Note IV'-26 — Chapter IV · OBSERVATIONS ON NEW SPAIN.[IV'-1]

The Navajos, Navahos, or, as they call themselves, Tennai, are one of the three main divisions of the southern group of Athapascan Indians (the other two being the Lipans and the Apaches). They have always lived, so far as is known to history, in the country where they do now, and whence they raided in every direction before their final subjugation in our times. They focused on the upper waters of the Rio San Juan, in N. W. New Mexico, whence they habitually ranged down the river in Colorado and Utah, and S. of it in Arizona. They were thus in contact and conflict with Shoshonean tribes on the N., and warred when they pleased with the various Apache tribes of their own stock which were about them; they were of course a terror to the peaceful Pueblonians, who had to hold their own as best they could against all the battlesome savages by whom they were beset on every hand. They were powerful, and are still one of the largest tribes with which we have to do, like the Comanches and some of the divisions of the Sioux. A late census returns about 17,000, nearly all on the large Navajo reservation which occupies the contiguous N. W. corner of New Mexico and N. E. corner of Arizona.

An interesting account of the expedition of Colonel Doniphan and some of his officers to the Navajos in 1846, together with the text of the first treaty of peace concluded between them, the New Mexicans, and Americans, at Ojo Oso (Bear spring), Nov. 22d, occupies Chaps. IX-XI of Hughes' Don. Exp., 8vo, ed. of 1847, pp. 61-76.