1859.] A PLUCKY LITTLE TEXAN WOMAN.

231

crossed, though the strong current swept our six little mules several yards down the stream, and compelled them to swim. Beyond, in ancient lake beds, our coach wheels crushed rattlesnakes, lying lazily in the road. They seldom bite except in August, when they are said to be blind and to snap indiscriminately at every living thing. Hogs do not fear them but kill and eat voraciously. Their flesh is a favorite dish with old plains

men.

Dined at the North Concho. Our spirited little landlady, reared in eastern Texas, gave us a description of an attack made by a hundred and twenty Comanches three weeks before. A stock-tender, her husband and herself shut themselves in the house, and with their rifles kept the assailants at a respectful distance. The savages drove away all their mules and cattle, and a dozen of their iron-pointed feather-tipped arrows were still sticking in the cottonwood logs. That very morning a party of Comanches had pursued the stationkeeper when within two miles of his dwelling. One of their arrows passed through his hat, but his fleet horse saved him. He laughed heartily at this morning amusement, but his little wife was only angry, declaring vehemently that they would not be driven out of the country by worthless Red-skins.

Many species of cactus beside our road. One, the soap plant,

has a large fibrous

A MORNING AMUSEMENT.

root said to possess saponaceous properties, and the Mexicans are reputed to use it in washing their persons and clothing; but

232

ON THE GREAT STAKED PLAIN.

[1859. generally they cherish strong antipathy to all soap. Most of them would be improved by spending half an hour under a pumpspout, with a vigorous man at the handle. Scores of spotted antelopes in sight. The wolves are said to chase them in a circle, thus enabling a fresh pursuer to take the place of the weary one every time they pass the starting point. Fleetness falls a victim to cunning, and the poor antelope soon furnishes a feast for the hungry pack.

At dark, with fresh strong team and additional rifles and revolvers on board, we entered upon that old terror of immigrants, the Great Staked Plain. In the cold dreary night this barren table land stretched afar-an utter sand-waste with a few shrubs of cactus and grease-wood. A few weeks before, travelers had narrowly escaped death from thirst. At one stage-station during four-fifths of the year, water for the mules was hauled in casks twenty-two miles. But now the ground was saturated. Again and again during the dark night our conductor left the stage with his lantern, searching for the track, which neither driver nor mules could see many yards ahead; there was danger of wandering off into the wilderness.

October 2.-Daylight found us on a shoreless ocean of desolation. Excepting the faint mail road,

The ancient Mexicans marked a route with stakes over this vast desert, and hence its name. It is four hundred miles long by two hundred in width, and two thousand eight hundred feet above sea level. Among its gypsum deposits are large sheets of 'the pure transparent selenite which' according to Hitchcock 'the ancients used for windows. It has the curious property of enabling a person within the house to see all that passes abroad, while those without cannot see what is passing within. Nero employed it in his palace.'

We journeyed for eighty miles across a corner of the desert, passing two or three mail stations, the most desolate and lonely of

1859.]

A GIRL STOLEN BY COMANCHES.

233

all human habitations. Then through a winding canyon we descended into the broad valley of Pecos river and halted at a station of adobe. Thence I traveled eight hundred miles before I again saw a wooden building.

Crossing the swollen river in a skiff we took another waiting coach and soon struck the old trail of the Comanches to the City of Mexico. Eight beaten paths side by side indicated the frequency of their bloody raids into northern Mexico, for cattle horses and children. They once kidnapped a daughter of the governor-general of Chihuahua, tatooed her and furnished her with an Indian husband. When discovered by her father she was the mother of several children, and refused to leave the tribe. Single warriors possess two hundred stolen Mexican horses.

Among these barren sands we suddenly saw on the horizon a lake of clear blue water fringed with wooded shores; but while we

gazed in wonder it vanished. This wonderful mirage was a lovely miracle; but it sometimes proves a terrible mockery to lonely American emigrants perishing from thirst; and it bitterly betrayed the French army in Egypt.

Beyond Camp Stockton-a military post of three or four edi

234 A FATAL FONDNESS FOR PICTURES. [1859. fices with pearly misty mountains in the background-we reached the well-trodden mail road from San Antonio to El Paso.

October 3.-After an intensely cold night breakfasted on delicious venison, at a mountain station where last winter the supply gave out, and the inmates subsisted for twelve days wholly upon corn, ground in a coffee-mill.

Sunrise overtook us in Limpia Canyon whose rocky walls, a thousand feet high, have been sculptured by water into fantastic figures. Some are isolated, others in bass-relief. Great pagan

idols show worshippers in flowing garments kneeling before them. Beside these stands a sentinel with hands in pockets, wistfully eying an enormous cask, as if waiting for his matutinal dram. Around the cask a sharp-nosed wolf is cautiously peeping, while beyond tapestry incloses the group in graceful folds.

The striking, beautiful gorge soon widens into a secluded valley, where the Apaches often stole the stock of the San Antonio mails. Once they killed the driver and took mail bags and all. At their next camping ground they opened one sack and discovered several illustrated papers. They had never seen an engraving; and a new world was revealed to them. Lying upon the ground with the pictures spread before them, these overgrown children were absorbed in wonder and delight. But suddenly the comedy was changed to tragedy. A squad of cavalry approaching unperceived dashed in among them, killing fourteen and routing the rest. The Apaches believed the papers had revealed their whereabout; and still supposing that pictures can talk they avoid them with superstitious dread.