Chapter 10

THE GRAVE OF KIT CARSON, AT TAOS.

Nearly midway between the pueblo ruins just mentioned and the city of Santa Fe, along the Rio Grande, is the Cañon Diabolo, a chasm that is not strikingly deep, but sufficiently weird to justify the Satanic appellation. High up in the walls, particularly near Espanola, are relics of a vanished race, in the form of excavations which once served as habitations, though evidently they were difficult of access. The appearance of these rock perforations are very similar to those on the Rio Mancos, and in the cañon cliffs of the Colorado; so nearly identical, in fact, that Stevenson expresses the belief that they were made by members of the same race, who took refuge in these caves when driven from their pueblos. At Santa Fe, a short stop was made to await the photographer who had passed around by Trinidad. The trip which he had made was in every respect as interesting as that which we had taken over the direct southern route. Upon passing beyond the Sangre de Cristo range eastward, the scenery grows tamely monotonous for a time, for the landscape is tiresomely level. But before reaching Trinidad, another agreeably surprising change occurs, as the Raton range breaks into view, and presents a kaleidoscopic variety of beautiful scenes. Trinidad lies at the foot of this range, and though it may not be described as a city of great architectural magnificence, certain it is that few places can boast of greater interest to the tourist. It was, long ago, the most important point on the old Santa Fe trail, and its ancient adobe houses were objects of endearment to the hearts of freighters, because they offered both refuge and refreshment after the perils of a dangerous journey. Though a great change has taken place since the railroad reached the town, it is still a typical Mexican city, which even the electric light cannot convert. Passing over the border into New Mexico, the scenery is varied and pleasing, but never grand. Instead of an arid region, however, the country is diversified, for all of the northeastern region is abundantly watered by creeks flowing towards the southeast, with occasional rivers, like the Canadian, Cimarron and Pecos, intersecting the railroad. On both sides of the road there are numerous knolls, called mesas, and craters long since burned out. The ascent of Raton Pass, sometimes called the “Devil’s Way,” affords many exquisite views, of which the Spanish Peaks, one hundred miles to the north, are chief, for the atmosphere is so clear and rare that they appear as distinct as though the distance were scarcely one-fourth so great. Upon gaining an altitude of 7,700 feet, the road enters a tunnel on the Raton Crest, and after a half-mile run emerges on the New Mexico side, where the sunlight appears to be intensified and the warmth of perpetual summer holds sway. The next considerable town reached after leaving Trinidad is Las Vegas, which reposes on a branch of the Pecos, the center of a great many sheep ranches, and it is wool that gives it chief importance. Six miles north of the place is Las Vegas Hot Springs, a sanitarium of much note, located in a region of considerable beauty. They are at the mouth of a small cañon which leads up to the Spanish Range, and thence joins the Rocky Mountains; the waters range in temperature from boiling hot to almost freezing cold.

TOLTEC GORGE OF THE LOS PINOS, COL.—This is one of the most inspiring views in all Colorado. It is on the Silverton branch of the Denver and Rio Grande Railway, 309 miles from Denver City. The road traverses the verge of the great chasm, the bottom of which is 1500 feet below. The photograph was taken at the bottom of the cañon, and away up near the top may be seen a passing train, which at so great a height looks like a child’s toy. A little mountain stream meanders through the chasm, gently murmuring and singing as it makes its way over the rocks, but when the snows melt and the rains fall it becomes a mad, roaring, rushing torrent, tearing the sides of the mountain and tossing great boulders about as if they were made of straw.

CAVE DWELLINGS in the CAÑON DE CHELLY.

A RELIC OF THE CAVE-DWELLERS.

At a station called Lamy, there is a branch of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, leading north eighteen miles, to the ancient and interesting city of Santa Fe, celebrated in American history as being the second oldest town in the United States. The place contains much to entertain searchers after relics of the past, and here we find the links that bind the old Spanish invaders with the civilization of to-day. Settled by Catholics, it still retains the characteristics impressed upon it by the Franciscan fathers, and remains true to the faith in which it was first baptized. It is the seat of the archiepiscopal diocese, and the Cathedral of San Francisco is the largest church edifice in the territory, as well as the oldest, the original part, which still remains, having been built as early as 1622.

Old as the town is, Santa Fe is the Phœnix that rose from one that was very much more ancient, for the site was, in the ages that are very remote, occupied by an Indian pueblo, the ruins of which are still to be seen in what is known as the “Old Home.” But the most curious and attractive object within the city is the Governor’s Palace, a long, low building erected in 1598, a summary history of which is thus presented by Governor Prince:

LA VETA PASS, COL.—Over this famous pass the railroad makes its way into San Luis Valley, and we have here a combination of the wonders of engineering skill with a grandeur of view unequaled in any other part of the world. The maximum grade is 237 feet to the mile, and the altitude at the summit is 9393 feet. Two of the largest locomotives are required to draw an ordinary train over the steep grades, and even with these the ascent is labored and tedious. From the top of the pass a view is obtained of such surpassing grandeur that no language can picture it.

ABANDONED CAVE HABITATIONS OF THE CLIFF-DWELLERS, NEAR ESPANOLA.

“Without disparaging the importance of any of the cherished historical localities of the East, it may be truthfully said that this ancient palace surpasses, in historic interest and value, any other place or object in the United States. It antedates the settlement of Jamestown by nine years, and that of Plymouth by twenty-two, and has stood during the 292 years since its erection, not as a cold rock or monument, with no claim upon the interest of humanity except the bare fact of its continued existence, but as the living center of everything of historic importance in the Southwest. Through all that long period, whether under Spanish, Pueblo, Mexican, or American control, it has been the seat of power and authority. Whether the ruler was called viceroy, captain-general, political chief, department commander, or governor, and whether he presided over a kingdom, a province, a department, or a territory, this has been his official residence. From here Oñate started, in 1599, on his adventurous expedition to the Eastern plains; here, seven years later, 800 Indians came from far-off Quivira to ask aid in their war with the Axtaos; from here, in 1618, Vincente de Salivar set forth to the Moqui country, only to be turned back by rumors of the giants to be encountered; and from here Peñalosa and his brilliant troop started, on the 6th of March, 1662, on their marvelous expedition to the Missouri; in one of its strong-rooms the commissary-general of the Inquisition was imprisoned a few years later by the same Peñalosa; within its walls, fortified as for a siege, the bravest of the Spaniards were massed in the revolution of 1680; here, on the 19th of August of that year, was given the order to execute forty-seven Pueblo prisoners, in the plaza which faces the building; here, but a day later, was the sad war-council held which determined on the evacuation of the city; here was the scene of triumph of the Pueblo chieftains as they ordered the destruction of the Spanish archives and the church ornaments in one grand conflagration; here De Vargas, on September 14, 1692, after the eleven hours’ combat of the preceding day, gave thanks to the Virgin Mary, to whose aid he attributed his triumphant capture of the city; here, more than a century later, on March 3, 1807, Lieutenant Pike was brought before Governor Alencaster as an invader of Spanish soil; here, in 1822, the Mexican standard, with its eagle and cactus, was raised in token that New Mexico was no longer a dependency of Spain; from here, on the 6th of August, 1837, Governor Perez started to subdue the insurrection in the north, only to return two days later and to meet his death on the 9th, near Agua Fria; here, on the succeeding day, Jose Gonzales, a Pueblo Indian of Taos, was installed as Governor of New Mexico, soon after to be executed by order of Armijo; here, in the principal reception-room, on August 12, 1846, Captain Cooke, the American envoy, was received by Governor Armijo and sent back with a message of defiance; and here, five days later, General Kearney formally took possession of the city, and slept, after his long and weary march, on the carpeted earthen floor of the palace.”

WAGON-WHEEL GAP.—Wagon-Wheel Gap is in Rio Grande County, Col., in the southern part of the State and near the head of the Rio Grande River. Hot Springs, famous for their curative qualities, are located here. The scenery is exceedingly picturesque, and the place has become a favorite resort for health and pleasure seekers. It is said to be the best place for trout fishing in the West, and this fact largely increases its popularity with tourists. It is 310 miles south of Denver, and is reached by the Creede branch of the Denver and Rio Grande road. The elevation is 8448 feet.

SPANISH PEAKS, FROM LAS VEGAS, NEW MEXICO.

Santa Fe now has many things that belong to the present age: street cars, electric lights, etc., but she is, nevertheless, still a place of adobe houses, before which there is ever a varied commingling of Americans, Mexicans and Indians. She is also the center of archæological interest, for besides the ancient objects which are to be found within her urban limits, there are villages near-by which present all the aspects of the aborigines, practically as they appeared to Cortes and Coronado. These adobe places and their inhabitants are called pueblos, because that is the old Indian name signifyingtown. The pueblos in New Mexico are nineteen in number, and while varying in size, they are very similar in appearance, showing, as they do, no variation of architecture. The houses were built to accommodate from one hundred to several hundred persons, as the Pueblo Indians were communistic in their manner of living. Instead of being one or two-story structures, like the present style of Mexican and the old Spanish adobes, the houses were built one upon another, in a succession of terraces, sometimes five or more in number, the upper stories being accessible only by means of ladders. The most noted of these pueblos are Taos, Laguna, Acoma, Santa Clara, Zuni and Santo Domingo. Albuquerque was also originally an Indian pueblo, built upon a slight elevation of rock, and the place still contains several clusters of square, flat-roofed adobe houses, arranged in terraces, as before described. The walls of these strange dwellings are very thick, and the interior is gained, not through doors, but by entrance-ways cut in the roof, which is reached only by ladders. The Pueblo Indians have been pronounced by many ethnologists to be the oldest race now living on the continent, though many others regard them as being the descendants of the Aztecs, whose ancient kingdom of Cibola extended from Colorado and Utah on the north, to Central America on the south. The capital of this extinct empire is supposed to have been situated in Penal county, Arizona, the ruins of which are traceable along the Gila River, in what is known as the Casas Grandes. Remarkable stories have been told of the relics of this ruined city, enthusiasts often describing them as equal in grandeur to the prostrate columns and mighty archways that speak in imperishable stone of the magnificence of ancient Egyptian cities. The Montezumas were supposed to have held their court in the splendid stone palaces whose relics lie scattered through the Casas Grandes, and whose carvings and hieroglyphics seem to attest the departed glory of a once mighty people. These famous ruins are twelve miles north of Florence, a station on the Southern Pacific, and are in a region of great picturesqueness, which is traversed by a good wagon-road running along the Gila River. The route is through an arid plain, in which the only vegetation is mesquite and cactus, but the parched desert is gracefully confined by a beautiful and opalescent range of mountains, while overhead is a sapphirine sky more brilliant than ever hung over Italy. The river margin is like a blue wave, colored as it is by the tossing heads of wild lilac flowers, which find protection from the beating sun under the waving branches of banks of willows that stoop low to drink from the river. There, under the shadows of the Tucson Mountains and the Sierra Catarina range, are the colossal ruins of the Casas Grandes. The buildings, of which confused heaps are all that now remain, were of irregular style, but of some architectural pretension, for the walls were constructed of concrete, moulded into blocks nearly three feet square. The principal structure, which has long been called Montezuma’s Palace, was about sixty feet long by fifty broad, and stood five stories, or forty feet high. For windows there was a square aperture over each door, wholly insufficient for either light or ventilation, though the ancient Indians were not partial to either, apparently preferring darkness; and living in the closest communal state, they appreciated fresh air like they did the storm and cold, only when it was on the outside.

LOS PINOS VALLEY, LOOKING WEST.—This beautiful photograph gives us a splendid view of cañon, table-land and mountain scenery. It is rugged and picturesque, with a fringe of distant snow-covered mountains as a central background. From the high table-lands to the right, a view of surpassing grandeur and beauty bursts upon the enraptured vision, repaying the tourist for all his pains in climbing to the exalted heights. Here the atmosphere is always cool and invigorating, and the weariness and lassitude of a warmer and more humid climate are not experienced.

MEXICAN OVENS, USED PRINCIPALLY BY THE PUEBLO INDIANS.

Occasional pieces of copper are found in the Casas Grandes ruins, but no iron, and the cutting instruments of the original occupants were made of obsidian, as were their arrows. Pottery still strews the ground about, but there are no evidences to support the old legends of magnificence with which early travelers invested the so-called palace. But there are plainly to be seen ruins of a great wall that once enclosed the city, on which were sentinel towers rising several feet above the main wall, thus proving that this was not entirely a land of peace, nor do appearances indicate that it was one of plenty. The Apaches, no doubt, harried the less war-like Moqui, who were at last driven southward, and left ruins of similar cities along their gradual retreat from Utah to Mexico. Professor A. L. Heister, the antiquarian, who has made a long and patient investigation of the pueblo ruins in southwest New Mexico, thus writes of his discoveries:

“Within a radius of five miles of St. Joseph, New Mexico, I have discovered several hundred ruins of the habitations of prehistoric man. In these ruins—the walls of which are built of undressed stone and cement—are found the remains of huge cisterns; walls of fortification; queer implements of bone and stone; beautifully designed, carved or painted pottery, together with odd and artistic pictures, characters and symbols cut upon large rocks in cañons near, and with such nicety of taste as serve to strike the beholder with wonder and admiration.

ADOBE VILLAGE OF PUEBLO INDIANS, NEW MEXICO.—The word pueblo in Spanish means village, and this term was applied by the early Spanish explorers to several powerful tribes of Indians whom they found living in adobe villages like the one so beautifully photographed on this page. They had evidently occupied such abodes for centuries before the Spaniards came, and they have not departed from the custom up to the present time. As the increase of a family requires more room, additions are made at the top of the house, and thus we find their homes built in tiers, one above the other, the upper stories being reached by rude ladders, as shown in the illustration. The baking oven, seen at the left of the photograph, is a village institution, and it has been adopted almost universally by the present rural population of Mexico. The Pueblo Indians are rapidly disappearing, their entire number being now less than 1000.

“The ruins are generally found on high ground, and are composed of from two to several hundred rooms, averaging about eight by ten feet, and six to eight feet in height. In some cases the buildings have been two stories high. There has been a side entrance to all of these rooms, but these openings, from some cause, have been carefully walled up.

SCENE ON THE GREAT AMERICAN DESERT.

“These people were larger than those of to-day, some of them being fully eight feet high. I am led to believe their average height was not less than seven feet. They buried their dead in the ground floors of their rooms, with the heads towards the east, and, as a rule, their pottery, trinkets and personal ornaments with them. In excavating these ruins, one is constantly impressed with one paramount wonder—their great age. Huge pine trees, three and four feet in diameter and 100 feet high, flourish upon the walls and in the rooms of these habitations of forgotten man. The infilling of drift and the increase of surface, caused by vegetable growth and decay, is very slow, and has been estimated by some geologists to average about one foot in eighty years. Admitting this to be near the truth, our surprise knows no bounds when, on sinking directly under these giant trees, we pass through from six to ten feet of vegetable mold, then encounter from one to three feet of clean-washed sand and gravel, then a solid earthen floor covered with ashes, charcoal, bones and fragments of broken pottery. Yet still below this are the skeletons of human beings, surrounded by their pottery, weapons and ornaments of stone, bone and copper. My own opinion is that these people were either Aztecs or Toltecs. They were sun-worshipers and well advanced in carving, painting, building, weaving and agriculture. They flourished many centuries in Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Mexico, Central and South America, and were exterminated either by famine, flood, disease or volcanic action at least 1,000 years ago.

“In the eastern part of this (Socorro) county are the ruins of an immense city known as the Grande Quivero, covering two by two and one-half miles square. Its walls are, in some places, eight feet thick, forty feet high, and 700 feet long. A great aqueduct carried water to the city, but to-day there is no water within forty miles of this ancient wonder. It stands silent and alone in the sunlight and moonlight, and where once the love, industry and skill of an unknown race made thousands of beautiful and happy homes, the coyote, bat and snake now hold sway. When and by whom it was built was a mystery to the Mexican people more than 300 years ago.”

THE PUEBLO VILLAGE OF LA GUNA.—This is one of the most important of the Pueblo settlements in New Mexico. It is situated in the midst of a rich valley, which, by means of irrigation and rude methods of cultivation, produces abundant food for the unaspiring inhabitants. The reader is referred to page 150 of this work for a very full, graphic and interesting description of the Pueblos and their customs, together with a history of their probable origin and descent.

INNER COURT OF A PUEBLO TOWN, ARIZONA.—In two preceding photographs we have had very fine general views of Pueblo villages, and in this one we are shown the interior or court, formed by the surrounding houses, where much of the domestic work is performed. It is a dreary, desolate-looking place, but decidedly better than the average of the homes of savage or uncivilized peoples. The sun-baked mud houses are certainly preferable to an ordinary Indian wigwam, and we are sure the baking ovens would produce sweeter and more wholesome bread than the roving Apaches or Sioux are accustomed to. In fact, the houses, the ovens, and even the dress of the forlorn-looking woman indicate the beginnings of civilization.

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