II. (continued 2)

I now cross the Arroyo de Pecos, and on its western bank, in the triangle formed by the creek with the military road to Santa Fé, nearly opposite the site of the old church, I met with a ruined enclosure and with remains of structures whose purposes are yet unexplained to me.

The distance from M to the arroyo is 40 m.—130 ft. Its E. line is 75 m.—246 ft.,—the S. line 70 m.—230 ft.,—the W., up to where the curve begins, 55 m.—180 ft. The distance from M to N is 15 m.—50 ft. At the north end of N is a mound of stone and débris, like a conical tower, 5 m.—16 ft.—in diameter; the other lines are distinct foundations only. Both M and N are scattered over with broken pottery, chips of obsidian and flint, and I also found a fragment of a stone implement.

Mariano Ruiz told me that the enclosure M was the corral of the pueblo; that is, the enclosure where they kept whatever herds they possessed. It was at all events but an enclosure, and no building. Still, why were their herds, their most valuable property, kept on the opposite side of the creek, so far from the dwellings themselves?

There are other ruins yet further south on the western bank of the arroyo, which, however, I shall not mention here. They are so important as to deserve special discussion in a later portion of this report. I therefore cross the creek back again to its eastern shore, and thence to the south side of the old church, proceeding thence southwards. From the church a grassy slope, very gentle and with almost imperceptible undulations, extends to the road which runs almost due W. and E. from the creek towards the Rio Pecos. The distance is about 300 m.—1,000 ft.,—of which 74 m.—240 ft.—are taken up by the embankments, walls, and foundation lines already described as pertaining to the church building. Plate I. shows the position of this section, its northern limit being about 34 m.—112 ft.—N. of the southern lines of the church annexes (or 42 m.—138 ft.—S. of the temple itself) the southern limit being the road itself, while on the west the creek-bed forms the boundary.

H, Corral-like structure, very plain, about 50 m. × 20 m., or 163 ft. × 65 ft. I understood Sr. Ruiz to say that it was the garden of the church ("la huerta de la iglesia"), but believe that he probably meant G, not having my field-notes with me at the time.

I, rectangle of foundation lines 30 m.—98 ft.—from A; 30 m. × 31 m.—98 ft. × 100 ft.—divided into 2 compartments, the western one 9 m. × 30 m.—30 ft. × 98 ft.

J, trapezium, with mound at S.W. corner 18 m. × 21 m., or 60 ft. × 70 ft.

K, rectangle 25 m. × 36 m.—82 ft × 118 ft.—open to the west, and only recognizable from the semicircular mound of not 0.50 m.—20 in.—elevation, dotted out as leaving a depression in the centre.

L, circular depression 36 m.—118 ft.—in diameter; ground always wet.

O, circular mound 10 m.—33 ft.—in diameter, 1.5 m.—5 ft.—high.

k, shapeless mound, possibly part of a hollow rectangle.

In many cases the foundations (which are the only remains visible) are themselves obliterated,—or at least overgrown. They are sometimes of 0.27 m.—10 in.—in width; again, two rows, even three rows, of stones compose them longitudinally. The mound is regular, but the soil is everywhere so hard and gravelly that I desisted from excavating. The basin L looks much like an estufa: there are few scattered stones on its surface, and this surface is moist; but I did not notice any trace of stone encasement. In general, there is no rubbish at all over the area. Stones are scattered about, and evidently they were once used for building purposes; but they nowhere form heaps. Then there is not the slightest trace of pottery or obsidian. In this respect the area just described forms a remarkable exception. All around it in every direction the painted fragments cover the soil; this particular locality, as far as I could find, has none. It only reappears in I, opposite the church annexes, and also in the enclosure H, whereas the church grounds are again strewn with handsome pieces, and some of the finest obsidian flakes were found on them.

Across the road to the south, the ground becomes covered with shrubs of cedar, and the eastern slope hugs the creek-bed. Upon reaching the creek, the road divides,—one branch crossing over directly to the west, and the other proceeding along the arroyo about 200 m.—630 ft.—to the south ere it turns across. The main military line of travel intersects there-about the one to the Pecos River, and thence, striking almost due south, forms a very acute angle with the creek. In this angle ledges of rock protrude, sheltered by a fine group of cedar-shrubs; and here, in what may be termed a snug little corner, the rocks bear some Indian carvings.

Expecting daily a supply of paper for "squeezes," I have until now deferred taking any exact copies of these vestiges. Therefore this report contains but superficial notice of them. It would have been useless labor to make sketches and take measurements when I knew that, within the period of time I shall spend in New Mexico, I should certainly be able to secure fac-similes. The carvings are certainly old; they are much worn, and represent mainly so-called footprints (of adults as well as of children), turkey tracks, a human form, and a circle formed by small cup-shaped holes, of the patterns about which I hope that my friend Professor C. C. Rau, of Washington, will by this time have finished his elaborate and very interesting work. The human figure is as rude and childlike an effort as any represented on the plates accompanying the reports of General Simpson and of my friend Mr. W. H. Holmes; the footmarks are fair, and the circle is rather perfect. Something like a "diamond" appears within its periphery, but I am not yet quite certain whether it is a carving or the result of decay. Some of the tracks seem to point to the high mesa, others to the north.[126] By the side of these original efforts there are recent additions, destined, perhaps, to become at some future time as successful archæological frauds as many of the most interesting products of excavation in the States of Ohio and Iowa. About the sculptured stones I again met with fragments of painted pottery. Still further down, on the east bank of the Arroyo de Pecos, about a mile from the church in a southerly direction, and on a low promontory of red clay jutting out into the creek-bed, there are vestiges of other ruins,—a low, flat mound covered with stones. I saw no pottery about it.

Directly opposite the sculptured rocks, on the other bank of the arroyo to the west, the cliffs of clay bordering it form a huge cauldron, out of which the contents seem to have been originally removed, leaving a semicircle of vertical bluffs of clay and drift about 3 m.—10 ft.—high. It is out of this locality that I suggested the clay for the adobe of the church might have been secured. The faces of the slope cannot have been washed out, for the creek runs straight far to the east, hugging closely that side of its banks; there is no trace of an old stream-bed winding to the westward, neither is there any sufficient drainage from the west in the shape of gulches or branches. It appears as if there had been an original start, at least, given to the present basin by a removal of earth in a curve, subsequent wearing and weakening enlarging the cauldron to its actual form and size. This size is constantly increased by decay and by the work of diggers; for this bluff has been of late a favorite resort for them, from the fact that in its face human bones—nay, complete graves—have been found.

I consequently started to examine the bluff, and finally noticed a plain wall jutting out at about one fourth of the length of the western curve from N. to S. This wall seemed at first to be a corner. It is well made, and its stone-work is much like that figured by Mr. Holmes from the cliff-dwellings on the Rio Mancos in South-western Colorado. Still the stones are not hewn, but only were carefully broken, the rock itself having a tabular cleavage. The surface is true. I am unable to say whether it was a corner or not; the thickness of the side (east) is 0.65 m.—2 ft.,—and it looks like a strong outside line running almost due N. and S., perhaps a little to the E.

The height of the wall is 0.94 m.—3 ft.; its depth beneath the surface, 0.52 m.—21 in. The sod (covered with grama) looks undisturbed; it is hard and coarsely sandy on the top, but beneath the clay is softer and loamy. Under the wall there is red clay to the bottom of the bluff with bands of drift. Clambering along the cliff to the northward, I soon perceived, at a depth nearly agreeing with the base of the wall, a layer of white ashes, similar to those found over the hearthstone in building B, mixed with charcoal and charred pottery. This layer was continuous along the exposure of the bluff; it formed a regular seam, intersected horizontally by bands of charcoal, and, at the lower end, a continuous stratum of pottery totally different from that found hitherto, except one fragment in the drift of the creek and another one among the adobe rubbish of the church. Instead of being painted, it was corrugated and indented, and identical with the corrugated and indented ware from the Rio Mancos and from South-eastern Utah, so beautifully figured by Mr. W. H. Holmes. There were also a very few pieces of painted pottery: but these, which became more numerous towards the top of the bluff, or cliff, appeared to have been washed in; whereas the corrugated fragments were a distinct, continuous band, most of the convex surfaces being downwards; and this band, except where ledges of the cliff projected far out into the bottom, or where the clay had tumbled down recently in front of the exposure, was visible from 50 m.—165 ft.—N. of the wall to 62 m.—203 ft.—S. of it on a line of 110 m.—360 ft. It was everywhere accompanied by the ashes and charcoal.

A, little barranca, exposing ashes, etc., which contained corncobs, and, in the upper parts of the clay, human bones.

a, grave found by Mr. E. K. Walters, of Pecos; obliterated now.

B, wall.

b, place where skeleton of child was partly secured, five metres S. of B.

C, southern barranca; no remains found.

c, last sign south of pottery, ashes, and charcoal.

W, rock carvings on west bank of the arroyo.

The following are sections at four different places:—

Clay Pit Area

Specimens of every section have been sent with the collection. It has struck me that the stratum of ashes, charcoal, and pottery, while visible always inside,—that is, to the west of a supposed lateral extension of the wall from B,—still appears to run below it. The human remains, however, protrude about at heights where the wall, if in existence, might have been in front of them. There were bones lying on rubbish in front of C,—there were also bones within the ashes, even at A; but the action of wear and washing being everywhere visible and very complicated, I do not venture any surmise in these cases beyond expressing the conviction that the human remains originally rested above the layers of charcoal, ashes, corncobs, and corrugated pottery.

While at Sr. Ruiz's, I had diligently inquired of the old gentleman about the graves of the Pecos Indians. He finally replied (after he had for a time insisted upon it that they were at the church) that before they became Christians ("antes que fuéron cristianos") they buried their dead on the right bank of the Arroyo de Pecos, where he had often seen the skeletons (las calaveras, the corpses) washed out of the cliffs and strewn about. At Mrs. Kozlowski's, this also appeared to be a known fact; but an examination of the creek banks showed no trace of bones, and showed no other structures except the mound already mentioned on the left shore. In the cliffs of the basin which I have now described I met with the first sign of what Sr. Ruiz called "El Campo-Santo de los Indios, antes que fuéron Cristianos." Still it is not at all positive, because the surface of the level west of the bluff shows extensive but flat and low mounds, covered with stones used for building, and with painted pottery, showing that at least adjoining the human remains a very large building, if not several, had stood at some very remote time. The wall would then stand towards that ancient structure in the same relation as the mound or chamber V stands towards the ruin A on the mesilla; and it would indicate the custom on the part of their inhabitants of burying their dead around their houses, or at least in sight of the rising sun, and in little chambers of stone. This view is corroborated by the statement of Mr. E. K. Walters, of Pecos, that at a place which I have marked a (therefore to the north of the wall) he dug out, very near the edge of the bluff, a stone grave, and with it a human skeleton. The grave was a rectangle, walled up on four sides, with stones on the top and no floor. The western side was rounded, so as to present the following plan:—

In it lay the skeleton, two feet below the soil, the feet pointing eastward. The length of the chamber was about one third of a large man's body; the head lay at the west end, amongst the bones of the chest. It had therefore been buried in a sitting posture facing the rising sun.[127] Along with the body arrow-heads were found, and pieces of tanned deerskin, such as are still worn by the Indians. Of course, all traces of the skull, etc., have since disappeared.

While this conversation was taking place, the partner of Mr. Walters, Sr. Juan Basa y Salazar, came in, and the question of the great bell (which I have already mentioned) came up for discussion. All the parties assured me that this bell formerly belonged to the church of Pecos, and that after the outbreak of 1680 the Indians carried it up into their winter pueblo, on the top of the high mesa, where it broke and they left it. The positive assertion that the winter pueblo of the Pecos tribe was about 2,000 feet higher than the great ruins on the mesilla—that these ruins themselves were but their summer houses—was very startling. It appeared incredible that the Indians should have left their comfortable quarters in the coldest season to look for shelter in the highest and coldest places of the whole region. Still, my informants being old residents and candid men, with certainly no intention to deceive me, and there being besides confused reports of the existence of ruins on the mesa current among the people of the valley, I resolved to devote my last day to a rapid reconnoissance of the elevated plateau. Therefore, after a visit to the Plaza de Pecos, on the 5th of September, where the Rev. Father Léon Mailluchet confirmed the reports about the winter houses on the mesa, I set out (always on foot) on the morning of the 6th, Mr. Thomas Munn having volunteered to be my guide.

We followed the railroad track downwards, and about a mile and a half south of Baughl's, east of the track, met a tolerably large mound. At the station of Kingman, four miles from Baughl's, there is also a ruined stone house, rectangular, but smaller than any one of those on the mesilla.[128] I had no time to make any survey. We went along the railroad for one mile farther, then struck to the S. W. across a recently cultivated but abandoned field, and finally reached the apron of gravelly clay and locas skirting the high mesa. Here Mr. Munn assured me were the remains of stone structures all along for miles, and especially stone graves. Of the latter he had seen "hundreds." He described them exactly as Mr. Walters had, and as I had found the pit in mound V, and described the position of the skeleton also as if sitting with the face to the east. We soon came to a walled ruin 6 m. × 6 m. or 20 ft. × 20 ft., the walls composed of sandstone,—a range of rubble blocks very much ruined,—a piñon having a diameter of 0.45 m.—18 in.—shooting up from the interior. 50 m.—165 ft.—further north a clearly defined estufa is seen, 4 m.—13 ft.—across, with stone walls 1 m.—3 ft. 3 in.—in width. The apron of the mesa is overgrown with fine pines. Thence, following a tie-shoot, we ascended very nearly vertically, about 1,000 feet at least, to the top. Here already the view to the E. and S. was magnificent; but the air was light and chilly. Thunder-clouds were hovering N. and E., rain-streaks pouring down on the Sierra de Tecolote, and soon a heavy cloud formed south of us, while others were slowly nearing from the N.E. The mesa dips or slants decidedly to the W. and S.W.; the strata on its surface are tilted up to a high pitch, and appear to be almost vertical. The ground is very rocky, covered with high piñon.

Notwithstanding the steadily nearing thunder, we plunged to the S.W., past the tie-camp of Mr. Keno, and soon struck the source of an arroyo in a rocky, desolate hollow, pines shooting up in and around it. There, on its left bank, were the foundations of a stone structure 11 m. × 3 m.—36 ft. × 10 ft. About three miles from the edge of the mesa, in a still wilder cañada, where there is no space nor site for any abode around, the bell was found. There is no trace of any "winter house" here,—not even on the entire mesa; and the bell was left there, not because its carriers there remained, but because it dropped there and broke. Who these carriers were I shall discuss further on; at all events, they were not the Indians of Pecos. This cañada is the entrance to a gorge descending directly towards the pueblo of Galisteo.[129] Meanwhile the clouds had accumulated over our heads, sharp thunder-claps and icy blasts preceding the storm. It was of short duration, but as the hail fell thickly we were thoroughly pelted and wet before again reaching the camp, glad to enjoy the hospitality and hot coffee of its inmates. At one p.m. the sun shone again, and we started (this time to the north) along the border of the mesa. Vegetation is here more exuberant than in the valley of Pecos. Not only do tall pines grow everywhere, but there is a thick undergrowth of encina; the Yucca is large and green, mountain sage covers the soil, and grassy levels are dotted with flowers. Animal life, also, is more vigorous and more varied. Whereas in the valley crows and turkey-buzzards alone enliven the air, and there are scarcely any beetles; up here there is deer and turkey, and the gray wolf; jays and magpies flutter through the thickets, and the horned lizard is met with occasionally. The pith of the pine-trees attracts a large species of buprestis, and lepidopteræ are quite common. But there is not the least vestige of former human dwellings, so far as I could see: the top of the mesa of Pecos is, and was, a wilderness. It may have been the hunting-grounds of the tribe even in winter, but as for their exchanging their large pueblo at the bottom for a residence on the top it is very much as if the good people of New York City should spend Christmas week on the Catskill Range, or the Bostonians take winter quarters on Mount Monadnock. We followed the crest of the mesa for nearly four miles, ascending two of its highest tops. They are steep, denuded, and craggy. Beneath them vertical ledges descend in amphitheatres. From the highest point the horizon to the south appears unbounded. Like a small cone, the peak of Bernal seems to guard the lowest end of the Valley of Pecos. Over this vale rain-clouds still cast their shadows, and distant thunder muttered behind the Owl Mountains and the high Sierras in the north. To the west and south-west are almost unlimited expanses of slope, dark green pineries, and grassy spots. The bold outline of the Sandia Mountains looms up stately beyond it. Even the distant Sierra de Jemez protrudes. Between it and the northern limits of the mesa lies, far off yet, the city of Santa Fé.

The mesa is mostly yellow sandstone, but its highest points are capped with red; therefore the name of "Cerro amarillo" often applied to it. Through a gorge worn in the rock, and on an almost perpendicular "burro-trail," we finally descended to the apron of the plateau, surrounded during our descent by scenery as weird and wild as any of the lower Alps of Switzerland. On the lower edge of the apron, a mile and a half north of Kingman, and half a mile from the railroad track, we struck again several ruins. They were partitioned rectangles, very similar in size and in condition to the foundations seen south of the old church of Pecos, and, like those, utterly devoid of fragments of pottery. Along their eastern line, and inside of the walls, there appeared little square heaps of stones. These were the graves of which my guide had spoken, and their position is exactly similar to that of those near and at the pueblo itself.[130]

My time was up, however, and I could not stop to explore them. I therefore returned to Baughl's, and thence to Santa Fé, with the firm determination to revisit Pecos at a future day, and then do what I was compelled reluctantly to leave undone this time. Should, in the mean time, some archæologist explore the same locality, correct my errors, and unravel the mysteries hovering about the place, I heartily wish him as much pleasure and quiet enjoyment as I have had during my ten days' work, in which the dream of a life has at last begun its realization. Before, however, turning to the close of my report, which will embody scraps of history gathered about the place, remarks on the customs and arts of its former inhabitants, and general reflections, I must express my thanks here to a few gentlemen not yet named in this "personal narrative." Besides Mr. J. D. C. Thurston, who kindly assisted me for the first two days, Mr. G. C. Bennet, the skilful photographer, of whose ability his work is telling, has been for two days a pleasant and welcome companion. Last, but certainly not least, I thank Mr. John D. McRae, not only for his assistance free of expense to the Institute in many important mechanical matters, but especially for the solicitude with which he has watched my work and looked to my comforts, and for the great store of information I have gathered from his conversation.

HISTORY.

My survey of the grounds occupied by the aboriginal ruins in the valley of the Pecos indicates, as I have already stated, three epochs, successive probably in time, in which they have been occupied by man; that is, I have noticed these, and beyond these I have not been able to go as yet. Subsequent explorers may be more fortunate. This distinction, or rather classification, is very imperfect in the two earlier stages, and even arbitrary; but between the second and the last there is a marked break,—not in time, but in ethnological development. I shall term the three epochs as follows:—

1. Pre-traditional. (Indicated by the presence of the corrugated and indented pottery as its most conspicuous "land-mark.")

2. Traditional and documentary. (Documents in the sense of written records.)

3. Documentary period.

THE PRE-TRADITIONAL PERIOD.

I have not been able to detect as yet among the confused traditions current about the pueblo of Pecos any tale concerning occupation of their grounds by human beings prior to the settlement of which the ruins now bear testimony. It is true that the proper traditions of the tribe of Pecos are now preserved only at the pueblo of Jemez, about eighty miles N.W. of Pecos and fifty miles W. of Santa Fé, and that I have not as yet visited that place.[131] But it must be remembered that I now report "up to date," and that subsequent information will, or at least should, come in time.

My reason for admitting a pre-traditional period is, then, simply that I have found human remains at Pecos older than those of the present ruins and different in kind. These remains, as it may already have been inferred from the "personal narrative," are those found on the west side of the arroyo, in the basin (or rather the bank encircling it) opposite the rock carvings.

One fact is certain, the human bones, the walls protruding from the banks, and the grave found by Mr. E. K. Walters, are all above the layer of white ashes, charcoal, corncobs, and corrugated pottery found as a continuous seam along an extent of over 100 m.—327 ft.—from N. to S. Consequently, the walls and graves must have been built over these remains of a people which appears to have made indented and corrugated pottery alone, and consequently also the latter must be older in time than the former. It does not appear that the sedentary Indians of New Mexico ever made, within traditional and documentary times, any other than the painted pottery in greater or less degree of perfection. Even Gaspar Castaño de la Sosa, when he made his inroad into New Mexico in 1590, mentions at the first pueblo which he conquered: "They have much pottery,—red, figured, and black,—platters, caskets, salters, bowls.... Some of the pottery was glazed."[132] The corrugated and indented pottery, as I am assured by Sr. Vigil, is rarely met with over New Mexico, except at old ruined pueblos, and only when digging (en cavando).[133] I feel, therefore, justified in assuming it to have been the manufactured ware of a people distinct from the Pecos tribe or the pueblo Indians of New Mexico in general, and their predecessors in point of time. This pottery, however, is frequently met with among the cliff dwellings of the Rio Mancos and in Utah.[134] Its relation, then, to the painted pottery has, as far as I know, not yet been investigated.

But what could have been the purpose in covering originally a space of over 100 m.—327 ft.—in length with the products of combustion and fragments of one and the same industry in such a manner as to form an uninterrupted layer of 0.45 m.—18 in.—at least in thickness? Those who subsequently buried their dead over the seam certainly did not collect these ashes and spread them there as a floor on which they rested their structures afterwards. The combustion of a large wooden building would not have given the same uniformity on such a large scale. Sr. Vigil has suggested to me the following very plausible explanation: In order to burn or bake their pottery, the present pueblo Indians of New Mexico build large but low hearths on the ground of small wood, sticks, and other inflammable rubbish and refuse, on which they place the newly formed articles, and then set the floor on fire, until the whole is thoroughly burnt. Fragments of broken objects, etc., are not removed. The combustible material is thus reduced to ashes, and the broken pieces remain within them; their convex surfaces, of course, falling outwards, and thus resting on the floor. In this manner a thick layer of ashes and charcoal, with pottery, is easily formed. These "hogueras" are still from 20 to 40 feet in diameter; but, as they accommodate themselves to the size of the pueblo, it is certain that they were formerly much larger. The analogy between such a "potters'-field" and the layer in question is very striking, and the inference appears likely that the people who made this corrugated and indented pottery made it in the same manner as the pueblo Indians now make their painted ware, and as they made it at the time of the conquest.

These very old manufacturers of indented ceramics were also a horticultural people, for they raised Indian corn. The cob found in the ashes, or rather cut out with the knife at some distance inside the bluff, is charred and small. To what variety of Zea it belongs the specialist must decide.

I hold it to be utterly useless, and even improper, on my part to speculate any further on these "pre-traditional" people. Perhaps I have already said too much. Excavations alone can throw further light on the subject.

THE TRADITIONAL AND DOCUMENTARY PERIOD.

The term "traditional" is applied to this period, because the people occupying the site of Old Pecos have left some traditions behind them, and not because we know when it commenced. In fact, I am much inclined to divide it, for the sake of convenience, into two periods again, one of which includes the occupation of the area within the circumvallation and its necessary annexes (field, etc.), whereas the other includes the area without. Of the former, we have definite knowledge in regard to its inhabitants; of the latter, we have none whatever. It is therefore also pre-traditional as yet. Nevertheless, I have included it in the second epoch, as its ruins indicate that its people possessed arts identical with those of the present pueblo Indians. Their pottery, wherever exposed, was painted, figured, and vitrified in places; its ornamentation is exactly similar to that of the pottery of the interior area, and different from that of Zuñi. They used flint, but no trace of obsidian is found. This may be purely accidental; still, why should it occur at three places so totally different in regard to erosion and abrasion as the slope south of the church, the west bank of the creek directly opposite, and, if thorough examination should confirm the results of my cursory observations, the apron of the high mesa? The graves, wherever found, are identical with those of the mesilla; the plan of building, and consequently of living,[135] appears similar to that exhibited in houses A and B; the material used is the same, but the walls are more ruinous, and apparently of a much older date. The inference is therefore not unreasonable, that the inhabitants of the three areas named, as outside of the great circumvallation, were of the kind now called "pueblo Indians," who preceded the tribe of Pecos proper in point of time. It is not improbable that one or the other of these ruins may have been erected by the Pecos themselves before they settled on the mesilla. Still, there is neither proof nor disproval of this surmise extant.

There appears to be also a slight difference between the different ruins of this period themselves. The ruins south of the church and those along the mesa are similar, in that they are more ruined, and not covered with débris, and in that their surfaces are also devoid of pottery. The space west of the creek has pottery and also heaps of rubbish, and I therefore conclude that it was the most recent of the three locations,—or at least the one last abandoned. To it must be added the small mound or promontory found further south on the east bank of the arroyo. One fact is certain: all these places were deserted, and perhaps as badly ruined as now, at the time when Coronado first visited Pecos.[136] (The partial removal of the surface material may have been effected by the Pecos Indians themselves in order to build their own houses.)

Referring now to the inhabitants of the two houses, whose ruins are situated on the mesilla, north of the church, it is a thoroughly well-authenticated fact that they spoke the same language as the Indians of the pueblo of Jemez. Jemez lies 80 miles N.W. of Pecos, beyond the Rio Grande. It is possible that the Pecos Indians came to the valley from that direction. But it is singular that, while there are no other settlements speaking this same idiom but Jemez and Pecos, these two pueblos should be separated, as early as at Coronado's time (1540), by three distinct linguistical stocks, different from theirs and lying across, intervening between them. Directly W. of Pecos the Queres, S.W. the Tanos, N.W. the Tehuas—all at war with the Jemez and the Pecos, and often with each other—lay like a barrier between the latter two. The point is an interesting one, as the pueblo of Pecos defines (together with Taos at the north) the utmost easterly limit to which the pueblo Indians seem to have penetrated.

Who were first in the valley of the Rio Grande? Did the Queres, Tanos, Tehuas, etc., drive out the Pecos, then already settled to the S.W., into the Sierra, or did the Pecos, migrating from Jemez, force their passage through the other tribes? I conjecture that the Jemez, etc., were the first; that they migrated down the Rio Grande, and on the same area, between Sandía to the S. and Santa Fé, were gradually displaced by the others successively coming in,—one branch, the Jemez, recoiling into the mountains towards San Diego;[137] the other, the Pecos, driven up the cañon of San Cristóbal,[138] and finally, when the Tanos moved up into that valley, crossing over to the valley of Pecos.

This is to a great extent conjecture; still there are other singular indications. I give them with due reserve, however, formally protesting against any imputation that they are intended for anything else than to suggest problems for future study.

According to my friend Mr. A. S. Gatchet, of Washington, D. C., an excellent linguist, the Tanos and the inhabitants of Isleta, the most southerly pueblo on the Rio Grande still occupied, speak the same language.[139] The same is asserted here, as a known fact, to be the case with the Taos and the Picuries in the north, and the Isletas at the south. If this be true, then the supposition that the Queres and Tehuas are the latest intrusive stock would become a certainty. More than that: the Tanos prior to 1680, had their chief pueblo at San Cristóbal, N. E. of Galisteo, on the slope of the mesa of Pecos. They also had become dispossessed of the Rio Grande valley, and divided into (originally) two branches,—the Picuries and Taos north, and the Tanos, of Galisteo, east. Isleta itself is a later agglomeration.[140] There being no pueblo E. and S. E. of Pecos, then it appears that the Jemez, or rather Emmes, were the first migration, the Tanos the second, and the Queres and Tehuas the last.

The earliest traditions of the Pecos are preserved to us by Pedro de Castañeda, one of the eye-witnesses and chroniclers of Coronado's "march" in 1540. They told him that, five or six years (?) before the arrival of the Spaniards, a roaming tribe called the "Teyas" (Yutas) had ravaged the surroundings of their pueblo, and even, though fruitlessly, attempted to capture it.[141] This tribe was afterwards met by Coronado in the plains to the N.E. and E.[142]

Another tradition, very well known,—so well, indeed, that it has given to the name of the unlucky "capitan de la guerra" of the ancient Mexicans the honorific title of an aboriginal "cultus-hero,"—is that of Montezuma.

I hope, at some future time, to be able to give some further information on this Spanish-Mexican importation. Suffice it to say for the present, that not a single one of the numerous chronicles and reports about New Mexico, up to the year 1680, mentions the Montezuma story! The word itself, Mon-te-zuma, is a corruption of the Mexican word "Mo-tecu-zoma,"—literally, "my wrathy chief,"—which corruption that eminently "reliable gentleman," Bernal Diez de Castillo, is to be thanked for. He wrote in 1568.[143]

What the Indians themselves say of this tale I have not as yet ascertained; but the people of the valley all assert that the people of the pueblo believe in it,—that they even affirmed that Montezuma was born at Pecos; that he wore golden shoes, and left for Mexico, where, for the sake of these valuable brogans, he was ruthlessly slaughtered. They further say that, when he left Pecos, he commanded that the holy fire should be kept burning till his return, in testimony whereof the sacred embers were kept aglow till 1840, and then transferred to Jemez.

There is one serious point in the whole story, and that is the illustration how an evident mixture of a name with the Christian faith in a personal redeemer, and dim recollections of Coronado's presence and promise to return,[144] could finally take the form of a mythological personage. In this respect, for the study of mythology in general, it is of great importance. That the sacred fire had, originally, nothing at all to do with the Montezuma legend is amply proven by the earliest reports.

It will also become interesting to ascertain in the future how many pueblos, and which, concede to Pecos the honor of being the birthplace of that famed individual, and how many, as is the case with other great folks in more civilized communities, claim the same honor for themselves.

I cannot, therefore, attach to the Montezuma tale any historical importance whatever,—not even a traditional value.

Of course, Castañeda reports the story which every Indian tribe tells of themselves; namely, that the Pecos Indians were the bravest and the most warlike of the pueblos, and that in every encounter they were always victorious.[145]

Historical data, founded upon positive written records, begin for Pecos towards the fall of the year 1540, when Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, then at Zuñi or Cibola, sent the Captain Hernando de Alvarado with twenty men to visit a village called "Cicuyé."[146] Indians from that village, "situated seventy leagues towards the east"[147] from Zuñi, had visited the latter town, and offered to the Spanish leader "tanned hides, shields, and helmets." The hides were buffalo-robes, for the woolly hair was still on them.[148] Alvarado reached Cicuyé, passing, as I have elsewhere stated, through Acoma and Bernalillo. I have already identified Cicuyé with Pecos. Besides the proofs already given, a few descriptive abstracts from the report of Castañeda will add to the strength of the evidence:—

(p. 71.) "Five days' journeys further, Alvarado reached Cicuyé, a well-fortified village, whose houses are four stories high."

(p. 176.) "It is built on the summit of a rock. It forms a great square, in the centre of which are the estufas." (Compare general description and diagrams.)

(p. 177) "The village is surrounded besides by a stone wall of rather low height. There is a spring which might be cut off."

In regard to the wall, I refer to the plans and descriptions; as for the spring, it trickles out beneath a massive ledge of rocks on the west side of the arroyo, nearly opposite to the field. Its water, slightly alkaline, is still limpid and cool, and a great source of comfort. The sketch upon the next page will give an idea of its appearance.

There is no trace of work about it. At sunset of the 3d of September, Mr. Bennet and I saw a herd of many hundred sheep and goats driven to this spring by Mexicans for water, although the creek still had a fillet of clear water running, and the pond in the old field was filled nearly to its brim; they still preferred the old source.

Finally, it must be borne in mind, that the name of Pecos, in the language of its former inhabitants and of those of Jemez, is "Âqiu," and that, in an anonymous report of the expedition of Coronado from the year 1541, Cicuyé is spelt Acuique.[149]

Castañeda gives some few details concerning the mode of life and the customs of the inhabitants. Aside from those which I have already mentioned, he notices the ladders (p. 176); that at night the inhabitants kept watch on the walls, the guard calling each other by means of "trumpets" (p. 179); that the unmarried females went naked until their marriage (p. 177); that the pueblo could muster 500 warriors (p. 176); and finally, that it was situated in a narrow valley in the midst of mountains covered with pines, and traversed by a small river where excellent trout is caught; very large otters, bears, and good hawks are found there (p. 179). The inhabitants received Alvarado with the sound of "drums and flutes, similar to fifes, which they use often." They presented to him a great quantity of cloth and turquoises, which are common in this province (p. 72). I must here add that the turquoise mines of "Serrillos" are, in a direct line, only about twenty miles nearly west of Pecos, in a country between the former pueblos of the Tanos and those of the Tehuas. I have seen splendid specimens of the mineral from that locality, and Mr. Thurston found and I have sent on a perforated bead of bluish color which he picked up among the rubbish of the house B.

When, in 1543, Coronado left Nuevo México with his whole army to return to Mexico, two ecclesiastics remained there,—Fray Juan de Padilla, who was subsequently killed by the Indians near Gran Quivira,[150] and a lay brother called Luis, who took up his abode at Pecos. Before Coronado left Bernalillo ("Tiguex"), he sent to brother Luis the remainder of the sheep. He was then of good cheer, but still expected to be killed some day by the old men of the tribe, who hated him, although the people were friendly to him in general.[151] Nothing was afterward heard of him. Thus Pecos was the first "mission" in New Mexico; perhaps, also, the first place where domestic quadrupeds became introduced.

Forty years elapse before we again hear of Pecos. The unfortunate father, Augustin Ruiz, who, in 1581, attempted to convert the pueblos, did not reach further north than Puaray, where the Tiguas killed him, with his two companions.[152] But Antonio de Espejo, who, with fourteen soldiers, explored New Mexico in 1582 and 1583, visited Pecos. There can be no doubt but that the pueblos of the "Hubates"—two journeyings of six leagues to the east of the "Quires"—are the Pecos and the "Tamos," the Tanos.[153] Espejo is very liberal in his estimates: he gives to the "Hubates" five towns with 25,000 inhabitants, and to the "Tamos" even 40,000 souls. He says they had cotton cloth; he also says there was much good pine and cedar in their country, and that their houses were four and five stories high. His visit to the pueblo was of very short duration.

In 1590, Gaspar Castaño de la Sosa, "being then Lieutenant-Governor and Captain-General of the kingdom of New Leon," made a raid into New Mexico. It is possible that the pueblo which he came to on the 11th January, 1591, may have been Pecos.[154]

The "Spanish conquest of New Mexico" proper took place in the years 1597 and 1598, under Don Juan de Oñate. He met with little opposition, and his conquest amounted to little else than a military occupation, followed by the foundation of Santa Fé. On the 25th of July, 1598, he went to "the great pueblo of Pecos,"[155] and on the 9th of September, 1598, in the "principal estufa" of the pueblo of San Juan, the Pecos pledged fidelity to the crown of Spain. On the same occasion, Fray Francisco de San Miguel became the first regular priest of the pueblo.[156] Here terminates the second period of the second epoch; and the last one begins where the history of the Pecos tribe, whatever is left of it, becomes almost exclusively documentary.[157]

Before, however, leaving this period, I must recall here two facts elicited by the reports of the forays and travels above mentioned. One is, that the Pecos Indians, however warlike they may have been towards outsiders, still were of an orderly, gentle disposition in every-day intercourse. This is a natural consequence of their organization and degree of development. The other and more important one is, that Pecos was the most easterly pueblo in existence in 1540, and that even at that time it was quite alone.

Castañeda says (p. 188): "In order to understand how the country is inhabited in the centre of the mountains, we must remember that from Chichilticah, where they begin, there are eighty leagues; thence to Cicuyé, which is the last village, they reckon seventy leagues, and thirty from Cicuyé to the beginning of the plains."

Juan Jaramillo, another eye-witness of "Coronado's march," intimates a similar fact.[158]

In regard to Pecos being "quite alone," Castañeda is positive; so is Juan de Oñate, who received and registered its submission. It is true, however, that Castañeda mentions a small pueblo as subject to Cicuyé, which pueblo, however, he says was half destroyed at his time. He locates it "between the road and the Sierra Nevada."[159] This may have been the small ruin noticed near Kingman.

These facts are very interesting in their bearings upon the older ruins of Pecos. It goes far towards furnishing additional proof that they were indeed abandoned and decayed already in 1540. In regard to building B, it is ignored in the reports, A, with its vast court and its estufas, claiming exclusive attention. Still there is no room left for doubt that B was occupied during this period. But it is evident, from the statements of the eye-witnesses, that A was the principal abode of the Pecos tribe in 1540 and afterwards.

THE DOCUMENTARY PERIOD,

commencing in 1598, and running up to the present time. Here we should be entitled to find, of course, ample and detailed documentary evidence. Two unfortunate occurrences, however, have contributed to destroy the records of the territory of New Mexico.

In the month of August, 1680, when the pueblo Indians rose in successful revolt against the Spanish rule, and captured the "villa" of Santa Fé, they brought the archives, ecclesiastical and civil, into the plaza, and made a bonfire of the entire pile. This was an act of barbarous warfare. But few papers escaped the general destruction; these were saved by Governor Don Antonio de Otermin, and sent to El Paso del Norte, where they are still supposed to remain. We are, therefore, as far as the period of 1598-1680 is concerned, almost exclusively reduced to general works like the "Teatro Mexicano" of Fray Augustin de Vetancurt, and to the collections of documents published at Mexico and at Madrid. That, nevertheless, some documents were saved, and subsequently carried back to Santa Fé, is proved by the fact that Mr. Louis Felsenthal, of this city, has recovered one, a copy of which it is hoped will appear in the Journal of the Institute in time.

Subsequent to the return of the Spaniards, the archives of Santa Fé were kept in good order by its administrators, the last revision thereof being made by Governor Donaciano Vigil. In 1870, however, the man who then acted as Governor of the Territory, although otherwise of irreproachable character, permitted an act of vandalism almost without its parallel. The archives had accumulated in the palace to a vast extent: the original good order in which they were kept had been totally neglected during and since the war of secession; there was not even a custodian for them. So the head of the executive of this territory suffered its archives to be sold as waste paper, even sometimes used as kindling in the offices. Of the entire carefully nursed documentary treasures, the accumulation of 190 years, the Hon. Samuel Ellison, of this city (notwithstanding his feeble health), has been able to register about fifty bundles (legajos), whereas wagon-loads were scattered or sold for wrapping.

Many of the intelligent inhabitants attempted to save what they could, and there are some who succeeded to a limited extent; but of what yet remained in the palace, reduced to a sufficiently small bulk as not to be "in the way" any longer, even the valuable journals of Otermin and Vargas were considerably reduced through further decay.

This has been, in times of profound peace and in the nineteenth century, the fate of the archives of New Mexico.

Ever since, the legislature of the territory has been, in fact, utterly neglectful of its public documents. Each and every reminder in the shape of a petition has been disregarded, and only Governor L. Wallace has at last succeeded in having them overhauled. Hon. W. G. Ritch effected their removal to a suitable place, and it is to the acts of these gentlemen, and to the labor of love of Mr. Ellison, that we owe the preservation of what now remains.

What little documentary evidence has, therefore, been left at my disposal, contains, as might be supposed, meagre information concerning the pueblo of Pecos. The older church annals I have not been able to find, for those at the Plaza de Pecos date back only to 1862. Whither they have gone I am unable to tell, except that they are not at Santa Fé.

About the year 1628, through the action of Fray Francisco de Apodaca,[160] then Commissary-General of the Franciscan order in Mexico, religious life in this territory obtained a new impulse. Until then the work performed had been almost exclusively missionary work; the priests had (and still have) enormous districts to visit. Thus: that of the first priest of Pecos embraced from N. to S. a country of over 60 miles long, and 30 to 50 wide from E. to W. However, after Fray Gerónimo de Zarate Salmeron had addressed to his superior at Mexico his remarkable report in the year 1626,[161] a new life began. It is therefore after 1629 that the large church at Pecos was erected, but I am as yet unable to give the exact dates. This church and the "convent" were both built by Indians, whom the fathers had taught to square timbers, to ornament them with simple friezes and scroll-work, and to make adobe in the manner now practised, namely, mixing straw with the clay and moulding it in boxes. They were also taught to grow wheat and oats, and their flocks increased. In addition to being a horticultural people they became herders, and the pueblo was prosperous. Its church was renowned as the finest in New Mexico.[162] Whereas Santa Fé, in 1667, had but 250 inhabitants,[163] Pecos, as late as 1680, sheltered 2,000 Indians.[164]

Still, during this very time of comparative prosperity, a storm was brewing in New Mexico, from whose effects its sedentary Indians never recovered. This was the great rebellion of 1680. The Indians of Pecos claim to have remained neutral during that bloody massacre, and I am inclined to believe their statements. Nevertheless, it is a positive fact that, on the 10th of August of the aforesaid year, their priest, Fray Fernando de Velasco, was murdered and their church sacked.[165] By whom, then, was it done? The reply is intimated by the place where the great bell was found, and by the events intervening between 1680 and 1692, when Diego de Vargas recaptured Santa Fé. It will be remembered that the bell was left on the slope of the high mesa towards the S.W., in the rocky and desolate gorge descending towards the pueblo San Cristóbal, the old home of the Tanos tribe.[166] Father José Amanda Niel writes, about twenty-five or thirty years after the rebellion, that the Tanos secured the greatest part of the booty, among which were bells (campanas).[167] That this bell was not carried to the high mesa by the Pecos I believe I have proved; its proximity to the Tanos village, and its actual position in the cañada leading towards the latter, shows that it was either to be carried down to it or carried up from it. If it is (as current report has it) the bell of Pecos, then it was a trophy which the Tanos secured when they, on the 10th of August, 1680, committed the atrocities at the pueblo of Pecos; and this would make it extremely probable, also, that the slaughter of Father Velasco was accompanied by that partial destruction of the buildings A and B, which I have described, and which appears to have been partly repaired by means of material taken from the church, and of adobe containing wheat-straw. This is rendered more likely by the events subsequent to the driving out of the Spaniards, and it does not appear that the Pecos Indians took any part even in their expulsion.

After the victorious aborigines had returned from their pursuit of Otermin, dissensions arose among them, and intertribal warfare, in conformity with their pristine condition, set in. The Pecos, aided by the Queres, made a violent onslaught on the Tanos, compelling them to abandon San Cristóbal and San Lázaro.[168] This looks very much like an act of retaliation. During that time the Spaniards were not idle. In 1682, Governor Otermin penetrated as far as Cochiti,[169] but appears to have taken no notice of Pecos. In 1689, however, Don Domingo Gironza Petroz de Cruzate made a successful raid into New Mexico, in which raid the warriors of Pecos assisted him against the other tribes. In reward of their services he, on the 25th of September, 1689, after his return to El Paso del Norte, executed there the document a copy of which is hereto appended, and for which I am indebted to the kindness of my friend David J. Miller, Esq., chief clerk of the Surveyor General's Office at Santa Fé. It is a grant to the tribe of Pecos of all the lands one league north, south, east, and west from their pueblo ("una legua en cuadro"), therefore four square leagues, or 18,763-33/100 acres, to be therefore their joint and common property. When, therefore, in the afternoon of the 17th of October, 1692, Diego de Vargas Zapata, having recaptured Santa Fé from the Tanos who then held its ruins,[170] moved upon Pecos, he was received by the whole tribe with demonstrations of joy,[171] and the "capitan de la guerra" of the pueblo afterwards assisted him in subduing a second outbreak in 1694.[172]

The result for the pueblos of the great revolt in New Mexico was a gradual diminution in the numbers of their inhabitants. It was the beginning of decline. The Tanos had been in some places nearly exterminated, and all the others more or less weakened.[173] The distant Moqui, far off in Arizona, were the sole gainers by the occurrence, receiving accessions from fugitives of New Mexico.[174] But it would be incorrect to attribute this weakening of the pueblos during that time to the warfare with the Spaniards, or to the latter's retaliatory measures after final triumph. Vargas was energetic in action, but not cruel. A few of those who had committed peculiar atrocities were executed, but the remnants of the pueblos were reestablished in their franchises and privileges as autonomous communities. It is the intertribal warfare, which commenced again as soon as the aborigines were left to themselves, and drouth accompanying the bitter and bloody feuds, which destroyed the pueblos of the Rio Grande Valley.[175] The Pecos, isolated and therefore less exposed, suffered proportionately less; still, their time was come also, though in a different way.[176]

I have already stated that, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, the Utes introduced near the pueblo of Taos another branch of the great Shoshone stock,—the Comanches. This tribe soon expelled the Apaches,[177] who had not been exceedingly troublesome to the pueblos, and, a vigorous northern stock, became that fearful scourge of all the surrounding settlements, which they have continued to be for 150 years. Their efforts were mainly directed against the pueblo of Pecos, as the most south-easterly village exposed to their attacks. On one occasion the Comanches slaughtered all the "young men" of Pecos but one,—a blow from which the tribe never recovered. Thus, when the Indians of the Rio Grande rose in arms against the Mexicans in 1837, as has been so ably described by Mr. D. J. Miller,[178] the Pecos did not take any part, for there were only eighteen adults left, huddled together in the northern wing of the huge building A, and watching the sacred embers in the face of slow, inevitable destruction.

Then, in the following year, 1838, an event took place which, simple and natural as it is, still illustrates forcibly the powerful link which the bond of language creates between distant Indian communities. The pueblos of Pecos and Jemez had been almost without intercourse for centuries; but in the year 1838, says Mariano Ruiz, the principal men of Jemez appeared in person on the site of Pecos and held a talk with its occupants. They had heard of the weakness of their brethren, of their forlorn condition, and now came to offer them a new home within the walls of their own pueblo. The Pecos took the proposal under consideration, but were loth to leave the home where they had lived for so many centuries. In the following year "mountain fever" broke out among them, and only five adults remained alive. These, by joint indentures, sold the majority of the lands granted to them in 1689 by Cruzate.[179] Another portion was left to Ruiz as "son of the tribe." In 1840 these five men, named respectively Antonio (gobernador, and still living at Jemez), Gregorio, Goya, Juan Domingo, and Francisco, appeared before Don Manuel Armijo, then Mexican governor of the territory, and declared to him their intention to abandon their home and to seek refuge among their kindred at Jemez. Soon after, the gobernador, the capitan de la guerra and the cacique of Jemez, with several other Indians of that tribe, appeared at Pecos. The sacred embers disappeared, tradition being, according to the Hon. W. G. Ritch, Secretary of the Territory, that they were returned to Montezuma.[180] The remnants of the tribe moved on with their chattels, and guided by their friends, to Jemez, where, in a few months, I hope to visit "the last of the Pecos."

MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS.

About the mythology of the Pecos Indians, aside from the Montezuma story and the sacred embers, the tale of the Great Snake ("la vívora grande") appears to be widely circulated. It is positively asserted[181] that the Pecos adored, and the Jemez and Taos still adore, an enormous rattlesnake, which they keep alive in some inaccessible and hidden mountain recess. It is even dimly hinted at that human sacrifices might be associated with this already sufficiently hideous cult. I give these facts as they were given to me, and shall not believe them until I am compelled. It has always been the natural tendency in everything which (like the idolatrous practices still existing among the pueblos, of which there is no doubt) we do not positively know, to make bad look worse and good better than it actually is. The prospect of securing a knowledge of it is, however, not very good. The Indians themselves appear to deny it, and are generally very reticent about their aboriginal beliefs.

I have previously mentioned that Ruiz had been called upon by the Indians of Pecos to do his duty by attending to the sacred fire for one year, and that he refused. The reason for his refusal appears to have been that there was a belief to the effect that any one who had ever attended to the embers would, if he left the tribe, die without fail, and he did not wish to expose himself to such a fate.

About the social organization of the Pecos Indians, it has not been possible, of course, to ascertain anything as yet. That they lived on the communal plan is plainly shown by the construction of their houses. That they were originally, at least, organized into clans or gentes, can be inferred; but here I must remark that it may be difficult to trace those clusters among the Rio Grande pueblos, on account of their weakness in numbers, and of the intermixture of the Tehua, Tanos, and Queres stocks resulting from the convulsion of 1680. It may be possible, however, to find them at Jemez. They exist at Laguna and among the Moquis, according to Mr. Morgan, and I do not doubt but that Mr. Cushing, who is so thoroughly studying the Zuñi Indians, has by this time settled the question for that tribe. One fact, however, I consider to be ascertained; namely, that there were neither castes nor classes among the pueblos, therefore not at Pecos. At the head of their communal government were the usual three officers,—the gobernador, the capitan de la guerra, and the cacique. I am not quite clear yet as to the proper functions of each, except that the first two are both warriors ("ambos son guerreros," Ruiz); that the capitan has also the supervision of the lands of the tribe; and that the cacique is more or less a religious functionary. Mr. D. J. Miller states that the latter very seldom leaves the pueblo. It was therefore an unusual act when the cacique of Jemez came to Pecos in 1840, and I presume it was brought about through his connection with the holy fire. I asked Sr. Ruiz very distinctly as to whether these three officers were elective or not, and he promptly affirmed that they were ("son elegidos por el pueblo"). I then inquired if the sons succeeded to the fathers in office, and his reply was that there was no objection to their being elected thereto if they were qualified ("si son buenos"). This disposes of the question of heredity in office, rank, and title, and it is almost identical with the customs found by Alonzo de Zuevita among the Indians of Mexico in the middle of the sixteenth century. How the presumable "gentes" of the Pecos might have localized for dwelling in the great communal houses I am, of course, unable to conjecture.

In regard to their marriage customs, their mode of naming children, etc., I have not been able to gather much information as yet. The old marriage customs are supplanted by those of the church. Still, they may be traced up eventually. Every Pecos Indian had, besides his Spanish name, an Indian name; and there is, according to Mr. Ritch, still a Pecos Indian at Jemez whose aboriginal appellation is "Huaja-toya" (Spanish pronunciation). I heard of him this morning (Sept. 17) through an Indian of Jemez. What I know of their burials is already stated.

Of their agriculture, or rather horticulture, I have also spoken; the modes of cultivation have not been explained to me as yet. Irrigation is therefore the only part of their tillage system upon which I have been able to gather any information. In addition to what the preceding pages may contain, Sr. Vigil has assured me that they also irrigated their huerta from the arroyo. This thin fillet of clear water, now scarcely 0.50 m.—20 in.—in width, fills at times its entire gravelly bed, 100 m. to 150 m.—327 ft. to 490 ft.—from bank to bank. This does not occur annually, but at irregular intervals. Sr. Ruiz said that while the Pecos Indians were living at their pueblo the streams were filled with water ("en ese tiempo, corrieron los arroyos con agua, muy abundante"). It is further said that the tribe worked other "gardens" besides, on the banks of the river Pecos, two miles to the east.

For their arts and industry I must refer to the collections, however meagre and unsatisfactory they are; a condition for which I have already apologized. Nowhere did I find a trace of iron nor of copper, although they used the latter for ornaments (bracelets, etc.), and there can be no doubt that they had the former metal also,—after the Spanish conquest, of course. The squaring of timbers, the scroll-work and friezes in the church, could only be done with instruments of iron. But all traces of these implements have disappeared from the ruins, as far as the surface is concerned. I cannot refrain, however, from dwelling at greater length upon two products of industry, so common among the ruins as hardly to attract the attention of curiosity-hunters any more. These are the flakes of obsidian and lava and the painted pottery.

I have called these flakes a product of industry; while the material itself is of course a mineral, the fragments scattered about are undoubted products of skill. They are chips and splinters. There is neither lava nor obsidian cropping out in or about the valley,[182] but highly volcanic formations are abundantly found to the north, within fifty miles from Pecos, in the high Sierra de Mora; perhaps, also, nearer yet. At all events, the mineral has been brought to the pueblo and chipped there. The same is the case with the flint flakes, agates, jaspers, and moss-agates, with the difference, however, that, in the case of these, water has done a great part of the carrying, if not all; whereas the drift of the arroyo contains no obsidian nor lava, except such as has clearly been washed into it from the ruins. Among the flakes there will be noticed several which may have been used for knives, whereas still others approximate to the arrow-head. A small perfect arrow-head was found and transmitted by me to the Institute,—the only one I met with on the premises.[183]

The fact that several localities at Pecos are completely devoid of obsidian has already been mentioned. These are the oldest ruins. In the case of the ruins along the mesa and those south of the church, I can only speak of the surface; but where the corrugated pottery was found the whole section of the bluff was exposed for more than 100 m.—327 ft.,—and still not a trace of the mineral appeared, while flint, agate, and jasper were rather conspicuous.[184] This may be accidental, but it is certainly suspicious and suggestive.

The painted pottery is scattered in wagon-loads of fragments over the ruins. There are two places, however, where, as already stated, the surface is utterly devoid of them. Whether or not this deficiency extends to the soil, I cannot tell. I doubt it, however. These localities are, again, the apron along the mesa and the ruins south of the church. For the rest, it is very equally distributed everywhere. Still there are two distinct kinds at least. One is exactly similar to the kind now made and sold: it is coarse, soft; the ground is painted gray or yellow; the ornaments show, in few instances, traces of animal shapes (they are either black or brown); and the vessels must have been thick, and with a thicker coarse rim. Out of the grave in the mound V, the pottery was more perfect. There are pieces of a tinaja (bowl) with a vertical rim, yellow outside, white inside, with black geometrical ornamentation, not vitrified. This kind of pottery is still made by the Indians of Nambé, of Tezuque, and of Cochiti. (The former two are Tehuas, the latter is Queres.) But there I also found fragments of a plain black pottery, of dark red, and of dark red with black ornaments, which are thinner and much superior in "ring," and therefore in quality, to any now made. This pottery is older in date, and appears to be almost a lost art. There was, however, no distinction in distribution. Both kinds have one point in common, namely, the varnishing of the ornamental surfaces. I say varnishing,[185] and not "glazing;" for, although I believe the glassy appearance of the painted lines to be due to some admixture of the coloring material, and not to a separate glossy exterior coating, I do not as yet find a reason for admitting that the Indians knew the process of vitrification.

Of the military manufactures of the Pecos, a small arrow-head of obsidian found near the church is the only trace. It is even too small for a war-arrow. They had stone hatchets, and may have had the dart, and, later on, the spear. Pebbles convenient for hurling are promiscuously observed on the mesilla, but they are not numerous; and nowhere along the circumvallation did I notice any trace of heaps.[186] The military constructions, however, become very interesting through their connection with the system of drainage and a comparison with the ancient Mexicans. Around the ancient pueblo of Mexico ("Tenuchtitlan") the water formed the protective circumvallation; at Pecos, the defensive wall collected the water and conducted it where it was needed for subsistence for the irrigation of crops.

That this great circumvallation, 983 m.—3,225 ft.—in circuit, was a wall for protection also there is no doubt, although the main strength of the pueblo lay in the construction of its houses, where the inhabitants could simply shut themselves in and await quietly until the enemy was tired of prowling around it. By Indians it could only be carried by surprise or treachery.[187] Hence it was customary for the young men to leave the pueblo at times in a body, abandoning it to the old men and women, etc., without concern.[188] As long as these kept good watch they were safe, even if the Comanches should appear. Roaming Indians cannot break open a pueblo house if well guarded. For that purpose alone the mounds near the great gate, and the mound H, Pl. IV., were erected. They were watch-towers for special purposes, for particular sections, where the lookouts from the wall-tops were not sufficient.[189] These two mounds—one on each side of the gateway—overlooked the fields and the creek-bank: in the morning, when the people went out to work, or to carry drinking water from the spring opposite; during the day, while they attended to their simple labor of tillage.

The mound and tower H performed a similar office towards the steep ledge of rocks there descending, among whose fragments Indians could hide for hours from the scouts on the house tops. Thus the great enclosure with its details served a triple purpose. It was the reservoir which held and conducted the waters precipitated on the mesilla to the useful purpose of irrigation. It was a preliminary defensive line,—a first obstruction to a storming foe, and a shelter for its defenders. But it was also in places an admirable post of observation. It formed the necessary complement to the houses themselves,[190] and both together composed a system of defences which, inadequate against the military science of civilization, was still wonderfully adapted for protection against the stealthy, lurking approach, the impetuous but "short-winded" dash, of Indian warfare.

In conclusion of this lengthy report, I may be permitted to add a few lines concerning the great houses themselves. Their mode and manner of construction and occupation I have already discussed; it is their abandonment and decay to which I wish to refer. This decay is the same in both houses; the path of ruin from S.S.E. to N.N.W. indicates its progress. It shows clearly that, as section after section had been originally added as the tribe increased in number, so cell after cell (or section after section) was successively vacated and left to ruin as their numbers waned, till at last the northern end of the building alone sheltered the poor survivors. They receded from south to north; for the church, despoiled and partly destroyed in 1680, was no protection to them. Its own ruin kept pace with that of the tribe.[191] The northern extremity of the pueblo was their best stronghold, and thither they retired step by step in the face of inevitable doom.

A. F. Bandelier.

Santa Fé, Sept. 17, 1880.

To Professor C. E. Norton, President of the Archæological Institute of America, Cambridge, Mass.

GRANT OF 1689 TO THE PUEBLO OF PECOS.

The following is a literal copy of the original grant, now (Sept. 25, 1880) on file at the United States Surveyor-General's office at Santa Fé, made to the inhabitants of the Indian pueblo of Pecos in New Mexico. The language of the document is not altogether clear, but the essential terms are distinct:—

Año de 1689 En el Pueblo de nu. S.a de Guadalupe del Paso del Rio del Norte en veinte y cinco dias del mes de Sep.te de mil seiscientos y ochenta y nueve años el Señor Gov.or y Cap.n Gen.l D.a Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate dijo que por quanto en el alcanze que se dio en los de la Nueva Mex.co de los Yndios Queres y los Apostatas y los Teguas y de la nacion Thanos y despues de haber peleado con todos los demas Yndios de todos Pueblos un Yndio del Pueblo de Zia llamado Bartolomé de Ojeda que fue el que mas se señaló en la vatalla acudiendo á todas partes se rindio viendose herido de un balazo y un flechaso lo cual como dicho es mando que debajo de juram.to declare como se halla el Pu.o de Pecos aunque queda muy metido á donde el sol sale y fueron unos Yndios Apostatas de aquel Reyno de la Nueva Mexico.

Preguntado que si este Pu.o volverá en algun tiempo como ha sido constumbre en ellos y dice el confesante que no que ya está muy metido en terror que aunque estaban abilantados con lo que les habia susedido á los de el Pu.o de Zia el año pasado juzgaba que era un imposible que dejaran de dar la obediencia; por lo cual se concedieron por el Señor Governador y Capitan General D.a Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate los linderos que aqui anoto; para el. Norte una legua; y para el Oriente una legua; y para el Poniente una legua; y para el Sur una legua; y medidas estas cuatro lineas de las cuatro esquinas del Pu.o dejando á salvo el templo que queda al medio dia del Pu.o y asi lo proveyo mando y firmo susca [?] á mi el presente Secretario de Gov.on y Guerra que de ello doy fé. D.a Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate. Ante mi Don Pedro Ladron de Guitara Sc.o de G.n y Gu.a

[Translation.]

In the year 1689. In the Pueblo of Our Lady of Guadalupe of El Paso del Rio del Norte, on the twenty-fifth day of the month of September, in the year sixteen hundred and eighty nine, the Governor and Captain-General, Don Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate, said that inasmuch as during the pursuit of the men of New Mexico, [namely], of the Queres Indians, and the Renegades, and the Teguas, and those of the Thanos nation, and after the fight with all the rest of the Indians of all the Pueblos—an Indian of the Pueblo of Zia, named Bartholomé de Ojeda, who had greatly distinguished himself in the fight, assisting at every point, surrendered, having been wounded by a bullet and by an arrow; he [the Governor] ordered that he should declare, under oath, how the Pueblo of Pecos is disposed, although it lies far off toward the sunrise, and [its people] are renegade Indians of that kingdom of New Mexico.

Being asked whether [the inhabitants of] this Pueblo will ever return to their old ways, he, the deponent, says that they will not, since they are now in great terror, and though they were very much emboldened by what had happened to those of the Pueblo of Zia the year before, he thought it was impossible that they should fail to give in their submission. Wherefore there were granted by the Governor and Captain-General, Don Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate, the boundaries here noted: to the north a league, and to the east a league, and to the west a league, and to the south a league; and these four lines measured from the four corners of the Pueblo, reserving the temple, which lies to the south of the Pueblo; and thus did his Excellency provide, command, and sign before me, the present Secretary of the Interior and of War, who attest it. Don Domingo Jironza Petroz de Cruzate. Before me, Don Pedro Ladron de Guitara, Secretary of the Interior and of War.

FOOTNOTES