This BOOK may be kept out TWO WEEKS 
 j ONLY, and is subject to a fine of FIVE 
 CENTS a day thereafter. It was taken out on 
 the day indicated below: 
 
 Lib. 10M-F.'35 
 
i 
 
i IN THE SOUTHWEST 
 
 j The Companion Library, j 
 
 Number 12. 
 
 PERRY MASON & COMPANY, 
 Boston, Mass. 
 
.♦The Companion Library 
 
 Is a collection of stories, travel-sketches and descriptive articles, complete, 
 exact, and so interesting as to meet the need of all who want "a 
 book for the leisure hour." It is made up from the works of some of the 
 best writers for The Youth's Companion. 
 
 The Library comprises the following volumes, each containing sixty- 
 four pages, illustrated and. bound uniform with this book: 
 
 No. I. Stories of Purpose : Bravery, Tact and Fidelity. 
 
 No. 2. Glimpses of i^urope : Travel and Description. 
 
 No. 3. The American Tropics : Mexico to the Equator. 
 No. 4. Sketches of the Orient : Scenes in Asia. 
 No. 5. Old Ocean : Winds, Currents and Perils. 
 No. 6. I/ife in the Sea: Fish and Fishing. 
 
 No. 7. Bits of Bird I/ife: Habits, Nests and Eggs. 
 
 No. 8. Our IVittle Neighbors : Insects, Small Animals. 
 No. 9. At Home in the Forest: Wild Animals. 
 No. 10. In Alaska : Animals and Resources. 
 No. II. Amongf the Rockies : Scenery and Travel. 
 No. 12. In the Southwest: Semi-Tropical Regions. 
 No. 13. On the Plains : Pioneers and Ranchmen. 
 
 No. 14. The Great I^ake Country : A Land of Progress. 
 No. 15. On the Gulf: Attractive Regions of Contrasts. 
 No. 16. Along the Atlantic : New York to Georgia. 
 
 No. 17. In New lEngland: The Home of the Puritans. 
 
 No. 18. Stories of Success : Skill, Courage and Perseverance. 
 No. 19. Stories of Kindness : Examples for Rich and Poor. 
 No. 20. Student Stories: Life in School and College. 
 
 Price 10 Cents Each, Post-paid. 
 
 PERRY MASON & COMPANY, Publishers, 
 201 Columbus Avenue. BOSTON, MASS. 
 
 / 
 
IN THE SOUTHWEST. 
 
 The Companion Library. 
 
 Number Twelve. 
 
 SELECTIONS 
 • From The Youth's Companion. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 THE BIG TREES OF CALIFORNIA . 
 
 M. V. MOORE. 
 
 3 
 
 THE LUMBERMEN OF THE SIERRAS . 
 
 . WILLIAM H. RIDEING. 
 
 7 
 
 A ROAD OF THE SIERRAS 
 
 GRACE ELLERY CHANNING. 
 
 II 
 
 CALIFORNIA RAISIN-MAKING 
 
 . ELIAS LONGLEY. 
 
 15 
 
 DEATH VALLEY 
 
 JACQUES W. REDWAY. 
 
 21 
 
 THE QUEER SURFACE OF NEVADA . 
 
 . PHILIP VERRILL MiGHELS. 
 
 25 
 
 PYRAMID LAKE 
 
 M. V. MOORE. 
 
 29 
 
 THE GRAND CANON . . . 
 
 
 33 
 
 CAVE-DWELLERS OF ARIZONA PRESTON H. UBERROTH, U. S. R. M. 
 
 39 
 
 A BUILDED LAKE 
 
 HELEN FRANCES BATES. 
 
 45 
 
 THE OLDEST AMERICAN HOUSES 
 
 HELEN HUNT JACKSON. 
 
 50 
 
 NEW MEXICO 
 
 . SARAH WINTER KELLOGG. 
 
 55 
 
 ADOBE 
 
 , SARAH WINTER KELLOGG. 
 
 61 
 
 Copyright, 
 
 1897. 
 
 
 PERRY MASON i 
 
 k COMPANY, 
 
 
 Boston, Mass. 
 
The Mariposa Grove. 
 
The Big Trees of California 
 
 The Big Trees of California represent the largest growth 
 known in the vegetable kingdom of the world, with the excep- 
 tion of a species of the Eucalyptus of Australia. 
 
 The Grizzly Giant, one of the most famous of the trees 
 in the Mariposa Grove, has its first limb one hundred feet 
 from the roots. This limb is six and one-half feet in diameter. 
 Nine feet from the ground the tree is twenty-seven feet in 
 diameter, and below that height its thickness increases. The 
 tree stands grim and grizzly, far apart from any of its com- 
 panions, in sublime and solitary grandeur. 
 
 All the largest and most prominent of the Big Trees have 
 their distinguishing titles. Each of the states has its repre- 
 sentative among the names; and many of America's most 
 famous men are honored in the appellations. General Grant 
 has a namesake, as grim and stolid as the great general, 
 who was present, I believe, at the christening of the tree. 
 
 One of the greatest of the trees lies fallen on the earth, and 
 is called the Fallen Monarch. It is estimated that the Fallen 
 Monarch was about four hundred feet high, and nearly forty 
 feet in diameter. The bark and sap are now gone, but the 
 tree still measures nearly thirty feet in diameter as it lies 
 prone on the earth. A long ladder is used in mounting to its 
 crest. 
 
 The very largest of the Big Trees of California are in what 
 is known as the Calaveras Grove, which is owned by private 
 parties. Among these there is a dead and fallen tree, which 
 is supposed to have been forty feet in diameter, and four 
 hundred and fifty feet high. It is estimated that it has been 
 prostrate a thousand years. The sap and bark of this tree are 
 gone, but the diameter of its trunk still measures thirty-four 
 feet. 
 
 The tallest tree standing is called the New York tree ; 
 
 rs 
 
 <^ 
 
 r 
 
4 
 
 THE BIG TREKS OF CAI^IFORNIA. 
 
 it is thirty feet in diameter, and three hundred and sixty-six 
 feet high. There is another tree, not so tall, which is thirty- 
 seven feet in diameter, and the bark alone measures thirty-one 
 inches in thickness. 
 
 In the Mariposa Grove there is a tree known as the 
 Telescope. The trunk is a hollow cylinder, open at the top, 
 about one hundred feet away. The cavity at the base is 
 large enough to shelter half a dozen men on horseback. One 
 of the largest of the fallen trees is also hollow. One may 
 
 through the base of the very tree itself. This archway, which 
 was bored and burned through, is some ten feet in diameter 
 and twelve feet high, and on each side there yet remains ten 
 feet of solid wall of wood which supports the tree. Into the 
 archway, under the vertical trunk of the tree, a stage-coach 
 drawn by four horses may be driven, and can find there secure 
 shelter from rain or storm above. 
 
 There are in all some six hundred of these Big Trees in 
 the Mariposa Grove. Twenty-five hundred acres of land 
 have been withdrawn from sale by the general government, 
 and they are now kept as a National and World's Park, held 
 in trust forever by the state of California for the people of the 
 world. The reservations include the Yosemite Valley. 
 
 ride in at the lower 
 end, and go out at a 
 knot-hole one hun- 
 dred feet up the 
 trunk. 
 
 One of the most 
 remarkable of these 
 gigantic trees stands 
 directly over the 
 broad roadway which 
 has been constructed 
 through the grove. 
 There is an archway 
 for the drive, cut 
 
THE BIG TRKKS OF CAI.IFORNIA. 
 
 5 
 
 The park is usually inaccessible during the winter and 
 spring, in consequence of the deep snowfall there, but it is 
 visited during the summer and autumn by tourists from all 
 parts of the world, and especially by people of the Old 
 World, who find these trees of very great interest. 
 
 The wood of these big trees is a variety of the cedar. The 
 Redwood of the Pacific is of the same family. Some of the 
 trees standing in California are estimated to be between two 
 and three thousand years old. 
 
 The heart of the tree is thought to be indestructible by 
 the decay that is usual in other woods exposed to atmospheric 
 influences. This certainly does not rot under ordinary climatic 
 action. Furthermore, the wood does not shrink like other 
 timbers, since it contracts from the ends and not from the 
 sides or edges, as is usual with other varieties. 
 
 Specimens of these trees are not allowed to be taken by 
 tourists from the National Reserv^ations. Not even a twig, or 
 shrub, or flower is permitted to be plucked. Policemen and 
 guards are stationed throughout the parks to prevent spolia- 
 tion by tourists. There live, however, upon the reservation 
 licensed parties who have for sale the seeds of this species of 
 wonder- wood. Foreigners are usually the heaviest purchasers. 
 
 Many young trees of the Big Tree species have been 
 started in various parts of California, and are now growing 
 thriftily. They are found in the streets of Los Angeles, San 
 Bernardino and other southern California cities. Though it 
 might be supposed that a tree whose age is reckoned so great 
 would be of very slow growth, the young Sequoias are found 
 to grow quite rapidly. The Calif ornians of one thousand 
 years, hence may see them in their full prime. 
 
 M. V. MOORK. 
 
The Lumbermen of the Sierras. 
 
 Travelling northward among the mountains from Glen- 
 brook on Lake Tahoe, we were appalled by the desolation 
 which the lumbermen have left in their wake. Clearing a 
 tract of every sound tree, they remove to another locality, only 
 to leave behind them again the hastily-built shanty which has 
 sheltered them, and a litter of chips and decaying boughs. 
 
 We rode for days through regions stripped bare, and 
 strewn with fragments, where broad forests once existed. 
 Here arui there a pine or fir, that has been rejected on account 
 of its infirmity, stands alone, and seems to grieve for its lost 
 companions. 
 
 As often as they move, the lumbermen build a new house 
 and furniture, taking only the cooking utensils and bedding 
 with them. The old house is left open to be blown down by 
 the wind, crushed by the heavy winter snows, or occupied by 
 anybody who comes along. Both the house and furniture 
 are frail, and the latter consists in most cases of nothing 
 more than two or three benches and a table made of rough 
 timber. The house and its occupants are collectively called 
 a camp. 
 
 We put up one night at Marlette's camp, which is under 
 Prospect Peak. The men had not come home when we 
 arrived, but the cook was busy preparing supper. He was 
 a white man ; most cooks in the Sierras are Chinese. 
 
 We had pitched our tents, and were waiting for our own 
 ration of bacon and bread, when a great clatter of hoofs and 
 voices seemed to shake the mountains. There was a break 
 in a neighboring wood, and out of this sprang a score of 
 men, some mounted and some unmounted, who came toward 
 us with the wildest yells, and at the greatest speed. A parcel 
 of schoolboys let out on a brisk autumn evening could not 
 
8 
 
 THK LUMBERMEN OF THE SIERRAS. 
 
 have been gladder than these big, rough lumbermen were at 
 the end of their day's labor. 
 
 After dark, we went into the cabin in which the men were 
 eating. The long table was covered with dishes, and around 
 it gathered as hungry a crew as ever relished unlimited beef- 
 steak, potatoes and onions. It was an excellent supper. 
 Beside the more substantial things, there were pickles, fresh 
 butter, hot bread, cake and tea. There were candles, too, 
 and a good deal of them must have got into the food, as one 
 was stuck into the spout of a coffee-pot, another into the neck 
 of a syrup-bottle, and another into a crack of the table. 
 Nobody minded this, however, and everybody ate with the 
 appetite of a giant. 
 
 When supper was over and the table cleared, a fiddle was 
 brought out, a very old and tuneless fiddle indeed, but its 
 squeaking afforded the company vast satisfaction, and stirred 
 them to some extraordinary antics, which, as a matter of 
 courtesy rather than of fact, were called a dance. Some of 
 the quieter men retired into corners, and read, or wrote letters 
 home. 
 
 Home seemed to be very far away as we left the cabin and 
 saw its little windows shining ruddily in the dark night. 
 The snowy peaks were all around, looking terribly lonely and 
 massive under the starlit California sky ; the pines were 
 densely black ; our own camp-fire cast off mysterious wreaths 
 of smoke ; but the little settlement of men took some of the 
 sadness away from the scene. 
 
 The lumbermen work in the mountains until winter drives 
 them to the lowlands. Their wages are about fifty dollars 
 and board a month. Many Chinamen are also employed, 
 but they are not treated so well as the whites. They live in 
 camps by themselves, and rude as the cabins of the Americans 
 are, theirs are ruder. Four or five logs laid on top of one 
 another make the walls of John Chinaman's mountain house, 
 and three holes answer for door, chimney and window. 
 
 Various devices are used in transporting the wood from 
 
THK IvUMBKRMKN OF THK SIKRRAS. 9 
 
 the mountains to the sawmills. I was riding through the 
 Truckee Canon one day, when a cloud of spray rose from the 
 river above the shrubs on the brink, and I was in some 
 perplexity as to the cause of it before I discovered a sign- 
 board cautioning passers-by to look out for the logs. A 
 trough or slide extended down the canon-wall, which was 
 almost perpendicular; it was bound with iron bands that 
 shone like burnished silver, and down this the logs were 
 shot with great velocity into the water, which floated them to 
 Truckee town. The fact that the trough crossed the road, 
 and that a traveller might be much startled by the sight of a 
 pine-tree, four or five feet in diameter, suddenly rushing 
 under his horse's nose, made no difference to the lumbermen, 
 who by this simple contrivance were saved the trouble of 
 hauling the wood. 
 
 When a wagon is used for conveying logs it is of the 
 peculiar kind shown in our illustration, which represents a 
 load of some seventeen thousand cubic feet, the largest ever 
 transported in California. The wheels of the wagon are 
 circular sections of the pine, convex in shape and bound with 
 broad iron tires. The draught animals are oxen. 
 
 The flumes through which the wood from the sawmills 
 is floated to the plains are V shaped troughs. Sometimes 
 they are laid down the mountainside, and then they are 
 bridged over deep chasms on trestle-work supports. One of 
 them is over forty miles long, and cost nearly three hundred 
 thousand dollars to build. The current of the water is 
 considerable, and takes the wood from the summit to the 
 railway at the rate of thirty-five miles an hour. 
 
 The large number of men, the enormous capital and the 
 ingenious appliances used make the lumber business of the 
 Sierras very interesting ; but no one can help regretting the 
 havoc it is causing in the lovely country around Lake Tahoe. 
 
 W11.1.1AM H. Ridb;ing. 
 
Echo Mountain. 
 
A Road of the Sierras. 
 
 We looked doubtfully at the strange, white chariot, and 
 then at the apparently perpendicular line up Echo Mountain, 
 in southern California, where the cable slid over its succession 
 of wheels. Should we venture on the ascent? The cable 
 looked small and the mountain large, and the end of cable, 
 track and journey was hidden in the clouds. 
 
 But for the fear of ridicule some of us would have refused 
 to go higher ; we could so easily have returned to the valley 
 below in the same electric cars that brought us up to the foot 
 of the cable road ! But the driver or conductor of the white 
 chariot was waiting ; so we shut our eyes and stepped into 
 one of the seats. 
 
 The conductor gave a signal, and suddenly the bottom 
 began to drop out of everything, and we to rise over the 
 tops of things in general. Awful canons, big mountains and 
 mighty plains rolled out beneath us ; there seemed no reason 
 why we should not continue to rise forever. 
 
 Up and up and up ! Weights seemed on my eyelids ; that 
 horrible cable incline appeared to run from my eyes to my 
 heart ; I secretly longed to lie down on the floor, and I am 
 sure the others felt similar sensations. 
 
 " We are now approaching the steepest part of the grade, 
 a rise of sixty-two feet in a hundred," came soothingly to our 
 ears ; and the dreadful slant seemed to become truly perpen- 
 dicular. Yet we held to our pretence of decent tranquillity, 
 and were pulled steadily and gently over the crest of the 
 mountain to the level top. There our chariot stopped, as 
 noiselessly as it had started, and we stepped out and looked 
 straight down from Echo Mountain to the world below. 
 
 I have seen some of the most famous and beautiful valleys 
 of the world, but they all seem tame compared with the 
 
12 
 
 A ROAD OF THE SIERRAS. 
 
 great, glowing plain of tender green and soft purple which 
 stretched its groves of southern fruit out to a golden, shim- 
 mering, distant something which was, we knew, the Pacific 
 Ocean. Santa Catalina Island, sixty-five miles away, shone 
 bright and clear in purple. 
 
 After we visited the menagerie on the top of the mountain, 
 we gave ourselves up to gazing on the beautiful scenery, and 
 to watching the white chariots skim swiftly up to the summit, 
 or drop noiselessly over the verge. 
 
 Though this Echo Mountain cable road is said to be the 
 steepest, it is considered the safest mountain railway of the 
 world. The contrivance is practically a great elevator. Its 
 ascending and descending coaches, welded to the cable itself, 
 precisely balance, and pass each other at a given point by 
 automatic switches. 
 
 As the cable has been tested to a hundred tons' strain, the 
 white chariots when loaded to their utmost capacity are 
 small weights for it. Should anything go wrong with the 
 machinery the chariots would simply stop, and the occupants 
 be enabled to dismount at their leisure. Though the structure 
 looks quite unsafe, it is really perfectly guarded against 
 disaster. 
 
 In the power-house the big wheels and revolving cable 
 turn slowly, governed by the dynamo, but the primary force 
 or motor of the cable road is water. Running through a six- 
 inch pipe, and finally through an inch-and-a-half nozzle upon 
 a wheel, it transmits a pressure so enormous that one might 
 better go down the incline without a cable than stand in front 
 of that harmless-looking nozzle. That inch and a half of water 
 is capable of going through the body of a man. 
 
 We watched the light go out of the landscape and fade 
 over the Pacific as we sat on the piazza of the pretty hotel, 
 which, with all its refinements of modern luxury, must have 
 travelled up piecemeal in the white chariots. It now sits 
 perched on the very verge of space, a kind of stationary 
 white chariot, itself. Round on the other side were softly 
 
A ROAD OF 'THK SIEJRRAS. 
 
 13 
 
 flying the echoes which give the mountain its name, but on 
 our side it was very still. 
 
 A little higher up, on a rounded knoll, gleamed the 
 metallic walls of the observatory, which we meant to visit 
 after we had seen the great search-light, on the platform just 
 below us. That long finger of light had come reaching 
 through our windows down in the valley many a night. Its 
 beam makes bright the streets of lyos Angeles, twenty-five 
 miles away, and carries a ray to distant Redondo, on the 
 Pacific itself. 
 
 Now its ray of light went sweeping across the plain below, 
 resting here and there where a red light signalled for a 
 visit. Down below, that beam had almost dazed us with its 
 brightness ; here we could stare into the very eye of the 
 monster without blinking, for the rays do not focus so near. 
 
 Away, back and forth, went the finger, now stretching out 
 into a full band of light, now narrowing to so fine a line that 
 it could be but barely perceived. Some spectators with inter- 
 cepting mirrors caught and flashed a ray here and a ray there, 
 into the shadows of the canons, on the observatory roof, or 
 back to the hotel piazza. 
 
 From watching the light we went to the observatory, which 
 contains a beautiful sixteen-inch glass. The perfect clearness 
 of the atmosphere makes southern California the paradise of 
 astronomers. We had looked through larger glasses, but not 
 at such a height, and the elevation of thirty-five hundred feet 
 above the murky air of the sea-level seemed to bring the 
 stars perceptibly nearer. 
 
 We had beheld the sea and the dry land and the heavens ; 
 there was nothing else but the wider land of dreams to explore. 
 Since we planned to come forth again at sunrise, we took 
 a parting glance at the constellation of cities on the plain at 
 our feet. It was a fascinating sight, even after the other 
 constellations, and a significant one as well ; we could easily 
 forecast the merging of twinkling city with twinkling city, 
 and imagine the time when one great city, stretching from 
 
14 
 
 A ROAD OF THE SIERRAS. 
 
 mountains to sea, will be a chief glory of the country we will 
 still call great. 
 
 An unkind fog saddened our sunrise the next morning, so 
 that we were glad to console ourselves by talking with a 
 workman, who looked over the terribly beautiful abyss and 
 said wearily that folks came there and made a fuss about it, 
 but he was sure he didn't see why. 
 
 At last we turned our steps toward the chariot, which was 
 kindly waiting to drop us over the brink. This time, instead 
 of the bottom dropping out of things, it was the top of every- 
 thing which rose and soared away, while we went slipping 
 down through space, until it was in a kind of wonder that we 
 found ourselves above the ground when we stopped. 
 
 In eight minutes we were among the ferns and oaks of the 
 canon ; in another fifteen we sped between the fields of wild 
 flowers ; in half an hour more we stood in our own rose 
 garden, with the scent of the orange groves heavy about us ; 
 and from the tropic of our palms and bananas and lime and 
 lemon we could gaze straight up to the snowy Sierras, and 
 mark a slender white line cutting the purple side, the route 
 of the white chariots. 
 
 Grace Ellery Channing. 
 
California Raisin-Making. 
 
 Until within a few years all the raisins consumed in the 
 United States were imported from Europe. It was supposed 
 that they could not be produced in this country because its 
 climate was not warm enough and dry enough, for a season 
 of sufficient length for the purpose. But when, in 1849, 
 California was invaded by American gold-hunters, they not 
 only found the largest and finest grapes growing they had 
 ever seen, but discovered that the surplus quantities left on 
 the vines, after ripening, became raisins ! 
 
 These raisins were not, however, of the best quality, for 
 the vines on which they grew were such as the Franciscan 
 fathers brought with them from Spain, a hundred years 
 before, when sent among the native Indians who then 
 lived on this Pacific coast. 
 
 But enterprising Americans, aided by foreigners from the 
 wine and raisin-making countries of Europe, imported many 
 varieties of the best kinds of vines that could be found. 
 Among these were the white Muscatels and Malagas, from 
 which the best raisins are made. 
 
 The white grapes have flourished well, especially in 
 southern California, where the long . warm and dry seasons 
 are more favorable for making raisins than further north. 
 The entire absence of rain for the six continuous months, 
 May to November, and almost complete freedom from fogs 
 or dews in many localities during the ripening and drying 
 season, render this the most favorable climate in the world 
 for producing raisins. 
 
 The grape-vine here is not staked and tied up, in order to 
 keep the fruit from the ground, as is done in the Middle and 
 Eastern States. It begins bearing the second year after 
 planting the cuttings, and for several years is allowed to 
 trail on the ground, after being cut back each season, so that 
 
i6 
 
 CALIFORNIA RAISIN-MAKING. 
 
 the fruit hangs very low, and most of it even lies upon the 
 ground. It is believed to ripen better on the dry, sandy soil 
 than when suspended in the atmosphere, which is always cool 
 at night. 
 
 As the roots grow older the main stalk of each is trained 
 to a tree shape, twelve to thirty inches high, and in some old 
 vineyards these stumps have reached a diameter of from six 
 to ten inches. The stumps are trimmed closely every winter 
 or early spring, and from their tops new sprouts spring forth 
 which bear the next crop of fruit. The yield of grapes is 
 enormous, ranging from one ton to two or three tons per acre. 
 
 Very few vineyardists manufacture their grapes either into 
 wine or raisins. It requires more knowledge, skill and capital 
 to do either than the mere farmer generally possesses. But 
 the raisin-makers, like the wine-makers, generally own and 
 cultivate a vineyard of from one hundred to one thousand 
 acres, and there is one in lyos Angeles County covering five 
 thousand acres, the largest in the world, as a basis of opera- 
 tions, and in addition the owners buy all the grapes that are 
 raised near them by the smaller cultivators. 
 
 Several methods of drying grapes into raisins are practised 
 by the smaller cultivators. The following is the most popular, 
 and may be seen in operation at almost every country and 
 village house in southern California. Some time in September 
 or October, small quantities of the finest Muscatel grapes are 
 bought at one cent a pound. Some of the bunches weigh 
 from two to five pounds, so large that they have to be cut in 
 pieces to dry. 
 
 They are spread out as thinly as possible, no bunch on 
 top of another, on some sunny porch floor, on the roof of a 
 house or shed, or on trays made of laths or shakes, as the 
 Californians call the redwood clapboards, and placed upon 
 trestles in the yard. Here they lie in the hot sun all day 
 long, and after they begin to color and shrink are generally 
 covered at night with some kind of canvas. 
 
 In two or three weeks the bunches are carefully turned 
 
CAI^IFORNIA RAISIN-MAKING. 
 
 17 
 
 over and allowed to continue drying for another two or three 
 weeks, until they are thoroughl}^ colored and the juice has all 
 evaporated. Thus thousands upon thousands of families are 
 now making their own raisins at a very small cost. 
 
 But now for the way in which raisins are made to sell. 
 The grape-grower, if he cultivates but eight or ten acres, can, 
 
 Raisin-Making. 
 
 with the aid of wife and children, gather his own fruit and 
 haul it to the raisin-maker ; but if he is a man of means, and 
 manages his hundred or more acres, he hires a force of 
 Chinamen, who with crooked pruning-knives go through 
 the vineyards, clip off all the ripe bunches of grapes and 
 
i8 
 
 CAI.IFORNIA RAISIN-MAKING. 
 
 place them carefully on shallow trays three by six feet, and 
 four inches deep, avoiding the possibility of bruising them. 
 
 These trays, when filled, are gathered up and loaded into 
 two-horse spring-wagons and hauled up many miles into level 
 places among the foot-hills of the mountains to get out of the 
 danger of fogs which often rise late in the season on the lower 
 plains. 
 
 Here from fifty to one hundred acres of as level land as can 
 be found has been scraped and rolled smooth. On these 
 fields the grapes are spread upon the ground, by drawing the 
 bottom from each tray and letting them drop gently on their 
 warm bed. They are thus emptied in successions of rows, 
 hundreds of feet long and of uniform width, from dozens of 
 wagons that come and go day after day, from every direction. 
 
 Such grape-fields resemble an immense carpet store, where 
 every imaginable pattern of goods is rolled out in the hope of 
 pleasing some fastidious customer. The freshly-laid rows 
 present a light green shade of color. Those that have been 
 down a few weeks have a mottled appearance, while those 
 that are about dry enough to come up have a deeper and 
 more uniform color. 
 
 For the reason that the dry soil retains its warmth during 
 the night, grapes dry quicker on the ground than if elevated 
 on boards, and they also more completely retain their flavor. 
 In two weeks the smaller bunches are ready to be gathered 
 up and the larger bunches turned over so as to be dried on 
 the under side. This requires two weeks longer, when they 
 are taken up also. Then follow the gleaners, women and 
 children, who gather up all the loose berries that have fallen 
 off. These are sold as dried grapes. 
 
 When the later crop is on the ground, and the first showers 
 are expected, raisin-dryers bring upon the field great rolls of 
 oiled Manila paper ; and at night, or when rain is threatened, 
 this paper is spread upon the rows of grapes for the purpose 
 of keeping them dry. This process is sometimes continued 
 until late in December. 
 
CALIFORNIA RAISIN-MAKING, 
 
 19 
 
 The dried grapevS are put into boxes holding about a 
 bushel, and hauled to the packing-house, where they are 
 piled on top of each other as high as the ceiling or roof. In 
 the course of eight 'or ten days the slight moisture left in 
 some of them, and the heat, cause them to sweat, and this 
 moisture so permeates the whole bulk as to give them a soft 
 and fresh appearance. They are then ready for sorting and 
 boxing. This is done by women and Chinamen, seated, forty 
 or fifty in a room, at long tables. 
 
 To each is emptied as needed a box full of fruit ; and 
 alongside of each are placed two new, clean boxes, into one 
 of which the largest and most perfect bunches are packed, 
 which are labelled *' I^ondon Layers," and into the other box 
 the smaller and less perfect bunches, which are labelled 
 simply "Layers," or as some California raisin-makers are 
 now taking pride in stamping them, "California Layers;" 
 while the loose berries are passed through a windmill and 
 cleaned of their stems and dust, and boxed as "Loose 
 Muscatels." Though most of them are the finest berries of 
 the crop, they sell for a much lower price than those adhering 
 to the stems. 
 
 Three sizes of boxes are made, one to hold five pounds, 
 another fifteen pounds, but the largest number to hold twenty 
 pounds ; and as the boxes are filled heaping full a careful 
 inspector examines and weighs each, taking out any surplus, 
 and passes them to the press-man, who places on the lids and 
 puts them in the press, where they are gradually squeezed 
 down and the lids nailed on. 
 
 They are then ready to be shipped to their Eastern and 
 Northern markets by the carload — about one thousand boxes 
 to the car. But as they are not considered perishable goods, 
 like oranges, lemons and pears, they are not rushed off, 
 regardless of demand or prices. The consequence is, they 
 have a steady as well as ready sale at prices which afford a 
 very fair profit to the enterprising manufacturer. 
 
 E1.IAS LONGLKY. 
 
1 
 
Death Valley, 
 
 Death Valley derives its name from the fact that the 
 majority of a party of emigrants who attempted to traverse it 
 perished from thirst and the intense heat. In all probability 
 quite as many would have perished had the party attempted 
 to cross the Mohave or the Colorado desert at any other point, 
 without knowing the location of the few springs and natural 
 reservoirs. 
 
 Had the leader known something about the character of 
 the country, or had he taken the precaution to employ an 
 Indian guide to pilot him to King's Springs, it is highly 
 probable the party would have made the trip with no more 
 danger than attends a journey through any part of this region. 
 Knowing the location of the few springs and tanks, or natural 
 reservoirs, one may safely travel through either desert at any 
 season of the year. Without this knowledge, however, it is 
 almost certain death to attempt it, especially in summer. 
 
 Death Valley is situated in Inyo County, California. It is 
 a small portion of the desert region which forms a part of the 
 Great Basin. It lies between two low granite ridges, and is 
 the northern extremity of a depression extending into lower 
 California. This depression possesses one remarkable feature : 
 nearly every part is below sea-level. It contains a number of 
 dry lake-basins, one of which, the sink of the Amargosa 
 River, practically constitutes Death Valley. 
 
 Another, somewhat larger, is the sink of the San Felipe 
 River, better known as Conchilla Valley. Both stream beds 
 are now nothing but dry washes, though at some former and 
 not greatly distant time each must have carried a considerable 
 volume of water. After the lakes had become dry the saline 
 deposit left by the evaporation of their waters was quickly 
 covered by the dust carried thither by sand-storms, and in a 
 few places only is the deposit left uncovered. 
 
22 
 
 DEATH VAI^LEY. 
 
 At King's springs, Death Valley is two hundred and 
 twenty-five feet below sea-level, though it is probable that 
 there are places where the depression below mean tide may 
 exceed three hundred and fifty or four hundred feet. A few 
 miles distant from Dos Palmas, now a station on the Southern 
 Pacific Railway, the writer found a point in Conchilla Valley 
 three hundred and twenty feet below the sea-level ; Dos Palmas 
 itself is two hundred and sixty-one feet below. 
 
 The reputed volcano in this valley is nothing more than a 
 hot spring, and the alleged eruption consisted merely of a 
 sudden and very large increase in the flow of water, 
 accompanied by ejection of mud. It is probable that a hot 
 spring had previously existed at that locality, and its sudden 
 increase was most likely due to an earthquake. 
 
 There are no poisonous gases emitted from the volcanic 
 rocks in either locality ; on the contrary, the atmosphere, 
 because of its relative dryness, is remarkably pure. More- 
 over, in this respect neither valley differs from any other part 
 of the Great Basin, or in fact from any part of the plateau 
 region. Meat exposed to the air will jerk, or dry up, but 
 it will not putrefy. This fact is attributed to the purity of the 
 hot, dry air, which is free from germs and organisms that 
 produce putrefaction. 
 
 The most interesting features about Death Valley and its 
 twin, Conchilla Valley, are their excessive heat and dryness. 
 During midsummer the temperature will often remain between 
 iio° and 115° for weeks at a time, and on one occasion a 
 temperature of 130^ was recorded at Indian Wells. In spite 
 of its intensity, however, this degree of heat is not intolerable, 
 and one may remain out-of-doors day after day without the 
 slightest danger of sunstroke. Indeed, in this region a 
 temperature of 110° is by no means so disagreeable as one 
 of 95° along the seacoast or in a region where the atmospheric 
 moisture is great. 
 
 In these valleys and throughout the desert region excessive 
 dryness is a peculiar feature of the atmosphere, and General 
 
DKATH VAI,I,e;Y. 
 
 23 
 
 Sherman's assertion that " even the steel rails of the railway 
 track shrivelled and curled up " is a pardonable exaggeration. 
 Water upon the ground disappears almost instantly, and the 
 whole volume of the Rio Colorado would not fill either valley, 
 so rapid is surface evaporation. 
 
 Still another peculiarity is the presence of an unusual 
 amount of electricity in the air. Rubbing the hand through 
 the hair will cause a fierce snapping, and in the dark will 
 produce a profusion of sparks. Horses' manes stand almost 
 erect, and their tails are almost globular in shape, because of 
 the self-repellent force exerted by the electrified hairs. In 
 the trading post at Dos Palmas there used to stand a wooden 
 bench on which several hundred cans of preserved goods were 
 kept. The metal of the can acted as a condenser to the extent 
 that at times one could draw sparks an inch in length from 
 the surface. 
 
 The rainfall in this region, as in all parts of the Colorado 
 and Mojave deserts, is less than two inches a year ; if evenly 
 distributed over the whole surface of the desert, it would 
 probably be only a small fraction of two inches. But the 
 rain-storms are local, rarely covering more than a few hundred 
 square miles, and when they occur they are apt to come in the 
 form of cloudbursts. There is a sudden darkening of the 
 sky, a deluge of water, and then the sun is pouring its torrid 
 ray on the white, glistening sand almost before one realizes 
 that anything has happened. Possibly more than an inch of 
 rain may fall in less than five minutes, and another cloud- 
 burst may not occur in that particular locality in two or three 
 years. 
 
 By far more trying, however, are the sand-storms. These 
 come with about as little warning as the cloudbursts, and 
 they are infinitely more disagreeable. During one of these 
 storms the clouds of dust are so dense that the darkness 
 is almost that of night. The finer dust is piled up in drifts 
 fifteen or twenty feet high, shifting from place to place with 
 each storm ; the coarser particles are hurled with a force 
 
24 
 
 sufficient to lacerate and bruise the skin. The fact that 
 telegraph-poles eight inches in diameter have been cut almost 
 entirely away in less than a year may give one an idea of the 
 force of these blasts. 
 
 lyife, either animal or vegetable, does not thrive in either 
 valley. There are a few species of cactus and one or two of 
 lizard. The cacti, judging from the number of dead plants, 
 seem to be succumbing to the intense heat and drought. One 
 species of lizard is a beautiful, graceful and agile little 
 creature that emits a musical chirp ; the other is the famous 
 horned toad. Inasmuch as there seems to be neither water 
 nor insects for them to subsist upon, just how they live is a 
 mystery. Several of the latter, made captives by the writer, 
 lived for nearly five months, apparently on nothing. No 
 amount of coaxing would induce them to eat insects or bits 
 of shredded muscle, yet they seemed lively up to a few days 
 before dying. 
 
 Jacques W. Rkdway. 
 
The Queer Surface of Nevada. 
 
 The State of Nevada has very few inhabitants, and is 
 commonly supposed to be a desert that ought to be avoided 
 by men who wish to establish homes. Yet its vast area is 
 rich in many ways, though considerable portions of it are given 
 over to freaks of nature — deserts, plains, sinks and ugly 
 eruptions. But the State can well afford room for its queer 
 spots, as it has, exclusive of them, enough fertile soil to 
 overlie the whole of New England. 
 
 The traveller who crosses the ' ' Sage-Brush State ' ' in the 
 cars sees much of its dreariness and little of its pleasant 
 places. He does not suspect that Nevada has great stretches 
 of valley wherein are ranches and cattle ranges, and lazy 
 rivers winding through broad, bright ribbons of green. 
 
 Indeed, water works emerald miracles in this strange 
 land, and there the farmers reap easy and sure harvests. 
 Their fields pay abundantly in hay and grain ; their herds 
 furnish ample measure of milk, butter, cheese and beef ; their 
 flocks produce well of long, wholesome wool, and their 
 orchards bow down with loads of fruit. 
 
 The surface of the state is about five thousand feet above 
 the sea-level, on an average, the range being from three 
 thousand feet, in some of the valleys, to ten thousand feet, 
 where snow-clad peaks lift into the deep blue vault above. 
 The aspect of the whole is gray, because sage-brush covers 
 nearly the entire extent, and the surface is a varying 
 succession of mountains and valleys. 
 
 At various places occur alkali flats, some of which are 
 readily reclaimed, while some are veritable deserts, almost as 
 white as snow, flat as a table, and barren as the bottom of a 
 sad-iron. 
 
 Some of these flats are forty miles long and ten to fifteen 
 
26 
 
 THE QUEER SURFACE OF NEVADA. 
 
 miles broad. Over them the winds blow blinding, parching 
 clouds of smarting dust. On the edges of such "blisters" 
 springs frequently gush forth, but the water is brackish and 
 often poisonous. 
 
 Beneath these chalk-like floors riches sometimes lie. Men 
 
 Queer Surface. 
 
 dig trenches near the edges and fill them with water. The 
 sun dries them out, and behold ! a fine crust of crystal 
 salt, pure and clear. Or, again, there maybe borax deposits, 
 and laborers plow or dig out the cotton balls of borax, grind 
 
THK QUKKR SURFACP: OF NEVADA. 
 
 27 
 
 them up, crystallize them, and get rich from the sackfuls and 
 tons of it carried into distant cities. 
 
 The state is wonderfully and richly endowed with springs. 
 To say nothing of snow-chilled, rock-filtered founts of . pure 
 water, there are hundreds of freaky spoutings, both cold and 
 hot, some of which have attracted the attention of science 
 from afar. I doubt if any like area contains so great a number 
 of hot mineral springs. 
 
 Sulphur taints some so thickly at times that the bottoms of 
 the ponds are formed of the grayish stuff, and every sub- 
 merged twig and root is coated heavily with it. 
 
 The hot springs, however, which are found in almost 
 every valley, are the most attractive. These gush up in many 
 sorts, but nearly all are said to possess healing qualities and 
 are exceedingly pleasant to bathe in. There are six or eight 
 of them within a short distance of the capital city, Carson. 
 
 One of these, Steamboat Springs, is famous in the scientific 
 world. The waters spout, small, geyser-like, from deep rifts 
 and chasms, making much to do of it and rumbling mightily. 
 Where the heated and agitated fluid issues forth it drops a 
 burden fetched from afar down and leaves it, red and heavy, 
 at the outside door. This deposit is cinnabar, or quicksilver 
 ore, and is regarded with great interest by geologists. 
 
 Another strange feature of Nevada are the sinks in which its 
 rivers disappear completely. The Carson River, the Hum- 
 boldt River and the Truckee River, not to mention small 
 streams, flow their life-imparting way to apparent lakes, which 
 are really huge sinks. Carson Sink, Humboldt Sink and 
 Pyramid Lake, respectively, swallow down the whole output 
 of the mountain springs. 
 
 Fish live in these uncanny lakes, and ducks and geese 
 gather in thousands on them, but the water is a little off 
 taste. Some much-learned heads shake wisely, and assert 
 that subterranean passages conduct the streams away. 
 
 In this wonderland are caverns that rival the great Mam- 
 moth Cave of Kentucky ; beds of salt where slabs may be 
 
28 
 
 THE QUEER SUREACE OE NEVADA. 
 
 quarried out like stone ; depo.sits of sulphur as pure as can 
 be made in the underground laboratories ; ledges of mineral 
 soap that may be cut out with a knife, and countless combi- 
 nations, chemical and curious. 
 
 There are vast treasures of metal, gold, silver, copper, lead, 
 iron, and those the names of which are much less commonly 
 known. 
 
 There are beds of coal, forests of trees and acres of sand 
 intermingled with gold in flakes. These sands are the 
 placers, and it is not easy always to separate the precious 
 bits of shining metal from the dross. 
 
 There are mountains of granite, sandstone and marble, not 
 to mention the volcanic and igneous formations. Quarries of 
 all of these rocks are worked a little, but so extensive is the 
 supply that the present working might be compared to the 
 scratching of one hen on a large farm with design to cultivate 
 the acres. The granite is close-grained, of all tints, and of 
 much beauty ; the marble is of infinite variety, and fit for the 
 finest of the arts. 
 
 Some wonder-inspiring " footprints on the sands of time " 
 are found in the stone quarries at the state prison, near Carson. 
 There they were left ages ago by birds and animals long 
 since extinct. Grave professors have hovered lovingly over 
 these mud impressions, and they pronounce them wonderful. 
 
 Weird animals and birds wandered along that place, then 
 a lake shore, while yet the mud was soft as ooze, and there 
 left their autographs ; and Nature came to save the page, and 
 she shut on it her cover of rock, hard-wove and thick and 
 lasting as the hills. 
 
 Philip VerriIvIv Mighels. 
 
Pyramid Lake 
 
 The volcanoes of the Pacific coast, in their extinction, have 
 left us no more wonderful phenomena than the deposits now 
 seen in a wonderful sheet of water known as the Pyramid 
 Lake, in Nevada, over three thousand feet above the sea- 
 level. 
 
 This lake lies near the eastern base of the Sierra Nevada 
 Mountains, about one hundred miles south of the Oregon line. 
 It is nearly forty miles long, by five to twelve miles wide. 
 Jutting out of its waters and rising abruptly up from their 
 very depths are hundreds of pyramids, or conic formations, 
 of a basaltic mineral ; they are not of stone proper, but the 
 evidence shows that they were once molten matter thrown out 
 in the upheaval of a prehistoric volcano. Whether or no the 
 area of the present lake was once the crater of a volcano, or 
 whether the crater was near by, throwing its jets of lava 
 into the cooling waters, are problems that are well-nigh 
 indeterminate. Doubtless strong testimonies could be pro- 
 duced in favor of either hypothesis. 
 
 The tallest of the pyramids in the lake are said to be some 
 five hundred feet high — about as large and as high as the 
 great Egyptian Cheops. The smallest appear to be from ten 
 to fifteen feet in height. They are seen singly, and in groups 
 or clusters, irregular in height and irregular in diameter, but 
 all of singular uniformity in shape — like an ordinary V 
 inverted, the angle acute at top, the apex pointed, and 
 usually very sharp at that. 
 
 Some of the .pyramids are hollow, having apertures 
 in the sides through which otter and other fish-eating 
 quadrupeds go in and out. There are thousands of these 
 fur-bearing animals seen sporting about the pyramids. They 
 are careful, however, to make their homes out of reach of 
 gunshot from the shore. 
 
PYRAMID IvAKE. 
 
 31 
 
 The lake abounds in the finest of fish, chiefly of the trout 
 and salmon family. The waters of this and its twin brother, 
 Winnemucca Lake, lie within the bounds of an Indian 
 reservation in Nevada, and the fish are the exclusive property 
 of the tribe of peaceable savages living on the shores. White 
 men are not allowed the privilege of fishing in the lakes, 
 except by the grace of the Indian, and that means both little 
 and much — little of the grace, and much of the consequence 
 if you happen to be caught ! You may catch a few of the fish 
 for your own personal use, but if you are found making 
 merchandise of them, woe to the fisherman ! 
 
 The provident Indian — for there are a few of them there 
 — spends some of his time during the summer days in taking 
 the fish and drying them for winter use. The fish are cut 
 open and hung, or laid, on scaffolds erected on the shore. 
 The hot sunshine over the white sands of the beach soon dries 
 the fish ready for packing away, the reflection of the heat from 
 below being almost as great as the direct rays from above. 
 
 The waters of this lake, like those of Great Salt Lake in 
 Utah, are never at rest. They are always, as I was told, 
 while there, in a state of agitation and unrest. It is indeed a 
 troubled sea, though its waters are fresh. Navigation over 
 its surface is ever attended with supreme danger, and even 
 the Indians rarely venture far from the broad, white beach. 
 Few white men have ever succeeded in crossing in boats or 
 canoes ; many have been lost in attempting the feat. The 
 winds sweep the lake with sudden and frequent squalls. 
 
 The Indian name of Pyramid Lake is written Cuh-o-wah^ 
 or Coo-ho-wah, a word that in the native tongue means simply 
 waters, or the big or much water. Lying by its side is the 
 Winnemucca, the great purple water. These lakes are the 
 reservoir holding the waters of the Truckee River, a raging, 
 roaring stream that leaps in considerable volume from the 
 canons of the eastern face of the Sierras, fed by the eternal 
 snows of the dizzy summits that rim the heavens away to the 
 westward. 
 
32 
 
 PYRAMID IvAKIt. 
 
 Up the northern bank of this river the Southern Pacific 
 Railway winds its course, past the sombre shades about Lake 
 Donner, up to the crest of the mountain at Summit Station. 
 The mountains about the Pyramid Lake are low, sandy and 
 quite barren. To the northward is an ugly stretch of desert, 
 and one of the roughest highways over which human traveller 
 is ever hurried by pitiless stagemen. 
 
 There are no waters of Nevada that have an outlet in the 
 ocean excepting some small tributaries of the Snake on the 
 north, and one of the Colorado on the south. 
 
 The principal river is the Humboldt, a current that winds 
 through a desert, without a sprig of verdure to mark its 
 shores. For a hundred miles one may travel not more than 
 half a mile from its course and never know that there is a 
 stream of water near. The banks are low, and in places the 
 desert plain stretches away in unbroken level for more than a 
 hundred miles. With the occasional exception of sage-brush 
 and bunch-grass, nothing grows on this desert plain except in 
 irrigation. 
 
 Humboldt River has no lake or sea outlet ; the waters, 
 after running nearly a thousand miles, simply disappear 
 and lose themselves in a vast sand and alkali basin known as 
 the Sink of the Humboldt, in one of the dreariCvSt and most 
 forlorn stretches of waste land human eye ever beheld, in the 
 heart of a great broad plain shimmering with sickening, 
 whitish alkali, while the far-off mountains to the southward 
 appear like a vein of silver, with their snow-capped faces 
 looking down on the desolation below. 
 
 M. V. Moore. 
 
The Grand Canon 
 
 Having read several interesting accounts of visits to the 
 Grand Canon of the Colorado River in Arizona, but none 
 describing the experience of a descent into the chasm, I was 
 filled with a desire to have this experience. 
 
 I was told that to make possible a descent to the river, the 
 services of a guide would be necessary ; but deeming the 
 price which the local guides asked beyond my means, I 
 resolved to go alone. 
 
 As I stood on the rim of the canon, ready to begin the 
 descent, I must confess that I felt a little uncertain of the 
 wisdom of my course, but I had no notion of turning back. 
 
 Mr. John Hance, who lives in a cabin near the rim of the 
 canon, told me that the distance from the rim to the river was 
 seven miles ; the vertical depth more than six thousand six 
 hundred feet ; the distance from the rim to a cabin on the 
 trail, three miles ; vertical depth to the cabin, four thousand 
 feet ; length of longest rope, fifty feet. 
 
 With neither coat nor waistcoat, carrying only my journal 
 and my lunch, I was ready for the descent. I noted the time, 
 which, was just seven o'clock and forty minutes, and bade 
 good-by to my driver, requesting that if I should not return by 
 the afternoon of the next day he should come down to seek me. 
 
 The trail is so steep that one can scarcely keep on his feet. 
 I walked, ran, slid and rolled down the three miles to the 
 cabin in just an hour and two minutes. 
 
 The scenery all the way was exceedingly interesting, 
 lyooking down, one would see a prominent ledge, or bench of 
 rock, perhaps a thousand feet below, from which would rise a 
 magnificent butte. A quarter of an hour's travel would bring 
 him to a level with this base ; and in the next quarter of an 
 hour he would see it rise a thousand feet above his head. 
 
34 
 
 THE GRAND CANON. 
 
 I found it exceedingly interesting to pick out prominent 
 points, both at a level with me and far below, and then stop 
 occasionally and see how we had changed position. In fact, 
 I think that is about the only way one can gain an idea, 
 inadequate though it be, of the great descent he is making. 
 
 The Grand Canon. 
 
 At the cabin I found a beautiful stream of clear, cool 
 water, which was very refreshing. Here I divided my lunch, 
 leaving some for my return. After half an hour's rest I 
 . pushed on. 
 
THK GRAND CANON. 
 
 35 
 
 The canon here, which is merely a side canon leading down 
 to the river, was perhaps five hundred feet wide, with walls 
 nearly vertical, a thousand feet high. On every hand the 
 scenery was indescribably grand. The canon was narrowing, 
 the walls were getting higher ; the whole scene was becoming 
 more impressive and majestic. 
 
 The indications of the trail were growing exceedingly 
 faint. I had gone perhaps three miles from the cabin. The 
 canon had narrowed to about twenty-five feet, with its walls 
 sloping at an angle of over eighty degrees. 
 
 I had descended through the sandstone and vshale, and was 
 already several hundred feet into the granite, when I came to 
 the first rope ladder. I was glad to see it, for it assured me 
 that I was on the right trail, although it brought visibly before 
 my mind the fact that the dangerous part of my journey had 
 yet to be accomplished. The ladder was about ten feet long. 
 I tested its fastenings and easily descended. 
 
 A few steps beyond, I had to climb by a single rope over a 
 ledge of vertical rock fifteen feet high. As I had no means of 
 examining the fastening, I hesitated for a moment, for I knew 
 the hardest strain would come upon the rope just as I should 
 round the top of the ledge and be farthest from the rock 
 below. I ascended safely, and then soon had to descend a 
 gentle slope, clinging to a rope about forty feet long. 
 
 When I had gone about one hundred feet, the canon had 
 narrowed in one place to a width of about five feet, and at the 
 bottom was a pool of water about eighteen inches deep. The 
 walls were so smooth and round that it was impossible to pass 
 the pool without getting wet. Removing shoes and stockings, 
 I got over nicely, and as I expected to meet even a worse case 
 in a moment or two, I proceeded with bare feet on the smooth 
 granite. 
 
 Turning a sharp angle in the canon, I had scarcely gone 
 forty feet when I heard the roar of a heavy fall of water, and 
 found myself hemmed in on both sides by steep walls, with a 
 waterfall about fifteen feet high in front of me. On the level 
 
36 THK GRAND CANON. 
 
 of the rock below the falls I saw a bunch of rope lying against 
 the wall of the canon, as if it had been washed there. 
 
 I at once supposed that I had reached the end of my 
 journey, and that the rope which I saw had at one time been 
 used to get over the falls, but was now out of reach. Never- 
 theless, I decided to see what I could do toward climbing 
 around the place. 
 
 The granite was very smooth, but, being barefoot, I found 
 climbing rather a simple matter. I was getting along nicely 
 and congratulating myself that I had got safely around the 
 falls, when, to my horror, upon turning to the left, I saw 
 below what at first appeared to be a descent without bottom. 
 
 Climbing to the edge of the precipice and looking down, I 
 concluded that this must be the great waterfall of which I had 
 heard Mr. Hance speak, and that the rope I had noticed 
 from the precipice, now behind me, had not fallen down from 
 that, but was intended for this next descent. 
 
 Making sure that the end of the rope was well fastened, 
 I cast it over the falls. It hung straight in the midst of a 
 cascade of water four feet wide and six inches deep. The 
 rope appeared to be strong, and I determined to try it. 
 
 The height was said to be fifty feet, but I think it was not 
 so much. As I did not wish to have my watch and my jour- 
 nal ruined, I hid those articles witli my trousers. As I was 
 concealing them it occurred to me that no one was within at 
 least six miles. 
 
 Below the falls there was a spot about ten feet square, 
 perfectly dry. Down upon this I tossed shoes, stockings, 
 shirt and lunch. My underwear I retained, to protect myself 
 in some measure against the rocky wall. The descent through 
 the falls was pleasant enough, the water having about the 
 right temperature to produce an exhilarating reaction without 
 chilling ; and as I passed down the rope I was delighted, as 
 well as surprised, to find the wall covered near its base with 
 beautiful moss and maiden-hair ferns. 
 
 Removing my wet apparel, I put on what dry clothing I 
 
THK GRAND CANON. 
 
 37 
 
 had, and went on. I had gone about two hundred feet when I 
 came to a place that troubled me. It was a slope, somewhat 
 steep, but quite smooth, and no rope was in sight. 
 
 Examining the place carefully, I decided that the best 
 method of descent was the one I had used years ago on my 
 grandfather's farm in descending straw-stacks. Only one 
 objection presented itself — the part of my costume that was 
 missing is the one usually most relied upon on such occasions. 
 Nevertheless, I conformed to the inevitable, and slid down 
 without serious injury. 
 
 Only one short rope remained for me, and, almost leaping 
 with joy, I found myself on the bank of the Colorado. The 
 river was an angry, muddy torrent, with rapids at short 
 intervals, flowing between rugged granite walls that rose 
 almost perpendicularly from the water's edge. 
 
 It seemed impossible to pass more than one hundred feet 
 up or down the stream ; and as I sat in the shadow of a mighty 
 boulder and enjoyed my battered lunch, I thought of Major 
 Powell and his party, who passed through here in 1869. My 
 wonder was, not that two members of the expedition had been 
 lost, but that any should have escaped. 
 
 Having looked upon the scene until it became deeply 
 impressed upon my memory, I gathered a few pebbles to carry 
 with me and started on my return. The sliding-place was 
 soon passed, such places being, on the whole, more easy of 
 ascent than of descent. 
 
 When I reached the base of the high falls, I removed all 
 my clothing, even to shoes and stockings, and thrust every- 
 thing except my belt into the bag in which I had carried my 
 lunch. Fastening the belt to the bag, I buckled it around 
 my neck. Then stepping into the midst of the falls, with my 
 face turned upward, so that my nose should serve as a water- 
 shed, the bag hanging under my head, I ascended the rope 
 and reached the top with my clothing only slightly wet. 
 
 The things I had hidden I found all right, and as I stopped 
 for a little rest I wrote up my journal. 
 
38 
 
 THK GRAND CANON. 
 
 I reached the cabin at four o'clock. I called to mind that 
 I had been told that the ascent from there would require at 
 least three hours. At that time of the year it is dark at 
 half-past seven ; so I concluded that if I started I must climb 
 the whole distance in the time mentioned. I determined 
 to go on, and not to look at my watch until I had reached the 
 top. 
 
 The distance is three miles ; the elevation is said to be four 
 thousand feet ; and it was just half-past four when I started. 
 In the first mile I do not think I ascended more than five 
 hundred feet. That was covered with ease, and then I pressed 
 on to the steeper part. After climbing hard for a while I sat 
 down to rest. 
 
 As I sat there, I remember looking up at some turret-like 
 projections of rock on the rim, several thousand feet above me, 
 and saying : " Well, I guess about four such pulls as this will 
 bring me out." 
 
 I struggled on. Each interval between my rests was 
 growing shorter, both as to space and time. The number of 
 rests was nearer forty-four than four, and by the time I had 
 reached the top I was so completely worn out that a pull of a 
 few yards was enough to bring me to a halt. 
 
 A dark shower which was raging on the rim had deceived 
 me somewhat as to the hour ; I supposed that it was later 
 than it really was. As I threw myself on the ground under a 
 pifion-tree on the rim, my heart beating at the highest speed 
 and my flesh aglow, I looked at my watch. It was just twenty 
 minutes past six. I had come from the cabin to the rim in 
 just one hour and fifty minutes. 
 
 As I dragged myself to the door of Mr. Hance's cabin, the 
 old man met me. He was unwilling, at first, to believe that 
 I had reached the river. I told him of my experience on the 
 ropes, and he was convinced. It is unnecessary to mention 
 that I slept well that night. 
 
 J. G. Owens. 
 
Cave-Dwellers of Arizona. 
 
 Arizona has an unwritten history which may be roughly 
 surmised from the rude characters inscribed on rocks, the 
 deserted dwellings of a prehistoric race, and the ruins of once 
 populous towns. All these things give evidence that a 
 peaceful, industrious people, cultivating the soil and practis- 
 ing some of the arts, had lived and died within the territory 
 centuries before the European saw this continent. 
 
 This aboriginal people passed away, leaving the wild 
 Indian and the buffalo in possession of their domain ; but 
 some of their works have withstood time, and remain to aid us 
 in guessing their history. Who they were, whence they 
 came, whither they went, are problems not yet solved. 
 
 Traces of these people have been discovered in New 
 Mexico, Utah and Colorado, but in those distrircts the ruins 
 consist mainly of crumbling walls, mounds of dust and masses 
 of rubbish, the remains of old buildings. The most authentic 
 history comes from the Great Tonto Basin in Arizona, com- 
 prising upward of ten thousand square miles. Here nearly 
 every eminence bears ruins that prove the ancient existence of 
 a vanished race. 
 
 Under the shadow of the Rocky Mountains flows a small 
 yellow stream called Beaver Creek, a tributary of the Rio 
 Verde, which runs into the Gila River. On the creek's high 
 banks are located upward of sixty walled caves of various 
 sizes, once the homes of that prehistoric race of whom the 
 American Indian has no traditions. 
 
 The caves vary from five to twenty-five feet in depth. 
 Their entrances are walled by heavy masonry of stone and 
 cement, still in good preservation. 
 
 The largest of the caves are divided into many small 
 apartments by partitions, or walls, of stone and cedar wood. 
 
An Arizona Cave-Dwelling. 
 
CAVK-DWKIvIvKRS OF ARIZONA. 
 
 41 
 
 It is asserted by many students of the race that the inhabitants 
 lived in the smaller apartments, securely fortified from enemies 
 who frequently besieged their cave-towns. 
 
 The dwellings consisted of an upper and lower cave. To 
 reach the upper cave it was necessary to ascend by outside 
 ladders, at peril of falling to the ground, sixty to one hundred 
 feet below. The lower cave was reached by climbing over the 
 rugged edges of projecting rocks. 
 
 To the walls of the rooms still hang small fragments of 
 mortar, proof that the interior of their cave-dwelling was 
 plastered. From discernible imprints of hands and fingers, it 
 is surmised that the mortar must have been spread upon the 
 walls with bare hands. In many places can be seen the 
 impressions of the small, chubby hands of little children, who 
 were, no doubt, delighted to make their marks in the wet 
 plaster. 
 
 Many of the caves are equal in size to some of our public 
 buildings, and in one of the largest ruins five hundred rooms 
 were found. Four stories still stand, but the roof and upper 
 walls have long ago crumbled and fallen to the ground. The 
 rooms are still well preserved. They have no other entrances 
 than small windows, for the buildings were entered by ladders 
 which rested in niches in the walls, and which were drawn in 
 after the occupant. 
 
 Floors were formed of cedar logs laid close to each other 
 with spaces between them filled in with twigs and cedar bark. 
 The ragged ends of the logs give evidence that they were 
 hewn by dull instruments, perhaps by the stone hatchets and 
 saws which we saw lying about. 
 
 Many cave-dwellings erected in proximity to each other 
 formed what was known as a cave-town. A plaza was set off 
 in the centre, and the rooms were arranged around it. The 
 architecture of each seemed to have corresponded in the 
 minutest detail to that of every other, so that all the dwellings 
 of the town were alike. 
 
 The walls of the cave were from three to four feet in 
 
42 
 
 cavk-dwe:i.i.ers of Arizona. 
 
 thickness, and the roof covered with timbers of cedar and dirt 
 over a foot thick. Often these cedars are found well- 
 preserved, and this has often caused doubt of the great 
 antiquity of these ruins. No such doubt is felt by those who 
 know that the cedars of Colorado and the Southwest never rot, 
 but die standing without support until borne away on the 
 winds in atoms of fine dust. 
 
 Cave-towns were often built in the form of a square and 
 parallelogram, as well as in a circular form, and their 
 measurements were exact in every detail. Their masonry 
 reveals a higher state of civilization than that enjoyed by the 
 Mexican or Pueblo Indians. 
 
 The circular towns consisted of three tiers of cave- 
 dwellings, one directly above the other. The second tier 
 receded some distance from the ground tier, and the third 
 receded from the second. So the whole resembled a huge 
 stairway of masonry and adobe. These tiers ran all round 
 the enclosure, and thus formed a stronghold for defence during 
 troublesome periods. 
 
 Among the great structures now crumbling to dust must be 
 mentioned the Casa Grande, situated in the valley of the Gila. 
 Its history antedates the time when the Spaniards conquered 
 and occupied the country. 
 
 This wonderful building stands a short distance back from 
 the Gila's banks. Its origin has been traced back on good 
 evidence through five centuries. When first seen by the white 
 man, three hundred years ago, the largest building was four 
 stories high, and had walls six feet thick. At the beginning 
 of the present century one house alone remained, which was 
 four hundred and twenty by two hundred and sixty feet. 
 
 The walls are of concrete, consisting of mud, gravel and 
 hard cement, while the interior is coated with cement, and is 
 hard and smooth at the present time. The ruin has diminished 
 in size until it is now fifty by thirty feet, and is rapidly sinking 
 to a mere hillock of dust. 
 
 The inside is divided into five rooms, the central one being 
 
CAVK-DWKIyl^KRS OF ARIZONA. 
 
 43 
 
 eighteen feet long and fourteen feet wide, while the others are 
 twenty-five feet long and ten wide. 
 
 The beams of cedar still inserted in its walls give proof that 
 the building originally had four stories, with a fifth located 
 above the central part. No stairways nor traces of any can be 
 seen, so that, as in all of the cave-dwellings, the upper rooms 
 must have been entered by ladders. 
 
 In all the ruins are circular apartments, surrounded by 
 walls of masonry sunk deep in the ground. These circular 
 chambers have an average diameter of twenty feet. They 
 were used for worship. The cave-dwellers were probably 
 sun- worshippers, and within this peculiar apartment were 
 performed the rites of their religion. 
 
 In connection with the cave-dwellings have been found 
 numerous hieroglyphics engraved on rocks centuries prior to 
 the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth. That they are of 
 great antiquity, and were engraved by men of no little 
 intelligence and ambition, can hardly be doubted. 
 
 Without exception the sites chosen for the erection of 
 cave-dwellings were in the vicinity of agricultural lands, and 
 the existence of artificial canals gives evidence that irrigation 
 was practised by their owners. 
 
 One canal, ten miles long, twenty-five feet wide and ten 
 feet deep, still exists, and was no doubt designed to receive 
 the waters of the Gila for distribution to the cultivated fields, 
 in which they raised Indian corn, pumpkins, melons and 
 certain fruits. Another irrigating canal has been followed 
 to the Gila, a distance of forty miles. 
 
 There have been found in the cave-houses more than two 
 thousand pieces of pottery, from large, coarse jars to cups and 
 jugs which might well be coveted by bric-a-brac collectors ; 
 hundreds of stone hatchets, knives, arrow-heads, hammers and 
 mortars ; bows, paddles, hoes, lances and plows of wood, and 
 mantles woven from yucca fibre, wild cotton and the inmeshed 
 feathers of turkeys — for there is abundant evidence that the 
 cave-dwellers had domesticated the turkey. 
 
44 
 
 CAVK-DWKlvI.KRS OF ARIZONA. 
 
 The high, dry recesses of the closed houses have preserved 
 not only the bones, but the burial-clothes in which the people 
 were wrapped and laid to rest in carefully walled-up niches of 
 the crags. 
 
 The skulls give evidence that the cave-dwellers possessed 
 average brain capacity. The skeletons show that the men 
 were sometimes six feet in height, and the women five feet 
 seven inches. The soft, reddish brown hair of the women is 
 neither wiry like that of the Indian, nor kinky and black like 
 that of the negro, but fine and straight. 
 
 The remains, indeed, indicate that these denizens of 
 pre-Columbian America may have been comely women and 
 strong, intelligent men. 
 
 Surely, from their homogeneous character, beauty, and 
 precision in detail of construction, we must believe that the 
 cave-dwellings and the domestic articles found in them are the 
 work of a great people, whose civilization was of a higher 
 order than that of the tribes which have succeeded them. 
 
 Preston H. Uberroth, U. S. R. M. 
 
A Builded Lake 
 
 A reservoir of water for mining purposes or the irrigation 
 of land usually costs vastly more in money and in time than 
 any one would think of devoting to such an undertaking, if 
 nature could be trusted to send rain enough for the work 
 intended. But in a large portion of the far West of the United 
 States rain comes seldom, and when it does fall the time is 
 winter or early spring, though the water is especially needed 
 in summer. It comes in torrents, rushes down the mountain- 
 sides, roars into rocky canons, and vanishes, leaving its traces 
 only in washed-out mountain trails, countless gullies and 
 undermined railroad tracks. 
 
 The plan of water-storage is to catch the water as it falls 
 in the winter-time, store it up in a huge reservoir, and use it 
 for irrigation in the summer season. 
 
 The site of the lake-basin should be shut in by hills, with 
 an outlet through some narrow cut in the rocks, as at the 
 mouth of a canon, which can be easily closed by a dam. The 
 area drained by the lake should be as large as possible, so 
 that the water-supply may fill the reservoir every year. Then, 
 too, if the water is to be used for irrigation or mining, the 
 dam must be built somewhere near the ground to be worked. 
 
 The simplest way of locating a storage-lake would be 
 to discover some ancient lake-basin and close its outlet, 
 precisely as was done in building the reservoir at Walnut 
 Grove, Arizona. 
 
 The dam at this place stands one hundred and ten feet 
 high above bed-rock, and is four hundred and ten feet long 
 across the top. It is a huge wedge of stone, built up of 
 four hundred and fifty thousand cubic yards of rock, and 
 sealed by an apron of three-inch planks, calked and painted 
 with asphalt, as stanch as the sides of a ship. 
 
 At the beginning of the work Walnut Grove was in the 
 
46 
 
 A BUILDED I^AKK. 
 
 wilderness, fifty miles from any place, but a town sprang up 
 quickly about the site. Hundreds of men were constantly 
 engaged on the job, all the day and all the electric-lighted 
 night, for nearly a year, during which time no rain fell. This 
 unusually long absence of rain was a great source of good 
 fortune to the builders ; but when all was completed we 
 anxiously desired a flood, that the great structure might be 
 tested. 
 
 We grew impatient and began to doubt whether such a 
 
 The Valley. 
 
 brazen sky could rain, and whether, if it did, all the water in 
 the territory could fill that immense lake-basin, which lay 
 parched and lifeless beneath the blistering Arizona sun. 
 Indeed, the outlook seemed dubious enough. There lay the 
 outstretched water-basin, a very desert in barrenness, its red 
 volcanic soil aggravating the sense of aridity derived from 
 
A BUILDED LAKE. 
 
 47 
 
 seeing the lurid heat. In the basin were brown grass, brown 
 rocks, stunted oak-brush, withering cactus, cattle dying on the 
 road to water, the only water in sight a sluggish creek winding 
 through the valley and sinking, at intervals, out of sight 
 beneath the sand. 
 
 The flood-gates had been closed three months in expecta- 
 tion of the rains, but winter had come and gone without even 
 a sprinkle. Heavy snow had lain on the mountain since 
 February, but no rain had fallen to bring the snow down in a 
 
 freshet. At last, in April, came a driving wind and rain, 
 blown in from the Gulf of California. 
 
 Rain-drops as big as marbles bounded from boulder to 
 boulder and down into the lake-basin. Every groove in the 
 rocks fed a hollow, the hollows fed the streams and the 
 streams quickly grew into torrents that tore their wa}^ through 
 
48 
 
 A BUII.DED I^AKE. 
 
 the empty creek-beds. The lake-level rose three feet in an 
 hour, but the effects of the warm rain on the mountains had 
 yet to be seen. 
 
 At midnight a cowboy rode in on horseback, breathless 
 with excitement, to tell us, There 's a wave from fifty to a 
 hundred feet high crashing down the valley ! ' ' 
 
 We seized our pouches and lanterns and started for the 
 boom. We could hear the roar of the river, ten miles away, 
 but it was an hour before it rushed in upon us, twenty feet 
 high and fifty feet across, a great tidal wave, seething with 
 foam, carrying trees, boulders, everything before it. Then 
 followed the deafening boom of the other creeks, as one after 
 another they came down. 
 
 We hurried back to camp, to find our approach nearly cut 
 off by the rising water. Everybody was awake and rustling. 
 The croakers, who had built on the flat in defiance of the 
 dam-level, were scurrying about in the dark, scooping their 
 belongings into gunny-sacks and rushing up the hill to 
 establish new claims above the one-hundred-and-ten-foot line. 
 
 By morning the rain-gage showed a rainfall of two 
 inches, but this gave no clue to the rise in the lake. We 
 looked out at daybreak to find the face of the country entirely 
 changed. The rocky water-basin of yesterday was now a 
 lake, three-quarters of a mile wide, a mile and a half long and 
 eighty feet deep by the dam, on which floated logs, tree- 
 trunks, fence-rails and islands of sawdust that had drifted 
 down from the sawmill above. 
 
 Roads, trails and cabins had disappeared. We found 
 ourselves entirely at sea, and had to look off repeatedly to the 
 divStant mountains to find where we were. Even the cattle 
 looked confused. Being used to a .swallow of muddy water 
 from the creek, they stood appalled at the ocean that lay 
 before them, and refused to drink. 
 
 The change in the landscape was too sudden to realize at 
 once, the smooth expanse of water being so striking a contra.st 
 to the rocky water-basin it displayed. We had known 
 
A BUII.DKD IvAKS. 
 
 49 
 
 beforehand exactly how high the lake would rise when the 
 dam was full, but imagination had not pictured to us the 
 beauty and variety of the constantly changing outlook. 
 
 As the lake-bottom sloped very gradually upward, a slight 
 increase in depth added greatly to the size of the lake. 
 Hillsides disappeared under water to become shelving beaches 
 and fine swimming-grounds, rocky cliffs became islands or 
 steep promontories, curves in the creek-beds made peninsulas, 
 valleys between the hills became bays, all changed as by 
 magic when the water rose. 
 
 It continued to rise for three weeks longer, until the lake 
 stood one hundred and five feet deep, covering seven hundred 
 and fifty acres. The debris on the surface gradually sank, 
 leaving the lake surprisingly clear and blue, like a translucent 
 amethyst in its setting of terra-cotta hills. 
 
 Helkn Francks Bate;s. 
 
The Oldest American Houses. 
 
 Santa Fe is said to be the oldest city in America. That 
 the statement is not true would be hard to prove, because the 
 question of its origin and age is wrapped in mystery. 
 
 When Coronado explored Mexico in 1540, he found many 
 Indian pueblos on the Rio Grande River, and speaks of 
 several which must have been near the present location of 
 Santa Fe. The one which it is generally supposed was on its 
 precise site at that time stretched along its river-banks for six 
 miles. Coronado reported that he found here a beautiful and 
 fertile valley, under high cultivation by the Indians. 
 
 Visiting Santa F^ to-day it is hard to realize, ancient as 
 the old ruins look, that one can really be gazing on walls 
 which Coronado saw nearly three centuries and a half ago. 
 
 It is still harder to realize what must have been the 
 oppressions and cruelties which have brought about the 
 present degraded and wretched condition of the Indians whose 
 ancestors formerly occupied and cultivated the whole valley. 
 That a race which, over three hundred years ago, had reached 
 comfort and success in agricultural and pastoral occupations, 
 should be to-day an abject, supine, wretched race of beggars, 
 is a melancholy comment on the injustice they have received. 
 They did not sink without struggles. 
 
 Santa Fe, being the seat of government, was always the 
 point of attack, the chief centre of strife, and very terrible 
 scenes have been enacted there. As late as 1837, a Mexican 
 governor who had ruled with great severity and laid oppres- 
 sive and unjust taxes on the Indians' crops, was murdered by 
 them under circumstances of tragic horror. 
 
 The struggle which took place at this time was the last 
 the Indians made. They were soon subdued, and remained 
 peaceable till they came, with the rest of the New Mexico 
 citizens, under the government of the United States in 1846. 
 
THE OLDEST AMERICAN HOUSES. 
 
 51 
 
 There is still standing in Santa Fe one building which has 
 been the home of the most prominent persons, and the scene 
 of the most important events, through all these vicissitudes of 
 the city and its government. It is still called, as it was called 
 three hundred years ago, " The Palace." Anything less like 
 a palace could hardly be conceived of. It is a low adobe 
 building, one story high, with a veranda running its entire 
 length. It makes the north wall of the plaza, and in it 
 are still the governor's home and all the offices of the 
 
 The Indian House. 
 
 government; the United vStates and territorial court-room, 
 libraries. Congress halls, etc. It has been so often repaired 
 that it has lost much of its ancient look, but the massive walls 
 and heavy hewn beams remain unchanged, and will, no doubt, 
 bear their mute witness to its antiquity for a century or more 
 to come. 
 
 The plaza on which it fronts is two and a half acres 
 square, well-shaded, provided with seats, and, commanding a 
 view of all the life there is in the town, it is the best possible 
 point from which to gather an impression of Santa F^. 
 
52 
 
 'THE OLDKST ami;rican HOUSKS. 
 
 Sitting there, looking at the governor's old palace on the 
 north, and the row of smart Jew shops on the south, at the 
 low and half-crumbling mud-walls and houses, and the big 
 new brick and wooden buildings cropping out here and there, 
 and overtopping everything, one sees an effective picture of 
 the clashing of the new and the old. 
 
 It is the new that suffers most by contrast. The long, low 
 adobes, with their lines of absolute simplicity, and their soft 
 yellow-gray color, seem far more dignified than the modern 
 
 street in Santa Fe. 
 
 wooden building, or even the substantial brick one, with 
 copings and facings of different colors. Contrasts no less 
 marked will be seen in the passers-by in the streets. The 
 successions are almost fantastic. 
 
 Close on the heels of two dapper young Americans in a 
 buggy, with surveying instruments and charts in their hands, 
 comes a Mexican cart, creeping along, drawn by oxen ; its 
 wheels are circles of solid wood, sections of tree-trunks, 
 
THK OIvDEJST AMERICAN HOUSES. 
 
 53 
 
 roughly hewn, with an irregularly-shaped hole in the centre, 
 in which creaks the rough-hewn axle. 
 
 The driver is in rags and dirty, but he wears a fine broad- 
 brimmed sombrero, with a roll of twisted silver wire and straw 
 around the crown ; and as he goes he sings a lilting song to 
 himself, or whistles softly, or takes a nap in his cart, and 
 he would not change places with the hard-working young 
 surveyors if he could. 
 
 Sauntering through the plaza, and looking curiously, with 
 furtive glances, at strangers, come his sweetheart and her 
 friend. They wear trailing cotton gowns, sweeping a foot 
 behind them, and begrimed half-way up the skirt with the 
 impalpable, ineradicable Santa dust ; they would feel 
 humiliated to lift them, and to wear them short would be 
 disgrace. 
 
 To be unconscious of dirt, superior to it, is dignity. On 
 their heads they wear gay shawls, black with gaudy flowers, 
 or white striped like a rainbow. With one hand they hold. the 
 shawl-folds firm over their mouths, their soft, but passionate 
 black eyes gleaming out of the triangular opening above, as 
 from the bars of a prison- window. They are used to only 
 half-seeing ; for the few windows they have in their houses 
 are without glass, and shut off from the street by jail-like 
 gratings of close-set wooden rails. 
 
 Behind them comes, with brisk step and erect carriage, an 
 American woman, the wife or sister, perhaps, of some officer 
 of the fort garrison. She is dressed in the last Paris style ; 
 nothing escapes her eyes ; as she passes the sauntering 
 Mexican damsels she glances disdainfully at their dusty 
 trains ; and they in turn speak scornfully to each other of her 
 needless uncovering of her ankles. 
 
 In a few moments, to complete the human panorama, there 
 go stalking along outside the plaza paling a group of Pueblo 
 Indians, bareheaded, wrapped in scarlet blankets. The 
 dignity of their bearing and the grace of their drapery put 
 both Mexican and American to shame. 
 
54 
 
 THE OI.DEST AMERICAN HOUSES. 
 
 Nothing can be finer. Roman senators in togas never 
 folded their arms better, or stood straighter. They make for 
 the shops. They have walked all the way in from their 
 village, twelve miles or more, having made a little money by 
 selling some of their pottery. They have come in to spend 
 the last dollar of it. 
 
 The two most interesting ruins in Santa are the San 
 
 on a foundation of small stones laid in mortar, which is the 
 reason of its wonderful preservation. It was first built in 
 1640, was partially destroyed by the Indians in their revolt in 
 1680, and built up again in 17 10. The interior of the church 
 is still in tolerable repair, and service is held in it. 
 
 The altitude of Santa is a little over seven thousand 
 feet. Its winters are sunny and mild ; a little snow falls 
 occasionally, but it never lies long, and the air is exception- 
 ally dry. 
 
 San Miguel. 
 
 Miguel Church and an 
 old building opposite it, 
 called the Indian House. 
 This is, undoubtedly, 
 the oldest house in 
 America. It is a rough, 
 two-story adobe, with a 
 low, narrow door, and 
 with windows like port- 
 holes. The logs that 
 hold up the dirt roof 
 show no signs of decay, 
 and the building is 
 yet used as a tenement- 
 house. The church is 
 also of adobe, but built 
 
 Hei^En Hunt Jackson. 
 
New Mexico. 
 
 It was midnight when we were landed at the Santa Fe 
 station, on the south side of the town. The moon was shining 
 brightly. In a moment I was riding, in effect, through foreign 
 streets. They were narrow^ rocky, lined with squatty, 
 unlighted, silent, sombre adobe houses. It seemed as if a 
 gentle, fun-making earthquake had jostled them out of line, 
 tilted them off base, started them down grade, perched them 
 in awkwardness. Un-American ! Old ! I cannot conceive 
 of a time when those old adobes were not there, sprouts from 
 the adobe soil, as it were. 
 
 The next day after I arrived at Santa Fe I asked the price 
 of a large plum of a Mexican dealer. 
 Five cents ; not less could be." 
 
 " One for three cents ? " I asked. 
 
 With scorn the dealer replied, " No three cent here ! Five 
 cents lessest money here. One plum, two, three, four plum — 
 all same ; five cent." 
 
 Seller, buyer, Spanish, American people alike have here 
 contempt for the change-making of the East, all declaring that 
 they would not live with people so mean as to bother with 
 change for five cents. 
 
 One reason why provision-dealers in these mountain towns 
 can sell their wares nearly at Eastern prices is, because in 
 the cool, pure, dry air of New Mexico, foods do not spoil. 
 In Santa Fe the tradesman delivers you a slice of butter as he 
 does a slice of cheese with no fear, even in July, of its 
 melting, and it reaches the consumer in August as firm as in 
 December. 
 
 Rents average somewhat higher in this little-understood 
 territory than in the Mississippi Valley, but the fine climate 
 confers on your apartments unexpected adaptability. The 
 comfort possible in a couple of adobe-rooms, which are usually 
 
56 
 
 NEW MEXICO. 
 
 large, is a surprise to a person brought up in the North. 
 Bivouacking is possible every day, and makes indoor comforts 
 less imperative. You can go picnicking forty-eight out of 
 fifty-two weeks. 
 
 Nowhere are sun and air on better behavior. There is 
 scarcely a summer morning when a light pinon fire would be 
 oppressive ; scarcely a winter noon when you might not 
 dispense with all fire. 
 
 I had ever at hand, ready-made, the means for keeping a 
 comfortable bodily temperature. If the air was too cool, I 
 moved into the sunshine ; if unduly warm, into the shade, 
 and the relief was always immediate and complete. 
 
 I had heard that the people were foreign, unapproachable 
 and unsympathizing ! Instead of this, in the most cordial 
 friendliness they began at once to advise me what to do, and 
 what not to do, to get the full value of my visit. 
 
 Mexican ladies are chary about seeking the acquaintance 
 or friendship of visiting States people, but they are responsive 
 to your advances or calls. 
 
 If you ask a Mexican gentleman to direct you to some 
 place, he will not only give you the information, but will give 
 time, if it seems to him necessary, in showing you to the 
 place and explaining noticeable features. At parting he will 
 thank you for the pleasant hour you have given him. 
 
 A Mexican lady acquaintance cheerfully spent a morning 
 showing me from one place to another,, looking for rooms, 
 pointing out advantages and disadvantages, advising me as 
 to prices and neighborhoods. 
 
 When it was known that I intended to furnish rooms, 
 there came the most surprising offers of loans — blankets, 
 pillows, chairs, desk, table. 
 
 Beside loans I was offered gifts, as a cook-stove from an 
 Alabamian who declared that she couldn't eat stove-cooked 
 food, and that her cook would use nothing but the fireplace, 
 as they did down South. 
 
 A Spanish friend sent word, I will lend you my Mexican 
 
NKW MKXICO. 
 
 57 
 
 to make you a fireplace. There's one in that angle of the 
 wall. He'll open it." 
 
 They close fireplaces in a free and easy way down there. 
 They break up a little space of the yard, stir in water, and fill 
 the fireplace to the jambs with the plastic clay. The mud is 
 then smoothed with the hand, trowel-like, finishing with mud 
 whose brown has been lightened with coloring matter. 
 
 The Mexican that was loaned to me cut into the adobe 
 packing with which some former tenant has filled the fireplace, 
 carried it into the yard, brought it back plastic, smeared it 
 over jambs, hearth and mantelpiece, finishing all smoothly by 
 
 A Mexican Street. 
 
 the pliable hand. It was all by primitive methods, but the 
 comfort and health that resulted from that bright little adobe 
 fireplace will make the name of one Spanish senora a sound of 
 music to my heart. 
 
 You have heard, no doubt, that the people of New Mexico 
 are lazy, to use plain English ; that the territory is the land 
 of Mariana — the land of to-morrow. 
 
 Before I deny or confirm that statement, let me ask, Who 
 
58 
 
 NKW MKXICO. 
 
 are the people of New Mexico? By the census of 1890 it 
 had more than one hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, 
 without counting the Indians on the reservations. The area 
 being so vast and the population so scattered, there is some 
 difference in the estimate. 
 
 About one-fourth of the entire population are Americans, 
 and a large part of these were born in New Mexico. The 
 Americans of New Mexico are the equals in culture and in 
 enterprise of the Americans in any part of the United States. 
 
 Of the people not American, about one-eighth are of 
 Spanish descent and three-eighths of Indian descent. The 
 other half are of a mixed race, Spanish and Indians, by the 
 Americans commonly called greasers. 
 
 To say, "The rich people are Spanish, the poor are 
 Mexicans," is a taunt in New Mexico. There is a proud 
 protest in many minds against being consigned to that 
 bottomless genealogical pit entitled Mexican. On the other 
 hand, I have met many people of pure Spanish blood who 
 resent being called Spaniards, claiming with pride that they 
 are Mexicans. 
 
 If people mean that the peasant or laboring Mexican is 
 lazy, my observation leads me to contradict the statement. 
 In a climate so invigorating as that of New Mexico, laziness 
 is hardly possible. Mexicans are indifferent to many things 
 about which the people of the United States are anxious, and 
 for which they struggle. 
 
 Some conditions of comfort regarded as essential, the 
 Mexican has without the cost of labor or money. A large 
 percentage of the world's work is done to keep the bodily 
 temperature within its narrow normal range. In New Mexico 
 this work is not needed, for there is but little extreme cold or 
 extreme heat to guard against. 
 
 " Make hay while the sun shines," has small significance 
 in a land where there are three hundred and sixty-five days of 
 sunshine in the year, and where there are four or five crops of 
 hay to the season, and not a stack or a mow is ever mildewed. 
 
NEW MKXICO. 
 
 59 
 
 The fact is that the Mexican peasants are workers from 
 childhood. They are reserved toward Americans. They do 
 not importune for work, but I never asked one for service of 
 any kind that I did not get the service at reasonable price. 
 There is no task that a Mexican will not undertake, CvSpecially 
 if he can reenforce himself by the assistance of a burro. 
 
 The burro, facetiously called ' ' the sweet singer of Mexico, ' ' 
 has a range of only two notes, but these are powerful. This 
 is what heartless people say of the burro. "The perfect 
 playmate for boys " would be a more just title. 
 
 All the children of New Mexico learn to ride burros, which 
 
 Burros and their Burdens. 
 
 are as docile and harmless as hobby-horses. One often sees 
 four or five boys on one of these patient creatures, or two or 
 more men, their legs dangling almost to the ground. It is 
 not a matter for surprise that brute playmates have been 
 expressed to New York and other Eastern cities for children's 
 use in learning, without danger, saddle-riding and driving. 
 
 The loads that the burros will carry are remarkable. They 
 take the place of market-wagons. I recall a caravan of a 
 score of these pack-animals under one driver. The}' would 
 come to town laden with melons, or mission grapes, or other 
 wares, bringing loads larger and heavier than themselves. 
 
6o 
 
 NKW MEXICO. 
 
 Like soldiers under drill, they would range themselves in 
 ranks before a store on the sidewalk. Nobody was offended 
 or afraid, for they were cleanly and harmless. 
 
 As soon as one was unpacked he would walk off into the 
 street, where he was sure to find something to eat, if only a 
 bit of paper. The goat is no more nearly omnivorous than 
 the Mexican burro. 
 
 In a ride of fifteen miles out of Santa Fe I once met two 
 hundred and fifty-three burros, with packs, industriously 
 plying their mouse-colored legs. The loads were largely 
 cedar and pinon wood, cut and split. 
 
 I have seen a burro carrying a cook-stove, or bringing over 
 mountain-roads timbers for a house. When they are carrying 
 unbaled hay they present a most amusing appearance. One 
 sees the great ears working, a tail switching, and four little 
 hoofs twinkling ; all the rest is a moving haystack. 
 
 If there was ever a flesh and blood creature capable of 
 living on a straw a day, it is the hardy, faithful Mexican 
 burro. So inexpensive is its keeping, with its unstable habits 
 of life, that the poorest peasant can afford the comfort of this 
 helpful companion, the friend of the mountaineer. It will 
 obey every tone of the master, every touch of his hand. But 
 a stranger must study burros well to get their best service. 
 
 Sarah Winter KeivI^ogg. 
 
Adobe 
 
 I have frequently watched the making of adobes by the 
 natives of New Mexico. Adobes are sun-dried bricks about 
 twelve inches long, eight wide and two deep. They are used 
 where the States' people would employ kiln-seasoned bricks 
 and stone, and for many purposes for which lumber is used in 
 a wooded section. Fences, for instance, are largely made of 
 adobes ; corrals, gardens, orchards, yards, churches, schools 
 and convents are enclosed by walls built of adobes. 
 
 These mud walls are often seen with cacti planted thickly 
 on their tops, as a double security against thieving or other 
 purposes. When cacti are not easily procurable, the walls 
 are defended by broken glass bottles, imbedded in the top 
 round of bricks before they are thoroughly dry. 
 
 On lines where protection is not called for, I have seen the 
 tops of these fences picturesquely ornamented with bright 
 flowering plants, such as scarlet and yellow cacti, the wild 
 sunflower, the Spanish bayonet and the Mexican lily. 
 
 When a house is to be built, an addition to be made to one, 
 an oven to be built or a fireplace, or a piece of ground to be 
 enclosed, the enterprising Mexican assembles his helpers as 
 at a primitive house-raising. The first move is to spade 
 up a patch of ground, often a portion of his own front yard. 
 Sometimes, as an act of friendliness, the adobe-maker gets 
 permission to spade up a neighbor's yard, or a vacant lot near 
 the building site. 
 
 The ground being well broken, water is brought on and 
 the mixing is begun. As the surface, before the breaking, 
 was in all probability but carelessly swept, many bits not 
 essential to good bricks get mixed in the mud — bits of glass, 
 stone, pottery, tin, wire, chips, rags, etc. But it is not in the 
 purpose of the adobe-makers to use other materials than water 
 and the soil everywhere found. 
 
62 
 
 ADOBE. 
 
 There is a little preliminary mixing with hoe and spade, 
 but shortly the workers strip to the waist, bare the feet, roll 
 above the knees whatever there may be of trousers legs, and 
 walk bravely into the mud. Standing in the brown mixture 
 of precisely his own color, the expressionless, statuesque 
 Mexican might, by an easy reach of fancy, be regarded as an 
 
 Making Adobe. 
 
 outgrowth of the adobe mud. Now hands and feet reenforce 
 spade and hoe, until the mixing is complete. 
 
 Rough wooden molds are then filled by the hands with the 
 mud, and scraped level by the hands. The molds are carried 
 away a short distance and the molded mud is tipped out on 
 the ground. 
 
 There the adobes lie for days or weeks, sunning, while the 
 owners are sunning themselves against adobe walls centuries 
 old, it may be. There is no fear of the blocks being spoiled 
 
ADOBE . 
 
 63 
 
 by rain, in this white and bright land where the sun shines 
 three hundred and sixty-five days in the year. 
 
 The mud-bricks being sufficiently baked on one side, they 
 are turned over, and in time, on edge, until all sides and edges 
 have had the effect of a sufficient period of direct sunshine. 
 
 An Eastern brickmaker would regard these adobe bricks 
 as rough, uneven, unsightly. But they have their merits. 
 Their making does not call for any skilled labor ; they can be 
 made in a day, dried without expense, and can be laid by 
 inexperienced hands. They form such inexpensive building 
 material that the poorest man can have his own house. 
 
 I have seen many a comfortable adobe house of four 
 rooms, plastered well inside and out, erected at a cost of five 
 hundred dollars. 
 
 I choose the adjective comfortable advisedly. Without 
 the shelter of a tree, in a land of perennial sunshine, an adobe 
 house furnishes a complete protection from summer heat, 
 however high the mercury may be. The earth walls never 
 get heated through in such a climate as New Mexico's; 
 neither do they ever get chilled through. 
 
 In the shelter of an adobe house, you can forget that there 
 is winter cold or summer heat. 
 
 The Mexican peasant builds an unpretentious lodge, but 
 for comfort it will stand comparison with the peasant-house of 
 any land. He lays the adobes on the bare earth, builds up 
 two or three feet, then waits some days to insure the walls' 
 dryness, builds a few more feet and again waits. 
 
 When his wall has reached a height of ten or twelve feet 
 he stops. Then he lays on the beams or rafters, usually 
 of the unbarked trunks of the pinon-trees, not fully grown. 
 The pinon is the mountain pine of the nut-bearing variety. 
 
 The rafters are not of uniform length. Some project a foot 
 over the wall, others more than a yard, furnishing a place for 
 drying plants, or for the storing of hay, or for the roosting of 
 Mexican boys ambitious enough to climb to the roof. 
 
 These rafters are the support for the thick planks or boards 
 
64 
 
 ADOBE. 
 
 laid closely across, which are to receive the dry adobe dirt. 
 This is piled on, to the thickness of about thirty inches. This 
 makes a dry, warm roof, on which, in the course of time, 
 chance seeds take root, causing a little forest of plants to 
 spring up on the low roofs. 
 
 The dirt roofs are safe as long as the timbers are sound, 
 and the timbers, being measurably protected from damp and 
 air, remain good for long periods. 
 
 But ants sometimes find out the rafters of a house and 
 honeycomb them, making no visible sign of their presence. 
 The timber then suddenly gives way, letting down the mass 
 of earth, imperilling life and injuring the house's belongings. 
 The brother of a Santa banker once lost his life by the 
 falling in of one of these dirt roofs. Many adobe houses, 
 however, both old and new, have roofs of a better character. 
 
 One might think that the adobe house would be a perish- 
 able structure. In a land of rains, of much freezing and 
 thawing, it might be ; but there are adobe houses in New 
 Mexico and Arizona centuries old, and as good as when first 
 built. 
 
 Some adobe houses have walls eight feet thick. These 
 were built not only for sure protection against heat and cold, 
 but also as defences against Indians and other enemies. 
 
 The adobe house is the outcome of ages of experience 
 in a climate of peculiar conditions. The Americans have 
 introduced some architectural improvements, but they have 
 taught the Mexicans little of real value in their climate. 
 
 Even the wealthy Mexican of to-day, educated, it may be, 
 in Washington or St. Louis, builds preferably an adobe house. 
 If one is built on a stone foundation, with hooded windows, 
 far-projecting roof, with balconies or portals, there is no more 
 comfortable, weather-proof, picturesque dwelling. For a 
 small expenditure, a house can be built in that delightful 
 climate in which not an hour of discomfort from heat or cold 
 need be spent in all the year. 
 
 Sarah Winter Kki.i.ogg. 
 
♦♦The Companion Series 
 
 PRESERVES in permanent form some of the most valuable and inter- 
 esting articles of the eminent authors who have written for The 
 Youth's Companion. These Books are appropriate for Libraries, both 
 private and public, and for use in Schools. 
 
 Each volume contains two hundred and fifty-six pages, is illustrated 
 by The Companion's best Artists, is bound in strong linen, and contains 
 four volumes of The Companion Library described on the inside cover at 
 the beginning of this book. The Series comprises the following volumes: 
 
 By I^and and Sea. A Book of Travel and Research. 
 
 Containing The Companion Library Nos. 2, 3, 4 and 5. 
 
 Talks About Animals. A Book of Natural History. 
 
 Containing The Companion Library Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 9. ^ 
 
 Our Country: West. The Newer Portions of the United States. 
 Containing The Companion Library Nos. 10, 11, 12 and 13. 
 
 Our Country : J^ast. The Earliest-Settled Regions of America. 
 Containing The Companion Library Nos. 14, 15, 16 and 17. 
 
 Purpose and Success. Some of the Richest Companion Stories. 
 Containing The Companion Library Nos, i, 18, 19 and 20. 
 
 Price 50 Cents Each, Prepaid. 
 
 PERRY MASON & COMPANY, Publishers, 
 201 Columbus Avenue. BOSTON, MASS. 
 
The Youth's Companion 
 
 is an Illustrated Family Paper. It is published weekly. 
 Its illustrations are by tiie best artists. 
 
 Its stories represent real life and aim to interest 
 readers of all ages. They are stimulating, healthful and 
 helpful, but never sensational. Their great number and 
 variety, together with their marked excellence, give The 
 Companion acknowledged preeminence among literary 
 publications. 
 
 Its miscellaneous articles are read by young and 
 old with equal eagerness. Its letters of travel present 
 the picturesque features of foreign life. Its articles on 
 health and etiquette are of real practical value. 
 
 No man or woman, however intelligent, can fail to 
 fmd in its editorials upon current topics facts that are 
 not ordinarily found in other papers, and that it is a 
 pleasure and a benefit to know. Young people, especially, 
 should possess the information they give. 
 
 Its biographical and historical articles are 
 
 very valuable to those who appreciate the elements of 
 progress. Successful men and women in many branches 
 of business and professional life give their experiences 
 to the readers of The Companion. 
 
 The paper aims both to entertain and to instruct. 
 Not a sentence to which the most careful parent would 
 object is allowed to appear in its columns. It seeks to 
 become a family friend, bringing help and cheer to every 
 member of the household, and to influence directly the 
 conduct and issues of daily life.