lone one may be com- 
 forted by gifts from the world he has left. These 
 tender offerings bestowed, the property of the 
 hero is portioned out to the tribe, fields divided 
 
27© The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 among those who need land, his grain, chickens, 
 dogs, bows, etc., fairly distributed. No wrang- 
 ling among heirs, no lawyers to absorb estates, 
 all is done fairly and equitably, in a submission 
 to precedent worthy our imitation. 
 
 Nor do the Pimos refuse to be comforted. 
 Cattle are driven up and slaughtered, and deeply 
 burdened with sorrow, every man loads down his 
 squaw with beef, and feasts whole days on funeral 
 baked meats. Dare I disgust my dear friend, 
 the classic reader, by saying these barbarian feasts 
 are reminders of the tremendous banquet in the 
 pavihon of Agamennon, where the *' steer of 
 full five years " was killed, skinned, and cooked 
 before the eyes of the Grecians. 
 
 Homeric champions — Trojan peers and scep- 
 tered kings of Greece — were not made wretched 
 by indigestion, and I suspect (low be it spoken !) 
 they took pepsin in the natural state. With their 
 enviable appetites they were ready to eat off- 
 hand; the squarest of meals never came amiss, 
 and their capacity for tough beef, rare done, was 
 prodigious and unfailing. So far very like our 
 Rocky mountaineers, but unhappily the red war- 
 riors are not embalmed in verse by the imperish- 
 able poets. 
 
 When the Indian woman dies no high sepul- 
 chral feasts, no games and honors, such as Ilion 
 to her hero paid. With scant ceremony she is 
 wrapped in her poor shroud, the moccasins of 
 her own make fastened to her shapely feet ; the 
 carrying-strap worn across the forehead, and the 
 paddle go with the cold hands. Sad emblem of 
 woman's destiny in the wilderness ; pathetic 
 tokens that even in the mystic land of shades she 
 must be the silent, uncomplaining slave of her 
 brutish, savage lord. 
 
 This is the Pimo legend of the Creation : The 
 world was made by an earth prophet. In the begin- 
 
The Pinios. Tj\ 
 
 ning it stretched fair and frail as a line of light 
 across the darkness of empty space. A wise 
 Sagamore lived in the Gila valley, and one night 
 a royal eagle came to the door and warned him 
 of a deluge close at hand. The prophet wrapped 
 his mantle of fur around him, for it was winter, 
 and laughed the gray messenger to scorn. The 
 kingly bird shook his white head, spread wide his 
 wings and soared away to heaven. Again the 
 eagle came with his warning cry, the waters were 
 near and would soon burst overhead ; but the 
 sachem drowsily groaned at the wakening voice 
 and turned on his bed of buffalo skins and slept. 
 Three times the broad wings shadowed the 
 sleeper, and the friendly voice entreated him to 
 flee the wrath of the gods, but the prophet gave 
 no heed. Then quick as the eagle disappeared 
 in the blue and starry silence, there came thun- 
 der, hghtning, and a mountain of water like an 
 earthquake overspread the valley of Gila, and the 
 morning sun shone on only one man saved from 
 destruction by floating on a ball of resin — Szeukha, 
 the son of the Creator. He was enraged at the 
 royal bird, thinking him the mover of the flood, 
 and made a rope ladder of tough bark like the 
 woodbine, climbed the naked, riven cliff where 
 the eagle lived, and slew him. He then raised 
 to life the mangled bodies of the slain on which 
 the eagle had preyed, and sent them out to 
 re-people the world. In the centre of the vast 
 eyrie he found a woman, the eagle's wife, and 
 their child. These he helped down the rope lad- 
 der and sent on their way, and from them are 
 descended that race of wise men called Hoho- 
 cam, ancients or grandfathers, who were guided 
 in all their wanderings by an eagle. Southward 
 they marched past forests of oak, sycamore, 
 cedar and flowering trees, past mountains of 
 crystal and gold, and rivers murmurous willi song 
 
272 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 flowing over beds of stars, till they reached a 
 deep blue lake kissed by soft winds, sparkling in 
 the sunlight. On its borders they planted a city 
 with streets of water — old Tenochtitlan, which 
 white men call Mexico. Through the uncounted 
 centuries since the deluge, Szeukha has not 
 dropped out of Indian memory. 
 
 Because he killed the bird of prophecy he had 
 to do a sort of penance, which was never to 
 scratch himself with his nails but always with a 
 little stick. The custom is still adhered to by 
 the unchanging Pimos, and a splinter of wood, 
 renewed every fourth day, is carried for this pur- 
 pose, stuck in their long coarse hair and plied 
 with extreme energy and enjoyment. Stern are 
 the duties of the historian, and truth obliges me 
 to record the Pimos do not scratch their heads 
 for nothing. 
 
 They are good fighters, and liave been a wall 
 of defence against the incursions of Apaches, at 
 one time the only protection for travellers 
 between Fort Yuma and Tucson. They appear 
 comfortable in their huts, — which are snug dens 
 of oval shape made of mud and reeds thatched 
 with tide or wheat straw, — quietly contented with 
 their industrious wives and their own lazy selves. 
 They make a kind of wine like sour cider, not 
 nearly so good though, and quaff the vinegar 
 bowl with sombre hilarity after the corn bread 
 and mutton are disposed at dinner. 
 
 The tributaries of the Gila bear sweet, soft, 
 meandering Spanish names which I forget. They 
 are rivers of the leaky sort, disappearing by 
 fitful turns and capriciously starting up 
 again in the deeply worn channels. Even in its 
 best strength the Gila (river of swift water) is not 
 so large as an Indiana creek which we would 
 blush to call river. It contains three kinds of 
 fish ; trout, buffalo, and humpback, all equally 
 
The Pimos. 273 
 
 mean, of slippery, muddy, flavor and most inferior 
 quality. 
 
 Not far from the Pimo villages, eleven in num- 
 ber, are the written rocks, mentioned in the 
 oldest histories and described at length by the 
 early explorers and the modern traveller. At 
 the base of an immense bluff are heaps of 
 boulders covered with figures of men and animals, 
 rudely carved with some coarse instruments. 
 Uncouth shapes of birds, footprints, snakes, and 
 the ever recurring print of a moccasin, indicative 
 of marching. Many writers attach a value to 
 these ancient inscriptions ; one old Spanish ad- 
 venturer discerned in them letters like the Gothic, 
 Hebrew and Chaldean characters. They are not 
 there to-day ; among hundreds of piled-up 
 boulders and detached stones there is no tracery 
 like the letters of any known language. Some 
 of the markings are centuries old and partly 
 effaced, others written over and over again. The 
 under sides of the rocks, also, are sculptured 
 where it would be impossible to cut them as they 
 lie, and some weigh many tons. These last 
 must have fallen from the mountain after the 
 hieroglyphs were made. There can be no doubt 
 of their great antiquity and the large numbers of 
 carved stones prove it to have been a resort ages 
 on ages ago, but I doubt the importance of the 
 lines, to me meaningless zigzags. Indians are the 
 laziest of mortals, and in their childish way love 
 to scribble worthless signs, rude pictography on 
 their skins and the hides of animals, their walls 
 and potteries. The "Pedros Pintados" which 
 took such hold on Spanish imagination were 
 probably boundery lines between tribes, and the 
 tortoise, snake and so on are the ancient tribal 
 symbols, treaties possibly. If they had the deep 
 significance claimed by easily excited chroniclers 
 the story would run like this : The sons of the 
 18 ' 
 
274 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 North have waded a lake of blood, have swept 
 like the whirlwind across the Sierras ; the bow 
 has rattled, the arrow flew. We have broken 
 the bones of the Apaches, scooped out their eyes 
 and warmed our hands in their smoking blood. 
 We have scalped the proud warriors and beaten 
 out the brains of their children. Whoop la ! 
 Now let the earth tremble, for the wolves are let 
 loose on the slain ! 
 
 There are widely scattered ruins in the Gila 
 valleys showing it was once densely populated, 
 but the remains are so monotonous they com- 
 mand little interest. The visitor who has seen 
 one has the type of all. A certain melancholy 
 pathos invests every ruin; houses where men 
 have lived and died are more or less haunted, but 
 the relics of New Mexico and Arizona are desti- 
 tute of anything like grace or comeliness. The 
 makers and builders never got beyond the rough 
 adobe, the stone hatchet and flint arrow-head, 
 and nothing is proved by them except that this 
 country has been inhabited from a remote period 
 by a people not differing greatly from the 
 Pueblos of to-day. 
 
 As we journeyed up the valley we saw herds 
 of antelopes, always too distant for a shot. The 
 Rocky mountain antelope is a most beautiful and 
 graceful animal, of compact form and exceeding 
 strength. The lithe limbs are delicate and fleet, 
 feet small and elegant, tail short and tufted. It 
 is light fawn color, under parts white ; its 
 luminous dark eyes are like those of the gazelle 
 of the Orient. Shy and not easily approached 
 the Indians domesticate them by trapping when 
 very young. They have the gentlest, most 
 confiding way of laying their heads in your lap, 
 and looking up with the lustrous eyes which have 
 furnished poets with lovely imagery from the 
 days of Solomon to the nights of Byron. I 
 
The Pimos. 275 
 
 know no creature with such an appealing manner 
 and such swift grace of movement ; they speed 
 across the still, wide plain, in the farness of the 
 distance appearing like low flying birds. 
 
 Though we are not in the Navajo country we 
 see now and then their famous blanket, striped in 
 gayest blue, yellow and red, this last color so 
 dear to the Indian eye, made from ravelling out 
 flannel which they buy of the white traders. 
 The dyes are vegetable and absolutely fadeless. 
 The blanket is coarse, hard and heavy ; a good 
 one will shed water like rubber, and wear a great 
 while as a horse or saddle blanket. The Indian 
 women spin wool in a slow, simple way by rolling 
 in their hands, and they spend all their spare 
 time for months in making one blanket which 
 may sell for thirty-five dollars, or if very brilliant 
 in color and close in texture, for fifty or a hundred 
 dollars. When on the march even, the Navajo 
 woman has her little contrivance for weaving, on 
 the mule with her, or across her shoulder if on 
 foot, and in five minutes after the halt is 
 sounded she sits under a tree weaving away as 
 composedly as though she had been at it for 
 hours. The loom is nothing but sticks placed 
 horizontally, one at top, two at bottom, far 
 enough apart to accommodate warp of the 
 blanket's length or breadth. Between these the 
 warp is stretched, and to one straps are attached 
 to throw over the limb of a tree. At the bottom 
 are other straps, for the feet to operate in beating 
 up the filling. In her silent, joyless, persevering 
 fashion the work goes steadily on, and the weaver 
 is satisfied to see it grow at a rate incalculably 
 slow. 
 
 A, sufficient measure of civilization is the 
 treatment of women, and among Apaches we 
 find the deepest degradation. The Pueblo wives 
 are incomparably better off than those of the 
 
2/6 The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 nomads. The contrast between them and their 
 sisters of the fairer race is more painful than that 
 between men of the two races. I have seen 
 young hunters with stately forms, erect, Hthe and 
 sinewy, and one warrior who might have been a 
 model for Uncas, the favorite hero of our early 
 friend Cooper. 
 
 We all remember the anecdote Gait tells of 
 Benjamin West. When in Rome his friends 
 agreed that the Apollo of Vatican should be the 
 first statue shown to the young Philadelphia 
 Quaker. It was enclosed in a case, and to try 
 the effect on him suddenly the keeper threw open 
 the doors. "A young Mohawk warrior," ex- 
 claimed West. 
 
 But the likeness is only in the body. The 
 ideal head of the Apollo with its clustering locks, 
 the exquisite sensitive face with its delicate 
 molding of lip and chin, the Phidian forehead and 
 nose, are in highest contrast with the sensual, 
 sluggish hneaments of the red man. 
 
 Among the various tribes there is a dire mono- 
 tory, and in nothing are they more alike than in a 
 lofty scorn of work. The man glories in his lazi- 
 ness, the woman exults in her slavery. I have seen 
 an Indian try a heavy lift and set the bag of corn 
 down again with a '* Ugh ! squaw's work." If 
 we insinuate he should do the little hoeing for 
 their scant supply of beans the woman resents 
 the idea. " Would you have a warrior work like 
 a squaw ? " is her indignant response to the sug- 
 gestion. 
 
 I once saw a married couple trudging home, 
 if their cold, smoky, dirty den may be called by 
 that dear name. The husband, perhaps twenty 
 steps in advance of the woman who bore on her 
 back a bag of corn. The noble red man (see J. 
 F. Cooper), waited for her to come up to him, 
 she hastening her pace as she saw it. Then he 
 
The Pimos. 277 
 
 slung nis rifle on her pack, folded his arms 
 across his noble breast, and strode forward with 
 easy gliding step, in untrammeled dignity. How 
 I longed to hand that noble red man over to the 
 mercies of a woman's rights convention. 
 
 The husband may disfigure or insult the wife 
 at pleasure, divorce her without form or cere- 
 mony by a mere separation, and she has no pro- 
 tection or appeal ; sometimes his conduct drives 
 her to suicide. In divorce it is the unwritten 
 law of the wilderness that children go with their 
 mother. Among the wandering tribes mother 
 and baby are not divided even in death. A mer- 
 ciful barbarity gives one blow with the hatchet, 
 and the little one rests with the best love it can 
 know on earth. They have few children ; four 
 are a large family, twins are unknown, nearly all 
 reach maturity. Among the wild tribes where 
 polygamy is the rule it is not a cause of com- 
 plaint among the women, from the fact that it 
 implies a division of labor, and the latest wife 
 lords it over her predecessors. Even among sav- 
 ages there is no love like the last love. 
 
 The Pimo Indians are not made of " rose-red 
 clay," they are dark brown, differing in com- 
 plexion from the Appalachians east of the Rocky 
 mountains and the olive hues of the California 
 tribes. Historians say they have ever been the 
 the most active and industrious of the Pueblos ; 
 still that does not imply the energy and activity 
 of the white race. They sit for hours in front 
 of their huts, motionless as a group of petrifac- 
 tions. In a mild climate their wants are few and 
 simple, and a little of this world's goods obtained 
 without much work and less worry is sufficient 
 for the calm philosophers who despise the arts 
 of the white race and steadily march in the paths 
 of the forefathers. 
 
 I must not leave their country without men- 
 
27§ The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 tion of the wooing of the young Pimo warrior. 
 All Pueblos have but one wife, and no girl is 
 obliged to marry against her will, however eligi- 
 ble the parents may consider any offer. If his 
 bent of love be honorable, his purpose marriage, 
 Romeo first wins over the parents by making 
 them presents, such delicacies as pumpkins, 
 beans, coyote skins, or if he is very wealthy a 
 pony. Then, in banged locks and straggling 
 braids of hair, he sits at the door of the lady of 
 his choice serenading her for hours, day after 
 day, tooting with all his might on a flute of cane, 
 an instrument of torture with four holes in it. 
 He hides himself in a bush and like the nightin- 
 gale " sings darkling." Sometimes JuHet is a 
 coquette and takes no notice of the tender 
 demonstration, leaving him to keep up the plain- 
 tive, shrill noise till 
 
 " Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
 Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops." 
 
 If no notice is taken of the appeal there is no 
 further sign ; he may hang up his flute, with its 
 bright pencillings and gayly tufted fringes, and 
 there is no mortification in the rejection. Should 
 she smile on his suit she comes out of the coop- 
 like den and the ceremony is ended. Romeo 
 takes her to his house and the bride is at home. 
 If he is a man of moderate means the house is 
 built of four upright stakes, forked at one end, 
 driven into the ground ; across these other sticks 
 are laid to support the roof, which may be of 
 corn shucks, or straw or rushes. If he is am- 
 bitious to have a lasting, palatial mansion it will 
 be walled round with stakes, plastered and roofed 
 with mud. An opening for a door is left about 
 three feet high to creep in at. These residences 
 are from five to seven feet high, so one cannot 
 stand upright in every one. Adjoining the wig- 
 wam is a bower of boughs open on all sides ; in 
 
The Pimos. 279 
 
 l:his shady lodge are the few potteries in which 
 Juliet does the cooking, and here the happy pair 
 sit on their heels when at rest, and Romeo 
 smokes while she grinds the corn in the metate 
 of stone. 
 
 It is expected that the bridegroom will pr/ 
 the parents all his means admit to compensate 
 them for the loss of a hand in the cornfield. The 
 Indian wife never hears of protoplasm, equal 
 suffrage, social science and the like. She often 
 builds the wigwam after Romeo has cut the 
 poles, always bears them on her shoulders in the 
 march, plows the fields with a crooked stick, 
 raises the beans, hoes the corn, bakes the cakes, 
 without a complaint. If her beady, black eyes 
 mark his coming and look brighter when he 
 comes I cannot tell why. He is sullen and still, 
 a dusky shape, the very perfection of gloomy 
 indifference. Perhaps if he eats the tortillas with 
 an appetite her soul is glad and she has her 
 reward. If she is content, why sow the seeds 
 or dissatisfaction by telling her she is a beast of 
 burden and he is a beast of prey ? 
 
 The trip through the Pimo country was made 
 memorable by my first bivouac. 'Twere vain to 
 tell thee all ; how a mule drank alkali water, 
 swelled up and died in an hour, how part of the 
 party had to push forward with a disabled team, 
 leaving a broken wagon and luggage to wait the 
 relief, and how a long, hot day brought us to a 
 government station. This was a mud shanty 
 thatched with cedar boughs and plastered Avith 
 clay. The edifice was divided into three rooms, 
 the first was a stable where a gay little pony was 
 pacing round and round without a halter. The 
 next was the guest chamber. As I approached, 
 there issued from it a fragrance, the triple extract 
 of raw hide, burnt bacon and old pipe. The 
 appartmen^ perhaps sixteen feet square, was 
 
?So The Land of the Pueblos. 
 
 without door or window. The " accommoda- 
 tions " were a mud fireplace in the corner where 
 one might make coffee and fry eggs, and a pile 
 of sheepskins on which the visitor might spread 
 his blanket and sleep, — if he could. The cedar 
 and mud roof slanted as though it would tumble 
 down any minute. The clay floor was unswept, 
 the walls fringed with cobwebs and adorned with 
 strings of red pepper, saddles and bridles. In 
 one corner lay bags of shelled corn ; on a swing- 
 ing shelf were newspapers, an odd volume of 
 Oliver Twist and sporting magazines. The third 
 room was sacred to herdsmen and rancheros. 
 The keeper of this lodge in a vast wilderness 
 was a retired minstrel, and his photograph as 
 jolly endman broadly smiled upon us, dangling 
 from enormous deer's antlers which upheld deco- 
 rative art in lieu of a mantel piece. I took 
 peaceable possession of the only chair and my 
 fellow traveller through life's journey lolled in 
 luxurious ease on the end of a candlebox, while 
 we surveyed the " accommodations." There 
 were three chromos of Evangeline on the walls : 
 presumably the peddler closed out his stock 
 there. One picture of that melancholy maiden 
 sitting on a nameless grave is depressing ; two 
 are hardly endurable ; three are heart-breaking. 
 I gave way before them and said, *' We will try 
 an Indian lodge under the open sky." My reso- 
 lution made the idea at once become a pleasant 
 thought. In a barren country the householder, 
 a pilgrim and a stranger, develops a versatile 
 genius second only to that of Bernini the Floren- 
 tine sculptor, artist, poet, musician, who gave an 
 opera in Rome where he built the theater, in- 
 vented the engines, cut the statues, painted the 
 scenes, wrote the comedy and composed the 
 music. In the spirit of communism which per- 
 vades the Territories I rummaged the abandoned 
 
The Pimos. 281 
 
 baggage and found blankets, buffalo robes, a 
 mattress, one attenuated pillow stuffed with 
 feathers pretty much all quill, made ** riant" by 
 a pink calico case ruffled all round. No sham 
 about that pillow. 
 
 A clump of stunted pines was the chamber, 
 carpeted with the soft needles undisturbed for 
 ages. A Navajo blanket made a striped roof, 
 its weight a security against puffs of wind even 
 \i we had not fastened it with strings and tent 
 pins driven into the warm, gravelly sand. The 
 pretty recess, so like a play-house, had a fine 
 charm ; spicy with the fresh scent of the pines, 
 shadowed by a great rock, the pink pillow 
 looked rather lumpy but restful and inviting. I 
 felt sure there were pleasant dreams, or better 
 yet, dreamless sleep in the unexpected luxury. 
 
 While I smoothed its tumbled ruffles the gay 
 troubadour came from high pastures with his 
 herds to let them drink at the precious spring, 
 and then fold them in a corral made of stakes of 
 mezquit wattled with cactus. 
 
 The grama grass on which they feed is 
 described in the books as incomparably the most 
 nutritive in the world, which may account for the 
 grand development of bone in the animals 
 throughout the region. All the wild grasses of 
 the country are peculiar in curing themselves 
 in the stalk. The grama bears no flower, shows 
 no seed, but seems to reproduce itself from the 
 roots by the shooting up of young, green and 
 vigorous spires, which are at first inclosed withii 
 the sheaths of their old and dried-up predeces- 
 sors, which by their growth they split and cast 
 to earth, themselves filling their places. The 
 vast region swept from immemorial ages by the 
 Apaches is covered with this sort of low, mossy 
 grass, and it enables those most savage of sav- 
 ages to make their wonderful marches with 
 
282 'J he Lard of the Pusblo:. 
 
 their wiry little ponies, whicli endure extra- 
 ordinary fatigue so long as they have this feed :.n 
 abundance, and are allowed to crop it from 
 native pasturas. 
 
 The troubadour who kept the wayside inn was 
 a handsome scamp, a captivating runaway from 
 civilization, calling himself John Smith, which 1 
 am sure is not his name. He apologized for the 
 absence of his cook (who had no existence on 
 earth), and in festal mood, with many flour- 
 ishes, insisted on displaying his own skill in the 
 culinary science. He graduated under the cele- 
 brated Micawber many years ago, and would like 
 nothing better than a "■ hot supper of his own 
 getting up." 
 
 With the help of a Mexican peon, he deftly 
 and rapidly concocted and served in the Evange- 
 line apartment various poisons, liquid and solid, 
 spreading them on a pine table covered with 
 newspapers. Conspicuous among the dishes 
 were hot death-balls, with lightning zigzags of 
 deadly drugs, known on the frontier as " soddy 
 biscuit." Under the beguihng name of spring 
 lamb we had paid an exhaustive price for a sec- 
 tion of ancient ram which might have battered 
 the walls of Babylon. Fire made no impression 
 on it, and the chops rebounded under the teeth 
 like India-rubber. However we had the usual 
 reserve of crackers, ham, canned fruit, and I 
 drank to the general joy of the whole table in a 
 glass of withered lemonade. The gentlemen ate 
 with cannibal appetite, and so far from dropping 
 dead, as I feared, seemed refreshed by the reflec- 
 tion. The banquet ended, we insisted on music 
 from the obscured, let me not say fallen, star, and 
 the banjo was brought forth from its case under 
 the festive board. Brudder Bones had a rich 
 and delightful voice, and we listened to him with 
 unaffected enjoyment. One by one the herds- 
 
The Pimos. 283 
 
 men came by leading their lean and thirsty sheep, 
 making a picturesque spectacle as they passed to 
 the spring. 
 
 Back of the miserable hut stretched a plain, 
 level as water, three miles to the foot-hills ; far 
 beyond were the Sierras, purple to the snow line, 
 then a shining silver chain. Their unspeakable 
 beauty haunts me still like some enchanting vis- 
 ion in which I beheld a new heaven and a new 
 earth. Beyond the bower rose a heap of boul- 
 ders, bare except for the tall yucca's cream-white 
 blossoms which decked them in bridal bright- 
 ness, and a species of night-blooming cereus that 
 with the declining day unfolded every petal and 
 filled the air with a fragrance like white lilies. 
 On a bench in front of the hut sat a prospector 
 and the belated travellers ; lounging on blankets 
 and skins were half a dozen soldiers, a Pueblo 
 Indian, a negro and a Mexican peon. The banjo 
 did its best for the musician occupying the can- 
 dle box ; I was enthroned in the only chair. A 
 mixed company, representative of the border 
 races. 
 
 What should we sing but " Tenting to-night 
 boys," and " Oft in the stilly night," the twilight 
 song with its tender memories of the lost loves 
 buried many a year ago ? Lastly, in the solemn 
 beauty of the afterglow, we gave " John Brown's 
 Body " with a rousing chorus in honor of the 
 graves forever green and glorious. 
 
 A line of crimson lights flamed along the 
 mountain peaks, then the drop curtain of violet 
 and pearl gray fell softly through the speckless 
 sapphire and over the darkening hills. 'Twas time 
 to say good-night ; most of the herdsmen wrapped 
 themselves in blankets and rolled like logs on the 
 ground ; the passive ragged peon bowed in cour- 
 teous grace with gently spoken adios, and 
 lay against the side of the hut, his delicate face 
 
284 The Land of the Piteblos. 
 
 upturned to the sky. Old uncle Ned made a 
 tiny fire of pine cones " to toas my feet, missis," 
 as he muffled head and ears in an army coat on 
 which a shred of shoulder strap hinted of better 
 days. We, too, said '< good-night." Besides the 
 old songs my ear was haunted with dim aeolian 
 soundings mingling an evening strain from the 
 Koran : 
 
 " Have we not given you the earth for a bed, 
 And made you husband and wife ? 
 And given you sleep for rest, 
 And made you a mantle of night?" 
 
 But I could not sleep thus mantled in that 
 Eden bower. The air was so electric that five 
 lines of fire followed my fingers as I drew them 
 across the buffalo robe. I was in that state known 
 to most women and a few men when my eyelids 
 would not close. I felt as if the seven doors of 
 the enchanted lantern were opened and I could 
 see all over the world. There was nothing to 
 fear, but a sense of strangeness and awe held me. 
 The spangled arch which upholds the throne of 
 God, — its splendor robbed me of my rest ; 
 my spirit was not fitted to the magnificent 
 infinite palace. Of the exquisite beauty of that 
 balmy semi-tropic night I hardly trust myself to 
 speak. Through the soft perfumed dusk, through 
 the leafy tent, the stars glowed resplendent. 
 None missing there ; the lost Pleiad found her 
 sisters; Aldebaran shone in the East; Arcturus 
 and his sons ; Orion belted and spurred with jew- 
 els. The blanket slipped from its fastenings and 
 there was no curtaining to veil the far-off mys- 
 tery of my boundless bed-room. The cool night 
 oreeze fanned my face as I watched the lofty 
 spaces so solemn, so wondrous fair. I had often 
 slept in the ambulance with curtains close-but- 
 toned ; that was a room. The walls of this apart- 
 ment were limitless. 
 
The Pimos. 285 
 
 Restlessly turning on the pink pillow I thought 
 of eyes that are looking down, not up at the 
 starry hosts, and the voice now beyond them 
 which used to sing to the air of " Bonnie Doon," 
 
 ' Forever and foreverraore, 
 The star, the star of Bethlehem." 
 
 The goats and sheep were at rest, the hurt 
 lamb had ceased its bleat, the light in the ranche 
 went out. In the stilly night silence all, save the 
 low wind soughing in the pines making midnight 
 hush the deeper. The long howl of a dog in the 
 distance. Was he barking at the silver boat in 
 the blue bay overhead ? What sailors manned 
 that fairy craft ? Did they understand the mys- 
 teries and could they answer my weary question- 
 ings? What saw they in the unfathomable depths? 
 and what meant that signal shot from the slender 
 bow across the trackless blue, dropping spark- 
 les of fire through the dusk ? 
 
 Good night, Good night! 
 
 THE END. 
 
a'19 7 9 
 

 
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